Moving On Up

...and over, laterally, under.

Things are moving and shaking at Casa Dotytron and Lagerfeld.

Move #1 - the Big Yam.  After going through the rigmarole of applying for Optional Attendance to a desired, but outside of our catchment area school, setting the Big Yam up in his new classroom, with all new homies and a slightly longer commute, he was happily settled.  Until, that is, the dreaded September reorganization happened.  The dreaded September reorganization for people who don't have school-aged children is when the school rejigs things based on actual enrollment, versus the projected enrollment that forms the basis for class placement at the end of the previous school year.  As a result of the shuffle, the Big Yam was moved from his 2nd floor, beautiful kindergarten classroom, to a dank and depressing basement class taught by a newly-minted teacher (who had been the ECE in his old classroom).

We were actually fine with everything, because the important thing for us is that the Big Yam was moving with his homies, and he did.  Until the parents of his homies went BALLISTIC about the dank and depressing basement classroom and went full-on mental (let's just say, there was a feature on Global News about it).  Don't get me wrong, the new classroom wasn't ideal - there are only a couple of small windows, the bathroom is outside the classroom through a dingy and dank storage closet, and there isn't any running water so hand-washing is an issue - but our main concern was that the Big Yam adjusted socially.  He was also totally fine with the transition - new teacher, new classroom, losing some homies (more on that later), because outside of our home, he is the most unflappable, easygoing kid in the free world.  Inside our home, it's a totally different story, but fine, whatever, he continues to make us look good in public, I'll take it.  Anyway, some parents went apeshiz and pulled their kids into the Catholic system because they were so upset about this classroom situation.

I actually went by the classroom yesterday to check it out, and the TDSB had BUSTED THROUGH THE CONCRETE WALL and framed a doorway so that now the kids have direct access to the bathroom.  They cleared all the gym equipment out of it, had repainted, had a sink roughed in...it was incredible.  Which goes to show that when there's political pressure to make things happen, you can cut quickly through the central services facilities backlog and get prioritized.  The weird thing is, that it was thanks to the efforts of the parents who ended up leaving the school that this got done, and now they don't even get to see the fruits of their labours.

Move #2 - New job for me.  I had back to back to back interviews the week after Labour Day and it damned near killed me, but the result was I received two job offers.  I ended up taking a promotion at my home position and I start right after Thanksgiving.  It was a tough decision to make and it involved me talking the poor ears off of my life decision sounding boards: the Dotytron, Dr. Rei, the Roomie and constructing a decision matrix with weighted scores.  YOU GUYS. DECISION MATRICES ARE THE BEST.  I seriously couldn't have made the choice without one.  Even if one of the categories was "Lync" which is the Microsoft-instant messaging system that people in the public service use.  We use it at my home position, but the firewalls mean that I can't communicate with people outside of the organization.  Anyway, the point is, being able to Lync with Dr. Rei has improved my employee engagement by about 10000%.  IT LOOKS LIKE WE'RE WORKING, GUYS.  Anyway, the Roomie and the Dotytron were very dismissive of my ability to IM Dr. Rei showing up on the decision matrix, but I weighted it the lowest, and seriously, I can't tell you how awesome it is being able to chat with your BFF while at work, and IT LOOKS LIKE WE'RE WORKING.

My new job comes at a cost of the awesome people I've met while on secondment and the loss of opportunity to continue to build my professional reputation in the public service.  I was finally feeling very engaged and energized where I was and saw lots of movement and opportunity ahead - it's hard to think that I might be letting that go taking on this position.  I think that's always going to happen whenever you make a change, though.  So I'm trying not to get too worked up about it.

Move #3 - Lindsay Lou Lou is moving around each G-D night after we put him to bed and thrashing his room like he's all the members of Motley Crue.  He takes all the clothes out of the dresser, he climbs on top of stuff to chuck all the books off the book shelves, he tugs on the blinds until they snap up and can't be brought down again, all while Quincess watches from his jail/crib and conscientiously objects, "Noooo! 'Top it! Lenny! 'Top it!" His little voice wailing is the most heart-breaking thing.  His distress is compounded by the fact that like every child in the free world, he wants to be sleeping in our bed.  We don't know what to do.  Lindsay isn't angry or anything.  He just goes on a systematic tear.  The odd time I've opened the door and he's just working at the easel and greets me with a raised eyebrow, mid chalk-stroke.  The rest of the time he hustles his fat bubble butt to his bed post-haste but resumes his thrashing as soon as you leave again.  We've had a small measure of success the past two nights by lying on the floor of their room until they're near-drowsy.  We also got drawer guards so he can't open the dresser drawers.  I don't really care about him thrashing the room, but I am worried more about him climbing the dresser and bringing it down on top of himself, and then poor Quincess having to pay silent witness to that on top of it all.

