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Poor residents of Illinois. First the tax apocalypse, then the snowcapolypse.  On top of our state woes,  our home experienced a cookie-capolypse last night. My mom and our friend, Jan, get together every year and bake TONS of valentine day cookies to ship to their friends and children. Due to this beautiful tradition, for the past ten years I have always received a box of tasty, pink valentine cookies in February. Even though my mom is gone on her mission this year, Jan and I got together to keep the tradition going.

Cookie-capolypse!

Jan and I are hard at work shaping and cutting the hearts. This is the first year that not a single cookie broke!

I have spent the morning hiding at the other end of the house, trying to avoid the cookies. At some point, I will have to face up to the task of packaging them to give away, and I am terrified that I will eat them all in the process. So I have decided to–once again–use blogging as a means of putting off items on my to-do list.

After Abe’s birthday on Friday, we spent the entire weekend in a birthing class learning how to do Lamaze, becoming educated on the joys of epidurals, and, best of all, learning about how husbands can help their wives through labor. The instructor was awesome. A nurse with 26 years of experience, she made all of the hubbies in the room practice massaging their wives and doing all different kinds of pressure-relieving holds to relieve pain. She then repeatedly encouraged the men to practice the massage techniques often, and to make sure their wives are always comfortable.

I married an over-achieving perfectionist, and Abe made that glaringly apparent yesterday by insisting on giving me a massage after working a fifteen hour day. Yay, husband! During the class itself, Abe sat in the front, took copious notes, and asked so many questions that by the end of the weekend, he and the instructor were on a very friendly first name basis. At one point I glanced over and caught him copying this down  into his notebook:

P – Powerful/purposeful
A – Anticipated
I – Intermittent
N – Normal.

Right. I smiled and nodded while the instructor soothingly talked about how pain is healthy and natural, but I didn’t buy it. I have met exactly one person who told me that not only did she not mind giving birth, but that she loved it. After three children, she said her births were some of the greatest experiences of her life. She wasn’t just talking about the meet-your-child part, either. This woman was referring to LABOR. Suspicious, I asked her if she had had natural births.

“Oh, no!” she exclaimed. “I had an epidural with all three.”

In my book, this type of advertisement trumps mnemonic devices any day. Bring on those beautiful drugs!! Except…Abe has a fear of needles, and this could prove problematic. He loved watching the natural birth videos, but he had to leave the room during the epidural birth video. It made him queasy and lightheaded, and ever since that experience he has been ever so gently talking up a natural birth.

This morning at breakfast (a time when he’s normally so tired he can barely put single syllable words together) he casually mentioned that he talked to his mom yesterday and discovered that natural births aren’t so bad. In fact, the only part of Abe’s birth that was unbearably painful to her was when the doctor stitched up a tear sans anesthetics. Abe then proceeded to tell me that he’d support me either way, but if I get an epidural he’d probably be holding my hand more for his own sake than mine. Oh, dear.

So it turns out the choice isn’t super easy after all. A) Experience a blissful ride in the “Cadillac of pain relief” and watch my husband pass out in the process or B) Stick it out naturally with the support of a fully-present partner. Hmm….

To make matters more complicated, my heart stopped when the instructor introduced us to the wonderful world of back labor. Back labor is when, as the instructor put it, “Baby didn’t get the memo to turn her head to the floor,” and therefore the hard skull of the baby is rubbing directly on the mother’s tailbone. This is, the instructor slowly explained, a very painful process for the mother.

My heart dropped. Back labor happens to women whose babies “didn’t get the memo.” Abe and I are two of the spaciest people I know. The only way I made it through school was making responsible friends who could tell me where to be and when after I’d lost my seventh copy of the syllabus. Abe has hilarious stories about forgetting about finals and walking around in his own little world, oblivious to everything around him. The chances of us producing a baby who actually “gets the memo” are approximately zero. I have confidence our daughter will be precious, beautiful, talented, and sweet, but I don’t expect her to be on top getting the memo. That appears to be a genetic impossibility. And so I prepare for back labor.

On that happy note, let me leave you with a wonderful chili recipe. I made it last night for the cookie-capolypse with Jan, and the chili turned out terrifically. I got the recipe from this month’s issue of Bon Appetite (and if you know how to do one of those accent thingys in blogger, let me know!): http://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/2011/02/black_bean_chili_with_butternut_squash

And since my chili came out monochromatic in color, here’s their picture:

Happy eating!

