TANGIBLE

Emergency rooms, Ambulance's and Avalanches

In the past week I have been reminded by different people that I may have officially lost my mind. I call it throwing caution to the wind..or maybe I was just drinking the day I decided that going skiing for Christmas was a great idea.

Lets break down our family history of trips to Kelowna shall we?

• Emergency Room Visit -Sarah breaks elbow while standing perfectly still on a day trip with Grandfather. Cast.
• Emergency Chiropractor Visit - Laurie has such a sever bout of Sciatica that she faints and needs so many muscle relaxants that a bathroom can't be more than 3 steps away...(TMI- I know)
• Emergency Room Visit - Laurie cuts her index finger nearly off while enthusiastically carving up a roast chicken. Stitches x 12 + tetanus booster.
• Ambulance Ride to Emergency- Sarah has seizure but really just wanted to see if the rumours that Okanagan paramedics were cute were true..

Not bad  for one city?

Friday we made some of our final purchases for the big adventure. I managed to find a pair of snow pants I could squeeze my ass into. As an added bonus, Sarah found the brightest ski jacket known to man.

 

At first we joked about how it will make it easier for First Aid to find her while on Big White. We thought a little longer and realized we probably shouldn't be joking about it.

Then we found the "Avalanche Rescue System" built into the jacket....

Ready for snow!

Winter activities call for Winter gear that fits. As a result, the past month has been filled with shopping for new togs for both myself and the boy child. I tried to get him to promise me last year that his winter jacket could be a do-over for this year, but I guess if your sleeves end at your elbows, plans change.

In my case I thought I would "make do" this winter with what I had. Did you know that when you gain weight you gain it every where? Vice versa when you lose it.... All of this means that my feet went from a 9.5-10 to an 8-8.5. Wow. I had REALLY fat feet.

Now with my new boots I have "Phat" feet!

I even found a super fab ski/hike/looks good with jeans jacket that I managed to get the zipper completely zipped on! Cha Ching!

on another note

I'm really proud of tonight's dinner. Going along with my "quality not quantity" mantra, I made version of what I think may be an Italian Wedding Soup with kale and veal meat balls. As a side, I sliced super thin pieces of ciabatta and put them under the broiler. They were perfect to dip in the soup but didn't make the kids focus on the bread...we all know how that goes.

 

As the meatballs cooked in the soup I decided to break into the bag of Quinoa that I had bought to experiment with. Morgan and I made a very quick Taboulli salad out of all the fresh farmers market goodness we had gotten on Saturday. I can officially say....I think I love Quinoa!

Ironing- An Olympic Sport!

As far back as I can remember, my mother has equated the measure of her love being directly proportional to the sharpness of an ironed crease. Back in the day...I can remember the hour long yellow school bus trip consisted of my trying to burnish, stretch and or hide the razor sharp love creases she would iron into my Fancy Ass jeans. The seat on the bus over the boxed metal heater was mine. If I sat on the seat above the heater I had a much better chance of sweating out the creases to a point where- in my eyes...they must have been less noticeable. Wearing acrylic/nylon 80's combinations of course didn't help matters. Nor did my purple hair or the massive shoulder pads I insisted on wearing. But at least my creased jeans were not going to make me a target.

 

Fast forward 25+ years to last week where I found myself explaining my ironing regiment to my co-workers. Such an attitude of superiority I must have had....My faux .."I'm so shocked..you don't iron??" Oh how I bragged about how I stockpile my favourite linen spray and can put  razor sharp creases in a pair of pants in less than 2 minutes flat. Ruffles, pleats and bows must quake in fear of my expertise and prowess with a super heated iron.

Unfortunately, what has started as  a matter of pride in taking care of all my new clothes, has revealed that I can be  more than a little bit competitive. My creases are sharper than yours. In fact, my  linen spray is so light and refreshing I probably no longer even need deodorant.

But after all these years what it really comes down to is....

My creases are sharper and stay in longer so my mother must love me more than your mother.

Shake Your Money Maker

There he is. The newest pseudo wage earner in our house. Who knows how long the lure of free pizza will last or how soon the novelty of having slurs and rotting food thrown at you from the side of the road will seem fun.

 

So far so good. He works 3 hour shifts and manages to make $2 less an hour than I do...AND gets free pizza. I think the pizza puts him over the top. I need to renegotiate my own wage. During the average week he is managing to work 2 maybe 3 shifts- all mid week. The kid can definitely handle it. In fact he is probably ready to work full time now. He's so much like me in that he needs very little sleep and seeing how he seems never to actually have homework or chores, perhaps I can give Sarah a little quiet time and just have him pick up more hours.

Crazy Highlights in a 14 year old boys work day:

• "Mom did you know there is a maze under the mall?!! I'm sure some one could live down there..."
• "Little Caesar's pizza sauce is only 3 ingredients!"
• "Putting pepperoni on the pizza is an art...I can show you if you like..."

and my favourite was the day a homeless guy walked up while he was shakin and gave him $5...even the indigent feel sorry for those Board Shakers..

