Totally Hectic

It's been a hectic week. I have worked some very long days, and the work has been mentally and emotionally tiring. I'm so far over my hours for this week that I came home today after only 3 hours and am now in bed. I am debating forcing myself to take a nap. I don't nap very readily, so it is a struggle to just lay down and close my eyes and still my mind. Even more of a struggle to actually fall asleep.

The main thing notable/sharable since Sarah left has been Daniella's and my discovery of Veggie Tales. Her piano student's mom recommended the song "oh where is my hairbrush" to her, and we proceeded to watch it on YouTube two or three times in a row. And then sing it non-stop for the next day and a half. "The Pirates who don't do anything" was also a hit, especially once we figured out through google that Mr. Lunt is a decorative gourd. If you don't know what I'm talking about, google "cucumber hairbrush," and you are in for a very silly treat.

I thought I'd also post some non-Thanksgiving related pictures from Sarah's visit. In addition to cooking, Sarah and I:

Went out for coffee (twice)

Laughed and giggled

Made cards

Stayed out late in Adams Morgan over falafel and dessert (the cookie sandwich at The Diner)

And saw more of those green balls, both in living sculpture

and store window plastic

I will now start a label for those green balls, as they seem to come up with inordinate frequency.

Thanksgiving Dinner

We had 2 guests for Thanksgiving dinner: Rowan, and Anne, who was my Head Resident (like an RA) at Smith for 2 years. We all chatted in the kitchen while Rowan was sauteing chard, and then in the living room over goat cheese and white bean hummus. We read poems, as is the tradition in my family. I botched mine up, but everyone else did great. Anne read us a poem in German and in English--she translated it herself! Then we sat down to dinner, saying what we are thankful for.
Rowan, Anne, me.

All of the food turned out excellently! I was very happy. Before pecan pie, to let our food digest, we played a great game of Pictionary Telephone. There was much laughter over difficult-to-decipher pictures (mine) and hard-to-draw sentences (Rowan's).

A few were especially funny.
First Sentence: The grass is always greener on the other side
Last Sentence: One stick figure is scratching my cornea which makes me really sad so I have to go break something and drink a cup of hot tea.
The middle of that sheet involved lice and Jack and Jill.

Another one:
First Sentence: Is this the true face of genius?
Last Sentence: A man with a tugboat on his head hums while imagining his home with a replenishing fruit bowl outside--only there never seems to be any grapes.

The pecan pie was delicious with vanilla ice cream.

Thanksgiving! Food Prep

Sarah and I had a wonderful Thanksgiving week! We very much enjoyed cooking and hosting our first Thanksgiving. The menu:
Butternut Squash Soup with Ginger
Green Bean Casserole (a la Campbell's Soup)
Roasted Beets and Brussel Sprouts
Stuffing
Pecan Pie

As we are vegetarian, we skipped the turkey. Rowan brought homegrown swiss chard and Anne brought appetizers.

Sarah and I started cooking on Wednesday with the squash soup and pie. When I make squash soup (which happens quite frequently), I roast the squash. This necessitates cutting the raw squash in half, an often formidable feat. I started gently:
After banging the squash with the knife stuck in it repeatedly on the counter in an attempt to break through, I resorted to brute force.
This resulted in some seriously raggedy-looking squash.

I thought that brandishing the remaining squash like a triumphant squash conqueror would help bolster my oomph.
Let's just say it's a good thing all the squash gets pureed in the end.

