Weekend Exposure 36

?: One year ago...

My answer can be found here.

Weekend Exposure 35

Yeah, I missed a week.  Ah well! Onward and upward....

?: Who (what/when/where/why) are you missing?
My answer can be found here.

Good Things Growing

I can tell that Spring is finally (nearly?) here.  There are signs of it all around.  

There are roses from Big Daddy.  These are very special roses, also known as Apology Roses.  Because my husband realizes he married a crazy person who immediately assumes, if she hasn't heard from him by 7pm, that he has been in a horrific industrial accident and is right this minute bleeding out from a wound that she would totally know how to apply a tourniquet to but how can she when she doesn't know where to find him ZOMGWTFBBQ?!  So.. yeah.  Apology Roses.  They smell sweeter than the regular kind, I swear.

Several days ago I planted seeds in some paper cups to get the seedlings started indoors because, sweet jumping Joe Jonas on a Pogo Stick, the danger of frost has STILL not passed.  Jack has been terribly upset by the fact that nothing has grown yet. (It's been 5 whole minutes, though, Mom! Why aren't the seeds growing us food yet?!)

And then, today, we spotted this little bugger.  I'm gonna go ahead and assume that that's spinach, since that's what's written on the side of the cup.  I've never seen spinach seedlings before, so I'm not really sure if that's what they're supposed to look like.  But look! How brave he is! Grow tiny spinach, GROW! Make us food, and bring me one step closer to winning Granola Earth Mother Of The Year In My Own Mind!  Because I've heard that's basically the recipe: cloth diapering + grow your own food = Green Parenting WIN! (Don't pop my happy little bubble by dispelling the delusion.  I like the bubble. It's warm and sparkly in here.)

Planting these food plants, in addition to the strawberry, blueberry and raspberry plants that I have planted in the yard, is another step in the Year Without Fear.  I've always wanted a food garden, but always been afraid I'd go to all that effort only to end up with no food to show for it.  I may very well end up with nary a bean for my efforts, but then again I might end up baking blueberry muffins with my own berries.  You never know until you try.

These are snake plants, birthed of some other snake plants, that are originally from a mother plant that was cared for by Big Daddy's Gramma Tina for I don't know how long.  The big plant we had - a cutting from Gramma Tina's plant - lived in Big Daddy old apartment in downtown Washington, D.C., where it was fed a steady diet of stale beer and cigarette smoke for many, many moons.  That plant finally started to lose its long battle with sickness and, despite my less-than-stellar track record at keeping green things alive, I took some cuttings from it and rooted them in water.  2 years later our original plant was finally giving up the ghost, but those babies were still going strong in the water in my kitchen window sill.  They're like the Britney Spears of houseplants: every time you think they're going to make it, they start to croak... and just when you count them out, they're BACK, Baby!  (Suddenly I'm seeing a parity between Britney Spears and Zombies that I had heretofore failed to detect...) 

Anyway, they are finally safely ensconced in some lush potting soil... which is to say that you can probably take safe odds they'll be hunched over limply in about a week.

Happy Spring, Everybody!  Go grow something.

Oh, wait.. you want to know about this?  *pointing at this here blog scenery*

What, THIS old thing?  Ah well. It IS spring, after all - time to make all things new again.  It was about time for a redesign, and this free template (courtesy FinalSense) was just too good to pass up.  A few tweaks to the design and... tah-dah!   It will take some getting used to, but I'm embracing it.  I hope you will, too, internets.

Open-Mindedness

Via Andrew Sullivan... This is maybe the most awesomest video ever.  Welcome to my brain.

Favorite Things, Tempting Fate, Embracing Love

Love and gifts from faraway loved ones.

(Especially ones who remember I have a weakness for pretty necklaces)

Definitely some of my favorite things.  

As to tempting fate, it's of course immediately after my year of Living On Purpose - "A year without fear" - begins that Milo has a double ear infection (with a perforated ear drum on one side, naturally), Tobin declares he does not want to go to school ever again, thankyouverymuchbuhbye, and Jack falls off the climbing wall at school and bashes his head on a metal ladder.  

But everyone is okay, and to scornful fate I say "pfffthhhbbbbbbt."  No one ever said it would be easy.  But life is something to be embraced.

This week, in spite of their minor complaints and my minor whining, I am embracing my children as tight as I can and silently hurting for the parents of Maddie.  Their sweet, beautiful little girl was born too soon and had to fight with all her might to live.  They lost her this week, and I can only imagine the shambles their world is in right now.  I can't let myself think about what it would be like to lose a child, most especially one for whom they had to fight so hard for to begin with. My heart is aching for them.  Follow the link to send them some support, or go here to find out what you can do to help.

And go hug your loved ones.

My Favorite Things.

One of my favorite Bloggers, Bossy, has a recurring feature called "Bossy's Favorite Things". She inspires me in more ways than one, but this is one of those ways.  I love the idea of sharing favorites, because it's an incomparable glimpse into what makes a person tick.

So from time to time I'll be sharing some of my favorite things with lucky you.  

Let's begin, shall we?

Coffee. In my Bad Ass (literally) coffee mug from my Father-in-law. 

Yo Crunch. Because it's yogurt (healthy!)

with little bits of Butterfinger (so it feels naughty!)

It's the breakfast of champions, people.

Awesome Things About Turning Thirty.

