Little Hands on my Growing Belly

The last time I was pregnant, Jack and Bella eyed my growing belly with suspicion bordering on terror. They touched it like a ticking time bomb, occasionally asking me whether it would pop open and whether there would be blood when it came time for the baby to come out. As I grew larger, I became more alien, more frightening, another sign that things were about to change in our house.

This pregnancy, my children cannot get enough of my swelling belly. They gravitate to it like moons in my orbit, soft hands touching me in passing. My belly is stroked, petted, and probed to feel the baby's gentle butterfly flutters. The transformation of my belly button is neat and cool, and when we read, they snuggle in close, thrilled that I've taken on this soft pillowy shape.

I've always been a little threatened when people touch my stomach during pregnancy, never quite understanding why its taut roundness is an open invitation to work colleagues and supermarket clerks. But I'm loving these little hands touching me, like a giant family hug before the baby is even here.

Thank you for indulging the pregnant ramblings of a happy mamma. Happy Wordful, Five Minutes Wordless, and Way-back wednesday.

Wordful Wednesday: Tell Me Their Stories

"Tell me their stories," she demanded from the back seat.

I peered at her through the rearview mirror, looking at me earnestly in her princess pink booster seat with her halo of uncombed hair and I asked, "whose stories do you want to hear, sweetie?"

"Their stories, Mom, the stories of all the dead ones with their names on the stones. I want to hear them all!"

Her request in the parking lot of our supermarket, was so unexpected, torn from the wilds of her 4-year old world, that I pressed her to clarify, but she insisted. She had chosen that particular moment to call upon my memories, to learn about those connected to her by blood but blocked by time. "Mom! I want to know all about them: their names, their stories, and where their stones are. Tell me Mom. Tell me now."

And so I told her about her great-grandmother, my Lola, her namesake who so resembles my Juliette in spirit and determination. A woman who would be shocked to have a descendant who eats corn dogs and walks out of the house with wild hair but who would no doubt see herself in my little dictator in the making.

I told Juliette Loreau's story in Disney terms, painting a picture a 4-year old would appreciate, the story of a rich little girl who grew up with her baby brother in a big castle. She had a friend who lived nearby, a best friend who she married when she got older and he wore a handsome costume like Cinderella's prince because he was in the army. They had four pretty daughters who loved to eat cherries, right from the trees in their backyard. And later on, when she was old and living in a little house on a hill by the sea, her baby brother came to live with her again, with a little yellow bird who sang pretty songs to them in the evening from its golden cage.

She listened to the story, rapt, with her mouth a little open as if she could drink my memories. When I stopped speaking, she let out a soft, "oh," and looked dreamily at the window, no doubt imagining the life of this woman she'll never know, happy to be filled with the stories that she craved.

Happy Wordful, Five Minutes Wordless, and Way-back wednesday! 

Crepes for Mardi Gras

We weren't very religious growing up, but we never missed an opportunity to celebrate holidays with food. Mardi Gras was always one of my favorite holidays, because we got to have crepes for dinner. My mom would fire up the crepe pan and start flipping. She would flip until we couldn't eat any more, our bellies filled with crepes.

My mom would begin with the traditional savory crepe fillings: grated Swiss cheese, ham, and egg. To keep things simple, she didn't use buckwheat sarrasin flour for the savory crepes, and I was glad because I hated the bitter taste of galettes de sarrasin. After a few salty crepes, she would allow us to move on to sweet crepes, filled with salted butter and sugar, jams, and Nutella. My sisters and I would stumble from the table in the throes of the happiest food coma.

Crepes are my kids' favorite food, but they won't waste their time with savory crepes. They insist on going straight to the sweet stuff. So instead of a dinner time treat, they've become their favorite breakfast. But tonight, to celebrate Mardi Gras like I did as a child, I'll whip out the crepe pan and flip until they can't eat any more. It's only now that I'm a mom that I realize how much my mother must have welcomed the relative peace of our food coma.

