Go.

We went apple picking today with twenty-two people, and there wasn't a wrinkle in the entire day.

I am here today to say go. do. live. feel. eat. touch. spend. take. give. laugh. yell. cry. get out. reach out. stop working. get working. climb. fall. hurt. heal. hold. hope. fumble. fear. reach. react. act out. bite off. make do. make new. make from scratch. borrow. beg. share. love.

It's all we can do.

Do it now.

Go.

{Who knew apple picking was so inspiring?}

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

It's too easy.

If you get to go to lunch in a place as beautiful, and pure, and perfect as Chase's Daily, and you happen to have been lucky enough to bring with you a proper camera, and you walk into the back room and see all the glorious bounty grown in a place called Freedom...
Well, it's too easy.

Here are the photos. But I really can't take credit. I give all the credit to the Chase family.

And to Tim, for being the most patient man in the world. Not only back then on that day that we went and spent two weeks grocery money on a proper camera. But also for today, when he held a box of leftover thin-crust eggplant pizza in one hand, and a highly spirited four-year-old girl in the other, while I fell in love with some cabbages.

And just in case you are all tired of the lovely pictures of Anna sniffing flowers and what not, here's the darling now, in Chase's Daily.


More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Trailer food:: Bubby's Burritos

In search of the ultimate roadside burrito, we went north, up the Hudson, to Bubby's. No Phone, no website, no nothin'.

Nothing but rice, beans, and cheese, local lettuce, tomatoes, and homemade salsa.
Served up with the perfect combination of hot and cold ingredients, rolled together in an organic flour tortilla. Made while you wait, and fresh, fresh, fresh.

I used to say that I wanted my ashes scattered at Spotty Dog Books and Ale, but I think now Tim might have to swing by the parking lot at the corner of Routes 9G and 199 in Annandale, and throw out a handful or two.
::
The details, as I know them:
Bubby's Burritos
Tuesday through Saturday 12-5
Montgomery Place parking lot/corner of Routes 9G and 199,
Annandale-on-Hudson, NY
There are a few picnic tables, and a grassy area to bring a blanket...or you can drive over to Bard College and spread a blanket there.

While you're up there, there's a nice farmstand right next to Bubby's, a museum at Bard, a pretty walk around tiny Tivoli, plus nearby are the towns of Rhinebeck, Red Hook, and (a little farther) Hudson.

Eat more burritos. Thanks for reading.
tt
ps::that's not me obviously, with the long hair and an orange hat and shirt, but she's stylin', no?

Dinner, Part One

I have been putting off writing a post about dinner for quite some time now. So long, that at this point, I've spent as much time thinking about why it's so difficult, as about the actual post.

We are all really busy, you and I. We have kids, we have jobs, we have homes, friends, foes, foibles. Lives.

Dinner, in any big family, is complicated. But as with just about any other subject, dinner in a big, blended family, is extra-complicated.

Perhaps it's been hard for me to tackle this subject because it cannot be separated from so many other things, which make for difficult writing at the least, and complex reading, to be sure. My most palpable fear is that what I have to say will be taken the wrong way, as some sort of manifesto, rather than what it is: simply, how we do things.

So, if you will, I proceed with part one: dinner with kids.

Yikes.

::

We have kids here every.day. But, with varying schedules, where some kids are coming home from school, going out to activities, coming back from practices, going over to other houses for the night, and stopping off briefly (I'm talking thirty minutes) for dinner, before going to the next thing, (and remember, this is just some kids, some of the time: some others are home, or coming home, or four, and waiting for someone to come home); dinner with kids could be a total crapshoot.

But, it's not.

Dinner with kids is eight plates and cups and bowls and napkins, around the table Tim's mom had in her house in Santa Cruz. It's and hour or two of prep work for thirty minutes of shouting and laughing and whining and "would you please put your bottom on your chair" and a million other things.

But it is not a crapshoot.

