Wow! I never saw candy hearts before!

…

These are not good for me.

…

Mama, I think I will brush my teeth. They are candy heart-y.

So a year or so ago I saw this purse made out of the Chicago Manual of Style, and fell in love with it.  But not quite enough to spend the money on it. Besides, I happen to work in a library that owns three copies of the 15th edition, and knew that the 16th was forthcoming. So Mary Jackson, our intrepid reference librarian, and I made plans to attack the 15ths once the 16ths were on the shelves.

In the meantime, we withdrew the Reader’s Guide to Periodical Literature. I used the 1993 book and a very helpful tutorial from Hungry Panda to make Mary a purse. It took me a couple months, what with needing to find child-free work time, and not having a sewing machine, but I’m pleased with the way it turned out, and can’t wait to attack the Chicago!

Our thermostat is upstairs.  Downstairs is always cold.  Cold.  People don’t visit us in the winter, because when they do they wear coats to hang out in our living room.  And gloves.  We bought an indoor/outdoor thermometer to check the thermostat’s calibration, and found that it’s accurate; there just isn’t good airflow down.  So we moved it downstairs to see just how cold it is.  And I’ve been waiting for it to be warmer outside than in.  We came home from church today, and it finally happened.

When I was a kid, my grandma had her grandma’s cookie jar on the counter, a round green tin with small holes in the top.  It always had cookies in it (I believe my grandpa, to this day, has a cookie & milk before bed every night), and they were rarely homemade.  As an adult, I kept an eye out for a cookie jar, half-interestedly, and never found one I liked well enough to buy.  Since, of course, this is going to sit on my counter forever.

My husband brought this one to our marriage.  It’s perfect.  I love it.  And its emptiness impels me to bake more cookies than I ever imagined I would, because even though Grandma did it, I can’t quite imagine putting bought cookies into a cookie jar.

Once upon a time, I had a friend who worked at Penzey’s.  We talked a lot of cooking, and one day he brought me a huge brick of instant yeast.  I baked all of my own bread for a year or so, and messed it up every time.  Too little kneading, left out the salt, under-baked, over-baked …  I never made the same mistake twice.  Then I met a boy who worked in a bakery, and made wonderful hearth-baked breads.  We got married, and I haven’t baked bread in about 6 years.

I regularly make a French toast casserole, which is great, but has been less so since we moved from Pittsburgh, and no longer have access to Allegro Hearth, and I’m not sure I’ve seen a loaf of challah since.  A friend recently blogged her own first foray into braided egg bread, and I was inspired.  Since I had today off, and I’ve promised an egg-bake to a family get-together this weekend, and we were recently given the new New York Times Cookbook, which includes a detailed recipe run in the paper in the late ’70s, I tried it.  And it probably could’ve rested longer before going into the oven, but still, I’m pretty proud of this eight-strand braid.

When I was a kid, Christmas Eve was the best holiday.  We did family Christmases with our Dad, and with our Mom, but Christmas Eve was spent at Grandma & Grandpa’s.  Grandpa lined the horseshoe drive with luminarias, and wore the red plaid sportcoat.  There was food - a spread of hors d’oeuvres, once it became clear that children didn’t do well with a full turkey dinner when we could see presents just across the room.  I loved the preparation, the cooking, the shaking boxes & trying to guess, the getting dressed up (before Grandma died, it was a dress-up affair), everything.  Tonight my family gathered, ate, laughed.  I have no doubt the red plaid jacket was there, probably on Grandpa (though, I believe, Dad’s been known to sport it on occasion.)  A phone call was good, but, of course, not at all the same.

Meanwhile, in Tennessee … this is the first year that Nathaniel has been really excited about Christmas.  He’s been looking forward to it for months.  I bought an Advent calendar, just to give him some sense of how long the wait was, because after his nap on Thanksgiving he woke up and proclaimed, “And after Thanksgiving, it will be Christmas!  Yay!  It’s Christmas!”  (The calendar has led to a month of him responding to his teachers’ offers of breakfast with, “No, I had chocolate,” but that’s another story.)  He wants a Noah’s Ark.  I’ve heard this several times a day since October.  His letter to Santa from playschool specifies that he also wants giraffes.  Noah’s Ark, complete with giraffes, is under the tree.  I can’t wait for him to have it.

