happy new year

what i did on my christmas vacation

An unplanned blog break. I'm sure you understand. In addition to cherished guests, starting last Sunday afternoon we also visited by two ear infections, pink eye, bonchitis and the 24-hour flu. I wasn't sure Christmas was going to happen at all, and we were prepared to call the whole thing off, but for a whole lot of antibiotics and some very good spirit on the part of our families willing to risk their own health in the name of turkey, presents and Irish coffee we pulled it off. And it was grand.


I'm sure my kids would disagree (Spiderman roller skates for Stella and a box of chunky markers for Henry are the bees knees around here) but I love these prints I had done for them. They started off as paper collage - each dash of colour is a tiny piece of wallpaper, construction paper or origami paper - and while these are prints, I was able to specify skin and hair colour to personalize them a bit.




My sister has a knack for groovy little gifts, like a '70s era book that I love as much for the craft projects inside as I do the inscription. I never had a nickname but if I did, I'd lobby for Poopsie.




And how was your Christmas?

maybe just one more stocking stuffer

Mr. Elephant joins the dog and the monkey. I really love this book but I've discovered the instructions can be deceptively spare - resulting in a frighteningly homely softy. Like Mr. Elephant here with his unravelly ears. Tip #1: find 100% cotton or 100% wool socks. Lycra's a killer to work with. Tip #2: ignore the instructions and sew the head on the body before attaching the ears. I had to redo those ears twice - twice!- to get the positioning right. Tip #3: Japanese socks are surely smaller than Canadian because I had to trim the arms, trunk and legs to get the proportions right.

So yep, this dude took two nights and about 3.5 hours to make. But like most of my projects the pain is forgotten the minute the last stitch (a very satisfying blanket stitch - my new favourite) is made. So much so that I'm eyeing a pair of argyle socks after seeing this zebra. So super cute.

Happy weekend friends.

little things making me happy today

Like a parcel from Sweden bearing this print. I love that bear.

And contented that what's done is done and what's not done isn't going to get done and that's OK. The perfectionist is taking a holiday. Thank goodness.

Enjoy your day.

snow day

We are getting a good old walloping from mother nature today. It's nice being snowed in. Nice when there is no where to be. If you choose to go somewhere, well that's a different story. Unfortunately my husband chose this morning to deconstruct the kitchen faucet - the one that's been leaking with increasing urgency for two months. With the roads closed and the streets deserted, he decided to set off on foot for the Home Depot, about a three kilometre walk. We bundled him up like Sir Edmund Hillary and bid him well. There was much excitement three hours later when the kids spotted his long, slow approach up the driveway. I applaud his determination, I really do. The actual faucet repair part? Well, that's a cliffhanger, I'm afraid. To be continued. In the meanwhile, we'll hunker down, enjoy the show and wash the dishes in the bathtub.

[ed. broken image links repaired]

weekending

Sent my Christmas goodies off to my swap partner in Brooklyn, just one day under the deadline because I was stumped when it came to the traditions requirement of the swap - as in share a family Christmas tradition. I think we're too new a family to have any of our own traditions yet, having done most holiday things but once or twice ourselves. Rituals from my days of yore, like driving around fancy neighbourhoods gawking at the rich folks' Christmas lights, didn't seem quite right. Stumped but with time getting on, I reverted to that old standby: a recipe. I considered my grandmother's shortbread or my mother's sugar cookies but in the end I settled on a biscotti recipe. Here's why. Nine years ago exactly today I met my husband. At the risk of setting off mass eyerolling and gagging, all I will say on the matter is that if I did not believe in love at first sight before December 14, 1998, I did a week later. Fast forward to December 1999 and Christmas with my future in-laws. I knew if I wanted to win the approval of my Italian-Austrian mother-in-law I'd better bake something good. Biscotti. I asked an Italian, food-loving friend for a recipe and this is the one she gave me. The biscotti were a hit. I've made them off and on over the years but when I told the story to my husband and mother-in-law the other day, neither of them had the vaguest recollection of my biscotti. Nothing. Further tarnishing my happy memory is learning that my friend's recipe, the one I'd assumed came from her Nonna's kitchen, was in fact taken from a doctor's office copy of Gourmet magazine. Feh. Life is like that. It's still my lucky cookie.


