Tag: holiday

A Breath of Fresh Air

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Those who know and love me understand that I am going to let them down at the holidays. It’s just not my thing – not that I haven’t tried. Not that I haven’t tried to do it up, that is, not not that I haven’t tried to let folks down. It’s inevitable that I let you down, because even though I try, I’m not that good at doing it up. Huh?

Point is, I suck at holidays regardless of my intention, but I’m a spectacular holiday voyeur. If I were to do Valentine’s Day for all ya’ll, I’d give you the gift of clean, fresh air. TreeHugger just posted a list of the plants I would consider for you. How cute is this Philodendron oxycardium (in lay terms, heartleaf philodendron)? It’s perfect for Valentine’s Day and a good air filterer to boot (whatever “to boot” means). Incidentally, you can buy a whole book, How to Grow Fresh Air: 50 House Plants that Purify Your Home or Office, on this subject. Maybe you could even pair the plant and book.*

I’m sure that I’m breaking some bloggy rule by reposting for a third year in a row an excerpt from a Valentine’s Day past post, but no one is paying attention anyway. This year, I think I might rather like some Garbage Soup.

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February 12, 2007

Please don’t go out on Valentine’s Day and drop a chunk of change on flowers that were coated in pesticides, kept in a green house, and shipped across the country. What is that supposed to say? “I love you so muchly that I’m giving you something unnaturally begotten. Also, in its making a part of the world was poisoned. Lastly, even with the aspirin dissolving in the water, it’s doomed to die leaving nothing to show for the cash. THIS is the symbol of my love for you.” Please. Save your money.**

…

I am compelled to request that you forget the expensive roses! Instead, share this recipe for Garbage Soup, from Dining with the Desert Museum* (with editorial). It would be good for your wallet, the environment, and an honest statement about the longevity of love.

INGREDIENTS:
water (the elixir of life)
vegetable waste (eggplant sounds like elegant fare for a Valentine dinner, but gack!)
coffee grounds (from the pot you shared over morning breath)
eggshells (you already walked on them so they are nicely crushed)
other similar kitchen waste (so not the shit you sling at each other like monkeys after the kids are in bed)
not grease (this is about living plants not the yummy goodness of slaughtered lambs)

DIRECTIONS: Chop waste in food processor or blender with equal parts water. Mix it up until it’s as convoluted as your fights. Bury soup around outer edges of plants along side the hatchet.

Commercial fertilizers can kill beneficial microorganisms in the soil. This recipe for plants can be used in lieu of those fertilizers. Can you feel the love?

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* Did I mention I am a sell-out, er, Amazon Associate?

** Populist, perhaps you could illuminate for us the reasons why guys buy temporary tokens of their love as you told me outright last year, “Your understanding about why men give Valentine’s gifts is obviously different from mine.” I’m willing to wager dollar to dime even in this recession that you know a damn sight more on the subject than I do. What would Grace think?

SUCK IT!

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I guess I was supposed to make a big “to-do” about my 100th post. Oh, well. YAY for you last post I posted! Anyway, onward and onward.

I couldn’t have predicted my adventish anticipation for January 20th. Inauguration is also the 100th day of school for my children and both their schools are planning celebrations. Plus, Arizona just made it to the Superbowl. Additionally, I just adore my friends. I have spectacular friends. My friends are great because they give me stuff. Good stuff. Stuff I bet you wish you had. A la la la.

Magical Martha, who can make anything happen and does, gave me lemons from her tree. Not only that, she gave me freshly squozen lemon juice and promises of a rockin’ lemonade recipe. THEN, our neighbors dropped by with more lemons. We are flush with the fruit. OMG! I want to make lemon everything! Got a good recipe?

Next up is the tale of my own greed and gluttony. A member of my book club, whose hubby heads up some biodiesel group here in town, gets fry grease from local restaurants and turns it into gas in their backyard for her car. The byproduct of this process is glycerin. Yup. Soap. They’ve packaged it as Grease Monkey soap and I think they should totally make it a commercial venture. I’m so in awe of this process because the oil was 1) used to cook food, 2) used to power a car, and 3) used to wash up, which means that it’s used, reused, and rereused with NO WASTE LEFT OVER. When her book club holiday exchange gift was Grease Monkey soap, well, I sorta threw a hissy fit. “I want some!” She’s a better person than I am (let’s face it, most people are), and made more soap – enough for our whole group.

And not related to my friends who are generous, I just want to do a quick shout out to Robyn. If you don’t know her, you should. Life would be gray and dull without her. I know this unequivocally. I watched her sew today and that was, it was, the penultimate.

Wanna know what I give my friends? NOTHING! HA! Suck it! Perhaps I should feel badly that I inspire such generosity without being generous myself – but I don’t! So, while some look at their buddies and wonder “what have they done for me lately?”, I’m going to suck a lemon, take a shower, and call Robyn to schedule a Superbowl clatch.

