Even Shira is Yawning

Though I'm not feeling much sympathy for little Shira. For the most part, I'm just not in a very generous mood. Other words for my mood today include: grumpy, impatient, irritable, fun-loving. Well, everything except that last one. Fortunately I was able to get over myself for an hour or two and take advantage of lunch with a friend. (Thanks for putting up with me, Dani.)

I would really, really like to talk about something else, but I've just reached that point where nothing else comes to mind. It's been months and months and I'm exhausted. I would love to begin a conversation about all the other stuff that is going on in our world, but when I try to speak or type all that comes out is this sludge of tired. Blurgh.

Matt, if you're reading this tonight from your quiet, child-free hotel room, we miss you here in sleepless Delaware. The girls put up with their tired mama and they are all tucked in their beds.

And I didn't even sell the cats! Although there is still tomorrow.

Come home soon.

Ten Things About My Tuesday

1. I am back to feeling that kind of tired that only Shira can produce. She's so sneaky that I sometimes don't even realize that I've brought her to bed and started nursing her. Before I know it she's pulled up the covers, claimed the good pillow, and is moving on to side two.





2. I got the results from my second Praxis exam (the English literature test) and I kicked its ass.

3. This morning a very tiny man arrived in my kitchen to fix the broken fridge light. I think he might have been part hobbit. After weeks of darkness, there is now light in our fridge. And, it turns out, a lot of dirt.

4. Matt is away in North Carolina for a few days and he stole the MacBook Pro and I miss it so.so.much.

5. I also miss Matt.

6. No, I really, really do. It turns out that I have the hardest working husband around. Life between 4:00 pm and 7:00 pm feels like hard work most days, chasing after Alyce, nursing Shira, coordinating bedtimes, making Alyce's lunch for the next day, and cleaning the mess that generally plagues our house, but it feels more than hard when you're doing it alone. Holy cow Matt does a lot around here.

7. Alyce and Shira go to bed at the same time each night, so Matt and I usually divide and conquer. Since I have boobs, I get Shira. I needed to come up with a plan tonight so that I could spend the necessary time nursing Shira to sleep and Alyce graciously offered to watch Alice in Wonderland and eat pretzels until Shira was sleeping.





8. I found out that I was pregnant with Alyce in March 2007. I think that might have been the last time I cleaned the litter boxes.


9. I'm not above eating chocolate icing from a bowl. This is unrelated to the previous entry.


10. My husband is currently in a hotel room, with an enormous bed, without children or cats. I don't really know how to process this information because I'm so tired I can't think straight. But I think I'm really jealous. A lot jealous.

School, Part Two

No textbook should ever be this big. Especially when I am required to bring it to each and every class. And because I don't like to break school-related rules, I will (but I'll complain about it).


2874. As in 2,874 pages with tiny print. Norton, this is out of hand.


Today begins round two of me returning to school. You'll find me in American Literature, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. The enormous Norton Anthology aside (if I can lift it), I'm looking forward to this class. I've been reading mostly cookbooks lately, and it's probably best to expand my horizons a bit.

I hope your Monday is an excellent one. What are your plans for the week?

Can You Send a Blog a Valentine? Made of Bread?

I love the internet.

Would you like to know why? Because I'm going to tell you.

(Please forgive the photo, but I wanted to offer proof!)

I made this bread a few days ago. As in, I came home from the gym, got Shira set up in her kitchen exersaucer (from where she can supervise), and made this most delightful bread. It took about 10 minutes from start to oven, and was cooling on the counter an hour later. And it is with thanks to the internet that our family came to devour this bread.

I started making my own challah a few years ago, though only very sporadically. After a year of classes and meetings and more classes, I had converted to Judaism before Matt and I were married (I was finally a Jew just a few days after Passover 2007). So when I began making challah, my kitchen wasn't filled with recipes passed down from parents and grandparents. I was faced instead with a few Jewish cookbooks and a counter covered in flour, yeast, and honey. Never mind trying to braid it. I was proud of my lumpy bread, and Matt, Alyce and the cats all enjoyed it. But making challah without a community of challah bakers and eaters was a lonely business, and so it didn't happen too often (we had just moved to Delaware, hadn't found a synagogue yet, and didn't know a single person).

There are a lot of reasons that I credit the internet, and blogging community in particular, for changing how I felt about baking my own bread, and how I felt about parenting. I was lonely for some community in so many ways when we first moved here, but discovering the incredible writing of, let's face it, some pretty fantastic blogs, opened up a community for me that I hadn't expected. I was trying really hard to make some in-person friends, but it was the community of parents and cooks and knitters and general life-adventurers that got me through. Oh, I'm just swooning now. Forgive me. If I sound a bit crazy-woman-on-the-interwebs, well, so be it.

