Sunday, December 19, 2010

Holiday Fun

Okay, beloved, there are some good holiday recipes over at family.com, and I hope you'll go. This chile tortilla eggbake is the perfect Christmas-morning breakfast; and these peppermint patties are amazing and make a terrific gift. If you have made them successfully, would you please post a comment over there? I'd love to balance out the frustration of the chocolate dippers. It is definitely a recipe that takes a bit of patience, but I think it's totally worth it. Speaking of that recipe, I did not ever end up making bar bark, like I wanted to. But I did do this:



Yowza. I think I imagined giving them away or something, but we ate them.

Another link: a strange piece of mine over at the fabulous Brain Child.

And, finally, my best holiday wishes to you and your family. May the light find you wherever you are.

xoxo


Tuesday, December 07, 2010

Okay, I'm going crazy posting, I know! 

I want to first mention that the recipe here for Rosemary Maple Popcorn is so insanely addictive, and would make such an amazing holiday gift, that I practically want to guarantee it. Not that I know how that would work exactly. But seriously. Please try it.

And next up, because you spoke and I listened (I'm talking to you, Jed), here is Recommended Games Part II: The Younger Years. I do understand that you are not all quite ready for The Strategy, and that you have younger children in the house still (sigh), and that Sorry and Guess Who from the previous edition of Recommended Games really might not fulfill all your gaming needs. (I'm assuming you have Uno already. And a deck of cards.) Plus, we had such a good time reminiscing about our favorite old games (some of which we still play). I spared you Mousetrap, despite my children's hearty nostalgia for it, because it is simply to significant a pain in the ass to deal with. It just is. But these are all great, in their own special ways:

Harvest Time
If the idea of a "cooperative board game," makes you want to weep with boredom, well. . . weep away. But we got this game when Ben was very small and very panicky over the idea of "winning games." We played it hundreds of times then, and hundreds more times when Birdy was the same age, with the same panic (and we still play it when our littlest friends are over). It's a sweet little game where you work together to get the harvest in before winter comes--but I'm warning you: you have to put out a lot--a lot of drama and enthusiasm and suspensified horror--or else it is deadly dull. When it's over, you can offer each other the products of your harvest ("Who wants a jar of my famous carrot pickles?") even though you won't find this detail in the rules.


This is a sweet little German tile game, where you roll the dice and race to spot the dwarf dressed in that same trio of colors. It's pretty and simple, and also Birdy always called it "Gorvin Dice," which we loved for no particular reason. "Dwarf" turns out to be a tricky word for her, given that just yesterday she asked if it was only his helpers, or of Santa himself was a "dorf." That website seems to have lots of lovely little German games. For instance, Orchard, which looks to be a pleasanter version of this old favorite:

This was another favorite of the early years, and we played and played until I poked a hole in my head with a fork and my liquefied brain dripped out onto the floor. Did I ever tell you how once, when I was doing some consulting for Hasbro, they showed me all their games, and when we got to this one, I announced, "Oh! Hi Hi Boring-O! Believe me, I've played it." Always a class act. Still, this game is all about the little plastic cherries. That's, like, the most exciting thing ever, and so your small children will love it.
Now this, on the other hand, is an unboring game. It is similar to--but easier than--the regular version of Mastermind, and it requires the same process-of-elimination strategy. It is probably the first strategy game we ever played with either kids, and they loved it mostly because the pieces are shaped like animals and the colors are great.



Slamwich is like a fancified version of that old you-snooze-you-lose card game Slap Jack. But the sandwich theme is lots of fun, and the game cards doubled for Ben and Birdy as the makings of a sandwich shop, that they ran almost continuously from their pretend kitchen. That was actually kind of a long time ago, which makes me feel a little melancholy.


Sleeping Queens
I love Gamewright games (Rat-a-tat Cat is another good one, as is Zeus on the Loose) and this one might be the one we played the most when the kids were younger. It's got a little bit of memory, a little bit of strategy, some silliness, and great art. Plus, it only takes about 20 minutes to play, which makes it good for those useless little windows of time that my life seems to be pocked with.





