A morning of thanks

Thanksgiving is an interesting holiday for me. For 11 years now, I’ve done a huge “feeding lots of people turkey” holiday at Mocksgiving. The result of this is that, despite my feeding-people, epicurian bent, I’ve never hosted the Family Thanksgiving. And now, of course, my inlaws are all pretty much in Atlanta and my brother considers Thanksgiving a weekend sacred to video games…. so. I don’t cook on Thanksgiving.

We’ve done a bunch of different things over the years. Back when I was young and judgmental, my husband’s family went out to dinner in a restaurant for Thanksgiving. The year Grey was born, we went back home. The first, only time I’ve been home for Thanksgiving since I left for college at 17. A few years we’ve done nothing. But I’m surrounded by awesome people, so when folks get wind of the fact we’re doing nothing, invitations appear. Several years, I went to the family Thanksgiving of a college friend. His mom is a fantastic cook, so I was sad when he moved out to California and it seemed… weird to invite ourselves without him. Last year and this year, friends from church have invited us. They have boys similar in age to ours, and are FANTASTIC cooks.

So Thanksgiving is a mellow, happy, friendly day. The last few years I’ve started a tradition of watching the Macy’s parade with the boys. I sleep in. Drink coffee. Don’t get dressed until noon. I rest. Relax. It might actually be the most relaxing day of my entire year.

Gratitude is an important part of not losing site of what’s important to you. I don’t do as great a job of it, but I’ve tried to teach my children to give thanks. Every night, as part of their going-to-bed, we have a prayer of gratitude. Grey usually just says that he’s thankful for “Everything in the universe”, although when pushed he’ll tell you he’s thankful for screens (DS, computer & TV).

But Thane has started this tradition now too, of gratitude. His favorite books are the How Do Dinosaurs books. He demands to know the names of all the dinosaurs. And of course, with the plasticity of a youthful brain, he remembers them. One of my ambitions this week is to get video of this. But at night, his litany of gratitude goes like this, Thane is thankful for … “Mommy, Daddy, Grey, Thane, Neovenator, Pachycephalasaurus, Protoceratops, Tapejara, Neovenator, Mommy, Daddy…” He can go on. It’s awesome!

One of the things I’m grateful for this Thanksgiving morning is that I have this venue to write down memories. Sometimes I look back at what was, and I’ve written down things I otherwise wouldn’t have remembered. I wouldn’t write if I didn’t know you would read this. I know this, since I tried for years pre-blogging. So thank you for being you, and reading what I have to say.

The First Five Kid

When my brother was a boy, he had a very rich fantasy life. There were two tropes: Ruff Land, where Matthew Ruff lived (it mostly involved rules) and Spaceduck. Now, Grey has always reminded me a bit of my brother, but plenty of perfectly normal kids don’t build fantasy-tropes that they talk about for months.

The author illustrates his manuscript

Then I encountered The Five Kids.

The Five Kids have awesome powers. They get in fights with bad guys. They reason with bad guys and ask them to make better choices. They get to eat all the Halloween candy. They are orphans. They are brothers. They all die at the end. They keep coming back in newer and better patterns. There are ten of them. (I know! Just makes it more awesome! Apparently the first set of Five Kids were brothers and they met another set of Five Kids and made them brothers so now Five Kids includes ten kids.)

For quite a while I think the Five Kids were actually five of the kids at school — Grey was one, and Lincoln and some of the other kids. But Five Kids has merged, melded, grown, expanded. It fills the dark and bright places of my son’s imagination — his wishes and his fears. The Five Kids are there.

Knowing how transient this can be, I sat with Grey to talk about the Five Kids today. I did explain that sometimes I write stories on the computer, and people read them. He gave his permission and cooperation to share this. Here’s his first ever Five Kids story:

Five Kids and the Bad Troll
By Grey
When the First Five Kid was very young, and four years old, he had secret powers. His name was Drago. He had ice, fire, no sensitivity* and he had flames. He makes the flames by scraping his hand.

When he walked over the bridge, a big bad troll came and said, “I’m going to shoot you up!”

So he said, “I’m going to flame you with my flames! Kaching! Kaching! Kaching!”

And then the troll ran away into the water and he was free to go.

finis

After this story, I did a brief interview with the author:

Interview with Grey
Q: How did you learn about Five Kids?
A: I went to bowling/wrestling and Jock Cina said, “The Five Kids are around here. Can you cheer?” And I cheered.

Q: Which Five Kid would you most want to be?
A: First Five Kid.

