I’m Crafty!

I’d love to explore artistic expression, but I’m too cheap to buy the supplies required for such an obsession. Frugality aside, I do not consider myself particularly creative or even artistic. On top of that, I don’t have a point of view that I just have to show the world. Even so, on occasion I can craft when given careful guidance and inspiration.

The Mollyanna Bowl
Some people, like my friend Anna, don’t wait for “someday” to do something that strikes their fancy. I discovered this the pleasant way while lingering at her home. We were perusing books on how to use recycled objects to make crafts with your kids. We agreed that the majority of the materials used in one book in particular were not recycled nor even recyclable. This is a bit of a sticking point since I’m not sure I’d want to keep or give away some of the crap, uh, crafts. I don’t like the idea of craft for craft’s sake because then you wind up with a bunch of JUNK and a house that smells like an old lady’s (that last part is purely conjecture on my part).

We did come across a braided rug technique used to make coasters. It seemed like something we might try this summer with the kids. Unfortunately, Anna had just given away her scraps to the best second grade teacher ever, Molly. We came up with the idea of using plarn (yarn made of plastic shopping bags). As I was still pondering, I realized Anna had already left the room, gathered supplies, and was cutting up shopping bags in strips. Plarn, we agreed, would make for a terrible coaster. We made bowls. This is my Mollyanna bowl full of CSA apricots.

I learned several things on this project.
* Plastic is a pisser to sew.
* Use clear thread and a thimble.
* Don’t prejudge the outcome.
* It’s okay to waste time like this. It has a name: experimentation.

The Art Teacher Utility Apron
Anna (again with the ANNA!) bought a bunch of oil cloth for use as a table cloth for her youngest child’s birthday. I’ve been looking at this material for some time. It’s colorful and functional and fantastic! Here Anna was buying it so casually and comfortably. Actually, what she bought was vinyl with a meshy backing, which is commonly called oilcloth though technically it’s not. Later, I saw a utility apron my friend betts* made for an auction at the school (a mix of traditional and contemporary oilcloth she bought in Mexico). Then betts* announced plans to make another apron for Molly while Anna was securing a Vy and Elle bag. Suddenly, I’m all about aprons and working with oilcloth or vinyl.


One day while sealing tiles for the Borton Environmental Learning Lab’s human sundial, the art teacher talked about how she identified with my son. She mentioned that she found it hard to take risks and get out of her comfort zone, but that she decided to do that this year with clay. Her clay work, well, I can’t express my thoughts on what she and the children did. It was moving to say the least. Plus, that she “saw” my kid out of hundreds and cared about his well-being – again, I can’t express my thoughts on that. After talking with her, I decided to take a risk and get out of my comfort zone. With the expert help of my pal betts* who made sure I didn’t sew the multiple pockets upside down, inside out, and backwards, I sewed this “oilcloth” utility apron for the art teacher. Isn’t it lovely? It took five hours minus buying time, but including the time it took to go home and get the foot pedal I’d left behind.

On this project, I learned:
* Make sure your foot pedal is stored with your sewing machine.
* Pay attention to the instructions, even when instinct tells you something else.
* Listen to betts* when she tells you three times, “don’t do that!” before she begs “please don’t do that.” What she means is, “your pocket may be right side up, but your seams will show.”
* I can top stitch!
* Slow and steady wins the race.
* Perfection isn’t a requirement.

Father’s Day Basket
Thanks to my mother-in-law I have cable (and high speed internet). One of our channels features networks that we don’t get in order to entice us to upgrade. I’ve never been thusly tempted, however, I was temporarily sidetracked from reality shows and Fox News by DIY. I rushed to the computer to look up their projects. Father’s Day was at hand and the kids wanted to make something for their dad. The DIY website provided several possibilities.


We made this basket out of old grocery sacks. You have to see it live on his mail table to fully appreciate it’s beauty. It looks great and when he’s tired of it, it’s totally recyclable. Our plan was to paint it, but as it was this took us three days.

I learned much with this project too.
* You need more than three days to weave and paint a basket with your kids.
* Rotary cutters make quick strips.
* It’s okay to BUY Dad a gift.

My future crafting goals are to make oilcloth lunch bags for my kids, sewing a shirt, and learning pottery from Mechelle and Anna. I’m giving myself years as a deadline for achieving any part of this as I still have an eight year quilt in the closet, a latch hook rug, and a cross stitch pillow turning to dust in the hall closet.

Unremarkable

I posted these on my other blog, but thought I could share it more broadly. Maybe my folks want to be updated on my medical status.