Orange-Almond Biscotti
2 cups flour
1 cup sugar (I like organic sugar - it's grainier and crunchy. nice in a cookie)
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
2 large eggs + 1 large yolk
1 tsp vanilla
1 tbsp fresh grated orange zest
1-1/2 cup almonds, lightly toasted and coarsely chopped

Egg Wash
1 large egg beaten with a splash of water

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Combine flour, sugar, baking soda and salt. In a small bowl whisk together the whole eggs, the single egg yolk, the vanilla and the zest; add the mixture to the flour mixture, mixing until a dough is formed. Stir in the almonds. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface, knead it several times and halve it. Working on a large buttered and floured baking sheet, with floured hands form each piece of dough into a flattish log 12 inches long and 2 inches wide. Place the logs at least 3 inches apart on the sheet, and brush the tops with the egg wash. Bake the logs in the middle of a preheated 300F for 50 minutes and them cool on the baking rack for 10minutes. On a cutting board, cut the logs crosswise on the diagonal into 1/2 inch thick slices, arrange the biscotti, cut sides down, on the baking sheet and bake them, in the 300F oven for 15 minutes on each side. Transfer the biscotti to racks to cool.

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I like them dusted with a bit of powdered sugar or, if you're feeling fancy, you could dip one end into melted chocolate.

Happy weekend friends.

antidote

Oh joy! A big fluffy snowfall - the very best kind with no wind, just juicy white flakes - is making me very happy this afternoon. Just what I needed after learning at 7:45 this morning that the Kindergarten Christmas pageant was in an hour. And then spending the rest of the morning at City Hall trying to procure a permit so I can hang a shingle outside my shop and get the show on the road already. Sheesh.

These globby things suspended from the tree are food for the family of birds that live in the eavestrough. Outside my bedroom window. I probably shouldn't be encouraging them to stay, but what the heck. We made these out of some internet recipe that goes like this:

1/2 cup peanut butter + 1/2 cup vegetable shortening (kind of gross but I guess not for birds)
Soften for a minute in the microwave, and then mix in enough corn meal + quick cooking oats + flour to make sticky balls. We also tossed in sunflower seeds. Pack in a ball shape around a length of twine (for hanging). Refrigerate to firm up. Et voila. An amuse-bouche for the birds.

Damn it Lindor

I wish I knew how to quit you. I don't think about you all year, then one commercial announcing the arrival of Swiss Chalet's Festive Special and I'm sneaking around with drugstore truffles all Brokeback Mountain.



The tree has been trimmed. A bit hastily. I may have to re-do it, if I can't tame the perfectionist. It's a long story, and it begins just after I was married in 2001. We went on a weird red shopping spree, which must have had something to do with getting hitched before Christmas. Within days of returning from honeymoon we bought a red car (ugh), red bed linens (ugh) and a big bunch of these red Christmas tree lights from that twee Christmas store in Niagara on the Lake. Well over the next couple of years we disposed of the red car and the red duvet, and put away the red tree lights in favour of a post-modern green, white and silver tree. It was pretty, if perhaps a bit boring. This year after the whole thing was decorated I had a hankering for those old red lights. As you can see they do put on quite a glow. I haven't decided if it's a good glow or if it's a bit too much like that Kenny Rogers Roasters episode of Seinfeld. It was no easy task winding those suckers through an already decorated tree so I am reluctant to take them down again. If I have an overwhelming urge for roast chicken every night do I blame the Lindor addiction or do I blame the blazing red lights?

we interrupt our regular programming...

