s[wan]son night

when i was little, i thought tv dinners were fabulous.

hmmm. i think i probably just dated myself with that statement. heh.

[putting in dentures and squinting from rocking chair] don't know what a tv dinner is/was? it's just what they used to call frozen dinners back in my day. they were in divided trays made of foil, because there were no microwaves back then. you actually turned on the OVEN and baked it, and it wasn't ready in 5 minutes, but more like 25. oh, yes. and they usually consisted of a meat entree, a starch, and a veggie. salisbury steak was my favorite.

i know i've made/posted about salisbury steak before, but seriously, this recipe is just so delicious. and last night, i served it in true tv dinner-style - with mashed potatoes and corn. all i needed was a divided plate, but i settled for a plain old dinner dish instead.


huh. i guess mine wasn't accurate after all - i didn't have dessert in the mix. oh, well.

MIL enjoyed dinner with us too, since she was hanging out with us after a long day with g-wan - her MIL. heh. it's nice to be able to serve her dinner and do her dishes for a change.

see? i told you my dinners were pretty uninspired these days. ho-hum.

i'm a freak of nature

i don't like chocolate chip cookies fresh from the oven.

well, i like making them. i love the way they make the house smell. and i sure love to eat them - just not when they're warm and gooey, the way most normal human beings do. nope, i always wait until the next day, when they're completely cooled off and the chocolate has solidified again. weird, huh?

this got me thinking about my other weird food-related quirks. you already know i don't do fruit - i like fruit-flavored stuff, but i won't touch anything that contains fruit chunks. texture. ew. and yes, this includes avocado. gross.

but there are lots of others, like when i'm spreading something on any bread-like substance (toast, rolls, bagels, etc.). i have to cover the entire surface with whatever i'm putting on there - edge to edge, corner to corner - not a single bite can be left without. i'm cool with food touching on my plate, or mixing sweet and savory (sometimes). i like my ice cream a little melty - when i was little, i'd put it in the microwave to soften it for a few seconds. i never heard the end of that one from my grandfather. i prefer my water to be at room-temperature (i once heard that j-lo does this, so my friend quirky, who also liked her water sans ice, and i dubbed it "j-lo water"), although everything else i drink has to be ice cold - milk, juice, soda (preferably coke on ice in a glass). i love mushrooms, but won't eat 'em raw. i hate cilantro and hard-cooked egg yolks.

there are more, but i think you already think i'm a freak as it is. might as well not add even more fuel to the fire.

in other news, the teen managed to hurt her ankle again in p.e. on monday. and this time, it was the OTHER ankle! oy. it's her week with her dad, but when the nurse wasn't able to reach him to pick her up, i got the call. and although it was under not-so-great circumstances (they even had to bring her down from the field in a wheelchair because she couldn't put any weight on it), i was excited to get some extra bonus time with her.

she got picked up pretty quickly, though, and then we spent the afternoon trading text messages. yesterday morning, the phone rang, and my trusty caller ID told me it was the ex. usually, the sight of that name and number fills me with dread, but i knew this call was most likely teen-related, and i picked it up quickly.

turns out that she still couldn't stand on the leg with the injured ankle, so he decided to keep her out of school and take her straight to the doctor. x-rays had already been taken and the ankle proclaimed as sprained (not broken, thank the good lawd), and they were waiting for the doctor to return to give them a note to pull her out of p.e.

shockingly, it turned into probably the longest conversation the ex and i have had in years. we chatted and laughed and talked about old friends (who all maintained their friendships with him after we split up), caught up on relatives, discussed other stuff going on in each other's lives. and it was really *gulp* great.

i got to thinking that a lot of people tend to remember the good things in failed relationships. but not me - i've been so consumed with the bad (SO much bad) in ours that i'd forgotten that there was actually some good in our twelve years together. i mean, come on - i like to think i'm fairly smart, so there had to be some reason that we lasted so long, right?

i don't know if this will lead to improved relations between us from here on out, but it was nice to be reminded that, aside from the teen, the relationship i'd had with the ex hadn't been all bad.

speaking of the teen, it turns out that the doc decided her sprain was bad enough that it warranted a walking cast. behold:

oy vey! she gets to rock this thing for two weeks, and it's scheduled to come off, of all days, on her birthday. sheesh.

the bean let me take more pictures of her:

i saw a recipe for cream cheese mints last week, and ever since, it's been haunting me. i love cream cheese. i love mint. and i love sugar. sounded like a winner to me. but i didn't have a special occasion to make them for. although i'd spent the entire day in my pajamas, so i decided that was good enough.

these are yummy - creamy, sweet, with a light minty flavor. reminds me of those shamrock shakes i loved so much last month. mmmmm.

and that leads us to last night's dinner. nice segue, huh? but the hub said it was one of his all-time favorite meals, and it's so simple and delicious that i had to share. i think i've made it before, but all that high praise got me all proud and happy.

laughing cow chicken is a recipe i discovered while surfing the cooking board on the nest. i paired it with some quickie rice pilaf from a package and added some delicious spinach salad.

hmmm. it seems like my recipes are becoming rather repetitious. booooring. time to find some new ones!

