Around the Neighborhood

Wednesday is supposed to be my "around the house" blogging day, but after spending 40+ hours a week for the last three weeks sitting in the bathroom with a VERY reluctant popper, my house is so scary and out of sorts that I actually fled the premises today rather than clean it.

It's hard to blame me when the weather has been so unseasonably gorgeous, dare I even say "unbearably hot" the last day or two.  I have had to make a full-scale seasonal switcheroo of household items and clothing, and we are literally acting as if summer was upon us.  Flip flops, sunscreen, sprinklers, the whole nine yards.  I even had to break down and crank the air conditioning on, even all night long, it's been that hot!

Mother nature is feeling it too!  Spring literally leapt out of the ground this past week.  Usually, the season creeps in gradually as one thing after another begins to bloom.  Not so this year!  Every single thing is blooming all at once - forsythia, daffodils, crabapples, magnolias...you name it, and it's literally EXPLODING forth right now.

Yesterday the kids had a day off of school and we spent it at the zoo.  At 10:00am, we entered the gate through a street lined with crabapple trees full of buds.  At 2pm, we exited, to a street lined with fully bloomed trees!  And when we got home, our own street was in full bloom too!

It only took me about three hours to figure out how to make this collage using Instagram coupled with Diptic.
Clockwise from upper left; daylilies shooting up, crabapples blooming, daffodils standing proud and a sweltering 81 degrees at 7pm.  Has anyone reminded Mother Nature that it's MARCH 21st, not MAY 21st?

I can't even imagine what will happen next, but I expect it to be a very interesting Spring.

What's For Dinner? Pasta with "Mommy's Special Sauce"

I have this sauce I make for pasta.  Pasta that's been around a day or two and needs some reviving.  It's kind of a modified riff on alfredo sauce.  And the kids go bananas over it.  I can even throw PUMPKIN in it and they don't care, that is the power of the sauce.  Developed accidentally out of desperation - isn't that usually where the best ideas come from?

Here's how I do it.

In a large skillet over medium heat, melt a hunk of butter or your favorite buttery spread (ours is Smart Balance - not as tasty as butter, but better for Daddy's ticker!)  If you twist my arm, I will say that a "hunk" is equal to 1/8-1/4 cup.  Pour in some half and half.  Cream would be heavenly, but it's a bit too decadent for this house.  Milk will work in a pinch, but won't thicken as well. So half and half is the perfect middle ground.  Add a cup, two cups, it depends on a. how much you have on hand and b. how much pasta you need to revive.  When in doubt, start with one cup and add more later if needed.  The sauce is forgiving like that.

Add your favorite seasonings, but just a touch.  We are happy with a sprinkling of sea salt, fresh ground pepper and sometimes a dash or two of garlic powder.  If we have fresh sage on hand, that's another yummy toss-in.

Throw in a few sprinkles to a handful of grated parmesan cheese and (if you're so inclined) a few heaping tablespoons of butternut squash puree or pumpkin puree (especially if you used the sage - they are a marriage made in heaven!)  In fact, any veggie puree would probably work in this sauce - roasted red pepper, carrot, sweet potato, asparagus...my brain is churning with new ideas!

Stir it up a little - it should be getting bubbly around the edges now.

Now toss in your cold, leftover pasta and stir it into the sauce to get warmed through.  After a few minutes of simmering, the sauce will magically thicken.  I don't know if this is because it reduces or because of some other chemical reaction (i.e "magic!") but when it happens, you're done!  Start to finish this should take about 5 minutes.

So to recap...

Mommy's Special Sauce

1/8 Cup of Smart Balance

1-2 cups of half and half

Salt, pepper and any spices you like

A handful of grated parmesan

Optional: Pumpkin, squash or veggie puree 

Stir it all together over medium heat, add your pasta, warm through until sauce thickens and enjoy!

O'Vindication!

If anyone remembers, last year's Saint Patrick's Day parade was a big, fat, FLOP for the Mallett family.  With the wind chill factor it felt about 20 degrees and everyone was crying.  