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Otorhinolaryngology. I didn’t even make up that word. I’ve been trying to see an ear, nose, throat (ENT) doctor for 20 years now. Mostly I was un- or underinsured for it. Then I got insured, but an ENT requires a referral and how am I gonna get that if I can’t even see my PCP when I have been hospitalized? Fortunately when I’m illin’, I’m crafty!

While being seen for pneumonia at the “same day” clinic, I complained about my ears. I went into my big ol’ long history of ear trauma and pathetically asked for my referral. Then I breathlessly insisted on it at my follow-up “same day” clinic appointment. I couldn’t walk for long distances or stand up, but I was highly motivated even in my decrepit state. If I survived flu, cocci, and pneumonia, by gum I was going to hear!

Oh, the world of difference between the office for poor sick folk and the office for rich people who can afford hearing aids! The primary difference is the big yellow sign in all caps reading, “YOU WILL NOT BE SEEN WITHOUT YOUR CO-PAYMENT, CURRENT REFERRAL, AND VALID INSURANCE CARD [sic] THANK YOU.” They are all about money. Other signs warned about service charges for bounced checks and processing fees if you left without making a co-payment. Lots of advertisements for hearing aids were on display. “TV Ears saved our marriage!” I had the vague fear that better hearing may negatively impact mine. I know for sure that Jesse’s artillery ear has helped us avoid fights after I’ve muttered grumbley grumbles under my breath, behind Jesse’s back, in a different room.

The secondary difference is that the specialist’s office is plush. They had a television and it was on Paula Dean. There were magazines. The wait was only 20-30 minutes. Of course they both had special signage, welcome windows, and time slots for drug reps. Next time I get sick, I am going to make a drug rep appointment rather than trying to see a doctor for my health.

Long story short, the ENT looked into my ears and said I had a hole in my eardrum – not the head, just the ear drum. Then he sent me for a hearing test, which I failed. DUH! But my hearing loss had the pattern of a brain tumor or something that sounded like “manure’s disease.” I’ll say. I’m real sick of all this manure about the best health care in the world. What he actually said was “meniere’s disease” but I couldn’t hear him because of the hearing loss. I later found out that Van Gogh likely had this disease and that’s why he chopped his ear off. So either my brain is screwed or I’ll soon lose my ear. Alternatively, and this is my own personal diagnosis, I’m perfectly healthy and it’s just a hearing loss related to that hole in my ear drum. I suspect the hole is the result of an ear drum that tired of bursting and rehealing in the absence of a doctor’s care and figured it might as well be permanently busted.

In the meantime, it’s a hearing aid for me and an MRI. More on that later, but as way of a preview this story ends happily for everyone except my children’s empty bellies. I’m currently teaching them the request, “More porridge, please.”

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Last Thursday was my make-up MRI. Of course it required a needle and “contrast”, which set me right off to the water fountain. I was going to be hydrated to the max to ensure my veins were pumped up and therefore less vulnerable to multiple puncture wounds. I didn’t want a repeat of the hospital horror leading up to the CT scan. The radiologist assured me the kind of needle used was different and “the dye isn’t nearly as dangerous.” How trustworthy is someone who radiates people for a living?

My brother already had me freaked out based on his surmise that if the radiologists had trouble with something as mundane as scheduling that I might really be in trouble when that big magnet was turned on and my brain was pounded. To add to my anxiety, at this point in my telling Jesse the toxic dye story he said, “Of course it’s fatal. Why do you think they call it die?” So I’m waiting for my father, son, or other important male in my life to say something slightly threatening to my life.

Needles aside, I was taken to a large room filled with a larger machine (I recognize that’s not possible). “Do you have anything in your pockets? Do you have any metal objects lodged in your body?” No, no. “Do you have your hearing aid on?” No. “What kind of music would you like to listen to?” Didn’t you just hear me say I’m not wearing my hearing aid? “Are you claustrophobic?”

Then they lay me down on the table. They lock my head in a mask. They give me a bubble to squeeze if I freak out. They strap me down, but insist the strap isn’t to keep me down. I’m pretty sure if I tied my kids down in bed like that, a CPS call would be in order. Then they proceed to blast my brain to what I think could have been Fir Elise. The process isn’t unlike early morning weekend sleep while the neighbors cut down a tree, tear down a storage shed, build another storage shed, or generally find something entertaining to do with power tools.

Halfway through -(dun dun DUN!)- The Needle. They slide the table out and stab me while still strapped down with the Hanible Lecter mask on. My arm goes numb and wonky. “You’re doing fine.” Really? It’s true the needle wasn’t as bad, but it wasn’t all that great either. And what does not doing fine look like? I’m strapped down on a table with my head in a vice, shoved in a giant machine with my brains exposed ala x-ray goggles from the back of an Archie’s Comic.

