My New Favorite Things

The kitchen sink pork marinade was a success, but I've simplified the base. The recipe I posted tasted great, and the pork was moist, but the maple syrup really came through--not a bad thing at all, just depends on your sides. Tonight I had pork steak/tenderloins, so I did salt/pepper/21 Seasoning with soy sauce, crushed garlic, course Dijon, lime juice and ginger dressing. This time it was the garlic/mustard that rose to the palate.

Today we saw The Secret World of Arietty, the new Studio Ghibli film. It's based on the Borrowers, which I haven't read in ages. In true Miyazaki form, it's charming, gorgeous, and girl-friendly. My #1 son was a trooper and saw it with me--and the theater was filled with lots of families and lots of girls. We've raised him on Studio Ghibli movies though, so he wanted to see it, too. All the other boys on line were off to see Star Wars, The Phantom Menace. To be fair, we saw that already, on opening night. He's become the 3D movie snob, but he's also become my movie buddy, which is really nice.

Oh yeah, and I would love a pair of boots like Arietty. 

I started using the phrase "My New Favorite Thing" as a monthly wrap-up or a backup when I did the shopping column for the Dig, probably in 2002. It's not so original that I don't think to claim any kind of dibs on it, but it tickled me to see a FB posting by my favorite author the other day using the phrase. (I haven't watched the video yet, so I can't vouch for it. This is a screen shot, so the links won't work, either.) 

Back in 1999 I actually got to meet Neil Himself, and it was wonderful. He did a reading at Waterstone's books in Boston (which is now a school) promoting Stardust and Neverwhere. He signed my advance copy of Stardust that my friend liberated from the bookstore he was working in, and a couple of other things. I'm excited and curious about American Gods as a live action series, but so glad it'll be on HBO. 

Yes, that is my natural hair color, too.

This is my 200th post, and on Twitter I have 200 tweets. It's a 200 kind of day! 

Marinade experiment

Marinade for pork: Salt, ground pepper, 21 Seasoning Salute, crushed garlic paste, applesauce, fig spread, ginger dressing, whole grain Dijon mustard, Tonkatsu sauce, soy sauce, lemon juice, maple syrup, leftover peanut sauce from takeout. Wish me luck!

deck the halls & happy new year

As our first Christmas in our new house, for the first time in many, many years, we had a tree. Last year my mother gave me many ornaments that were given to me by her, old friends, my grandmothers and aunts, ornaments I'd made as a kid. It was pretty emotional opening up the last one my Nana gave to me in 1991, before she died in 1992. We also got to hang ornaments our kids have made, and others that have been given to me in the last few years. Needless to say, the tree is pretty crowded. The only ornaments that didn't get hung were the glass ones I bought at Woolworth's in Boston for my first and only non-home Christmas tree in 1995.

This one is from 1981. Even though the hanger is broken, I found a way to make a new one for the tree.  We still need that kind of magic, that innocence. I still think it's weird that this ornament is 30 years old.

As for the outside of the house, that was kind of a fail. We put the lights up around our lamp-post, and that was about all we could follow through with. There's always next year.


We also did the Elf on the Shelf this year. What a pain that was, and I/we didn't even really get creative with Elfie doing stuff during the night--we were lucky to remember to move him most of the time. We got busted one night when I crashed out early and husband forgot to move him. I delivered some lame excuses: "Maybe there was a lot of traffic," and "I think he liked that spot." On the 23rd I put him on top of our dusty, half-assembled, long-unused hookah. (It was a wedding gift.) Kind of fitting, and it's a nice seat for Elfie.  I've been resisting the last couple of years, but #1 Son begged me for one--which is funny because he's on the verge of not believing in Santa. There are a few blogs that extol the fun and naughty things your elf can do (why make more work for yourself?), but I'm with Jen from People I Want to Punch in the Throat, who brilliantly derides the over-achieving elf-mommies.

summer slump

It's been a pretty lazy, hectic summer. Where did it go? Suddenly it's fall. I had my first Dunkin' Donuts pumpkin donut and muffin last week, and tonight had the first pumpkin beer (Harpoon UFO) of the season.

I grew tomatoes, but with the wet weather, I'm waiting for a bunch to ripen. We didn't lose power during Hurricane Irene. My moonvines are well over 6' tall and on the brink of blooming.

O-dog lost a bunch of teeth, including his two front tops. The Rorster is chatting up a storm. He says, "Sure." His favorite story at the moment is "Winken, Blinken, and Nod," an iPad app that recognizes words read aloud and is animated with paper. He turned 2 last week! While there may come a day that I'll miss the slobber marks on the shoulders of my shirts, I'm not there yet.

For work, I went to Sedona AZ, and while we were there, to the Grand Canyon. It was amazing, and we only saw a small, tiny corner of it. At sunset, there was a storm with thunder and lightning. Driving out after dark, we nearly hit a couple of deer, saw a couple of coyotes on the side of the road, and other animals--bunnies, mice, raccoons--dashed across. 

Knowing the path and walking the path

As I sit here with a sleeping baby on me, this seems especially true is a couple different ways.

We've finally mostly put toddler-boy to sleep in the crib at night. Except when we're both exhausted between 4-6am and sleep is more important than discipline. We *are* still nursing, just at night, though I'm trying to cut down on this, too. At least when he's in his crib, I feel like I'm slowly getting myself back.

With that, I'm taking baby steps toward losing weight, trying a combo of the old Weight Watchers core program, which worked amazingly for me losing baby weight the first time, and also Somersizing. Sure, you can laugh, but at least that'll give me the jump start I need. Apps wil also include Lose It!, a calorie-counter & food logger. Journaling helps. Wish me luck!

o hai blog

It has been a crazy time with moving, house renovating, and now settling in that my poor blog has been sorely neglected. It doesn't help that co-sleeping and laptops don't mix, either. Blogging on an iPhone isn't fun, so I may only post sporadically until one of those items are remedied.

I've noticed that my traffic is up, and I'm wondering if that's a result of being linked to SAM's blog? If it is, then, hi to fans of Mr. SAM. It's fun being a character and co-pilot, and thanks for the support!

if i only had a brain

Happy birthday! We bought you a house.

Well, we didn't really. But we did move out of our condo (sniff), moved in with my parents (!), and closed on a house a week later. In that week Rory turned one, and on his birthday he stayed up way too late and mushed his cupcake. Which I then had to stuff some in his mouth. We also had lobster & corn, and he liked petting the lobsters and carrying around the corn--very tactile!

Two-plus months later, we are still at my parents' house while we renovate. From doing a redo of the bathroom to a total gut of the bathroom, kitchen, and replacing the window in the dining room with a sliding door and covering up the back door. Sounds easy, right? This is in combination with redoing the septic system (taking a few trees out in the process) and replacing the roof, which revealed some rotted siding that also needed replacing. Covering up the back door revealed--surprise!--more rot and a badly flashed porch attachments, so that came down too. (To our inspector's credit, he did say that we'd want to reinforce the deck, and there's no way he could have known about the siding.) Why not replace the bathroom and kitchen windows while we're at it? It's hard not to spiral into replacing A LOT of stuff.  I keep telling myself it'll be worth the wait, and soon it will be over.