This year however, was proof that a dream deferred is not a dream denied.

Last year we FROZE, and this year felt like SUMMER.

Even the daffodils were out to say hello!

Last year, we missed the parade.  And this year?  This year we were IN the parade!

That's Jack in the striped top hat.

It was all thanks to little Miss McSunshine who started taking Irish dancing lessons again six months ago.  Her school marches in the parade each year, and families are allowed to join in the fun!

Molly is behind the little girl in white holding the school banner.

And here she is marching with her classmates. 

I was SO PROUD of my shy girl for jumping right in and holding hands with a girl she didn't know and jigging her way down the parade route.   She was proud of herself too.  I overheard her telling Ben "We get to walk in the parade!  We're going to be famous!!"  

After we were through with the parade, we met up with Auntie Treecie (who was visiting us on her spring break from nursing school, just like last year!) Auntie Ulia and cousin Cam (who is a whole lot bigger than he was at this time last year!).

 Ben and Molly had a ball sitting on the rock ledge around the fountain.  I couldn't believe Ben was still standing - he walked the entire 2 mile parade route, refusing to sit in the wagon, or even hold my hand!

He was so adorable in the shirt Auntie Treecie brought him!  Cameron had a matching one too.

They really are best buddies.  It's so sweet to watch.

Then we met back up with Daddy, who wasn't able to get back to walk with us after dropping us off, the parade traffic was so congested.

We found our neighbors at their perch outside Sullivan's Steakhouse.

And we got to watch the last bit of the parade with Daddy.  You'll never believe who came to celebrate St. Paddy's Day in Naperville....

Darth Vader!  Apparently, he's "Black Irish", har har.

He brought his buddies too....

Bet you never saw a Storm Trooper in a kilt before!  

What a fantastic day!  We all went home exhausted, kissed Auntie Treecie goodbye as she headed back to Boston, and collapsed for the afternoon (except for Marc and Jack, who went and played 9 holes of golf)

We had a great time, and were absolutely, 100% vindicated from our disastrous parade-fail last year.

I can't wait to see what our next St. Patrick's Day in Naperville brings!

Recipe of the Week: Broccoli Crunch Salad

I'm not ashamed to admit that I had an out of body gastronomic experience at Whole Foods last week.  I was out running errands and about to do my grocery shopping on an empty stomach (never a good idea!).  So I popped into Whole Foods and had myself a $10 salad bar fiesta.  I love to try a little bit of everything, especially their asian dishes (because I don't have all the funky ingredients needed to make something like that) and their nutty dishes (because we have a no-nuts policy at our house on account of our favorite tree-nut-allergic 4 year old).

Who knew that I would nearly fall over from happiness over BROCCOLI?  I mean, I enjoy cooked broccoli like most people, but trying to gag down the raw stuff is a challenge, even though it's soooo good for you.

Whole Foods' Broccoli Crunch Salad was like a broccoli evangelist, and praise the vegetable gods, I have been converted!!  I spent the next week trolling the internet for a DIY recipe, and cobbled together a few to come up with something mostly healthful, that tastes so good I ate it for every meal until it was all gone.

If that isn't enough of a reason to try the recipe, how's this? 

 I lost TWO POUNDS the day I ate it.  And I was so full all day I thought I'd burst.

I guess raw broccoli really does do a body good!

BROCCOLI CRUNCH SALAD

A Whole Foods Knockoff

For the Salad

4-6 Cups Broccoli Crowns, chopped bite size

1/2 Cup Dried Currants, Raisins or Craisins (or any mix of them)

1/2 Cup Bacon Crumbles

1/2 Cup Finely diced red onion

1/2 Cup Sesame Sticks* (for a nut-free salad)

OR 1/2 Cup Candied Cashews

For the Dressing

1/2 Cup Light Mayonnaise

1/4 C Apple Cider Vinegar

2 T Honey (more to taste)

Pinch of Cayenne Pepper

Toss the salad ingredients in a bowl.  *If using sesame sticks, sprinkle them on just before serving or they will get mushy.  Whisk the dressing ingredients together, adjusting as necessary for taste and consistency.  I find some days I add more honey and others more vinegar, depending on the mood my tastebuds are in.  Toss salad with dressing and let the flavors meld in the fridge for a few hours if you can stand it.   (I can't - I eat it straight out of the bowl.  In fact, just pausing to take the picture was torture!)

