How a 7 year old can ruin a birthday

I know, at the advanced age of 29 (for the 10th time!), I should be a little more sensitive, but my son ruined my birthday and I want to complain about it.

Grow up Gudrun, is what I am saying to myself. But he hurt my feelings.

The Big Guy was tired of everyone having a birthday except him (Little A, DH and I all have our birthdays within a sever day period), so at my birthday dinner, he threw a fit.

Actually, it started earlier that day, but I was gone, celebrating my birthday with a little TLC for mommy (massage at Watercourse Way, followed by a mani/pedi at Touch of Elegance -- lovely!) DH said all day the Big Guy had been a pain in the butt, complaining and grumping.

Just before dinner (DH made a lovely sablefish on a bed of leeks and cherry tomatoes), the Big Guy started stomping around, complaining that we did not give him any respect. Oh, wait, it was that we did not give him enough respect. What?

He was not happy with dinner, claiming to not like fish. Right after I blew out the candles on the cake, during the serving of the cake, he had a little incident with the cream whipper and he fell apart, going to his room, totally upset.

This was when I decided to revert to his level of maturity and declared my birthday a mess.

Good Gudrun, really adult. Get over yourself - the Big Guy is 7. And yes, it is pissy that everyone gets to celebrate something this month except him. And yes, it sucks that everyone gets gifts and attention, but him. And you are the adult Gudrun, help him understand it.

But just for a moment, I want to whine, and since this is my blog, I can do that.

I want my birthday to be great, just like the birthday celebrations I put together for Little A and DH. I want the dinner to be well thought out, I want the cake to be an expression of their love for me. I want everyone to be happy and want to enjoy being together as a family.

I want DH to spend as much time thinking about my birthday as I think about his. I want my kids to be happy about the chance to celebrate (we all love cake), and I want to make happy memories for all.

I guess I just want my mommy.

10 Sweet Years

Today is our 10th wedding anniversary....it is also the birthday of Little A.

Best anniversary gift ever.

10 years is a long time, but frankly, with a couple kids thrown in there, it seems like just yesterday that DH and I met playing Ultimate Frisbee with Ebb&Flow. Now we are into that second decade of marriage where you really see if you can do it. The kids are getting older, they won't need us so much anymore, it will be a chance for DH and I to figure ourselves out as adults (not that we weren't adults when we married, but you know what I mean).

Here is to another 10 years - and yes, we will drink champagne tonight. Little A will think we are toasting to her birthday, little does she know!

Happy Days to you, too, whatever the occasion!

Valentine's Day - the aftermath

Besides being totally exhausted this morning, I think my kids were still coming off yesterday's sugar-high. Two, sometimes three, times a year, the school actually condones giving the kids copious amounts of candy, in an effort to celebrate a mostly Hallmark-holiday. But I digress.....

For most of January and the first week of February, amidst much yelling, screaming and hair pulling, we managed to get all 20 Valentine's for Little A's class done. Each one was an individual work of art, created by Little A, and each one was a process unto itself. I was happy in the knowledge that the other parents were at home going through the same torture (or not) and that February 14th would signal the end. The deal was everyone in class makes a valentine for every other person, all part of a post office project, which involves super cute stamps with the kid's pictures. But I digress, again....

On Thursday, after passing out all the homemade valentine's, three kids actually brought in more valentines. That's right, a whole 'nother round for the class, mostly consisting of candy bars and fuzzy pencils. What was that all about? Will the insanity ever end? First it was a little holiday, with a little red/pink and a card for your loved one. Now it is a multi-$$$ industry, starting just as soon as the decorations come down for Christmas, culminating in a big finale on February 14th. No wonder my kids are exhausted. Valentines for everyone, class parties, gifts for the teacher, decorated cupcakes, pink and red everything, prix fixe dinners at every restaurant, a scarcity of babysitters. Chaos. Needless to say, isn't it time for this holiday to regain some perspective?

Fortunately, I can say that, as I already have all the supplies for next year's Valentine cards ;-)

Valentine's Day Gift Swap

Kailani over at An Island Life organized a Valentine's Day Gift Swap! I signed up a couple weeks ago, and today she emailed me with my swap partner, Naomi of superdumb supervillain.

I love swaps - I did one back in 1994 or 1995 with a woman from New Zealand. It was organized on rec.food.cooking and the idea was to trade foodie things from your local area. I know I sent her a copy of San Francisco a la Carte, created by the San Francisco Junior League and chock-a-block with interesting recipes. I know she sent me a cool pen with a train that went back and forth at the top, a jar of New Zealand Honey (incidentally, I saw the same jar at a fancy schmancy food place in Berkeley not too long ago) and an Edmonds Cookery Book, which I now notice she inscribed - To Gudrun, Have fun cooking, Heather from Plimmerton, NZ! Cool.

To help Naomi with this swap, I am supposed to answer these questions:

• What is your idea of a romantic Valentine’s Day?
  • My husband coming up with his own romantic idea, without me having to "suggest" anything
• In reality, what is your Valentine’s Day really like?
  • Kids to school, me to work, plans for fun ways to celebrate the day with the family, special dinner that I take time to cook and is eaten in 5 minutes, shower night, books, teeth brushing, and then a little reading for me before bed.
    