What a day! When the alarm went off on Friday, I woke Abe up by wishing him a cheery “Happy birthday!”.

“Let’s not overstate it,” Abe groaned, as he dragged himself tiredly out of bed. “How about saying just ‘birthday’?” (Abe’s least favorite part of every day is getting up, so feeling happy in the morning can be slightly daunting for him.)

Ooooh, boy, I thought to myself. We’re going to have to work extra hard to make this day special.

I jumped out of bed, made Abe a birthday breakfast, prepped his lunch, and got to work cleaning the kitchen. As soon as he left for work, I hauled out the vacuum and cleaned all the floors and carpets, and then I busted out the dusters and wash rags and cleaned until the house sparkled. After cleaning, I squeezed in a scripture study and then practiced the piano for a good three hours. At that point, I started to panic about the food. It was about noon and I had yet to:

• assemble, ice and decorate the cake
• make Abe’s favorite borscht (recipe follows–you will see it requires an insane amount of cutting and chopping)
• make and fry potato pancakes (using a box grater because my food processor is back in Hyde Park. This task was also daunting because I am terrified of frying and all of the spattering oil.)
• make three appetizers (rye bread with homemade Liptauer cheese and radishes, cucumber slices with trout pate and dill, and stuffed Medjool dates–some with goat cheese and pecans, and others with cream cheese and pecans)
• wash my hair and dry my hair (an hour + long process that I had put off for almost two weeks!!)

All this had to be done in a total of less than six hours. It might seem like a long time, but each of the things on the to-do list could easily consume an hour or more. Plus, I had a billion dishes to do between each dish! And, to make matters more interesting, Abe and I had been up until the wee hours the night before assembling training packets for his officers. I was exhausted, but I wanted Abe to come home to a clean and birthdayed-out house, so I rolled up my sleeves and got to work.

Here are the finished products:

Appetizers! Malika saved the day and made a whole other plate of stuffed dates because I ran out of time after putting these two trays together.

I used the leftover red dye for the piping on top, but it came out pink. So it looks like a cake for our baby girl instead of my 27 year old husband. Oh well. The red velvet cake was great, thanks to my friend Betsy! Check out her blog for the inspiring recipe (and pics of a superior end product):http://betsyandmicah.blogspot.com/2010/05/red-velvet-cake.html I have not piped in years, and so I covered the cake with a cake cover because I was sure all of my ridiculous baubles would melt and fall off the cake. I didn’t want to witness its sad demise. Tragically, when I removed the cake cover, I managed to smear off half of the decorative edging!

This is the most amazing borscht! It’s not very traditional, but it sure is yummy. I am posting the recipe at the end. Seriously, this is a winner (and it’s even vegan if you don’t garnish it with sour cream!).

Potato pancakes with sour cream and caviar. Thanks, Lily T., for the tip on World Market’s caviar! (It’s only $6!) Also, the pancakes weren’t burnt! One looks black in this picture, but I promise that’s my camera’s fault. They really were a pretty brown color and turned out very well, despite the fact that I was scared to death of flipping them in that hot, splattery oil!

I forgot to take a picture of Abe on his birthday!! So he wore the same outfit two days later and posed with a piece of leftover cake. His outfit matched the cake–very retro. He’s wearing his grandfather’s sweater–and shoes. =)

Here Malika and I are  having a very serious discussion about the joys of cream cheese frosting.

Anthony, Abe’s best friend, looking pensive. Abe had fun discussing Anthony’s childhood with Malika, who was curious. One of my favorite quotes of the night was Abe saying that Anthony was every teacher’s favorite student because “it’s just so hard to find a third grader that cares.”

How did the surprise go, you might wonder? Well, I managed to drop the Skype call just as Abe was walking in the door, so I made him go back out and come in two more times before I was finally ready. But it all worked out. His family sang “Happy Birthday” to him and his friends called in for the next half hour and sent along birthday greetings. Some of them are planning on coming out to meet our baby, and they had fun joking about how they’ll have diaper changing parties together. (Can you just imagine a group of male Wharton grads getting together and changing diapers? Talk about a break from Wall Street. The thought makes me laugh soooooooo hard!)