It is me, planning, choosing, buying, preparing, setting, cooking, drinking, (oh! did I say that out loud? but seriously, do you think I'm doing all this without a glass of wine?) and putting out, so that when the last girl is home, the last one has changed her clothes, and done her homework, and put her bike in the garage, and charged her iPod; when the last girl has brought her violin up out of the front hall to her room, filled out her reading log, cleaned up the scraps from collage-ing; when they've all at the very.last.minute come back from the neighbors' trampoline, and we've shuttled out the door any kids who are not ours (sometimes); when they've all washed their hands: we can eat.

::Tim makes pizza: we buy Whole Foods organic pizza dough for $1.49 each, white or wheat. We make our own organic tomato sauce ($1.19 a can), fresh mozzarella (really expensive, but essential), basil (fresh and free, all summer in the yard), sometimes peppers, rarely other toppings. We're light on toppings, but big dippers: hot sauce, olive oil, balsamic vinegar (sometimes all together). The crust is that good. I should really just be writing a whole pizza post.

::We make burritos: flour tortillas, black beans cooked with salsa and lime juice, brown rice, shredded cheddar (no cheese for JoJo, if you recall), hot sauce (again, always) and grape tomatoes halved with lime juice and cilantro. (I suppose it's the lazy version of fresh salsa.)

::Our girls are big salad eaters, as long as I have the right stuff. I wouldn't buy iceberg (although I love it, don't get me wrong), but I do buy romaine hearts ("the crunchy kind.") when I can't get good, fresh mixed greens from the market. They fall into two camps: ranch (one girl stands alone, here) and vinaigrette. But we've made whole meals out of "salad bar", where I put out everything from roasted chicken, shredded, and nuts, cheeses, sunflower seeds, etc...and they make their own.

I find anything that they can customize works well: salad, baked potatoes, tacos, omelets, etc...

::Pasta of course is my favorite thing to give them. I feel that if I've cooked a homemade sauce, good garlic bread, and a fresh salad, I'm pretty much done. I directly attribute this to a book I used to read to my nephew about Elmo's first sleepover, at which this was the meal that comforted him at his friend's house. At the time, I was a childless twentysomething and took this to be "what families with kids eat." I still think "they" were not far off.

::We grill often, year round: Tim grills all sorts of things: burgers and dogs (organic and nitrate free-easily found and not all that expensive), pork tenderloins and the occasional steak. Tuna steaks are a huge hit, but man, are they a budget breaker. Really good though. And make excellent tacos the next day. He's even been known to grill burritos.

He has that "man make fire" thing. You know what I'm talking about, right?

::I love to make things in casseroles: lasagna, real mac & cheese, chicken pot pie, this pasta dish with vegetables I made up one day, in Maine last summer, that I still can't believe the kids like as much as they do.

::No Knead Bread. Always.

::Milk, and then bottles and bottles of water.

Oh, is one of you still awake? I'm sorry, I know this is probably tedious. But this is exactly my point. It's endless. Tedious. Complicated.

Dinner. For eight. Over, and over again.

But you know what? It's really my most favorite thing to do.

It's not always my favorite time. I'm tired. I've just spent hours preparing what they are either complaining about, or devouring in an instant, loudly.

But they are doing it right next to their sisters. Across from their mom and their dad. Playing out the end of whatever mood they were in for the day, and trying out all sorts of ideas about themselves they can't dip their toes into anywhere else. Playing off of everyone else at that table, knowing that no matter what, we will all be sitting next to them the next time, asking them to pass the whatever, and loving them, all the same.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.

tt

ps: breakfast, lunch, and snacks, here.

Friday Happiness

Welcome, Friday. Weren't you just here? Wasn't that yesterday?

::

It's a little grey and rainy today, and thank goodness for that. I need a day where it is less compelling to take a walk, than it is to fold the laundry.

::

I have two books on my table to devour today:

My fellow Tarrytown mom, Lynda Fassa's second book: Green Kids, Sage Families. This is a thought-provoking, invaluable and entertaining guide to all the small changes we can make to raise healthy, happy kids. There is so much enlightening and important information in this book, and at the same time it is down to earth, and real-life inspiring.

Lines and Shapes journal FEAST: this is a small jewel of a book, with evocative pictures and simple drawings. It moves me. I hold it like a bird. I may sleep with it under my pillow.