Q: What are the names of the Five Kids?
1) Drago
2) Mario
3) John Michael Robert
4) John Meana (because he’s mean to bad guys)
5) Fire Flame Guy
6) Scooby Lick
7) Fire Ice Squares
8 ) Camera (he blinds his opponents with flash)
9) Light bulb (he, uh, blinds his opponents with lights)
10) John Michael Cina Underpants (he included an illustration of Mr. Underpants)

So there’s your introduction to the Five Kids. If you talk to Grey, this is probably pretty useful, as he will assume you know what he’s talking about. I can’t wait to hear what the Five Kids do next!

The priceless document
The priceless document

*Apparently this means he’s immune to other attacks. The word choice is his.

Mocksgiving Recipes

Mocksgiving has come and gone, leaving in its wake only memories, dirty dishes and two inexplicable pounds. Mmmm… I love Mocksgiving.

This makes me hungry just looking at it

A post-party call was made for some of the recipes served. It occurs to me this might be particularly useful pre-Thanksgiving information. So, without further ado:

Cranberry Sauce with Pomegranate Molasses
Originally from Bon Apetit
1 1/3 cups sugar
3/4 cup red wine
1 12oz package fresh cranberries
3 tablespoons pomegranate molasses (recipe below)
1/4 teaspoon dried basil
2 1/2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

Stir sugar and wine in heavy saucepan until sugar is dissolved. Boil for about 8 minutes, until syrupy. Add cranberries, and boil until they pop (a minute or two). Off heat, stir in pomegranate molasses and basil. Cover and chill. Add cilantro directly before serving.

Notes: this is a very tasty relish, but a little goes a long way. Most people served themselves 2 – 3 tablespoons of this. I would say this could serve 15 or so people. I doubled it this year — I won’t do that again.

Pomegranate Molasses
2 cups pomegranate juice (1 bottle POM wonderful)
1/4 cup sugar
1/8 cup lemon juice

Heat mixture until dissolved. Simmer for about an hour, stirring occasionally, until syrupy. Store refrigerated. (NOTE: I store this in a canning jar. It might be an interesting preserve long term.)

Chocolate Chip/Peanut Butter Bread Pudding
Originally from Better Homes & Gardens Prizewinning Recipes
3 cups white bread cubes (stale is good)
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate pieces
2/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup peanut butter
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
Dash salt
2 cups milk

1) Place bread cubes in a greased 2 quart baking dish. Sprinkle with chocolate pieces. In with electric mix, beat sugar and peanut butter until well mixed. Beat in eggs, vanilla & salt. Gradually add in milk. Pour over bread, pressing bread down to make sure it’s all moistened.

2) Bake in 350 oven for 40 to 45 minutes.

Serve hot with vanilla ice cream. Feeds about as many as a pie.

I was also asked for my peach pie recipe and my bread recipe. The peach pie filling is Betty Crocker. (What? Betty Crocker is awesome!) The pie crust & bread recipes are light on ingredients and heavy on technique. I’ll share them if you really want, but the best way to learn how to make those things is to come and make them with me.

Thomas ready for carving

Some other notes… this was quite possibly my best turkey ever. It was a Butterball, so no secret in procurement. I think the trick was that we let it rest significantly longer than usual — probably twice as long. And I think that it would be even better yet if I had given it another 15 or so minutes. Don’t be afraid of the turkey getting cold. It won’t. Put tinfoil over it and let it sit for half an hour or 45 minutes before carving and it will reward you.

I also have a secret for making one turkey provide more gravy than turkily possible. I didn’t do it this year, and I now deeply regret it, as I have everything required for hot turkey sandwiches except (SOB!) gravy. When you put the turkey in the oven, add two cups of chicken broth. (Note: this is for a like 22 pound turkey. If you are making a more reasonably sized bird don’t add as much.) It will totally taste like turkey after you’re done basting, and the result will just be 1.5 cups more gravy at the end of the day.

Finally, a question. Hey mom? My lemon merangue pie crust ALWAYS schlumps. I blamed it on the pie pan I liked to use, but I didn’t use it this time and it still schlumped. How do you make an unfilled pie crust stay up on the sides? Oh well, only one thing to do with an imperfectly schlumpy lemon merangue pie. Someone hand me a fork?

My brother indoctrinated my son in Space Duck... as if I hadn't heard enough about Space Duck when my BROTHER was 5!

Thoughts on Mocksgiving morning

This is my 11th Mocksgiving morning. I’ve been thinking lately about how the age I’m entering is the height of power and responsibility, and I feel it this Mocksgiving. An endeaver that seemed unutterably grownup — a usurpation of maturity back when I first did it — now seems comfortable. It’s so much easier, this feeding of the five thousand (ok 30), now than it was 8 or 9 years ago. I know the questions — that’s the hardest part. And now I even know the answers.