Mancala
Mancala is a beautiful, beautifully simple game that grows with kids: they can play it before they understand about strategy, but they will play it differently after. Plus, the glass pieces are so pretty, as is the wooden board, and it all has such a lovely, classic feel to it--like it could be a million years ago, and there you are in your cave playing mancala. If you know what I mean. Obviously, don't get this if anyone in your house will be tempted to put the marbles in their mouth or nose.

Jenga
Speaking of classics: right? Oh, Jenga. Michael and I used to babysit kids in Santa Cruz, for whom "Jenga!" was their all-purpose exclamatory swear. And boy did we play a lot of Jenga with them. It's a totally physical game--you need some dexterity, a little bit of a steady hand and common sense--but it's not a heavy strategy one or anything. And it's fun for everyone when all the pieces fall down (Ben and I played just last week at a family gathering, and it was as much fun as ever.) Plus, the pieces double as great, all-purpose building blocks, and get tons of use.

Pick-Up Sticks
Speaking of classic dexterity games. . . we have this exact set, and love it. And the only thing I would say about this game is that very young children can become incredibly frustrated when other very young children insist that this or that stick moved some imperceptible amount. What I'm saying is: I think an adult needs to play to keep things humming along peacefully, and this works for me, since I love pick-up sticks and happen to be incredibly good at it (kidding, though not about liking it)--but if you're looking to lock your kids alone in a room with a game, don't make it this one.

Squeezed Out
Aka Booby Trap. This is a lovely version of this game, and looks very much like my childhood one that I still have and that, in fact, Ben and I just played, given that he's home sick today. You try to extract pieces without the spring moving, and if you pick a truly bad one, then they all fly up, and it's very exciting. Again, not for the extremely faint of heart (it was too much for Ben until he was about 5 or so), given the suspense factor and the possibility of losing somewhat dramatically.

Operation
Speaking of the suspense factor: we spent years playing Operation with the batteries removed, as it was simply too nerve-wracking for the kids to anticipate the awful buzz of their own clumsiness. But later, when they were maybe 8 and 5--or 7 and 4--they played a ton, and enjoyed it. We have the Homer Simpson edition (I'm not sure why, and it appears to be $90 now!), and the buzz is accompanied by "Doh!" along with other classic Homeric exclamations, which is a good or bad thing, depending. If dexterity completely eludes your child still, maybe hold off on this one (or remove the batteries).

As always, please chime in in the comments about your own favorites--or if you have questions.

xo
Oh, so many game wishes! I wish I could buy you all the games you want!

But: Bum ba-da dum. . .  the winner is. . . .

mommyneedsanap

Send me your address (email on the right here), and I will put that game in the mail! Though you won't be getting a nap any time soon with a game like that around! Ha ha ha.

But wait! There's more! I sent out a few emails about this contest, and look what I got back:


Dear Catherine,

Thank you for your email. Normally we wouldn't do this, but because you made me
laugh with the phrase "totally random crack-potness!", I'll send you a copy of
Ticket to Ride for your giveaway

It'll go out to you tomorrow. Can we get a mention on the blog that we donated it
when you give it away?

Best Regards,

Mark Kaufmann
Days of Wonder
Come out and play!

As if I didn't already love those guys enough! So we did a separate drawing of the Ticket to Ride Folks and the winner of that excellent game is. . . 

Sarah, who said "You've sold our family on Ticket to Ride." Please send me your address! 

Thank you so much for playing, guys. I am so excited that there are so many enthusiastic gamers out there. 

xo

Friday, December 03, 2010

Quickie Contest:

Guys, let's just do this right now. Why don't you write me the name of the board/card/family game you want in the comments here (it doesn't have to be one I recommended, but it has to be not electronic in any way, because I'm a pain in the ass like that), and on Monday at midnight I'll pick one and send it out. I'll post the winner here, and you'll need to check back and send me your address if it's you. That way you can get it in time for the holidays, if the holidays isn't Chanukkah. Which you'll get it after.