::

I am in thrall to the trees. I am in love with dogwood. I am mesmerized by the redbud. I am inebriated with lilac.

::

I am counting the hours until the first Stone Barns Farm Market of the season, today.

::

I don't think the laundry stands a chance, after all.
Enjoy the weekend! Thanks for reading.
tt

Book Club Cooking

Tim and I are on a big push to finish our book club book. Especially high stakes this time, as we picked the book; Rabbit Run. We are notoriously bad book club book finishers. But I think we've got this one in the sack, so to speak.

We've been sharing one copy for the last couple of weeks. I know, I know. But we honestly couldn't get a copy from the libraries (we tried several), or the used bookstore, and ended up buying it new, and it seemed frivolous to buy two. So.

In the meantime, the real point of book club looms large for me: the eating and drinking of good food and wine, and having amazing conversations with all the ridiculously smart people in our book club. They're really something. And they don't even make you feel badly when you can't keep up. Or, ahem...pipe down. Well. Anyway.

Everyone brings something to the table, literally and figuratively.

As we tend toward vegetarian at book club, I've pulled out of my recipe stash Carrot Dill Soup.
This is one of the first things I ever made, back when I first got my hands on my own kitchen, and joined a mail-order cook-book-of-the-month club. When my father, still reeling from college tuition bills, caught wind of that, he asked me if I was going to "get a job, or just stay home and cook."

I knew what the right answer was back then, but we both, my dad and I, have come a long way since. I now essentially do the latter, and no one is a bigger fan of my soup than my dad.

I used to follow the recipe from The New Basics like science lab instructions, but now I rarely follow much of anything. I started switching in vegetable broth for chicken broth a few years ago, as it seemed so unnecessary-almost an affront to the carrots. And those Silver Palate girls always had to complicate everything. Creme Fraiche? I'm still sketchy on what exactly that is.

So here's my idea of carrot soup: veggie, organic, fresh and easy. Even easier if you buy a couple bags of those baby carrots. Also, I don't have a blender around anymore, but I have one of those hand blenders, which you just plunge right into the pot and puree everything right then and there. Eliminates all sorts of issues.

Carrot Dill Soup

::saute in 1/2 stick of melted butter, 1 chopped onion, until wilted
::add 2 lbs carrots (either baby or diced), 2 celery stalks + leaves, chopped, 1/4 c fresh dill
::add in 8 cups of vegetable broth
::salt + pepper to taste, pinch of cayenne pepper (don't skip this!)

::bring to a boil, reduce heat and cover, cook for 40 minutes.
::transfer to a blender, or, if you have one, definitely use one of those hand blender things, to puree the soup to a texture that pleases you.
::check for salt + pepper, and sprinkle with a little more fresh dill, to serve.

I hope book club enjoys this as much as I enjoy them. And if you're reading, Dad, I'll save some for you.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Flashes of kindness realigning one small part of the Universe.

::The neighbor who usually keeps a distance, comes to the door with a ball in her hands. You're ready to explain that it's not your kids', but before you can, she is smiling and apologizing for the one her grandson lost down the drainpipe. And telling you about a new grandchild on the way.

::The waitress in a pizza place, 98 miles away, remembers you all from last summer. Gives you an extra glass of wine, stops by the table and tells you a bit of her story. And you wish she could sit and talk a while more.

::Your husband is an artist who can also do minor plumbing repairs. And doesn't get mad when he finds the root of the problem in the kitchen sink is definitely.you.

::You start the day out grouchy and quarrelsome, and end up laughing with your daughters over your own embarrassment. Really laughing.

::The guy at the bookstore recommends some new, local music. And it's so good. Not perfect, but the tunes stick in your head, and make you think about them.

::Someone you've always admired, but don't cross paths with nearly enough, writes you the kindest, most encouraging words in an actual letter, just when you needed them most.

And you start to think, everything is going to be OK, after all.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.

tt

Friday Happiness::Local edition

This is a major Friday, as it is leading into a week off from school. To that I say, without reservation: Yippee!! We all of us need a break, and with no real plans for the entire week, I think we're bound to get one.

