Tuppence

   I have been having very bad luck lately with regards to driving animals, and driving in general. Lately when I have been going along driving around this small Island I am visiting, well honestly mostly rushing for the ferry, drivers stop and pull over when they see me coming down the road. Yes I can see out of both eyes. Yes I am on my side of the yellow line and Yes I am going pretty darn close to 60kph. It has happened 3 times now in 2 weeks and for the amount of cars on the road here that equals approximately one third of all the cars I have seen. One person stopped on the far side of a corner right by a drop off down to the beach in the dark on the road to look at the moon as it was particularly glorious that night but not glorious enough to put oneself in that position. So even though I counted that one at first I am now saying it was on account of the moon and not because they could see me coming down the road towards them.
   Hoping to tune it down a bit I decided to take the miniature pony out for a trot on the pony cart. The pony thought it would be much nicer to sit in the field and eat hay than pull me around in the frosty snowy air and me foolishly trusting the intelligence of small beast aptly named Reepicheep let my guard down for a split second in the which said pony dived for the paddock and in one small step hit a small rock, which tipped the small cart, which flew over a large boulder with pony attached, ran through the yard, careened the cart into the car, ripped past the fruit trees and through the gate that only the pony can fit through and being a miniature pony the pony can still only fit through the gate the cart staying on the opposite side and the harness in tatters. The pony was very lucky to have totaled the cart and the harness or I and it would most likely still be out there roaming the dark streets ten hours later.
   The other reference with regard to driving animals and trusting the intelligence of small beasts happened Sunday morning as we were meandering down to the ferry. Who am I kidding? Church starts at 9:30 and I have 3 boys to get dressed, fed, snacked, washed, combed, ironed and out the door all in time to catch the 9am ferry so we were rather going straight down the hill. Across the parking lot in a straight line from the hill to the ferry ramp was a small flock of pigeons eating some crumbs on the ground and looking very "feed the birdish" from Mary Poppins. Who doesn't like to see a nice flock of birds flying overhead on a Sunny Sunday morning so I aimed the car straight for this little flock and they may have been eating something illegally grown on this island here in the middle of nowhere (I will have to check what kind of brownies the coffee shop is selling down there in the parking lot) but these birds didn't even look, not at 20 feet, 10 feet, 5,4,3,2,1! There were 3 distinct crunches and we were past. Lousy flock of birds didn't even fly away at the last minute, no pigeons swarming up gracefully over the water just some ferry worker cursing me under his breath a half hour later as he is scraping frozen pigeon off the parking lot. If the ferry rates go up next month I am not to blame, well maybe, but probably not.

It's Halloweenish, not Halloweenie! Part 2

   Halloween Tradition number two: A new mythical way to stretch the truth to your children! Well actually there is no truth involved but it is just so much fun to have an excuse to totally pull their leg and get away with it.
  The Halloween Witch has been invented, not by me so I can't take all the credit but I think I did a good job giving her some personality as well as getting rid of all the Halloween candy by the 3rd of November and no the boys did not eat it all and neither did I as a matter of fact!
  The Halloween Witch comes to your porch on the night of the 31st, 1st or 2nd. Three chances. You leave out your candy and she eats it and leaves you a gift but being a witch at heart and not caring if you are happy or sad about your gift she will leave you whatever she wants or thinks she should to get you to leave your candy out again next year.
   The boys figured their candy was worth 10 dollars each, as if they could go out on the corner and sell it but according to them that is beside the point. I told them they could probably count on a Hotwheels car or a book or some socks. There was much deliberating yesterday as to if it was worth it or not and the myriad of things they hopped she would leave and what she could leave for it to be worth it and how many years they would give her a chance for. We skimped a bit on the Witches loot as we saved all the hard candies for December for our candy plastered Gingerbread Houses we always make.
  In the end the candy went out on the porch and in the morning the boys ran down and checked but there was great disappointment as the candy pumpkin was still full of candy and there was only a black garbage bag out there, so of course being a good mother I said, "Don't touch the bag!" And explained that if she didn't take the candy then maybe she was playing a trick on them and the bag could be full of snakes or spiders or slugs. Then of course no one would touch the bag and the anxiety of it all was just to much with much nail biting and looking out the window and walking around it and talk of smashing it with a shovel to which I replied that it may be something good and then they might wreck it, finally brave boy who loves candy more than anyone around here decided that if the witch didn't want the candy that he would just take it instead but picking it up realized it was just all the wrappers in the pumpkin and no candy was indeed left. They were still wary of the garbage bag but I told them if the candy was gone she probably left them something good or at least not horrid so they resorted to kicking the bag a bit and I would have given anything to have had it jump in the air but as there were only socks and books inside it just stayed put.
   Turns out the Halloween Witch left the baby some nice warm winter socks and the boys each got a Christmas Sticker, coloring book apparently donated to the Witch by Santa himself as she is prone to giving out apples or toothbrushes as Halloween "tricks"
   So even though they were secretly wishing that she would leave them the Lego Death Star or at the very least a 60 dollar set what child in their right mind is going to complain about a gift left by the Halloween Witch which was donated by Santa Clause a mere 7 weeks before Christmas! Needless to say they have only good things to say about getting a Christmas Book.