As I cook, I think. I think of you. I think of what I want to tell you, so often, while I stand at the sink and gaze out at the autumn leaves falling like first snowflakes. Here are some of my thoughts this morning.

  • I wonder very much what this looks like to my sons. This holiday includes them, but it is not for them. How few holidays we have that do not revolve around “the children”. This is one. I wonder if Grey watches from the corners of the rooms, what he makes of the trope conversations that have been continued year to year since the year his parents were first married. I wonder if when they grow older, they’ll feel proud (or resentful?) that they don’t have a “normal” Thanksgiving, but rather this jubilant, crowded celebration of friendship and food?
  • This was my easiest turkey in years. Usually I end up hacking out the gizzards with tears, numb fingers and great persistence. This turkey was actually (gasp!) THAWED. I’m not sure that’s ever happened to me before, even when I managed to find a fresh 20 pound turkey two weeks before Thanksgiving.
  • I only made 3 pies this year. I didn’t make apple because no one ever eats it. I’m feeling anxious. What if people aren’t rolled out of here? I have a backup recipe in case I actually have time. What are the odds?
    Getting ready to stuff the turkey

  • My friend Corey is up for nomination to sainthood. He’s playing with Thane in Thane’s room — dealing with the barrage of “I need help!” that defines current interactions with my scion. The hardest part of Mocksgiving for me is taking care of the kids.
  • I’m a comfort cook. I make the same turkey and same stuffing every year. I make my mom’s recipes for lemon merangue pie, bread, stuffing. I innovate rarely. I sometimes feel… embarrassed? that I’m not a more ambitious cook. But on the other hand, it is who I am, and perhaps I should embrace it.
    Farmshare peach, pecan & lemon merangue (plus brownies)

  • I think a lot at Mocksgiving about Hospitality. You might not know it from the headlines about Christians, but Hospitality is a fundamental Christian virtue. I only practice pagan hospitality — the welcoming of friends. Christian Hospitality is the welcoming of strangers, of enemies even. But you must begin at the beginning of hospitality, and practice until you become good at it. Our culture does not support Christian Hospitality. It is hard to welcome the unwashed and unwanted into the fullness of your home with your beautiful babies and good china. But I think of it this day. There is also, to me, a holiness to the welcome of guests into my home. I find it profound, meaningful. When you cross my threshold, you are more welcome than you know, friends. It is one of the things I was truly called to do.
  • This call to welcome is perhaps why the one thing I don’t like about Mocksgiving is that I can’t invite everyone. This galls me. Trust me, if you wish you’d gotten an invite and you didn’t — I wish you had too. But every solution takes something fundamental from the venture. It must be my home. We must sit together. The 25 to 30 who come every year are the capacity of my house.
  • It’s a bright, sunny, warm Mocksgiving today. I love those, because the boundaries of the house bulge, and on warm days we can overspill to the yard or porch.
  • The first of my guests have already come (the aforementioned Sainted Corey). For years and years I always had this anxiety “What if no one came?”. I no longer suffer than one, to the same degree. But some of the stalwarts are not able to be here, and I wonder who will appear first at my door.
    My mother's bread recipe. We also have a loaf of Adam's bread.

  • Of course, the tragedy of Mocskgiving is that I have no time to talk in depth with the rooms full of people I love. Irony!

    (Note: if opportunity and thoughts strike, I’ll continue adding pictures and thoughts to this post until the party starts.)

    • Busiest time of the year

    This two month period is the busiest of the year for me, and the two weeks ending in next weekend are the busiest fortnight in it. I have four birthdays, Halloween and Mocksgiving, all smooshed up together. And right now I’m also super busy at work.

    So that’s a nice way of saying… don’t expect much from me until the middle of the month!

    Election Day is tomorrow

    I remain convinced that the best, most constitutional way to fix the issue of money in politics is for voters to ignore ads and money when placing their votes. Poof! Money ceases to become important, and whatever criteria we’re using to make our decisions suddenly becomes critical.

    So today, in advance of election day, I went and found my ballot, compared candidates answers on a range of questions, and made up my own mind based on stated policies who I wanted to vote for. Take that, attack ads!

    For my fellow citizens of the Commonwealth — Boston.com has a great voter’s guide. You can print or email your ballot when you’re done to take with you into the polling place. You can also tweet/facebook your endorsements. This is a great opportunity to help make America a Republic where votes can’t be bought, they have to be earned by thoughtful statements of policy. I think that’s something we can all agree on.