Crepes (Makes 15-20 small crepes)
Ingredients:
1 cup of flour
3 large eggs
1 1/4 cups of milk (I always used whole or 2%, but this weekend I used skim and found the crepes to be thin and tasty)
2 tablespoons of melted salted butter

Toppings: Butter, Sugar, Jam, Nutella, Sweetened Condensed Milk and fruit

1. In a food processor, pour the flour, milk and eggs. Pulse 3-6 times until just blended. 
2. Pour into a bowl, add the melted butter and stir together. The dough should be very liquid, much looser than American pancake dough. Add more milk if it feels a little thick. You can always add a little more flour to even things out. Err on the runny side, better to have a thin crepe than a thick one.
3. Many cookbooks would tell you to rest the crepe batter for 20 minutes at this point to let the gluten in the flour relax. I sometimes do this, but often the kids are out of their minds with hunger and I just get going.
4. Heat a non-stick skillet on medium heat until hot. Pour some vegetable oil on a bunched up paper towel and grease the bottom of the pan.
5. Pour the crepe dough into the hot pan, swirling the pan around until all the batter has been spread around. Keep on swirling until no batter is moving.
6. Place pan back onto the flame. Cook the crepe until the bottom is lightly browned, peeking for doneness with a spatula. Flip the crepe either with a grandiose flick of the wrist (after loosening it with a spatula), or the old fashioned way with a spatula. Cook it for another 30 seconds to a minute and serve.
7. For butter and sugar crepes (my kids' favorite flavor), I melt the butter on top of the crepe as soon as I flip it.
8. You can serve these immediately, cooking and eating as you go, or make a big batch that you cover with plastic wrap and reheat in the microwave for 5 seconds a crepe.

From Romance to Family in the Snow

My husband and I had only been dating a few weeks when we went away skiing together. The tiny rental car propelled us from the muddy snowbanks of the New York highways to the pristine Vermont snowscape sprinkled with picturesque red barns. Somewhere along the way, we became a couple.

We love to settle marital disputes on the Nastar Race Track.

I was a bundle of nerves during the ride up, but not about our blossoming relationship. I was terrified to ski. My childhood skiing memories were filled with the harsh sounds of skis skidding on hidden ice, painfully frozen fingertips, and the thudding of my heart from fear. But the next day, at the rental shop, Steve convinced me to rent smaller skis, and they transformed my skiing experience. Suddenly I was in control, able to go fast and stop when I chose, feeling the wind in my hair and the sun on my face instead of the terror in my chest.

My form is looking a little stiff. 

We enjoyed two more romantic weekends in Vermont that winter and spring, and skiing became our thing. We learned so much about each other as Steve challenged me to move beyond greens and blues and make my way down giant mogul mounds and steep slopes. Off the slopes, we discovered that we also shared a passion for food, whether it was romantic dinners at snowy Vermont inns or gigantic breakfasts of bacon, eggs, and pancakes with real Vermont maple syrup.

Steve taking a strong lead. It's about playing, not winning, right?

We've kept our skiing tradition, heading out to Colorado and Utah every winter to conquer new bowls and remember that first winter together when our love blossomed in the snow. Until this year, we left the kids behind, to better pretend to be a young couple alone.

But this year, we decided that it was time to share our tradition with the kids. Their skiing was good enough to make the trip out West worthwhile. I was nervous about giving up our time together, about turning our treasured tradition into something different, something too focused on the kids. But I shouldn't have worried.

Jack and Bella eager to get going down the mountain.

Overnight, our treasured couple tradition became a family tradition. Jack and Bella were racing down the mountain on their first run, marveling at how high they were in the sky, and racing. Juliette went right along with the family, snowplowing between Steve's legs and telling him, "Faster Daddy! Faster!"

But every afternoon, the kids went home to a babysitter, and Steve and I raced around the mountain alone again, enjoying our romance in the snow.

Happy Wordful, Five Minutes Wordless, and Way-back wednesday.

Requiem for Annie's Ice Cream, our Neighborhood Greasy Spoon

Yesterday Annie's Ice Cream Shop closed its doors for the last time. For two days straight, the crowd of kids surrounding the tiny shop had been huge, and the police had been on hand to keep order over the hordes that turned out to say goodbye to the Chung's, the Korean couple who founded this neighborhood institution 25 years ago.

