Sometimes perfect is the enemy of the delicious

Every Christmas my mother bakes these ginger cookies for my stepbrother. He lives out of town and doesn't spend too much time at my mum's, but he adores her ginger cookies and so my mum, because she's amazing like that, never forgets to include them in her Christmas baking. Since mum has come to rely on my help with baking (and by rely I mean I show up and beg to help), I have been in charge of the ginger cookies for the past two years. I'm a pretty decent cookie baker, or so I thought.

Last year I accidentally doubled the butter. Rarely do I think too much butter is a bad thing, but in this case the cookies drowned in it. They swam in oceans of butter. They still looked like cookies but they were too soft and just not what I set out to bake. Hoping to prove myself as at least an average baker this year, I tried again. And failed, again. Who leaves out half a cup of flour. Half a cup? All the time and energy one devotes to properly scooping and sweeping my flour with just the right technique falls to the gutter when one abandons the recipe in favour of not paying attention. To be fair, I was paying attention, but not to my cookies. I would wager my entire bank account that my attention was held by two exceedingly blonde children who take up residence in the middle of kitchen each and every time I turn my mixer on.

My cookies were a mess. Without the right amount of flour the cookies couldn't reach their intended round shape, and instead became one single, enormous cookie. We were left with three of these colossal cookies, one from each cookie sheet. With her glass half full attitude my mum dug out the pizza cutter and simply cut cookie shapes from the flat, soggy, cookie mess. We set them aside on the cooling rack and crossed our fingers. By the next morning they looked like this:

For those of you who can't decipher the iPhone-captured shape in front of you, I'll just tell you what it is. It's a Ginger Blob. A blob of crystalized ginger, molasses, butter, sugar, and (a little) flour. It was already Christmas morning at this point, but I couldn't handle my failure. My mum asks so little from me and I didn't want my stepbrother to think I did care enough to make him a single, round, edible cookie. So in between making Eggs Benedict (my mum's Christmas morning specialty) and prepping for our family dinner, I made a new batch of ginger cookies. They were round and they were perfect.

But then. In the middle of the Christmas day chaos, we never threw out the Ginger Blob. It sat there on the back counter next to the gorgeously round, neatly presented, real cookies all day. That's where the magic happened. Every time someone new walked through the kitchen they would pop a piece of Ginger Blob in their mouth. Not only did everyone start snacking on Ginger Blob, they declared it to be delicious, over and over again. All day long my perfect cookies remained untouched and the Ginger Blob slowly disappeared.

We are all so hard on ourselves sometimes. Afraid of failure, afraid of being judged, afraid of anything less than perfection, we can make our life a lot more difficult. I should rephrase that: I can make my life a lot more difficult. Besides being delicious, Ginger Blob taught me an important lesson: don't overlook opportunities, new possibilities staring you right in the face, because they are less than perfect. While I'm wasting my precious time trying to live perfectly, to make the perfect decisions and take the perfect steps, opportunities are passing me by.

So here I am, a little voice on the internet, asking you to find something in your life that doesn't seem to fit, and look again. Take a second look at that job opportunity, that chance at a new friendship, or the beginning of a new habit that at first glance seems to hard or wrong or out of reach. Does it match perfectly with the things you think you want? Maybe not. But might it end up surprising you with unexpectedly deliciousness? It might. Let's find out.

In a week filled with resolutions (and I'm brewing up a few of my own), let's take a moment to be a little easier on ourselves. Try something new, not something perfect.

xo

Update: My husband informed that I misspelled "perfect" in my post about perfection. Of course I did. But I corrected my typo, not because I'm trying to be perfect, but this is a writing blog and it's time I start editing my work. Baby steps. 

I drag my husband out and he all he got was a lousy dog bite

Never a Halloween enthusiast, I had to drag Matt out trick-or-treating last night. He tells me that even as a kid he thought Halloween was too much work since he could just eat candy from his kitchen. And yes, when he shared that little observation with me I did collapse on the floor in the biggest eye-roll in history. But I invited him nonetheless because I was worried that I wouldn't have enough arms and patience to keep two kids under five from running into oncoming traffic and gangs of goblins if I went out on my own.