    Spooky Sprint

    This was a delightfully busy weekend. I’m sure you’re all expecting the “The kids were so cute and we went trick-or-treating” post, which may yet come if I get time to write it up. (Note: I just doomed any hope that such post will ever be written.) Instead, I’d like to tell you about what I did Saturday morning.

    I ran my first 5k race ever.

    Yup. I did. I know. Pretty amazing. And yes, by “ran” I mean “ran the whole way” and by “5k” I mean “5 kilometers which is like well over two miles”.

    This story starts with my new job in February. It turns out that there’s a gym in our building, which is something new for me. And the gym is cheap — like $25 a month, $150 of which are reimbursable annually. So I got a membership, figuring it probably wouldn’t work but I’d try it out. For several months I made it maybe once a week, often at about 2:30 pm when I’m completely brain-dead anyway. In spring, as the weather turned nicer, I decided to go run instead of doing the elliptical. About a third of the way through my planned course, I was too tired to continue and had to walk. I intermittently walked and ran the course. I felt completely wretched afterwards. A month or more elapsed before I tried it again. I think I made it half way through the 1.5 miles or so before I had to walk again. Maybe a month and a half ago, I managed to run the whole course without stopping. I still felt like dying afterwards. But then I started working out TWICE a week instead of once. Apparently this makes a huge difference.

    Now, this isn’t the first time in my life I’ve run. I did track in high school. I don’t remember running ever getting easy, or less painful. I ran the mile, but I was terrible at it. I only ran the mile because no one else wanted to. I hated the training. I dislike the races. I mostly remember hurting. I also ran while we lived in Malden, with my husband. Again, I don’t ever remember having it get much easier, or make much progress. I’ve never been much of a runner. It hurts all over when I’m done. But I think the real problem was frequency. In high school I don’t know what was up, but as an adult I just never worked out often enough to build on itself.

    As the days cooled down, I ran the whole course again. I added another half mile to the run. Then I started running it faster. Tuesday, a very very frustrating day, I pushed it and ran it with adrenaline and frustration powering it. I’m not sure what my time was, but I certainly went faster than I had before. I’d been toying with this whole “5k” thing for a few weeks, and I decided that maybe, just maybe, I could run the whole race.

    There’s deciding you’re going to do a run, and then there’s getting up at 6:30 on a cold October morning to get ready to go run. I did it anyway. I stood in the lobby of the YMCA building, surrounded by people dressed as cupcakes and fairies and the Cat in the Hat (I was dressed as a person pretending to be a runner), wondering what I was doing there and feeling profoundly out of place. I had confessed my ambitions to few people, but I’d passed one of my coworkers in the gym as I got my shoes on Friday and he’d given me some good advice. “Don’t start strong”, he said, “I tried to keep up the first time I ran a 5k and I nearly passed out at mile 2. Just start slow and speed up as you go through.” I considered this sound advice. I firmly set my goal to be running the entire distance.

    As the air horn went off, i was passed at on all sides, and had to restrain myself from attempting to keep up. I ran through the brisk morning air, leaves crunching under my feet, blue October skies peeking over autumnal lawns and gardens. I ran. I ran on Lebanon street — the route I’d traveled the night I gave birth to my eldest son (yelling backseat driving directions to my husband through contractions). I turned on Sylvan Street, and ran past the graveyard I’d wandered many a time. The people around me laughed and talked and caught up on the latest shared gossip. I waved at one of my son’s teachers at Mile 2 as I turned up the gravel road through the park to the top of the hill. I pondered race etiquette at the water stop, cups flung lewdly on the ground. On Main Street a convict and a cat, pushing a stroller, passed me. I called out to them — my neighbors — and we ran together for a while, before they (showoffs!) put on their final burst of speed to finish the race. Feeling pretty awesome myself, and knowing there wasn’t much further to go, I also put on speed and started passing people. At the last turn, my family was waiting. I called to Grey to join me, and he took off down the blocked street in front of me.

    I crossed the finish line 32 minutes and change after I’d departed it.

    Now, that won’t win me any plaudits. That’s over ten minutes a mile. I don’t know the winning time, but I bet it was half the time it took me. But you know what? It’s really cool when you remember and realize that the world is full of things you haven’t done yet, but you can do. I’m no gym rat. I’m just as awkward at this as you are. I didn’t have great shoes, or special clothes, or time, or a trainer. But I did it. And I felt really, really good afterwards (if a tiny bit sore today). And now I can think about what else I might want to do. Another 5k? Beat the 30 minute mark? Is a 10k within reach? (Would I want to do one?) Would Grey ever want to run a 5k with me?