It's Halloweenish, not Halloweenie! Part 1

   I am writing this post on Nate's "telephone" computer which always makes me lean way back in my chair and honestly I feel a bit intimidated by the huge screen glowing right in my face. At least I can look down at the tiny little keyboard and feel more at ease.  Nate you need some "goggly eyes" for this thing!
   We started two new traditions this year for Halloween.
First we had two nice, well behaved, very excited children over for a Halloween Dinner. Annie and her Cousin. Annie was so excited as it is just so, so exciting to be invited over for dinner when you are 10 years old. The boys and I decorated the table with black cloth and lace and all the gross creepy things they have collected over the years from past Halloweens, gooey slimy glow in the dark bugs of various sizes. Lots and lots of spiders, rats and centipedes. We had Candles and Bones and Pumpkins and a Menu stained with Blood (beet juice).

Menu:
Horse Pee (warm cinnamon apple cider)
Troll Noses with Snot (small rolls with butter)
Vampire Teeth (chopped carrot salad)
Chilled Dragon Blood Clots (cold roasted beets)
Spider Monkey Brains and Blood (spagetti with sauce) served in a pumpkin
Giant Rat Scat (grilled ground beef)


   The Horse Pee was very popular and everyone had lots of fun requesting dishes to be passed around the table by their real name so I had lots of requests to, "please pass the snot" and no one had to feel bad or rude if they didn't eat their blood clots or rat scat. Next time I will find something else for vampire teeth as we were eating chopped carrots all week. All in all it was a success and the baby drank three cups of horse pee, everyone had a good laugh when he started asking for, "horspee, more horspee" so of course he got more.

For dessert we had:
Tadpoles in Swamp Mud topped with Polar Bear Puke. (apple gingerbread cake topped with whipped cream)
Which was delicious and which I will be making again. Here is the recipe if you have recently been craving tadpoles
http://smittenkitchen.com/2009/11/gingerbread-apple-upside-down-cake/
I used extra apples and didn't do the whole upside down thing, I left the tadpoles under the mud.
I had to cook it for about an hour and a half too, who wants to eat crunchy tadpoles?

   We played Master Labryrinth and carved some amazing pumpkins.

   My son did not sleep well the night before, he was up for about 4 hours in the middle of the night so he spent most of the Halloween Party asleep on the couch or trying to stay awake to eat dinner as he was so excited for it and helped plan it and decorate. I thought he couldn't sleep for excitement in which case I was about to cancel Christmas but it turns out he was just terrified because unbeknowst to me Nate had left the radio on when they ran to the store to pick up some eggs for the cake the night before and apparently the news was talking about some robber getting beaten up in the kitchen by some guy. So good news for Ethan as Christmas will not get canceled, bad news for Nate as there is a big lump of coal heading his way.

