No More Suspense
I’ll just tell you already what we’re having, or show you, rather:
She’s due February 20, 2009! We are SO excited!
News
We know what we’re having. 
Toddler Milestone
It happened on Saturday.
JR asked me, “Why?” With definite sass in his tone.
Twice.
I was speechless. John laughed, moreso at me.
And now I don’t even remember what I was telling him beforehand. He hasn’t said it again since, yet.
Not yet. I know it’s coming.
Le YUM
I have found the sourdough love.
After learning of sourdough’s amazing benefits, I decided to capture some wild yeast (present in the flour and in my kitchen) and made a wild yeast sourdough starter. I think of it like a pet now, which isn’t much of a stretch given that I do have to feed it regularly. And pets should have names, so I’ve named my starter Jack.
My first loaf of sourdough was… not so great. It had a beautiful crust, but the crumb was entirely too dense to be to my liking. It became a bread pudding, and is much better now.
My next was a batch of sourdough cinnamon rolls with homemade icing. YUM. John loved them too.
Then yesterday I decided that I wanted a real sourdough loaf. You know, with the blistered crust and the big telltale holes inside and the delectable tang. Ok, ambitious for a sourdough newbie, but I had to try. I used this recipe to prep my dough, let it ferment, shaped, then proofed. Late last night I baked it. I didn’t use the best baking dish, and the end result sort of cracked around the edges. I let it cool on a rack overnight (it was late, I had to sleep). This morning, with the steel cut oatmeal I had for breakfast (that I let soak overnight, sooo easy), I cut into my loaf.
It slices beautifully. It smells wonderful. It has a mildly blistered crust. It has a stable somewhat springy crumb, dotted with big holes. I lost the first slice to JR. It’s delicious. I’m very proud of myself.
The next time I make a loaf, I might try proofing it overnight.
I encourage all of you to abandon your commercial yeast and make a true sourdough starter today!
Family Portait
Eve Ensler on Sarah Palin
My mother-in-law forwarded this to me. I had to share it. Thanks, Mona.
Eve Ensler, the American playwright, performer, feminist and activist best known for “The Vagina Monologues,” wrote the following about Sarah Palin.
Drill, Drill, Drill
I am having Sarah Palin nightmares. I dreamt last night that she was a member of a club where they rode snowmobiles and wore the claws of drowned and starved polar bears around their necks. I have a particular thing for Polar Bears. Maybe it’s their snowy whiteness or their bigness or the fact that they live in the arctic or that I have never seen one in person or touched one. Maybe it is the fact that they live so comfortably on ice. Whatever it is, I need the polar bears.
I don’t like raging at women. I am a Feminist and have spent my life trying to build community, help empower women and stop violence against them. It is hard to write about Sarah Palin. This is why the Sarah Palin choice was all the more insidious and cynical. The people who made this choice count on the goodness and solidarity of Feminists. But everything Sarah Palin believes in and practices is antithetical to Feminism which for me is part of one story — connected to saving the earth, ending racism, empowering women, giving young girls options, opening our minds, deepening tolerance, and ending violence and war.
I believe that the McCain/Palin ticket is one of the most dangerous choices of my lifetime, and should this country chose those candidates the fall-out may be so great, the destruction so vast in so many areas that America may never recover. But what is equally disturbing is the impact that duo would have on the rest of the world. Unfortunately, this is not a joke. In my lifetime I have seen the clownish, the inept, the bizarre be elected to the presidency with regularity.
Sarah Palin does not believe in evolution. I take this as a metaphor. In her world and the world of Fundamentalists nothing changes or gets better or evolves. She does not believe in global warming. The melting of the arctic, the storms that are destroying our cities, the pollution and rise of cancers, are all part of God’s plan.
She is fighting to take the polar bears off the endangered species list. The earth, in Palin’s view, is here to be taken and plundered. The wolves and the bears are here to be shot and plundered. The oil is here to be taken and plundered. Iraq is here to be taken and plundered. As she said herself of the Iraqi war, “It was a task from God.”
Sarah Palin does not believe in abortion. She does not believe women who are raped and incested and ripped open against their will should have a right to determine whether they have their rapist’s baby or not.
She obviously does not believe in sex education or birth control. I imagine her daughter was practicing abstinence and we know how many babies that makes.
Sarah Palin does not much believe in thinking. From what I gather she has tried to ban books from the library, has a tendency to dispense with people who think independently. She cannot tolerate an environment of ambiguity and difference. This is a woman who could and might very well be the next president of the United States. She would govern one of the most diverse populations on the earth.
