Holding Steady

The Wonder Twins had their 3 month check-up yesterday.  Prof. Gantok is weighing in a 9 1/2lbs and the Great Gazoo is about 8 1/2lbs, so they're you know, approaching 1 month old sized!  They killed it on their 1 month old assessment but I suspect that when I bring them back for their 4 month assessment, they will flunk.  The results of Prof. Gantok's ultrasound yesterday revealed that the new cyst was gone (or couldn't be detected) and the one that's been there from the get-go is showing no change in size.  So that's good.  We just have to continue to keep an eye on it.

I made this little graphic below to show how the Wonder Twins both look like their big bro, but in different ways:

It's like the Big Yam is a combination of his two little brothers 

- this pic is basically a punnett square (remember those? Grade 11 bio, say what!).  Also: I've got to stop taking pics with Prof. Gantok in the foreground, because he always looks WAY WAY WAY bigger than the Great Gazoo.

Now that the update is out of the way, can I talk about how much I hate Mackelmore (and by extension, Ryan Lewis)?  STOP LECTURING ME, MACKELMORE!  Gawd.  I hate, hate, hate him.  I am so not into some white dude from Seattle "saving" hip hop and civilizing it with his preachy, terrible music.  The Dotytron and I were talking about it - a white guy from Seattle who hasn't been a part of the "scene" in any meaningful way is not going to effectively address homophobia in a subculture.  Mackelmore might as well be Melissa Etheridge, for the effect he's going to have on those issues at large.  I know it doesn't have to be said: but I'm obviously not homophobic.  I just hate maudlin, heavy-handedness like that Mackelmore (and Ryan Lewis) song, "Same Love."  I also find the video really cheesy.  By the way, Ryan Lewis is like the "based on the novel Push by Sapphire" of the music world.  Anyway, my point is, changing notions of masculinity are going to have to come from people who are within the culture - like when the Game had that butterfly tattoo on his cheek.  

In other news of people I hate: Terry Richardson.  I know, I know, it's low hanging fruit, but still - that guy is THE WORST.  He directed that new Miley Cyrus video, for "Wreaking Ball" and it's so Terry Richardson that it makes me barf in my mouth a bit.  That being said, can anyone tell the difference between Terry Richardson and Dov Charney of American Apparel?  Not I.

Well, I ended up d**king around on the internet so much I ran out of time to gift you with additional pop culture reviews/musings.  I will say that I think Ai Wei Wei comes across like a bit of breakcore kid in that fawning documentary, Ai Wei Wei: Never Sorry, but I will unpack that further when I have the capacity to be a bit more on point.

Fin.

No, I won't.

Newest Big Yam phrase: "Will you pay me the dollars, please?" - said at random moments (e.g. last night during the tail end of dinner or during play).  I find it so funny when I'm elsewhere in the house and I can hear the Dotytron say, "No! I will not pay you the dollars!!!"  I don't really know where he got it from, but it's pretty funny, and at least he asks nicely.

The whole asking nicely thing is a bit of an issue right now.  We've stressed the asking nicely (repeating the request sans whining, saying please and thank you) thing a lot, but now he thinks that when we say no, it's because he didn't ask nicely enough.  So he'll say stuff like, "I want to ask nicely now!" and get all sad and cryface about it.  Now we have to explain that even though we really appreciate that he asked nicely, sometimes, he still doesn't get the thing he wanted.  It's a bitter pill for him to swallow.

This Tumblr called Reasons My Son is Crying (which has gone viral, justifiably) encapsulates some of the madness that is parenting.

Another Big Yam thing: for the last month or so, he'll randomly want us all to hold hands in a circle, and then pump our arms up and down while we say, "Gracias, thank you, gracias, thank you" again and again.  On Sunday morning, I was thanking him and his Baba for making a delicious waffles and sausage breakfast and I got all "teachable moment" and was like, "We should also thank the farmers who harvested the grain, and the pigs who gave us their meat for sausage, and the non-unionized slaughterhouse workers for processing the pork into sausage..." and the Big Yam looked at me for one long, grave moment and then stretched out his hands to me and the Dotytron for a round of "Gracias, thank you."  It was so funny!  It might be our new family way of saying grace.

