Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from October, 2008

Yes, I'm making supper!

OK... finally figgered it out. ~ Multi-veggie barley soup (ie leftover slimy fridge celery plus frozen cut-up veggies) ~ Pasta (casarecce) in creamy garlic tomato sauce (ie the rest of the cream cheese and tinned-tomatoes) ~ Sweet potatoes like we had on Yom Tov in the oven with butter & brown sugar Mmm... and then off to aerobics to work it all off! <3 J

Birthday Boy Jollity

Yay! Somewhere along the line, we made it to 14 without killing this boy. Family dinners have become a real party as Daddy gives away all his junkiest possessions (a binder full of provincial park brochures to YM as a remembrance of this summer's wonderful camping trip - BONUS: "you can keep the binder"). When he's not divesting himself of the stuff he can't take with him, he's dispensing advice - offering to buy me a cemetery plot, exhorting me to care for my teeth, etc. This week's good news is that my root canal wasn't... it turned out the decay wasn't that extensive and we managed to avoid drilling into the root - for now. Dr. S assured me that it might or might not "stick" and it might need a root canal at a later date. Oh, well. Tonight's Supper: NO CLUE! <3 J

What Naomi's getting

Well, her birthday's still almost five months off, but if anyone asks what she wants, here it is: TEKNO the robotic BOUNCING puppy! Available at Sears for only $70! We have a totally old-school Tekno I bought Elisheva a million years ago. Even with batteries, he no longer has the pep he once did, but this is honestly one of the best electronic toys I have ever, ever seen. Some of the reviews on epinions say their kids got bored with it very quickly, but our kids have NEVER tired of switching him on and letting him run around. And even now that our Tekno doesn't really switch on, Naomi and Gavriel Zev love him to bits. So I'm hoping a new one will provide just as many years of fun. Let's hope so, cuz this is what I'm suggesting to the first person who asks what she wants! <3 J

The baby's gift arrived!

Well, here's what I got him... and let me just say, he was TOTALLY surprised! It's a Baby Bottoms Doll. They're available in various ethnicities, but I ordered this one, which is hispanic, because the caucasian model is so very, very unnaturally white. The shade of white my father has turned lately. Deathly-pallor white. Aren't these the sweetest little "babies"? They're anatomically correct, but not OVERLY so, if you know what I mean. Some of them look like something cops would use with abused children, all in-your-face and dangly. This guy is cuddly and comes with a diaper so you can still take him to shul. ;-) (Naomi has his big sister already: http://www.kidsandgrandkids.com/products/large/hispanicbg.jpg ) Bad experience ordering it, however. Ordered from a company called dollslikeme.com based on my two criteria: had to ship internationally, and had to take PayPal. Those two things totally limited the playing field, so I was happy to find

Under Pressure!

Got Freecycled a Lagostina pressure cooker (Brava model?)! So last night, our first on-our-own, non-Shabbos, post-Yom Tov meal (last Thursday night, we had leftovers), I made pressure-cooker "risotto." Vegetables, mushrooms, wine, leftover chicken soup, Louisiana chicken sausage, whatever else I had sitting around, plus some Arborio rice. Mmm... I put "risotto" in quotes, however, because it wasn't creamy and soft like I suspect real capital-R Risotto is supposed to be. The dumb thing wouldn't come up to pressure for the longest time, so basically, I suspect the rice cooked in the normal time. Veggies were nice and soft and eatable, however. The red stuff below is leftover meatballs from Shabbos. Also, I dumped the leftover chicken soup in the pressure cooker, but didn't want to waste the nice kreplach, so I fried them in my small pan a la pot stickers - yummy! They're the slightly slimy-looking things at the 11:30 position on the plate at the

Belly Button Surgery Nummies

They didn't say no, anyway. Just not the morning of the surgery, or the 24 hours following. I can't imagine how we'll go 2 days without nummies, though... or have him shlepped back and forth so he can get a little nummies the week I'm away. Or how I'm going to possibly take a week out of my busy life... :-((( J ----- Original Message ----- From: <> To: "Jennifer" <> Sent: Thursday, October 16, 2008 2:04 PM Subject: Re: Shouldice Hospital - food inquiry > Dear Mrs. MamaLand: > > Thank you for your follow up inquiry. It may be a good idea to prepare as > many bottles of breast milk as you can before your admission. The morning > of surgery you will be mildly sedated and this will not be a good time to > breast feed. The residual anaesthetic in your system makes breast feeding > unfavourable post operatively for at least 24 hours and after that you > should be fine. You should inform the nurses of your wishes to have

Sukkos Meal Plan

Meal Monday Tuesday Wednesday Day   Glozics   Round Challah Salmon w/honey,mustard Some Kinda Soop Blintz Loaf thing Crunch-E-Cheez Neapolitan Cake Goldberg   Steak Salad Green Beans Honey cake   Night     Ballas   Round Challah G fish ballies Pea Soup Cabbage Rolls Honey Cake Judy   Round Challah G fish ballies More Pea Soup Shepherd's Pie Honey Cake  

Fw: Products: Irresistibles, Selection, Master Choice, Equality, Solutions 1-2-3

----- Original Message ----- From: "Customer Care-Metro ON" < > To: < > Sent: Thursday, October 09, 2008 8:07 AM Subject: RE: Products: Irresistibles, Selection, Master Choice, Equality, Solutions 1-2-3 Dear Ms. MacLeod. Thank you for tyour e-mail. Our Corporate Brands Department has informed me that they have just confirmed that the 2 vendors in the running for the new IS Pasta business are both Kosher.  So when vendor changes (4-6 months), the new IS product will be Kosher. Kindest regards,   Lucie Gignac Customer Care Specialist Metro Ontario Inc.

