Passing on the Blog Love

The lovely and super-mama-writer-teacher Kate Hopper (of Motherhood & Words, if you have not taken one of Kate's classes yet, sign up now!) honored me with a Liebster Blog Award, which is, as far as I can tell, a pat on the back from one blogger to another. Thanks, Kate!

This icicle has nothing to do with this blog post, but I liked the way it looked against the blue sky.

As part of her award-passing duties, she provided five questions for me to answer. I've been putting it off for a couple of weeks because I'm no good at answering these sorts of questions, but here goes:

1)    What is one thing you’d like to accomplish (professionally or personally) in the next year?

One year from now, I will have finished my MFA degree in creative writing, just shy of nineteen years after finishing my bachelor's degree. Between now and then, I'll be getting a lot of researching, writing and revising done, that will hopefully result in publication(s).

2)    Who is the one person who has had an important influence on you? Describe.

My husband, C, who is always so calm and easygoing. He has figured out what he wants to be when he grows up and is doing it––he runs his own business and is a leading voice in residential energy efficiency in Maine. He is also so supportive of my own dreams, watching the kids two nights a week when I go to the library, and twice a year when I go to residency for ten days.

3)    What essay or poem or short story do you return to again and again? Why?

I can't choose just one, so I'm going with the American Library Edition of Shirley Jackson's short stories and novels. I love the size and heft of this book (narrower than your typical hardcover), the thin, onion-skin like paper, and the green satin ribbon bookmark. Then of course, Jackson's stories inside: her humor, her dark themes, her witchy tendencies, her surprise endings that make you rethink everything you thought before, her characterization of small-minded small towns, the characters' sense of alienation, the suffocation of domesticity. If you've only ever read "The Lottery," get thee quickly to the library and check out this book. I can't choose just one, but "Louisa Please Come Home," "The Flower Garden," and "Behold the Child Among his Newborn Blisses"are among my favorites.

4)    In what ways has parenthood shifted your perspective on some aspect (you chose) of your life?

I think the biggest perspective shift has been with regard to time. It's the least original thing I could possibly say, but time moves SO fast when you have kids (except when it doesn't, and then it moves so slowly it doesn't feel like it's moving at all, like when you're playing Star Wars guys with your four-year-old). I feel much more aware of using my time wisely, accomplishing things I want to accomplish, and not wasting it doing whatever I used to do to waste time when I was young and child-free.

5)    Describe your ideal day.

My ideal day would involve: sleeping late, reading a good book in the bathtub with a cup of tea, hiking out in the woods (my ideal day being sunny, of course), taking pictures, drawing and writing in my nature journal, eating a really good lunch (which someone else prepared and will clean up), writing, some more reading, eating a good dinner (ditto prep and cleanup), watching a good movie with a bit of knitting, going to bed in freshly-washed and off-the-line sheets. Lots and lots of peace and quiet so that my brain can do whatever it needs/wants to do. Also, it would need to take place in a really clean and organized house so I don't get tempted to dust or clean sinks. And yes, I do love my husband and children, but they get to be a part of every single one of my ordinary days, so I think it's only fair that I get to be alone on my perfect day.

Now I get to pass the pat-on-the-back to five more blogs of my choosing. The blogs I choose are:

Meryl at My Bit of Earth, who writes about motherhood, chickens, toddlers, gardens, knitting, cooking, photography––all the good things in life.

Kendra at By Hand at Home, project-making, green-living mama extraordinaire. 

Liz at Motherlogue, who writes about writing and mothering and led a kids' NaNoWriMo project.

Katherine at KatherineJBarrett, Literary Mama editor, mama of three boys (including twins), and food columnist.

Raina at Mamacita Spins the Globe, because I want to see her back in bloggiland soon!

I could give new questions to you all, but I think Kate's are so good and thought-provoking, I'm going to pass those on as well. Check out these lovely ladies' blogs.

Happy Little Things

Flowers

A new project and a good book

Scribblings

Fresh snow

What happy little things are you celebrating these days?

Long Weekend

Ahhh, three-day weekends.

I had a lovely Saturday afternoon all to myself, with the boys all at friends' houses and C at his mother's. As I so often do, I sat with all of my projects spread out around me, not knowing which to dig into first--like being at a gourmet dessert buffet.  

On Sunday, we went for a walk in the woods and Z decided to trek to his grandpa's house.

 C caught up with him after he'd already crossed the river.

I took the opportunity to kick back in the snow before heading home to what I hoped would be a quiet house (but E and M had beat me there).

And play with close-up photos some more. It was hard to focus with my glasses wet from the snow and fogged from the cold air and my warm face.

Monday the sun came back, one of those bright February days that reminds you spring just might come back.

When I got up in the morning, I found the boys all reading in their room.

Z hates to have his picture taken, so I have to sneak, taking them through the doorway, or of his hands while I'm pretending to look at pictures I've already taken.

I started a little basement re-org/tidy up that I hope to finish and tell you about soon,

And then I threw the kids outside when they started to drive me crazy (making me slightly grateful I don't share their February vacation--at the end of the week one of us might be forced to move out into a snow cave).

I think we all might be suffering from a bit of spring fever (or is it cabin fever?). These lilac buds give me hope we won't have too long to wait.

In the meantime, this is the perfect book to read on a blustery, windy, snowy winter's day, so lovely and haunting and mysterious.