A bad rap..

 

Walmart seems to be the new pariah. Not for the mass marketing or poor employee support, but instead for the souls who choose to willingly walk its aisles. I for one enjoy Walmart. I'll drive by, drive around and even drive through Superstore...Give me a good Walmart Super Center any day. It will beat the pants off of all the poor cart drivers I've ever seen at Superstore.

Not to mention all the other things seen in Superstore's..but I'll mention them anyway..

• I've never seen some one have a fist fight in Walmart over a water melon..
• People don't change baby diapers on stacks of towels in Walmart..
• Tear pages out of recipe books with people watching...in Walmart..
• Let snotty kidlets eat out of the bulk bread bins..ok this may happen in Walmart, but I don't buy bulk just because of the bug factor anyway..

and my favorite..I once over heard some one telling their kid in a Super Store  to go pee in the corner by the shampoo..apparently they felt it wouldn't be noticed there..

Every single time I go to Superstore I hear or see something that disgusts me. So I try not to go. In fact if I didn't like their Joe clothing so much I wouldn't go at all. I think Superstore is also probably the reason I would never paint my kitchen yellow.

In Walmart you might see someone you saw last week at the symphony, of course now they are wearing a tube top and and blue eye shadow instead of diamonds and lace but at least they aren't looking for a quiet place to urinate.

As an added bonus you get to have interesting conversations while standing in crazy long line ups at Walmart. I don't mind. Generally me and my new friends discuss the covers of "PEOPLE" magazine or inquire about whether or not I think the new Infinity pads I just put on the conveyor belt, really will change my life....This is just the type of bonding that can happen while in Walmart not the kind where the smell of your baby's diaper makes me want to vomit as I look for a shower curtain..

Not to mention...Walmart was the first this year to get in my beloved HoneyCrisp apples...

GO WALMART!

November Speed Round

I'm currently behind on everything. The only thing I seem on track with is Christmas. Presents are being purchased mostly online and seem to arrive on my doorstep nearly daily. Very cool and so nice not to be hitting a mall..don't have time anyway!

Enjoy the bullet points, I worked hard on them...

• Morgan won "most creative costume" for his Hot Air Balloon get up and managed to collect nearly 20 lbs of loot. Most of which I gave away when he wasn't looking.
• Sarah was awesomeness personified as "Eco Girl!"  Personally I thought her "carbon free emissions" stamp on her butt was inspired.
• I worked 2 weeks straight and am tired. Don't know how you 9-5'ers do it.
• Walking every night and am trying to make it to the pool 2x a week..so hard..
• Have 9 books on my night stand and have no hope of getting to them.
• My personal H1N1 formula- Engystol + Oil of Oregano + 5000UI of Vitamin D. A Gripp-Heel is sometimes thrown in for good measure.So far so good.
• Am craving salt and have no clue why.
• Plan to try do art NEXT week.
• Dwayne comes home this weekend. Going to the W.E.M Water Park.
• Want "Fiddler on the Roof" tickets.
• Have officially "lost" 100lbs and never want to find it again.
• David Sedaris is hilarious- just finished "When You Are Engulfed in Flames"
• Thinking about blue berry muffins...

FYI the following dates.

Make it! December 11 - 13 at the Alberta Aviation Museum.

 

and

Opening Party:
Saturday, November 28th, 7 – 11 pm
Print Sale Duration:
November 28– December 19, 2009

Venue: SNAP’s Main Gallery

I've never been to SNAP's Christmas sale but think I am going to go this year.

Going in..

 

Morgan goes to an amazing school with some one- of- a- kind programming. They've been voted one of Canada's best schools five years running and are frequently written about in Parents magazine. We are so fortunate that we received some excellent advice, while the boy was still in Elementary School, advice that made us look farther than the school system we were in at the time and find a Junior High that has been perfect for him.

Sure they seem to validate his need to blow shit up occasionally with guests who put on demonstrations involving large explosions...and they occasionally seem to employ the odd crazy person...

....but the point is he is excelling and is interested in going to school each and every day.

Yesterday was Parent-Teacher interviews. Just one more thing I love at his school. They do 3 interim reports with a Parent-Teacher interview after each report and then a month later is the actual report card. Genius. Nip it in the bud while there is time to make change. LOVE IT. I also really really love the opportunity to talk to the people who see the boy wonder in action. I know what his marks are. I see the work he brings home when he brings anything home..but is he a "playah.."? Who is his girlfriend? Sooner or later someone slips up. This year it was the English teacher without the aid of any bright interrogation lights telling me him and "Lauren" make a nice couple....(insert double take here).

But I am getting ahead of myself..