As for the piano performance, it went…okay. I managed to botch every single piece, but Abe professed to not notice. He insisted on taping the performance, so eventually we might post it to the blog. I introduced each piece by saying a little something about it. When it came time to introduce the Chopin Ballad in g minor, I mentioned that music critics often say this piece feels like a battle between Heaven and Hell. I meant to talk about why it represents to me how a couple in love can overcome their inner demons and the trials of life together, but it sounded hokey…so I ended up comparing the war between Heaven and Hell to marriage, and it came out all wrong. By the end of the piece, Malika exclaimed, “Wow, that makes me afraid of marriage!” Oops! But hopefully Abe knows I love him, even if I managed to compare our marriage to divine warfare.

So in the end, we had a wonderful time. By the end of the night, my legs were so swollen from standing and working all day that I could barely move, but everyone was well fed and happy. And Abe felt so loved! Thanks, everyone, for all of the recipes, suggestions, tips, skype dry-runs and phone calls. You helped make Abe’s 27th birthday a success, and I love you all for it!

Ooh, and Abe’s dad just sent me a Skype photo he took of Abe during the birthday Skype session!

Here’s the borscht recipe for those interested in tasting the best, most nutritious borscht of their lives. (This was given to me by Abe’s dad, who got it from Abe’s Aunt Christina):

Tomato-Beet (Borscht) Soup
1 (14&1/2 ounce) can tomatoes
1 (16 ounce) can sliced beets (use homeade bottled beets when available)
2 cups diced, peeled potatoes
2 cups thinly sliced green cabbage strips
1 cup chopped onion
1/2 cup chopped celery
1/2 cup shredded carrot
1/2 cup drained, canned sauerkraut
1 (3-ounce) can tomato paste
2 cups tomato juice
4 cups water
3 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
3 tablespoons chopped fresh dillweed (or 2 teaspoons dried dillweed)
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon garlic powder
2 bay leaves

Salt and pepper to taste

Sour cream for garnish

1.  Drain tomatoes and beets, reserving liquid.  Chop beets and tomatoes.

2.  In large pot, combine tomatoes with liquid, beets with liquid, potatoes, cabbage, onion, celery, carrot, and sauerkraut.  Stir in tomato paste, then tomato juice unitl blended.  Add water, parsley, dillweed, sugar, garlic, bay leaves, and salt and pepper to taste.  Mix well.

3.  Bring to boiling.  Reduce heat.  cover and simmer 45 to 60 minutes until potatoes are tender.

To Serve:
1.  Remove bay leaves.  Ladle soup into serving bowls.  Garnish with a daub of sour cream.

Yield:  8 Servings

I am planning Abe’s birthday, which includes an element of surprise. Abe thinks I can’t keep surprises, and he is right! I have already asked him twice if he wants to know what his surprise is, and he insists he doesn’t want to know. But I want to tell someone! I feel confident confiding this to the family blog because Abe is super, super busy this week, and he will have no time to discover this post. (Even if he did have time, he usually just waits until I tell him we have a new post before checking.) So I can tell you, but promise not to tell Abe, okay? He appears to want to be surprised.

I am planning a surprise party for Abe–but not the kind where people actually show up. Follow? Abe’s bests friends, with about one exception, all live far away from Chicago, and so I am planning a Skype surprise! Well, actually, one of his friends has very generously offered his conference line for the occasion, so Abe’s friends will all be plugged in via a conference call, and Abe’s family will plug in via Skype. I am very nervous because I hate coordinating stuff like this–so many things could go wrong! I have visions of dropped calls, Skype not working, people getting left out, people forgetting, and so many other bad-case scenarios. Also, it has been years since I’ve used Skype, and I am sure I will botch up the group Skype session. But I love Abe, and I really want him to know he’s appreciated on his birthday, so I am risking disaster all in the hopes that he will feel surprised and loved.

Here’s how it will work (if it works):  Unbeknown to Abe, Abe’s best friend and his best friend’s girlfriend are coming up for the evening.  When Abe walks in the door, he will be greeted by the three of us. One of us will be holding a phone with  seven of Abe’s best friends on the line, and the other two of us will be holding computers with skyped in family members. We will all yell “Surprise!” and tell Abe how much we love him and how happy we hope his birthday is.

Then I am planning on serving a bunch of appetizers (thank you wonderful Facebook friends for your helpful suggestions!), which Abe and our friends can eat while I play the piano for Abe. He loves listening to the piano, but I rarely ever play for him because I’m always out of practice. I hate producing substandard music, but I have been working this past week to get a Mozart sonata and a Chopin Ballad in shape to play. My muscle stamina still is horrible, so I’m hoping if the pieces fall apart the food will be good enough that no one will care.