There was one tiny complication though: some jerk dog in a pumpkin costume bit Matt. Yes, I dragged my husband out to trick-or-treat in the pouring rain and all he got was a dog bite on his back. He's ok, though it did really hurt. The dog managed to clamp his teeth down enough through Matt's jacket to leave teeth marks and a big bruise, though thankfully he did not break the skin. The owner of the dog, someone I see in the neighbourhood every week, behaved terribly. We had to yell at her to stop walking as I pulled up Matt's jacket and shirt to see the severity of the damage. She asked if he was alright, but did so trying to hide behind a tree down the block. We should have gotten her name and information but everything happened so fast. I'm going to speak to her next time I see her. This dog came inches from biting Shira, who was catching a ride home in Matt's arms. If the dog had bitten an inch to the left we probably would have spent last night at the hospital.

Our Princess Sleeping Beauty and Fairy Princess had a delightful Halloween nonetheless. We've been drawing ghosts for weeks and we even managed to carve out a pumpkin last night, who joined us for dinner on the dining room table. And then there was the bake sale at school on Tuesday and, of course, the candy. The girls asked to sleep with it last night and I expect that we'll hear a lot about it over the next day or two as we ration out a few pieces at a time. I also expect that by the weekend we'll offer to trade in their candy for a Barbie. We all pick our battles, no?

P.S. Sorry, Matty.

A list of thanks

It's Thanksgiving in Canada and so I offer you a list. I am thankful for my children. I am thankful for Matt. I am eternally thankful that we joined forces and brave the world together.

I am grateful for two year old girls in rain boots and stripy leggings. I am grateful for shared hot chocolates.

I am grateful for this glorious fall season, walks to the market, and the colour yellow.

I am grateful that my husband now loves kale.

I am grateful for imagination, bears. and tea parties.

I am grateful for little feet.

I hope it's been a good holiday at your house, and for those of you beyond Canada, I hope you could feel our collective gratitude the world over.

Valentines and Vaginas

From the Vagina Monologues. Not quite office-appropriate.

Happy Valentine's Day! I am head-over-heels for Valentine's Day because I jump a the chance to tell someone I love them, and I want to share this joy with my girls. It's the perfect excuse to make a craft, bake with chocolate, and relax a bit about things in life that are hard. A good day in my books.

I've had some great Valentine's Days in the past, but my two absolute favourite Valentine's Days celebrated a different kind of love: the love of vaginas. Have you even seen The Vagina Monologues by Eve Ensler? I have seen two performances of this incredible play, one at Queen's University and one at the University of Alberta. The first time I watched my friends perform the monologue (and I wish now that I had had the courage to perform along with them), and the second time I took my father's wife's mother (let's just call her May) to watch Jann Arden perform. Both times blew me away. Made me proud. Made me cry. And, most importantly, these performances stuck with me for years, fueling my commitment to teach my own girls to love their vagina.

Here's the thing: I want Alyce and Shira to be proud of their bodies. All of their bodies. We just can't be proud of something we don't talk about, so in our house, we talk about vaginas (Hi, Matty!) and that's just not going to stop. So Valentine's Day in our house will always, for me and my girls, be a day for vaginas.

Oh Monday, there you are

For Alyce, Valentine's Day is a two-day event. She doesn't have school tomorrow (the actual Valentine's Day), so today is the day of her Valentine's party and card exchange at school. And the day she dresses up in hearts and brings her new favourite princess to school. Belle was a gift from her Nana this weekend and the two are fast friends. I am exceptionally tired of sharing my house with Disney princesses, but I am awfully fond of her smiling face.

And what plans do we have for day two of Valentine's? We baked chocolate heart cookies on the weekend (which, I must confess, were a bit of a disaster. Martha's cookies never fail, but these ones, I'm afraid, just didn't work--it was like trying to roll out fudge, not cookie dough) and tomorrow we will cover them with icing and sprinkles. I'm thinking of trying out some icing paint, found here. Alyce has also declared that the house needs decorating, so I guess we have work to do. I'd also like Alyce to help me to make a nice dinner for Matt (I like to delegate), so I'll likely be asking her to help me roast a chicken. It's never too early to learn how to blend rosemary and lemon.