...to bring you this missive, delivered to my inbox last night by my Christmas-stressed sister. It happens every year.

"Dear Santa,

I would like a teeny-tiny, rustic log cabin far away up north, nestled amongst the pine & cedar trees. All would be blanketed with white crisp untouched snow, the dark skies glowing with stars at night and a warm crackling fire. We would hunker down for Christmas and spend our days skating on the pond, sledding down the hills, making snowmen, angels and forts.

There would be no reindeer on the lawn made of metal and lightbulbs, no inflatable, hydro-sucking snowglobes & Santas. No overheated shopping malls filled with cranky people and the same junk over and over. No questionable mall Santas with terrified-looking children.

There would be but one gift exchanged on Christmas morn. One simple gift. No need to hold on to gift receipts for exchanges; no batteries required, no assembly needed. Christmas would be about: family. snow. pancake breakfasts. snowball fights and that ONE special gift. A girl can dream...and sigh..

My reality: Kyle asking for the most mundane, inane, out of date, impossible to find, #%*!. [edited for language] i.e. Godzilla movie circa 1998, the Popeye movie w/Robin Williams. I'm trying really hard to be a good mom/Santa and find those movies; I dig and dig the bargain bins here and across the border. I call 4 Blockbusters. Nope. So wouldn't you know it, I see them on Kijiji; some guy in Stoney Creek is selling them, all battered and beaten up but at least my kid will have Popeye. Nanoo Nanooo."


Oh dear. Now I happen to think an 8-year old boy asking for an obscure and unfunny Robin Williams' movie is hilarious and a fine addition to the Christmas list. Hunting it down secondhand on Kijiiji is all part of the fun I say. But it's not just my sister feeling out of sorts. Canada AM did a thing on holiday stress this morning - apparently it peaks exactly two weeks before the 25th. Let me check my stress-o-meter. Frankly I find all this talk about holiday stress pretty stressful. It makes me start to wonder if I'm supposed to feel stressed. I feel my usual state of half-doneness. A half decorated house. Half the cookies baked (the other half eaten already.) Half the presents accounted for. Half the holiday cards written up; none yet mailed. But stressed about Christmas? Nah. I've got bigger problems. Yet I can't sit here all smug and disorganized and smirk at my sister's Yuletide angst. I really must help this girl find her Christmas spirit. But how? A log cabin in the woods, while a lovely idea, is out of reach. Inviting her over to bake cookies seems a tad self-serving. Hmmm. I'll have to give this some thought as I try to locate a pair Spiderman roller skates - the sole item on Stella's list - without actually having to step foot in a store.

gotta get a gosta

Ikea's Gosta Gatt down-filled pillows are strange little things: no more than 12" long and 8" across. Sort of kid-sized. Maybe travel-sized. They were marked down to $5.99 from $14.99, so I guess other folks didn't know quite what to make of them either, but a 70% markdown is not to be passed over lightly so I scooped up a pair. I figured a set of mini pillows would be useful in the car when one or the other kid falls asleep and leaves me free to daydream out the window without having to crane around every five minutes to straighten a lolling head in the backseat.



So there we are, me and a pair of cute but bland mini pillows. What to do, what to do? I admit that I'm a one-trick pony when it comes to sewing - appliques on everything! But I've gotten quite handy at doing them and I was able to whip up a pair of dandy pillowslips in an hour. If you want to jazz up your own Gosta Gatt, what I did was:

Cut a rectangle of cotton fabric that measures 33" wide by 12" tall and double hemstitch both short ends. Right or wrong sides together, it doesn't matter at this point, fold the long side of the rectangle about three quarters of the way up onto itself & press. Now you have a large section of doubled fabric and a smaller section of single-thickness fabric. Fold the single-thickness fabric over so that it overlaps 3 - 4" on the double-thickness fabric (follow?) This is where you'll stuff the pillow later. Press the two folds. Flip over to the front and centre your applique design on the front, using the two crease marks you just ironed as guidelines.