Resolution 1 – Keep Tongue in Cheek

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My buddy posted a photo of me on Facebook with my tongue sticking out. The hubster has posted a photo on Facebook and My Space of me with my tongue sticking out. All embarrassment aside about why I’d have “My Face” accounts, I really need to examine my tendency to sabotage photos with my tongue.

My mother used to say, “I wouldn’t want that nasty thing in my mouth either.” In today’s parlance, I think that means, “Whatever.” While she found the stuck out tongue offensive, in one of my most memorable photos of her mother, the tongue is out. Apparently, I’m passing the proclivity on to my own progeny.

Tongue Twisters

This is my kids’ favorite:
Unique New York

This is Guinness’s hardest:
The sixth sick sheik’s sixth sheep’s sick.

This is the least appropriate for children:
I’m not the pheasant plucker, I’m the pheasant plucker’s son,
And I’m only plucking pheasants till the pheasant pluckers come!

Are these facts true?

* If you yelled for 8 years, 7 months and 6 days you would have produced enough sound energy to heat one cup of coffee. Anyone wanna come over for a piping hot brew?

* The catfish has over 27,000 taste buds. That’s sad news for bottom feeders.

* Every person has a unique tongue print, though I am sure the blotters don’t taste all that great.

Great Tongues Behave Alike


Mental Note

Sticking out your tongue isn’t the only way to goof in a photo. In the New Year, I will place my tongue more firmly in my cheek in favor of less bacterial photos.

New Year’s Kiss Off!

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You see that? THAT is how I feel about the new year thus far. It’s only puke, cleaning up puke, and being flipped off at the In-N-Out on New Year’s Eve. Okay, that latter part is actually quite funny, don’t you think? The hubster is HILARIOUS.

I spent forever on an end of the year photo retrospective. It was going to be awesome and you would have loved it. Sadly, I never saved the project and it was gone in a flash. So, too bad for all of you ’cause it would have been the bome (inside joke – too bad for you again)!

Did I mention the puke? As in clean it up with a dustpan volumes of puke. Puke from every member of the family except the person who had to clean it all up – me. Puke in the minivan, which requires 24/7 open windows. Puke on the carpet, which has had to be shampooed twice in the last two days. Puke that you slip on when you hit the concrete floors. Puke. That reminds me, I’m not feeling so well.

Speaking of bodily functions, I visited Milk Breath today. She posts about Google Analytics and requests key word search information from other bloggers. Overwhelmingly, poop brings people here. My most viewed page is the chocolate chip cookie post. It would be easier to just look at the bag of chips for the recipe. In any event, I hope poop searches have nothing to do with my cookies.

That cookie post is about accepting imperfections. Having recently returned home from home, I am reaquainted with all my imperfections past and present. If I cared about continuity in writing, I’d say it makes me feel “pukey”, but really it feels like shame. Shame, shame, everyone knows your name. I wondered about this today with a friend. I’ve done a thing or two that I can’t be proud of, but overall I’ve worked hard to be honorable. WHY do I have to feel shame and why is the shame illusive and not tied into a particular event? My friend said it’s because people have a fixed frame of reference. It’s the you 20 years ago that they can’t let go because it’s familiar. That past you was still trying to figure out how to be and they don’t know the current you. Perhaps, but that’s their problem. Why do I have to feel the shame?

Two days into the new year and here I am. Spinning wheels, puked on, poop reputed, and shamed. Pluck you 2009! I’m resolving to outlast all 365 damn days of you.

This Girl Can GIVE!

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HO-LY COW! I got an e-mail from my friend Tracy about her giving this year. I’ve wanted to hear expressions of appreciation for memorable, meaningful gifts. Partly because I don’t want to give away what I’m giving and partly because I’m so frequently the recipient of gifts made of pure awesome. Once I read her message for, oh, the bazillionth time thinking that this is a woman who KNOWS how to give, I asked her if I could digest her Christmas list on my blog.

You may recall from a previous post that Tracy is a Caddo artist specializing in fan making. Fans aren’t the only thing she can make. These are traditional Caddo necklaces. “Yes, they took a looong time to make. But, they are gonna look great on my girls!”

Not to be outdone, her son made a necklace for each of his sisters and his father. Like his mother he considers each bead and the eventual design it will make. That is quite some bit of work for a tyke. “It is funny to watch him picking out which bead is next. He really has a “thing” with colors.” He has plans to make two more. Go little P!

These are traditional Caddo Dushtoohs. “I made new ones because my girls keep growing! I wish they would quit that. So inconsiderate to grow out of the clothes and regalia I make.” Not being Caddo, I’ve never had a Dushtooh. Makes me feel a little sorry for myself. I did have a traditional pair of Nikes once. They were purple and I pronounced them with a long I and a silent E. I think Dushtoohs are prettier, but I’m still not sure how to pronounce them.