1) I finally feel like a grown-up.  Well, not entirely... but at least I don't feel like an overgrown teenager any more.  But, lest I despair, I did get carded when buying Big Daddy a bottle of single-barrel Jack yesterday.  I made sure to tell the check-out girl "Thank You!"

2) The Year Without Fear starts TO-DAY.  I'm celebrating by making a huge pot of Oatmeal and having breakfast with my family.  Not that that's something I'm afraid to do. Well, not totally afraid, anyway. (Have you ever SEEN small children eat oatmeal? It's enough to turn the hair white. Let's just hope we keep it off the ceiling.)

3) Big Daddy swept me away last night for a romantic dinner for two at the new local restaurant that constructs its entire menu around locally sourced ingredients.  They change the menu up every few weeks and have an incredible chef who I am now fantasizing about kidnapping and forcing to be my personal Food Goddess for the rest of eternity.  Calamari with bleu cheese dipping sauce (I normally HATE bleu cheese, but I wanted to bathe in this.) followed by marinated hanger steak (medium-rare, of course) with caramelized onions, three-cheese polenta, and braised greens.  We shared a bottle of the most amazing Cabernet from Chile over dinner, and then I was treated to the Best. Creme Brulee. Ever.  If I could have? I totally  would have shrunk down to an inch high just so I could roll naked in it. It was THAT. GOOD. (And you're welcome for the visual.  It's my little birthday gift to you. heh.)

4) Did I mention that today marks the beginning of "A Year Without Fear"?  Because today we're taking the boys to see Monsters vs. Aliens (all 3 kids. To a movie.  I am slaying dragons over here, people!) And also my embrace of healthier eating.  I figure at 30 I'm entitled to set rewards for myself for losing 3-babies-worth of weight, too, so after 10 pounds my friend Sarah and I get to make a visit to the Shrubber.  After 30 pounds I'm getting my new tattoo.  After 50 pounds I'm gutting my wardrobe and starting over. My new wardrobe will contain ONLY pieces of clothing that I love, because life is too short to surrender to the frump.

So share my birthday joy with me, internets.  And don't forget to ride along with me and maybe dive into fearlessness this year, too.

Weekend Exposure 33

?: This Week's Celebration...

My answer can be found here.

What Have I Been Doing?

There is a list of things that have kept me away from the internets recently.  

Ready for story time, boys and girls? Good. Then settle in and get comfy, because this could take a while.

1) Cake.  Holy Hanna Montana, CAKE.  What started with a single friend asking to hire me to do her daughter's birthday cake has sprung up into a much bigger venture than I would ever have imagined.  It rules, it really does. It's also exhausting and involves hours at a time bent over the kitchen counter with a piping bag in my hand.  That's not nearly as dirty as it sounds.

2) Soccer.  Did I mention that I'm a full-blooded soccer mom now?  Yeah, when I first realized it I actually felt myself die, just a little, on the inside.  But then I was faced with this:

and, really, how could that possibly make a person feel anything but glee?  Wookit my wittle MAN-man, all dressed up in his uniform!  GAH! The cuteness! IT BURNS! (And entirely justifies the excessive use of capital letters and exclamation points right there.)

3) Sushi!  We've started rolling our own, and now it's addicting.  Sushi is the one food that everyone in the house can agree on -- even Tobin, aka "He who has been known to refuse bananas, bread, and basically every other food or food-like product".  So I've been perfecting my craft (which is to say I have been eating lots of sushi recently because, um, research?)

4) Garden.  Okay, so I haven't actually started a garden yet, but I have had every intention of doing so.  I bought seeds and I picked out a spot in the yard with perfect sun. I even looked up how to build raised bed boxes for the perfect backyard vegetable patch.  By next year I might even get some veggies planted.  For now, though, its a lovely little kitchen garden in my mind.

5) Lists!  Lists gets an exclamation mark because I am incredibly good at making lists.  If they gave out trophies for list-making I would have a mantle full of them. (If I had a mantle.)  I am basically Queen Of Listing.  (As in writing lists, not the art of drunkenly walking at an angle. Though I have done that once or twice, but I'm not very good at it.)  When it comes to making lists, however, I totally "make them my companion".  Bonus points if you watch enough news network television to get the reference. (Also, Hi! Pardon the ADD, it's entirely genetic and totally not my fault.)

So, Lists. I have been making a lot of them.  Most notable is the list I am compiling for Things I Shall Do This Year as part of my Year Without Fear.  I'm contemplating a trapeze lesson this summer.  Not even my idea!  But I it fell across my path and I might just have to do it because it seems to fit right in with the whole "grab life by the cojones" spirit of the project.  Did I mention I'm terrified of heights? And falling?  This should be fun.

Also on "The" List for this year are things like "get dirty playing with the kids" and "make a Baked Alaska".   Yeah, I'm hoping the ideas will get better as the year comes along.

Do you have any great ideas for things I could reasonably do this year that would be awesome and fun and not incredibly expensive (and also not incredibly dangerous because - hi! - 3 little boys expect me to be alive to tuck them in at night)?  Leave suggestions in the comments below!  (If it's something like "Dye your hair purple" you'll have to come up with a very good cause I could support by doing so.  This is about doing Good Things, people.)

So there's the sordid, somewhat partial tale of what I've been doing.  I'll maybe get around to telling you more later, but for the moment there is a cake waiting for fondant details to be constructed.

So allow me to leave you with this:

I'm telling you... the cutness! IT BURNS!