My thoughts drift, as they often do, and this morning I was struck by the sun shining through the skywalk window sparkling on the dust. It was so pretty until I started to sneeze and realized that it was dust, not heaven-sent sprinklings of patience and time. What a violent burst to my bubble.

I have written about a sprinkle jar before – the sight of sparkly cinnamon-sugar falling out of a jar melting into butter on warm wheat toast correlating to the warm fuzziness of a happy, worry-free childhood.

Of course, it’s the romanticized version of the sight, the movie set slow motion scene with perfect lighting – I do not recall sunlight pouring into the kitchen and straight into the tiny pieces of cinnamon and sugar as they dissolve into the butter. I recall sitting down with my toast at the table to read the comics and attempt the crossword, plopping down for Saturday morning cartoons or in front of the crackling fire. It’s the relaxation, the minute or two to take a deep breath and just be.

It’s been a long fall adjusting to new grades at school, home improvement projects that seem to have a mind of their own, irregular work schedules, and the stress of balancing work, school, home and parenting. Finding balance is hard – especially because I have trouble balancing myself, have been known to trip over my own feet, fall off of sidewalks and cannot walk and chew gum at the same time.

There is an old corporate training program about work-life balance with an exercise where you imagine that you are juggling glass balls and that each ball represents a part of your life – work, home, etc. You are supposed to imagine what would happen if you dropped a ball while juggling and that ball broke beyond repair. Juggling requires balance (which I lack) so I preferred to imagine that all of my glass balls were safely tucked away in my pockets where they were not at risk of crashing.

Earlier this week it felt as if everything was off balance, that the glass balls were about to dig themselves out of my pockets and crash to the floor. I took a few minutes at work for just me, opened up a new Word doc and made a list of everything that was so hard that day. The last thing on the list was ‘refill sprinkle jar’. I took a deep breath, stood up and stretched and just let the worry go. I could do nothing about a lot of the stress so just let it be rather than let it bother me.

At home that night I made cookies with my daughters. A batch of snickerdoodles that failed so miserably I could only describe them as a cookbook type-o. I made a second batch of always successful chocolate chip cookies, half for a company Thanksgiving luncheon today, and half for a co-worker with four children whose husband suffered a massive heart attack earlier this week.

Sprinkle jar, refilled.

A very good tomato soup

A few weeks ago I was on the couch at home snuggling a sleeping, sickly Gretchen and watching the Today Show. Martha Stewart was part of a segment on how to make quick and easy food at home rather than ordering take out. Martha said that a good replacement for pizza delivery is tomato soup and a toasted baguette slice with fresh mozzarella. Meredith Viera quickly put Martha in her place by informing her that while the soup and side were delicious, they were no substitute for pizza. The look on Martha’s face was quite amusing.

Here is the tomato soup recipe, I really liked it and took it over to my in-laws and they really liked it. Gretchen is the only one that will eat tomato soup with me so I cut the recipe in half and post the half recipe here.

Tomato Soup

1 T. olive oil
¼ tsp. red pepper flakes (optional, but they did add a nice kick)
½ c. onion, diced
1 clove garlic, minced
14 ounce diced tomatoes and the juice
1 ¼ c. chicken broth (could use vegetable broth)

Heat the oil and red pepper flakes over medium-high heat in a medium sauce pan. Add the onion and garlic and cook for about 6 minutes, stirring once in awhile. Pulse the tomatoes in a blender or food processor 3-4 times. Add tomatoes and broth to the sauce pan and bring to a boil, then turn down to a simmer and let the soup simmer for 30 minutes. Allow soup to cool* then pour back into the blender or food processor to blend until mostly smooth or whatever consistency you prefer.

*A word to the wise, blending hot liquid is not a good idea unless you do it in small batches, about 1 cup at a time, and hold the lid on with a towel. If you choose to dump all the hot soup right into your blender, go ahead and turn it on and watch as the lid blows off and coats your entire kitchen in tomato soup.

The red pepper flakes add a nice spicy flavor and if you have non-spicy eaters, just leave it out and add hot sauce to your own bowl. The soup would work quite nicely with a toppings bar – small pieces of fresh mozzarella and basil, variety of crackers, croutons, good bread, cooked shrimp, or even partially cooked veggies.

Oh yes, he did.

The dog ate Katie's homework.

Her class just finished studying pioneers, including a field trip to Living History Farms. To finish up the unit, she needed to complete a final project. A list of suggestions was sent home and she chose diorama.