Also, speaking of Chanukkah: don't forget last year's latke recipe. They really are kind of insanely good.

More soon, darlings. xo

Monday, November 22, 2010

The Board-Game Round-up


Dear Ones,

On the off-chance you'll be celebrating Thanksgiving later this week, I've posted a Sparkling Cranberry Centerpiece here, and the world's best Brussels sprouts here.

(Oh, and also: I *did* do something with the leftover cranberry syrup!


I stirred two packets of plain gelatin into a cup of boiling water until it dissolved, then stirred in two cups of the syrup and stuck it in the fridge for a couple of hours. Delicious.)

But the main reason I'm writing today is to post the board-games round-up I've been promising for, oh, I don't know, a year? I am so lame. But I swore I'd get it up in time for the holidays, and here I am, doing that. As always, if we generate a bunch of credit on Amazon, I'll do a give-away. Of board games, of course! That will be so much fun! Also, I will happily try to answer any questions you ask in the comments section here.

Editing years later to add: current links to board games are at the games index, up in the upper right hand corner of this blog.

Okay, to sum up: we play a lot of board games. I think I've mentioned this before, but one of the things I love about board games--and Michael actually read this somewhere--is that they're totally pointless, and so when you play a board game with your child, you're saying, "This is time I want to spend with you." It's simple, but really quite lovely, don't you think? I'm assuming that you already have Scrabble, Yahtzee, Boggle (which our kids prefer to play without a timer), Chinese Checkers, and Bananagrams--all of which are crucially excellent games. So what I'm doing here is introducing you to some games you might not know, in particular some of the European-style board games that we love: these are strategy games that involve very little luck and very little boring down-time; they tend to be deceptively simple to learn and wildly complex to play, and they are almost always physically lovely, with heavy-duty, beautifully made wooden and cardboard pieces. Also, they're often relatively expensive--but I have never regretted investing in one, since we get so much play out of them. If there's a gamer's store near you--you know, once of those places where a bunch of fragrantly-male adolescents is exclaiming over their Magic cards--see if they offer a game night where you can come and try a game that you're thinking of buying; besides the wise preview factor, it's also a fun (free) night out. Most of the games I mention here are good for kids 7 and up, though Birdy has been playing them a bit longer than that (not that she had a lot of choice in the matter). A word of warning: once you play these games, some of the games you've been loving for years (Monopoly, Clue, Sorry, Uno) will suddenly seem so boring you will wonder what you were thinking.

The European-style games:


This might be our all-time favorite game, although New World (see below) is definitely contending. For one thing, it's lovely: you lay out forest, meadow, and river tiles (there's not actually a board) to create a stone-age landscape full of woolly mammoths and fish ponds and rambling woods. And for another, it's just this crazy mix of simple (draw a tile, lay a tile) and mind-blowingly strategic This is the first European-style board game we ever played--we borrowed it from a friend before buying it--and, as a person who grew up with such maddeningly-competitive-but-numbingly-boring games as Monopoly and Risk, I honestly had no idea that a game could be so engrossing. Brace yourself for a bit of culture shock when you unfold the directions: there's a steep but swift learning curve, and I swear it's not actually that hard to play. I also love it because it's finite: as with all the Carcassonne games, you simply play until you run out of tiles, which takes around 45 minutes.
2-5 players
Ages 7+



The play is very similar to Hunters and Gatherers (or to the original medieval-themed Carcassonne which is, strangely, our least favorite so far), but this one has a westward-expansion theme, and offers a different style of play: quicker and more fluid, with lots of short-term strategy. You're building farms, towns, and roads (instead of meadows, forests, and rivers), but the play is very easy to learn if you've learned any of the other Carcassonne games--kind of like learning Italian if you already speak Spanish.
2-5 players
Ages 7+

