Monkey Lobster

dinner time

I could go on about dinner time, but I won't, instead I'll thank our parents for giving us this wonderful tradition. Thank you.

Too much fun............

My home was packed with family and friends this past weekend. It's hard for me to accept sometimes that now we are the grown-ups, the parents, the ones responsible for making everything happen. It turns out that we eat better and have more fun than they ever did.

I remember sitting up late one night with Sara when we were teenagers, she wondered if we would ever have kids and hang out together with our families. This time she wondered if our children would hang out together without us someday.

There was lots of food and drink, dancing and singing. Turns out that printing up the lyrics to "Sweet Child of Mine" was one of the best ideas I've ever had. Feel free to ask to listen to the recording (recordings?) of us doing it on my iphone.

It was so great to settle into this new house of mine. There was a kids table, a tweens table and a teen and grown-ups table. A couple of the kids were confused about my status, they decided that I must be a grown-up because I was so tall. This made me happy. As did the breakfast that arrived with one of our guests of pickled, smoked and cured fish and an array of other items that can only be found in New York City. With so many small vultures around I thought it would be most wise to put the spread in the center of the grown-ups table where we could guard it on all side and throw small scraps to the vultures to keep them back.

This little blog of mine is kind of an insurance policy for me. If my house were every to catch on fire and I could only grab a few thing I would not need to grab boxes of photos because they are all archived right here.

I just thought I should add this one to the collection.

just wanna have fun

Well, we have moved from outdoor to indoor.

And these girls are serious. And feisty, and fearless, and tough, and smart, and a whole lot of fun. After an undefeated season we had our big championship game last night. My heart was beating so fast I thought that it was going to beat right out of my body and run out there on the field with the girls.

We were down one then tied, then down one, then tied, then down one, then tied, then down one, then tied, then down one, then tied and then lost in that last few minutes. We play in a league two age groups older than our girls, and even though we played a smarter, more skilled and more sophisticated game of soccer, we just got beat by size.

I love to stop and think about how good this activity is for their growing brains. How in the moment they are, how hard they are working, how committed they are, and how it will carry through into their lives.

This past fall I started playing in a co-ed grown-up league myself. It has made me more patient with Elsa about putting her socks, shin guards and shoes on, they are a real pain. (I'll try not to talk about my current knee injury that's had me picking up my guitar more often that usual.)

But most recently, the coach I assist has given me the keys to the car and I'll be coaching these girls solo for the up coming season. Maybe he won't text me too much from his seat on the stands? 



But what is really comes down to is that, girls just want to have fu-un. It's all they really want.

sans enfant

Doing something special without the kids is a real delicacy around here, so I thought I'd archive the event.

The meal was inspired by the idea of staying in and drinking vodka and eating caviar. I was reminded that the last time we went out sans enfant with this group of friends, I fell out of my chair and onto the floor in the middle of the French restaurant. The restaurant laughed with us, not at us.

I did my best to behave this time, but you know you've had too much vodka when after licking the inside of the caviar jar you mistake your lens cap for the lid.


The short but sweet evening consisted of food, drink, lots of laughter and some old fashion booty shaking. It's nice to get away from the kids on occasion and even nicer to have such wonderful friends to do it with.

making extraordinary out of ordinary

We just get so excited when Cyrus does something ordinary. There is a lot that he doesn't do,that maybe he won't do, but he does cut with scissors.  And I can't help but rejoice in his extraordinary accomplishments. Feel free to join in.

corn dog

I don't care much for the game itself, but I love to make something obscene for the Super Bowl. Corn dogs seem to fit just right.

I found a standard old cornbread recipe, made it a little thicker by cutting down on the milk and adding a little extra cornmeal, some chopped spicy peppers and a little extra honey. Then I dipped the hot dogs into the batter and laid them on some parchment paper and baked them for about 20 minutes at 425.

They were pretty good, but the home team lost the game.

Valentines Past

Ta-Da!!!!