Cora, I think, doesn’t know what’s coming.  Next year she’ll be into it, too, but this year it will be a complete surprise, and that’s wonderful in its own way.  She has a baby doll and a sit-n-spin, and a sleeve of racquetballs. And I think she’ll love them all.  She also has Thomas the Tank Engine jammies, which match her brother’s, as she is in love with Thomas these days.  I’m not sure whether it’s for Thomas’ own sake, or because she loves her brother.  Tonight during his bath, she rocked the new jammies, and N’s fire engine boots, and N’s Lego headlamp.

Santa will not be visiting our house.  Nathaniel isn’t as afraid of him as last year - at least we don’t have to skip the Santa parts of Caillou’s Winter Wonders anymore - but still, my kid’s going to be that one, who tells his classmates that Santa doesn’t come to his house, and his parents buy the presents.  Not through any ideology of mine.  I never thought I’d be that mom.

N informed me earlier this week that on Christmas Eve, we would bake Christmas cookies.  It occurred to me last night to ask what kind of cookies he meant.  ”Christmas cookies, and not regular cookies.”  Turns out, the Christmas variety are shaped like Christmas trees.  I am not a rolled-cookie baker.  I don’t own cookie cutters.  Fortunately, Target had them on clearance today.  (Who knew that Dec. 24 was the day to mark down all the holiday merchandise, and roll out the spring lines?)  We now own a tree, a star, and a snowman.  And we made egg yolk/food coloring paint, and had a grand time.  An astonishingly calm, un-messy time, considering the combination of two toddlers and  paint.  It washed out of Cora’s hair beautifully, and came out of the carpet just as easily ;-)

It might snow tonight, but today was clear-ish.  The kids played outdoors while Jon & I cooked (Jon decided we needed pfeffernussen, in addition to the sugar cookies.  I also made rugelach, and French onion soup.  Our house smells great.)  Nathaniel built igloos in the sandbox.   We read stories.  Jon left for work, the kids had baths, changed into their matching Thomas jams, and went to sleep.  I talked with the family, and set up the presents.  All in all, a wonderful day.  And I cannot wait for the kids to wake up!

This morning at day care (“playschool” in our house, to capitalize on Caillou’s affection for the place) Cora was a little extra snuggly.  I finally put her down, and sent her off to the table for her blueberry muffin & milk.  She got all the way to her seat, turned around, and came back, arms outstretched.  I gave her a hug, mentally bracing to have to guide her away.  But that was it - she took the one extra hug, turned, and went off happily for her breakfast.  It’s so nice to be Mama.

Is that a elementary school?

Yes, it is.

What is the elementary school doing?

Teaching kids all kinds of cool things.

Are they playing with toys?

Well, there aren’t as many toys at elementary school as there are at playschool.  There are more books, though.  You’ll learn to read all by yourself!

Yeah!

Big, long books, like Mama and Papa read.  With no pictures!  And you’ll imagine the pictures in your head!

<pause>

I have little teeth in my head!

Nathaniel is becoming ever more verbal, which is a joy and a wonder every day.  Most of the time it makes life a lot easier (“Nathaniel, where are your jammie pants?”  ”In the toolbox.  Nathaniel was going on an airplane.”  And then yes, there are the jammies, neatly packed into his toolbox-cum-suitcase.)  Sometimes it makes life harder (“Mommy!  I want to stay home!” cried as I try to leave daycare in the morning.)

Sometimes, though, little things creep through that remind me that he’s not growing up where I did.  (“We’re going to have to give you a haircut pretty soon, Bud.”  ”Because Nathaniel’s hair is getting big.”)  And the pervasiveness of “You all.”  (“What are you all talking about?”)  At least he’s not contracting it ;-)