It’s a messy, messy world!

Alan is a funny kid. When he’s tired, he likes to twirl his hair with his finger. But when he’s wide awake, he likes to mush things in his hair with his fingers including peanut butter, sweet potatoes and scrambled eggs. Just when I thought this phase was almost over, we had a major set-back.

Today we spent the morning with Melanie and Ivan finger-painting. Alan eagerly sat in “Louis’s Big Chair” waiting for their arrival, telling me that he wanted to play with “yellow and blue”.…When our guests arrived, I offered Ivan a smock. But Melanie had a better idea. She just took off Ivan’s shirt. (Genius!).

Bare-chested like two cavemen, I plopped a gob of red paint in front of Ivan. He looked at me with his sweet eyes, and then it occurred to me that this was his first finger-painting excursion….boy was he in for a treat! I began illustrating the fine art of finger-painting which I guess to a 3-year-old is antithetical to what has been learned when sitting at the kitchen table. It didn’t take long for him to pick it up! He began making squiggly lines with his finger until all ten were covered in red….

Everything was going as well as expected, (messy but controlled)….but then all of a sudden….Alan scooped a blob of blue paint right from the jar, and began squishing it between his fingers as if wringing his hands to plot out his next move. In the blink of an eye, Alan was scrubbing his hair with “blue” turning the finger-painting into an exercise in performance art!

While some moms would scold him with disgust while grabbing the nearest paper towel, I took a different approach and grabbed the camera. An article I read recently (name escapes me), says that mothers should encourage their children to make messes – to let them explore different sensations (gooey hair). It enhances their creativity (and fine motor skills).

Where else but in childhood, can one have the uninhibited opportunity to happily explore the world (and one’s hair), while creating an enormous mess without the worry of having to clean-up? ….Lucky kid!

Postscript: Roger matter-of-factly asked me why the tub was purple….

Today’s beetle discovery 5pm.

If a ladybug lands on you, it’s supposed to be good luck. I wonder what it means when you find the largest brown beetle in Ulster County stuck to your blue canvas beach chair in your front yard. To verify its size, I called on my neighbors, Jimmy and Miera while also enthusiastically inviting passers-by to take a look. Rudy’s mother thought it wasn’t real. (But then it moved, and we all jumped). Another person thought it was a Japanese Beetle. Jimmy sized it at about ¾ of an inch long, but I think it was probably closer to an inch in size.

I wish Alan was a little older to appreciate my discovery, but he was more interested in playing “little guy” with his bus on the porch. Before the beetle flew and/or crawled away, I quickly ran to my kitchen and grabbed an old pesto jar and punctured some holes on the cap. I ran back outside and scooped the beetle into the jar. Having lived through three indoor snake incidents (3-5 feet in length), capturing a one inch beetle seemed uncomplicated. I added some grass (I’m not sure why, but it seemed like the right thing to do). This would be his temporary home until after dinner when I could study it more closely.

I placed the jar next to me while I snapped the green beans. So many questions entered my mind. As I tossed a raw green bean into my mouth, I wondered about what beetles eat. Was he hungry? I wondered about the role of beetles in our environment. Why did it land on my chair? Then I began to feel guilty about having captured another living thing. Was it scared? Did it want to go home?

After rushing through dinner, I excused myself so that I could research my beetle. My time is so limited these days, and researching beetles may not be the most appropriate use of my time, but it was worth examining. Imagine how I felt when I learned that there are “more species of beetles than species of plants! There are about 350,000 named species of beetles in the world and many more unnamed species. In the United States and Canada alone, there are almost 24,000 species!!”

Unnamed species of beetles? Where do I begin?

The closest I could estimate is that he is a bean leaf beetle. However, these types of beetles only measure at ¼ of an inch, and my beetle was much bigger. Not wanting to over think this, I deduced that he was most likely one of the thousands within this category.

Instead of trying to "name" my beetle, I decided to spend the rest of my time looking into the bigger beetle question: What is the role of the beetle? Why will they thrive even after human life becomes extinct?

Before releasing my beetle back to my front lawn, I tried to memorize his features (spotless and brown) so I could always remember my time with him. I’ll always wonder if he was one of those “unnamed” beetles waiting for a scientist to discover him under a rock in some exotic tropic island (or on a blue canvas beach chair). Just my luck!

4th of July Parade

Even with the cloudy skies and drizzle, it did my heart good to see the children scurrying around on the porch, reaching for a cookie and happily sharing toys. (My father was in disbelief that so many children interacted together without one crying “incident”).