But today. Today is Monday! It's been too long since I've properly taken advantage of the Monday momentum and I need to fix that.  Lately I've had tough time staying positive, or even just staying focused.  I need to regroup, and what better way to regroup then with a list!

• I'm in the middle of designing the new course I'll begin teaching this summer. I'm grateful to have been given the time and money to redesign the course, but it's no easy task. When given the opportunity to start from scratch, I sometimes struggle with keeping my project small enough. I think it's part of what made me a good researcher (because I think big), but at some point decisions need to be made. So this week I want to finish putting together my course reader and complete the first few weeks of lecture notes.

• I would like to spend some time thinking about what I write here on this blog, about how I might structure things a bit differently. When I started writing here and was unsure about what would become the focus of my writing, I figured I would just start writing what came naturally and see where it takes me. Now it's been year and a half, and I'm still not sure. I don't think it's necessarily a negative, but reassessment is good. Sharing these little details from my life has become so important to me. 

• At home this week I would like to do some early spring cleaning, tiny steps at a time. As Matt suggested to me earlier this week, it's time for toy purge. We like to keep half of their toys hidden so we can bring them out later (hey look, new toys!). We brought so little with us home from Delaware and already I feel as though we are buried in toys. It's also time to go through their clothes again, because against my wishes, The Children keep growing.

• I am also trying me hand at some gluten-free cooking this week. I thinking of trying some gluten-free cranberry-orange bread.

What do you have planned for the week? Do you write Monday lists, too? Am I obsessed with lists? Probably.

Tu B'Shevat

Today is Tu B'Shevat, a relatively minor Jewish holiday, but a holiday nonetheless. Alyce and I rarely pass by the opportunity to make a craft, so in our house we love these days. Tu B'Shevat is special to me for non-craft reasons, too, because it was the first Jewish holiday I celebrated once I had begun my conversion to Judaism. In January 2006, after a few meetings with our rabbi, Matt and I signed up for a year long course on Judaism. It was a requirement for conversion and needed to be done before I could go before the beit din, or Jewish court, and formally convert. Tu B'Shevat is one of four Jewish New Year's, and this particular new year's celebration is for the trees! Technically this is a day to mark the age of trees for tithing purposes (and is introduced in the Talmud), but now those who celebrate Tu B'Shevat use the day as a chance to give thanks for the fruit and nuts that grow on trees (especially those that grow in Israel). It has also been used as a springboard to discuss contemporary ecological issues, so for a minor holiday, there is still a lot to work with!

We used the coming of Tu B'Shevat to spend some time learning about trees, taking walks in the woods (we have another one scheduled for after school with Alyce), and, of course, making things. The tree in the first photo above is my childhood tree located around the edge of the old cemetery behind my house. My friend and I each had our own tree, mine named Fred, hers named Harry, and we spent hours in them. Hours. I still visit it, and sometimes I even find a tree fairy poking around. Can you spot her? She's the one that resembles a puffy blue marshmallow with rosy cheeks.

Alyce and I made a tree painting that we covered in pictures of fruit that we drew. I painted a large tree trunk and then she went to town with the leaves. While we were busy tree-making, Shira painted her own hands blue. Before dinner last night Alyce and I hung the painting on the front door, waiting for Matt to come home and find a surprise. Just for the record, internet, the man walked up to the house, opened the door with the enormous blue poster board painted with an enormous tree, and didn't notice it at all. Alyce and I sent him right back outside to take proper notice, Which he did, and he loved it, of course. Alyce declared this morning that it is never coming down, so he'll have many opportunities to enjoy it.

For a few more tree-inspired crafts, check here.

For those of you celebrating, I hope it it's a lovely Tu B'Shevat where you live!

