cooking – Page 12 – Darais Days

Content

I only have a couple pictures today. This one I took this morning while I was doing homework. The girls were angelic today and let me do hours of homework while they entertained themselves:

During Mary’s nap, Ron and Shirl replaced a window in the house. Lydia was curious and at one point left the house to watch. I was upstairs reading when I heard the front door bang, and I knew Lydia had just let herself out to watch them. So I hurried downstairs and ended up reading to Lydia on the lawn. She was really excited because Puss got to come, although she was a little worried he’d blow away in the wind…

Then I went to cooking school and made a bunch of stuff for my Latin class.

a turkey with two special salsas, fresh cheese (I made it for the first time and couldn't believe how easy it was!), pickled onions, and a bunch of other stuff — a turkey with two special salsas, fresh cheese (I made it for the first time and couldn’t believe how easy it was!), pickled onions, and a bunch of other stuff

Abe had another great day at work. The girls were wonderfully behaved today, and now it’s time for bed. Good night!

Good people

Abe is already in bed, so this will be quick.

The most notable things about today were 1) Ina came over and watched the girls so I could do whatever I wanted for three hours. Ina is a saint. She is a woman in our ward who loves my children, and she’s been telling me for years she will babysit for free. I never want to impose, but I have been rather desperate to get to the temple, so finally I asked for her help. When she got here, I realized I’d misplaced my recommend, so I went swimming and grocery shopping instead. Ina is such a huge blessing. Abe and I have been fretting about getting to the temple more, and she was so genuine in her offer to watch the girls whenever we want that I think we will avail ourselves of her sweet help in the future. I am so touched by how much she loves my children, and I am impressed by her giving heart. I could tell she honestly just enjoyed serving, and I hope to be more like her when I grow up!

2) We had dinner with Jill, Ty, their four kids, Katie, Pat, and their three kids. Jill texted me this morning about getting together, but I have school on the other free night she suggested, so we just did it tonight. It was so fun. We forgot to take pictures, but when Abe went upstairs to gather the children, I asked him to take a quick picture first.

Also, I watched a Youtube video and decided to try a new hairstyle on Lydia:

Easter egg hunt round two

It was a packed day. First, I took the girls to the store to buy some eggs to stuff for their second Easter egg hunt of the season. Misty arranged a wonderful hunt with her play group at Ensign Peak Park. The day was sunny and clear, and the bright eggs hidden green field nestled right underneath the mountain made for a picture perfect hunt. The only down side was that the sun was so bright, I couldn’t see my phone’s screen at all, so I had to take pictures completely blindly and hope that something would come out.

Then we came home and ate lunch. After lunch, I put Mary down for a nap and then dyed Easter eggs with Lydia.

Then Mary woke up and had a snack.

Then I went to school and cooked some salads. They looked a total mess because we were in such a rush to plate them.

Pear salad with so many steps it made my head spin. Roasted pears, fanned out. Sliced raw pears. Blue cheese tart. rehydrated cherries. Port wine reduction. Bacon bits. Pear vinaigrette. Aghhhh! And that is why I ended up just throwing it all haphazardly on the plate and saying: Done.

Salads should have a liner and a garnish. My liner made my salad look like a butterfly... — Salads should have a liner and a garnish. My liner made my salad look like a butterfly…

Abe had a great day at work and we feel God’s hand operating in that arena of life. I haven’t had a chance to talk to him at all so I’m going to end this post, shower, and go to bed. Maybe if he’s still awake I can actually talk to him for more than thirty seconds!

Sunday Dinner pics

Not much happened today. Mary made it through twenty minutes of nursery unattended, but for the rest of the time Abe and I traded off being there. In Sunday School we talked about the Exodus and the Passover, although the discussion turned into the whys and hows of suffering.

When I was trying to teach Lydia the 23rd Psalm, I looked up a discourse on youtube given by a Jewish rabbi explaining his interpretation of the psalm. He pointed out that the rod and the staff have different meanings; the rod is a correcter and the staff is a comforter, and yet both are said to “comfort me” in the psalm. I had always glossed over that line thinking that the rod and staff were just synonyms and the repetition was poetic. Anyway, ever since I watched that video, I have adopted the verse, “Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me” as a mantra whenever I’m feeling upset by a given situation. It helps a lot, and that line came to mine when we were discussing the hows of suffering.

Abe taught a wonderful lesson on the Sacrament today, although I wasn’t there to witness it. He loves the new teaching style and says the trick is this: the less the teacher talks, the greater everyone seems to think the lesson went. When I passed by his room on my way to Relief Society, Abe was standing at the front silently while the class broke up into pairs to discuss a question he asked them. It sounded like a lot of active discussions were taking place, and that always spurs learning. The only thing I don’t like about Abe being an Elder’s Quorum teacher is that I never get to hear his lessons. I wish I could.