Happy Valentine's Day

Hope your day is full of lots of love!

Finished Valentines...yes I cut out the paper hearts and threaded the yarn. E stamped his name, using the signature stamp I had made when he was four––in his four-year-old handwriting! Z scratched a letter "Z" onto his.

This year's Valentine's card––a picture of a heart E discovered in December formed in the ice on a small pond near our house.

Chinese New Year and Coconut Snow Ice Cream Recipe

Happy Year of the Black Snake!

E and Z's best friend and his parents joined us for our annual Chinese New Year celebration Sunday afternoon (Past Chinese New Years: 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009). We had a daytime party, because I had a meeting to go to Sunday night, and it turns out that the middle of the day is the best time to have parties with kids––they went out to play in the snow, and no one was tired or cranky or kept up past their bedtime. Too bad it took me eleven-and-three-quarter years of parenthood to figure that out!

Anyway, our friends brought lo-mein, a yummy jicama salad, stir-fried veggies with beef and beef teriyaki on a stick. I made egg rolls with my world-famous sweet & sour sauce. 

We didn't do any Chinese New Year crafts––I got out our Buddha Board and some origami paper, but mostly the kids wanted to play out in the snow (except when they snuck upstairs to watch Ninjago on the computer...at least it has an Asian theme...), which is just how it should be.

I had looked up traditional Chinese New Year desserts online, but everything sounded complicated, with steaming and mysterious ingredients (glutinous rice flour). So then I was going to make the brownies from the Forks Over Knives cookbook, using aduki beans instead of black beans (aduki beans bring good luck and prosperity in the New Year), but I didn't want to go out into the blizzard to find things like date syrup and caramel extract. And then it snowed. A lot. So what else is a person to do but make:

Coconut Snow Ice Cream

Whisk together until smooth:

1 can coconut milk (the thick, creamy kind)

2 cups coconut milk from the carton (the thin, milky kind)

Add:

1/2 cup (or more) sugar (depending on how sweet you want it)

1 cup shredded unsweetened coconut milk

Scoop your largest mixing bowl full of fresh, clean snow. 

Scoop about half of the snow into another bowl.

Pour the coconut mixture into the second bowl of snow. 

Stir. The snow will shrink down as the liquid mixes in. Add more snow until all of the coconut mixture has been absorbed and it takes on the consistency of ice cream. The amount of snow you need will depend on how much moisture your snow has to begin with. Play around with it until it seems right.

Scoop into bowls and eat right away. This recipe made enough for eight people to each have a small bowlful (about one cup each). If you try to freeze it for later, it will lose its ice cream consistency and turn into a solid block.

Enjoy!

(P.S. I suppose coconut is probably more Southeast Asian than Chinese, so probably not all that authentic, but it was yummy).

The Blizzard of 2013

When I was a kid, we had a big blizzard on December 24, which was forever after referred to as "The Blizzard of '82." It had seemed so epic then. The relatives that were supposed to come over for Christmas Eve couldn't make it (and I was very put out that we had gone to all the trouble of cleaning the house for no good reason), and my Grandpa had to come by the next day in his Suburban to take us to his house for Christmas Day.

So maybe my kids will always look back on The Blizzard of '13 as epic. Although snow is a much more regular occurrence around here (Maine) than it was there (Denver), and this year has been more notable for its lack of snow, so maybe they won't.  

The snow started Friday morning and continued right through Saturday.

We went out into the midst of the storm Saturday afternoon.

Z throwing snow because he doesn't want his picture taken.

The river that was all black water last weekend. I wouldn't want to walk out on that snow to see if it froze back up.

It wasn't quite like in the Little House books, where Pa needs to hold onto a rope just to get to the barn without getting lost in the blizzard.

When we came back in, we made snow ice cream (yes, a departure from a plant-based diet, but I made up for it on Sunday with a coconut version I'll tell you about tomorrow).

We did get a good sixteen inches of light, fluffy snow in our front yard (not nearly as much as southern New England),

With thigh-deep drifts.

And, of course, mountain-high banks where C plowed.

I played some more with auto-focus

capturing winter weeds very close-up,

while the boys dug tunnels in a huge snowbank.

Sunday was an absolute perfect winter day––sunny, blue sky, no wind, lots of fresh snow and nowhere we had to be.

And a cozy front door to come home to when we needed a break from playing in the snow.

Valentining

 To help keep the winter blahs at bay, I did a bit of Valentining this past weekend.

I lined up all the heart-shaped rocks we've been collecting over the last year on the new mantel.



And then, because I just can't stop with minimalism, I added cards from Valentine's Days past and beeswax hearts on a branch (which turned out to be hazardous over the woodstove).

It's amazing how simple it is to find something, once you open your eyes to look for it.

 Then I added a bit of red to brighten the kitchen,

 And some hearts here and there and everywhere.

Next weekend is already chocka-block full, so I got started on the boys' Valentines.

Z has never once shown any interest in helping to make Valentine's and this year E seems to have joined him in curmudgeon-dom.

I thought briefly of buying them some Ninjago Valentine cards ('cause nothing says I Love You like the Weapons of Spinjitzu), but decided that I didn't want to break an eleven-year streak of homemade Valentines, so I made them myself. Maybe they'll help me paint them next weekend (ha!).

What are you Valentining?