We waited until 8PM for the crowds to die down, it was close to bedtime, but the kids had been scared off by the rowdy teenagers and they were desperate to have their turn to say goodbye. They took turns climbing up on the dusty pink stools to look at the man behind the counter in the eye and say a final thank you. It was probably the first time they realized that the man who handed them their ice cream cone had a family, grandchildren, an entire life beyond hot dogs and chocolate shell. Then they ate their ice cream cones slowly, reverentially, visibly trying to store up every lick in their young memory banks. In our six months on the block, Annie's played a big role in our lives. 

We turned onto the street on a sunny, yet mild August day, driving slowly past the unfamiliar houses. The kids were quiet in the back, asking every few blocks or so, "Is that our school? Is that one our new house?" When I stopped the car in front of the unfamiliar blue house, they hesitated to step out into the street, loitering in the car, and I imagined that they were stalling making our move a reality.

When they finally emerged, they looked suspiciously at the neighborhood, scowling at the wooden houses with their welcome front porches. "These look so old! They're yucky! Why do we have to move Mom!" The mood was turning stormy, and the likelihood that this carefully planned visit of our new home would end with tears.

Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw giant white letters on an old black rooftoop spelling out two beautiful words: ICE CREAM. I dragged my mutinous crew down the street, praying the store wasn't condemned or closed down. Twenty minutes later, the kids were all smiles, so excited that their new house had an ice cream store that they could walk to whenever they wanted. "Can we go there every day Mom? Can we move tomorrow? Can we eat breakfast, lunch and dinner at Annie's?"

During those first few weeks of school, we finished each difficult friend-making day on the swiveling stools at Annie's, and I watched the angst of being the new kid melt off my children's faces with every lick of their vanilla cone. By the time they began getting more adventurous in their ordering, getting chocolate and vanilla swirls with half chocolate and half-rainbow sprinkles, I knew they were getting acclimated to their new school. Once winter settled in, our visits to Annie's became less regular, but lunch at Annie's was still a frequent Sunday treat.

Rumors are flying about the town's plans to tear down and renovate Annie's block. Regardless of whether the restaurant remains empty or is replaced by yet another sterile bank, for our family, it will always be the site of our favorite ice cream joint. Goodbye Annie's. You will be missed.

Finally Finding Diversity

"Hey Look! An Asian person!"
We'd only been in Ohio for a few weeks when I realized that choosing the public school with the highest test scores may not result in the best environment for our family. The shocking statement had been uttered by my daughter's best friend with a completely innocent, delighted smile. She was pointing excitedly out of the window of our car as we drove in to town, the same way she would point at a pacing tiger in the zoo.

I was surprised by her comment because our neighborhood was not completely white. We had a Korean family living across the street and an African American family living next door. But over the next few months, I observed that geographic proximity is not enough to integrate different races. It was as if an invisible wall of frozen politeness divided us, an unspoken, unbreachable divide respected by people on both sides, never going beyond enthusiastic waves hello and goodbye as we crossed each other in our cars.

This wasn't the world I wanted to live in, and it wasn't the world I wanted my children to grown up in.

Our lives in our new home in the Chicago suburbs couldn't be more different. My son's classroom more accurately represents the diversity of our world. They are not color blind. They know who is black, who is white, and who is in between. They compare the hues of their arms, and discuss their heritage. They celebrate where they come from through cookbooks, stories, and descriptions of their special holidays. They're learning to celebrate diversity, but most of the time, they're just playing soccer, sweating and laughing together, a sight that never fails to make me teary.

When I explained what Martin Luther King, Jr. was fighting for the other night, I illustrated the story with his friend's names. "If it wasn't for Martin Luther King, Jr. you wouldn't have gone to school with Joe, wouldn't have been able to go swimming with him, and we wouldn't have been able to all go out for pizza like we did the other night." His answer was immediate and strong, "Well that would have been stupid, unfair, and just no fun! Good thing Martin Luther King took care of that."

And as the conversation moved on, I wiped a stray tear, the emotional mom once again, overwhelmed with gratefulness that we've landed in such a wonderful place for my children to grow up.

Happy Martin Luther King Day.

the Legacy of Fear

This month the topic for the women of the Yahoo Motherboard is Legacy and whether our children will follow in our footsteps.  I've been thinking about it for days, wondering whether to write about the careers they might have someday or my hope that my children will, like me, derive joy from good food and great books.