I've been dealing with mad twerps-related dramas lately.  Basically, I was supposed to have been referred to the multiples clinic at Sunnybrook at about the 20 week mark so they could monitor me.  Then, assuming everything was fine, they would release me back to the shared care of my midwife and OB once I reached the 32 week mark.  Through a series of giant clusters, mostly related to the OBs at Sunnybrook balking that a midwife is in any way involved in my care, I still haven't been to see them yet.

When I last saw my regular OB, she was all like, "So have you been to Sunnybrook yet?" and I'm like, "Uhhh, noooooo...I thought your office was handling this," and she's all like, "You NEED to see the multiples clinic, [insert comment about how the twerps are as high risk as they come]"  Here's the thing: getting in at Sunnybrook is COMPLETELY out of my control!  At first, my midwife sent in the referral, which got rejected.  Then my OB sent in the referral, and it also got rejected (because they didn't like her sharing care with the midwife).  There's weird midwifery politics going on.

There are a few factors at work here.  1) Say I went into labour tomorrow *knocks wood a billion times*, I would just have the Dotytron take me to Sunnybrook immediately, so that's a moot point.  2) Assuming I go to term and everything is all as normal as possible with the twerps, as soon as I step foot into my regular hospital, it's a transfer of care to the OB anyway.  My midwife is just around to like, catch the baby (if the OB gives the go ahead) and provide labour support and then help me with the post-natal care (home visits and the like), so that's a moot point.  OBs don't do labour support OR post-natal care.  My type of twins means that I HAVE to be under the clinical care of an OB during delivery.  I mean, I can do what I want technically.  Like, if I wanted to be all guerilla crazy-cray about things and do a homebirth, I could do that, solo, but there's no way my midwife would touch that legal firestorm-waiting-to-happen with a 10 foot pole.

Anyway, while I've been waiting in limbo, I've decided to do what I can do, which is research the f**k out of my type of twin pregnancy.  I went on PubMed and downloaded a million articles on ultrasounds and twin pregnancies and I've been reading about twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome.  It's pretty grim, guys.  Level 5 TTTS is death (I know I'm no doctor or anything, but I feel like if level 5 is fetal death, then you don't really need a level 5, do you?  Shouldn't it only go up to 4?)  Levels 3 and 4 are pretty grim, with a high rate of fetal death of one of the twins and neurological and cardiac defects in the surviving twin.  Level 1 is okay, and just requires a tonne of monitoring.  There are two kinds of TTTS, chronic, and acute.  Chronic can pop up at any time and either hold steady or progress.  Acute happens like, all of a sudden (during labour or whatever).  Statistics on TTTS occurrence for monochorionic diamniotic pregnancies (which is what I have) range anywhere from 10-15% up to 20-30%.  Again, there's nothing I can do about it.  It either happens or it doesn't.

The only way to stay on top of it is through ultrasound monitoring followed by some kind of doppler if level 1 presents itself.  Suffice to say: all this reading made me feel like a s**t person and a s**t parent.  Like, way to NOT KNOW ANYTHING, LAGERFELD.  Here I've been more concerned about my Land of Nod order coming in on time and getting the Big Yam's room set up and there's a risk of brain damage and heart problems?  I'M THE WORST.  More importantly, the lack of information has meant that I haven't been able to adequately advocate for myself during this whole process of trying to get to Sunnybrook.  I should be getting ultrasounds every 2 weeks if level 1 TTTS presents itself, otherwise, I should be managed conservatively.  My last ultrasound was at 20 weeks.  I'm getting one this week, which is week 25.  I've consoled myself that I've only technically missed one ultrasound, then.  Also, my last ultrasound was perfectly normal ("grossly normal," even).  So there wasn't a risk of TTTS at the last one.

The latest update is that based on my ultrasound this week, we'll decide what to do from there.  My OB apparently tried to refer me AGAIN to the multiples clinic this week (Sunnybrook rejected me again).  Basically my OB is at the point where she's like, "Uhhh, do we even have to bother with the multiples clinic?"
Stage 1 TTTS is determined through the presence of oligo-polyhydramnios (where the amniotic fluid index in one sac is 5cm or less [donor twin] and greater than 24cm in the other sac [recipient twin]).  If this ultrasound shows that I'm developing stage 1 or am at stage 1, then I think I'll end up at Sunnybrook.    BLARGH.  So much to think about.  If this ultrasound comes back normal, then I'll get ultrasounds every 3 weeks to monitor for the development of TTTS, until such time as I hit twins term, which is around 32 weeks (and I'll probably be getting weekly ultrasounds at that point, to watch for intrauterine growth restriction).

