The Reluctant Grownup

I Guess This Will Be A Weekend Blog Now

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This morning, it was crisp.  The Professor got a fire going in our wood-burning fireplace, then built the king bed we just bought after 2.5 years of sleeping on a mattress on the floor and it makes our room feel so much less grad school!  Now, of course, I want a bed skirt, king-sized duvet cover, bedside tables, a long low dresser, and a throw rug . . . but we’ll take it one step at a time.  While the Professor was handy, I took all three boys next door where our neighbors were having a yard sale, and sat and chatted for a while.  It was nice to hang out with adults – and their granddaughters were in town, the perfect ages to play with Jack and Liam.  Now it is just past lunch.  The two littlest boys are napping, the husband is at Lowes, and Jack is pestering the heck out of me as he does these days since he dropped naps.

WORK IS OMG

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I continue to drown in work.  I’m making it work, but it’s very hard.  I billed a 15 hour day Monday and was kind of thrashed the rest of the week.  Next week I have four days of depo and depo prep.  Phew.

. . .  BUT CHARLESTON IS COMING

That said, we have a long weekend coming up, during which I will attempt to relax a bit.  Today one of the associates at work is getting married here in town, and next weekend another one of the associates is getting married in Charleston.  I’m going to both weddings, and the Professor and I are making a weekend of it in Charleston.  You may or may not recall that we ourselves were married (eight years ago as of last Tuesday) in Beaufort, South Carolina, not far from Charleston.  So this trip to the colleague’s wedding also serves as a little eight year anniversary trip for us.  I’m a teeny bit sad about missing Halloween with the boys – Craig’s first! – because Halloween is by far my favorite holiday.  But it’s a favorite because of my parents, who always loved it and made it special.  They are coming down to be with the boys while we are out of town, and I’m happy to know they will get to revisit those happy times when we were all kids.  Plus I’ll get tons of pix messages I’m sure.

HALLOWEEN

Since we will be gone for the big day, we have to cram our Halloween fun into these weeks prior to our trip.  Liam had a fall program at school last Thursday, after which we headed to Beef O Brady’s and had a meal made very miserable by one squirmy, grumpy baby.  I left work early Friday and we took the boys to Halloween Fest at the local children’s science museum, where they made slime, painted pictures, and saw a pumpkin explode.  Tomorrow night we will carve the pumpkins that we purchased last weekend during our hot and dusty corn maze excursion.  Yay.

ANNIVERSARY BLISS

As I mentioned above, we hit eight years of wedded bliss last Tuesday.  We went to see Lyle Lovett, who happened to be in town.  It was the day after my 15 hour billing and so I was a little bit sleepy for Lyle, but enjoyed him and his acoustic group nonetheless.  Once we arrived back home and dismissed the babysitter, I propped my eyelids open for a glass or two of champagne out of our wedding flutes, and then fell heavily asleep.   It was a nice little mid-week celebration.

EATING IN AUTUMN IS FUN

So I feel the need to report on last week’s meals, because MY GOD some of them were good.  The quinoa fiesta enchilada bake, which we had last night, was divine.  Last weekend I made the recipe but stopped short of baking it, and stuck it in the fridge.  Last night after the Halloween event, I stuck it in the oven for half an hour, and I swear we ate almost the whole thing.  I kept spooning more on my plate.   I blame Lag Liv for our quinoa obsession of late – she’s wise, because that stuff is good and has lots more bang for your caloric buck than typical pasta.  The buttermilk baked chicken strips were also amazing.  I soaked them in buttermilk overnight, and they were so tender, just falling apart, but with a nice crispy exterior due to the bread crumbs (I dredged them in half regular breadcrumbs, half panko to give it extra crisp).  The healthy Italian winter soup was a good choice, though definitely don’t put the bowtie pasta in until you’re planning to eat it.  Last weekend I also made that up to the point of adding the pasta, and then on the night we had it I just boiled the pasta in the soup til it was done.  But we had a lunch’s worth of leftover soup in the fridge, and the bowtie pasta absorbed absolutely all of the broth and swelled up huge.  I ate it for lunch anyway, but it was more like a (soggy) pasta bowl than a bowl of soup.  We will have the black pepper chicken tonight – the marinade smells pretty weird but I’m going to give it a try anyway.

This week, we’re having:

That’s it for us.  Hope this fall finds you well.