Let's go Krogering!

Even though I'm 30 (it still hurts to admit), I still don't have a clue as to how to put a meal on the table five days a week, let alone seven.  Now that we have a baby, cooking seems like a required skillset for a mother.  With all that said, it's been quite a bumpy road in the kitchen.

One of my good friends, Ellen, turned me onto meal planning. She plans a week of meals at a time and buys groceries over the weekend. At first, this seemed like a very daunting task.  So many decisions!  But, I worship practicality, and this seemed like a very practical approach to cooking.  As a bonus, it also allows my sweet husband the chance to "pre-approve" my meal decisions and rule out anything too weird or pricey.  We tend to not agree on all things culinary and he is quite a grocery penny pincher (we save $1,000 each year with our Kroger card). 

So, here was my first weekly menu: Monday - "meal of blah" (previously discussed); Tuesday - hot dogs, grilled tomatoes stuffed with pesto and artichokes and roasted corn on the cob; Wednesday - BBQ ribs + apple slaw ; Thursday - BBQ pizza + pesto pizza & salad.  Everything outside of Monday turned out pretty good.  Anyone have suggestions for next week?

Crock Pots...what a crock.

Someone gave me a Crock Pot as a wedding gift.  In theory it seems like a great tool in the kitchen, but, every slow cooker recipe I've tried has resulted in "eh, it's okay" reviews.  What's the deal?  Take for instance tonight's dinner - Coq au vin.  Since my husband doesn't watch the Food Network, I translate it for him as "French chicken."  From the start, I realize that my "Fix it and Forget it Lightly" coq au vin isn't likely to taste just like my $30 coq au vin from the fancy french restaurant.  But, there's a recipe and I have the ingredients (most of them anyway), so I get a little excited.  Now, I didn't have the red wine (used extra chicken stock) and I couldn't use mushrooms (J hates them), and we never have fresh thyme (or dried for that matter), but I threw it all in the crock pot and headed out the door expecting culinary mastery. 
When we return and I open my Croq pot present, I subconsciously realize that what I had was "chicken cooked in chicken stock with bacon and onions with a tomato paste sauce" and not necessarily coq au vin, but I thought my taste buds could still sing.  Think again.  The chicken turned out moderately juicy, but the sauce was ho hum and there was no resemblance of my fancy French restaurant coq au vin.  It was a nice plate of boring.  You know you have a nice dinner of "blah" when the highlight of the meal is the only thing that's fried.

So, tonight I wave my white flag of cooking defeat and plan tomorrow night's dinner of hot dogs and chips.  Hey - don't judge me.

Me Time and the MLB

It's a Friday night and the baby is asleep.  The hubs and I are alone.  I always look forward to this time so that we can reconnect as a couple and wind down our day.  However, I can always tell when a good baseball game is on.  I usually go downstairs after putting the baby down to bed to either clean up the kitchen or check facebook.  If I'm not back upstairs within twenty minutes, my sweet little husband comes down looking for me.  But, not tonight and my bet is that it's a good game between the Braves and Mets keeping him company.  So, I'm stealing a few extra minutes to update my blog.  Who knew that baseball could actually help my marriage?  Thanks Bobby Cox!

Yep, he's a momma's boy

For my ahem, 30th, birthday, JT rolled over for the first time.  Look how proud of himself he is.  And, keep in mind that he slept through the night for the first time on Mother's Day.  What did he do on Father's Day, you ask?  Nada.  He loves his momma!  XOXOXO my little puppy.

First Date Jitters

Sweaty palms, rapid heartbeat, inability to sleep....these are all symptoms of a fifteen year old on her first date.  Yet, thanks to the internet genious of meetup.com, I was experiencing these first date jitters in anticipation of my first Mom date. A bookclub, innocuous enough, seemed like a neutral enough venue.  Keep in mind, the only all-female get togethers I've ever experienced involved a basketball, buckets of sweat and plenty of unattractive athletic gear.  As a jock, the world of non-athlete women is as foreign of a world to me as a Yankee Catholic at a Southern Baptist revival.  I have NO idea what non-athletic women talk about all the time. 

So, I went into the unknown carrying my Rachael Ray appetizer and my copy of the Help, the month's designated read.  I was the first to arrive and the only one who found the group on the internet.  Despite talking a little bit too much about the book, I think I did okay.  There were six other women, most stay at home moms, half Southern, all thin (why did I notice that?) and (thankfully) nice. It was fun and my appetizer was the fanciest one there believe it or not...who would've thought?  The book was about the stories of Black maids that worked for white women in Jackson, Mississippi, during the 1950's.  As we were discussing the women of the book, and families we knew who had help, it struck me that this was the first time I'd ever shared such a communal dialogue with a group of women outside of sports and family.  It seems significant.  There was a complete void of competiton and it felt very new to me.  Nice, but new.