I just wanted to point out a couple of local items:

::Sweet Grass Grill is opening! It's taken them some time longer than anticipated, but they've done a beautiful job with the space, and Robert Welsch of Westover has created some exquisite containers for the front of the restaurant. Spruces up the whole block, I daresay.

We've been waiting so long for this place to open; Tim's joking that eyebuzz is going to move a few of it's hours over to the bar there, where they'll be serving up beer on tap and seasonal, local food. At least, I think he's joking.

::Cowberry Crossing Farm, my favorite organic vendor at both indoor and outdoor farmer's markets in the area, has announced a CSA this summer. For anyone interested in taking part in a CSA, I can't think of a better place to put your support. Their website is a work-in-progress, but you can get all the information about their farm and where to find them. Their produce, meat, and eggs are of amazing variety and quality, and their business is truly family run: two charming kids are always working right next to their parents at the markets, year round.

::And speaking of markets, the indoor market at Briarcliff Manor is on tomorrow. If you haven't made it there yet, go. I swear you will not be disappointed. If nothing else, go buy some cheese!

::If you're wondering what the pictures today have to do with anything (not that my pictures usually do), I'm tickled by the contrast between my pretty little pansies set out on the bench just so, and what actually takes place around that bench on any given afternoon. It makes me think of that quote about cleaning the house while the kids are still young being like shoveling while it's still snowing. Certainly whoever that was, was winking and gesturing at me when they said it.

I hope you all enjoy the weekend!

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Snacks and Snacking

I can hear them coming up the street.

When their sisters were in fourth and fifth grade, we picked them up so religiously, two blocks away, as if the three of them were in danger of coming under sniper fire on their way home.

Now, the two next in line, ten and eleven, walk themselves home. Wave thank you (hopefully) to Georgia, the volleyball-player-turned-crossing-guard. Pet the black Lab at the house on the corner. Run through the hundred-yard wood that connects the block from school, to the block from home.

There is a cheeriness, a determination, about their responses when I ask "do you want me to pick you up?", that speaks volumes about the resiliency of second and third and sixth children.

They're o.k.

So, at least this year, these two are the first in line for afterschool snack.

::

I've already mentioned Emily's admirable desire for peanut butter on whole wheat English muffins. I could just stop there, now. Can you imagine a better snack?

But, she's pretty much the only one, for that.

I always have snack out and ready. (Well, truth be told, maybe not always, but usually.) Of course, fruit. I've been over that, before.

And then usually some sort of pretzels. I'm a huge pretzel fan. Tortilla chips and salsa. Dried cranberries, and maybe some walnuts, almonds, etc...

More often than not, something sweet, too. Cookies: either I've made some, or some FigNewmans, Newman's O's. Banana bread: because what is wrong with my kids that they have slowed down on the bananas? I mostly don't buy them anymore, because they usually go uneaten until they finally are not fit for anything but banana bread.

Popcorn. Lots of popcorn, because it's cheap, easy and popcorn.

We eat a lot of toast for snack, since I'm a crazy person with the No-Knead Bread. But you may have already surmised that.

But then, snack is also something different. It's 4:45 and we're waiting for Tim to come home and grill, or make pizza.

So, snack, then, is a bowl of cut up veggies, maybe even just a bag of baby-carrots poured out into a bowl, with a cup of ranch, a cup of vinaigrette (there are two distinct camps in the house, dressing wise.)

When I have fresh carrots with the tops on, and I scrub them and call out "who wants a big carrot?" you would be surprised at the enthusiasm. You'd have thunk I just offered Twizzlers. (Hi, Jo!)

In the winter, when it's dark at 4:30, and some girls are on their way out the door to gymnastics, or band practice...there is usually something warm;a little soup, some edamame, an omelet. Snack here can be supper. And supper is warm.

On summer days...well. Snack is all of the above, but also: ice pops. Now, you and I know exactly how easy it is to make an ice pop. And a good one, at that, with organic juice, or lemonade, or whatever. But thankfully, so far, the kids seem to think I've done something fabulous.