Bon Appetit!

Happy Birthday to Cam!

In the first installment of "Something We Did" Mondays, I present Cameron Angelo the Great and his super-amazing, wowtacular, first birthday party.

Absolutely IMPOSSIBLE to believe, that this baby boy we waited....and waited....and waited for, has suddenly gone and turned ONE YEAR OLD on us.  Ulia spared nothing to plan a celebration and special and unique and SWEET as Cameron is to all of us.  This party was one for the ages and it was SO much fun to be a guest!

The party theme was

Winter ONEderland

Get it? Wonderland? ONE-derland? Genius!!!

I was lucky to get to make the invitations, taking the color scheme from 

Cam's trademark sock monkey hat....

And the color scheme carried over in a BIG way into all the party decorations and special touches.  It seriously looked like something straight out of Martha Stewart or TomKat Studio.  From before you walked through the door, even!

Once inside, you were greeted by the most amazing and inspiring (and sugar coma inducing) sweets table you could ever dream of...

There were so many little details that you just couldn't stop gasping at the sheer fabulousness of it all.

 Like the water bottle labels....

The milk glasses with straw holders made from powdered donuts and teeny tiny fleece scarves...

The party favors - handmade snowmen kits, with handmade hats, detachable felt flowers, stuffed noses, river rocks, oversized buttons, and giant googley eyes?  Are you kidding me??

My kids don't know how lucky they are to get such a fantastic favor.  And they won't either, because I stole all their kits so they can't mess with them until the next good snowmen-making snowstorm hits.  Winter 2013 look out!

Oh, and did I mention the penguins made out of olives?

No, seriously.  Penguins.  From OLIVES.

(Martha, eat your heart out.)

Filled with cream cheese and accessorized with tiny carrot bits for feet and beaks.

All lined up marching around their bacon and cheese dip igloo.

They were so cute it was hard to eat them!

But we did. (YUM!) And they were delicious!

I knew I was going to go on a picture-taking rampage, so I came up with an idea that would enable me to build a guest book of sorts into the pictures.  I've been to a million showers and parties where some kindhearted bridesmaid undertakes the challenge of getting pictures to match up with guestbook comments.  It's a thankless, and impossible job.  

Enter, the DIY wipe-off board....

It's really just a picture frame with scrapbook paper underneath the glass.  Guests can write a message to the birthday boy, snap their picture with their message, and voila!, instant guestbook.

(disclaimer: Jack's statement was verbally revised to reflect that Cameron is Jack's favorite ILLINOIS cousin ever.  Not to be confused with Jack's four favorite NEW YORK cousins ever, or his two favorite REVERE second cousins ever, or his two favorite REVERE sorta-kinda-it's-complicated cousins ever.  Just to make sure we're clear on that.  Because everyone's a favorite in this house.  Unless you ask Molly about her friends.  She has a ranking system.  It's complicated, but I"m assured that everyone in first grade is on the same page.  But I digress....)

 Everyone wanted in on this action.  Even the pets!

No pets were harmed in the taking of this picture.  Though some may have been bribed with cold cuts.

And then it was time to SING to the birthday boy!

Get a load of this CAKE!!

Ulia found the most amazing local baker to create this confection.  And the icing on the cake (pun very much intended) was that Cameron got his very own mini-igloo cake to smash.

He didn't though.

Because he's sweet like that. 

(or he could have been overwhelmed by the dozens of screaming lunatics singing at him...just a guess)

But I also think he kinda likes those lunatics - he is one of us after all!

And we like him right back...even if he did go and turn one on us after we told him he's not allowed to get any bigger or older until we're good and ready for him to!