Our new home teachers came over to visit us after church, and it was great getting to know them better. One of them is a professional down tester. He says most of the down he tests is good quality, but he’s found sticks, cigarette butts, beaks, and bird feet in the down before. Yikes! Makes me want to buy synthetic pillows…

Then I made rolls and we went to Tom and Suzanne’s for dinner. I took a lot of pictures while we were there:

And then these two that Abe took a couple days ago that I didn’t see until just now:

Grandma Darais’s funeral

The pictures from today are on my phone, and that’s in the car. So sorry, Grandma! We’ll be better tomorrow.

This morning I went to school and helped prepare food for a charity event. I cooked so slowly and messed up the mousse so many times that eventually I had to call it quits because I was going to be late to Grandma Darais’s funeral. It was an exercise in humiliation.

The funeral was absolutely beautiful, though. I couldn’t imagine a single thing about the funeral itself that I would change. Six of her seven children gave talks, and about twelve of her twenty-something grandchildren also spoke. I accompanied one of her daughters-in-law for a musical number, and two professional violinists played a beautiful number as well. If I could do it over, though, I would get a babysitter so I could actually hear the talks. What I heard was wonderful, but the girls were out of their minds with over-stimulation/fatigue, and I had my hands full chasing them all over the church (obviously, I took them out of the chapel, but they had the run of the rest of the church…). I am glad the funeral was taped and transcribed, and I can not wait to watch and read what I missed. Grandma Darais was incredibly inspiring, and Abe and I sat in the car a long time after getting home (the girls were asleep) and discussed the clarity of perspective Grandma Darais’s life and death have provided for our own lives. Apart from loving her, we also admire her immensely. She’s on my personal hero list.

Also, funeral potatoes and green jello are real, and they actually serve them at funerals. I have eaten funeral potatoes since coming to Utah, but I didn’t realize their nickname was based in any sort of reality. Nor did I imagine that people actually ate green jello at LDS funerals–but they really do! I felt ridiculously Mormon sitting in a chapel in Provo eating funeral potatoes and watching the girls eat green jello.

I’m going to go daydream now. I’m tired from chasing the girls. Abe is going to play video games with his brothers, who are in town for the funeral.

A perfect Spring day

Really, it was. This day felt perfect. Having sunshine made all the difference! Even though Abe and I anticipated being zombies because we got so little sleep last night, both of us had great days. We credit God and the sunshine for that. That the girls were really quite adorable all day long helped too.

I got in: a walk to the library, baby book club with Misty, a nap, reading more in The Triple Package, a lot of homework, some ironing, a long walk with Abe and the girls, Bikram yoga, cooking a veggie phyllo roll, picking up the house, doing laundry, folding some laundry, feeding the girls three meals, setting the girls up to craft and watercolor, reading to the girls, a couple phone calls with my mom and grandma and even forty minutes of piano practice. It was an abnormally productive day. As my dad used to say, “variety is the spice of life!” This day had spice.

On the Abe front, he had another tremendous day at work. He raved to me almost the whole walk about how blessed he feels and how there is literally not one part of his day that he dreads. He looks forward to every task at work, and great stuff is basically falling into his lap for no reason other than that God must be looking out for him. Obviously, he’s doing his part, but he can not remember a time in his life where he has felt so abundantly blessed by an outpouring of God’s love.

The girls are cute. Mary said “Nana” to my mom on the phone today, and Lydia is very concerned about my grandma’s health. She kept asking how Grandma was feeling and doing. Here are some pictures Abe took of the girls while I was at yoga:

short post

As usual, we are racing to get to bed because of Abe’s early bed time. I just want to record Lydia’s conversation with Mary after we put them to bed. Mary was crying, and Lydia said, “Mary, don’t worry. Heavenly Father and Jesus and the Holy Ghost are protecting you. Jesus will come down from the sky into your crib, and then he’ll go back up into the sky. You can bless God and get protected.” She babbled a lot more stuff like that, but I don’t have time to remember specifics.

Tom came over for dinner, and afterward we Skyped with Clark and Swathi. Abe took these pictures while we Skyped:

One more thing, mainly for myself so I can remember in case Abe doesn’t get me this cookbook for Mother’s Day or my birthday. I made a soup that I don’t want to forget from Anna Thomas’ book, Love Soup. It’s a red lentil soup with squash, yams, and loads of ginger. I made the root veggie broth for a base, and it was just fantastic. The link shows the soup pureed, but I didn’t do that. Hey, I am paying a lot of money for knife skills, and I wanted to see my little cubes (okay, okay… most of them were more like rectangles) of yam.