Sarah was a bit more sedate making her pecan pie crust.
The filling:
The finished pie! Isn't it pretty? Sarah managed the lovely top decoration even though I kept eating the pecans from her "decoration" pile. I thought she had made a pile of the rejects.
Thursday morning we started with the stuffing. Every year when I am home for Thanksgiving, I wake up to the smell of onions sauteing in butter: my dad starting the stuffing. He cooks the stuffing and turkey, and likes to be out of the kitchen before anyone else starts cooking. So when I started sauteing my own celery, carrots and onions in a whole stick of butter, it really smelled and felt like Thanksgiving.
Right before it was time to put the stuffing in the oven, I remembered the most important flavor of the stuffing: white wine. By some miracle, we actually had a corkscrew (2!). I didn't have to borrow one from Ken and Kenny, or the scary neighbors. I had not, until that moment, successfully uncorked a bottle of wine. As you can see, it was quite the effort. But I had success!
The stuffing about halfway through cooking. This was my favorite part of the meal.
We also roasted beets and brussel sprouts. The color contrast when raw was excellent, and they tasted so sweet cooked.
One thing about having several different roommates over the last year and a half is the rotating kitchen supplies. I am now without a sufficiently large mixing bowl, and my soup pot was in use. While all of the green beans fit in the bowl, it was difficult to stir them into the sauce. About halfway through I realized that it was customary to defrost the green beans before mixing them in the sauce. This might have aided the mixing process.

It was a fun day and a half cooking--not stressful.

Alaina's Bat Mitzvah: The Day After

Sunday, November 22: After sleeping like rocks, we headed down to the hotel breakfast area for brunch. Up in our private area, the hotel staff had put together a lovely display. The nests are lox, the martini glass holds capers, and I like the look of the paprika.
Although those white disks look like baked goods, don't try to grab them! They're cream cheese, molded into shapes that resemble biscuits. I had to stand there and make sure people didn't try to hold them.
I like how they used Saturday's kids' table decorations to display (just a few of the many) leftover cupcakes.
In addition, we had free range of the hot breakfast buffet, a fruit bar, and meats and cheeses. The beef tenderloin made a reappearance, this time under the auspices of "corned beef hash." There was lots of giggling over this. Personally, I wouldn't blame the hotel staff, as we had pretty much harassed them the entire weekend, and they still managed to smile at us.

We rolled out of our rooms and piled into Kim's living room to recap the evening and enjoy being in a real house (we had pretty much spent 36 hours in the hotel). Sheryl and my mom looked through my sign-in book.
Kim has 3 cats. Two keep to themselves, but Gizmo is such a cuddler! Except when he decides to bite.
He had a snuggle with me--I realized how much I miss cuddling with animals in this job. (There are sometimes animals in the office, but only the heads of potentially rabid backyard critters, and they are not good to snuggle with). Gizmo settled down in my lap and rested his face in my leg. After a long time relaxing on me with much purring, he bit me. Kim says it's a love bite. I say he's spending too much time with Kim's friend M.
Eventually, my parents and Claire's family left for the airport, and Alexa went back to South Carolina. I had a mellow evening with the D's and S-H's. Alaina and Molly recorded Alaina's gifts and did some math.
Kim taught me how to style my hair and use a diffuser on a blowdryer. I am indeed impaired when it comes to blow-drying. It was a fun and relaxing evening. Around 7pm we figured we'd all be asleep by 9, but somehow Jill, Molly, Kim and I stayed up late talking. I was so glad to have the extra day to spend quiet time with my extended family.

Overall it was a most excellent weekend! Thanks to the D's for hosting and making it all happen!

Bat Mitzvah Party

Alaina led the service extremely well. Her Torah portion was smooth and her speech heartfelt and meaningful. And was the service ever speedy! One hour exactly, which is quite short for a Torah service. Before the party opened, adults and kids wrote notes to Alaina on my pages.

The adults shmoozed over drinks while the kids played games with the DJ inside. I thought this was a great idea--we didn't have to hear them play "Coke and Pepsi" and other loud bat mitzvah games. My older cousins, Alexa's best friend, and I ordered Shirley Temples from the bar and chatted. When we went inside the ballroom, the desserts were all spread out like this:
Isn't it pretty? There were skewers of chocolate-dipped marshmallows, chocolate caramel apples, chocolate-dipped pretzels and more.