But back to bread. I started making challah again because it was showing up again and again on some of my favourite blogs. All of a sudden I have only one recipe to follow, but I got my community of challah bakers, because of course one recipe linked to another, and another, and another, and you see where I'm going with this. If blogs are good at one thing, it's gently pushing you in the direction of twenty other good ideas.

I now make a pretty decent challah. But why stop there? Why not also make this wonderful soda bread, too? And then take a photo of it and share it on your own blog. Interwebs, you've created a monster.

For those of you who observe it, have a wonderful Shabbat! For the rest of you, enjoy the greatest of Friday nights.

P.S. My favourite challah recipe.
P.P.S. The soda bread recipe that you need to make this week. Update: I forgot to add that I had to add more all-purpose flour to get the consistency right. Since I don't have a kitchen scale, it might be just because I had the conversions a bit wrong.

In Other News: There is Standing

This week Shira discovered that her legs are more than just delicious rolls of baby and stripey leggings. They are perfect, it turns out, for standing.

It also happens that Alyce's bed is the perfect height for little hands to hold on to for dear life. Those legs, after all, are new at this standing business.

So if you stop by our house anywhere between six and six (during the day, please and thank you), be sure to stop by the girls' room, where Shira has vowed never to leave her new post.

(I just noticed my own feet in the photo. Lovely. -the editor)

P.S. Shira has gone from waking every hour or two to only waking up once or twice through the night! I love progress so, so much. Especially when it involves sleeping. I'll keep you posted!

P.P.S. Alyce still doesn't want Shira back. I can't say that I blame her.

Ten Things I've Learned This Week About Feeding My Children

1. I will always end up being the one crying in the corner. Every time.

Moving on, then.

2. If you join us for dinner, be prepared for Alyce shrieking at the possibility that I've hidden something in her macaroni and cheese. It was pepper, Alyce. PEPPER. Clearly, I've been discovered.

3. Did you know that Shira loves pears? No, wait, she hates them. Nope, she loves them! No, wait, she still hates them. What's that Shira? You NEED them? You needed them five minutes ago? Not anymore? Not ever? Of course. I give up. Again, sobbing.

4. Alyce is such a Nosy Parker that she'll insist on trying anything that's on my plate--even if she's disgusted by it--just in case I tried to sneak a piece of chocolate inside my quinoa.

5. Shira, I'm just not buying the melodrama.




6. When Alyce asks for peanut butter toast she doesn't actually want toast, and if you bring her anything toasted, well, I wouldn't want to be you. What she really wants is peanut butter on a piece of untoasted bread. She'll take some jam, too, if you've got any.

7. The one way to ensure that your child will not like a food is to order it by the case. If anyone needs a case of organic baby oatmeal, you know where to find me.

8. I don't ask much of the cats. The least they could do is eat the cheerios on the floor. Instead they spend all their time circling the table, awaiting their chance to swipe the more desirable yogurt or shredded cheese. Maybe it's time to remind them that I can unsign the adoption papers. Especially Lucy's.

9. Pediatricians, parenting books, and all manner of dinner experts will tell you not to stress over how or how much your child eats. They are probably right, and if I were writing a book on feeding kids (which I'm not), I might suggest the same thing. After all, my husband survived an entire year on olives. But no matter how many times you read about how you shouldn't stress, feeding kids can be really annoying. When you hard-boil eggs, make egg salad, offer it to your child who loves egg salad, and then have it handed back to you as though you handed her a salad of stinging nettles, it drains a person.

10. A three-year-old is a most useful ally in distracting a stubborn baby at the dinner table. I will always be grateful for Alyce's help, whether it is her pterodactyl impression (a reliable laugh, for sure) or her mash-up of John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt and ABCs.

Sick Day

It was a sick day at our house. Alyce's sniffles from yesterday turned into a fever and other unpleasantries. Alyce coped with a rare weekday viewing of Alice in Wonderland, some Dora, and, of course, crafts. My favourite thing about her creation this morning is that she wrote out all of our names (Shira, too). If you are having trouble, look closely at the scribbles. You need to squint your eyes a bit. Maybe all the way.

By afternoon Alyce was in fine form, fever gone and fancy free. But all that getting better makes a girl tired, and she passed out before six, with me not far behind her. The cats too.

Good night!