Then we’ll have dinner, after which everyone except me will jump in the hot tub. (No hot tubs while pregnant! Plus I don’t really enjoy the sensation of being boiled alive, even if it’s in the company of friends.) After that we we’ll come back and play some board games and enjoy everyone’s company. Abe has to get up the next morning at 5am for work, so we can’t stay up too late. On Saturday he works from 5am- 9am and then attends our birthing class from 9-4pm, after which he returns to work until who knows what hour. Same thing on Sunday, only I am hoping he gets some time off of work in the evening so we can go to a violin concert at 6pm. Abe looooooooves concerts, so I’m thinking the violin concert would be a nice extension of his birthday celebrations.

Whew! That feels good to tell about the surprise. I just can’t keep secrets. But I’m hoping you can! =)

On Thursday Abe and I went a little crazy at Buy Buy Baby–the store really lives up to its name! We went in expecting to purchase a total of three items and walked out with the following:

• a jogging stroller
• a car seat
• a bassinet
• a baby monitor
• a baby bathtub
• a nursing pillow
• bottles
• pacifiers
• a baby sling
• a diaper changing pad
• a diaper changing pad cover
• onesies
• a diaper genie
• other stuff that I am too lazy to catalog (it’s all in bags right now)

Needless to say, it was interesting trying to fit all of the stuff into Abe’s car, but we he managed to do it.

Obviously, that means our hallway is full of boxes and bags, and ever since Thursday I have been saying I will take care of unpacking and assembling these new items. I figure it’s only fair since Abe unpacked and assembled the entire nursery back in Hyde Park. But, as usual,distractions abound. Thus far, I have managed to assemble the bassinet you see displayed on the right.

I am quite proud that I assembled this piece of furniture. It wasn’t hard, but you have to understand, I am easily daunted. At one point today, Abe, who had to work, called home to see how I was doing.

“I’m doing great!” I responded cheerfully. “I just finished assembling the bassinet all the way up until the steps that require a screwdriver. I have no idea where the screwdrivers are, so oh well.”

“They’re above the laundry machine on the second shelf,” said Abe helpfully.

Ominous silence on my end of the phone.

“Um, I mean,” said Abe, back peddling furiously, “I have no idea where they are. I’ll find them as soon as I come home and take care of the rest.”

“You are so wonderful!” I gushed. “Thank you for being so incredibly helpful!”

Last year I learned a technique called Boys Town, wherein positive praise is used as a way to condition students to comply with school rules. Occasionally–okay, more than occasionally–I use this technique in my marriage. Whenever Abe does something really great, I lavish on both specific and general praise and hope for opportunities to repeat the process in the future.

This time, however, I did some reflecting after I hung up the phone. I thought about my mom, who single-handedly hauled one ton (no exaggeration) of slate to redo the walkway of our house. The image of her hauling stone to and from the station wagon flashed in my head, and in the back of my mind I heard her saying “We can do tough things.”

I sighed. Certainly, getting a screwdriver and screwing in a couple nuts and bolts does not count as tough, so I really had no excuse not to complete the project I’d started. I flipped on Saint Saens’ “Carnival of the Animals” for Lydia to hear as I went to work finishing her bassinet, and when it was all done I stepped back to admire the finished project.

I eagerly anticipate the positive praise I will undoubtedly receive when my tired husband comes home and discovers he doesn’t have to finish my project.

I can’t do it–I have to blog!! I have too many things to do that need to be procrastinated, and I have exhausted all other avenues of procrastination. I have caught up on all of my blogs via google reader (something like 50+ blogs!), obsessively refreshed my Facebook feed and stalked every remotely interesting post,  g-chatted until my fingers have hurt, and even done some semi-productive things: deep cleaned all of the bathrooms, vacuumed all the floors, dusted and oiled the kitchen cabinets, completed three loads of laundry, washed all the dishes, baked loaves upon loaves of bread, worked out, practiced yoga, observed a Suzuki lesson, and started a new project to incentivize my own piano students to practice. (These activities have taken two days–I certainly didn’t get it all done today!) But there is still more to be done.