Katie takes classes in the summer from a certain retired teacher that resembles ET when sitting at her kidney bean shaped table. The big project she worked on for summer classes was on her favorite vacation - given that she's technically been on two vacations, she didn't have much to choose from. Katie made a shoebox diorama about our family vacation to Minnesota in 2009. We went kayaking in Lake Minnetonka and Katie took a bunch of pictures of the lake houses, boats, lily pads and sand. The pictures turned out to be perfect for covering the shoebox, she made a dock, added a boat and called it done. The diorama turned out to be really cute and I was thankful that she did not include any pictures of my hyperventilating. While kayaking looks like fun, I have this thing about not being able to touch the bottom of a body of water.

So, when Katie chose diorama for her final pioneer project she was really excited. She dug a shoebox out of the basement and looked around for a small box to craft a covered wagon. Turns out that a Jiffy corn muffin mix box is not only the perfect size for a mini-covered wagon, when we emptied out the package to make cornbread, we found that the inside white paper packaging was a perfect covering for the wagon. Katie covered the wagon with construction paper and we rubber banded the packaging paper to a large can of diced tomatoes to round out the shape.

The rounding out turned out beautifully and made for cute little covered wagon. We called it a night with homework, saying that we'll add wheels and a background tomorrow. That was Wednesday, the project was due on Friday. The next morning we went through our usual morning routine, Katie met the bus, I dropped Gretchen at school and headed to work. Erik had been working ridiculous hours for a few weeks and got home at about 8:30 in the morning. He called me at work to report that in the 45 minutes Rommel had been left alone in the house he had torn apart and eaten part of the covered wagon. Apparently the corn muffin smell was more than he could take and the only option was destruction. That's what we get for naming him after a genius of strategic warfare, he's always got something up his sleeve.

A replacement box of Jiffy corn muffin mix later, the second diorama turned out quite nicely and made it school in one piece.

October = baseball. I love the wild card play off games, the league championship series. The sold out crowds are electric, you can hear it in the constant chants, cheers, fans standing up the entire game. The announcer booth chatter is reserved excitement. It doesn't matter who plays, though it is more fun when the Cardinals or Yankees are playing.

Things to look forward to over the next couple of months...

My sister and her family coming to town
A new nephew due any day now!
Pumpkin patch with the girls
DaVinci dinner date with my honey
Voting (don't forget!)

Over the course of 2010 I have gradually become more of a Locavore. My spell check says that is not a real word, I beg to differ. The term describes a person that eats locally grown food and such, likely a word rooted in some sort of hippy-liberal-vegan source. I kid, of course, who knows who thought that one up and I am the exact opposite as a boring-middle of the road-omnivore.

This has been a gradual process and yet one that is logical to me – it would have to be logical and economical or it just wouldn’t work. I love the Downtown Farmer’s Market for the locally grown produce, meat, bread and cheese. I love the produce section of Hy-Vee on Fleur Drive, they are pros at marketing what is locally or regionally grown. It’s not a political stance, I’m not going to hop up on a soapbox and proclaim it to the world, it just makes sense to me – kind of a ‘how did it take me so long to realize that buying local food is a such good thing’.

There really is no excuse for not buying locally available in-season vegetables. They are going to be fresher and taste better, buying them is supporting area growers and farmers and it is fun to talk to the vendor about how to cook the vegetables that they grow. Our girls love to go to the Farmer’s Market and pick out fruit and vegetables and I am happy to give in.

I’ll give you an example of something that I buy locally – I doubt that I will ever go back to store bought chicken. There are two vendors that I know of at the Farmer’s Market that have whole frozen chickens for sale. One is Fox Hollow Farms and the other is the one that I buy from and the name escapes me. They are expensive and they are delicious. If I spend $10 on a chicken, roast it, pull the meat and spread it out over 4 meals - the cooked meat freezes nicely – it is absolutely worth it. I prefer to roast the chicken whole but it could be cut up if you know how to do that. I do not know how and am perfectly happy with roasted chicken.

I recently learned about the Iowa Food Cooperative http://iowafood.org/shop/. It completely fascinates me. A lot of the same vendors are at the Downtown Farmer’s Market so I see no reason to join the coop when I can wander around the Farmer’s Market to shop and people watch at the same time. :-)

It's official, school has started. Yes, school started 3 weeks ago, but the germs have just now arrived. Hundreds of children sharing one building, one lunch room, they are bound to share germs. Round one has started with sniffly noses and coughs but so far no fevers. Colds make for a long week and on this Friday night Erik is working so the girls and I will be snuggling in for dinner and a movie and what I hope is an early bedtime.