• If you could have a lifetime supply of your favorite sweet indulgence, what would it be?
  • Ritter Sport Dark Chocolate a la Mousse au Chocolat. Or any of the German or French cookies that have one side coated in chocolate, dark please. Or really any dark chocolate, I prefer 62% or 80+%.
    
• Is there any sweet treat you absolutely do not like?
  • Dinner mints, white chocolate anything, licorice, fruit filled chocolates.
    
• If you fell into a pool of chocolate, how would you get out?
  • Why would I want to get out?
    

Feel free, if you are one of the two people reading this, to consider yourself tagged. I would love to hear what my friends think is romantic for Valentine's Day.....

New Traditions

I think we might have found our new Christmas Eve tradition - without going into a lot of detail, we have been trying to find a dinner/gift opening plan for Christmas Eve that is a mix of DH's traditions and my own. This year we seemed to have hit the nail on the head. In the afternoon, we made tamales (see previous post for details). At 5pm, we went to a children's Christmas Eve church service. When we came home, we ate our dinner of tamales and green chili potato soup, along with margaritas. Then opened all our Christmas presents from relatives and friends. Great night!

Candle Making for Gifts

After reading an interesting post on Boogiemum about candle making, I finally found the time to do the same project with Little A. I was a little nervous, as I have not made candles before, but it actually turned out to be much easier than I anticipated, mostly because the directions on Boogiemum were so clear and she included pictures.

I started with a pound of Parowax Household wax, which I cut up with my chocolate fork and dumped into an old coffee can. I put this can into another pan that was filled with about 3 inches of water, making a double boiler of sorts. Over medium-low heat, the wax melted. When it was almost done, Little A threw in a green crayon that she had broken up. At the same time, I added some bits from a broken green candle that I found in the candle drawer. Turns out it was a nice candle from Australia, so it provided some lovely fragrance.

After all the wax and crayon bits and broken candle were melted, I poured 1/2 an inch of wax into my mold (an empty fake-o egg container) and nestled in the top of a taper that I purchased on sale at Longs. Then I added a cup full of ice, and more hot wax almost to the top of the taper. Then I let it cool for an hour.

Since I had some melted wax leftover, I also filled a couple silicon muffin cups, adding wicks that I salvaged from the broken candle.

We repeated the whole process again with red crayons and our final result is very Christmassy. I plan to package a red and green candle together for each recipient.

Advent Calendars for everyone!

When I was a kid, we had an au pair for a year from Switzerland, and she made us the greatest advent calendars I have ever had. Each day was a different surprise and she made the whole thing by hand. Sadly, she had to return home to take care of her parents, so she was not around another year, but ever since then, I have loved advent calendars. This year is no exception, although for different reasons.

My kids are so motivated by opening the little doors that I can exert all sorts of control over them, which is an awesome thing to have in the morning as we struggle to get ourselves all sorted out and ready to go to school/work. Usually I have to keep reminding them, threatening them with timeouts, pushing, pushing, pushing until we finally get out the door. This morning, all I said was that everything had to be done before they opened their advent calendars - get dressed, eat breakfast, practice piano, brush teeth, wash face, brush hair, make bed, put on socks/shoes, feed the dog, and turn out the lights in their room. It is 8:15am and both kids are ready to go to school and we don't even have to leave for 15 minutes! This is going to be a great month!

Picture courtesy of Tim Bartel

Tamale making update

For my zillions of readers who have been worrying themselves sick over my post from Thursday, I wanted to provide a follow up after my Cookie Exchange and Tamale Making Party. In short, it went great. Here are the details....

Yesterday and this morning, I worked pretty hard. I had a great experience at Chavez Market, where I was able to pick up the masa, corn husks, pork and chicken, as well as some great Mexican crema, fresh salsa and queso fresco. I also visited Trader Joes and Safeway for a couple other things, and got home about 11am. Then I got to cookin'.

I roasted three butternut squashes from my CSA, Two Small Farms (it is not really my CSA, I am just a happy subscriber). To this, I added the queso and white cheddar cheese. I also boiled the crap out of a chicken and once it was cooked, shredded the meat and added some roasted tomatillo salsa that I made this summer (tomatillos also from Two Small Farms).

While this was working, I mixed my cookie dough - I made two different cookies from one master dough, from the One Dough, Fifty Cookies book. The two I chose were Lebkuchen Biscotti and Rugelach Spirals. Last year, I made Walnut Maple Syrup Cookies and Chocolate Dipped Coconut Sticks. All of these have been excellent, I love this book. I would recommend it, you should buy it!

Yesterday afternoon, after The Big Guy returned from his chess tournament (5th place among all 2nd graders!), we went to see the open studio for Mitchell Johnson, an artist friend of ours. While the kids ran around, we viewed his newer pieces from Italy and work he did this fall back east. It was nice to have a break and view someone else's creative work. On the way home, DH suggested a quick stop by the Toyota dealership to check out the colors of the 2008 Prius. Tee hee!

