Hello 2010

Posted by Jennifer on Jan 1, 2010 in General | Comments Off

It sounds so futuristic! Hello Twenty-Ten! I was perusing my “time machine” posts from the previous January 1’s that I’ve posted. It’s been… fun? I wont bore you with a recap. I promise. It was just interesting to see where I was in previous years as compared to right now. The more things change, the more things stay exactly the same. Some things any way.

In the more immediate, this time last year I was going raw. That didn’t work out exactly, but it majorly impacted my eating habits. This year I am going to eat at least one 100% raw meal a day, two if possible. So far, so good.

Last January I posted this and from that list I’ve gotten a new mesh juicing cone and yarn. I still have not gotten a video camera and I am still kicking myself over it. I have been wanting one for almost ten years now. I really regret not having one, especially when all I have are short (thirty seconds and less!) clips of mom with the kids. I don’t want that to be my greatest regret, especially when recording devices are so affordable. I just can’t find one I am satisfied with.

At the end of the month I plan to re-evaluate the list, see what I can cross off entirely (decide we don’t actually need), what I can maybe move to February’s list (and note if I’ve been saving for it), and what I can actually purchase. This months wish list:

• a good video camera
• Nintendo DSi for the kids – especially Malachai purchased Feb 5 2010
• new bike for Fish
• iMac to replace my PowerBook which is dying purchased Feb 5 2010
• new shelves for my cookbooks
• eta:
• Also need to fix the computer monitor issues.
• Nook to replace Sony PRS when they die
• pasta attachment for Kitchenaid
• tamper and wrench for blender
• new pitcher for blender?
• this box of nifty from NatGeo

My intention is to recreate a “wishlist” every month (I usually keep track of these things on a piece of paper in my bag or on my phone) and really track our wants and needs and make goals of them.

Dad and I sat down today and made a household todo list – I am going to convert it to a page in here so I can keep track of those items. He expects to be able to start in March. In the meantime, I am going to be FreeCycling like a madman to get rid of stuff. This morning I Freecycled a bunch of unused glassware, a food processor, a glass dish and carrier, and a coffee carafe. Those items made room in my cabinet to put away my baking pans and cupcake pans and lunch sacks instead of moving them around because there was no place to put them.

Happy New Decade!

Posted by Jennifer on Dec 31, 2009 in Memories of the Random Sort | 49626 commentshttp://quirkymom.com/2009/12/31/happy-new-decadeHappy+New+Decade%212010-01-01+01%3A06%3A29Jennifer

This decade has brought so much pain, so much grief, and so much love. A quick decade in review…

I finished college in 1999. I moved back to MD in December, moved in with Michael two weeks later, spent New years with him and his friends, conceived Dorian that night (oops, yay!) and we had our HandFasting in March 2000.

In 2000 I also had my first BIG job (full time in my field) and also left it to move back to Fla. I kicked Michael out and he moved back to DC later that year. Dor was born in September.

On 9/11/01 I was in bed and my good friend Mandy called me up and told me to turn on the news, so I did and I was on the phone with her when the planes hit. I hung up with her and immediately tried to call Michael (who at the time was working across the street from the Pentagon) and Matt (who was/is NYFD) and finally got through hours later. In Oct 2001 Dor and I moved back to MD.

In Feb 2002 we moved back to Fla. Malachai was born in August. My mom was diagnosed with cancer this year and on her 49 birthday had major surgery to remove it. We took the twins and the boys to Orlando that week so they wouldn’t worry about her and so dad could be with her. She started chemo following and was in remission for a few years.

In 2003 Erin died. Michael and the boys were in bed. I was downstairs with the rest of the fam, and then matt phoned me and we chatted for a bit. I remember telling him it would be today, and mom yelled up that stairs and told me to come down NOW so I hung up on him and ran down. That was that. We took the auto train up for the funeral and I think we drove back down.

We had an apartment in 2004 (I think) and moved out when the leave was up because I was pregnant and we didn’t have room for another person in that apartment. We moved back in with my family to help out (mom was sick by now) and wound up staying until after Eshiva was born in Feb 2005.

In Feb 2005 Michael, my dad and myself all quit smoking. I got an IUD ;) My mom never did stop smoking and the cancer came back this year.

2006: We were living in West Va, and I drove down with my MIL and the kids two weeks before she died. That was in Sept 2006. You guys got me through that. Michael flew down and then we drove to MD for the funeral, went to WVa and packed our shit and moved back to Florida to take care of everyone. We’ve been here since.

I think we’ve been in a holding pattern since then. I have been learning to tattoo forever now, took up knitting somewhere in there, and a crapton of other hobbies.