I was seated at the big kids table--my older cousins, 2 of Alexa's friends, and a couple about my age. Molly and I experimented with my camera.
Molly is a camp counselor, and also likes to dance, so she, my mom and I danced quite a bit. Having gone to many a bar/bat mitzvah in my day, I know many line dances, and so does my mom. We rocked out to The Electric Slide, the Cha-Cha Slide, and Cotton Eye Joe. We started grooving our heads off to YMCA, then looked over at the 13 year olds to find them standing in a tight pack and boucing slightly. Apparently they only dance during the letter part of that song, omitting the pointing during the "young man" portion. We sat down, a bit embarassed but laughing at ourselves. The DJ played some 80's music and got all of the adults up and dancing. One of Kim's friend and her boyfriend were especially, uh, enthusiastic on the dance floor. All of the 13-year-olds and many of the adults stopped dancing to watch. "It's like the sun," I remarked. "You can't look away, but it hurts to look." "Someone's gonna get pregnant out there," added Lisa.

Elisa or Sheryl wanted some group shots of the Stangers. She took the first few herself.

Then she called on the male half of the dancing couple (who were catching their breath) for assistance with a full group shot. He lined us up, asked if we were ready, and did away with the more typical "Say cheese!" in favor of a graphic and utterly complete crotch-grab. You can tell who saw from this next photo.
As the music shifted back to today's hip-hop, the adults in my family drifted out to "our" couch in the lobby. Most likely Elisa has said something obscene, provoking the reactions from my mom and her sisters. That's my dad on the end.

Temple Photo Shoot

Before the Bat Mitzvah was the obligatory photo shoot, lining up each family grouping with Alaina. I took photos on the sidelines.
Molly (17), Alexa (18) and Kim:

Lindsey (20) joined the 3 of them for a photo. After I got a nice picture, I said, "now make a gross face!" Alaina was the only one who heard me.
The formal photo shoot was a little stiff, and the photographer did little to lighten it up. So my mother took matters into her own hands.
Once you get my mom going with showing off her muscles, it's hard to stop her. Also, Kerri, this photo is for you to see her wearing her beautiful dress.
But eventually she cracked herself up. Love those knees.
Every time I looked at Alexa, her shoes were off.
I like these two.


Poppa and me.
Kim looking over the Bat Mitzvah manual one last time.

Alaina's Bat Mitzvah: Getting Ready

Alaina, Alexa, and I went to Sheer Bliss, where Kim used to work, to have our hair done for the Bat Mitzvah. Alaina went with a classic look for her hair, while Alexa and I had a chance to catch up. Alexa has become such an interesting person. I wish we lived closer so I knew her a bit better. Alaina after her appointment:
I went with a curly look and I loved how it turned out! The stylist lifted some of it up on top of my head with bobby pins to give it some height and it looked really cool (although it hurt when I lay down for bed later).
Meanwhile, back at the ranch that was the Durham Hilton, party set-up was in full swing. Kim's friend Marti was heading up the decorations committee, with help from Elisa, Casey, Sheryl and Molly.
Marti made the centerpieces, which were made of layered pink and green sand topped with flower arrangements she did herself. It was a good look.
Molly and I rocked our way through the hotel to her ipod (sharing headphones, of course), and set up for the candle-lighting ceremony.
A cupcake tower was part of the dessert extravaganza. Here the baker sets it up.
The finished product. The cupcakes were tasty, but the cake on top was AMAZING. We cut into it on Sunday evening--really chocolatey layer cake.
I made the a sign-in book for guests. I basically designed scrapbook pages without any pictures where guests could write messages to Alaina. I tried to incorperate her interests and favorite colors. It was a challenge for me, because I rarely scrapbook, but I am very happy with the outcome. I layed out the pages on tables to make them accessible.

Alaina really loved the book, which made me extremely happy and proud as well.

With everything in place, we were set to leave the hotel and proceed to the Temple for photos and the main event.