A week later, today, I get the results. The ENT’s aid calls to tell me “I’ve got good news. The results of your MRI came back and you have brains. Further, there is nothing at all wrong with them.” The gloating on my part was short lived. The letter from the radiologist with the results came in the mail. “IMPRESSION: Brain appears unremarkable….” The bubble bursts.

Who Lives Down There?

For Earth Day I taught 300 Borton children and adults how to determine “what lives down there?” Here I am.

My daughter is the noticeably bored kid in blue. The first language of the kid staring at the ground up front is Kurdish. I’m hoping they don’t represent how miserable everyone else was at the only station in full sun.

For three years, I’ve been visiting the bird sanctuary at my children’s school and staring at a variety of ground holes. The first year, I walked around a couple of times watching Anna and betts struggle with irrigation while noticing the subterranean homes of the desert critters. Jesse was in Iraq and so my attention was divided. Mostly I remember the striped shirt I wore on both visits. The second year was focused on pulling buffel grass and looking at ground holes. I don’t remember what I wore. This third year we’ve worked on getting children and families into the bird sanctuary. Since I’d spent three years thinking of Wonderland down those rabbit holes, I was elected to run a station on ground hole identification. I wore a striped skirt.

Here’s your minilesson:
1) Where is the hole located? Is it elevated or level with the ground? Is it out in the open or under a bush or between rocks?
2) How big is the hole? Is it small for insects or ants? Is it medium sized for a rodent of some sort? Is it large enough to accommodate a coyote? Measure the height/width of the entrance for more precise identification. In general you’ll look for holes smaller than 3 inches, between 3 and 8 inches, and greater than 8 inches in diameter.
3) What shape is the hole? Circular holes typically belong to rodents. You’re likely to find lizards in semicircular holes. Ovular holes will house tortoises, for example.

You can take note of other details too like if it has a silky barrier to it (you can expect a spider in that hole) or whether the homeowner is tidy or messy. Sometimes another animal will move into an abandoned hole. I showed the kids all kinds of photos of animals with their holes, including burrowing owls and kangaroo rats.

At this point, I asked the kids to look around the sanctuary to see if they can guess “who lives down there?” If they wrote down the answers to the three questions I gave them and send a letter to me using the school’s post office, I would help them identify ground holes in their yards or nearby parks. The kids were pretty cool, but the adults giggled when I invited everyone to tell me about their holes. I have received no letters thus far.

Check out more pix of our awesome Earth Day. Sadly, the composting station didn’t get photographed. The kids really got into worm poop.

Jumping for Joy

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Twice recently I found myself literally jumping up and down delirious with some sort of emotion I’m not sure I could identify. The last time I felt it, I was around 16 years old playing in the mud with my buddy Princehoss. That girl knew, and still knows, how to play. Holy crap! That’s what I was doing. I was playing! Well, I love to play and I am going to do it more often.

In the first case of joy jumping, I was actually jumping. I got an invite to double dutch from Tamale. She and her chick rocker friends, literally chick rocker friends as they were all female and played drums or guitar, have a dutch gang and they let this old lady hang with them. We tried variants on rope swinging and running in and out of the ropes and best of all I had to jump a six-foot chain link fence to get to the slab. Of course I was bone sore later and it didn’t help that I ripped my ass muscle to disability, but it was so worth it.

The following weekend Anna came over and taught me how to make my wannabe petite diced tomato cans into flowers with tin snips and spray paint. Jesse nailed them to our backyard fence for color in this drab desert town. I took pix of the whole experience – from flesh slicing snipping to spray paint tagging to gloating fence nailing. Maybe I’ll share with you the secrets of my creative, artistic mentor in a future pictorial, but for now all you need to know is that seeing the final product made me squeak and jump. I can only imagine what Anna thought, but she still talks to me so I couldn’t have totally blown my cool. The above flower my kids call the sun star flower.

Joy.

Salsa Sabrosa de Alex

Alex occasionally blogs about her adventures in cooking. Her mad kitchen skills are one of the many reasons you could find her annoying. Another would be that she’s a adored among the kids at school who think she’s soooo beautiful. I would avoid her, but she’s ridiculously nice (and cool, and funny, and shares her recipes). Besides, the kids are right. She’s an attractive woman with three cutie pie boys to prove it’s genetics and not simply superficial style.