The OTHER complicating factor is that there's a chance that my twins aren't identical at all.  The easiest way to determine chorionicity of twins is with an ultrasound before 8 weeks.  I had my first ultrasound at 12 weeks, when it is possible that two eggs implanted and their placentas just fused together, giving the appearance of one.  There's also this thing called the twin peak sign, which indicates dichorionicity, but that also has to be picked up at a certain time.  Otherwise, we wait to until the twerps come out and inspect the placenta, or, if we REALLY cared about whether they were identical or fraternal, we could send away for genetic testing, at a cost.  Frankly, I don't care.  I just want healthy me, healthy twerps.  The thing is though, all this fretting about the potential for TTTS could all be for naught (fraternal twins can't develop TTTS).

Well, all this reading has served to simultaneously make me more freaked out AND feel better because I am now armed with knowledge and a vocabulary.  Despite what a mess this all is, I am feeling better knowing that I know more.

Tuesday night we had patty melts for dinner.  Ummmm...patty melts are LIFE.  It's basically a hamburger/grilled cheese mash-up.  The most traditional form of a patty melt is a hamburger, with caramelized onions, rye bread, and Swiss cheese.  Our rendition was a 6oz all ground-beef patty (that the Dotytron cooked PERFECTLY - look at how rosy and juicy it is inside!) that we pan-fried in butter, between slices of challah (also buttered and griddled) and aged cheddar cheese.  We instantly regretted not making 2lbs of ground beef's worth.  It is everything you want it to be - gooey, juicy, crispy, buttery.

Broiled kalbi with jap chae (with spinach, mushrooms, and carrot) on Wednesday.

Last night's dinner was spinach & artichoke melts (basically, a souped-up spinach artichoke dip sandwiched between thick-cut bread and grilled), with more dilled cucumber salad.  

I've also been working hard on this orange poppyseed cake I made with Cara Cara oranges which are THE BEST ORANGES IN THE FREE WORLD.  They're like a super-sweet cross between blood oranges and pedestrian navels.  Check it.

Fin.

FAIL

I didn't get the job.  Found out yesterday early afternoon.  I was pretty gutted about it and had myself a pretty unprofesh subdued, trying-not-to-but-not-very-successful cry at my desk and then a bit of a pity-party lunchtime walk with Dr. Rei.  By the time I got home, I was feeling more myself.  I don't know that it would have been a complete perfect fit.  Plus, it was an internal candidate, so my chances were slim anyway.  If anything, I'm feeling chuffed that out of 350+ candidates, I was obviously good enough to give the internal a run for their money and make the decision-making that much harder for the people hiring.

It's demoralizing because I'm all like, uhhh...do you KNOW me?  I have Red Bull running in my veins!  I've done two graduate degrees (both while working full time, one while on maternity leave!)!  You could basically hire me for a job where I have NONE of the qualifications and I would kick about 50 different kinds of a** because I'm an exceptional person.  I think that for the sector I work in, I've got too much zing.  I think people are looking for someone with less ideas and enthusiasm and someone more meek, and if that's what they want, then I can't give that to them. Plus, I love love love my current job and I find it fulfilling and it affords me a pretty exceptional work-life balance, so at the end of the day, I didn't lose.

I'm a lucky button, still.

I came home to this from the Dotytron, who went and got me treatsies from a new, local French bakery, Bonne Journée, as a pick-me-up:

See?  I'm a lucky button with a lovely boo.

Then, the Roomie and sweet baby T came over so I got to look at this little mug while I ate my dinner:

See?  I'm a lucky button with amazing friends and adorable babies in my life.

So we had a nice long visit and I got to squish T and listen to her funny little hooting laugh and gossiped with the Roomie and planned our New Year's Eve plans and then I busted out my glue gun to finish my new and improved yarn-wrapped wreath, because my long-awaited new shipment of vintage Shiny Brite ornaments arrived yesterday:

See? Could the successful candidate do THIS?!  I don't bloody well think so!

Also, we had a splendid, rib-sticking dinner of slow cooker chili with avocado, sour cream, cheese, and cornbread on the side.

