Isn't It Ironic. . .

Today I bought a pair of scissors at Ikea. I thought it was rather ironic that, when I went to use them this evening, the only thing capable of cutting the plastic zip-tie was another pair of scissors! Wouldn't you think that the scissor-makers would know that reason you're buying scissors in the first place is because you don't have any!?

Christmas Giveaway

Check out our other blog for a little Christmas Giveaway.

Yummy Pie Recipe

We went over to a friend's house for dessert and she introduced me to this delicious recipe. She found it here on Oprah.com

Oats 'n Honey Granola Pie

Created by Suzanne Conrad

INGREDIENTS

Crust

1 Pillsbury® refrigerated pie crust (from 15-oz box), softened as directed on box

Filling

	1/2 cup butter or margarine
	1/2 cup packed brown sugar
	3/4 cup corn syrup
	1/8 teaspoon salt
	1 teaspoon vanilla
	3 eggs, lightly beaten
	4 Nature Valley® Oats 'n Honey crunchy granola bars (2 pouches) crushed. To easily crush granola bars, do not unwrap. Use rolling pin to crush bars.
	1/2 cup chopped walnuts
	1/4 cup quick-cooking or old-fashioned oats
	1/4 cup chocolate chips
	Whipped cream or ice cream, if desired

Heat oven to 350°F.

Place piecrust in 9-inch glass pie pan as directed on box for One-Crust Filled Pie.

In large microwavable bowl, microwave butter on high 50 to 60 seconds or until melted.

Stir in brown sugar and corn syrup until blended. Beat in salt, vanilla and eggs.

Stir crushed granola bars, walnuts, oats and chocolate chips into brown sugar mixture. Pour into crust-lined pan.

Bake 40 to 50 minutes or until filling is set and crust is golden brown. During last 15 to 20 minutes of baking, cover crust edge with strips of foil or pie shield to prevent excessive browning.

Cool at least 30 minutes before serving. Serve warm, at room temperature, or chilled with whipped cream or ice cream.

Store in refrigerator.

Dinner Party Debt

I found this hilarious article on rd.com while looking for reading material to give my ESL students. I hope you enjoy it! If you would like to view the article at it's original location, click here.

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Dinner Party Debt
by Mary Roach

Our friend Dave loves to cook. Dave will call us up and say, "Hey, come on over. I got a leg of lamb," as though it had just sort of landed in his lap like a fly ball. Dave talks very fast, which he needs to do to answer the question "What're you making?" in a reasonable amount of time. The last time we went to Dave's -- for a 50th birthday dinner for our friend Sandy -- the answer was, and I'm not even slightly kidding here, "Gonna start with oysters with lemongrass and a blood orange granité, then a fish plate with halibut and preserved lemon, a little cauliflower soup, pasta with anchovy sauce. Meat course, I'm thinking bavette steak with white beans and fennel. Ed eats beef, right? If not, I'll whip him up some Thai snapper."

We happen to have a Thai cookbook, which we use constantly (for propping up the Tex-Mex cookbook), and it has a recipe for snapper. So I happen to know this isn't something you "whip up." It is something that whips you. The shopping alone would require a month's sabbatical. The recipe called for, among 278 other ingredients, "1 tablespoon coarsely chopped kha." As I know from our Scrabble dictionary, ka is what the ancient Egyptians called the soul. Who sells this? What sort of knife does one use to chop life energy?

Generosity like Dave's is difficult to reciprocate. I once tried to cook for Dave and Kate. It was humiliating. I made angel hair pasta with toasted walnuts and some variety of cheese that had not showered in a while. When I tried to mix everything together, the angel hair pasta simply moved around the bowl in a solid lumpen knot. "You forgot the conditioner," said Ed, who has since quietly absorbed the cooking duties on the rare evenings when we're not eating at Dave's.

I have tried to convince myself it's okay that Ed and I have not properly reciprocated by preparing 22 six-course dinners for Dave and Kate. "He understands that we're not up to it," I said to Ed. "Besides, he's not keeping score."

"Everyone keeps score," said Ed. "How many times have we had Lou over without his inviting us?" Lou is one of a small group of bachelors whom we sometimes invite over for a meal at the last minute. It is never intimidating to cook for these men, as your culinary talents need only surpass those of Mr. Top and his ramen.

But Ed was right. I knew exactly how many times Lou had been over.

Last week I e-mailed Dave to tell him I'm writing a column about dinner party debt. Dave was leaving on a business trip that afternoon. "Have a good trip," I wrote. "When you get back, you'll be eating at our house for the next year and a half." I had anticipated some reassuring reply, something along the lines of: "Oh, Mary, I cook for you guys because I love to cook, and I love you. In fact, what are you doing next Saturday? I got a school of tuna."

However, Dave wrote: "Gotta run. Look forward to collecting."

It's true. Everyone keeps track. We owe Dave, we owe Steph and Jerry, we owe Bill and Adair big time. We actually sat down and made a list. It was shocking. What should we do? said Ed. Can we offer them the cash equivalency? How can we ever erase such an enormous pile of debt? Is it possible to declare dinner party bankruptcy? There should be a system in place that allows us to collect credits for feeding Lou, credits that we can then apply to Dave and Bill and Steph.

If I could, I would sell Dave my soul to repay his kindness and generosity. And I know for sure that he's got the right knife to chop it up.

Experiment

Ever since taking Child Psychology in college, I have been itching to conduct an experiment that I will call "The Color Confusion Experiment."