Instead of looking to the future, I realized that I've already passed on a legacy to my son, one he struggles with every night: the legacy of fear.

When I was a little girl, when I was old enough to ride a bike without training wheels, but long before I ever struggled into skinny jeans with zippers at the bottom, I was terrified that the Germans would come again. We were still living in France, and spent many weekends at my grandmother's house in the village my mother grew up in the Loire Valley.  During the day, I would sit with my grandmother or my aunts, peppering them with questions about living through the German occupation. My mom's oldest sister was a toddler at the time, but the tales of the German soldiers who had taken over the family home were part of our family lore. I couldn't get enough of the stories about being forced to co-habitate with German officers or my grandmother's explanations of how she traveled through occupied France and the free zone to be reunited briefly with my grandfather. I asked and asked and asked until they sent me to bed.

Then, alone in the darkened room, I would toss and turn under the cold damp sheets, terrified. The wooden shutters had a small crescent moon cut out that gave a glimpse of the starry sky. I peered at it anxiously, imagining that any minute I would see planes overhead carrying bombs and angry Germans once again. I would lie there, shaking with terror until I couldn't bear it anymore and had to call for my mother to tell her that I thought World War III was beginning. At first she would be patient and sit with me, calming my fears with rational answers to my panicked questions. But by the third or fourth time that I beckoned her away from the adult dinner table, she would tell me to be quiet and go to bed with pursed lips.

It wasn't until we moved away to the United States, far away from the Germans that my night fears subsided. The nocturnal noises of rural France were replaced by those of suburbia: raccoons tipping over garbage cans and the distant rumble of Mack trucks on I-95. My mind was too filled with the strange guttural sounds of the English language to find a new terrifying scenario to keep me up at night.

Thirty years later, it's my son's turn to lie in bed staring at the ceiling frozen with fear. He calls me back to his bedside screaming at the top of his lungs three or four times a night, demanding that I check the windows one more time, bombarding me with question after question, and peering up at me skeptically as I offer up reassuring answers. He's not afraid of the Germans, Chinese, or Russians, or other threatening nation. He worries that a someone, a fat guy with glasses like the one that broke into our car, or an evil old crone like the one in Tangled, will climb up the front of our house and kidnap him.

Like my mother before me, I am patient for the first 2 or 3 panicked calls. Then I either channel Darth Vader's most threatening tone to tell him to go to sleep, or get into bed with him until he relaxes and starts snoring softly. But even though I get annoyed, I get it. I remember how frustrating it was to have someone dismiss my fear, to not even consider the possibility that my nightmare would come true. And so, most nights I hold him tight and stroke his head, whispering in his ear that this fear shall pass.

Pinch Me, Was I Dreaming?

Tonight her lips were chapped again. At dinner she cried until I slathered them with cream. I rubbed the raw skin slowly, mesmerized by how quickly it went from sun kissed to wind burnt.

Just yesterday I was smoothing suntan lotion on the very same spot.

Already our time in the sun seems like just a pleasant dream, a deep freeze hallucination. Our sand cities, like our footprints, have been washed away.

Pinch me please. Or rather don't. I'd rather close my eyes a little longer to feel the kiss of the sun on my face, the soft sand between my toes, and be seduced by the riot of blues all around me all over again.

Happy Wordful, Five Minutes Wordless, and Way-back wednesday.

Make 2011 the Year of Bliss

I began 2010 calling for MORE. I wanted more joy, more butterfly kisses, more sweat, more spontaneity, and more living. And 2010 delivered more of everything, more traveling, more moving, more adventures. It was an exhilarating year, full of changes and challenges.

I'd like 2011 to be the Year of Bliss. The year of appreciating the bliss in the little moments that make up the mosaic of life.

• The bliss of spontaneous kitchen dance parties.
• The bliss of my husband's hand in mine on a Saturday night.
• The bliss of happy conversation around the dinner table. 
• The bliss of sharing cookie dough with a crowd of happy kids.
• The bliss of filling the blank page in a burst of creativity.
• The bliss of the first bite of an unforgettable dish.
• The bliss of preschool pick up hugs.
• The bliss of sharing a blanket with my daughter as we read on the couch.
• The bliss of a great book cry.
• The bliss of a long run on a sunny day.
• The bliss of filling the house with the aroma of roasting butternut squash.
• The bliss of the tickle of sand between my toes.
• The bliss of a beautiful sunset.