Namely, I need to finish one of the books I am reading. Because I spent most of my reading time last week researching my church talk, I put my books down and have been unable to pick them up ever since. This is the takeaway lesson I’m getting from this: Only read one non-fiction book at a time!! Even though the three books I’m reading are all very interesting and readable, they are ALL heavy-duty non-fiction, and I am going crazy with guilt because I am plodding through them at an unbelievably slow pace. I crave that feeling of accomplishment that comes with finishing a book. You know, that semi self-righteous feeling of having enlightened your mind about how a child’s brain develops, what factors interact to produce societal collapse, how culture interacted with the development of a great prophet, etc., etc., etc..  I have over 1000 pages to go before I achieve this type of non-fictionesque brain nirvana, and I am seriously daunted.

And so I blog. For those interested, here’s a picture of me at 32 weeks:

 

I have banned myself from blogging until I complete the following tasks: 1) Deliver a talk in church today 2) Deep clean the house 3) Finish reading at least one of the books I’m currently stuck in. But until then, feel free to peruse my newest blog obsession: my little brother’s intro-to-self blog! He is one of my all time favorite people in the whole world, and I am sure you will agree he is pretty spectacular. (And he is not a narcissist! He had to do this blog as a project for one of his grad school apps, but I just enjoy it because the entry does a good job capturing some of my brother’s amazingness.) http://clarkllamzon.blogspot.com

Enjoy!

I had no access to my camera during our Christmas trip to Utah because I left it in the overhead bin of the plane on our way out. Thankfully, the airlines found my bag and shipped it to me, but that means I have little photographic documentation of our Utah trip. It also means I couldn’t download photos from our trip to Nauvoo until now, so in a nutshell, here’s what the past three weeks of our lives look like (kinda).

Abe trying to look cheery after I kicked him out of bed so that he could make a good memory by running to the Mississippi and back.

I am happy because I intend to make my memory by taking a leisurely stroll. I ended up spending most of the time sitting next to a cute Christmas tree staring at the temple.

My view from my bench near a Christmas tree.

Abe is excited to eat in the only open restaurant in Nauvoo.

The frozen Mississippi

I am excited to eat my pie.

Abe calls the many flocks of geese to him. (There were probably a billion geese flying around the river!) Sadly, none responded to his call.

Nauvoo Temple from the front

The ladies from our Hyde Park ward also threw me a really sweet baby shower. I was so touched! I forgot to bring my camera, but Barbie sent me hers. Thanks, Barbie!

Yummy food! I still daydream about these amazing rolls Elise made.

A diaper cake!

The sweet ladies who came to the shower

Sweets =)

And then we had Christmas in Utah. Abe’s mom used to get Abe and his brothers pj pants from a brand called “Uglies.” The fabric on the front and back of each leg in an Ugly is different, and for a while there the brand went out of business (I wonder why?). I decided to make them all Uglies for Christmas, and the hours upon hours of sewing yielded the following garish results:

Abe and I just moved to Evanston for three months. Don’t ask why unless you want a lengthy explanation involving hospital proximity, Abe’s best friend’s semester schedule, my mom’s mission, and the Obama home-buyer stimulus. It’s all very complicated, but the end result is Abe and I have decided to boomerang between Hyde Park and Evanston for the next year; this is the first of four moves. Fun.

Actually, I really don’t have much room to complain since Abe did the majority of the work moving. At one point, he also deemed it necessary to deep clean the bathroom using a host of carcinogenic cleaners. I begged and pleaded (from a distance) with him to use some natural cleaners instead, but he insisted that the cancer-causing stuff did a superior job. Between coughs, he would exclaim over how white the tile was or how see-through the shower glass had instantly become. I guess in the mind of a perfectionist, such results must absolutely trump the possibility of contracting cancer.   So now Abe is pumped full of carcinogens (he was still coughing an hour after finishing the project), but at least our friends in Hyde Park will enjoy a sparkling shiny bathroom.

As for me, I OD’d on the edible aspect of our Christmas celebrations in Utah, and that translated into an impressive new level of back pain that has made itself my constant companion ever since. At one point, I was walking home and ended up sitting in a puddle on the steps of a seminary two blocks away, sobbing hysterically into my dying phone about how much my back hurt, how I couldn’t possibly survive being pregnant for two more months, how I certainly couldn’t  manage to walk the entire two blocks more, and blah, blah, blah. Really, I don’t know how Abe was so patient with me–especially since I brought this on myself! But he came as fast as he could, bought me some beautiful flowers and gave me a long back massage (after he finished moving all of our stuff). It is, in short, disgusting how spoiled I am.