[edited to add: I wrote "westward expansion," and didn't even pause over it, until now, because I am in it to win, and never think holistically about the themes of these games, but: "westward expansion"? As in, the near-genocide of native people? I don't know. Stick with Hunters and Gatherers maybe. . . ]



Every time I play this game, I say, "I think this is actually my favorite board game," and the kids say, "You always say that." It's a cross-country train-themed game, and you're trying to complete various routes (from the Destination Tickets you draw) by laying out trains (using the Color Cards you draw). It's both insanely easy to learn, and truly challenging to play; the game's designer describes it this way: "The tension comes from being forced to balance greed – adding more cards to your hand, and fear – losing a critical route to a competitor." Greed and fear! And also, a little bit of screwing other people. But it's so much fun, I swear. And you really don't know who is going to win until it's all over--which I love, especially compared to a game like Monopoly, where usually you're spending more than half the game experiencing your own agonizingly slow defeat.
2-5 players
Ages 7+



Okay, this game too: when we play it, I'm a hundred percent positive that it's my favorite game. Partly it's because it's got this super-cool play element whereby you are completely involved even when it's not your turn, and partly it's because it is just another beautiful, beautifully designed strategy game where you're gathering resource tiles to build settlements, cities, and roads. There's lots of trading, which we think is incredibly fun, but which a younger child might find kind of stressful. Also, even though you only need ten points to win, it can take well over an hour. That said, one of the things I love about this game is that Birdy is just as likely to win it as anybody else, even though the whole time we're playing I am secretly thinking that her strategies are completely crazy. Go figure. There are lots of "expansions" you can buy to complicate play and increase the number of players, but we've never tried any.
3-4 players (more if you get an expansion)
Ages 8+



The summer we got this game, we played it every single day; we were obsessed. And we still love it. It's insanely demanding, strategy-wise, and yet it's easy to learn, and the sweet animal-themed tiles has made it lots of fun for Birdy, who had been initially put off by some of the other strategy games we were playing. Like the others, though, this one is beautiful--a mix of sturdy cardboard and wooden pieces--and it feels like it offers layers and layers of play: you learn it and think you get it, but then the more time you spend with it, the more you start to understand other ways to think about it. You're trying to fill your zoo with just the right number of animals (And if you get a mating pair you can have a baby! Yay!), and the play is finite (it's over when the tiles are gone) and there's no clear winner until the very end.
Note: we downloaded the expansions for free from the Rio Grande website.
2-5 players (but best with 3 and up)
Ages 7+




Acquire and Modern Art are Ben's two very most favorite board games--even though they're the ones we actually play the least because Birdy doesn't like either of them. And it's no coincidence. Acquire is a densely strategic game that's a little bit brutally competitive, like Monopoly that's been infused with testosterone. For instance, I sometimes feel like I'm going to punch Michael in the face when we're playing. They call it a "High finance game of speculation and strategy"--but really they mean "Screw or be screwed." You're trying to control the biggest hotel chains on the board, and along the way your children will learn terms like "merger" and "majority shareholder." If capitalism is not your bag, take a pass; but if you crave the catharsis of board-game rage, this is a great one.
3-6 players
Ages 10+  (Ben played younger, but he's totally obsessed with money)
Okay, of all of the mind-twisting games we play, this is the mind-twistingest. In fact, every time we play it, I say, "Oh, wow, I think I'm only just beginning to understand this game now." And we've played it, like, a hundred times. It's an art-themed auction game, where you're trying to get the other players to buy your paintings for a lot of money, but you're also trying to control who the most valuable artists are--and you need to think long-term, since the game progresses over four rounds. It offers some fun theatrical opportunities (you might auction off your paintings with a heavy accent, for example), but I for one feel like the art is a missed opportunity, since each of the paintings is uniquely ugly. Please note, however, that I'm the only person bothered by this fact.
3-5 players
Ages 10+