Wishing you a 2011 filled with all the bliss you crave. Can't wait to hear about your resolutions.

a Little Caribbean Bliss to Close out the Year

Last year was our first year living through a Midwestern winter, four straight months of shades of gray. By the time March rolled around and those bold crocuses poked their courageous little heads through the snow, we were all starved for color and desperate to give our chapped lips a break. And we weren't even living in Chicago, the capitol of winter!

This year, we decided to deal with the Midwestern winter differently. We planned a bold escape to a place filled with a riot of color: the Cayman Islands.

The chapped lips are gone and are replaced by big smiles all around.

The return to the frozen world will probably be rough, but for now, we'll continue to wade blissfully in the Turquoise Caribbean waters.

a Christmas Morning Miracle

The turkey was moist and golden.

So they tell me.

The pommes dauphines were crispy and light.

So they tell me.

The Alaskan King Crab legs were fresh and decadent.

So they tell me. I wouldn't know. I was up, in bed, knocked out by the stomach flu, missing our yearly Christmas feast with my family.

Luckily, the flu hits hard but disappears just as quickly. By the time Santa made his delivery, I was back up and ready to rejoin the fun.

Nothing short of a Christmas morning miracle. Missing the feast was sad, but just as good the next day, heated up in the microwave. Missing the magic of Christmas morning would have been heartbreaking.

I hope your holidays were bright and merry, filled with family, good food, and fun.

Mine certainly were, snuggled in my new cozy Yahoo blanket, trapped under a crumbling pile of new cookbooks, was my idea of heaven.

a Tree Full of Memories

Tonight our tree sparkles.

Through the window, it beams to passing cars and people too bundled up and cold to notice. Tonight the festivities of Christmas went into full swing in our house.

While some families get their Christmas tree in early December, we wait. The kids wouldn't dream of decorating the tree without their California cousins, and I wouldn't dream of doing it without my sisters. The first December after my parents divorced, my mother shipped me a giant cardboard box filled with our ornaments, officially handing the role of Christmas host to me.

It seemed so strange that first year to unpack all those memories in my New York pre-War apartment: the only surviving fake shiny present I didn't rip through when I was six, the adorable Raggedy Ann and Andy dolls that have to be hung together, and the tattered gold star to tower atop of the tree. But slowly, we made our own Christmas tradition, and the ornaments settled into their new home.

beautiful pictures stolen from my sister's blog

A few weeks ago, I visited five grandiose homes in my neighborhood during a house tour. Each home had at least two Christmas trees. I'd never seen such fancy trees. They had themes like Seuss Whimsy or Icy Glory and seemed to have been conceived by a decorator. They made me love our kitschy, crazy tree even more.

Our ornaments are worn, well-loved. They've been played with, chewed on, picked at, and glued back together. They are scarred by two generations of eager kids, but I wouldn't trade them for the fanciest tree filled with Tiffany's ornaments. It just wouldn't seem like Christmas without them.

a Little Elf, a Lot of Mayhem

Around midnight I prowl the house, peeking in on sleeping children, plotting my next prank. Other elves spend December giving children little gifts and relaying messages from Santa. I do a little of that too. It's important to keep my kids in line, to remind them to behave as the big man finalizes his lists. But my specialty, and my true joy, is wreaking a little mayhem.

Where's the fun in being good all the time?

One morning, you may come down and find that I made a teetering five foot stack of books. The next day, you'll find me swinging from the chandelier, frozen after a night of wild ruckus with the kids' favorite stuffed animals. And some days, you'll have to search long and hard before finding me hidden behind the water cooler. That's the beauty of having me around. You'll never know what you'll wake up to.

You should have seen Bella's face this morning when she woke up to a room filled with toilet paper. I almost laughed out loud.

Happy Wordful, Five Minutes Wordless, and Way-back wednesday.

And if you have any picture inspired posts to share this week, feel free to do so at the linky below:

Wordful Wednesday: The Lady and the Mink

The box under the tree was huge, shiny and white, and topped with the most perfect red bow I'd ever seen. My sisters and I had been poking it gently for the last 30 minutes when my father walked in and announced that it wasn't for any of us. "That's a present for your mother," he declared with a broad smile.