You could definitely feel the anticipation (both children and adults) as we waited for that first drumbeat and flicker of light from the fire truck. As the opening marching band approached we eagerly proceeded to the curb where I had strategically placed several of our beach chairs. While the other children nestled on the laps of their parents, Alan enjoyed the freedom of wandering the yard without my constant lecture about handholding. Occasionally he would climb atop his “popper” to watch the surprising sights around him. I watched Ava covet his “ride”, so I added another vehicle from Alan’s fleet creating a little parade of our own in my front yard.

While I am partial to fire trucks (mainly because of Alan’s interest), my favorite floats have always been the ones with live music. Several caught my eye this year. But it’s hard to go into any more detail, because here’s the downside to parades. You can only enjoy the music for a moment, and then it’s - - - more fire trucks. So it’s a challenge keeping the children interested. If you’re lucky, a lollipop will land on your lap.

Intermittent showers had some of us back on the porch, but several diehards like Julie and Jace stayed curbside. Eventually, after the fumes of the antique tractors had us light-headed, we all re-convened on the porch for some more blueberry cobbler (made by moi!), chocolate chip cookies (a la Jamie), pumpkin bread (Julie), as well as some real lunch food.

While passing out lemonade spritzers (non alcoholic), I thought about those cupcakes which I had made last night sitting in my fridge. With all of the candy, cookies and sweet breads that the children had already consumed, I thought if I brought out one more once of sugar, the parents would never speak to me again! So after everyone left, I walked over to the firehouse. The party there was just beginning. I handed them to the lieutenant and thanked him for a job well done.

Garden Song

I couldn’t find a performance on the net with Dave Mallett performing the Garden Song, but I just found John Denver singing it on the Muppet Show(of all places!) Below is the link to the YouTube video. This song has special meaning. It’s the lullaby we sing to Alan. (which Eileen sang to Roger when he was a baby)

Alan hasn’t seen this John Denver performance yet. I can’t wait to show him. Take a look. It's like visiting an old friend....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6NIumQsg7g

Baking the Cake

(Hello Folks! If you're here to read about Jamie's party, it's the next blog entry below this one. This entry is my egocentric experience of baking the cake..)

Baking the Cake

Though my husband calls me “Cake”, this nickname does not live up to my baking skills. In fact, my first inkling when offering to bake the cake for Jamie’s birthday was to purchase one from Price Chopper. It’s fast, easy and for the most part, tasty. My second gut reaction was to buy a box cake and pray that nobody asked me if it was made from scratch.

It’s not that I didn’t want to show effort, it’s just that I wasn’t sure if I could abandon all of my fears, and I wasn’t sure if I had enough courage to take the risk of baking one from scratch….What if everybody hates it! What it if it’s gooey inside!

Thinking about how Jamie has been the “real deal”, (no pretense or phoniness here), I just couldn’t let her eat a cake made by a factory or faceless baker. Plus, she makes just about everything from scratch – muffins, cookies, granola, you name it!

I decided to take the risk, and knowing how much she loves pineapples, I decided to try out a pineapple/carrot/coconut cake that I found on a baking website.

What if people don’t like pineapple? What if I screw up? But like a skilled culinary therapist, I tried to dispute my dysfunctional beliefs, replacing them with positive thoughts…this will be the best cake ever!!

I wasn’t so sure.

First, I didn’t have all of the tools necessary. I don’t have a food processor. (well there is one in my attic picked up at a yard sale, but I don’t know how it works) What if I didn’t chop the carrots small enough and an innocent child spontaneously began choking on a carrot bit? Boy, this recipe called for lots of carrots. What if it tasted more like a salad than sweet?

I don’t have a sifter. (I’m not sure what one even looks like). So I combined the flour, baking powder and baking soda as best I could, creating a lightly coat of freshly fallen snow on the table. Then, I looked more closely at my measuring spoon. Ooops! I realized that I had a ½ teaspoon, and not a full teaspoon, so I had to add and mix again….

The recipe called for “crushed pineapples” Another oops. I contemplated digging through my attic to search for that food processor.

Finally the 3 mixing bowls of ingredients were combined together, and I poured the batter into a large rectangular cake pan. I'm supposed to pre-heat the over? The recipe said that the normal “tooth pick test” would not work for this cake, because it is too moist. My anxiety level increased. How will I know it’s done!

I set the timer, and walked out of the kitchen, urging Alan to stop eating carrot bits off the floor…..

45 minutes later, I peeked into the oven, and the cake looked pretty good. I let it cool for the rest of the day, and started mixing the ingredients for the frosting. Once the cake was frosted, I sprinkled the top with nuts and took a heart-shaped cookie cutter. I placed it in the middle of the cake, and sprinkled the remaining coconut creating a white heart in the middle.

If you’re with me this far….I thought it came out delicious, but I can’t say for sure how everyone else felt. But nobody choked. Nobody died…and the children had a nice helping of fruits and vegetables under that frosting……Love, Cake

The best collusions are those involving.......