Hanukkah, around our house

We've had five wonderful nights of Hanukkah, although a little too eventful if you ask me. Things started off swimmingly, with school presentations, candles, a Cinderella doll, lego. The usual good stuff. This was the first year that Alyce understood the story of Hanukkah and has more than once gone on about that mean king who didn't Jews read their special books. There have been crafts done at school and at home, now hanging all over the house. But as soon as Hanukkah really got rolling, things got a bit messy around here. Alyce was sent home from school on Wednesday morning having complained of sore ears, and it wasn't long before she was on fire with a ridiculous fever. She'd been sick for a week or so, but since The Children are sick with colds about 98 percent of winter, we hadn't paid much attention. But this fever told us to snap out of our germ complacency and we found ourselves begging the doctor to see us, which she did on Wednesday night. Just as Alyce's antibiotics were kicking in, Shira started to look as though she were possessed by a cranky zombie, which led Matt to spending Friday morning at the emergency room (all the doctor's offices were closed for the holidays). Shira, too, is now slowly on the mend and less zombie-like. Let's hope the next few nights aren't quite so eventful.

For those of you lighting your candles each night, happy fifth night of Hanukkah! Do you have any parties left to attend? Have you made your latkes? And for those of you waiting around for Santa, I hope your Christmas day finds you with good family, good food, and a much needed day off from the rest of the world. Merry Christmas to you!

It's beginning to look a lot like Hanukkah

 

Of course everyone knows it’s the holidays, but in our house this means Hanukkah, not Christmas. Actually, because we’re living with my mum and stepfather, it means Hanukkah and Christmas. Not a combined celebration (in the way many interfaith families celebrate), but side-by-side celebrations that are sometimes a bit confusing for everyone involved. Especially this year, when Hanukkah and Christmas overlap on the calendar, we’re are in full-blown double-holiday season. There are presents wrapped in silver and blue and red and green. There are menorah and dreidel crafts and Christmas Trees. My Jewish family is giving Christmas parents to my family, and my Christmas-celebrating family is offering Hanukkah presents to The Children. But like I said, our family doesn’t celebrate Christmas; we celebrate Hanukkah. I’m so confused some days.

Let me start at the beginning. I wasn’t born Jewish, but converted shortly before I married Matt. I didn’t grow up in a home that identified with a particular religion so I didn’t quite leave a tradition when I spent a year learning Hebrew, learning how to make challah, or when I promised that panel of three rabbis that I would raise my children in a Jewish home. I had developed a closeness to Jewish traditions before even meeting Matt, when I was working for a Jewish professor during my master’s program, spending a lot of time with his family on Shabbat and holidays. A couple of years later, around the time that I knew I would marry Matt I realized, too, that I would become Jewish. It wasn’t a simple decision, but an easy one. My immediate family was completely behind my decision (while the rest of my family oscillates between indifference, curiosity, and slightly offensive comments). But no matter how much I adopted these traditions as my own--welcoming Shabbat on Friday nights, following a new calendar of holidays, committing to a lifelong cycle of learning--it wasn’t always easy to separate myself from my non-Jewish family. Of course no one asked me to put up a wall between my Jewish and non-Jewish life, but becoming Jewish meant not being and not doing other things. While we didn’t observe all of the laws as Orthodox Jews, we still kept kosher and marked Shabbat as a day more special than the others, and this meant that we often couldn’t share the food my family prepared and said no to going shopping on Saturdays.  No matter how much I maintained a bridge between the two worlds, roadblocks still happened sometimes, and that’s just the way it was going to be.

Let me start even more at the beginning. Matt wasn’t born Jewish, either. I won’t share with you his reasons for converting, but I can tell you that he converted on his own (not in preparation for marriage, which is the most common reason for converting) four years before we started dating. It’s not very common to meet two married Jews with no Jewish family, but here we are. In practical terms this means that we make our own party, so to speak. We have no family traditions on which to build, no challah recipe to pass down, and no mother-in-law to remind me that I’m supposed to make brisket this way. It also means that when holidays come around (which they do a lot, because Jews know how to mark historical events like nobodies business), we find ourself in this strange new world of wanting to share our celebrations with a family that doesn’t share our traditions.  There are many wonderful things about our unusual little family, including the freedom to create our own traditions and habits, and the pure amazement both Matt and I feel as we watch Alyce recite a prayer in Hebrew or play Shabbat with her dollies. But December presents some challenges for everyone around here.

