Yep, Still Here

Just haven't had much to write about lately. School is still going well, and I can't believe we are a little more than halfway done. The days are flying by lately, and I think it's because I have a good combination of work and fun in each day. I could definitely deal with this all year!

I know a lot of people around here have been complaining about the weather, but honestly, I've been loving it. It's been great for sleeping, and it hasn't been unbearable in school (we don't have a/c there). It has also allowed Stein and me to sit outside almost every single night. I love that.

We've been eating light meals, or making things that could carry over for a couple meals. I don't want too much to do in my afternoons, okay?! But two recipes have stood out in the past two weeks that were really good, and also used some of the seasonal produce we find all around us now.

Grilled Pizza
This recipe was the one we used, because we had a lot of the ingredients on hand. I bought a pizza dough from Trader Joe's (and the marinated artichokes), so the prep time was really short. It was really good. We thought that the next time we make it, we may put grilled chicken on top as well. There were other recipes on foodtv.com for grilled pizza, so this may be the summer of grilled pizza. Stay tuned!

Potato and Green Bean Salad
Last week I went to the farmer's market and was overwhelmed by the abundance of produce. Remember how I said that summer's farmer's market brings this overwhelming feeling for me? It hit me right in the face that day. Swarms of people stood in lines to grab blueberries, blackberries, tomatoes, and almost every other fruit or vegetable you could think of. But the green beans. Oh, the green beans. And the potatoes. Why did I think potatoes were a fall thing? Regardless, I came home with a sack full of produce and immediately thought, what the heck am I going to do with this? I found this recipe, which worked out perfectly. Stein and I are still trying to decide if we like it better refrigerated or at room temperature. Either way, it's a nice light potato salad that's really easy to prepare.

Happy summer eating to you!

Friends and Fritatta

A couple weeks ago, I had my good friends Regina and Andrea over for coffee. (Well, they drank coffee, and I drank water.) I decided since they were coming over at breakfast time to make some breakfast foods for us to nibble. I decided on a fritatta, since Regina tries to stay away from gluten. I found this recipe to use as a guide, and added some fresh asparagus to it. Since I had most of the ingredients on hand or in the garden, it worked out well. I made a blueberry and strawberry salad to go with it, and Andrea brought some fruit and some baked goodies.

Whenever the three of us are together, the time just flies. So much so, that we eventually look at our watches and realize that 3 or more hours have gone by. We have known each other for three years now. We met in one of the classes I was taking. Regina was our teacher, and Andrea was one of my peers. We have been in touch since then, and our friendships have grown.

This day, we talked and talked, and moved around the yard to avoid the sun, for 5 hours! By the time they left my house, the three of us were sitting in a row along the side of the garage in the only piece of shade in the yard. I guess we should've known how late it was by the amount of times we moved around the yard. But the only thing we were paying attention to was each other. Catching up, telling stories, offering advice. Just what good friends do. What a great morning/afternoon it was.

Finding My Way Back

I started teaching summer school on Monday. It has been great for the most part. Today, which is the last day of the week, was a little shaky, but I think we were all ready to be done for the week. I really can't complain at all, because I have eight students in my class. Oh, and guess what? I teach with my friend Mandi. In the same room. Yes, we have eight kids, and two teachers. Talk about a dream. Talk about an excellent ratio for the kids. Talk about perfect for summer.

In the midst of all of the math, reading, and writing, I am finding my way back to teaching. Although I had the long-term sub gig this year in the media center, to me it wasn't exactly teaching. To me that was more like being a supervisor.

In a regular classroom, you see the same kids everyday. You learn about their families, learn what they love to do when they're not in school, learn about the books they love to read. In return, they learn a lot about you. They learn what buttons they can push to get a reaction and they learn when they have crossed a line.

I didn't have this "learning" in the regular classroom. I saw all of the kids in the school, which meant that maybe I would see each of them twice in a week. I didn't really get a feel for who they were as individuals, and they didn't get a feel for who I was, either. The director of the summer program put it well when he said, "You're a relationship person. You value the relationship with your students which motivates them to learn." I couldn't have said it better.

I'm so glad that I've found my way back this week. It feels right, and it's right where I should be.

How Much is Enough?

You ever notice when you hear about something or read about it, it seems like every other article or news story you encounter is about the same thing?

I've been experiencing that lately with living simple. Or reducing abundance. Or reducing, recycling, reusing. You get the point. I know that this is the result of the economy, everyone is cutting back, taking stock, and looking around to see what's really necessary. I know in our house there are a lot of things that we could get rid of. Things that haven't been touched in years. Things like, why do we need 2 more plastic ice trays sitting in the basement when we already have four of them in rotation in the freezer?

I told you about my friend Lisa (of Lather, Rinse, and Repeat) who turned me on to the excess toys article? Well, lately she took it a step further. She locked up all of her kids' toys in a closet, except for a few favorite stuffed animals and art supplies. She did break down one day and take out the Lincoln Logs, but that's it. And you know what? The kids are fine. Doing art projects and going to the pool have become much more fun than the 500 pieces of plastic strewn across the floor.

So where am I going with this random post? Oh yeah, the picture. In that picture you will recognize the plastic tabs that come on bread products. I think any sane person would probably throw them out when the bread was done. But we (I) save them. Without the risk of being like my Great Aunt Ann, a product of the depression, who had a shoebox full of them when she died, we actually use them. Instead of putting things like frozen peas into another plastic bag, we just cinch the top of the current bag with a plastic tab. Or my oatmeal that comes in a plastic pouch can just be cinched as well instead of being put into another plastic container.