She also donated over 250K feet of reel-to-reel audio recordings her grandparents made of Caddo dancing, singing, and talking along with 45 pounds of written language, notes, and journals migrated to CDs. Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History, one of my favorite places on earth, recognized this act as more than a simple archival donation. Many tribal languages like Caddo die out with the elders. The museum already found a Ph.D. candidate in Linguistics to start working on it. Do you think refrigerator drawings of guys picking their noses and eating their buggers would be as happily received? Hell no! Tracy comes from a family with weight and the entire world will benefit from her gift.

I’m not giving away any more of her presents with a presence. For one, I don’t want her fam to know what they are getting and for another I’m going to steal her ideas. Just trust me, it pays to be a member of her family. And yes, Tracy, you pass. I’m thinking of something more special for you than molted chicken feathers.

I still want to hear your stories of receiving. I went shopping today with an evil woman who allowed $200ish to slide right out of my wallet. I feel the spirit of giving creeping right into my bones.

Presents with a Presence

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This is a participatory post, so you lazy lurkers put on your big kid pants and help a girl out.

I’ve changed my mind about hand-made pledges at Christmas. I tried it last year, but the store has good stuff too. I think “presents with a presence pledge” would be more appropriate for me. To ease into the holiday spirit and to put giving in the proper perspective, I plan to spend the next few weeks reflecting on gifts that affected me in a fundamental way. That includes the Molly Pitcher sheet music, gold-cup strung necklace, and “¿Eso si, que es?/SOCKS” (This gift here, what does it mean?) I mentioned in my previous post. I want YOU to leave a comment or a link to your blog post on meaningful giving.

I’ll get us started. Yesterday I was looking for love notes from the Hubster. I didn’t find any, but that’s something to hash out over dinner when it’s time to make the children cry. Instead I found the leather bound blank book my 6 YO girl’s great aunt sent to her, in which she wrote funny stories of her brother/my daughter’s grandfather. I was taken aback at how affected my daughter was by her grandfather’s passing all things considered. The two of them were lovely together and she took his passing hard. The journal from her great-aunt wasn’t just a way to pass on family history, but rather it honored the connection between a grandfather and granddaughter.

For Locals

I’ve just stepped off the curb with my “He Lives” sign and I’m all high on Jesus. I appreciate the welcome to ALL people (including Republicans) and, once a year, pets at my place of worship and want to give them a shout out for two of their upcoming events.

December 7th, Grace St. Paul’s is hosting an alternative craft fair. After the 8 and 10 a.m. services, tables will be set up offering you the opportunity to buy mosquito nets from the Episcopal Relief and Development to help prevent malaria in Sub-Saharan Africa, a flock of chickens for a family in South America from Heifer Project International, or you can buy lovely handmade and unique crafts from African Team Ministries. Additionally, if you are crafty and would possibly like to have a table, it’s an open fair. But it’s THIS Sunday so call quickly, 327-6857.

December 14th, Grace St. Paul’s is having a Blue Christmas service for people who tend more toward depression than celebration this time of year.

These Gifts Knocked My Socks Off

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Every so often someone surprises me with a gift so special that I can’t possibly express my gratitude. After I was presented a Molly Pitcher award, which is unquestionably the highest honor I’ve ever received and an embarrassment of riches I did not deserve, my father-in-law enlisted my sister-in-law’s help to purchase sheet music to the Molly Pitcher song he sang as a child. It wasn’t the sheet music that was touching, but what it represented. Acceptance from in-laws doesn’t come easy. That’s one thing you can’t buy at the Walmarts.

I can appreciate an expensive gift as easily as an affordable one if the thought is there. My parents and brother gave me a necklace one pearl at a time over 20 years to commemorate big days in my life. Last year Mom strung my pearls in a gold cup pattern (that’s like a tin cup only instead of singles, the pearls are in groups of two and three). I did earn this gift and it was presented to me over time by three people who know virtually every rotten thing I’ve ever done in life and politely don’t mention them. I don’t know if I’ve seen anything so beautiful EVER as my necklace and my kids had better not let it go in a tag sale upon my death.

I am again the lucky recipient of yet another gift to remember for the rest of my days. Today, my daughter’s teacher, who was also my daughter’s teacher last year and my son’s for the two years prior to that, gave me a pair of socks. These are the most fantastic socks I have ever or will ever own. They are colorful and comfortable and hand knitted by a woman so committed to children, families, and community that it’s folly for her to waste time on me. She used Japanese wool that she had been saving for a special project. As she knitted, loop by loop, she thought of me and the cold weather I encounter when going home for Christmas.