First Day of School

Ah, the first day of school. Katie, Gretchen, Erik and I were all excited for school to start, albeit for different reasons. The girls were ready to meet their teachers, see their friends and meet new ones and while they each admitted to being nervous, they couldn't wait to go. Erik and I were ready for them to be back in the routine of the school year.

Both girls were up by 6:30 this morning, before I even had a chance to shake their little shoulders. Katie rode the bus today from one side of Norwalk to the other to and we all stood in the garage/driveway waiting for the bus. I dropped off Gretchen at school, returned to my car and breathed a sigh of relief and stopped at Starbucks for a back to school treat.


Our big Kindergartener. No, she was not instructed to pose, she just did. It was chilly so her favorite sundress made friends with her favorite zip-up hooded sweatshirt. Gretchen had a great first day and said that she only cried once, when she bit her finger during lunch. She did not cry to her teacher about her bit finger, she found our neighbor, Donna the lunch lady instead.

Our big fourth grader. Once again, she was not instructed to pose, she just did, she always does. Just one of the many awesome things about Katie, she's always camera-ready. Katie had an awesome day and went on and on about how huge everything was at school - the lunchroom, the library, her locker. She went to bed saying that she couldn't wait to go back!

Recently, it dawned on me that some of my favorite restaurant meals are really quite easy to make at home. Example #1, Chicken Fried Rice. Make sure to have a timer on hand, I use the microwave above the stove. The recipe goes together pretty fast once all of the ingredients are lined up so at that point I kick everyone out of the kitchen until it’s time to wash their hands and set the table.

Just wait, those of you with younger children than mine, one day the clouds will open, the heavens will shine down on you and angels will sing when your children are old enough to set and clear the table, then rinse plates and load the dishwasher. It is truly a glorious moment in motherhood.

The original recipe was found on the website www.tastykitchen.com, and was called Garlic Fried Rice. I made the recipe and included all 6 cloves of garlic - yes, 6. My skin smelled like garlic the next day and as much as we loved the recipe, some changes were definitley in order! Feel free to add or substitute your favorite veggies, whatever you like. I'm making this for dinner tonight!

Chicken Fried Rice
serves 4-6

6 T. butter, divided
2 cloves minced garlic
1 t. lemon juice
3 cups cooked rice, chilled (that's 1 1/2 cups before you cook it!)
1/2 medium onion, finely chopped
1/2 c. carrots, chopped, more to taste
1/2 c. other vegetable, chopped, more to taste
1 pre-cooked chicken breast, chopped into small pieces
2 eggs, beaten
2 T. soy sauce, more to taste
2 green onions, chopped
salt and pepper, to taste

Melt 2 T. of butter, add the minced garlic and lemon juice and set aside to let the flavors combine. Cook the rice as directed on the package and set aside or in the fridge to cool.

Chop the onion, carrots and other vegetable, chicken and place each ingredient in it's own bowl so it's easy to drop into the pan. The original recipe called for 1 cup of frozen peas and carrots which I never have on hand, tonight I'm using fresh carrots and broccoli so will steam them in the microwave until they are about half-cooked. Also, I like to pre-cook a couple chicken breasts and freeze them so they are ready for dinners like this - or bbq chicken pizza, or chicken salad, etc. You could easily substitute leftover roast, pork chop, ham, shrimp, whatever meat you have on hand, or use no meat and increase your vegetable amount. Finally, beat the eggs in a small bowl. Line up everything within reach of the stove, this goes together quickly.

In a large, non-stick skillet melt 4 T. of butter over medium heat. Add onions and saute until soft, about 5 minutes. Add vegetables and the butter-garlic-lemon mix and cook for about 3 minutes. Add meat and cook for 1 minute. Push all ingredients over to one side of the skillet and on the empty side add the eggs. Salt and pepper the eggs and scramble them until just set. Then move the rest of the ingredients back over and stir the eggs into the mixture.

Add the cold rice and the soy sauce, stir to combine and cook for another 3-4 minutes, stirring every 30 seconds to nothing burns. Add green onions and stir, taste for seasonings and add more soy sauce, salt and pepper if needed.