In 2010 the twins graduate high school, and I think the dynamic of the house is going to change, esp. if/when Sara gets into Rollins and Michael gets into FSU. I’m kind of bracing for that lol

I have to say, I am pretty excited to see what the next ten or fifteen years brings. Dorian will be 18 in 2018, Mal will be 18 in 2020 and Eshiva will be 18 in 2023. I expect the US to pull out of this recession (is it a depression yet?) by then, and I can’t wait to see what new technology my kids help invent :-) I can’t believe it’s been ten years, the time has flown, except when it hasn’t, which wasn’t too often. I think we’ll have this thread going on again before we know it.

I was just lamenting in a friends blog that Baltimore calls to me like a siren in the night… and has done so for thirteen long years now, but I know, at the end of the day, I am home where I am. I told him that I hope he finds himself where home is soon too. Purpose of sharing here? My life may not be where I expected it to be at all, and home might have turned out to be far far away, but it certainly has been a grand adventure so far – I expect it to remain so. Bonne Vivant!

Delicious Chicken Stir Fry

Posted by Jennifer on Dec 25, 2009 in General | Comments Off

This one is all mine :-)

Serves at least 8, possibly more

[u]SAUCE[/u]
ginger root (a thumb-sized piece or larger, to taste), grated (I use a microplane that almost grinds it but not quite)
1 – 2 cups of soy sauce (I start with a cup and add as needed)
1/2 C maple syrup (the real stuff, [u]not[/u] Mrs. Butterworths – you can sub sugar if you don’t have syrup)
a pinch or two of kosher salt

[u]STIR FRY[/u]
8 chicken tenderloins (or 6 boneless skinless chicken breasts), cubed into 1/2 – 1 inch pieces
a couple of zucchini, cut in half, then slice
1 each red, green, orange peppers, sliced into bit size pieces
broccoli florettes
1 large sweet onion, halved and sliced
a couple of carrots cut into medallions
8 oz mushrooms, sliced
3 or more garlic cloves, to taste (garlic grates amazingly with the same microplane that you used on the ginger!)
S&P to taste
2 – 4 T stir fry/wok oil OR olive oil

8 cups cook rice OR 8 servings of thick spaghetti or udon noodles

optional:
just buy frozen stir fry veggies
add canned bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, whatever else you want!

[b]Sauce:[/b]
Mix all ingredients in a large measuring cup (I usually measure right into a glass 4 cup measuring cup), whisk together. That’s it!

[b]Prep:[/b]
cut chicken and put in a bowl, pour sauce over *but reserve about 1/3 C!* Stick in the fridge for at least 30 minutes, but if you can do it over night it’s best! If you didn’t have enough sauce to cover the chicken, pour in some more soy sauce.

cut all your veggies and have them ready.

[b]It’s time to cook![/b]
Heat up your oil in your wok or large deep saute pan. Not too hot, but it should sizzle if you put a drop of water in. Dump your chicken in, add some garlic and stir until cooked through. Remove from pan, but leave the extra sauce and yummies. Now add a little more oil if needed and start adding your veggies and more garlic, the hardest ones first (they take the longest to cook!). Usually this means carrots & broccoli first, then onions, peppers, zucchini and mushrooms last. Salt & Pepper to taste during the cooking process.

I like to cover mine for a bit and sort of steam it as well as stir frying it.

Once your veggies are done, add your chicken and pour your reserved sauce over the lot of it and give it a good stir, make sure everyone has flavour and is heated back up.

Serve over rice or noodles. If you use noodles, put a little soy, ginger and garlic in the noodles too – it gives it a little something special.

As you can see, this uses a ton of soy, so get the low sodium if you can.

option: get skirt steak and slice in place of chicken

Pot Pie Soup

Posted by Jennifer on Dec 23, 2009 in General | Comments Off

We had this at Sweet Tomatoes in November, and I was so bummed when we went back a week later and it was gone! I make pot pie almost once a week, and wanted to give this a try. This isn’t the recipe I had at ST, it’s one I adapted from my pot pie recipe.

ingredients:

1 or 2 rotisserie chickens (depends on how much chicken you want – I used one though)
2 cartons (8 cups) chicken stock
1 cup heavy whipping cream OR half and half
1 – 1.5 sticks of butter
1 cup of AP flour
4 – 6 cups frozen or fresh veggies (green beans, corn, carrots, peas, potatoes, celery)
salt & pepper to taste

biscuits (make em fresh or pillsbury, whichever is easiest for you)

1. pick the chicken(s) and set the meat aside.

2. melt the butter in a large pot (like a stew pot)
3. slowly whisk in the flour. this should make a thick paste.
4. slowly whisk in the stock. it should stay thick until the end of the first box, maybe the beginning of the second box.
5. add the cream or half and half. you should have a very rich and creamy soup now.
6. add the chicken, give it a stir
7. add your veggies. yep, all of them.
8. salt and pepper to taste.