It’s a little easier for Matt because he doesn’t have many opportunities to interact with his non-Jewish family. Maybe it’s because he converted long before me, or maybe it’s just because he’s always been an independent sort (that’s the polite way to describe his anti-social tendencies), but whatever the reason Matt finds it easier to draw a firm line between Christmas and Hanukkah. And we do draw a firm line in our own home, where the only mention of Christmas comes in the form of Dora’s holiday special. But even when we’re not living in my mum’s Christmas house, we still have to negotiate how the two holidays will mingle because we do see a lot of my family (hi, mum) and a lot of our friends aren’t Jewish. How do we share in gift-giving? Are they Hanukkah or Christmas gifts? Are we participating in someone else’s holiday or just in the same room for moral support and a good meal? And while Alyce has no problem telling strangers on the street that her family celebrates Hanukkah, and they say isn't she just the sweetest thing, I’m terrified that she’s going to march up to a bunch of children and tell them that Santa isn’t real. I’m really afraid of that. I don’t want my child to be the one who spoils Christmas for her entire kindergarten class.

Most of these details are just that, and ultimately there isn’t much to worry about. But some days Matt and I struggle trying to define our own traditions in the middle of all these competing forces. Sometimes I wish people didn’t assume that everyone celebrates Christmas or that my children are somehow missing out on the greatest.day.ever (M. Bloom wrote about this earlier in the week and it got me thinking), like when my sweet uncle begged me to let Alyce and Shira believe in Santa. To him it has nothing to do with being Jewish or Christian, but only with magic. I get that, I really do. But Alyce and Shira have a lot of magic in their life and they are not made any worse for not having Christmas. They receive plenty of surprises on the eight nights of Hanukkah and love lighting the candles each night. And they have the magic of lighting the candles each Friday night throughout the entire year, so there’s that, too.

But from all of this confusion comes good things, new traditions. Tomorrow morning, for instance, Matt will be teaching Alyce’s entire kindergarten class (and some older students, too) about our Hanukkah traditions. Alyce’s school is pretty old-fashioned when it comes to marking holidays, and Christmas is a big deal there. But her teacher tries hard to incorporate her Jewish traditions, and this is why we found ourselves making an enormous batch of sufganiyot tonight, ready for Matt to share them with 30 four and five year olds. He is also bringing a bag full of dreidels, and an episode of Sesame Street where Elmo learns about Hanukkah. I’m sad that I can’t be there tomorrow (but not sad that instead I have a job interview!), but I’m already smiling at what I imagine will take place in Alyce’s classroom tomorrow. Matt is an excellent professor, but a room for of kindergarteners might prove a bit more challenging!

For those of you celebrating Hanukkah, chag sameach! For those celebrating Christmas, you might want to stay clear of Alyce. Or at least keep her away from your children.

Our week

This week was, you guessed it, a bit hectic. I'm not sure why I ever think it will be otherwise, but ever the optimist, I always have big dreams. Like this will be the week that I don't spend hours going in circles trying to organize my day, or this time I'll finish everything on my list early enough that I'll have some down time with Matt before bed, or maybe this will be the week that I develop enough discipline not to eat the entire tray of holiday baking that seems to appear everywhere I turn lately. My chances are not looking good, I admit. But baking aside, I think dealing with all this chaos is really more about perspective than anything else. I can't make The Children stop being The Children (and most of the time I don't want them any other way) and I can't force them to sleep through the night. I can't prevent the toys/blocks/crayons invasion that creeps its way into our house each and every day. I can't make little Shira move any faster on our way from the house to the car (she does have very tiny feet, you know, though you wouldn't know the size of her winter boots). And so I'll embrace the chaos, if only a tiny bit, and hope that a little change in perspective might make the week feel a little smoother. As my husband tells me constantly sometimes, I need to reframe my expectations.

No matter the chaos, my little family makes me laugh a lot. Like when I skipped out of work early this week to watch Alyce's first ever on-stage singing performance at school. Sure it was a Christmas concert (and we don't celebrate Christmas), but Alyce loved belting out Jingle Bells no matter what. I was an exceptionally proud mama, and before I realized what was happening, I was actually crying in the audience. I think hearing Alyce's warbly little voice singing alongside all her little kindergarten friends struck a nerve in my uterus and brought up an uncontrollable urge to return Alyce to her baby state. Because there is no way that the baby I grew in my body is now old enough to perform all the hand gestures to songs about Santa.