The specialty in the Alex home is Mexican food and so accordingly she cooks great meals for her familia. She’s posted posole, chicken tacos with each tortilla hand fried, and bean tostadas. Each of these served up with a side of salsa. I don’t pretend with myself. I can’t manage that – not even with all the love, adoration, and dedication I have to and for my family. Did I mention that my ancestral women folk worked? It’s a lame excuse since those women managed to work AND cook, but it’s all I got.

Ignoring my rationalizations and knowing I can’t cook, I decided to attempt Alex’s salsa. It was hard work. I slaved in the kitchen. And like my cookies, there was deviation from perfection. Fortunately, this is one of those informal recipes you get from gramma and friendly types. Precise measurements and enumerated directions are for Betty Crocker. And without further ado:


(Alex’s salsa photo)

1 28 oz. can petite diced tomatoes, unless you didn’t pay that close attention and got plain old diced tomatoes, which gives you a slightly chunkier texture
A generous sprinkle of garlic salt, however much that is
A few grinds of fresh pepper, as though you had fresh pepper
Juice of 1 key lime, or in my case lemon juice because I didn’t have a lime, much less a key lime, rolling around my kitchen
Seed and mince 4-6 jalapeños, but don’t try to put your contacts in afterward
Chop 1 onion, organic cancer fighter
Finely mince 1/2 bunch of fresh cilantro, or the whole bunch since there’s not much chance you’d use the other half, which would just go wasted like so many CSA greens
Mix it all together in a big bowl. The end.

We drank it out of margarita glasses with salty rims (that’s a joke). The salsa stood alone at my table, complimented only by the chips. Salsa is what was for dinner. I put the remainder in jars. See?

I ate one jar the next day and gave the other to Todd-o the following night. A half hour after saying goodbye to the final jar and after a couple of beers, Jesse went looking for the last bit of salsa and was peeved to find there was none. The moral of the story is that Alex’s forgiving salsa recipe must be solid if I could stir it up and a late night tipsy muncher would mourn the last bit.

I Heard the News Today…


The best part about my recent trip to Canada is that I allowed myself to take a real vacation. I didn’t even get dressed without reading the newspaper. Here’s a round-up of stories that captured my attention.

From the Globe and Mail in Vancouver…

From the Obituaries
McDonalds franchise owner responsible for the invention of the Egg McMuffin passed away March 25th at the age of 89. Had I known, I would have canceled my trip in favor of mourning, or at the very least I would have had a breakfast sandwich in his memory. Say what you’d like about McDonald’s, but Herb Peterson was a great man whose McMuffin has brought me great joy. (The Canadians may take exception to the term “Canadian bacon”, but I say the Chicago-born Herb can call that stuff whatever he likes.)

Tiny Mentions
A French folk song is the oldest recording of the human voice. Recorded 148 years ago, a 10-second recording was made by a Parisian inventor who got lots of recognition. The singer’s name wasn’t mentioned. As usual, the poor artist gets the shaft again. If you have a particular sort of something you can even listen to the recording.

Star Gazing
In less than 48 hours Carla Bruni managed to step neatly out of the role of temptress, husband-stealer and all-round sexual velocraptor into the role of an impeccably poised first lady. People are trying to compare her to Jackie O but, pul-eeze. Forget it.

Big Boys with Little Toys
To commemorate their 40th anniversary, Hot Wheels had a design contest. All the major car companies were represented and somebody won. Hooray! The real news is that this momentarily took Parrish’s mind off LEGOs and Bionicles.

Homework Completed
George’s teacher told her to look for a great tree while in Vancouver and she did just that. After reading this story about Stanley Park’s Hollow Tree, George was on a mission. She listened to the story closely, cut out the article, and kept it with her even as she slept in the closet. We went to visit the tree where George was interviewed by a broadcast journalism student. He asked her several questions about the tree, to which she gave her informed opinion. Her major soapboxing was that it was time to stop spending money on the tree. “Trees are part of nature and they should fall over theirselves.”

American Politics
(Editorial note: There is hardly mention of McCain except in terms of his existence. Clinton is mentioned occasionally, but mostly in terms of her desire to renegotiate NAFTA. They don’t appreciate that idea. Obama is the love child of Canada I think. They discussed him in detail, including the following article.)

Did you know Obama only wears white dress shirts? Apparently so, and this article even gives you tips on getting your own white shirt. Seriously. Because it really matters if you are white collar. I think I’m going to go buy myself a blue collared shirt. No disrespect to Obama, but since I’m now forced to think of the symbolism of my shirts…

We may have the same news here in the States. I wouldn’t know. I don’t have time to read the newspaper now that I have my internet access back. Canadians have a serious lack of free wifi.