The best collusions are those involving _________. There are many possible answers to the fill in the blank, but my favorite collusions are those involving birthdays. You know the kind - secret e-mails with co-conspirators, whispered conversations with the birthday girl in the next room, a wink of an eye when her back is turned…Finally, it all came together as planned, and yesterday we secretly convened for Jamie’s 30th birthday party/picnic at yellow park.

Jamie started putting the pieces together about a week ago. Apparently, I had told her that I was notorious for giving surprise parties. What?! How foolish of me to spontaneously say such a thing! In addition, she said that too many people were inquiring about her weekend plans, another clue that something was in the works.

Her husband arranged for them to go on a family outing to the park. As they were walking, they were seen by some of the co-conspirators in a car heading to the party. Her husband tried to divert her attention. At that point, her suspicions were confirmed. As they approached, we all yelled “surprise”, and an embarrassed Jamie began to blush. She had told us previously that she didn’t like “adult” birthday parties, which had me a little worried, but her husband reassured me that it would be okay.

I hope she enjoyed herself...we all did!! The setting was perfect, familiar to all of us who have used yellow park as a center point of our playdates. This time, I covered the normally bare picnic tables with beautiful white linen table clothes, and had picked a bouquet of hydrangeas as a centerpiece. However, with the breeze, the blue glass vase toppled over shattering into a million pieces. I am hoping that this is a sign of good luck!

Everyone brought delicious things to eat: fruit salad, cucumber sandwiches, pasta salad, pina coladas… I baked the cake...As Jamie has a love affair with pineapples, I chose a Pineapple/Carrot/Coconut cake. E-mail me should you want the recipe.......I may post something later about baking this cake. It was quite an event!

As a gift, we chipped in for a gift certificate to the local tattoo parlor. Jamie and I have shared tattoo stories, and she told me that she wants to get more. So we thought that since she is moving next month (sob!), that giving her a tattoo from Saugerties would be a nice way to remember all of the people she has touched the past year. So I guess in some ways, this birthday party was also a way to communicate to her how much she has been loved by so many of us this year! She will be missed, but we wish her the best!!! !

Friday-Saturday/End of June

FRIDAY
Freaky Friday : The knock at the door couldn’t have come at a better time. Alan was refusing lunch, crying inconsolably at the table, and I was at my wits end trying to figure out what to do next. In a last ditch effort to console him, I playfully exclaimed that maybe it was the mailman at the door, and tried to usher him out of his seat to check with me. (He normally loves the mailman). But he wouldn’t budge and clanked his fork onto his plate.

Having run out of strategies, I looked at my watch to see if naptime was approaching, and walked to the door praying that it wasn’t someone complaining to me about the noise level. (How ironic that would be).

I opened the door, and it was Jimmy, my next door neighbor. He’s a retired 67-year-old second father who always has great timing whether it be showing up with a bucket when the roof leaks, or a hammer to put in some drywall. This time, he smiled at me holding a toy fire truck in his hand as if a gentleman holding out a delicate boutique of flowers. Or better yet, he was more like Superman coming to save the day! Thanks Jimmy!

SATURDAY
Farmers Market Visit
Each year, our farmer’s market brings new vendors, expanding local offerings of fresh fruits and vegetables, desserts and breads as well as homemade gourmet food such as jelly, syrup and granola. Live music played (a bass player) while I visited each table. A former NYC advertising designer, who I worked with briefly when he was exploring a career in mental health, has established a baking business with his new wife. They had delicious pies and sweat breads for sale.

I found my neighbor, a videgrapher at a flight school, there as well. This was his first day in twenty years selling desserts using recipes he learned as a child. I purchased some pure maple syrup for making granola (there was a woman selling granola who adamantly told me to never use the sugar free kind). Plus, for $1.00, I bought baby spinach that I’ll sauté with some grape tomatos for lunch today. By far my favorite was the dried vegetables that are sprinkled with sea salt that you can eat like potato chips. I identified rutabaga, sweet potatoes, green beans, and carrots. I returned home via the backyard, and picked some glorious blue hydrangeas (which I had seen for sale at the farmer’s market). I put them in a blue glass jar placed them on the table.

Party Girl
Portia’s 40th Birthday Party: Surrounded by friends and food, I teasingly asked who was the next person to turn 40. As people shared their numbers (some in months), it never occurred to me that it would be me. Now mind you, one or two of those people had already passed that marker, but most of the attendees who were privy to this conversation were at least 5-6-7 years behind me. As the conversation shifted to sharing engagement rings and wedding stories while Alan darted down the hallway to explore the house, I suddenly felt older and wiser.