Tween

Tween wants to experiment with makeup, but doesn't actually want to wear any out in public.

Tween won't give up the Barbies, but asked for a more discreet storage solution.


















Tween is old enough to babysit, but then begs to be taken to the toy store so she can buy a baby doll just like her favorite toddler has.

I love my tween!

Back to School

You'd think they were getting root canals the way they acted this morning when I brandished the camera.  But these milestones must be documented apparently.  We are now more than half way done with lower education.  Aidan started 8 years ago, Bridget has 7 more to go.

Bridget was just a bit nervous this morning and Aidan was all swagger and confidence.  I think back to when they each started kindergarten, and it was the opposite.  Bridget had had the run of the school for two years since I officed there, and she was all too ready.  Aidan, being first, wasn't so confident on his first day.  You can see it in his eyes.

 

But he survived and went on to be the "President" of the playground, apparently.  His self-appointed job was to hire and fire the kids he would play with.  He even had a training program for apprentice playmates.

Bridget has some good coping mechanisms for alleviating the stress though.  She laid out her outfit last night.  She set two alarms even though I was going to wake her up.  She packed and re-packed her backpack.  And she left me a note on the refrigerator with instructions as to exactly what was to go in her lunch.  Never forget:  with Bridget, it's all about the food.

Destin..... aaahhhhh......

Day One
Awake at 1am.  Get into the packed and waiting car and drive, drive, drive.  It's just me and the truckers.  The family are sleeping, the roads are clear.  Eventually, the gas tank and everyone's stomachs tell us it's time for breakfast somewhere in Louisiana.

Note:  on the drive?  It's ALWAYS "somewhere in Louisiana."  Crossing Louisiana takes nearly 50% of the road time.  I am so glad they have finally fixed their roads!

Time for Ray's conference call, must pull off and find a wi-fi connection.  We drop Ray at the public library in Fairhope, Alabama while the kids and I go to explore the town's surprising charms.

Miss a critical turn in Niceville, FL requiring us to drive the whole drag thru Destin instead of helicoptering in from the bridge east of the traffic.  My bad.  Ooops.

Check in to the hotel and then head to the Bayside Wharf.  This is the place where "family vacation" is not an oxymoron.  Ray and I can listen to bands that cover Eagles, Buffet, Journey and Zac Brown while the kids play in arcades, human-sized hamster balls, or ropes courses.

Perfect start to the vacation:  Eat a large bucket of crustaceans and bivalves while a band plays Zac Brown's "Toes" and drink wine.  Go sit on the patio of a martini bar and listen to a pianist and drink a little too much more wine.

Day Two
What?  You don't want a blow-by-blow of every moment of our vacation?  You don't care what we ate for breakfast?  You only want to see photos of the kids?  'Cuz it's only been photos of food for months and months and months?

Awright....  Here ya go.

Aidan driving the boat

Bridget snorkeling.  She sings through the snorkel, it's a total hoot to sit in the boat and listen to her.

Aidan fishing.  That boy simply cannot be near a body of water and not want to fish.

Not much luck with the fishing....

Bridgie learning to drive the boat

Aidan flying his stunt kite on a really windy day.

Daddy has two guns and big brother has one.  Do you think we need more?

No trip to the beach is complete without building a sand castle with Ray

No trip to the beach is complete without burying your child in the sand and then going off for cocktails.

Lots of things to amuse the kids (oh, OK, the adults too - I rode the carousel) in the evening.

There you have it!  How We Spent Our Summer Vacation minus the stories of nearly 30 hours in the car.

Beach bound!

Whoopeee!  In just a few short days, we will be heading to Destin, our new favorite vacation spot since moving to the south.

This is the beachcam on the beach where we spend all our time.  I've been checking it daily to be sure there are still plenty of people playing in the water - a sure sign that it is unaffected by the oil disaster.  If you want to check out the beachcam for yourself, click HERE.  In fact, if you text me while we are there, and you are looking at the beach cam, I will go stand where the red star is and wave to you.

A few days of packing and organizing, a grueling 14 hour drive, and then it's just me, a stack of books, lots of cold sweet tea, my 3 favorite people and my toes in the sand.  Ahhhhh......

The All Food All The Time Blog

I know.  You are just waiting anxiously to find out what I did with all that farm fresh produce!  And how were those pickles after all?  And what about the jelly?

And I just left you hanging.  I am sorry.  I've been busy eating.

The word Ray used to describe this creation was "fantasmagoric" I think.  Aidan's friend who was here for dinner said "Omigawd, Aidan, can I move in here?"   High praise, indeed.  Fresh ingredients, simply prepared - nothing more.

More of those vegetables were grilled an thrown into a yummy risotto that Ray made.  Leftovers of that will be my lunch today.

The pickles are delicious.  The bread and butter chips taste exactly like they are supposed to.  The dill that Ray made have a wonderful crunch and are just sour enough.

"But what about the blackberry jelly?" you ask....  Trial and error.  Super Confident Me did not do a test batch.  Super Confident Me cooked and processed about 30 jars in one marathon session.  Super Confident Me was horribly deflated to discover none of it jelled to Super Confident Me's satisfaction.

Ugh.

Deflated Me had to open up every jar.  Deflated Me had to clean and re-sterilize everything.  Deflated Me had to hubble bubble toil and trouble over the burning fire and bubbling cauldron for another afternoon.

Happy Me got jelly.  Happy Me made some cute labels of the cute berry pickers for the lids of the jelly.