The teacher shared the socks with her students at “Tree Talk”, her version of show and tell. After school, my daughter joined her teacher to witness the giving. As I waited for my surprise, I tried to pry the secret from my daughter who was looking up at me with her sparkling eyes and an expression of pride. She would not tell, but the silly grin on her mug showed that she was excited.

Here again, the thought and meaning behind a gift launches it into the forever of my memory and teaches me about being more engaged in giving. The socks are indeed warm, gorgeous, and fit just right. The socks represent that another person in this world sees me and thinks of me when I’m not around. The gift of these socks elevated me in my daughter’s eyes. How could I ever express my appreciation to a woman who is already such a part of so much of what is good with my children? The woman who got my son through his father’s deployment, the woman who welcomed my daughter into her class before she was even a student, the woman who lets me into her class and share in the breakthroughs of her students. It’s impossible.

Thank you.

Halloween Snapshot

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Okay, I wanted to blog all this stuff about Halloween, but I neglected to attend to one of the more important tenants of publishing – deadlines. Of course for a blog, I don’t have to plan as far ahead as traditional publishing, but perhaps some of this would have been more interesting/useful BEFORE Halloween. It’s highly unlikely that my three readers would take a look at this today. In any event and without further ado, here are my Halloween snapshots.

First, we picked pumpkins. This was a time for funny faces and produce bigger than my baby. In AZ, we sell our pumpkins alongside dried chilies.

On to the massacre. The Weisers continue to invite us to Pumpkinpalooza in spite of the fact that we ALWAYS come. Robyn is a great pal who shows us a good time and feeds us well. Chili – YUM! I took a photo of my dinner. This year, I let the ankle biters carve their own designs with actual knives. No trips to the ER. Phew!


The 8 YO boy carved a bat in flight and the 6 YO girl carved a kitten cat. I scored a surplus pumpkin for free because someone dropped it. I carved snakes coming out of the resultant crack, which I had enlarged. We coated our pumpkins with Vaseline so that they would keep. We didn’t do such a great job this year and that, partnered with the heat, saw two of our pumpkins turn gross-out mushy.

I painted the girl’s fingernails orange, but it didn’t last. Then we roasted our pumpkin seeds. We washed the 3 or so cups of seeds, boiled them for 10 minutes in 14 cups of water and 14 tablespoons of salt, then coated them in olive oil and roasted them at 400 degrees for 20 minutes. YUM! Better than I thought, though I’m not the sort who cares for the outer shell.

Finally, we are looking forward to Dia de los Muertos. The kids made sugar skulls at one of the school’s fundraisers. Cute huh? These were made sans glue, so they are entirely edible.

Anna and I have been talking about how fun and inspiring Dia de los Muertos is in comparison to the more somber Memorial Day. They each have their place. Grace St. Paul’s Episcopal Church is celebrating the Feast of All Saints on November 1st and the Commemoration of the Faithful Departed (All Souls’ Day) on November 2nd. I’m looking forward to bringing photos of my loved ones who’ve passed on to the services.

Check out posts from last year. Here, Here, Here, and Here.

We’ve Been BOOed!

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The hubster and I endeavored to teach our kids the time-honored tradition of ding-dong ditch. We called it something else when I was a kid and though it was alliterate, it wasn’t very nice. Pranking isn’t part of the value system we normally teach our children, but with Halloween coming and all we were happy for the chance provided by some goblins at my daughter’s school – the happiest place on earth with all due respect to Disneyland. We were BOOed, you see. It’s a cool tradition even if it does smack reminiscent of chain letters.

The other night as we fought over homework, there was a frantic knock on the door, but no one visible through the peephole. JEEPERS! A mystery! Upon opening the door, we saw a sack full of candy and a note that read, “You’ve been BOOed! Blah blah blah. You have to BOO two other families.” As we read the note, there was another knock. The thing is you are supposed to put a note on your door stating that you’ve been BOOed to prevent spam BOOings, but you can’t do that if you are still in the act of reading the directions. More intrigue! Upon opening the door that second time, we had a pumpkin full of Tom’s children’s toothpaste and toothbrushes, among other stuff. How cool! Why, oh why can’t we be BOOed all the time? Oh, yeah, the chain part.

The kids and I went shopping for spooky gifts to pass on. We made sweet little bundles and set out with the master of delinquency, their father. Heh heh. First house, darn! Door’s open and barking dog spies the kids through the screen door. The 6 YO girl shouts her brother’s non-standard name. RUN! The door answerer squinted through the dark as the kids ran to our vehicle.

On to door number 2. The kids are fighting about whether or not the gifts are placed close enough to the door and when the bell should be rung. DING DONG DOH! The door answerer through the bushes spied the 8 YO boy attempting conversation outside the driver side door to his father who urged, “Get in the car! Get in the car!” Fortunately, by house 3, we had the procedure down.

Ding-dong ditch, easy peasy lemon squeazy heavily laced with adrenaline.