Now as far as appliques go, you can't go wrong with a basic shape like an apple, pear or tree. I've done all three freehand very easily. Kids' colouring books are a good source of simple, graphic shapes that make good appliques. And of course, Martha Stewart always has templates for cookies and other decor projects. The reindeer shape I used came from a cookie recipe in the December issue of MS Living, I drew the sheep freehand, using a stuffed animal for inspiration. Make sure the applique fabric is washable. Be careful with synthetic craft felt - it tends to pill and may not hold up on a frequently washed item. A bit of Heat & Bond on the back and a running stitch along the outer edge secures the applique to the pillowslip.

You're ready to sew. Flip the pieces right sides together, realigning the crease marks you ironed in earlier. You should be left with a more or less pillow-sized rectangle with the top quarter forming an overlap or flap. Sew up the long sides using a 5/8" seam allowance. Backstitch a few times at the overlap to make the seam extra-strong. Clip the corners so they'll poke out nice and pointy when you flip it the right way around and pink the sewn two sewn edges so they won't fray. Presto. A pillowslip.

time enough

It's not so bad taking care of a sick kid, vomit on the sofa aside. $400 for an emergency enzyme wash at 8:00 p.m. was the remedy, if you're curious. The couch still stinks, if you ask me. Of course I have been coveting a settee from Trianon for a few years now, so my olfactory perception may be tainted by an ulterior motive. Anyway. It's a rare thing for my gal to stay still for any reasonable length of time, a trait she no doubt inherited from me, so the past couple of days were a welcome break for us both. And Mulan really is one heck of a movie (insipid Disney soundtrack aside.) In between Mulan and Mulan 2 there was time to whip up a few holiday cards. Stella sat quietly at my side, transfixed by the thrum of the sewing machine. I don't know if Stella will remember that half hour when she's older, but I think I will.

Despite five years experience there are moments when I feel like a mom-imposter. I can't really explain it, but maybe you know what I mean. I don't mean a going-through-the-motions ennui (though there is that too on occasion.) It's more feeling like I've overstated my qualifications and somehow landed this job of mother of two and now what the hell am I supposed to do? It's the weight of responsibility. I heard that as adults we tend to recall our childhood in absolutes: it was either fantastic, wonderful, amazing or it was complete torture. I feel that way about Christmas. I have a tendency to get stress-y about Christmas because my own memories are, fortunately, fantastic, wonderful and amazing. Snow-dusted. Happy. Loud. And of course I want nothing less than the same for my kids. Yet the more time I spend at this parenting gig, the more I've begun to realize that the times that bring me the most happiness are when I'm not concerned with creating a perfect memory, and I just enjoy the moment - whatever it is.

craftus interruptus

I was really looking forward to a quiet morning, at home, alone, to do some work and, as a treat, get cracking on the Christmas cards, for which I finally have a design idea, thank you Denyse Schmidt. But you know, a phone call from the school twenty minutes after drop-off never means good news. So the cards will have to wait while we watch Mulan for the umpteenth time, sip apple juice and hope for an afternoon nap. Back tomorrow with at least one finished card, I hope!

sleep is for sissies

One kid sick and the other kid plagued with night terrors. In need of uninterrupted sleep, yes, but more in need of a remedy for vomit on sofa cushions. I can say with all honesty it wasn't a bad weekend. And with that I know I've earned my black belt in motherhood. Yay for me.

This is Henry's breakfast. The egg got a bit leathery; I was distracted with something or other and lost track of the time until I heard the sound of egg exploding in the microwave, but it was still a hit. Here's the deal:

Toast and butter two slices of bread. Cookie cutter out the centre. Crack an egg into the well. Microwave on low (this is the crucial part) for 90 seconds or so. Bon appetit. Thank you Canadian Family for the recipe. It's real good.