P.S I use this link all the time and have never been disappointed which is more than I can say for all my cookbooks.
http://smittenkitchen.com/recipes/

The Amazingness of Occasionality

   The boys got outfitted with goggles, elbow pads, knee pads, jerseys, braces, helmets and boots. There was a small amount of drama when awesome cool items had to be swapped out for other awesome cool items that fit better, but everyone was outfitted in the end and we set off for a nice quiet drive, down nice quiet roads, amid peaceful trees and farms. We passed the biggest pig I have ever seen, I seriously thought it was a cow at first and am still deliberating with myself as to the possibility of crossing a pig with a cow. We drove for an hour to get out of the city into the country to go and breath in some pollution, but all for a good cause.
   The boys were attending their first ever Motocross Camp. Which also happened to be a Haunted House and all you can eat candy bar. I am glad I am a Super Mother and brought water with me (that's right, in my world all you need to do is bring bottled water and presto you are Super Mom) who ever heard of all you can eat candy but not water. I guess this is what the world is coming to.
Needless to say the boys all fell more than promptly asleep in the car on the way home, I know perfect teeth rotting conditions and it's not even Halloween yet!
  The boys all felt very, very, very important and cool and amazing which are all good things for little boys to feel occasionally the occasionality strictly depending on their genetic makeup.
   They rode and ate and rode and ate and rode and ate yet some more candy. They learned how to corner, how to jump, how to start off a line, how to race, how to pass, and more. Including how to fall and how to barely avoid crashing head on with a stationary tractor, the last two being voluntary learning which we are all for around here.
   Their favorite part was riding the whole track which seemed so huge to them and so much fun. Nate even got to go for a few rides with them and passed a poor kid who crashed into the trees by the tractor, turned out to be his own son! But he was just fine and can't wait to go again, the fame this brought him could have been the highlight of the day which may be a close second to the sucker or the whoops needless to say he/they/all can't wait to go again next year.
   The Haunted house was just haunting enough and more anticipated than the new Harry Potter movie coming out. The Haunted house was deliberated on for a good half hour as to weather or not it would be too scary, too scary, or too scary! Turns out it was too scary but it was a good thing and, "maybe could have been scarier but probably not."

Cornering

Eating

Jumping

 Racing

 Waiting to be bigger

Instruction

Keeping an eye on Tractor Boy

Oatmeal and Ursula

   I would be sorely misleading if I gave anyone the impression that my circumference of thought did not include food! The main problem being I have no talent and neither does my camera for taking pictures of food. Something that is warm and smells divine when clicked by my camera becomes cold, flat and tasteless, I need a camera that also detects smell and temperature, some people have this knack...I will have to keep practicing or just rely on words for some recipes.
   
Recipe #1 Oatmeal.
   Oatmeal and I have had a love/hate relationship until recently. When I was young it was the stuff you ate so you could eat more of the stuff you wanted to as in, "Mom can I have Alphabets for breakfast?" "After you eat your oatmeal you can have any cereal you want."
    Once some friends were visiting from out of town and we made a big pot of oatmeal because being good children we knew the rule and wanted to eat lots and lots of sugar cereal, so we made a huge pot of oatmeal because we all were "starving" probably about 10 cups of it and added about 10 times too much salt. It was awful. Our hopes of sugar cereal vanished with one taste but luckily for me one of the children volunteered to eat the whole pot in order for us all to have any cereal we wanted, we cheered her on and we all got the cereal(s) of our choice (except for her as she was too full to even think of eating applejack's)
  I have tired just about every oatmeal variation I could come up with, my favorite for a while was oatmeal with jam in it.
   One day oatmeal changed from what you eat because it's good for you to what you eat because it's good. I was visiting an elderly lady who was a friend of my fiance, she invited us over for breakfast and of course the first course of breakfast was...you guessed it, oatmeal which was the point I started looking around for mini-wheats but the oatmeal was delicious, nutty and creamy and actually tasted really good. Like the polite, modest lady she is when I asked her how to make it she just said, "oh it's just oatmeal, would you like some more?"
   So my quest to make oatmeal began, cooked hot, cooked slow, cooked in milk, thick oats, quick oats, thin oats, served with sugar, served with butter, served with cream, none measured up.
Recently though I think I have found it, or else it has been so long that I have forgotten what the original tasted like but either way this is excellent oatmeal especially on these cool mornings.

1 Cup Steel Cut Oats
1 TBSP Yogurt - as plain and pure as you can get
1 1/2 Cups room temperature water
Mix the yogurt onto the chunks of oats with a spoon till the oats are all coated, add room temperature water, cover with a cloth or plate, let sit on the counter about 12 hours or all night.
 Boil 1 1/2 cups of water, add soaked oatmeal mixture bring back to a boil then turn down heat and simmer for about 10-15 minutes.
Serve with butter, maple syrup or brown sugar and milk.

