I Guess Beggars CAN Be Choosers

So I went to purchase the aforementioned obnoxiously colored cupcakes and to my surprise they were buy one get one free. To my disappointment all the chocolate cupcakes had halloween (which blogger tells me needs to be capitalized but I refuse to give it that much credit) or ghost picks in them. Now typically I would just take what is there and keep quiet. But this time I decided to ask the nice bakery lady if they had any other cupcakes. She asked what I was looking for and I told her something a little less evil. No, just kidding, I asked if she had any with pumpkin picks. She said no but she would change out the picks for me. Trouble was the picks didn't come out so well so she pulled 12 new cupcakes out of the freezer and quick frosted them for me complete with pumpkin pick on the top of each while I completed my shopping. I guess my mom was wrong, beggars really can be choosers.

Yeah...about that

Yesterday I passed Snow White's evil stepmother on the road. She was driving a Isuzu and smoking. Only in America. I'd like to say only in America on Halloween but that would be a lie.

Compromises

As I get older, and hopefully wiser, I am learning that life is full of compromises.

Thursday night I was needing to bake cupcakes for FirstBorn's Harvest party today at school as well as clean up the house for BabyBoy's intervention specialist visit Friday morning. All the while the little voice in the back of my head is saying "Why do you always wait until the very last minute?"

We went to my mom's for dinner and as we were leaving FirstBorn said "But when are we going to carve pumpkins?" At this point I did not share with him that carving pumpkins was not on my to do list this year.

I posed the question to him "Would you like store bought cupcakes for your party and to carve pumpkins or would you like homemade cupcakes for your party and no carving pumpkins?" He didn't even bat an eyelash and answered "Store bought, let's go carve."

Now I would be lying to you if I said I rolled my sleeves up and attacked the pumpkins with gusto and a good time was had by all.

My feelings were hurt that all the other moms would be looking at my child with pity that *his* mom was one of *those* moms - you know the ones who buy their cupcakes instead of making them. I was not in the mood to deal with pumpkin guts and besides, I had a house to clean.

When I shared this with Mr. Steady he gave me a guy's perspective: boys don't care whether cupcakes are homemade or store bought, they just like cupcakes. And in 20 years will they remember the homemade cupcakes or the memories of carving pumpkins?

I have reconciled myself to not making myself crazy trying to give the appearance of a perfectly groomed life. The fact of the matter is my life is not perfect and most of the time it's not even groomed.

For about 1/2 hour Thursday night I thought I would just stay up late and bake those cupcakes to preserve my image. Then I decided that going to bed and getting rest was way more important to my health and my family's sanity.

The children devoured the obnoxiously colored cupcakes with gusto and none of them asked me if they had partially hydrogenated vegetable oils or high fructose corn syrup in them. And no one refused to eat them because they "only eat baked goods made with love" which I actually heard a grown woman say one time. That would be a good way to not gain weight.

Oh and the house I was supposed to clean? Mr. Steady picked up the living room while I drove the boys to school, I closed the doors in the living room and called it sufficient. Sometimes sufficiency has to be enough. Next time I will strive for excellence or maybe even perfection but for today, it's enough.

It's Time to Request Thanksgiving Books

Today* I am putting in my requests for Thanksgiving books at my local library. I like to have about 30 picture books for each holiday. I ask my boys to each read 20 minutes a day and we usually read 2 picture books each night unless we're reading a chapter book. So it doesn't take us long to go through 30 picture books at our house.


If you have never used your library's website from home before, you might want to ask your librarian how to use it. Once you've requested the books, your library will either call or email you and let you know your books are in. Then, you can just pop in, go straight to the front desk, and be checked out within a matter of 5 minutes.


Did you know that your library actually likes it when you request books from their consortium? It increases their circulation numbers which are imperative when looking at what programs and corners to cut. If their circulation numbers are up, it's a good thing.


I am the reason the library aides stand all those books up on display. Like a greedy kid in a candy store I go right down the aisle grabbing up any books with delicious looking pictures. So I don't always request as many books as I think I'll need because I am open to getting some new titles I haven't seen or heard of before.


And here's one last tip for you. If you know you are going to need want a book for longer than your allowed time (by the way, ask for a teacher's card if you home school, they have a longer checkout time) put the book on hold while you still have it. That way your name is already on the list and it will soon be your turn again.