Sarah believes in guns. She has her own custom Austrian hunting rifle. She has been known to kill 40 caribou at a clip. She has shot hundreds of wolves from the air.
Sarah believes in God. That is of course her right, her private right. But when God and Guns come together in the public sector, when war is declared in God’s name, when the rights of women are denied in his name, that is the end of separation of church and state and the undoing of everything America has ever tried to be.
I write to my sisters. I write because I believe we hold this election in our hands. This vote is a vote that will determine the future not just of the U.S., but of the planet. It will determine whether we create policies to save the earth or make it forever uninhabitable for humans. It will determine whether we move towards dialogue and diplomacy in the world or whether we escalate violence through invasion, undermining and attack. It will determine whether we go for oil, strip mining, coal burning or invest our money in alternatives that will free us from dependency and destruction. It will determine if money gets spent on education and health care or whether we build more and more methods of killing. It will determine whether America is a free open tolerant society or a closed place of fear, fundamentalism and aggression.
If the Polar Bears don’t move you to go and do everything in your power to get Obama elected then consider the chant that filled the hall after Palin spoke at the RNC, “Drill Drill Drill.” I think of teeth when I think of drills. I think of rape. I think of destruction. I think of domination. I think of military exercises that force mindless repetition, emptying the brain of analysis, doubt, ambiguity or dissent. I think of pain.
Do we want a future of drilling? More holes in the ozone, in the floor of the sea, more holes in our thinking, in the trust between nations and peoples, more holes in the fabric of this precious thing we call life?
Eve Ensler
September 5, 2008
JR’s Muffles
Must write this down somewhere so I can make them again (if they’re a hit):
JR’s Muffles
2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 tsp sea salt
1 tbsp baking powder
pinch of nutmeg
~~~
1-1/4 cup yogurt (or other suitable liquid)
1 stick butter, melted
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
~~~
1 cup frozen blueberries (or substitute whatever)Heat oven to 400*. Mix dry ingredients in large bowl. Whisk together wet ingredients in separate bowl; blend into dry ingredients. Fold in blueberries. Fill muffin cups, bake for 15 to 20 minutes.
I plan to use this formula to help with fruit and dairy that are on their last days. I’ll use sour cream, milk, yogurt, whatever is handy for the liquid. Likewise for the add-in; I picture bananas, berries, pumpkin, the possibilities are endless!
Barack Roll
I freakin’ love Obama.
Holy Toddlerdom!
My baby is two! How did that happen so quickly?
He got cake on his birthday — Daddy cut it and served up some pieces for us. JR decided that he didn’t want a piece. He took the plate that had the rest of the cake on it. It was his birthday, we let him have it, and he wound up covered from head to toe in chocolate frosting. He loved it.
He insists on doing everything himself. He reads books all the time (and by read I mean he points at pictures, names them, makes whatever sound they make, and repeats). He can count to 14. He knows the alphabet song, and can recognize a handful of letters. He can sing “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” and “Pat A Cake” and is trying to learn the hand gestures for “Itsy Bitsy Spider.” He’s 3 feet tall, over 35#, wearing 3T-4T clothing, says “thank you” for everything, reminds us to say grace at meals, reminds us to say prayers at bedtime, is starting to say “please” for things, loves to color (crayons and markers must be supervised if he gets to use them at all or he’ll color on the walls and appliances), and is generally the sweetest, most curious little guy we know.
Oh, and he has a new phrase: “I know.” Yep. Daddy and I will be hearing that one for the rest of our lives. “Please help me” is another funny phrase that pops up from time to time.
Yesterday he was looking at my belly, and I said, “There’s a baby in there.” He looked at me like I was absolutely crazy, but decided to indulge his insane mother by saying, “Oh! Hi baby!” Then he looked at me again with this surety that I was just nuts. It was cute.
He’s the greatest little boy around, and it’s such a joy watching him turn into such a sweet, smart, considerate little man.
Sorry, Mama
but I hate my sister. And her girls. And sometimes dad. They’re making it so hard to carry out your wishes with your estate. And they treat me like I was never really part of the family. I want nothing to do with them. They will never know the child growing inside me, and will never again have anything to do with JR. I am ashamed to be related to them.
I miss you so much. All I want in any given day is to be able to talk to you, hug you one more time, laugh with you. I don’t know how to do things without you. I never wanted to. I still don’t want to, but I get by every day somehow.
I had a horrible dream about you last night, and woke up terrified that I had caused you harm. I hope I made you happy. I hope I made you proud of me.
I miss you so much, mama, and I love you. Always.
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