My friend JJ referred to Lindsay as "Bam Bam" and it's so apt.  He is such a Bam Bam.

I love these little nutters but two 2 year olds is hectic.  And yet.  And yet I go around exhausted at the end of the night ("end of the night" = 9pm, when I'm at the drop-down point of the day, stumbling around the house in a haze), and I go to hang up a little vest and I feel the pockets heavy with something and I empty them out to find this:

20-something "corn-eggs" tucked into a pocket for saving.  C'MON.

We have been terrible parents lately.  Dropping balls everywhere.  We forgot to send the Big Yam to school with his "1 item related to fall" today.  We forgot that Monday was picture day and he looked like a scrub.  But!  I was a rebellious parent and sent him in for his birthday with homemade cupcakes and I asked him how it went and he said, "Everyone. FREAKED. OUT."  LOL!!!  They were a hit, apparently!

Quincess' "handsome face"

They're moving out of a phase where they were obsessed with Disney's Cinderella.  I put hats on them like Cinderella does to her mice and started calling Lindsay "Gus-Gus" and Quincess "Jaq-Jaq" and they wouldn't take the hats off.  I like this photo cuz they look like stoners in the common room in residence in undergrad

So yeah.  They're friggin' adorable and I love their trying little butts.  I put Quincess in our bed the other night in this misguided attempt to show Lindsay that if he doesn't thrash his room, he gets privileges.  Quincess hunkered down immediately, the covers pulled up under his nose, and I turned off the lights, told him I would be back, and he was just so thrilled to be in our bed that he poked his little head up just enough for me to see his teeth flashing in the moonlight in this ultra-pleased grin.  It was the cutest thing.

Last Friday, we were all piled in the basement, watching Peter and the Wolf and goofing off and the Dotytron turned to me and said, "You ever have those times when you're just so high on your family? This is one of those nights." A family can come in many forms.  The Dotytron and I were a family long before the goon squad came along, and yet, adding to your family is a magical thing. I like the idea that there are more people to bear witness to the quirks and trials and tribulations that make up the idiosyncrasies of our family, and more people to contribute to them in the intimate way that goes along with living under the same roof.

We've been making a point of availing ourselves to urban nature exploration.  We did a tiny portion of the Humber River trail last weekend, and before that, Highland Creek.  It's pretty awesome.  Exploring the watershed is amazing and honestly, what else am I supposed to do on weekends now that I have a pair of Blundstones?  Are you even allowed to live in the city, work for the government, bike to work, wear Blundstones and like, NOT do urban nature hikes?  Probably not, amirite?

Here's what we've been eating lately:

Taco Tuesday one night was chilaquiles

A torched salmon sushi rice bowl where I thinly sliced raw wild salmon and then torched it slightly with a blowtorch, to give it the aburi sushi taste that I like

I got ambitious one weekend and made blintzes

We've been going hard on the Sunday suppers.  This was ginger-pear glazed ham, smashed potatoes, grilled zucchini, and the ever present green beans

The Big Yam kept pestering me for "pumpkin pie with a cherry in the middle" and so I made pumpkin pie, and I suspected, he had no idea what he was requesting and didn't eat a single bite of it.  However, one night I put Lindsay to bed and noticed that his hands smelled strangely of cinnamon.  Then, I came downstairs and found that the slice of pie I had cut on the counter looked like it had been compromised.

Sunday Supper - Rosh Hashanah edition.  Braised brisket, latkes, broccoli patties, and the ever present green beans

Mushroom pappardelle.  Killer stuff.

Coconut browned butter cookies

Quickie weeknight dinner - bacon, mushroom, spinach, and cheddar quiche and zucchini patties

Fin.