This all goes to show that when life gives you lemons, you pick up your hot glue gun and take comfort in the fact that you lead a full, fulfilling, and joy-filled life filled with good food, good friends, good family, good crafting, and love and no amount of failed job interviews can take that away from you.

That wreath was the easiest by the way (so technically, I guess the successful candidate could do it, BUT DIDN'T), and it looks classy as all f**k.  I have an allergic reaction to decorations made with cheap, plasticky dollar store ball ornaments.  They just never look...Etsy enough, for lack of a better word.  Anyway, this is a simple matter of finding ornaments and a color of yarn that produce a nice color combination - I liked the modern feel of a the tweedy brown-grey with the antiqued, faded metallic undertones of the ornaments.  First, I wrapped a foam wreath form with the yarn.  Then I took my hot glue gun out for its' maiden voyage and put a dab of glue along the edge of the ornaments so that the tops were secure and they wouldn't pop off and shatter.  Then I strung them on a 12" piece of thin, flexible, low gauge wire and alternated sizes and colors until they formed a pleasing cluster.  I twisted the wire a few times to make sure the cluster would stay put and then tied the wire around the wreath and twisted it around the back to secure it and hide the sharp edges.  Then I hung it - ta-da!

I still have the red yarn-wrapped wreath form from two years ago and I might do something similar and then give it away (I'm running out of doors to place wreaths - I put my classic, felted, "Holla!" wreath on our inner door).  

And then, to complete my full descent into young, urban, crafter cliché, I've decided that all presents this year will be wrapped in brown kraft paper and classic red baker's twine.  BECAUSE OF COURSE THEY WOULD BE.  I'M A WALKING ETSY BILLBOARD.  

Tonight we had freezer curried squash soup &amp gruyere and ham paninis for dinner and listened to holiday music (Advent Activity #5).  Even though the Big Yam's preference is to listen to his Chinese School CD, which he loves more than anything.  I guess I shouldn't complain - he's picked up two of the songs and a bunch of the vocabulary, which is reinforcing my belief that early second language introduction is both feasible and practical.

Pretty terrible picture of the Boobla (who looks 10?!) going to town on his 4th bowl of squash soup.  But I love how our tree photographs against our purple wall.

Fin.

She who shall not be named...

AHHHHHHHHHHH!!!  The roomie had her baby!  A girl!  At home (lucky!)  The baby was born on Monday morning.  The roomie is pretty particular about things so she's put a moratorium on visitors...it's probably for the best because I'm starting to get a bit baby-crazy and I'm starting to develop a reputation as a giant baby hog.  Whenever I can get my hands on our neighbour's baby, the Zen Potato, I do and I don't give her up if I don't have to.


Anyway, from L'Armi's announcements on FB, it *seems* like the baby might not have a name yet...which I find weird [edit: textual communication with the roomie confirms the baby has not been named].  The roomie and L'Armi were having a hard time with names from the get-go.  I was talking about with the Dotytron last night and my position is that it's weird when people don't name their baby for days after the baby is born.  I feel like it's a sorting hat type scenario.  Even if you were on the fence about names, it should come to you in the moments (I'll give you a few hours) immediately following the birth.  You should have a sense of the overwhelming rightness of it all.  As I said to the Dotytron last night, if the name doesn't come to you, then you might end up with a Slytherin.


Are you guys tired of hearing about how much I love my street?  We went outside after dinner and EVERYONE was out and freezies were being dispensed and the kids were running amok and then we saw our neighbour striding out with this duct-tape-and-box contraption that he had stuck a home made pinhole camera attached to it that he had rigged up to watch the transit of Venus or whatever it was called.  So we all clustered around and tried to see and it was so cute - kids out in their pajamas after bedtime, everyone running around with sticky hands, the neighbours talking and chatting. It was so cute.  A bunch of the neighbours are all going camping together in late August, too.  We'd totally would have gone, but we're going to be at our friends, B & G's wedding.  I'm sad to miss the camping fun but so pumped to go to the wedding!  I think we're going to get the Dotytron a new suit for the occasion, which he can use for Lolly's wedding in the fall.  The Dotytron gets to go on this canoe/camping trip with B and his high school crew as B's "shower" type thing.