Maybe this stay at home mom thing isn't so scary after all.

A vacation from sleep

Have you ever heard anyone say that they needed a vacation to recover from their vacation?  My guess is that they were probably traveling with babies.  We took our three and half month old, JT, for a week on the beach in Charleston, South Carolina, along with seven of our friends.  Little did we know that the nine hour car ride from Nashville to Folly Beach would be the easy part.  Starting with the first night, and every night thereafter, JT woke up every 2 hours.  Since we were sharing a room with the baby and staying in a beach house with seven other people, we could not let him cry himself to sleep.  Being new parents, we had not even considered the possibility that the change might affect the baby's sleeping pattern.  So, for seven lovely nights and six fun-filled days, we took a vacation from sleep.  And, oh yeah, a few other things happened.  Here are some highlights:

1 - I was pooped on during lunch in a fancy restaurant.
2 - I b-fed the baby while standing in a bathroom stall, sitting on the toilet of an unconditioned restroom, and sitting on the floor of a culinary store.  (Gross, I know.)
3 - I changed the baby's diaper on said fancy restaurant's ladies' room sink and on said culinary store's restroom floor.
4 - I sat on the street in Charleston with the baby for an hour and people watched while I missed my Low Country cooking demonstration. 
5  - I had a nice momma meltdown on day 6 trying to take family photos on the beach. 

I have learned a few very important things from this experience.  First, there is no place like home.  No matter what paradise you visit, nothing beats the comfort of your own things.  Second, spending time with your hubby and baby can be the best vacation in and of itself.  Despite the good food, exploring and relaxing on the beach, my favorite moments, however short, were those of me and J sharing special moments with the baby.  Listening to the baby find his voice, watching him try to figure out how to get his toes in his mouth and getting splashed by him for the first time during his bath - those are the sweetest moments.

I'm not sure I had to lose a week's sleep and travel 1,142 miles for these nuggets of knowledge, but I'll chalk it up to experience.

Jack Black the Moralist

My brain and my heart are TNT wrestlers right now to see who will win the argument over whether to work or stay home (and how long).  They are TNT wrestlers and not Olympic wrestlers, because they are not displaying much logic or self-respect.  No, they are running around in neon tights waving metal chairs and 80's hair.  Why?  Well, I think every mother wrestles with this choice and is banted around the ring with her irrational emotions.  I could blame it on the hormones (thanks, they are fun), but I think it's mostly about fear.  Fear that if I don't work that I'll be handicapping my long-term financial and career future.  What if I have to support myself or our family later in life?  How will I be able to market myself back into a good paying job (that I just gave up)?  One of my strongest fears is that my brain and intellect will slowly dissolve into a pool resembling the Cartoon Network logo...What if my contribution to conversations includes the latest news as reported on the Today show and what's on sale at Target?  I think I'd rather be forced to wear neon pink and green stretchy pants and wrestle a tiny band of midgets.  Wait...is that a sign from the universe that I want more children?

I am learning that when I am going crazy on the inside, that what I really need is to be still and listen deeply.  I am currently reading Living Buddha, Living Christ,  by Thich Nhat Hahn.  Most of us know that Buddhism encourages the practice of listening deeply through meditation, but Christ also practiced listening deeply when he was in the Garden of Gethsemane.  Modern moms are pulled in all directions, physically caring for their children, spouses/partners, families, friends and sometimes themselves; how easily our emotions follow this back and forth on the ropes of life.  It is a great challenge to stop the running and be still.  But, when I am still and my self goes quiet and all my worries melt away, all I see is the happiness that surrounds my son and my life.  And I know that I am meant to be with him right now and nowhere else.

Maybe this means I am growing...I have had a lot of experience with growing of late thanks to my 40 pound pregnancy.  But, perhaps I am expanding in more ways than my waistline or jean size.  Like Jack Black said in Nacho Libre, "Sometimes, when you are a (hu)man, you wear stretchy pants."  I doubt that my body will ever shrink back to its original size and shape, but my heart won't either.  And, I am okay with that.

As an aside, I concur that it is a sad social commentary on myself and society that I am quoting a Jack Black movie for moral guidance.  But, hey, he is a monk in the movie....