My mother tortured us for another agonizing 10 minutes as she prepared her Christmas morning coffee before coming to even see the box. My sisters and I had lost all interest in our own presents as we walked around it, putting our ears close to see if we heard any rustling inside. If a baby elephant had poked its trunk out from under the lid, we wouldn't have been surprised.

When my mother finally opened her present, she pulled out something infinitely more exotic and exciting than a jungle animal. The lustrous black mink coat seemed to sparkle next to the Christmas tree. And when my mother draped it over her pajama clad shoulders, she was instantly transformed into a movie star. The coat moved with her, a midnight sea of texture. It was glamour personified, not that I could have articulated that as an 8-year old kid. Instead I just stared, open mouthed, desperate to surround myself with its soft fur.

I wasn't allowed to touch it beyond a quick pat with clean hands. The fur was whisked away to an isolated  closet and only worn on special occasions. My mother would appear like a goddess at the top of the stairs, her red high heeled shoes peeking out from the bottom of her mink coat. She would button it all the way up, framing her made up face with a bright ebony garland. With a quick peck on the top of our shampooed heads, she walked out the door, leaving us with the babysitter and the faint trace of her Anais Anais perfume.

For 30 years, I've been dreaming of owning a fur coat just like that one. No account of animal cruelty was powerful enough to erase my notion of a mink as the ultimate elegance for a woman. I wanted to feel its weight on my shoulders, to drape the flowing coat around me, and feel like a movie star, just for one night.

When I saw the ad in our local list serv, I thought it was a hoax. "My aunt died and left me her mink coat. I don't want it. It's yours for $50 obo." 24 hours later, the coat was in my hands. I haven't worn it out of the house, and I may never, but even when I'm wearing comfy socks and pajamas, it makes me feel like I'm walking the red carpet. Like a lady.

Happy Wordful, Five Minutes Wordless, and Way-back wednesday.

And please link up your posts here so that others may see what pictures inspired you today:

Why the Saugatuck Police Department Have my Eternal Gratitude

I didn't see the broken glass at first. We were still flushed and smiling from our beautiful walk through the Lake Michigan Dunes and it seemed like the car passenger window was just reflecting the sun in a funny way. It wasn't until we rounded the corner that we realized the car had been broken into while we walked in the forest.

The girls started crying immediately, traumatized by the reality of a bad guy rifling through our lives. Steve picked the rest of the glass carefully out of the window pane, and I kept a crazed Jack from picking up the shiny pieces with his bare hands. His reaction to the drama couldn't have been more different than the girls. He was giddy with excitement and kept pushing up against my restraining arm, drawn to the evidence of the crime like a moth to the flame.

The robber had shattered the window and grabbed only my purse before running off. He left behind our GPS and my camera bag with the macro lens. He also appeared to have ignored the trunk with my laptop and our iPad. We looked around nervously, wondering if he was watching us from a nearby bush, getting ready to pounce with a gun or a machete. Then, as an afterthought, I told Steve to call 911.

We almost didn't make the call. I was so freaked out, making a mental list of the contents of my purse: my cell phone, credit cards, and most painfully, my writer's notebook with a year's worth of work. I remember thinking, as Steve dialed, that the call was probably a waste of time, that there was nothing the police could do.

I couldn't have been more wrong.

Within 20 minutes, a sergeant arrived, notebook in hand. Our case was already being worked on, and looked promising.

• We had a suspect! Another deputy was on his way to interrogate him at his home. The team had tracked down the license plate of the driver of a pick-up truck who had been reported by another park visitor for acting suspiciously around empty cars. 
• Cell phone tracing is not just for movies. When I mentioned that my cell phone had been stolen, he immediately got on the phone with Verizon to trace the signal to see if they should be pursuing another lead.
• Next he spoke to American Express to get more details on a suspicious charge at BP, ready to call the nearby gas stations to pull their video records.

Twenty minutes later, we had an update.The suspect, found wearing women's lingerie, confessed to a long list of crimes, including our car break in. The deputy told us to sit tight while they went to look for my purse and belongings.