By the end of last summer I was making twenty ice pops at a time, to fill the demand. When you are handing out pink lemonade pops, you really don't want to be the one to say that you don't have enough for one more kid.

Snacks wear me out. It is the unexpected meal. The thing that rears it's head almost as soon as you have cleaned up from the last thing.

But, I find snack to be an easy way to give them something that they want, and still give them something that you want them to have.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Lunch(es)

Lunch is lovely.

Lunch is your good friend you don't see so much anymore, but still treat each other on your birthdays. Lunch is the quick bite to eat with your co-worker that runs into a second (ahem...) glass of wine. Lunch is three women who are having a "meeting" about the school fundraiser, but talk about everything but. Lunch is you and your mom, with the happiest three-year-old sitting between her two favorite women. Lunch is your husband stealing home with chocolate in a pink bag.

Lunches, are a whole other ball of wax.

Lunches are what need to be taken care of on top of everything else. Lunches are what you spend time thinking about, shopping for and preparing, with no guarantee or confidence that they are getting actually, you know, eaten. Lunches are what you buy all sorts of cute, eco-friendly paraphernalia for, only to have them left in a locker for weeks.on.end. Yuck.

Lunches are also the gesture that you make so that they feel loved. That someone at home thought about them and sent an extra sweet. Bought that special sort of roll that they like. Remembered that they like sprouts, but not lettuce. Took the time to write a little note, or draw a little picture. It's the only way we can send a bit of our t.l.c. with them for their six or so hours away from the nest. Send them off feeling like you've done all you can; now they're somebody else's problem charge.

So, I make lunches.

I always make them the evening before. I have to. I can not imagine the extra task of putting together a lunchbox on a school morning. This way, I can take a little time to think it through, balance it out, get creative.

Because I have this theory about lunches; that while they won't eat anything weird, they are more likely going to eat something that's a little different. Novelty sells.

:: always at least one fruit; whole apples work, whole pears, not as well. Cut up kiwi, apple, cantaloupe. Or berries, whole. Strawberries get slimy if you cut them, but travel nicely, just stemmed. Apple sauce cups: awesome as a standby.

:: always some pretzels, with peanut butter, even. That, in and of itself, is practically lunch. Or tortilla chips and salsa. Rice crackers.

::Dry cereal or granola. Just plain. I bothered with a little box of milk for a while, until I learned it was routinely being given away.

:: always something else fresh: either carrots, celery, peppers...with dressing for some, hummus for some, tzatziki for others...plain vinegar for one, who shall remain nameless.

:: I've tried valiantly to send soup in a thermos, but it invariably either a) leaks out all over everything before or after lunch, or b) gets eaten successfully, but left to fester into a new kind of scary in the locker for a while before being returned.

I've decided they get enough soup at home.

:: Three of them love turkey with sprouts. Actually, it's sort of become turkeywithsprouts. Its own thing. Of course, then, there are still two of them who don't, so they get just turkey, no sandwich, and a pickle, please?

:: While we eat a lot of yogurt and cheese(except for one, who "doesn't like cheese," although she will eat pizza, lasagna, grilled cheese, and mac and cheese. Hi, Jo. I know you're reading this during Research Skills right now. Get back to work!) these items do not sell in a school lunch, for whatever mysterious reason.

:: And always a sweet. I may be a food tyrant. But I'm a generous tyrant. I'm not above a cookie. Or three. Or last night's brownies, wrapped in wax paper. I am completely not above bribing the kids in my life with food.

Here's the thing: I know that my kids may be the kids who are trading the organic fruit for Doritos. I suspect that some of them pull crumpled up dollar bills from their skinny jeans and buy a soft pretzel every day. I've already heard "Mom, everyone knows what I have for my lunch," and I hear the sound of crinkly wrappers in the back seat on the way home from downtown.

But this is what I can do. I can send them out the door with a healthy, thoughtful, organic, well-balanced lunch, with a silly little note and a recycled napkin. And hope for the best.

The best is that as they grow into their older selves, they will value good, fresh, food over nasty, processed, fast food. But mostly, they will recognize that healthy food is a choice they can make for themselves, and that my tyranny stemmed from love.