Running the Gauntlet

What a week.

It's cool and drizzly out and I can't tell you how much I'm loving the Saturday we've had so far.  We were under the impression that the Big Yam was starting Chinese school so we hauled a** to get out of the house and to the school in time, only to find that the mad scramble was in vain and we were a week early.  Is there anything worse, when you're a parent, than a mad scramble for naught?  Not really.  So much wasted coordination and energy.

Faced with an unexpectedly free Saturday, we did our grocery shopping, hung around in the park, then we had quiet time and I started Roxane Gay's already-excellent Bad Feminist and died a few deaths at how good it is (to give you an idea of JUSTHOWVERYGOODITIS I'm only halfway through the introduction).  The heat has broken, it is easy to believe that we're slowly slouching into fall, and the rain means that you don't feel guilty for cozying up at home.  The best thing about fall and winter is cozying up at home.  Luxuriating in your home and your family.

I wasn't one of those kids who imagined what my adult life would be like.  Like, I had lofty goals about maybe being a writer, or an academic, or a perhaps some high-powered 80s lady, but the idea of having a family of my own didn't register.  Remember: for a long, long time, I didn't think I was going to have kids.  I associated having kids with some kind of betrayal of radical feminism.  When we decided to start a family, I still didn't spend time trying to picture what that might be like.  I never imagined how much I would covet and enjoy an insular weekend afternoon spent with my own family.  How an open afternoon with nothing pressing to do, perhaps making dinner, definitely lying on the couch reading while my boys careened around me, would be so fulfilling.   How I could so enjoy seeing just these 4 faces engaged in the mundane.

Edit: fast-forward to Monday evening - I reveled so much in my free afternoon that I abandoned blogging

Summer ended in a roar of activity and culminated in last week's insanity.  We hit summer, HARD, and we're wringing out every last drop of goodness.  We went to the CNE, we went to the beach, had one more glorious swim in the outdoor pool, and hit up some nature walks with some of the people we love best.

 These two photos make me laugh because you can see various stages of Quincess trying to scale that log.  He's trying so hard!

Big Yam didn't want to sit in the front because he wasn't sure how he would "drive" this thing

School started last week and chaos of the first day was given a thematic supporting assist from some truly hellish weather.  I dropped the Big Yam off at his new school and it was hot, humid, muggy, oppressive.  His new school made the tactical error of letting the parents into the kindergarten area to drop off their kids which obviously resulted in a smaller-scale recreation of that Civil War scene from Gone With the Wind.  There were people strewn about the halls, widespread pandemonium, tears.  The Big Yam had been on board with me up to that point but when he walked into his classroom, he went AWOL on me.  Flipped right out.  I tried everything.  I spoke calmly, I was upbeat, I tried distractions.  He was having none of it.  Finally, I had to do something I'm not proud of - which was to shame him into snapping into it.  "I've been very nice and calm with you up to now, and you're leaving me no choice.  I'm going to have to get stern with you and cross.  Do you want me to get stern and cross in front of all your new friends?"  I re-live that moment and squirm inside every time.  But you know what?  IT F**KING WORKED, okay?  And there's a small part of me that doesn't regret the fact that I was able to deposit my kid in the system and get to work *only* an hour late.  You do what you gotta do, desperate times, etc., etc.

  

 This guy's ridiculous, crooked-mouth, old man, elvish face kills me

Sunday we intended to do a hike in the Rouge Valley Conservation area, but it was raining so we skipped to the city's first ever Kothu fest.  We picked up Kothu and supplemented with Babu for the kids.  It was a bit of a bust, but we wanted to show our support for kothu and Scarborough.

Also, every other day since then has been beyond fine.  He's found himself some homies, he's adjusting well, this new school - first day tactical error notwithstanding - has been head and shoulders above the previous one.  They just have their s**t together and are inspiring a great deal of confidence in us.  We're happy with the transition over all.

I mean, it probably wasn't helped by the fact that  I had three consecutive interviews last week.  By the time the week ended we were all DONE.  So the lazy Saturday described above was exactly the reset we needed.