So we headed to a nearby Burger King and waited while a team of policemen searched under leaves in a ditch in the dark to recover our Flip video camera filled with irreplaceable birthday candle blow-out moments, my notebook with the beginning of my historical fiction novel, and my wallet with all our insurance information.

As I write, we're waiting for the police to arrive, getting updates every thirty minutes or so, wondering what the police will have found, incredibly grateful that this story of a beautiful walk gone bad may have a happy ending after all.

Update: At 9:30PM, the police escorted us to the station to retrieve some of my belongings, my precious writing notebook, a few credit cards, my wallet, and some cash. The suspect, a registered sex offender, was in custody. My Flip video cameras, my car keys, my iTouch, and my purse itself, were still at large, tossed in the leaves of a hunting reserve.

I couldn't believe the police had even found anything. They, on the other hand, seemed to think they hadn't done enough, and promised to get right back out into the woods to search at first light.

The Simple Joys of a Walk to School

These days, our car spends a lot of time in the driveway.

We've become walkers again in our new home, and it's a welcome change from the hours I clocked in Ohio behind the wheel of my minivan, feeling my butt expand with every refill of the gas tank.

It took the kids a few weeks to get used to really embrace the walking. At first they clung to the car door and begged me to drive them to school, but now they march out the door, ready to kick the leaves and breathe in the fresh air on their way to school.

Driving in the car, we were quiet in our respective rows, staring out the window. Now, even when the kids are running up ahead, we're shouting back and forth to each other, talking about the day ahead, testing out spelling words, and pointing out spooky houses. No longer a chauffeur, I feel more connected to the kids, more awake in the moment we're sharing.

I never thought that walking to school would be one of the things I love most about living in Chicago, but so far, it's the highlight of my day. We'll see how we feel after the first snowfall...

Happy Wordful, Five Minutes Wordless, not so Wordless and Way-back wednesday pics.

Camp Confidential: a Surprise Tween Tear Jerker

I had just settled into the couch with a deep sigh of contentment when I heard the crying. The sobs were loud and emotional, clearly more than a few preschooler nightmare whimpers. I put the remote back down and reluctantly started peeling off my warm blanket to investigate, wondering if someone had fallen out of bed. Then I heard the feet, clomping down the stairs.

Bella walked into the room, tears streaming down her face. She clutched a paperback in one hand, and was ineffectively rubbing her eye with the other. I looked up at her, completely confused.

"What happened? What's wrong? Is there an animal in your room? A bee? A mouse? Did something fall on you? Are you hurt?"

She was crying so hard that she couldn't answer at first. Instead, she just crawled onto my lap, just as she used to when she was three years old. I held her long tween body, rubbed her back through her flannel peace pajamas, felt her sobs subside slowly as she leaned into me. It had been a long time since I held her that way.

Finally she looked up at me, and explained with a sad smile, "My book is just so sad. It just finished and it was so sad. It can't end like that! It's just too sad!"

And that was all she was able to say before beginning to cry again. As I walked her back up to her bed, I asked if I could borrow the book so we could talk about it together in the morning. Then her tears finally stopped.

When I walked back downstairs towards the comfort of the TV room couch, I wiped away one of my own tears. Mine were tears of joy. Joy that one of my children shares my love of reading, and got to experience the cathartic release of a good book cry. There's nothing like being moved to tears by the creation of characters and plot of a really good writer, someone who makes a story so vivid that you can't help but cry your heart out. I've cried on the plane, on the subway, and even in hiding in my office cube just so I could get through the last few pages of a great book.

There's nothing like a good book cry.

I'm not sure if Camp Confidential: Suddenly Last Summer will bring me to tears, but I hope that Bella's gesture, that handing over of a treasured book, is the first of many shared mother daughter reading experiences.

Sprinkle Pudding: a Fun and Easy Dessert to Make with the Kids

There's something about these gloomy post-daily savings evenings that makes me crave pudding. Big bowls of creamy pudding. Isn't that the perfect food when it's pitch dark outside at 5PM?

Last night I wanted to make pots de creme with the kids. If you've ever had these delicious little puddings and felt your spoon pierce through the thin skin on top to get to the rich custard beneath, you'll agree that they are the perfect dessert to cure the late fall blahs. They are practically the definition of homemade goodness.