I've heard the groans. But the other night at dinner, I heard this:

In a discussion of the fabulousness of the brand new middle school cafeteria offerings, someone mentioned that there is a "top your own yogurt" station. And Callie said: "I would never eat cafeteria yogurt. I don't know where the cow's been."

Call her a budding food snob if you'd like, but she's really a nice girl. She's just a nice girl who wants to know where her food comes from.

For now, it comes from her Mom. That won't always be the case.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Breakfast

I remember so well several specifics about breakfast in my parents' house:

1) on weekends, my father would stand at the peninsula in the middle of the huge kitchen and fry bacon on an avocado green electric griddle.

2) he was also an expert omelet-maker, flips and all. But...

3) he would use solidified bacon fat he stored in an old can in the fridge to make the omelets, which grossed me out immeasurably. And...

4) I ate copious amounts of Lender's Bagels.

I have such a clear picture of myself at the round oak table in that kitchen, wrapped up in a robe, eating distractedly and reading the paper. It's like I spent my whole life, right there.

Oh. Right.
I did.

I lived in that house, off and on, with my parents, and later, with out, for thirty five years.

Sometimes, when I wake up here, in this house, there is a split second before my eyes adjust that I think I am still there. I can still hear the sound the kitchen drawers made, the screech and slam of the basement door, and count the eleven stairs up to the second floor.

Now I live here, in this house, with many, many girls. You may imagine breakfast to be chaos and frenzy, but actually, I find everyone a bit subdued, mostly. And like everything else in our blended-family household, breakfast happens in shifts.

Some days, there are just five of us. Some days just three of us. Some days, eight. Those days, I try to stay in bed for as long as possible.

On school days when we have eight, there is usually a good deal of bagel toasting, toast eating, cinnamon toast making. And Emily, girl after my own heart, will have at anytime of day what I consider the perfect concoction: a whole wheat english muffin with peanut butter. Bless her.
Fruit is major in our house, morning, noon and night. So even on days when I need to skulk back to bed and let the storm blow over, I sneak downstairs and put out a bowl of cut up oranges, or cantaloupe and blueberries (amazing colors, together), or sliced grapefruit, or that mythical treat my girls always beg for: fruit salad. What, you may ask, is the difference between a bowl full of fruit and fruit salad? Well, I've asked this also, and it seems that if I spend an extra six minutes cutting things up small and mixing an extra one or two fruits in, it is transformed into fruit salad, which holds much glorious wonder for them. Go figure.

On weekends, Tim's thing is always french toast or pancakes. And he's great at it. At the gallery on Third Fridays or openings, we often have a big wooden bowl filled with sliced up french bread. We rarely go through it all, so we end up having these incredible mini-french toasts for the next couple of days.

I made the mistake, in the last three weeks, of learning to make pancakes, myself. Seriously, I had never done it before. It was always the other guy's job.

So, of course, it's not that tough, after all. And I now find myself making pancakes for weekday breakfasts more often than not. I failed miserably at one of the basic rules of domestic delegation. What the heck am I going to do next, go out and cut the grass?

Then, the storm blows over. Or, at least, blows over to another part of town, where the schools are located, and I am left with a three-year-old, a kitchen to clean, and the realization that I haven't eaten breakfast, yet.

I clean up. I set her up with something to do. And I cook for myself:

Goat cheese and arugula omelet

whisk together,
Two eggs
salt and pepper

melt,
T butter in a small pan, swirling to coat

Pour in eggs, pulling back edges to let the eggs spread thinly in the pan, 'til set.

Distribute on half,
1 oz. goat cheese
1/2 c arugula, spinach, even baby salad greens

Fold over on itself, and, if feeling courageous, flip and cook for a minute or two.
Otherwise, slide off the pan, and eat, sitting right there in the kitchen, reading a cookbook, or staring off into space. Tell three-year-old you'll be there in a minute, to add a room onto the block house for the cows.

No bacon fat required.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Monday Morning :: How did that happen?

Good Monday. I really don't know how this came up so fast. Well, we did lose that hour, and we're paying for it, now.