Serves 2-4 depending on how much of a morning appetite you have or how much sugar cereal your children are drooling over.

Lost: Right arm. Reward.

   I am sitting here hunched over my computer with my arm in a homemade scarf sling. I went to the farmers market Saturday and bought my weight in meat and fresh veggies. Walking around carrying my bags I felt like my arm was going to fall off and apparently it did, to a degree. I'm happy I resisted purchasing the gigantic warty pumpkins because then I would have had to carry my arm home too.      
   Fortunately we went to Ikea Saturday and purchased a desk which is the perfect height to rest my arm on while typing with no pain but I must resist the ease of the computer and hope that the table is also the perfect height to rest my arm on while I figure out how to sew 2 Halloween costumes one handed.
   I need to make a Link costume and a Hoth Rebel Trooper. I was feeling very resourceful when I realized I could use the old cover from the couch to make a Trooper costume to which costume-ee responded, "well you are going to have to cut it", I guess he thought I would just wrap him in the couch cover. I told him of course I would cut it and sew it and it would look great, after a moment of thought he said, "well I guess I could just go as a couch."
  I guess I have been much more impressed with my "homemade" Halloween costumes in the past than they have. I think the Costco Halloween isle has made them a little bitter toward me and my Halloween ethics of homemade costumes, probably because no matter how scary of a costume they request, there is always a bit of a funny side too.

Circumference of a Thought...or naught

   There is a pile of papers to go through on my kitchen counter, enough that when the boys eat I have to remind them all day not to get food on the, "pile" but I am going to sit here and write about concussions because anything, even this topic is more fun than going through the mail and bills and junk and bits of random stuff from all over the house. For someone who does not build things why oh why do I always have screws and nails in my pile of leftovers from tiding the house?
    The most exciting thing that has happened in my life recently was when my son got a concussion, I know, I should get out more and I am thinking he should get out less but hear me out.
   We were at these little sand hills with rubber mats on them and the boys were jumping their bikes off the top. I was over on the other side of the hill with the baby and did not see but heard the thump crunch of one of them crashing once again. Apparently he jumped and landed then went off over his handle bars right onto the top of his helmet. (It would probably help if he stood on his pedals instead of throwing his feet off the pedals and sitting on his seat as his bike hauls him through the air). But what do I know!

Incase you are wondering or have 3 boys like I do here is some pertanant information:
That -disclaimer- should not replace the advice of your Doctor.

When one gets a concussion the first 12 hours are the most dangerous. Wake up concussion-ed every hour if they are sleeping and make sure their pupils dilate in both eyes at the same rate.
Keep constant surveillance for first 12 hours
Keep close surveillance for first 24 hours
Make sure they know people, place and time.
Can take Tylenol for pain,
Don't take anything to keep food down as it can make one drowsy
Arnica homeopathic remedy worked well for pain

Rush to the hospital if:
Person does not wake up
Has different sized pupils
Is projectile vomiting
Has a fever
Has blood coming out of nose or ears
Has any fluid coming out of nose or ears

It's OK if:
They want to sleep
They are throwing up
Their head really, really hurts
They feel dizzy but can still walk
They are not hungry

   I can remember, amazingly enough, getting a concussion when I was about 11 years old. I was riding my horse and jumped across a ditch onto a gravel road and somehow landed right on top of my helmet, (It would probably have helped if I stood in the stirrups instead of throwing my feet out to the side and sitting on my saddle as my horse hauled me through the air). But what did I know!
   I can remember just wanting to sleep and sleep and I did, for 3 days! My mom kept waking me up and it was so annoying to me because I just wanted to sleep and she would make me touch my toes and put my chin on my chest and random stuff like that and all I wanted to do was sleep and sleep and sleep and she would bring me plate after plate piled with beef and gravy and I would eat maybe 3 mouthfuls before I was sleeping again and she kept turning on movies and kept me on the couch probably hoping that the noise would wake me up but I just slept and slept. My friend was visiting from out of town and she went home horrified and told her mom that I had died and that my Mom was just leaving me on the couch.