But just as I reached for the whole milk and the chocolate to melt, the cozy mood in the kitchen disintegrated. Bella started moaning about the stupidity of math homework. Jack pulled Juliette's hair. And Juliette decided to attach herself to my legs and whine continuously. The opportunity for a slowly and lovingly baked dessert had vanished. I needed something quick, something fun, something instant to get the mood back on track.

Instead of homemade goodness, I reached for a box of Jello Instant vanilla pudding and put the kids to work. Bella poured the milk. Jack opened the pudding box. And Juliette whisked with gusto.

Exactly two minutes later, we had 6 ramekins filled with golden vanilla pudding, and smiles on everyone's faces. Time to decorate. I let the kids rummage through the pantry for leftover Halloween candy and anything else they could find that would fit a 2-inch ramekin. They came back with Oreos, chocolate chips, sprinkle sugar, and marshmallows, thrilled by the illusion of a sugar free-for-all.

A few minutes later, the puddings were beautiful and ready to be put aside until dessert. And we were all re-energized for bathtime and dinner.

I'll expose them to the natural goodness of pots de cremes soon. The Jello pudding mix can't be compared to how delicious they will be; they're not in the same category. But sometimes, homemade is not the answer. In the name of family peace and sanity, I'm all for instant pudding.

Sprinkle Pudding Extravaganza
ingredients:
1 box of Jello Instant Vanilla Pudding (or Chocolate or any other flavor craved!)
3 cups of 2% or whole milk
An assortment of toppings like sprinkles, marshmallows, chocolate chips and oreo crumbles

1. Measure the milk.
2. Pour in the pudding mix.
3. Whisk for exactly 2 minutes.
4. Pour into reserved ramekins.
5. Let the kids decorate. Either serve immediately or refrigerate until dessert.

Jazzing Up School Lunches with Orzo

How much do you experiment with your kids' school lunches? We're pretty adventurous at the dinner table in our house, pushing the envelope with honey duck and Cornish game hens, but if you took a peek in my kids' lunchboxes, day after day, you'd get pretty bored.

Messing with the lunch my kids expect to find is a dangerous proposition. Whenever I've changed things up from cold cut sandwiches or breaded chicken bites, the kids are downright furious with me after school. They don't mind the repetition, in fact, they love the same lunch every day.

But I can't leave well enough alone. I'd like to see them eating healthier lunches, with less nitrates, and some veggies other than raw baby carrots. Ideally I'd love to see them excited to discover what they'll find in their lunchbox, and to have their friends be jealous of their lunches. A girl can dream, can't she?

So this week, I took the plunge with a little help from Orzo. Orzo is a great pasta to layer with flavors. And it's a great fit for a thermos - not too big, not too small. I tossed the warm orzo in a little olive oil and parmesan, added some cut up roasted chicken, and some steamed broccoli florets.

Then I headed to my closet to hide, afraid of their reaction. They might hate it so much that they use the cold orzo to make pasta snowballs.

Orzo with Roasted Chicken and Broccoli
Ingredients:
1 cup of orzo dried pasta
1/2 cup of cut up roasted chicken breast
3/4 cup of frozen broccoli florets
3 tablespoons of grated parmesan
3 tablespoons of olive oil

1. Boil water for pasta. Cook orzo according to package directions. (Mine were to cook it for 9 minutes).
2. Drain pasta. 
3. Add olive oil and toss until well coated.
4. Add chicken bites and broccoli. Mix thoroughly.
5. Toss parmesan. Taste. If needed add salt (and even pepper if your kids are much more adventurous than mine!)
6. Place in your child's thermos while still hot. Two to three hours later, it should still be warm.

What's the Best Thing about Halloween?

What's the best thing about Halloween?

Parenting is a life sentence.

Is it the costumes that make a not so subtle statement?

Is it the anticipation of the sugar high?

Is it trick or treating with friends?

The answer of course, is the pictures that remain long after the candy is eaten (or shhh... thrown away!)

Wednesdays are a time to use pictures as a writing prompt. Check out the Wordful, Five Minutes Wordless, not so Wordless and Way-back wednesday posts to see how others were inspired today.