Something weird happens when you prepare one recipe for ten families. You hit a rhythm. Your eyes sort of glaze over… cranberry sauce, onion soup, pour the dressing, mix it together… until you make a mistake and dump the cranberries into the wrong bowl. Then you halt, figure out what’s what, and get back to the business of making freezer meals.
Several years ago my friend Carrie read a book about cooking a whole bunch of meals in one day—30 to be precise—and them freezing them. It’s a lot of work up front, but incredibly helpful in reducing meal prep time for future dinners. Carrie invited a bunch of girlfriends to Cooking Day and we worked, side by side, on our feet for hours on end to fix those 30 meals. We divided the costs and went home that evening with achy calves but feeling like queens with freezers full of meals.
Fast forward a few years. Carrie is keeping tabs on her husband’s cholesterol, which means a whole lot of lean chicken meals and not many casseroles at her home. So I’ve started a new freezer meal coop where all the chefs prepare two meals at home… ten times over. In this post I’ve included a few shots of one of my meals, Cranberry Chicken, and one of my dog, who stays oh-so-faithfully at my side when I’m cooking. I like to pretend he enjoys my company but I know better. He’s the dog equivalent of a Hoover vacuum cleaner so all in all, he earns his keep and keeps the kitchen floor spotless.
The recipe for Cranberry Chicken can be found at my (our) recipe blog, Needs More Butter.
This morning Livia woke up and wanted to write a Valentine for Haiti. She told me it would say this, “I am sorry your whole family died. I hope you love me. Love, Livia.”
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[Written on another day...]
Liv has just returned from time-out for disobedience. She returns to her kitchen stool and urgently calls me. “Mama! Mom! Mom! You need to come look at this!!”
I put down the soapy dishes and walk to the stove.
Liv points to the rounded pound of ground beef I’m browning, “Is it a brain?” and then she declares, “It’s MASTY.”
I got a good chuckle out of the masty brains, that she then admitted smelled good.
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Livia’s Reminder Note to Self:
Photographers should not take pictures of people when they are naked. It is rude.
Recorded on a piece of newspaper after kid camera incident with mom in the bathroom that morning.
Bath time around here is an Event. (And when it can’t be an Event, it becomes a difficult task for everyone involved.) Sometimes there are bubbles and sometimes there is a new, special bath toy, but always there is one little girl, tons of mismatched and somewhat random toys to play with, soap and water.
And by the time the little girl gets out of the tub, she’s usually quite relaxed. She rolls up in a towel and takes a breather. All that fun in the hot water is hard work!
Challenge for the day: take your camera somewhere new. Let me know if you blog about it.
Livia’s cubby at school had a little note in it today. It read,
Livia got caught being good! Signed, [her teacher]… For helping another student!
I cheered on my daughter and she explained further that a friend’s pants were coming down and she helped her notice it. Liv has issues with falling pants, so it really was a kindness and help to her friend this afternoon.
When you are five years old and you have a hard time focusing and keeping yourself under control, it is a HUGE deal to be noticed for being good. And oh, how I love it that her teacher sees these good qualities and encourages them. I have been brought to tears more than once by the way Liv’s teachers “catch” her doing good and then praise her accordingly. There are just so many “No, don’t do thats” and “Quit touching thats” and “Move fasters” that a young child has to hear. It’s important that kids know what it is they are doing right in the midst of their days. I have to be reminded periodically to verbally rejoice and encourage my child.
In the same vein, I think it’s important that we tell our friends what it is that makes them special. Do you have a friend who listens to you drone on and on about your workday? Do you know someone who is particularly cheery when you’re not? Do you have a mom/sister/best friend who will come wash your dishes when you’re down? (Real life example with my mom last week–thank you, Mom!) Do you appreciate the way your friend sees beauty in the mundane? If so, figure out a way to send them a slip of encouragement.
There is snail mail, which I’ve particularly been craving lately. Anyone else crave a good newsy letter?
And then, there is Valentine’s Day. How cool would it be to send out notes of encouragement on a holiday that celebrates love?
I almost wrote that I’d get off my soapbox now, but ha! Who am I kidding? I’m a blogger. This is my soapbox! And I’m totally not getting off anytime soon.
Livia is becoming surprisingly efficient at applying face paint. I’m trying not to plan her future career based on the whims of Liv-at-five, but still. Wouldn’t it be cool if she worked in the movies someday? She could get her mom onto the set to watch the action. She might win an Oscar for makeup. You never know.
These are the ramblings of a tired woman on a Friday night. I can hear car doors slamming for a movie and game night next door (no, not there, a tired woman lives at that house too). I feel very unhip and old and boring at the moment. Blogging on a Friday night. BLOGGING. Oh well. Hope these shots entertain you on a Friday as well.
I present: The Many Faces of Livia.
Oooo. Scary.
And sweet.
Super silly.
And serious.
This baby is so soft and scrunchy and dreamy, I just can’t stand it. Welcome to the world, precious Ian! I have had the great privilege of watching your mommy’s tummy grow over the past several months and now I get to celebrate your arrival. You are such a blessed gift from God. We love you so much already.
I’m quite pleased with Ian’s photo shoot and can’t wait to share more images with you. Isn’t he delightful?
We went for a walk in the park. In knee-deep snowdrifts. Hip-deep for Liv. It took an hour to make a very small loop in which I could see my house the whole time. Still, in a desperate moment, I recalled the doomed flight that landed in the Andes Mountains. And I decided Liv and I would eat the dog first before making more, shall we say, difficult decisions. Fortunately I had my cell phone. Even more fortunately, my child chose to be brave when she felt like giving up.
This series is from the more light-hearted moments of our almost ill-fated journey. And even though I wanted so badly to catch a shot of a snowball in the air, I wanted even more badly to keep my camera dry and functioning. : )
A professional portfolio for photography.
It’s about time I created a little space to showcase the work I’ve been doing over the past year. I’m also looking forward to linking to all the sites and photographers who inspire me on a regular basis.
Stay tuned!
Here’s the face paint shot you’ve been clamoring for. (What? No? Ohhh, so sorry.)
The holiday party for Jeremy’s company was held at Teatro ZinZanni on Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco. I’ll admit I was a bit nervous about potential audience participation for this event, but the evening ended up being so. much. fun. It was the dinner theater to end all dinner theaters—and I believe it was the perfect counterpoint to all the cold, snowy Saturday nights Jeremy and I have spent at home this winter. We were out! in San Francisco! eating five courses! and drinking! and being entertained! [sigh] It was lovely.
And the facepaint was an added bonus. Just try doing this at home!
The other face shot was taken on our doomed flight home. It was the precise instance of photographic inspiration and traveling companion exhaustion. Let’s just say the subject at hand was getting beamed ferociously by the sunrise and didn’t want his picture taken. I believe we stayed in the air—after departing San Francisco 45 minutes late—for only 20 minutes before making an unscheduled landing in Reno, Nevada.
We were informed that we needed to make a landing, and that there might be emergency vehicles awaiting the plane, but not to worry. The mood was remarkably calm; we passengers sat and patiently waited to figure out what was going on. We landed easily and sat still while mechanics entered and went into the cockpit. I overheard a flight attendant saying a cockpit computer had electrical problems and the cockpit had filled with smoke, the pilots had to don oxygen masks(!). Eventually we de-planed and spent way too much time in the Reno airport where Diet Mountain Dew is NOT sold and you can play slot machines in the hallways. Charming. And eventually we made it home to Lincoln, about eight hours after we had planned. By that point, we were simply relieved to get back to our daughter.
Our luggage found us the next day.
