Beef and winter vegetables

I actually braised something that DH loved! So, I must record the recipe. Or I’ll never be able to duplicate it. Of course, I made it in the orange le Creuset pot, which seems to make all food taste better.  Or at least, its beauty makes your brain think it tastes better.

beef stew

Ingredients

Stew beef
Raspberry vinegar
onions
Fennel
Cranberries
water
Beef bullion cube
4 tsp raw sugar

Directions

Heat oil in a Dutch oven. Brown beef. Remove beef to a plate.

Deglaze pot with raspberry vinegar.

Add onions. When onions are soft, add fennel. Return beef to pot. Add cranberries.

Add water to just cover. Stir in bouillon cube and bring to a boil.

Reduce heat to simmer and add sugar. Stir until sugar dissolves. Cover. Simmer until meat is tender and cranberries form a sauce.

Washing Machine Control Lock

Without a doubt, the most fantastic feature on the washing machine is the control lock.

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What am I going to do with all these Hobbies

Since I spent my twenties putting myself through school, I didn’t really have any hobbies.  I have always owned a computer, liked to read and exercised.  But I would not have called any of those things a hobby. I worked.  I studied.  That took up more time than I really had.

However, now that I’ve become domesticated I have acquired hobbies. Here in the United States people inquire about your profession.  But in other places, the interesting thing about a new acquaintance is their hobbies.  I guess in other countries people have time to have hobbies?

Whatever.  I’m not sure how I can possibly keep the scrapbooks that I began when I realized the inherited 70s collections were rotting.  I don’t know how I’ll ever finish them.  That’s a whole accidental hobby by itself.  And there is the related and completely time-consuming family history and genealogy.

Unrelated I have sewing.  Sewing is practical.  And I might argue that it is necessary.  But that would be silly since we won’t go naked if I don’t sew.  I rarely sew garments.

I also have this blog.

So now I have acquired hobbies, a fair amount of accessories for each, and have very little time.  If the girls didn’t just look elven, but could actually behave like elves and help me, then we could do all of the hobbies.  That is not likely to happen anytime soon.  DD7 has her own scrapbook.  It’s great.  But it looks like a seven year old did it (as it should).  So I probably shouldn’t hand over the scrapbooking scissors and irreplaceable photographs.  DD1 harasses DD7 from under the kitchen table, trying to climb up into her lap and grab things off the table.  So… scrapbooking is out as a family activity.

Ditto genealogy, blogging and sewing.

Boo, hiss.

We do sort of exercise together.  I have rubberbands that I use to work out.  I purchased more of them so that we could all share and nobody would fuss over not getting to hold one.  But DD1 wants whichever one someone else is holding, regardless of whether or not she has one, nearly identical, in her own hands.  DD7 has only a marginally better attitude.  She doesn’t covet the rubber band I’m using.  She instead wants to jump over one like jump-rope, in the house next to lamps, hook one over her sister, or swing one wildly like a whip.  She appears unable or unwilling to remember this from day to day.  Either way, somebody ends up laying on the floor yelling.

Sometimes I think it should be me.

Thursday Kids and Activities

Thursday is the most hellish day of the week. It’s ballet day. And if I didn’t truly believe that children need activities to keep them out of trouble, build self esteem, and gain physical exercise, grace, or whatever, I would drop it.

blue ballet tutu

DD7 complains incessantly. Not about ballet, which she loves again, now that the child who was bothering her in class is not attending. She just complains, about homework, which generally takes ten minutes of actual work and twenty minutes of complaining, about her sister, being bored, doing any task, and pretty much anything that she can articulate into a sentence.

Though annoying, the complaining is tolerable, or ignorable, except on Thursday. Then, the three of us are trapped in a van for the round trip, tired and hungry. Even the snack creates drama.

DD1 dislikes it when I (or anyone) is doing something that does not involve her. On Thursday, the exclusionary tasks make up a long list. She throws regular tantrums while I wash dishes, prep everything for dinner, do emergency laundry which inevitably happens, pack snacks and run everything to the car. Sometimes she naps. On Thursday, not so much.  It could be a form of protest.

Then we get into the van and head for the car rider line.

Today DD7 told us about her friend not being polite, then bursting into tears. DD7 clarified that yes, the person being mean was the one who cried. She didn’t understand why either. Immediately, DD1 grabbed the snack bag. Then she threw a cracker at her sister. Then all of the crackers, one after another. Instead of taking the bag back, DD7 complained loudly, in an indignant tone.

I couldn’t stand the drama a moment longer, so I said, “There, now she’s run out of crackers. ”

DD1 then threw everything else she could reach – sip cup, pacifier, a toy, and a brush.

I was unable to find sympathy in my heart for DD7, who declined to sit a row away from DD1, because she didn’t want to be bothered to move her booster seat.  Moving the booster seat involves simply picking it up, and carrying it back one row.  It takes seconds.  So, she was in no way ambushed by DD1, and had actually begun to complain prior to the cracker attack.

Gaah!

DD7 says she would like to also do gymnastics, karate, and pretty much any activity that a friend is doing or she hears about on the radio.  I have informed her that unless she plans to be say, an entirely different person, one not prone to injury or getting sensory overload when more than one afternoon per week is scheduled, she can forget about it.  For years I told her she could do something instead of ballet and she said no.  Now she just has far too good a time, has too many friends in class, and is too good to quit on a whim.  I have seen what it looks like when she genuinely isn’t interested in something – this isn’t it.