brusha, brusha, brusha

the bean is back to normal! yay! and to celebrate, she got to play with her very first set of crayons. they're in cute little holders designed for toddlers to get a good grasp on 'em.

she's actually played with some before - restaurants always give her a set when we go out to eat, and she's come home with green and blue teeth in the past. heh. anyway, it's wonderful to have my happy, shiny baby back.

i made jessica's favorite recipe for chocolate chip cookies again. i think this is my very favorite too - it's been my go-to recipe for the last several batches. i pretty much have it memorized. the wans' cookie jar is rarely empty.

the bean and i watched the laker game together. she was highly amused at my antics, shouting and cheering and gesturing towards the tv. i'd chant "kobe! kobe! kobe!" and she would mimic me, chanting in her own babble and doing a little hop. it was pretty funny.

and during halftime, i got her ready for bed and then busted out her brand new toofbrush.

she's pretty familiar with a toothbrush, although she's used to her daddy's electric one. so she checked it out for a bit before shoving it in her mouth.

then she decided it would be best to stand in the sink while she did her bidness.

"how YOU doin'?"

"this thing doesn't taste like anything."

"ah, screw it. i'll make mom happy and just do it."

she liked it so much, she decided to keep on brushin'. in the living room.

and then figured she'd check if the other end was any more fun.

i tried to get her to show me her clean pearly whites when she was done, but she was pretty coy about it.

before the third quarter was over, she was out like a light. and i had to cheer silently for the rest of the game.

go lakers!

emo bean

my poor little misera-bean was teething all. weekend. long. ugh.

until easter weekend (which she spent grumpily teething, too), we'd been lucky - she hadn't been sick even once in her little life. [knocking on wood] no ear infections, colds, coughs, barfing. she rarely even had spit-up issues when she was really little. and the only time we'd given her any kind of medication was before doctor's appointments - a little tylenol to help ease the pain of those nasty shots. quite a healthy little bean she was.

and then on saturday morning, she woke up cranky and hot as all hell. she was fighting a fever, super clingy, didn't want to eat a thing, and missed her morning poop! TMI, i know, and she'll kill me for that one day, but the bean is uber regular. like freaking clockwork.

when she was able to fall asleep, she looked so sweet and peaceful.

as you can see, today's visual aids are black and white, to emphasize the emo-ness.

but when she woke up, i got this:

and this:

then we got in the car to head over to the grandparents' for dinner, and she was the queen of silly faces.

the tylenol and homeopathic teething meds must've kicked in during the ride, too, because she turned it on when we got there.

she even sat down and folded her hands to pray before the meal was served.

i peeked in her mouth and spied the problem - a ginormous molar popping through her red, angry gums way in the back. poor little thing.

i just want my shiny, happy baby back. please? soon? kthxbai.

super sweet birthday treats

a funny to make you smile:

when the teen is at her dad's, i show her picture to the bean and try to teach her how to say her name. or, at least, part of it. but i learned recently that i totally and completely screwed it up:

"hey, babe, who's that?" as i point to the picture.
"thaaaaaaat!" squeals the bean.

and when the teen gets home, i say "look who's here!" and the bean breaks into a huge smile and exclaims "thaaaaat!"

aw, shit. i inadvertently caused the bean to call her big sister "thaaaaat!" instead of her name.

"you're such a butthole, mom!" says the teen, as i dissolve into gales of laughter. oops.

today is one of the teen's new BFF's birthday. so she and their other friend, rock-el, decided they wanted to bring her some balloons and treats to celebrate.

the birthday girl, blondie, loves my snickerdoodles, and so i offered to make some for them to bring to her.

my stupid, unevenly-heating oven somehow ended up at 500 freaking degrees, and you could smell burning cookie dough from downstairs. not to mention, when i looked in the oven, there was a weird wire hanging down from the top (i've gotta call management to fix that), and although the cookies on the pan were perfectly fine, i noticed that the wire had dragged along the edge of one of them. of course, i saw this a little too late, as i pulled the pan out and the chunk of cookie dough fell smack on the floor of the damn oven. and that's what burnt to a crisp. what a pain in the ass. but hey, at least the rest of the cookies were yummilicious.

the girls also decided to make some muddy buddies, a super delicious concoction of chocolate, peanut butter, and rice chex cereal. well, you could use any kind of chex, but i like rice. they put a bunch of it into a purple party bag, dropped some cookies into another, and put them in a cute little plastic pink pail, which they decorated with a black sharpie.

in the midst of the madness, the bean thought it would be fun to try on mommy's shoes.

our original plan for dinner was to scarf down some leftover enchiladas, cold sesame soba noodles, and pulled pork sandwiches, but when the hub suggested picking up a cheese pizza from costco, no one argued with him. mmmm, i love me some costco pizza.

and this morning, rock-el came over before school to put the finishing touches on the birthday extravaganza. i'd promised them that i'd make that extra-special disneyland french toast, and i delivered. hey, i love any excuse to make that stuff, it's so good. she and the teen were quite appreciative - and i enjoyed polishing off the leftovers after i dropped them both off at school.

some days i totally give myself the mom of the year award. today is one of 'em. heh.