I'm hoping that one of those interviews results in something, but even if it doesn't, I'm happy with my current job, I'm happy with my home position - so I think I'm in a pretty good spot, overall.  All the preparation and work that went into the interview process was harrowing, but it's behind me, and I think I know better now than to sign up for back-to-back-to-back interviews again.  Although knowing me, and the my masochistic need to put myself in the line of fire, I wouldn't put it past me.

Every day, I come home from work, put away my bike, take off my shoes and bag and put the finishing touches on dinner.  Within 10-15 minutes of me being home, the Wonder Twins cotton on to the fact that I'm in the building, and they clamber up the stairs and I get this exact same greeting:

Every. Single. Day.  "Hi, mama."  It kills me.

We started watching the new Netflix series, Narcos on the weekend and blew through 6 episodes.  I didn't think I'd like it.  I'm only so-so into drug movies.  They can get kind of repetitive after a while - the tropes, the delivery.  This series has a killer first episode, but I do recall wondering how they were going to sustain it for 9 more.  For me, they don't do a good job of delivering.  This is "history comes to life" type of watching.  It relies on some narrative clichés and some clunky exposition, but it's anchored by a compelling score and charismatic performances.  Like, how do I end up having the hots for Pablo Escobar?  Granted, he's a bawss.  But he's also a really, really, really bad person?  That does terrible, terrible things?  Yet when you watch him, as embodied by Wagner Moura, you can see how you fall under his thrall.  It's good for watching while you're knitting (*raises hand*), but I only half pay attention.

Quincess has been using the placeholder, "Ummm..." before he answers a question.  It's friggin' adorable.  Lindsay doesn't have time for placeholders, because he's too busy aiming at my head with a baseball bat and saying, "shoot mama?" "No, we don't shoot people."  "Shoot baba?" (and so on, until we go through the entire list of everyone he knows, who he's NOT allowed to shoot), or trying to wrestle a giant couch cushion, UP the stairs.  

End of summer means blueberry pudding cake.  Blueberry pudding cake means blueberry pudding cake and whipped cream breakfasts, with a boiled egg for respectability.

Smitten's hazlenut plum tart.  Which I may have talked about already?  I doubled the hazlenuts but would reduce the butter and omit the custard filling, so all you have is toasted hazlenuts, crunchy around a thin layer of plums turned jammy in the oven.  

Meal templates to the rescue of busy week/school days!  Taco Tuesday: salad edition

A pound of zucchini, thinly sliced, fried in olive oil with minced garlic, some sliced basil, and tossed with artisanal pasta, topped with grated ricotta salata and a fried egg

We hung onto summer hard this past weekend - lobster rolls on buttered brioche buns, fried pickles, and this roasted cabbage salad that I've been obsessed with, ever since Dr. Rei made it at the cottage.  Thinly sliced cabbage, tossed with oil, roasted and turned every now and then at high heat in the oven until crispy, tossed with a spicy mayo dressing.

Smitten's crispy peach cobbler.  This was a HUGE hit.  You sprinkle a generous amount of sugar on top of the cobbler topping and then sprinkle that with water.  It makes a shellac that bakes up in the oven until it shatters.  A nice mix of textures against some fresh, juicy, yielding peaches.

The textbook Lagerfeld late-summer pasta - fried eggplant cubes, cooked with minced garlic, some grape tomatoes thrown in and cooked in the pan with the lid on until they burst, with some kalamata olives and basil, tossed with pasta.

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.

NEVER...

...take a baby/toddler to a wedding.

I know you were thinking that I was going to end that with..."fall in love" *cue Whitney Houston's I Will Always Love You* but no.  Never fall in love is TOTALLY a rule for bodyguards, don't get me wrong, I'm not asking you to take that proscription lightly.  But for any parents and prospective parents out there, even if your baby/toddler is invited to the wedding, don't take them.  Seriously.  It's the worst.  It just ruins your time.  They're not having fun, because there aren't any other kids there and it's a late night, and you don't have any fun, because you're worried about them or trying to eat roast beef one handed with a giant 30 pound sack of potatoes out cold over your shoulder.  It's a giant fun-suck.

