This just in: 1 scoop of melty vanilla bean ice cream + 2 crumbled Trader Joe’s Candy-Cane Joe-Joe’s = Not Bad, I Tell You, Not Bad At All.

Unrelated to the ice cream and cookies: I am about to undertake a craft project that I think will be crazy-easy, which is a sure sign that it’s going to take eight times longer than I expect and will require all kinds of seam-ripping, supergluing, and general creative problem-solving to salvage materials when I mess it up.

Isn’t that always the way? If I expect it to work, it isn’t going to. I understand this. Which means that on some level, I DON’T expect it to work. So when I expect something to work out, I also expect it not to work out.

Hmm. Suddenly I’m the Sicilian kidnapper guy in Princess Bride. I clearly cannot choose the wine in front of you, and I clearly cannot choose the wine in front of me.

And now I sound like I’m stalling. Which I might just be.

But answer me this: if I put another bowl of ice cream and cookies next to my sewing machine, will that be my consolation prize when I get stuck, or will it keep me from starting? That is the philosophical question of the day.

I know, I know, I’m supposed to be writing yet another winning blog post (ha!) (and by winning I don’t actually mean winning anything) because it’s still November. Also, this week has seen a couple of seriously lame posts. I realize.

And what am I doing right now? I am scouting salt dough recipes and reading blogs and looking up the ingredients for oat bars and entering Portobello Pixie’s 12 Days of Christmas giveaways and, you know, other really important stuff. Really. Important.

At any rate. Today it rained. A bit. The forecast called for a quarter inch of rain over the course of the day, and I imagine that was pretty close to accurate. The kids were crazy-excited to see water! falling! from the sky! and to splash in the measly puddles.

I always feel guilty when the forecast calls for something other than our typical 70 degree days, because a) since we live in the Land of No Weather (aka San Diego), we’re never prepared for the little bit of weather we do get (we have no rain boots, no slickers, no fun kid umbrellas); and b) the kids enjoy it so much, I feel like we’re depriving them of seasons by living here.

Then I realize I’m a loon and get over it and enjoy the five whole minutes of rain before we get back to our regularly scheduled sunshine all the time.

Dude. It is now 11:20 at night on the second day of Thanksgiving weekend fun. I have two regularly sleeping children, one sick child, and one AWAKE THREE-YEAR-OLD.

I love the crazy non-routine-ness of the holidays!

(Ah, you see? Sarcasm has returned. As promised.)

Thanksgiving morning, Dane and I and the kids cut circles out of construction paper. On each one, someone wrote something they were thankful for. We stuck the circles to the sliding-glass door in our living room, which happens to be the landing place for much of our seasonal artwork. (Snowflakes will be taped to it very very soon.)

We started with big things on big circles: family, friends. After a while the kids each took a stack of little circles and wrote every last thing they could think of. They were thankful for parents. For siblings. For heaven. For farms and birds and nature. Also for toys. And so many things I wouldn’t have thought to list: they were thankful for light. For air. For water, and bathtubs.

And I, for my part, am so thankful that I get to hang out with these cool little people every day, even the days when they’re more thankful for their toys than for their parents, who make them tidy up before bed. I should probably cut out another circle and add that to the collection.

I’d add one that says I’m thankful not to be shopping the day after Thanksgiving, but the kids wouldn’t know what to make of that. So I’ll just be thankful for it privately.  (Uh, as privately as one can be, once one has written it on a public blog on the internet.)

What about you? Any thankful thoughts you want to share here? We can get back to our regularly-scheduled cynicism/sarcasm/complex appraisals of life tomorrow. For now: I’m thankful for you. Thanks for being there, internet (and in-person) friends.

May your day be as exciting or as uneventful as you desire.

(I’m aiming for uneventful, as I continue to be traumatized by this memory of Thanksgiving past.)

But either way: may your day be blessed.

I forget, from year to year, that some of my kids are too young to remember traditions.

A three-year-old, for example, may not remember the whole idea of Thanksgiving dinner.

And a vegetarian three-year-old may not have yet realized that not everyone eats the way her family does.

So when people are discussing their holiday preparations, she may be puzzled. She may look from one adult to the next, trying to fit their conversation into her understanding of the world.