Here is the basic idea--from the time a child is born, he/she would be told that the color blue is called "red", green is "purple", red is "black", etc. The person conducting the experiment would have to be very careful to doctor-up all the evidence to the contrary (so books naming colors would need revision, crayons would have to be de-papered, etc.) Other than switching up the names of the colors, everything else about the child's life would be "normal" (if there is such a thing).

What I would be curious to find out is how such a scheme would effect the child's long-term development. Would he have a deep-seated mistrust of authority figures? Would he end up with some serious psychological disorder? Would he assume that his eyes were color-deficient and blame himself? Or, would it create in him a heightened sense of humor, making him a world-class prankster? Or, would it not really effect him at all?

Well, my opportunity has come, but being the kind, loving, and fairly normal mother that I am, I am not going to subject my son to my hair-brained idea. Instead, I'm posting it up here in case one of you wants to conduct the experiment on your kid. If you do decide to undertake this scientific endeavor, please get back to me in 20 years and tell me how your kid turned out. =)

Please pray.

Some dear family friends are currently going through a very difficult time. Eric, father of six children (two of whom were recently adopted from Africa), is in the hospital in a forced coma due to severe respiratory problems. If you would like to read more, please check out their blog. Even if you don't have time to read the whole story, please do keep them in your prayers.

Chantilly

Every single time (and I do mean, every single time!) I take the bus home, I find myself singing "Chantilly Lace" as I am walking up the hill back to our apartment. For the longest time I couldn't figure out why? Why would my brain chose that particular song and not a better, less obnoxious song to serenade itself with? Why?

A few weeks ago, I figured out what was causing this strange brain glitch.

This sign is outside the condominium complex just next to the bus stop. Turns out, I had been subconsciously reading this sign all this time, thus my sudden urge to sing that song.

The problem isn't solved, but at least the mystery is.

A blatant plug

I'm not even going to bother being subtle about this. . . this is an advertisement.

My long-time friend (we went to high school and college together) Sarah Stranske, sent me a surprise care-package about two weeks ago. Alongside the fresh corn tortillas, flour tortillas and Mexican spice mixes (all of which were a sight for sore eyes! I'll post pictures of the resulting meals on our other blog), she enclosed a book entitled A Stranger With You. What's so noteworthy about that, you ask. Well, Sarah wrote it! Yep, a full-blown, 350-page, legitimately published novel. And, not just any novel, a good one.

I am in awe that someone I know is a published author. It is so cool to go to Amazon.com and type in my friend's name. After reading her novel, I momentarily felt inspired to write a book, too! Then I realized that I don't have any idea what I'd write about, and even if I did, I wouldn't have time to write about whatever it is I would write about (As the more observant of you have already noted, my blogging, commenting, and even emailing have greatly declined in the last few months). So instead of writing a book, I decided to write a blog post. That will have to suffice for now.

Whether or not you know Sarah (but especially if you do), I would recommend you check this book out. Of course, I'm hoping my friend makes a decent profit off the sales of her book, but more than that, I think the novel is worth reading.

I'll make it easy for you. . . here is the link to Amazon =)

Rule breaking and a thank-you.

For the second time this week, Caleb and I made the laborious 2-mile trek to the grocery store. I try my best to buy everything I need during my weekly trip, but this week, we ran out of a few essential items mid-week, and I was forced to make a second trip. By the time we arrived at the shopping center, I was hot, sweaty and sapped of energy. It's bad enough to feel that way myself, but when I looked down into the stroller and saw little beads of sweat on Caleb's face, my heart melted. We were in dire need of a pick-me-up and I was desperate. In the heat of the moment (literally the HEAT of the moment), I decided that the fastest plan of action was to head for the nearest restaurant and order a cool treat. (This is where the rule-breaking comes in. . . ) So, before I could think twice, I pushed the stroller through the entrance of McDonalds and heard myself ordering an Oreo McFlurry.

I always swore I would never willingly feed my kid McDonalads (have you seen Super Size Me?). It was rule number 2 on my list of "Things Good Moms Never Do." But there I was, hunched down next to the stroller offering spoonful after spoonful of flurry fluff to my 13-month-old kid. Only 13 months, and I'm already resorting to McDonalds. . .

"What kind of mother am I!?" I thought. "With every spoonful, I am dooming my son to a nutrient-deficient future. My son will never like broccoli or spinach or cauliflower. I can see it in his huge grin and oreo-studded teeth. And, if he's ruined, what hope can I possibly have for any future kids God may give us!"

As I berated myself for ruining my son's appetite for all things green and nutritious, I heard my brother's voice ringing in my ear, quoting one of his favorite verses, "Be not righteous over much; neither make thyself over wise" (Ecc 7:16 KJV) (If any of you know my brother, you know he is always quoting obscure verses from the King James version. . . usually with a King James-ish accent, to boot).

Be not overly wise. . . be not overly wise. That's just what I was being. . . or trying to be. Suddenly I realized that there are some rules in life that are worth breaking every now and then. . . and eating at McDonalds was one of them.

So, even though he's half-way across the world, I'm sending out a little thank-you to my brother. Thanks, Dan, for the reminder that it is possible to be overly righteous and overly wise. (If Caleb could type, I'm sure he'd send his thanks, too!)

p.s.-Just for the record, I'm going to make Caleb eat green peas for dinner! =)

The True Test of Motherhood

You know you are officially a mom when you can sit in a Thai taxi holding your sick 1-year-old who just vomited all over you and 1) you don't gag and 2) the only thing you care about is whether or not your child is okay.

God really does give us the grace we need to handle the situations He sends our way!

(for more info about the story behind this, check out our other blog)