We went to the Dotytron's uncle's wedding last night.  In Ancaster.  ON A SUNDAY NIGHT.  I don't know what I was expecting - I figured a Sunday night wedding would be a quickie civil ceremony followed by a quick dinner - I figured I'd be home by 9:30-10, at the latest.  I didn't factor on a hour plus long cocktail reception and a 45 minute ceremony and the full slate of speeches.  I just didn't.  It's my fault.  We also made the monumentally horrible decision to carpool with Momma D...so we couldn't leave.  NEVER EVER EVER NOT TAKE YOUR OWN CAR, PEOPLE!  Be you not so foolish as I-and-I (we)!  All we wanted was to be able to hop in the car, grab some McDonald's and head home.  But we were trapped!  The poor little Bubba was a good sport, he really was.  He didn't cry or complain, but he got really tired and overwhelmed by a million old white people.  I don't blame him, really.  Also the Ancaster Old Mill, while a gorgeous spot for a wedding, is weirdly committed to stupid details like NOT HAVING PROPER HIGH CHAIRS.  Instead, what they have is these weird wooden things with this cloth crotch-strap that you tie around your kid.  Even CRACKER BARREL, which is FULLY committed to being period-correct, has a decent (wooden) high chair that you can strap your kid into.

Anyway, that's my advice for you.  You want to drink and have a good time and not have your genuine happiness for the couple getting hitched to be marred by your own seething resentment at your own stupidity for not seeing clearly how your evening would go down with a toddler in tow.

The pluses: the Dotytron's new suit looks banging.  We got him a new charcoal suit and tie and it's a much more modern cut than he's used to.  He's spent the ENTIRE time since picking up the suit complaining about how he "hates his new suit" and how the pants are "skin tight" but when he put the suit on, he looked like a stone fox.  You don't put someone who is 6'4" and naturally slender in a boxy suit.

I wore this vintage, dusty rose dress I bought years ago.  It's really quite flattering and I wore my platform Seychelles and looked pretty hotsy if I do say so myself.  That's me and the Big Yam up there - the Big Yam already looked a little peaked.

It didn't help that the wedding followed the Big Yam's birthday lunch - AYCE Indian food.  My family came and Dr. Rei and Hanbo and Momma D and Ehmdo.  It was fun!  Big D came and it was the best.  He totally turns it on when he's out and it's so cute.  I love it when Big D turns it on.  It's the BEST.  You're always like, "uhh, who IS that guy!?!" cracking jokes and yukking it up and pestering my brother on cell phone plan details.  

It didn't help that the night before, I was up til midnight putting together the Big Yam's play kitchen.  Imagine putting together an Ikea fridge, stove, counter, oven, microwave, cabinets, sink and phone...BUT MINI:

There is only one word for it: hell.  It took me just over 2 hours and I almost stripped a few screws AND all the skin off my thumb in the process.

It didn't help that we had spent that afternoon at my friend P's Annual Competition Backyard BBQ, which raises funds for Common Ground Co-Operative.  P is a maniac.  He turns his backyard (which is giant) into a hay-strewn, tent-bedecked mini Toronto Underground Market.  AND he enters like 3 different categories and cooks up a brisket that is tasty enough to make you cry tears of joy.  He is an inspiration to us all.  

TOO MANY THINGS this past weekend!  TOO MANY THINGS.  

In other news, today I found out that the job interview I had been preparing for, for the past two weeks, has been cancelled and they decided to not post the position after all.  This was of course, EXTREMELY DEMORALIZING.  I was primed!  I was ready!  I really really really wanted the opportunity to do this job!      At the very least, I really really really wanted the opportunity to INTERVIEW for this job!  

On Friday night we had burgers & sweet potato fries.  

I love me a good old fashioned homemade burger.

Saturday's post Mandarin school homemade sausage and egg McMuffins.

On Saturday night we had that Thai coconut curry soup with rice noodles.

Last night we had grilled cheese sandwiches with freezer minestrone/wedding soup reheated together.  Then I chased that with a billion pounds of wedding-favour shortbread and the Big Yam's portion of prime rib (which was HUGE) from the wedding.  THIS IS OFF THE RECORD, MY FITNESS PAL!  Snitches get stitches!  I'm clearly stress eating my face off.

Tonight we had "sorry they decided to cancel the interview" takeout fried chicken and butter tarts and a million shortbread cookies.  THIS IS OFF THE RECORD, MY FITNESS PAL!

Fin.