Which brings me to today.  Yesterday we had a great lesson in church on receiving the Holy Ghost, and I decided I need to be less bratty and more actively seek the companionship of the Holy Ghost in my life. Abe and I tried to go to bed early enough in order to wake up in time to arrive at our church institute at 6 this morning–all in the hopes that an early morning churchy discussion will translate into more Holy Ghost/less brattiness for me. Falling asleep at a reasonable hour proved impossible, so when the alarm went off today we had gotten approximately 4.5 hours of sleep. I still wanted to go, though, and Abe, in his typical uber-supportive fashion, dragged himself out of bed and came with. We had a great institute discussion about eternal life,and I’m really glad I went, but when I came home I passed out for a loooooong time (basically until now).

Once again, I feel spoiled and bratty–not to mention intimidated by the mess of moving. My original goal was to unpack, organize, and clean everything, but everywhere I look there is so, so, SO much to be done! I’ve retreated to the most chaos-free part of our home and armed myself with my computer and three giant books (all fascinating and completely recommended thus far: Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, and Your Child’s Growing Mind). Between blogging and reading, I expect to lose myself in a variety of alternate realities for the next couple hours, at which point I expect to experience full-blown panic at the prospect of having passed the day without accomplishing anything. Maybe at that point, I’ll grab some carcinogenic cleaners and have a go at the bathroom…at least it’ll be a quick and cancerous way to finally getting something done.

A couple months ago I heard an NPR special wherein the featured guest commented that when she was pregnant, her naked body gave the impression that she had had “an ill-advised affair with an elephant.” I couldn’t put it better myself. To spare you further rumination on that unsightly image, I am posting a photo from a couple days ago that shows how pregnancy week 27 looked:

On top of that (those) large bump(s), I often find myself layering about six thick layers of clothing because my winter coats no longer fit. Often I just borrow Abe’s favorite coat–which happens to be very roomy and cozy–but there are some days when he tentatively asks if it would be okay for him to wear it, and then I reluctantly hand it back over for his (temporary) use.

Yesterday after I came home from the gym (a totally pointless form of weight management at this stage, but it still feels like the right thing to do), I asked Abe to drop me off at the other end of Hyde Park so that I would have to do all of my errands on foot. As I walked around, I would catch glimpses of myself in store windows and simply stare. All I could think about was the ill-advised-affair-with-an-elephant phrase…but I carried on, in spite of my bounteous form.

Three hours later, I waddled back home laden with all sorts of goodies, but foremost on my mind were the items that enabled me to make this:

What is that, you ask? Well, I shall tell you! Last year I discovered this lovely salad on Mark Bittman’s website. It’s an orange, tapenade, and fennel salad (I sometimes substitute thyme) based on the dish served at the Zucca Magica in Nice, France. For a picture of their salad, click here: http://content.markbittman.com/photos/the-orange-tapenade-and-fennel-salad-at-the-beloved-zucca-magica-in-nice

This is soooooooooo easy, and it is so yummy that I find myself dreaming about it. The other day I fixed it four times and then woke up at 2am to make it again. All you need are four ingredients:

one navel orange
pitted Kalamata olives
fennel seeds or fresh thyme
good olive oil

Cut away the pith of the orange, and slice your orange into rounds. Chop up the olives in a food processor and dollop on top. Sprinkle fennel or thyme on top, and drizzle it all with olive oil. That’s it!

Last year I tried making a lot of this salad and saving it for later, but it doesn’t keep well. The orange starts to taste too oily if left to sit in the mixture too long, so it’s best just to prepare this whenever you’re in the mood.

Why is this salad so yummy and addictive? I think it’s because you get both sweet (from the oranges) and salty (from the olives). The fennel adds some complexity to the salty-sweet thing, and the oil keeps the dish from being too acidic and briny. It also adds some welcome fat to smooth all of the flavors together. So you end up with an absolutely perfect winter dish–and it’s such a nice, healthy counterpart to all of the hot cocoa and cookies that otherwise dominate the season.

One more veggie-full dish that feels really good in winter: veggie lasagna with pesto. You might already have your own favorite veggie lasagna recipe, and if you do, I would love to have it! Email, message, or comment. I’ve tried a bunch of different recipes, and this improvised one is my favorite so far.