    I am, for sure, a novelty seeker. I love doing new things. But I rarely do them. I’m not sure why… lack of courage? Lack of energy? But doing new things feeds my spirit. It allows me to create these entirely new memories. My previous recollections of running were almost entirely of pain. These memories include exhilaration, strength and the surprise of those first two!

    Plus, now I feel totally justified in eating more Halloween candy. I mean, hey. I just ran a 5k. Right?

    Thane is Two

    One of my coworkers had a Diwali invitation up on his screen today, and I was reminded. It was Diwali the night Thane was born. One of the attending nursing students at the birth was from Kerala, and between contractions I wished him a happy Diwali. I thought it a good omen that my son was born during the festival of lights.

    My sweet Thane is a light. He is a wonderful and joyful child. Knowing this post was coming, I’ve been thinking about what I want to tell you — tell him — about who he is at two.

    My little man

    The first thing you notice is the language. Thane is a talker. And talker. And talker. He has a remarkable vocabulary and command of language for a two year old. He is constantly commenting on the world around him. In the car, he’ll comment on the cars he passes, “Bu van! White truck! Red Essyoovee!” He clearly expresses what he wants, “I need the blue marker! I need the blue marker!” He will always repeat himself until he is satisfied or you have made it clear you have heard him. When he wants to know the name of something, he will often ask “What does this mean?” If he locates something he likes, he’ll proudly announce, “I found it!” He will learn the names of things often after hearing it only once — he remembers when you tell him what it is. He knows all these incredibly random words too — every weird animal in his stupid Young Einstein’s ABC book, the sounds every animal makes. I can understand pretty much everything he says, and he understands most everything I say. This whole verbosity can actually be kind of tiring. He has a second child’s persistence in being LISTENED TO and will repeat himself until you take the time to truly pay attention to what he’s telling you. “Yes, Thane, that is a blue car.” But there’s nothing like having him walk up to you, thumping at every step, wearing your shoes, then have him crack a grin and tell you, “Dese Thane’s shoes!”

    Thane is a young man of great passion. He loves cars with an unflinching adoration. He will wander through the house, with as many Matchbox cars as possible pressed to his chest. (Note: He usually organizes his collections of cars around colors — so he’ll carry all red cars or all green cars.) He loves his books of cars, unlike his parents who loathe and despise his books of cars and attempt to hide them where he will not notice them. While cars are his primary passion, he also really likes books. One of his birthday presents was an ABC book of construction vehicles. After I’d read it to him, he took it with great authority and said, “Thane read dis book now.” He likes construction equipment and putting things into things. He enjoys throwing balls in the backyard and running around and giving me heart attacks by trying to run and jump and slide like his big brother.
    Smiley guy!
    There are so many things that are important about him. Perhaps I should move to bullet format:

  • He has the cutest, most amazing golden curls ever
  • He is obsessed with his Scooby-doo lunch box
  • He eats huge breaksfasts — usually shovelling the cereal in with his hands
  • He loves water to a degree that scares my husband and me. Even when he submerges his head for a considerable time, he is completely unafraid. He will stay in the bathtub until he is a prune.
  • He loves talking on the phone with “gamma”
  • He’s a singer. He will sing “Old Macdonald Had a Farm” for hours, with multiple animal noises. He hates new songs, though, and will firmly tell you “No, thank you!” if you attempt to expand his repertoire

    • (

    From October2010

    )

  • He will insist he is right, past your willingness to argue, “No, dat a bu car!” (No, it really isn’t. It’s a black car!)
  • He firmly believes that car is HIS
  • He still goes to sleep like a dream. I know better than to think that is anything but sheer luck.
  • He has two friends, Puppy (who is a bunny) and Grover. They are his comfort and stay as he sleeps.
  • He sucks his thumb to fall asleep. No other time.
  • He’s incredibly tough. He falls down and gets right back up.
  • He hero-worships his big brother, whom he ALWAYS calls “Brother Grey” (never just Grey)
  • If he sees you getting your coat on, he’ll put his coat on too. Half the time, even when we’re not going to school, he insists on carrying his Scooby Doo lunchbox.
  • He’s my snuggle bug. I’m the only person he usually snuggles, but I’ll take it.

    • He is my persistent, singing, playing, happy son, and I love him with my whole heart.

    Happy birthday, Thane!

    Super hero brothers
    Super hero brothers