The other games:




Is it the vague Amish theme? The fact that it says "A Vonderful Goot Game" so campily on the box? I don't know--but make no mistake, this is one of our family's very most-played-ever games. In fact, we played it so much over the summer (it was the only game we took on our trip) that I got blisters from shuffling, and our cards, which had been new, ended up looking like something excavated from a ruin. That said, we often find ourselves being so very loud when we play this game--swearing and muttering and singing crazy songs--that we have sworn off playing it in public for a while. It's got a very simple Solitaire-style of play (stacking consecutive cards) and is all about speed and concentration rather than, say, strategy. It's a great game to play a few rounds of if you've got just 15 or 20 minutes to kill, and it's good with 2, 3, or 4 people. I'm never quite sure what makes it so much fun, but it is, and it has been our go-to birthday present for months.
2-4 players
Ages 6+



This is one of my own personal favorites, and it's a game we play often if we've got a bit of time, but don't have the full hour or hour-and-a-half that the Euro board games require. It's a rummy-type of strategy game, and you're trying to get rid of your 14 tiles by laying them out in runs or sets--but you can actually rearrange and pilfer from the tiles that are already out, which makes for a really challenging and entertaining level of play. That said, though, it's one of those great easy-to-play games that is just as likely to be won by the youngest kid as by the mathiest adult.
2-4 players
Ages 7+



Another rummy-style game, though this one is simply a deck of cards, which makes it great for travel. You need to complete 10 "phases"--ten specific hands--in the correct order, without falling behind your opponents, and it's a game that Ben and I play together a lot, just the two of us, even though it's fun with more people (but slower too). It is somehow engaging without being exactly strategy-driven, and it's also small and inexpensive enough to be a good stocking stuffer.
2-6 players
Ages 7+



Surely you've played Blokus, right? You're trying to fit as many of your pieces out onto the grid as you can--more than anyone else does--before you run out of space. There's, like, one rule, but somehow the game is crazy-spatially-challenging. It seems to involve some really particular part of your brain, because when we play with our friends Peggy and Nina, who are both math professors, only one of them is good at it. But Birdy, who plays with her own "snuggle" strategy ("I'm snuggling all your pieces, Mama!") often wins. The only downside is that you really need four people for it--no more, no fewer--which is slightly limiting, since often 3 of us will want to play, and then we've got to rope the other person in.
Best with 4 players
Ages 5+



Rumis is like Blokus taken into a third dimension: you're recreating imaginary Incan architecture (there are a number of boards you can use) and you've got to get more of your pieces out than your opponent. It's challenging, quick, and varied--and fun for both adults and kids.
2-4 players
Ages 6+

We first played this game at the hostel where we were staying on Cape Cod, and we always call it "Globbet"--I think because Ben used to say "Pliget" instead of "Piglet." It's a beautiful, wooden 2-person game that is divinely simple and pure strategy. And even though it gets described as a "tic-tac-toe" game, it's got some crazy elements (you can "gobble" a player's pieces with your own) and is almost chess-like in its intensity--but much, much quicker to play, obviously. I admit that sometimes Ben gets it out and I say, "Oh, Ben, pick something that won't make me have to think so much," but I tell you that only as a lame confession, since I tend to think that thinking is a good thing.
2 people
Ages 7+


Farkle is another of our favorite travel games, since you just need the six dice and a score sheet, and play is quick--for instance, you can get in a few rounds while you're waiting for your burgers, as long as you lay a napkin on the table to mute the sound of the clattering dice. It's simple to play (you need 5s and 1s to score) and it's not so much a strategy game as a gambling one: we are forever slapping our own foreheads and bemoaning our own greed and foolishness. Plus, it's so much fun to say, "Excuse me, I farkled." If you aren't giving this as a gift, and if you already have 6 dice from your Yahtzee set, then you can simply look the rules up on-line and skip the whole packaged aspect of it.
From 2 to loads of players
Ages 5+