Last night's dinner was solid.  A shrimp po'boy with remoulade sided with slaw, on a super-soft Strickland's butchers bun.  ARGHHHHH.  I would happily eat cornmeal & flour coated fried seafood iterations piled on a bun with remoulade for weeks on end.  It's so good!!!

Tonight's dinner was homemade cheeseburger casserole.  Like Hamburger Helper but homemade.  I would also happily eat sautéed ground beef with onions and garlic on starch (one of my favorite Chinese dishes that I never get to have is "minced beef on rice" which is basically the above served on steamed rice - it's DELICIOUS).  I've posted the recipe below.  You basically sauté up your ground beef with onions and garlic and then add seasonings, broth, ketchup, and cook the macaroni in the mixture and stir in grated cheddar cheese at the end.  It was so, so, good.  I served it with a cucumber, celery, and red pepper salad with a cumin mint dressing.  No surprise: big hit with our little Tamil Tiger, who basically likes to eat either the most cracker-jack mangia cake food, OR the spiciest string hoppers this side of Ceylon.  He kept going, "mmm, mmm, mmm! yum!" all of his own accord. It was pretty high praise.


I'm home alone tonight - the Dotytron's music night.  I'm hoping the power doesn't go out as I have a long night of curling up with my books ahead of me.  I'm currently alternating between Kristin Cashore's latest, Bitterblue (YA fantasy type stuff), and Joe Sacco's Footnotes in Gaza (a crash course in Israeli-Palestinian history).


Fin.


-----------------------------------------------------------------


Cheeseburger Casserole
serves 4-6, generously


2lbs ground beef
1 large onion, chopped
6 garlic cloves, chopped 
2 T. dijon mustard
1 1/2 c. ketchup (I told you it was kind of trashy!)
4 c. beef broth (approximately, you might have to add more)
1 500g. box of elbow macaroni
2 c. of grated cheddar cheese
salt and pepper to taste


- sauté up the onions and garlic in some olive oil in a large, wide, shallowish pan (I use this Jamie Oliver chicken fryer pan, that's about I dunno...14" across and 3" deep?) 
- add the ground beef and cook until browned over medium-high heat
- stir together the mustard, ketchup and broth, pour into the pan
- stir in the macaroni, bring to a boil, and then cover and lower the heat, stirring occasionally until the macaroni is cooked through.  You might have to add some water if the macaroni absorbs all the liquid before it's cooked.
- when the macaroni is cooked through, turn the heat off, and stir in the cheddar cheese.
- season to taste with salt and pepper (it shouldn't need much in the way of salt with the cheddar and ketchup).
- serve and be ready for mad kid accolades.

I didn't forget about Dre.

I swear! I've been taking an extended hiatus to work reeeeaaaalllllyyy hard on finishing my LAST PAPER OF FIRST YEAR MPPAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's done done done! It's in in in! WAHOOOOOOOOOOO!!! I'm freeeeeeeeee! Free to spend the summer with my boys and chilling out maxing relaxing all cool. Free to spend my afternoons swimming, visiting with friends, crafting, thinking about cottage fun times, cookings, farmer's marketing, bike adventuring with the Dotytron. FREE.

So my extended absence from chinotto hating land was well warranted, methinks. This does leave me with a big hodgepodge to tell you about and a recap of last weekend on the cusp of this weekend...but so what? The last weekend was delicious. We had a park picnic with kdubsguelph crew at Riverside Park in Guelph:

We played ladderball (BEST. GAME. EVER.) and the girls changed the Big Yam's diaper while I was playing catch and he was apparently quite traumatized by it - to the point of trying to crawl away from them with his bare butt in the air while they all laughed. LOL! Then we came home and were obviously pooped from a day spent outside. Sunday we had a bbq at Xtina & Buns' home to see baby H.

