Apr
27
Some random stuff from the weekend:
- We live in a cute house. It really is. If you drove past, you’d look at our house and say “Oh, isn’t that cute!” It IS cute, until you get inside. And that is when you see that cute on the outside can often mean not useful space on the inside. It does not have what decorating people would call “good bones”. Small rooms, bad rooflines, poor construction and design choices — our little house has it all. But it’s ours, and so we are constantly trying to help it morph into a comfortable home. And that means endless fits of moving furniture around the house in an effort to make some useful, comfortable space. So this past weekend, we began another of our “let’s-move-stuff-around” adventures. And while the latest configuration might still be just as ungainly as the last, these fits of redecoration do mean one good thing: spring cleaning-level purging of stuff. We throw things out, and pack things away, and clean and dust and vacuum. These are not things we are particularly good at as a matter of course, so when our redecorating fits come along, it’s actually kind of refreshing.
- I don’t like ribs. I have tried, but as a former vegetarian, I tend to struggle with any meat that has bones in it. But honestly, it is safe to say I have never liked ribs, even from childhood. I have tried, though, because BDH loves ribs. He will order a full back rib dinner when we are out and revel in the barbeque-y goodness. And so, because he loves ribs, and in an effort to diversify our menu and make things interesting on a budget, I decided to give cooking them a try. I got a tried-and-true recipe from our classic BHG red-checked cookbook, I bought the ribs, and yesterday I cooked them up. The house smelled wonderful, with the tang of barbeque sauce and cooking meat. When they finished, we took the ribs out of the oven and they looked fantastic. And the sauce was really tasty, which surprised me no end. The problem? I still don’t like ribs. I ate them, but even at 10 pm last night, as I was getting ready for bed, my stomach was still doing flips at the thought of the 5 or so ribs I had actually eaten. And the worst part? After 12+ years with me, BDH is now coming to a place in his life where he’s beginning to struggle with the “meat with bones” thing too. So he didn’t enjoy them as much as he once would have. It’s a shame, too — for a rib lover, they were darn tasty ribs.
- There are not enough hours in the day to get everything done that I want to get done AND be a hands-on mom who engages with her child. I just can’t do them both. My priority is my daughter, of course, but then that means that housework, work, or other activities must fall to the wayside. And for that I feel guilty, like I am a failure at my “job” taking care of the house. But if I leave my daughter parked in front of the TV while I do other things, I know I’d be failing her also. It’s not always hard to do both, but a growing child makes life a changing landscape. We get into good routines for awhile, but then she grows or changes and her needs grow and change and then the routine is gone until we can get into a groove again. But if I could get a few extra hours in the day, when my daughter was napping or something, I’d be golden.
- I didn’t get my seeds started for my garden this year as I had hoped. There were a couple of problems I couldn’t figure out — a watering problem while we were away on vacation, and a cat who would probably destroy the plants with all those unsupervised hours anyway — and so I decided not to start any seeds this year. I am kind of bummed about it, because it’s a cheap way to garden and I’ve done it for years. So what I am going to have to do is go through my seeds and see which ones I can just stick in the ground, and then we will hope for the best. If the birds, the local wildlife, or the frost don’t get them, we may have an interesting garden this year.
