Mendolonium

I read a blog post yesterday at the mama years about the challenge that Type A folks (such as myself) feel at living in the moment.

I can relate.

I am fantastic at planning.  I think half of the reason I enjoy birthdays and holidays is that they involve many a list and a schedule (at least how us Type A folks party).  A passion for planning has more serious benefits too; I feel as ready as we can be for an earthquake, we hold fire drills at home, and you should see my first aid kit.  The flip side of this passion is, however, sometimes an inability to live for the present.  I vowed this year that I would strive for a relaxed, happy, and less than picture perfect holiday season; to focus on the moments with my family.  I know that these holidays with the kids hold a special kind of magic that one day won’t be so powerful.  The boys tell me as they fall asleep at night that they are dreaming of our Christmas tree and cookies with sprinkles.

Although I am not religious nor spiritual whatsoever, I enjoy the anticipation of the holiday as much as the day itself and so we celebrate advent.  Years ago my mom gifted us a simple advent calendar made up of 24 drawers arranged in the shape of a Christmas tree.  The drawers are small, they won’t hold much.  Initially we hid chocolates in the drawers, but I didn’t want to use candy this year.  Besides the fact that I don’t want my kids high on candy every night, the joy of candy doesn’t last very long.  It probably takes them about 30 seconds to devour a Hershey’s kiss.  I did include a few nights of simple treats to coincide with days when I work and we don’t have much time, but mostly I focused on activities that would be inexpensive, relaxing, and fun for all of us – not just the kids.

I’ve seen some truly fantastic advent calendars handmade by bloggers.  I have to admit that I was tempted to type out each item on red and green colored card stock and cut out each piece of paper in the shape of something cute – think wee little Christmas trees.  I did not do that.  Instead I scrawled down each item quickly on an old red file folder and then cut out squares (or squarish shapes – I’m not particularly good at cutting a straight line) and stuck them in the drawers.  It is not photo worthy.  But it will be fun.  Since the boys don’t read the blog – yet – here’s the list of what we’ll be enjoying.

 Advent 2012

1. Open a new advent calendar:  My mom found an Eric Carle themed advent calendar – it is simply a pop up – no candy and I thought it would be fun to open it each morning and save our other advent calendar for the evenings when we are all home together)
2. Go Get a Christmas Tree (This is the one I am looking forward to most!)
3. New Christmas Book:  Here Comes Jack Frost, by Kazuno Kohara
4. Hershey’s Kiss for Each Boy
5. Make Paper Christmas Decorations for Your Room
6. Pancakes with Maple Sugar for Dinner:  We’ve been reading Farmer Boy, by Laura Ingalls Wilder, and her husband Almanzo eats these frequently in the book.  Maple sugar (as opposed to maple syrup) is specifically mentioned in the book so when I spied some at Trader Joes I thought it would make a nice new treat for the kids.
7. Movie Night with Popcorn
8. Make Salt Dough Ornaments
9. Make S’mores in the Fireplace
10. Make Paper Snowflakes and Hang them in the Dining Room
11. Hershey’s Kiss for Each Boy
12. Beach Bath:  Give the Boys a beach themed bath where they get to wear their swimsuits, listen to the Beach Boys, have the water dyed blue, and eat a fruit juice popsicle.
13. Order Pizza and Mozzarella Cheese Sticks for Dinner From Our Favorite Restaurant
14. Make Crayon Ornaments with Friends
15. Carousel Tokens
16. Go to the Park
17. Read 10 Bedtime Stories Tonight!
18. Hershey’s Kiss for Each Boy
19. Make Holiday Cards and Put Together Gifts for Teachers
20. Gold Dollar Coin for Each Boy
21. Stay in Jammies All Day
22. Go Look at Christmas Lights
23. Make and Decorate Christmas Cookies
24. Open 1 Christmas Present Tonight

Do you celebrate Advent?  What will you and yours be doing?

Yesterday, I posted a “free” ad on craigslist for our broken printer.  I’ve gotten 12 emails so far wanting it – many with stories of how they above all the other craigslisters deserve this treasure.  But my favorite email is this one:

Hi there,

how r u!?

tk u 4 the giveaway.

may i ask if it’s still available?

tk u 4 ur attention 2 this message.

hope 2 hear fr u soon.

regards!

Is this the language that the young people speak these days?  Apparently I am not as young as I thought.

Regular readers will notice a new look and feel to mendolo.com.  Some of the big changes:

• The entire site is now hosted in WordPress with the blog as the “front door” of the site.
• Our gallery of photo albums is accessible via the “Gallery” link at the top of the page.  I update photos of Thomas often and am currently working on a photo album of our garden.
• Pre-blog recipes are now all “blog posts” and can be found in the recipes category.  I am currently updating the recipes and categories so that you will be able to go and easily search for a recipe based on what you are looking for, i.e., an egg-free dessert or a vegetarian entree.

I love the new look and a big “Thank you” goes to my brother-in-law Gregg for using his free time to implement the changes (in addition to hosting our site for free)!

As I mentioned in the last post my meal plans have gone somewhat awry this week so I ended up making the “drunken penne” tonight. Drunken penne is simply 1 lb of penne, tossed with vodka sauce and the cooked vegetables of your choice (I used broccoli and peas tonight), topped with “The Drunken Goat” cheese. I have been trying to develop the perfect vodka sauce recipe for quite some time. I needn’t try any longer – I have found it. I haven’t been posting new recipes due to some issues with my recipe software, but this one couldn’t wait.  It is that good. So here it is:

Gina’s Vodka Sauce