Just chop up a ton of whatever kind of veggies you enjoy running into when you take a bite of lasagna. We had a ton of the following on hand, so I used these:

Then put some sauce on the bottom of the pan. You can make your own with a couple cans of tomatoes, some garlic and spices, but I am lazy and just reach for a jar (usually Barilla or Newman’s. I like Classico, but I can never get their lids off–does anyone else have that problem??).

Then put some no boil lasagna noodles on top:

Now for the yummy cheese mix.  I just dumped two big containers of ricotta in a bowl and mixed that with chopped and drained frozen spinach, a big dollop of pesto, and about a cup (I know! that’s a lot, but it’s so good!) of Parmesan.

Spoon this on top of your noodles, along with some fresh mozzarella and a little more sauce:

Add your veggies:

And repeat. Top off with some more sauce and cheese. Cover with foil and bake at 375 degrees for 45 minutes. (For the last ten minutes remove foil.)

You end up with this:

And I even had enough veggies leftover to throw into a frittata for a later breakfast. For a frittata, simply saute a bunch of veggies (I used two onions on top of the other veggies) in an ovenproof skillet, and then pour an egg mixture on top. This egg mixture contained eggs, a little soy milk, basil, and some grated Swiss cheese. Cook on the stove for a couple minutes until the frittata looks set on the edges, and then pop it under the broiler until it’s all puffy and golden. (It will deflate when you take it out of the pan). Slide it onto a board, and cut into wedges. Yum, yum!

 
It is once again time for me to make my pointless trek to the gym. I have been putting it off for three hours.  But I guess the good news is that when I come back, yummy things await! (Perhaps that’s why these treks are so ineffective…hmmmm. I’ll think more about that as I down my lunch later this afternoon.)

Lily told me that all she wanted for Christmas was for me to write a post on our family blog.  Well, she is certainly going to get more than that for Christmas, but I think it is about time I contributed to the Darais family blog. 

First I just want to say how much I love being married to Lily.  I am a firm believer that God puts people together for a reason. On a near daily basis I find myself reflecting on how perfect she is for me and I praise God constantly for the joy she is in my life. One of my favorite things about her is that although she is constantly striving to do well and be a good person, she doesn’t seem to get caught up in being overly serious about it all in the way that I do.  With her I find myself having a deeply spiritual conversation in one moment, and then laughing so hard I almost cry in the next.  She has been a breath of fresh air to a life that can at times be a little tense.

 We have been married over six months now and for me it has been a giant joy ride.  We had a beautiful wedding in Utah, weekend trips to Michigan, a backpacking trip in Utah, and honestly just lots and lots of fun time together.  One of my favorite memories from the backpacking trip was when my brothers and I told her that what appeared to be snake holes were actually tunnels to the world of the care bears.  HAHA!  Well, she didn’t quite bite on that, but it was worth a shot.  She was such a good trooper!  I truly love my time with Lily. I feel I could spend all day every day with her, and there certainly are days when I do!

And now we have Lydia on the way!  What a joy that will be.  We just went to IKEA on Tuesday to get some baby furniture.  It was so much fun to go shopping with Lily and pick out things for our newest family member!

I will admit that my reaction to knowing a child is on the way has slowly moved from shock, nervous excitement and anxiety to pure joyful anticipation.  Don’t get me wrong, Lily and I planned to start a family right away, and I’ve always wanted to be a dad, but there is a giant difference between “let’s start a family” and “honey, I’m pregnant.”  It took a long time for me to actually wrap my head around the idea that we are having a baby.  So many concerns about wanting to be a good father, finances and wanting to provide well, wondering if I’m ready, wondering if I’ll ever feel rested again for the rest of my life, wondering if Lily and I will have as much time together etc. etc. etc.  But it’s interesting; As time has passed and I’ve processed what is coming… as we’ve read children’s books to Lydia and prepared the room for her……as we’ve talked about her and to her……I just start to feel pure joyful anticipation about expanding our family.  I’ve realized that I already feel a great deal of love for Lydia.  I don’t necessarily feel ready, but I do feel happy!  I’m really going to try to be a great dad!

Well, I guess that’s all I have for today.  I didn’t have anything tremendously witty or profound to say, but I do love my wife tremendously and I wish the best to all those who have taken time out of their day to read about our family.