As Tillers puts it, leaning babies up against each other is never not funny. Look at these three hooligans! You've got H looking like a dad in his dad jeans, Big Yam looking like he's having the time of his life, and sweet mullet V looking like she's ready to cut someone:

We came home on Sunday and I was working on the computer when I saw someone coming up the shared driveway and rummaging in our neighbour's recycling bins. I wasn't sure what was going on so I watched for a bit, until the person started rummaging in our recycling bin. Then I told the Dotytron to maybe go outside and let the person know that we put out our recycling on Tuesday, so if he could come back then to collect recyclables for cash instead of showing up in our driveway, we would prefer that. So the Dotytron went out there and told him and was super nice about it, but OF COURSE the guy was an old Asian man and I immediately felt guilty for shooing him away and I started crying cuz I was all worried that he wasn't going to be okay. The Dotytron loves it when I cry over stuff like this. Mainly because he and Dr. Rei both love nothing more than when I drop my tough-guy routine. LOL! Anyway, I kept crying about it off and on all Sunday evening. To the point where on Monday, the Dotytron turned to me and said, "remember when you were weeping last night? THAT was an awkward display of humanity." LOL!

On Monday I made us a dinner of baby new potatoes tossed warm with creme fraiche, salt and pepper and chopped scallions, with roasted lemon-oregano stuffed sea bream, and a side of roasted asparagus. Didn't get a photo of it, though. Tuesday I made us lamb kofta in a harissa-kicked sauce with sweet-sour Moroccan style eggplant on top of whole wheat couscous with raisins and grated carrot. This was a big hit:


Last night we had dinner with our Discerning Coyote friend and his new ladybird, N. We went to Bairrada on College. I suggested it based on the fact that it has a gorgeous, giant patio and lured by the promise that Wednesdays are "roasted pork on a spit" night. Anticipating big hunks of juicy pork, I was chagrined to find that they saw off little wee plates of dry pork brushed with piri piri. When we saw that suckling pig was on the menu, we tried to order that, but it was sold out! Then our meals and apps took forever to arrive (they comped us an app and our second round of drinks though) and when the food did arrive, it was underwhelming. Don't think I'm actually a fan of Portuguese food, to be honest. As the Dotytron summarized, "nice patio with dry stuff." It was true: everything we had there WAS dry.

One of our favorite nighttime rituals now is on our way to bed, to go and "take a peek" at the Big Yam while he's sleeping. We tip toe into his room, peer into the crib, behold him looks all peaceful and pouty in slumber like this:



...and then turn to each other and smile all welling up with love and happiness and cute overload. It's my favorite part of the day. Seriously - how can you not love looking at that?!?

I also kind of like going into the room when he's wigging out and peering in the crib and seeing him all distressed clutching a stuffy - it's also cute with his two little (soon to be four) Chiclet teeth poking out:

The Dotytron went into work today to clear out his classroom and attend meetings. He should be home earlier in the afternoon and then we're planning on heading out to Metro Hall to hear some big band free outdoor concert thing. More likely, I'm going to splinter off and hang out with Dr. Rei while the Baba and Boobla listen to big band. Pingy comes into town tonight! Then tomorrow is a Supper Club Canada Day picnic on the Island, maybe more hanging with Pingy in the late afternoon, and then up to Markham to visit with my family because my sis is coming into town - it's Little Ze's birthday today and my Poh Poh's 89th birthday on Sunday. Yay! Family time. Fun time. Sun time. Bliss.

Fin.

Another one bites the dust...

Yes, yes! One more paper handed in - one less monkey on my back! Now I just have to finish ONE MORE RESEARCH PAPER and I will be fully caught up on school! I'm giving myself the week off and tackling it once I get back from Boston, though - so from here on in, I am free!

What a weekend of craziness. Friday we made plans to head out to the kdubs to visit with Tillers & Jen and see their sweet new bébé. I'm kicking myself that we didn't get any photos - she's a perfect little bean with a full head of dark hair in a very monk-ish style. Even though she weighs a full pound more than when the Big Yam was born, I was flabbergasted at how wee she was when I was cradling her tiny little form. It's shocking how quickly you forget that your kid was once that tiny. It's only been 7 months and I can't believe that the Big Yam used to be just that clueless and frail, making tiny little bird sounds and staring into the middle distance with his mouth stupidly agape, smacking his lips absently at the air. And now look at him - sitting up on his own:

He started being able to consistently and reliably sit up last week...no more tottering and lurching to one side, no more squawking with his legs and arms up in the air like an upended beetle. Nope, you can plop him down with a toy and he will stay put...it makes him look so grown up that we're quite taken with the novelty of it. He looks so darned cute! This age is really fun, I have to say. He's becoming more independent and yet he's still not so big that he's been corrupted by the world and still invariably wakes up every morning by my side with a slow fluttering of the eyelids and upon espying me, a gummy, beatific grin that envelops his whole face. I love waking up to that. I love his joyful squirming when you cover his fat cheeks with kisses. I love how he ducks his head down like he's bashful and sleepily rubs his chubby fists against his eyes when we've kept him up past his bedtime. I love it all and I don't ever want it to end.

