It's Fat Tuesday!

Dude, we've had the Olympic opening ceremonies, Chinese New Year, Valentine's Day, Presidents' Day, and now Fat Tuesday (Mardi Gras = Fat Tuesday en français)! Eat your pancakes tonight! (Is that a Methodist tradition?? Methodist Men's Group Pancake Tuesday growing up? Anyone? UMYF? Choir Tour? Shout out to the Northern Hillers! Holla back!) AND spring has sprung here in beautiful California (<-- which I always, always say in my head with an Arnold Schwarzenegger accent)! All the neighborhood children came over and planted Karen and Daniel's wildflowers! I'm full of exclaimation points!

But tomorrow it's Ash Wednesday, and I'll return to more sober punctuation.

:D :D :D

Happy Valentine's Day

I'm a little late because I spent all day yesterday hugging Luke like this:

I am a good mother

Today is Friday, so this morning we went hiking to the little farm that the county runs. It's beautiful! On the way back, I let Scott play in a giant puddle of mud and, no kidding, FIVE PEOPLE stopped to tell me what a good mother I was. Ha! Letting him play in mud was like the easiest mothering thing I've done all week.

Now, laundry and car wash. :)

Rambling updates on Scott ...

Luke does bedtime most of the time, and he's been telling me about this cool new thing Scott's been doing. When Luke lays him in the crib, sleepy but awake, Scott says "Bye-bye" and Luke leaves and Scott goes to sleep. Parents of newborns, wonder of wonders, one day your children may do this too!

Tonight I got to do bedtime and I was excited to see this new "trick", but I couldn't part with him and instead held him until long after he drifted off, staring at his big baby body wrapped all around me in the chair and his perfectly rosy little cheeks and lips.

Since I'm basically using this site as a baby book, a record of the words Scott's using regularly and more or less correctly: bye, hi/hello, up(py), down, go, no, door, bath, chair, book, milk, juice, more, don't, mommy (except he says money), daddy, ear, nose, eye, thank you, duck, dog, dirt, yucky, pretty ... that's all I've got. Just remembered: shoe, bird, poo poo, two, and whoa. Last night he said potato, but I think that was a fluke.

He is really, truly such a delight.

From our recent trip to see the elephant seals on the coast:
Photos taken by Lucia!

Opt out of Yellow Pages

If you use the internet or your smart phone to find numbers and addresses, you might want to opt out of receiving the yellow pages: yellowpagesgoesgreen.org. A small step towards keeping those pretty pines standing.

I've been working more this month, but I think I'm going to have some time to make these beautiful bretzel rolls with Scott tonight. I've been craving egg salad on salty pretzel for, oh, 5 years now since I moved away from Vienna and the Anker bakeries and UN cafeteria (<-- world's. best. cafeteria.). I'm a little nervous about trying a new recipe again, because on Sunday I attempted these braised leeks and it was a catastrophe. I was missing several ingredients, and while I think the sweet onion worked as a substitute for shallots, the can of 3 month old baby food that I added (thinking it was turkey stock I had stored in a baby jar) did not replace chicken broth. I killed all those beautiful leeks for nothing. And asked Luke to throw it out because I didn't have the heart/stomach.

But our compost worms liked it!

From 1984

Your feelings are valid

This links to a (serious and enjoyable) TED talk by Eve Ensler on embracing your inner girl self (you too, men).

For my sister, who has trained herself as a scientist and serves in the male dominated military and has done it all without forgetting that emotions are powerful.

... and THANKS for all the viewing recommendations! Off to watch Dexter now while the popcorn's still hot.

Viewing recommendations?

Okay all, I like watching TV. But I don't like paying for it, and I don't like spending hours sitting mindlessly in front of it, and I am not really very good at resisting temptations when they are right in front of me. In 2005, I moved to Europe for a year and one of the very many wonderful things to come out of that year was the end of the TV habit. TV viewing was a social activity rather than a time sink. (Bill & Agi used to host Twin Peaks nights once a week during the dark winter!)

With the exception of one 6 month period, I haven't had a TV subscription since.* I don't think Luke has had one since he moved away from home. And while we'll probably get basic cable again one day (like so we can watch the local news and learn about school closures for our children) and enjoy it, for now we are peachy keen happy with Hulu and Netflix. Often we'll watch an episode of whatever TV series before bed ... but we're kind of searching for a new one now.

We totally love 30 Rock, Battlestar Galactica, and Dollhouse (except WHAT WAS UP with the end of that show????). Were iffy about Big Love, and can't quite decide about Dexter yet. Hated Mad Men despite the beautiful clothing. Haven't seen any 24. Suggestions?

And for you, some netflix insta-views I've really liked:

• 30 Rock
• The Business of Being Born (yes, it's produced by Ricki Lake; no, it is not really fair and balanced; and WOW is it amazing to see so many births)
• Sunshine Cleaning (cute Amy Adams film without being girlie)
• A League of Their Own (so power-girlie, so great)
• Paris, Je'Taime (interesting little short story films)
• Philidelphia and The Color Purple (serious, wonderful)

What about Oscar movies? Seen any of the nominees?


*BUT we did have Alex for about a year who gave us all his favorite shows on disc, which is a thousand times better than any cable service.