Dear Ulia, I'm sorry you blinked.  But this is the only picture I got, so I'm running with it.
I hope the gorgeous pre-party pictures with your hair flowing like a Pantene commercial make up for it.

Happy Birthday Cameron!

Thanks for such a swell party - it was so much fun to be a part of your special day!

Outfits for the Mallett family may or may not have been coordinated with the party theme on purpose...
Styling secrets have been withheld to protect the coordinate-aholics from the fashionista polizei.

The End of Procrastination?

I don't know that it ever could be possible to put a complete end to procrastination, especially with young kids to raise and a house to run.  I try to keep things simple (and fail at it, consistently) and yet, the level of projects and ideas that I put off on a daily basis seems insurmountable.  Which is where the apathy comes in.  I mean, why even try if you're doomed to never succeed, right?

But as I was explaining to Jack last week in a battle royale over homework (also consistent in our house) the energy it takes to procrastinate NOT doing something, and the angst it creates, is at least equal to, if not worse, than actually TACKLING the job once and for all.

So for Lent this year, when giving up Facebook didn't seem like enough (dare I say I've actually begun to look forward to it?) I decided to take a stab at giving up PROCRASTINATING.

In the last week, I've tackled more projects than you can shake a stick at.  I'm still not one millionth of the way down my mental list, but at least my feet are moving in the right direction.

And ever one to live by a plan (because so many things cross my mind in a given moment, I could not possibly focus unless I have a to-do list)  I've made a little blogging schedule for myself, to try and stay caught up and preserve the memories we're making as we go, instead of in retrospect.

Here's the routine I'm starting with, knowing that I'll probably end up tweaking it as I go...

Monday: Something We Did

Tuesday: Something We Ate

Wednesday: Around the House 

(kind of like a house tour, but in snippets)

Thursday: Crafty Stuff

Friday: Child Spotlight

Since I want to show pictures of the house, and since I haven't taken steps to anonymize our lives on this blog, and since I'm neurotic by nature, I need to put my security defense arsenal back in place.  I know it's a pain for others, because once the blog is no longer public, it loses a bunch of functionality, like auto-notification and such.  But I actually lie awake at night thinking of that freaky Kiefer Southerland character? In that Sally Field movie?  Where he killed Dorothy Jane from The Torkelsens who looks just like my friend Jimena's sister Daniela, and I'll never get over the horror I felt when Sally Field had to listen to her daughter be killed?  And I don't want Kiefer knowing where the security system is, because I posted pictures on my blog, you know?

So a-private we will go in 3....2....1

What's For Dinner? Aunt Sandy's Pork Roast

This pork is mouth-wateringly incredible.  It's a Mallett Family, Fall Ball must-have.  I've got to confess that even though I do it exactly as she told me, it never tastes quite as perfect at when Aunt Sandy makes it.


AUNT SANDY'S PORK ROAST


For best flavor, marinate overnight. 

6 large cloves garlic, chopped
2-3 bay leaves, crumbled
1 teaspoon paprika1 teaspoon coarse salt
1 tablespoon of Crushed Red Pepper (calda de pimenta) 
2 tablespoons olive oil
Juice of 1 orange
1 tablespoon of vinegar
3lb pork loin (not the tenderloin, the LOIN)

1. Using a mortar and pestle, mash the garlic, bay leaves, salt and paprika.  Blend in the Pepper Paste or Crushed. Slowly drizzle in the olive oil and mix. Add vinegar and orange juice.


2. Cut crosshatches on the surface of the roast. Rub the paste all over the roast, pushing some of the paste into the crosshatches. Place meat in a lightly oiled roasting pan. Refrigerate overnight.

3. Heat oven at 500 degrees - roast pork uncovered for 10 minutes. Lower the heat to 300 degrees, cover the roast and bake it for about an hour or until the pork reaches an internal temperature of 150 degrees. Let the roast stand for 10 to 15 minutes before carving. 

Tip: If you are planning to serve roasted potatoes with this dish, you can roast them in the same pan as the pork.