Aside: there is NOTHING cuter than a baby boy in madras print shorts. I'm obsessed! He's such a cute little gaffer!

I'm so excited to have dear friends like Tillers & Jen embarking on parenthood - I want our kids to grow up never having not known each other. No doubt time and interests and growing autonomy will pull them apart but I want them to be able to look back and say, "So-and-so is my oldest friend." I want to kvetch with them about how wack-a-doo our kids are turning out to be and commiserate with them when our kids turn into pre-teen dorks and we have to deal with the attendant attitude that comes with.

Ahhhh, feeling sentimental after a weekend of good times with good people. Saturday night we had a lobster dinner with our friends S & P who put my hosting abilities to shame. Fresh lobsters from Halifax, a smoked salmon & cream cheese spread with toasted baguette, potato salad, a beet & pear salad, and I provided my rosemary olive loaf and dessert - a blackberry macaroon tart, recipe courtesy of Smitten Kitchen by way of 101 Cookbooks:

The tart is divine - so simple and satisfying. A whole wheat short crust enriched with the toasty warmth of coconut, topped with halved blackberries and dotted with little tufts of chewy, crunchy, golden coconut macaroons...so good! And it would definitely lend itself to cherries and raspberries when they're in season, too. Can't wait to try it out again - the whole thing comes together in minutes.

Thursday night we had a throwback meal of French onion soup with a BLT salad (mixed greens tossed with crisped bacon, hothouse cherry tomatoes from the Mennonites, all dressed in a creamy, tangy, celery-seed-sparked ranch-style dressing):

Academic book club was interesting and engaging, although it did reveal that there are fundamental differences in the parenting styles between the members - it was very illuminating how people's reactions to Chua reflected on how they were raised and how they raised their kids. The next book we're reading is The Hunger Games, which I'm super-pumped about.

Friday morning I made French toast for myself and the Big Yam (it was a big hit) for breakfast with blackberry rhubarb compote. I'm rhubarb crazy at the moment and am desperate to throw it into anything I can find:

Saturday morning we had croque hermaphrodites:

On Sunday we met up with S & A at the Bloordale Pantry which is previously uninhabitable neighbourhood of Bloor/Landsdowne. The fact that the presence of this restaurant is one of the first harbingers of oncoming gentrification means that you can go for brunch at 11am on a Sunday and STILL GET A TABLE FOR FIVE (!!!!!!!!!) This is UNHEARD of in our neighbourhood. The menu is quite good - nice and varied with something for everyone. I ordered this pancake dish consisting of pancakes stuffed with cheddar and bacon and served alongside onion potato hash and 2 perfectly sunny sunny side up eggs:

Then we went over to S & A's house to take a look at their kitchen reno - which was totally inspiring for me. It only took a month!!! That's incredible!!! I've heard a lot of horror stories so that was very heartening, even if everything in their house, top to bottom, is covered in a thin film of dust.

I had a serious case of 'itis all Sunday because of white people. By that I mean, white people not eating the lobster tomalley in their lobsters on Saturday night meant that I had FOUR LOBSTERS' worth of tomalley myself - it's quite rich and my gut was hurting. So Sunday I bowed out of making dinner and instead applied myself to making a blackberry rhubarb bread pudding that I ate late at night, after fasting all day (my stuffed pancakes aside) and served with bourbon toffee sauce and ice cream:

I also had a visit from Xtina with her new baby, H - who is the spitting image of his father, Buns:

What a little Aryan prince.

I baked off 3 loaves of onion bread variations. 1 GIANT (2lb!) roasted garlic, caramelized onion loaf, 1 smaller version of the same, and 1 caramelized onion and parmesan bread. They are now nicely wrapped and ready for the freezer. The dough begins with a sponge that's based on my sourdough starter, but the final bread also gets a boost from commercial yeast as well:

Tonight for dinner I made us a spicy salmon brown rice bowl - to kick start our healthy eating/getting back into shape movement:

Now it's yoga & Game of Thrones time.

Yay!

Fin.