It’s a weirdly happy day for me, started off by the fact my sainted father-in-law came to my house yesterday and washed all the dishes, and is returning today to fix the leaky faucet. I cleaned off the entire counter around the sink for the occasion, and making breakfast felt like I was working on a television set, maybe Martha’s, it was so clean and empty. Tessa made Luka’s lunch the night before—score! Save 15 minutes in the morning and they’re all my minutes.
Then, I hear Britney is finally getting a mental health evaluation, and I want to hug someone. This woman’s
experiences, plastered all over the media, will bring so much attention to mental health and addictions (I hope she just plays with drugs and there isn’t a true addiction there as well) that maybe our countries will finally realize the cost and devastation of mental illness, and the fact that it can hit anyone. Brit will also be dashing (more…)
Hi all,
Just another reminder to join our forums tomorrow to discuss what you’d write in a letter to your body, and to pose questions to the cast members of the play Body & Soul (some of whom you can see in this photo), who were cast for their roles based on their answers to this very question.
See you there,
Helen Racanelli
Web editor
This is a second blog on the Georgain Cheese bread, also known as Khachapuri or Hachapuri, because I guess my pictures looked so good that people have been asking me for the recipe. Well I don’t blame them, it is delicious and well worth and easy to make.
This is the recipe for the dough:
It’s a super-short Works for Me Wednesday tip that ALL parents, teachers, babysitters, in short, all people who can’t stand the sound of hiccupping, needs. Our family’s cure for hiccups:
Take a breath and swallow three times. But, you must take a little breath in between the swallows. Here is the play-by-play: (more…)
There are many recipes for this bread. I love to make it as as an appetizer and bake it right before my guests come and serve it hot from the oven. Sometimes it is made with a yeast dough but the recipe I use is really simple: flour, salt, baking soda, butter, yoghurt and egg. This bread usually has a mild cheese filling in it but I felt like getting creative with the filing this time so I made something up. I sauted some spinach with garlic and anchovies and then mixed in some ricotta cheese and a bit of mozzarella. It turned out great, there wasn’t a speck left. Next time I make it I think I’ll put some chopped up prosciutto inside.
Here is the step by step method for shaping the bread. (more…)
In this case, I am the Mum, and it’s my daughter, Tessa, who was doing the real shopping. She is my guest blogger today, and will show off her most recent stealin’ deals from the likes of Urban Outfitters, H&M and Forever 21, all of which also have online shopping too. There are pics and commentary, but she is asleep right now. So bookmark her now, and check back around, what time do teenagers arise on the day after they’ve written their last exam??? Try noon, maybe?
I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait to see what she posts… (more…)
Here are some pictures of a cake I made on the weekend for my niece’s birthday. It is an over the top gushy four year old girly princess cake. I actually had this bubble gum coloured fondant at home for some reason so I put it to good use. The hearts were from the super market bulk candy section and the silver dragees I had . The inside is a four layer banana cake with cream cheese filling and sliced bananas.
Here are some close up shots as well. (more…)
FAMILY LITERACY
My mother uses the expression “a day late and a dollar short,” and that describes perfectly my lateness with Family Literacy Day, which was January 27—yesterday. We were so busy doing cloze exercises (I had no idea until two years ago what this word meant—I thought those sentences were called “fill in the blanks”) that the wonderful opportunity to read together as a family was lost. Never mind that I can’t imagine how a 7, 14 and 16 year old would read together. I read with Luka every night. Tessa devours books holed up in her room. I mistakenly ripped one of Graydon’s hip-hop fanzines in half in a frenzy of recycling Sunday morning, so I don’t think I’d have gotten far with a plea to read to him. Heavens knows not one of them knows how to read the Chore Chart I have so carefully taped to the fridge with red masking tape.
ABC Canada Literacy Foundation is behind Family Literacy Day and the many events held across the country to encourage reading. (more…)
“Fair fa’ your honest, sonsie face,
Great chieftain o the puddin’-race!”
Today is Robbie Burns Day. Admittedly not the biggest foodie event on the calendar but I could not resist a nod to the fair Haggis especially after stumbling on this site for Crawford’s Scottish Butchers. You have to go and see the excellent pictures of generations of Scotsmen parading the treasured haggis.
Rather than choking down a chunk of Haggis (apologies to haggis lovers out there), a better tribute to old Robbie Burns would be toast the bard with a fine glass of scotch. (more…)
Exhale anyone who read yesterday’s post. Graydon cleaned the baby powder off the TV screen, since it is the thing he stares at second most in the world, and his friend didn’t come over. Graydon read this as: my friend doesn’t come over, I don’t have to clean up my mess from the shaving-foam-bug-spray-baby-powder fight. How weird! As a parent and an adult, I would have read it this way: friend doesn’t come over, dang, I have to clean up this mess by myself. Aren’t kids funny like that? Especially teens, who have a strange new way of interpreting the simplest of action=consequence situations.
Which brings me to my latest concept in the quest for a creative, peaceful, well-run home: No Fight Fridays. (more…)