Last night, we had a quick dinner of soup and Hatch Green Chili Bread (from Trader Joes, DH is sooo happy!), and then got to tree decorating. DH did the lights, the kids did the bulk of the ornament hanging and I decorated a separate 3 foot tree with ornaments from my Great Aunt Marie. She sent me her collection last year after she decided she was done having Christmas trees and it is great to be able to display them on a special tree.

This morning, after coffee and newspaper in bed (Sunday morning routine), I got up and got going again. Little A helped me package the cookies into little holiday bags. DH helped me with the Quince Tarte Tatin. I finished cooking the Posole Soup and got the salad ready to go. Also mashed the avocados for guacamole and put the chips out. Then a quick wipe of the counters and I was ready to go.

My guests arrived, I poured Gruet and Italian Sodas while we snacked on the guac and chips. Lunch was nice and relaxed, with great conversation. After our lunch, we proceeded to assemble the tamales which went a little quicker than I thought. Everyone seemed to get into it and many tamales were produced. I steamed mine tonight and we will eat them tomorrow. The one I sampled was pretty tasty!

Four rounds of cleaning the kitchen, and two loads of dishes in the dishwasher, everything is finally cleaned up. We tasted all the cookies tonight and DH and I have picked our favorites (which means they will be squirreled away out of sight of the kids!). Tomorrow I will take all the extras from my baking to work to share the joy. Gosh, I love this party and all the work was worth it, I will continue the tradition next year.....

Mama's Christmas list

Around our house lately, much energy and time has been focused on creating our Christmas lists. And even though I want to reduce the amount of items coming into the house this holiday season, I feel as though I should help out my husband, who I understand might be having trouble coming up with gift ideas. Any of these items, alone, or in multiples of 3, would be absolutely wonderful to find under the tree Christmas morning:

2008 Toyota Prius in Seaside Pearl or Barcelona Red

Eagle Creek Tarmac ES 25 along with packing cubes and compression sacks

Terra Pass Carbon Offset

Nikon D80

Flip Video Ultra

Altec Lansing Earclips-S

InStyle Instant Style or Tim Gunn's Guide to Style

From Uncommon Goods - Ticket Stub Diary, License Plate Necklace, Cow Clock, Sea Glass Necklace, Snarky Luggage Tags

Italian Ceramic Salt Box

Almost anything from the Viva Terra catalog

SIGG 1.0L Reusable bottle

Reisenthel Mini Maxi Shopper

Other places for inspiration:
Green Gift Guide
Grist
The Daily Green

Don't worry, I will post shortly about greening up our Christmas and helping our whole family understand what Christmas is about. This is just my wish list....Santa has to have somewhere to start!

Day 1: Intro to NaBloPoMo

I am not sure I am going to get this right - on various occasions, I have written NaBoPloMo, NaPloBoMo, NaMoPloBo....and I am not 100% positive what it is all about, except that I know I have pledged to write a blog post a day for the entire month of November. Fun, yah!

Yesterday was Halloween, and while I am opposed to so much candy and sugar, our family does have a great time. Our day started with getting the kids ready for school, with costumes on. School parade started at 9:30am, and following the parade, both kids had class parties. Little A's party was for the entire kindergarten, all 140 children, and was controlled chaos. The Big Guy's party was a much lower key affair, with healthy snacks requested by the teacher, and everyone sitting at their desks. I enjoyed being involved with their classes, something I had not done much before this year.

After the parties, I got a little work done and then picked up the kids from school. The Big Guy had a birthday party to go too (you have got to be kidding me, on Halloween!) and while he was busy, Little A and I decorated pumpkins. We did not have a ton of time, so we opted to paint our pumpkins, instead of carve them. That was fun. After picking up The Big Guy, we headed home for more pumpkin decorating, followed by quick dinner. In rapid succession, we finished dinner, DH came home, costumes were reassembled, wine was procured, friends were greeted and we were out the door to Trick or Treat.

This year, we invited several friends to join us, and at the peak, I think we had about 40 people (kids and adults) walking around our neighborhood. The kids were having a blast, the adults were enjoying the conversation and wine and a great time was had by all. Sounds like we might do the same thing again next year!

Ok, now I need to get started on my list of potential topics for the month, with a holiday and vacation thrown in there, I hope to find enough interesting things to write about....

Get Boo'd

On Tuesday, we were Boo'd, sometime early in the morning by a very clever person. This is one of my favorite Halloween/October traditions - in the dark of night, or early morning hours, you go around to three houses in your neighborhood and leave them a bag of treats and a cute little note. All anonymous, and very fun.

Melissa Summers at AlphaMom put together a great piece on how she super-craftily decorated their bags, with additional links to more ideas.

Last year, I took this tradition to work, with some moderate success. This year, I suggested to my Dad that he Boo his friends at his retirement place. The whole thing is fun and in our family, makes Halloween last longer than a day.