This weekend is about spending time together, the four of us. Last weekend Matt and I spent most of the time packing up the old house and packing everything away in storage, and getting even more settled into mum's house. It was a lot of work and Alyce and Shira spent a lot of their time with mum while we packed. This weekend we have no lists, a date with friends (and Liz, Alyce would like to know if the indoor park has any girl toys), and our only responsibility is to enjoy some quiet time however which way we please. We'll also (fingers crossed) enjoy some naps. Even the dollies around here are looking forward to a good nap or two.

How are you spending the weekend?

Like a drunken Snow White

Found here, via A Cup of Jo

For your Monday, in honour of your upcoming holiday party circuit. May your parties be filled with good wine, sparkly shoes, and good cats friends.

Halloween

 

It's that time of the year again, when you find yourself sick on couch, having eaten too much of your childrens' candy. I did it last year, and I'll do it again the next. I like tradition.

I tried to take a proper photo of Princess Alyce, but she was too busy screaming with excitement, sprinting from house to house, yelling, and I'm not kidding, "I WANT TO BUY MORE CANDY! HAPPY HALLOWEEN!" She has since collapsed, drunk on chemicals, having cried through the sugar crash around bedtime. Again, tradition.

I hope you were all sufficiently entertained by all the Halloween ghouls and goblins out there tonight! Enjoy the sugar, and I'll see you at the kale salad bar later this week for a good detox.

Thankful

It's Canadian Thanksgiving, and so I offer you another list. Here are a few things I'm thankful for right now:

1. Shira's little face.

2. Alyce's not as little face.

3. That my friend, Gemma, gave birth to another healthy boy yesterday!

4. The pies I made made for Thanksgiving dinner today at my mum's house. I am just getting comfortable making pie crust from scratch, but they turned out beautifully. There was one apple, two pumpkin, and no photographic evidence. We were too busy eating.

5. Being close to mum after years of living all over the place.

6. The new season of Dexter.

7. For those of you who are always cheering me up when I'm feeling discouraged.

8. I'm grateful for how delicious my coffee tastes each morning.

9.That Matt and I can rely on each other, and most importantly, stay married, during these very uncertain months. I consider myself very lucky.

10. For my blog. I can't explain just how much joy it brings me to connect with so many different people, especially when there have been so many times in the past few years when I've felt awfully alone. Also, I love having a place to smother in photos of my two favourite faces (see: #1 and #2).

Happy Thanksgiving! May you eat lots of delicious food and then find a couch upon which to collapse, happily.

P.S. I cannot find any figs. Not a single one. Maybe I'll have to order some fig jam, to give me just a taste until next fig season?

P.P.S. I'm going apple-picking again tomorrow, but this time for red delicious apples, Matt's favourite. I still have a large batch of apple sauce to make from the last round, but I'm up for the challenge.

Ten quick things

1. At Starbucks this morning, they gave me a free Americano (double, lots of room. milk), for no reason. An auspicious start to my day.

2. I'm currently watching game five of the ALDS with my husband. I'm going for the Yankees, but only because I have a crush on NYC.

3. I voted in the Ontario provincial election today.

4. Hille (the cat) is snoring loudly. May his dreams be filled with giant bowls of cereal milk and potato chips, his two favourite things.

5. I'm thinking about the pies I need to make for Thanksgiving dinner this weekend. Apple and pumpkin.

6. Did I tell you that my good friend in Seattle broke her ankle last week in a daring act of heroism? Well, she did. And she has two little ones the same age as Alyce and Shira. And it's her driving foot. I really wish we lived closer so that I could help her, as I'm sure she's already over the deep end. Also, it wasn't so much an act of heroism as it was a misstep on the stairs, but still. It's broken.

7. Chocolate chips cookies are so delicious. Especially these ones. They are all gone, sorry.

8. I'm hoping the weather cools down a bit because October is supposed to be Fall. With a chill in the air, not a blazing sun in the air.

9. I picked up a Stephen King book from the library this week, because October is also supposed to be just a little bit scary.


10. Tomorrow I will buy a fig and I will try that fig. I'll report back.