Now I am back to Super Confident Me and saw the wild mustang grapes growing by the side of the road.  Super Confident Me went and picked a bunch.

Super Confident Me's kitchen looked like a murder scene as I rendered all the lovely, tart juice.

Super Confident Me has a couple of pitchers of juice which will make maybe about ten pints or so of jelly.  Should I do a test batch?  What do you think?

But dang.  I have to go to the boring old tire store.  The story of the wild mustang grape jelly will have to wait for another day.

Oh, the suspense!  What will you do!?

Meet your meat

I met my Thanksgiving dinner over the weekend.  One of these scrawny little guys will be the centerpiece of my Thanksgiving table come November.

They don't look like much (yet), but hopefully by November will look more like this:

The breed is a "Midget White" and it's one of many endangered breeds that are being revived by small growers throughout the country.

Mine is being grown at "my" farm over in Roanoke - just a few miles from my house.  I say "my" farm, because this year I bought a share in the farm and every Saturday I get to fill a bag with the week's harvest.

I'm looking forward to watching my turkey grow and learn interesting tidbits from Farmer Sandra about keeping poultry. 

And slaughtering poultry.

Yes, let's just put that out there.  Slaughter.  Turkeys really don't just magically appear frozen, featherless and shrinkwrapped with the giblets (read: guts) in a little wax bag.

Hungry yet?

This week in Pam's local kitchen

Top left:  potatoes, carrots & beets.  I think I'll roast them.
Tom right:  zuchinni, yellow squash, banana peppers and some other kind of mild pepper.  Salsa?  Zuchinni tart?  Grilled squash?  Risotto with some roasted carrots too?
Bottom left:  More peppers, including some really spicy Asian varieties.  Currently on the back patio getting sun dried.
Center:  Tomatoes of all sizes.  Salsa?  Freeze for sauce later?  Bake the little ones with chicken breasts until they burst and become a sauce?
Bottom right:  Purple hull peas.  Never had them before but apparently the peas are delicious sauteed with onions, and then you can boil the hulls to make jelly.

Providers:  Two different neighbors and my farm share.  Everything was grown right near me.

My sincere apologies to those who come here for updates on the kids, or absurd and amusing tales of motherhood.  While the crops are bursting, this is now the All Food All The Time Blog.  We will get back to our regularly scheduled programming once the kids get around to doing something amusing or absurd.

The wild mustang grapes have ripened and are calling to me.  That must mean more jelly making is in my future.

Lazy Lady

We all have to take shortcuts sometimes.  That wall of hermitically sealed packages gave me my veggies and salad for the weekend.

I brought three spare kids home from swim practice yesterday morning, and had several more orbiting in and out of my house all day so I didn't get ot the Wednesday farmer's market.  Tomorrow begins a 3-day Very Big Swim Meet so I have to trek to nearly Louisiana and back three times, so no Saturday farmer's market for me either.

Forgive me, Mother Earth, for I have sinned, but a gal's gotta do what a gal's gotta do. 

Possibilities

It almost always starts like this.  Even before my plan is fully formed, the onion gets chopped.  Still thinking, "OK, I've got chicken.... some veggies in the fridge.... what else have I got, and who am I feeding tonight?"

Picky kids, best to concoct a sauce with a few hidden things like grated carrots and finely chopped squash.

How to prep the chicken?  Grill, sautee?  Cut or whole?

What do I have for a side?  Bread?  Salad?  Pasta?

But while I am chopping the onions, the possibilities are only limited by my pantry and my imagination.

What are YOU having for dinner?

Cucumbers are better than.....

This week at the farmer's market, I bought every cucumber they had.  I love cucumbers.  After all, they stay hard in the crisper for weeks, you know.  I got all sizes, because you know, size doesn't matter - and a cucumber will never try to convince you otherwise.  And even thought I bought a LOT of cucumbers, none of them seemed to have a problem with the fact that I could handle ALL those cucumbers.

OK.  I'll stop now.  My intentions for the cucumbers are purely culinary.  Seriously.

Ray even got interested in the cucumbers.  Culinarily speaking of course.  Seriously.

We both wanted pickles.  Dill for Ray, bread-n-butter for me.  Ray even got green tomatoes to pickle as well.  Hmmm....  are green tomatoes better than women and I missed the joke?

Back to the cucumbers.  Seriously.

And this is VERY serious, because I even broke out the French mandolin to slice 'em purty and didn't even lose any of my parts in the process.  Tricky things, them mandolins.  I also sliced onions and salted the whole mess of 'em and let them drain.  A little finely minced sweet red pepper went in there too.

As usual, no particular recipe was followed, but I just tossed in various ingredients that I'd seen listed in the recipes I perused on canning websites.  Tumeric, mustard seed, clove, garlic...  All simmered in a pot with equal parts cider vinegar and brown sugar.

In go the cucumber slices to heat through, and then fill and process the jars.  The hardest part of the whole ordeal is waiting the 3 weeks until they're ready.  I hope they're good, because I've already given a few jars away.

Ray is using a fermentation process for his dill pickles, which won't require water bath processing.  Being a beer maker, he's more comfortable with that whole fermentation thang than I am.  I should have helped him and maybe I'd learn a thing or two about how to properly treat a cucumber.  But Bunko the night before, followed by 5:30 wakeup for swim practice and a 9am meeting, and well, I confess I was sleeping in the middle of the day while my husband was in the kitchen having his way with several dozen cucumbers.  I know.  I missed out.

We'll let you know in a few weeks how good those cucumbers actually are!  Or maybe we won't.  We're shy that way.