So, without further ado, the list o' Thanksgiving books:
One Is a Feast for Mouse Judy Cox
Gus, the Pilgrim Turkey Teresa Bateman
The Thanksgiving Train Richard Stein
Thanksgiving Turkey Trouble Abby Klein
The Very First Thanksgiving Day Rhonda Gowler Greene
The Great Turkey Race Steve Metzger
One Little, Two Little, Three Little Pilgrims B.G. Hennessy
The Amazing Turkey Rescue Steve Metzger
This Is the Turkey Abby Levine
This First Thanksgiving Day Laura Melmed
Thanksgiving is Here Diane Goode
The Night Before Thanksgiving Natasha Wing
The Best Thanksgiving Ever Teddy Slater
Thanksgiving on Thursday Mary Pope Osborne (there is a companion book to this to study deeper that we will be using as well)
Amelia Bedelia Talks Turkey Herman Parish
Thanksgiving Day at Our House Nancy Carlstrom (an AR book)
Thanksgiving at the Tappleton's Eileen Spinelli (an AR book)
Happy Thanksgiving Emily Claire Masural (an AR book)
My Thanksgiving Jennifer Gillis (an AR book)
Setting the Turkeys Free Lisa Nikola (an AR book)
I Am the Turkey Michele Spirn (an AR book)
Nana's Sweet Potato Pie Gracie Porter (an AR book)
The Extra-Thankful Thanksgiving Kim Watson (I am normally against TV character books but I love Little Bill and it's an AR book)
Henry and Mudge Under the Yellow Moon Cynthia Rylant (an AR book)
Squanto and the First Thanksgiving Teresa Celsi (an AR book)
In November Cynthia Rylant (an AR book)
The Thanksgiving Door Debby Atwell (an AR book)
Thanksgiving, What Makes It Special Harold Myra (an AR book)
Molly's Pilgrim Barbara Cohen (an AR book)
Thanksgiving With Me Margaret Willey (an AR book)
Mary's First Thanksgiving Kathy-Jo Wargin
P is for Pumpkin Kathy-Jo Wargin
Give Thanks to the Lord Karma Wilson
Thank You Thanksgiving David Milgram
A Pioneer Thanksgiving Barbara Greenwood
An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving Louisa May Alcott








*I honestly put some of these on hold before the beginning of October because there was already a list of requests. I will probably just re-request them when I get them so I can keep them through the holiday.

Wow. Just wow.

A sister in Christ shared this with me today.

High-Low

Each night at dinner we play High-Low, where each member of the family tells what the high point of their day was and then we go back around and share what the low point was.

SecondBorn said his high of the day was (and I quote) "Taking it easy on the couch." Mr. Steady and I could not contain our laughter. Where does a 5 year old even get the notion of "taking it easy?" From Frog and Toad, of course. It seems he had been enjoying the book earlier and one of the characters said he would stay home and take it easy. So that is what the SecondBorn thought he would do too. Too funny.

At one point it seemed the boys weren't paying attention when we went around the table so we started having everybody repeat what everyone before them said. This has really seemed to help and make everyone feel heard. Sometimes the boys like to add silly things like the most surprising part of the day or most exciting.

My favorite answers to hear to High-Low are

• High point "Right now" when we're all sitting around the table sharing about our days
• Low point: "I can't even think of one"

What do you do to start the dinner conversation?

Because Every Man, Woman and Child Deserve Good Meatloaf

There are a handful of things that I will only eat if made from my mother's general recipe. They include meatloaf, tuna salad, pumpkin pie, and a handful of other things. Today I'm going to share my recipe for meatloaf.

Now, I know you may ask "Who doesn't know how to make meatloaf?" Well, lots of people. Take my good friend Jody for example. One day I went to her house and she asked me how I make meatloaf. I gave her the general recipe below and she shared with me that she had been taking meat and shaping it into a loaf, serving it to her husband and calling it meatloaf. I slept better that night knowing that I had saved one American family from the travesty of bad meatloaf.

Meatloaf is one of my favorite foods and my children love it too. We generally serve it with baked potatoes and green beans. But hey, make it yours.

I have found one other meatloaf recipe that I like to use in addition to this one called Cheddar Topped Meatloaf which includes barbeque sauce and cheddar cheese but this is my go-to recipe.

This will feed a hungry group of 6-8 people.

2 lb ground beef*

2 eggs*

1/2 c. oats (I prefer quick cooking for this recipe but beggars can't be choosers)

Salt & Pepper

Ketchup

*Typically I like home grown, corn feed, hormone free beef but it is the end of October which means the ground beef is all gone until butchering time which will be after Thanksgiving. Some people demand prefer beef that comes on stryofoam trays and others of us are married to their sons. Those people will also not eat brown eggs for various, weak, obnoxious reasons. Others of us are married to their sons. Which is not the reason I am using store boughten eggs and beef. The reason is because I was at my mother's when I was making this meat loaf and that's what she had. Why did I feel the need to share this? No idea. None at all. Call it therapy at your expense. {Note: It has been my experience that the sons of these naysayers could care less where their beef or eggs come from as long as the meatloaf tastes good.}

Add all the ingredients to a large bowl. At which time you remember you forgot to include onions in the recipe. So if you are daring, add about a tablespoon of minced dried onions to the mixture. But do not add big fresh chunks of onion because then it wouldn't be mom's recipe.

Add about 1/2 cup ketchup. Or more. Or less. The truth is I have no idea how much is there. It's better to err on the side of too little and add more later.

Mix it all up with your hands or a big wooden spoon if you are one of *those* people. It should be a moist, gloppy mess.

Put it in a 9x9 square pan, two loaf pans, or if you must, shape it into a loaf on a cookie sheet. Bake at 350 for 1 hour uncovered.

Eat with lots of ketchup.

Now I will slumber peacefully tonight knowing that there is no reason why anyone in America should be slopping a pound of ground beef into a loaf pan and calling it meatloaf. Nor will anyone ever again have a reason to put a boiled egg in the middle of the meatloaf. Now that is just weird.