Pitch black. Ten-year-old sent back to the drawing board, getting-up-for-school-wise. I need to go wake her, I just wanted to say good morning.

I didn't evaporate over the weekend, just took a computer break. Had lots to say about Saturday's farmer's market, Saturday's dinner, Sunday's walk. Didn't we have a snow day a week ago? Nice pictures for The View, which never got posted. Incredible work coming in for Public Bookstore. Really beautiful mini-landscapes in the gallery, from Elizabeth Solomon. But never got around to posting.

I see this as a wee bit of progress. A crash blog-diet.

I'll be back, but have to go now. I don't hear a sound from upstairs.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Monday Morning :: One step forward, two steps back

Well...we did get out a bit this weekend. I even left the house alone. Twice.

Once to go to the indoor farmers market, which was a pleasant surprise. Where I imagined just onions and potatoes, there were pickles, and eggs, bread (but no pies) and cheese, honey and beef jerky. Yes, beef jerky.

Again, alone, to stop in at my favorite store and say hi. Browse a little. Found a Valentine gift for the ten-year-old. Found eight or ten other things I'd love to bring home, but not in the budget, right now.

The big new room in the shop looks amazing and has some new (journals and books) and vintage things that make the perfect little something to give. My girls could get a new journal every day for the rest of their lives, and still not be bored by them. They write stories, they write secrets, they make lists, they make business plans (not joking), they keep track of time, they draw pictures, they write notes and poems.

On Sunday, feeling optimistic, (and a little stir-crazy,) we made a break for it, Tim and I, and went out for a late lunch with the little one. She totally rose to the occasion, complete with skipping down the block, but we're paying the price today.

Today we have a variety of girls home, with a variety of ailments. So if you drive by...maybe, just wave from the car. Unless you're looking for some time under house arrest.

I have to admit, it has a few charms, this staying home sick. But I wouldn't wish this on anyone.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Everything in its place

The tree is up, the lights are on, the ornaments hung. This year, mutiny. We went with colored lights on the tree, by popular demand. I'm fine with it, actually. It looks pretty.

I'm doing quite well, I think, with the increasing clutter and mess that all of this Christmas-ing brings. Candles and stick stars on the windowsills, wooden Santas jumbling up the tabletops, red and green bowls crowding around the everyday white in our already crowded cabinets. Furniture moved around to make room for the tree. Relatives sleeping on the couch. That sort of thing.

I'm doing quite well, because I'm quite charmed by it all this year. I'm going with it. It feels good to walk in our house, I think.

I'm crazy in the kitchen. Every day seems an excuse for some sort of party, some sort of treat to be baked or comforting dish conjured up. Armed with chocolate chips, homemade bread and good cheeses, I feel I can rise to any occasion.

what we're eating these days:

grilled marinated pork loins (yes, that was Tim outside last night, grilling in his down coat), with roasted potatoes and cherry tomatoes.

frikadeller (danish-style pork and beef meatballs) over wide egg noodles.

pumpkin cookies, over and over and over again. With chocolate chips, because I can't help myself, but sliced almonds are exceptionally good, too. Plus the kids don't eat as many, then.

and speaking of almonds, an idea stolen from the samples at Whole Foods: any gooey, rinded cheese (I used an Italian cheese made with sheep and cow's milk called robbiola), "marinated" with honey and sprinkled with sliced almonds. It will knock your socks off; it looks beautiful, has a wonderful mixture of textures and tastes, and will seem like you've done something elaborate and creative without, really, doing much.

and, always, homemade pizza. Tim's pizza, as it's known around here (and elsewhere, I'm proud to say). Right now, with slivered red peppers.

Some of us are also eating more than their share of candy canes. And organic or not, a word to the wise: if you put candy canes out in a pretty little jar on December 2nd, you will have a three-year-old junkie with a wicked sugar jones by December 3rd. Just saying.

More tomorrow. Thanks for reading.

tt

One night in Hudson

We did the usual Warren Avenue walk, Spotty Dog beer fest, Baba Louie's romantic organic pizza dinner (for three).

This time, though, we stayed for nighttime. Christmas decorations, and after-dark lights.