Baking Cookies

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I’m pretty sure I shouldn’t have told my children that kids die in Iraq and so quit asking me for Eegee’s. It was a tough day, but that’s not much of an excuse. I could probably be a better mother. I lost my interest in feeling guilty as a granddaughter, daughter, sister, aunt, niece, cousin, and in-law after an intervention. The “professional” said I could let it go, so I did. Maybe I need a mommy intervention.

I’ve been wondering because Mz. Molly asked me some pointed questions about reacting in a positive way to family who would control you through guilt. It didn’t seem realistic to suggest an intervention, so I told her I’d think on it.

That night I made chocolate chip cookies for the kids. They’ve been good little zombies and I wanted to treat them. I read the “traditional” recipe on the bag and realized happily that I had all the ingredients except for the chips. So we bought the bag and were on our way.

The thing about my baking is that my mother was a working mom. Her mother was a single working mom. And even her mother, my great-grandmother, was a single working mom. My dad’s mom worked too. What woman was responsible for teaching me how to bake cookies?

I made up my own guilt-free, perfectly imperfect chocolate chip cookie recipe just for Molly, and myself. Here’s how it played out:

In a big bowl combine flour, baking soda, and salt. Oops, in a small bowl. I’ll wash the big one in a second. It’s encouraging to see that there are no wee beasties in my flour, but if I double the recipe, I can get fresh flour for future mischief. Unfortunately, there’s a 1/4 cup left and my frugal inner voice can not waste it. Oh, darn. The bag upended spilling the flour on the floor. Sweep it up and put flour on the grocery list. Stir.

In a big bowl – maybe I won’t wash that one out. In a big bowl mix softened butter – softened! I didn’t see that. Ah, well. Chilled will have to do. Mix cold butter, sugar, and brown sugar. I should have softened the brown sugar. It’s a block. Well, that’s what ice picks are for. I mean, they are for ice, but they’ll work on any chunk of something that has petrified in the pantry. Beat.

The cold butter and chunky brown sugar stall my beater and the familiar smell of band aids from the motor fills the air. This is a good beater. It has been with me for 20 years of cold butter and chunky brown sugar. At this point, a wedge of brown sugar pushes my beaters apart and threatens to bend them at the base. After ice picking the wedge out, I’m pleased to see that ol’ faithful shook it off and finished the work of butter batter beating.

“Do you want me to finish these cookies or not? Okay, then get out of the kitchen.” Baking is a great family activity.

Oops! Add organic vanilla was supposed to come before beating cold butter, sugar, and chunky brown sugar. The recipe doesn’t actually call for organic vanilla, but it’s what I have and I feel good about it. Now, it’s all beatted. Beaten?

Anyway, it’s time to add the cruelty free, locally produced, organic eggs. That’s right. These eggs are so hot, so now, that surely everyone will realize what a great human being I am. I’m proud to add them to the mix one at a time. While the recipe calls for one-at-a-time eggs, it’s one of those serendipitous things because it gives me a chance to remove the shell fragments that fall in the dough when I crack the eggs.

All done with the eggs, add the flour a little at a time. There’s some. There’s some more. You know, when I was younger I didn’t have the patience for that. I’d get to the point when I just dump it, which is what I do next.

I’m at the end of the process. Now all I have to do is add the chocolate chips. Holy crap! Dos problemos aqui. First, these chips are made by Nestle and I swore when I nursed my son eight years ago that I would boycott Nestle. I’d better hide the bag deep in the trash. This bit of shame just might erase the local goodness of my eggs and the chemical-freeness of the vanilla. Secondly, I doubled the recipe and only have single the chips. Whatevs! I’m not turning back now.

Time to drop them by huge spoonfuls (does anyone really make beautiful dainty chocolate chip cookies?). It gives me the creeps to even think on it. I’m sure they are convenient to carry and good for the waist, but who wants to watch for 10 dozen cookies to cook? It would take all freaking day!

Preheated oven, no greased pans, easy-peasy. OMG! Did I really just say easy-peasy? First batch, underdone. Second batch, overdone. Third batch, burned. Each kid got a doughy cookie and a glass of milk five minutes after they should have been in bed. I can’t stand the thought of making these innocents brush the comforting, warm yumminess from their baby mouths with sterile, burning toothpaste. I make brushing teeth optional.

This recipe yields enough cookies for kids, teachers, and the midnight cookie monster. The cookies are as imperfect as their maker, but tasty nevertheless. They are part wholesome goodness that benefits the world and part corporate evil that packs on the pounds. On balance, I have to say that I’m perfectly satisfied by the effort and have no need to feel guilty about any of it. I could do better, and may in the future. I may do worse. For certain, I will not be paralyzed to do nothing.