Guess who demanded that I include this game in my line-up? I'll give you a hint: she's the youngest person in my family. And she's the person who still wants to play Guess Who if it's just her and me on what she calls "a date"--when Ben and Michael happen not to be home. This was the first game Birdy really loved, and it's a great introduction to the process of elimination (what the Cat in the Hat calls "calculatus eliminatus"). Plus, it's very quick to play! Which is good, because it's also boring and forces you to ask weirdly reductive questions about race and gender. I'm just saying.
2 players
Ages 5+
Even though we don't play this anymore, I need to give Sorry a little bit of love here. When the kids were younger, it was our favorite family board game for ages. It's mostly a game of luck, but I actually love it for the way it teaches kids resilience in the face of getting screwed--especially because, in our family at least, you have to say "Sorry" with an irritatingly drawn-out mix of meanness and irony whenever you send someone's piece back to home. And you've just got to comport yourself with grace in the face of it: a good lesson, I'm not even kidding. (Hasbro calls it "the game of sweet revenge.") Plus, it's a pretty fun game, a pleasantly mindless one, and the kind that's never over til it's over.
2-4 players
Ages 6+

Okay, that's it for now! I hope you'll use the comments to opine, inquire, and offer your own suggestions.

Monday, November 08, 2010

Wow. Could it be any Novemberier? Honestly. I love it when the weather gets so candid like this: blustery and raw with a scrim of ice over everything, the dark descending all day long. Then my dread can ebb away and I can just deal with it. You know?

Meanwhile:


Michael made an apple pie.  Read all about it!

(He looks deceptively sweet there, doesn't he? When really. . . .


as we all know. . . )

Then the kids made fancy pastries with the leftover dough.

And then I read this book. And was totally devastated.

Then it was Garfield Day Halloween:




complete with flower fairies big and small:



And then I read this book. And was totally devastated.

And then we took ourselves up to MASS MoCA, where there happened to be an amazing exhibit about gender and junk called "Pink & Blue Projects." Guess who happened to be wearing pink?


Love that boy.

Then I made Whole-wheat Pasta with Broccoli Pesto and Garlicky Breadcrumbs.

Phew. I hope that you and all your knights and vampires, witches and rainbow fairies, platypuses and deviled eggs, ninjas and angels and eagles and sandwiches have had a magical couple of weeks.

And finally: Laura, how did you guess? We did indeed find a young woman in the woods, pregnant and afflicted with the wandering amnesia, and we brought her home with us and fed her delicious pastas and nourishing soups while we waited for her memory to return. Or something like that. xo

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Dear ones,

It's lentil soup season! Isn't that good news? No? Oh. I think it is, even though I can see you yawning and wondering when I'm going to post a truly exciting recipe. Braised Pork Belly with Caramelized Fennel, say.

That piece I mentioned--the one from Whole Living (formerly known as body + soul) is here.

And here's a picture of Birdy and Frankie doing tummy time:



And another picture, this one of the shoes Birdy picked out, when we told her she needed "fancy shoes" for the weddings we were going to. I love that Birdy. Also pictured: Strawberry. My friend Ann took this photo, and it is one of my all-time favorites:


Birdy and Strawberry are being flower fairies for Halloween (fun!) and Ben is being Garfield (kill me). Anyone got a couple hundred yards of orange plush to send my way?

What are your kids being? Tell me everything.

xo

p.s. Edited to add: No! I didn't have a baby! (And, in fact, last time I saw my OB, she said that my uterus was sunken on the floor of my pelvis like the Titanic.) Frankie is Anni's baby; Anni came to live with us when she was pregnant. It's the perfect way to have a baby. I recommend it.

Saturday, October 09, 2010

Hi, hi, hi!

We are running off to spend the weekend with my parents, but I wanted to link to the column I posted early, in case you wanted a great idea for your Sunday dinner. It's pork roast with cider-cream gravy. Are you dying just from even how good it sounds?