Also, another reason this post is rushed is that I’ve been rereading the notes I have from my interviews with Grandma Darais. Every sentence feels like a treasure, and I am so grateful I have this information. I would have liked more, though. Lesson learned. My mom is covering it on the interview Grandma front, but I want my own interviews. Grandma, when I come out, can we do an interview, please? I love you so much!!!

Packed

I am at the climax of my book, The Family, by David Laskin, and I really want to get back to it. So here’s the run-down of today:

We started off by crafting all morning with Jen and her kids. I had a lot of fun chatting with Jen and making another Spring decoration, and Lydia loved wearing Natalie’s princess attire. Mary loved playing with Jen’s baby-proof iPad. We were going to go to Institute, but we missed it because paint takes a bit of time to dry.

Then we came home for lunch and naps. I spent the first hour and a half of quiet time devouring my book, and then I headed downstairs to clean and cook. Also, the piano tuner came today! I switched to a new tuner, and he did an amazing job. I loved chatting with our old piano tuner. He’d tell me stories and tear up quite regularly. He was a lovely, sweet older gentleman, but I wasn’t totally convinced that he was completely competent at tuning the piano. This new guy is amazing, and even though we didn’t sit around for hours chatting and crying (a la our old tuner, Doug,) he absolutely fixed the piano. I’m excited to practice tomorrow.

Then Jen came over for dinner with Natalie. One of her twins got really sick right before they were supposed to come over, so the boys stayed home with Eldon, but we had a ton of fun with Jen and Natalie. Jen regaled us with tales about the Samoan physique (Eldon is Samoan), and Abe and I came to the conclusion that she married a super hero. After one day of weight-lifting, her husband gets bruises on his back because the muscle has already grown that fast! She told us other stories that had our jaws dropping. I guess I never really thought much about the Samoan build before, but I am duly impressed by now.

Lydia told us that she spent the evening tumbling and climbing and giggling with Natalie, but she fell off a chair right at the end and had a little sad moment. We played a bit on the stairs, and I think she ended the evening feeling pretty good.

Abe had a great day at work, but he’s a little overwhelmed with his new job duties. This is his first week in his new position, and there is a ton of information to absorb. Qualtrics has a “clinic”; really just a red psychiatrist’s couch set up by the tech experts. Whenever the salesmen have technical questions with clients on the phone, they go sit on the red couch and get help. Abe visited the clinic several times today.

Right now he’s on a run past down town to retrieve our car from the auto shop. It’s been ready all week, but we never have time to go get it together. So tonight he just decided to run on foot and get it. Oh! There he is! I have to end if I want time to read my book.

Here are some pictures I took of Mary after she woke up. We played for a long time after she woke up from her nap because she was in a great mood. I tried to capture her fun on camera but failed miserably. She loved emptying her pack ‘n’ play of all contents and I kept putting her stuff back in to keep her going. We also played a lot with her binky. She’s only allowed to have it at nap time, and she thinks it is hilarious fun when I put her binky in my mouth. I put in two at a time and then blew them over her crib, and she about died laughing. I have a video somewhere of Abe playing that game with Lydia to the same effect.

Anyway, here are the pictures, such as they are. Mary was a lot cuter in person.

A rushed post

Abe is starting to get up at 5:30 to get to work extra early, so we are racing for bed. I tried to email myself a video Abe took of Lydia doing a puppet show, but it didn’t go through. I’ll fuss with it tomorrow when I have time.

Here are the pictures Abe took while I was at Bikram tonight:

Mary gets to be an only child for an evening.

Mary’s old enough to go to nursery in church now! Theoretically, this means Abe and I could drop her off and focus on our meetings. However, Mary is very, very, very sad whenever we leave her in nursery by herself, so we’re taking turns staying in nursery with Mary. Last week I stayed, and this week Abe did. He took photos of her on his phone while he was watching her:

While I never recall Lydia hitting any child other than Mary, Mary is different. She’s been hit and pushed and grabbed from all of her little life (thanks to Lydia), so she is a little more aggressive in nursery. When some other child took one of her toys today, she had no problem bonking him in the head several times. Lydia would have just run to me and cried. I guess they’re all different.

This evening Suzanne came over and took Lydia to the Miners’ party. We were feeling tired and under the weather, so Abe and I stayed home with Mary. She got more attention this evening than she ever has. In fact, she’s so excited about all the attention she got that she can’t currently get to sleep and is standing next to me watching me type. We have a ton of pictures of her from our evening together.