That’s it! Let it cook for another half hour or so if you used frozen, about 15 – 20 min if you used fresh, or until everything is cooked and hot.

Set in a bowl with a biscuit on top or on the side, or crumble crackers over to make a “crust”.

Is Popularity Genetic? | Healthy and Green Living

Posted by Jennifer on Dec 23, 2009 in MediaWhore | Comments Off

One day, we all showed up to middle school and some kids were popular, while others simply weren’t. As someone who was never lucky enough to sit at the cool kids’ lunch table, I always wondered just what it took to be popular. It was an ephemeral and intangible quality, but it was impossible not to notice that the popular kids all seemed to have the right clothes, the right hairstyles, and they certainly didn’t do dumb things like get good grades or play clarinet in the band (like yours truly). Popular kids may have been blessed with the perfect crimped bangs and the trendy Guess jeans, but it turns out that they may have lucked out in the genetic lottery, too.

via Is Popularity Genetic? | Healthy and Green Living.

I was never popular. Nurture vs. nature? Who knows. I didn’t care about the latest fashion or the newest cool thing. OTOH, I had one outgoing parent and one very introverted parent. I like to think I take after both, but the mix I got didn’t lend itself to the popular crowd traits either.All in all, it’s an interesting read.

Black Tattoo Art: Modern Expressions of the Tribal Boing Boing

Posted by Jennifer on Dec 23, 2009 in Body Modification, MediaWhore | Comments Off

Black Tattoo Art: Modern Expressions of the Tribal Boing Boing.

Very cool book. A little out of my price range, but a very cook book. Pictures on link maybe NSFW – it shows some bottom, so I think it is NSFW, but it’s not genitals or anything.

What’s up QuirkyLand?

Posted by Jennifer on Dec 23, 2009 in Food, Memories of the Random Sort, Mishpucha | Comments Off

Just everything! Everyone is feeling better (see below), Channukah is over and the little one keeps asking me when it’s going to be Channukah again. We burned a Yule log (and roasted marshmallows over it ;) ). I have five bored kids home till after New Years, but I have work to do, so we’re kind of at odds. I have tons of stuff to drop off at Good Will or Salvation Army. Maybe tomorrow. Got media whore love coming up after this post!

12/20 – Did you know my sister is awesome? For the low low price of 15$ (I’m going to give her more, the kids were suppose to help) she is cleaning the kids room, which includes getting rid of all the crap I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of (I kept tallying it up in my head *sigh*), putting away the stuff they use, and sweeping. ??She is amazing and I love her. ??Lest you think I have done nothing while she slaves away (and earns some dough!), I’ve sorted all the kids clothes, gotten rid of didn’t fit (in bags to donate tomorrow), threw out what was damaged beyond repair, saved a couple shirts to make into patches (the sleeves were holy or didn’t fit, but the design was fine) and put it all away. Now I’ve got cornbread in the oven :-)

12/13 – Really, Everyone? Eshiva brought some kind of stomach bug home from school last Thursday. She didn’t go to school on Friday. She had a fever and was vomiting and diarrhea, you know, classic stomach bug. No one else had it all day yesterday so I thought it wouldn’t spread. ??I was wrong. Malachai got it, and he didn’t understand at all that even though he was so thirsty, every tiny sip made him vomit again. Poor kid. I have something like ten towels, five top sheets and three fitted sheets to wash. He also didn’t quite reach the trash bin at all – I get that, he didn’t want to move, but I hate sick laundry.??Michael got home around 11 – he was queasy and he has it too. Yep, he has some bedding to wash as well. ??So far, knock on wood, I don’t have it. Let’s keep it that way. Neither does Dorian. ??I am going to try and take him to the Channukah festival at shul today. The other two can’t go, and I feel a bit like Typhoid Mary and I I’d rather not get everyone around me sick, but… they were really looking forward to this. We’ll see what happens I guess. ??I had also wanted to go out today with the fam, but I suspect my biggest baby will be in bed all day. Understandable, and I am “glad” he only gets sick on his day off, but why the fuck does he only get sick on his day off??? It also magically coincides with when I Have big chores to get done. Grrrr

12/12 – Kitchenaid Mixers are the bomb. I totally said that. So, I picked up a slicer/shredder attachment for my Kitchenaid instead of buying a new food processor and ohmigodyay! Not only did it mean one less gadget in my kitchen, but I think it works better than the processor did! We shredded ten potatoes in no time last night, plus four onions. ??So if you’ve been thinking about getting one, do it!??I also have the grinder, which I don’t use even weekly, but when I need it it’s amazing. Fresh ground chicken and beef as a fraction of the cost. Plus it’s awesome for chopped liver, which is also stupidly expensive to purchase pre-made. ??I’ve been eying the pasta maker, but I don’t think I’d use it often enough to warrant buying it