So we arrived at the school with appointments to speak to the 3 teachers that were new to me this year. It involved the traditional locker stop. The one were I usually find all the things that disappeared mysteriously from the house. The BBQ tongs, my flip flops and of course more candy wrappers than anyone would ever see in a single lifetime.

No wrappers, no missing tongs and most importantly...NO BOOKS...

Waste of a Pillow

Last night I had a horrible case of insomnia. I don't know if having one sleepless night counts as an actual case, but I literally could not keep my eyes shut. After laying in bed for nearly 2 hours I got up, made a cup of tea and surfed the Internet until 6 am. At that point I was finally able to say good morning to the kids and then finally go to bed where I managed nearly 4 hours of uninterrupted shut eye.

In the wee hours between midnight at 6 am I managed to play hours and hours of Bejewelled, read more blogs than I can count do and some online Christmas shopping.  It was all good cause I rediscovered some sites I had book marked ages ago.

Enjoy.

Go to How about Orange and learn to make your own gift bows out of recycled materials.

How about some real Pop Art? Check out The Craft Junkie and how she uses actual pop cans to make coolio jewelry and canvas art.

 

Check out the Pantone 2010 color forecast at Apartment Therapy. Great way to plan your wardrobe shopping...

On the retro food front. Check out A Year of Slow Cooking. If you love your Crock pot and if you know me..you know I am am blissed out on those days I have it together enough to put dinner together before I leave for work..Very cool and smells good too.

Ok...and if you really happen to have alot of time on your hands and a spare gourd or two...

 

Yup..this is Yoda..

It came through like a Hurricane..

The scene in the kitchen mid afternoon Saturday. A whole bunch of "works in progress". No worries. No one died and all the Pioneer Women recipes worked out fabulously. I think the best part about her recipes on her blog is her pictures of the recipes. You can actually see the consistency of a batter and compare it to yours. It really gives you a feeling of whether you are on the right track or not.

One thing this weekend that I learned....

I will always from here on out put some kind of alcohol in my whipping cream....OMG SO GOOD!!

Saturday turned out to be a truly, one of a kind, seldom seen good day. There seemed to be an unspoken agreement between all our house inhabitants to keep focused on the big prize. For me, the prize was a shower at the end of my cooking day.

For him...

It was getting that little piece of paper he is holding. His "Learners Licence". How quickly time has gone by. How he ever got to this stage of growing up I will never know. I mean, I've done absolutely everything I can think of to stunt this kids growth and he seems to manage to shake off all the coffee grounds and forge ahead. Whether I am ready or not.

Welcome to my new life sitting in the passenger seat.

Remember kid....I still get to control the radio....

Let the cooking begin!

I can always tell when I am officially over some illness by the need I feel to get back into the kitchen. When I am sick; toast, soup and the occasional scrambled egg is about all I have energy for. The kids are the ones who really suffer..or do they..hmm. If my parents were part of the meat and potato generation, I am of the soup and sandwich. Home made soups are made bi weekly and my veggie sandwich with avocado is well...legendary. The kids and I could live off those sandwiches for the rest of our lives.

So good.

Today I walked through Safeway and knew in an instant I was over being sick. All I could see were cooking possibilities. Totally random things hit the basket and we all know it doesn't help one flying fig that I was hungry too boot. Safeway annoys me though. Finding canned pumpkin annoyed me..One till open at 9 am annoyed me. (Diane would tell you I was cranky when I left work.) I really like Wal Mart Super Center for  groceries and the selection. You can hiss and boo me all you want but I bet I could of found at least 6 varieties of canned pumpkin there..sigh.

Once home from my short work day and grocery stop, all I could obsess about was the 40+ tomatoes I had in a bowl on my counter. Tomatoes from our plants that were pulled a week ago before the snow hit. Even more tomatoes were discovered in the veggie crisper. Red, yellow, purple and in all shapes and sizes all courtesy of patient with a massive green thumb. So out came my big stock pot and they were all introduced to some garlic, onions, celery and assorted good smelling spices.

Nothing and I do mean nothing makes my family happier than as they walk down the blocks toward our house and the cooking smells get stronger and stronger the closer they get to home. You would think they never get fed by the reaction when they finally open the front door.

Today was a happy day for them. Morgan correctly identified the smell as tomato sauce and started making dinner requests. A portion of red sauce was very efficiently turned into pizza sauce. Dough was made, toppings sliced and Friday night pizza night was reborn.

The results were amazing and now we have left overs for lunch tomorrow. I plan to be cooking most of the weekend as I am feeling inspired by Pioneer Women. Pumpkin Cake with Whiskey Whipped Cream and  Fresh Corn with Wild rice are on the agenda along with, by request, Stuffin Muffins. Not to mention I am hoping to gift a special Italian with some goodies.

If you have a special to die for- OMG Laurie has got to try this recipe!! I would so love to hear about it as I am totally in the zone!

Happy Cooking!