Finally she will ask, “Do they mean they’re going to FEED a turkey? There will be a turkey there, and everyone can feed it?” Her little eyebrows will go up, hopeful.

And then, of course, you have to decide: do you tell the truth and freak her out (plus crush her newfound dream of hand-feeding live poultry), or lie and keep her world cruelty-free just a little while longer?

Or do you point in the other direction and say: “Oooh, look! Something shiny!” And hope for the best?

Things I learned from upgrading my blogging software over the weekend:

1.    That handy “5 minute installation” only takes 5 minutes if you follow all the directions without screwing anything up. And maybe not even then. I wouldn’t know. I’ve never managed that. But I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.

2.    When it says “do not delete these files:” and then gives you a list of files? You probably want to NOT DELETE THOSE FILES. Because if you do? Yeah, ain’t nothing going to work anymore. Following directions = Good idea.

3.    If you do happen to accidentally delete your necessary, uh, stuff, you will be glad that you followed Direction Number 1, which was to back up all your files. You did back up all your files, didn’t you? Didn’t you? Wait, did you? Oh, you did. Heart attack averted. Excellent.

4.    Restoring the backup will take about eleventy million years. Have a paper bag handy for hyperventilating purposes.

5.    After restoring the accidentally deleted files, you still have to install the software you started trying to install an hour and a half ago.

6.    DON’T DELETE THE SAME FILES ALL OVER AGAIN.

7.    And… ta-daaa, 113 minutes later, the blog looks exactly like it did before upgrading. Except on my end, where the dashboard looks all different and I don’t know where any of the features are. Awesome. We should really do this more often.

Dear Internet,

I’ve been neglecting you today, and I probably will tomorrow as well, because the library gave me good stuff this week: The Help, by Kathryn Stockett, and Liar, by Justine Larbalestier. (Yes, Liar is a Young Adult novel. I’m not that old. Okay, yes, I am that old. I’m not really exactly totally completely the target audience for this novel. I’m reading it anyway—devoured half of it already this evening.)

Also on the hold shelf for me at the library this week: Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World. So you can see I’m a tiny bit busy. Between the reading and the avoiding preparing for the holidays, I’m swamped.

Whoops, did I say that thing about avoiding the holidays? Shouldn’t have mentioned that. Discussing the whole looming-holidays-thing impairs my ability to be in denial. If I keep pretending they’re not getting ready to run me over like a freight train, maybe they won’t! On that note: anybody have any book suggestions?

xo.
me

PS – By “Internet” I mean news stories and email and shopping and research and such. I have in no way been neglecting to read my 96 trillion favorite blogs. Or facebook. Just to be clear.

PPS – I know I just wrote a dear-something-else post yesterday, but hey. It’s been a slow weekend.

Dear Cinnamon Oat Cookies:

BAKE FASTER. I am waiting to eat you, and I am running out of patience.

Love,
Melissa

P.S. – The recipe.

Cinnamon Oat Cookies

1 cup oil (because some of us around here can’t eat butter, even if others of us think butter is tasty.)
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar

1 egg
1 tsp vanilla

2 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
1/2 cup flour (I used spelt, but any old kind will do.)
1/2 cup wheat germ (so we can pretend they’re Healthy Cookies. Ha ha ha ha.)
2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt

Combine oil & sugars.
Beat in the egg & vanilla.
Add oats, flour, wheat germ, cinnamon, & salt.
Drop onto cookie sheet.
Bake at 350deg F for 10-15 minutes, or until the edges turn golden brown.
Eat. And eat. And eat and eat and eat. Maybe with ice cream.

[The scene: almost bedtime. Bigger kids are finding pajamas, brushing teeth, that kind of thing. Dane and I are sitting on the couch in the living room, chatting about this and that.]

Says I to the three-year-old, who is already pajama-ed and needs to settle down, “Audrey, do you want to sit on my lap and listen to Daddy tell me about his day?”

“Yes,” says she, clambering up. “Also, I don’t know what Daddy does at his office when he goes there all day. So next he should tell me that.”

This is a good question, especially when you’re three. What do adults do at that mysterious place called Work? Still, all I could think was, at least she didn’t ask what I do all day.