Ant swarm erev Shabbos!

Gack! I'm still covered in ants from this crazy swarm going on outside... must be mating day! I think I'll be feeling creepy crawlies, both real and imagined for a while... I went out to take pictures and only too late realized I'd been colonized. After Yom Kippur Supper: ~ Blintzes (too-thick too-big skins by Elisheva Chaya, filling by Ted, stuffed by Ted & me) ~ Honey-Mustard Salmon by Yerachmiel Meir - just right on the second attempt! The first attempt involved stirring all the ingredients, including mustard and bread crumbs, together in a bowl. Whoops! ~ Lime pie by MOI! ~ Ace Bakery bread Mmmm... Shabbos food: ~ Challah ~ Chicken Soup (made ahead and frozen since Wednesday) w/ kneidlach by me ~ Garlic-Mayo Shake n' Bake Chicken by Ted ~ Leftover potato broccoli kugel from before Yom Kippur, by me ~ Leftover cranberry kugel from before Yom Kippur, by me ~ Chocolate cake by Elisheva, baking as I write this... ~ Pumpkin spice cake with Orange Frosting by me -

Dull Pasta Letter to Metro Stores

"We've shopped in our new Metro store (formerly Dominion) twice so far.  I've been dismayed to notice that none of the Irresistibles brand pasta seem to have kosher certification.  Since most (if not all) of the national brands of pasta and other stores' brands do as well, I'm surprised this isn't a feature of your product.  I'm wondering if you have plans for kosher supervision in future.  Your response is appreciated.  Thanks!"

Brilliant! Idea! What to get for the baby who has every THING!

Mary (big kids' grandmother, but I just call her my mother-in-law because I promised I would never divorce her) called yesterday to ask what she could get the baby.    She was on her cell and had her hands on some probably gorgeous baby-outerwear thing at the time, but I had to say NO MORE CLOTHES because their dresser is literally overflowing... okay, what they need is a new dresser, but that's not a great birthday present. So I asked another mama, Rachel, what to get for the baby who literally has everyTHING he could possibly want... we are actually asking people to not send any more stuffed things EVER and, studying the toy company websites last night, I couldn't imagine opening our home to any more plastic JUNK.    And she said a zoo membership.  Which is brilliant because it doesn't clutter the house and saves us about a hundred bucks each time we visit (oy, literally - I just added it up and once Elisheva turns 13 and Naomi turns 4, it's $92 for the 6

Morbid Math

"If you have THIS MANY kitties and two of them DIE, you only have one left!" I guess that makes it slightly easier to remember than all those word problems where some ghostly hand was "taking away" your apples. Supper: Ha ha. No clue. <3 J

And so it begins...

With tomorrow bringing Toronto's official First Frost Date, I declare... The Indoor Coleus Season 2008/2009 officially open!!! Ladies, start your rooting... or something!

Circle time, sukkah time

Here's a rare shot of my sometimes-sung hero of the Sukkah world... putting up our sukkah over a week ahead of time. Amazing! Went with Elisheva and the Littles to "visit the relatives" today, ie the graves of my grandparents. Tried desperately to figure out which Tehillim you're supposed to say when you go there, but all I could find were mentions that you're supposed to say Tehillim: thanks! So I did, I took a tehillim and actually said a couple. Then we ran around finding rocks to put on the headstones and then we left. Well, not to make too much light of it. We actually do take our time, reading the names, seeing who's related to whom, who was born and died when, all that stuff. And I point out to each kid which relatives have "their" name. Gavriel Zev fell asleep in the car and I was dreading shlepping him in the carseat around from site to site, but then it turned out they've redone all the roads into Bathurst Lawn and I was able t

Well, this is unusual... (me, awake)

Sitting here at 7:26 waiting for the stunned-by-two-days-of-Yom-Tov kiddies to wake up; what a rarity to have a moment of peace and quiet.  At the expense of sleep, of course.  Got up at 5:30 to wake YM & EC so they could eat before the fast (Tzom Gedalia) and wasn't able to fall back asleep, OF COURSE.   Lay awake thinking about my father and his crazy obsession with spreadsheets and ITINERARIES.  The earliest "big word" I remember learning - itinerary.  His dumb binders full of trips and plans as opposed to my brilliant and occasionally disastrous spontaneity.  And now they have all those "cancer patient" brochures... I wonder if he'll stick all those into a binder as well.   Rosh Hashanah was a total disaster... we didn't have money so couldn't shop until the last second.  I actually ended up running out leaving Elisheva with the kids with strict instructions NOT to put them in the bath while I was out, even though we'd alr