This Post Contains Three Useful Items

December 19th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Life - (9 Comments)

I’m on reprieve from my usual cooking, cleaning and other domestic duties for a bit here thanks to an early Christmas gift for the girls.

Surprise Toronto Trip

We’re in Toronto! Me, two girlies, one fetus and one Granny Weeds.

CN Tower

We had to leave Dad at home to go to that pesky thing called work. Don’t feel too bad for him though. He threw a party over the weekend, he gets a three night break from the bedtime routine and I left him with a crock pot full of No Fry Refried Beans.

Crockpot and Pinto Beans

Yesterday, Today and Probably Tomorrow

November 13th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Life - (11 Comments)

A Grilled Cheese and Pickle sandwich.

Grilled Swiss Cheese and Pickle

Real butter, sesame Ezekiel bread, Swiss cheese and a sliced Claussen dill pickle. Soooo good.

And yes, that pickle totally counts as my vegetable.

Most vegetables are completely unappealing to me right now. I expect that these odd food aversions I’m having will pass in the coming weeks, but for the time being, I’m doing my best with pickles and a lot of fruit.

(Not at the same time, but now I’m thinking…)

Not Waiting For Thanksgiving

November 6th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Life - (3 Comments)

Can you eat just coleslaw for dinner?

Coleslaw for Dinner

I can.

You can too if you want, I won’t tell. Here’s how you do it.

First, spend your afternoon at a child’s birthday party that you didn’t intend to stay at. When your sometimes-shy-sometimes-not 5 year old persuades/begs you to stay because today she’s feeling shy, you stay.

But that means instead of heading home for a couple hours to prepare a real dinner and then coming back later to pick them both up, you sit around chatting with some of the other moms who stayed too, snacking on pretzel sticks and a particularly beautiful fruit salad.

Merry Happy Birthmas

October 27th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Life - (5 Comments)

Some days you’ve totally got your act in gear.

Holly Muffin Tins

And then there are other days where you don’t. Like the kind of days where you’re forced to use holiday muffin tins for pumpkin muffins at the end of October.

Pumpkin Muffins

Good thing the horde of hungry kids at snack time didn’t notice.

Sometimes you can’t always be Suzie Homemaker. Sometimes birthday dinner comes pre-made from the Wegmans bakery and is topped at home.

Bakery Pizza Topped at Home

(cheaper and at least slightly healthier than take out!)

What Did You Learn Today?

October 13th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Life - (5 Comments)

I don’t know about you, but we learned how to ride the bus.

The Bus Stop

Crazy, no? We’ve only lived here for nearly two years now.

Did you know that Google Maps makes it EXTREMELY easy to figure out how to get from Point A to Point B on the bus?

Google Maps Bus

Yet another thing I learned today!

With an afternoon class on the schedule for the girls, we decided to try the bus and let Zak take the car to work.

The Plan:

Destination Marathon Food Prep

October 7th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Life - (2 Comments)

T minus 36 hours until Steamtown, tonight has been all about getting ready for a three hour road trip to Scranton, PA tomorrow and then a 26.2 mile race on Sunday.

I’m definitely excited to run this marathon, but I ain’t gonna lie – I’m plenty nervous too, mostly about my knee. I’ve been stretching my IT Band like Gumby on an organic taffy pulling machine and am pleased to report I’m currently pain free – but still.

I mean, that’s sounds like good news, right? I thought so too, but then I started listening to the horror stories my friend Google tells me when I search for “running a marathon with ITBS”.

A Backyard Picnic

August 28th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Life - (6 Comments)

On the weekends, I’m apt to be a bit less motivated to cook and a bit more motivated to goof around.

Everybody's Favorites

Instead of attempting to go out to eat and playing the Kids in a Restaurant game (wheeeeee!) – sometimes it’s a lot easier (and arguably more enjoyable) to hit up the grocery store and let everyone pick out a bunch of their favorite foods.

Vegetables optional. Manners too.

Weekend Dinner Time Play

So this weekend we did exactly that.  We loaded our grocery loot into a basket and hauled it to the backyard.  An impromptu picnic was in order as we watched dad finish up some yard work for our meal time entertainment.

Finger Felon: Out On Bail

June 24th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Life - (24 Comments)

I get a surprising amount of traffic from people searching the web for information on finger felons.  A finger felon is an infection in the tip of your finger and this happened to me at the end of last year.

It turns out that finger felons are not that common. Blogging about finger felons is apparently even less common. Go figure.

I feel like I owe the people in search of info on finger felons an “It’s Going to Be OK!  (Someday.)” post, so here it is.

Tough Nut to Crack

February 27th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Life - (35 Comments)

If you’ve been following along, you may recall that I recently spent some time hulling black walnuts.

These black walnuts have spent the winter curing in my cool, dry attic. Rumor has it that black walnuts are really hard to open. Rumor has it this would be why I’ve been none too eager to get cracking here.

Black Walnuts Curing in the Attic

Come to find out that when you harbor black walnuts and don’t crack them, you’ll be haunted by backyard squirrel ghosts; the lost souls of squirrels who died from winter starvation because you deprived them of all the food they would have otherwise stored for hibernating.

So I dropped off the face of the blogosphere for a month and a half or something.  Oh yes, I’m still here – new camera collecting dust while I’ve been off having fun with much of the following:

1.  The Primal Blueprint Meets The 4-Hour Body.

I devoted a bunch of posts in December to the wonders of The Primal Blueprint and how much I was digging it, right?  Well, The 4-Hour Body by Tim Ferris deserves the same accolades.  Quite informative and entertaining in many respects.  Funny, inspiring and errr, intriguing?  (Be sure to check out the chapter on the 15 minute female orgasm, for the illustrations if nothing else.)