So have we hearkened back to the "olden days"? Has our society seen so much excess that now it is time to pull back the reins a bit? It obviously coincides with the economy, unemployment, etc. I don't know if all the articles and posts about conserving are encouraging me to do things like this. But it just feels good doing it. I know I am not saying anything new here, but: If something can be reduced, reused, or recycled, then why not? It just seems frivolous not to.

It's Summer

The other day I really had to concentrate hard to think about what day of the week it was. I had to back track through all of the days and activities to figure out if we were at Tuesday, or Wednesday, or possibly Thursday.

Summer is here.

Yes, I realize what a luxury it is to have part of my summer off. I am grateful for this time and have been enjoying it to the fullest. We went to two baseball games in two days this week. I have been sipping lemonade with meals or alone. We had to turn on the A/C for the first time this season when the heat and humidity were unbearable. I made pesto.

Ah, pesto. Something so easy and fresh, makes my mouth happy. I love that in less than a half hour, I can have fresh, straight form the garden pesto. I even forgot the garlic at one point in the process and took a taste. Even then, without one of the most important ingredients, it tasted good. I think I may have even said, "Mmmm" out loud to myself, I don't know. I added the garlic, took a taste and just nodded my head. Yes.

When Stein called later that day, we had our usual end of the conversation question. "What do you want for dinner tonight?" I already had the answer. Pasta with pesto. I was going to add some more ingredients, but I didn't know what at that point. Roasted red peppers? Artichokes? Tomatoes? Mushrooms? After consulting with Rich on some flavors, I decided to keep it simple: pasta with pesto and tomatoes. A caprese salad of sorts with pasta.

I found myself on the other side of town later that day, so I popped into Zingerman's for a loaf of bread. Their bread of the month - Rustic Italian, caught my eye. That will be perfect with the pasta, I thought. And it was.

When Stein came home from work, I ripped off a hunk of that bread and slopped up some of the pesto. I brought it to him. One look at the bright green paste and he knew what it was. He popped it into his mouth and smiled.

Yes, it's summer.

If You Give a Mouse a Paintbrush

You may be familiar with the If You Give a Mouse book series, where the mouse is given something in the beginning, like a cookie, and then he needs a glass of milk, followed by a napkin to wipe the milk. You get the idea.

This weekend, we felt like the mice. Our kitchen ceiling had a leak at one point which we ignored for a while. A couple months ago, we decided to get the origin of the leak fixed and then have the kitchen ceiling patched as well. To save money we decided to paint the ceiling ourselves. Yet as we looked around the kitchen, we realized that there was some other painting that could be done as well.

When we moved into our house, we painted everything except the woodwork and trim. Those two things were still in decent condition, and we saved some time and money by ignoring them. Even when we were painting the kitchen cabinets white, we didn't care that the whites of the trim and ceiling didn't match the white of the cabinets.

Now they all match.

So, what started as a ceiling-painting project led into a kitchen painting (sans the walls) project. The cabinet doors were removed and repainted. The trim was given a new coat of paint, and the ceiling was done. It feels good to have it all done, but I really hate painting. I said to Stein when we were about a half hour into it, "I don't know how my grandpa did this for a living. I really don't like this." But eventually it got done.

Now if only some magical mice would show up (like those in Cinderella) and give us a new kitchen floor...

Possibilities

I'm sure that I have a post similar to this written last summer, or the summer before that. I don't know, I'm too lazy to check. But here we are in the beginnings of summer, and I'm feeling it once again.

The possibilities.

My time is unstructured and unscheduled. I can do whatever I want, wherever I want, without thinking about time. After being in the very structured and scheduled environment of school for nine months, this almost feels foreign to me.

But then I remember summers when I was younger, when this yearly occurrence wasn't so foreign. I became an expert of sorts at it, having an unstructured routine, if that was possible. I think back to those days, when my mom would go play tennis promptly at 9:00 every morning. Some days I would go to the park with her and play at the playground across the way, or play in the dirt just outside the fenced-in courts.

Other days I would choose to stay home, and be with my siblings. We were left to our own vices then, which consisted of any breakfast food topped with ice cream, and TV. My mom created the ice cream thing, I have to say. She came up with the ingenious idea of putting ice cream in-between 2 frozen waffles for a dessert after dinner. We just took it a step further by eating the breakfast foods (frozen waffles, leftover pancakes) for breakfast, but still incorporating the ice cream. Just call it invention. After all, it is the father of necessity, right? We needed to eat.

Oh, and the TV. It is amazing to me that I don't remember much fighting surrounding what we were going to watch. At least during the summer. We were all fans of sitcoms, so inevitably it would be something like The Jeffersons followed by Alice. One summer I distinctly remember being enthralled by the show, Please Don't Eat the Daisies. We all wanted to live in a huge house like theirs, along with their set of twins, Trevor and Tracy. We would top off our TV watching with a few game shows, if we had time.

We weren't couch potatoes all day. We would always get outside, find the neighborhood kids, and get into some trouble somewhere. I say trouble, but it was usually harmless. Breaking windows with hard-hit baseballs, cutting through neighbor's yards to get to our friends house. Again, the possibilities were endless. We didn't know what we were going to do each day, other than eat breakfast, lunch (maybe), and dinner. Freedom at its finest.

So for the next two weeks (I start summer school in 2 weeks) I'm going to embrace that eight-year-old girl and that feeling of having endless possibilities.

If only we had some waffles. And some ice cream.