And a gallery opening; such beautiful work...work I would take home and hang, and be happy to have in my house and my life, everyday. Maybe it's hard to make much of these paintings online. You have to see them in person. They are wonderful; complex and soothing at the same time.

I found this years-old post about the artist on a now-defunct blog, and I love the quote about how and why to buy art.

Then the long, windy road home to our little house, poised on the edge of December, already sparkling with little white lights.

More about that, tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
tt

Monday morning, Saturday night, and Thursday

Good morning. This is a hard post to write.


Not that anything momentous has occurred. It's just hard to write this morning because I'm exhausted. I am writing checks with my social schedule that my forty-one-year-old body can not cash.


But fortunately for me, I am not doing any major cooking this year for Thanksgiving. Come to think of it, I'm buying cheese for Thanksgiving. This I can handle.


Actually, I sort of miss the thrill of it all. Choosing the dishes, setting the table, baking ahead, cooking in the middle of the night.


So, for solidarity with my friends and family who are in the throes of meal prep this week, I'm going over to Whole Foods. I'm going to look in the faces of my fellow shoppers, and smile. I'm going to let someone else get the last bag of organic fresh cranberries. I'm not going to clear my throat at the poor soul standing smack dab in front of the chestnuts, wondering if they could possibly really be edible and what her sister-in-law says have to be on the menu at Thanksgiving. I am not going to judge the one who sneaks the pre-made gravy into the cart, because I. have. been. there. And frozen organic pie crusts are in aisle six.

If I see you there, I'll gladly wait in line at the deli counter for you, or go fetch a bag or two of Parker House rolls. Or better yet, a cup of tea.

Because I'm just bringing the cheese this year. And man am I tired.

Happy Holidays! Thanks for reading.
tt

Sunday drivers

We often take long Sunday drives, with Anna strapped in happily in the back seat and a "car picnic" packed. We'll go out looking at galleries, nurseries, museums, or even just wander around some town and check out the "housing stock", see if the aluminum siding salesmen had hit town or not, at some sad point in the last 30 years or so.

We often drive up to Tivoli, have a look at Bard's performing arts center and walk the little village from end to end. Beacon is a favorite if we want to check out the galleries, see what other people have got going. Rhinebeck is beautiful, and (almost too) perfectly preserved and updated. Red Hook is lovely, too, and worth a stop if only for this store.

And always, our favorite outing, is Hudson, with its long, grand Warren Avenue of shops, galleries, antiques (and more antiques),restaurants, refurbished (and not) townhouses and The Spotty Dog Books & Ale-one of those rare places where we can hang out and drink pints of beer with a happily occupied three year old looking at great wooden toys and playing Connect Four in the bar. And then float up the street for organic pizza. Like a dream come true.

But we didn't do any of these things this Sunday. As we set out over the Tappan Zee the weather was grey and rainy,

but the sky gradually began to clear up.

Our plan was to drive to Warwick, NY, a town neither of us had ever laid eyes on but we've been hearing a lot about lately. There was an interesting interview with the mayor there in The Valley Table's last issue, and we knew of an organic farm there we thought we might check out. What we hadn't counted on were the 30,000 people who were also driving to Warwick yesterday for the Applefest...an event that was quite impressive in size, but is pretty much a prime example of our worst nightmare. We didn't get out of the car. We also couldn't find the farm, even with the address and a Google map, but we did find a nice cornfield to park next to and have our car picnic.

So, instead, we drove back over the Bear Mountain Bridge, with the weather at this point near-perfect, and headed up the east coast of the Hudson to Garrison.

There we could let the three year old stretch those little legs on the shore of the Hudson, run and climb (Tim says there's an unspoken rule that sculptures out-of-doors are fair game?),

while we could have a look at the current show at the Garrison Art Center,

and my favorite part, its pottery studio.

In the end, another beautiful Sunday drive. The best part, as usual: arriving back in our neighborhood-all blue skies and falling leaves at 5 o'clock-to find neighbors' kids and dogs running in the park, our little house waiting for us in the afternoon sun, and being so grateful that the road, for us, winds back here.

Home. Thanks for reading.

tt