Also, I posted miso kale chips last week, and they're good, even if they sound not so exciting. Plus, not to pull out all the stops to entice you over there, but the recipe did inspire this one-line email from a friend: "how i love that you can weave a hand-job reference into a post about kale chips. is there an award for that?"

I also wanted to mention, kind of late, that I have a piece in the October issue of Whole Living (formerly Body + Soul), that will likely be available for approximately one more minute. And I have a piece in the new issue of Brain, Child too.  I don't mean to brag and I don't mean to boast, said Peter T. Hooper, but speaking of toast. . . (ten points for anyone who can name that reference).

Otherwise, it's just the usual. You know gorgeous weddings. . .


. . . and flying kids.

Have a wonderful weekend, my friends. xo

Monday, September 27, 2010

Dear ones,

Did you need some recipes for this transition from summer into Fall?

I thought you might!

Hence the late-summer tomato-bread salad, here.

And the early-fall potato-leek soup, here.

Also, not to taunt you or anything, but there's a photo at the end of that last post you might want to see. I'll give you a hint. It's of a baby. Not this baby



Although, yes, that is a very cute baby. Okay, another hint. It's about a birthday. Not my friend Chris's fortieth, for which occasion I made this t-shirt that I am hereby showing off:



I would actually like to make a little tutorial, because a layer-cake shirt is such a fabulous birthday present. . . 

But okay. Here's your last hint:


Yay!

xo Catherine

p.s. If you are serious about Europe or the huts or Paris or wanting more information, maybe email me directly? That way I don't have to bore everyone with all the details or try to figure out if you're just being polite. But about those hut shoes: a hut is like a hostel, and when you arrive you take off your stinky, muddy boots and put on a pair of crocs. They have dozens of pairs for this very purpose, so I took a photo to remind us of them.


Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Seriously, what was I thinking?

Of course I wanted you to ask about that photo! I posted it, right? But then I have been paralyzed by a feeling simultaneously of not knowing where to start, and also of life barreling forward, into the fall and school and work, and away from the heavenly heavenified heaven-on-earth that was our trip abroad.

But let me interrupt myself to say this:

Over on family.com, I've got some new recipes posted, and I hope you'll visit me there, and even leave a comment if you have a mind to!


  • I posted this best-ever one-bean salad in honor of Anni's baby shower.
  • And this pizza, which is one of the recipes I have worked on the most and over the longest period of time. In fact, go there for the tomatillo salsa recipe alone.
  • And then there are these circle-of-comfort oatmeal cookies, along with my blahblahing about what an act of devotion it is to make them. What is wrong with me? I don't know.
But back to Europe. The short version: Michael's brother and his family have been in Lithuania for two years; my brother and his family live in Geneva; we hatched a plan a year ago to save up and go--and we did. To Paris for a week, where we met Michael's brother's family; and to Switzerland, where we hiked in the Alps with mine. In the Alps! Where we stayed in "family friendly" huts--even though "family friendly" turned out to mean only that you could hike to them in 11 hours but without an ice-axe or crampons. (Crampons! Ha ha.) Insanity in every amazing and unforgettable way. It was, to put it as simply as possible, the trip of a lifetime, and in two weeks we must have generated a couple hundred thousand memories. Can I share just a tiny few?


Birdy on one of the jasquillion carousels they rode in Paris. Gorgeous.


Name that Cathedral! Our Lady of Perpetual Amazement. Even an old atheist Jew like me is moved to tears by the majesty and devotion of such a beautiful piece of architecture.



A promise: skinny dip in a glacial lake, and your young nephews will never ever stop talking about it.


Heading up, up, up to the top of the world where one of our huts was perched.



And then looking down. Wowza.



Hut shoes.

I am dying a little from wishing we were still there. But so glad to have been.

Thank you, friends, for indulging me.

xo