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The Orangette Reading
photo from this morning. The lilacs in the city are in bloom!
It’s easy to add up the ways Molly has influenced my life because all of them are tangible and concrete. I make the oatcake recipe she borrowed from 3191 Miles Apart for many play dates, always to accolades. Her writing introduced me to The Breakfast Book, the now-most bespattered cookbook on my shelf, the foundation of many cozy mornings. Her blog introduced me to my now-internet friend Andrea of Book-Scout, the blonde bookworm of Portland.
I was so happy to be in a basement in Wellesley last night, listening to Molly talk about her life. Happy to have a new book in my hands, full of stories of food and experimenting and taking risks for dreams. Happy to leave with my friends and walk next door to share crusty bread and pink cocktails and split a butterscotch budino at the end.
At the reading I spotted Jess Fechtor of Sweet Amandine, a food blog she writes from Cambridge. I’ve liked Jess’s writing for a long time, and it was treat to meet her in person. She was towing along her littlest newborn daughter and accompanied by her friend Andrew Janjigian (on twitter here), associate editor of Cook’s Illustrated and pizza-dough-expert. It just so happened that I’ve had several concerns the last few times I made pizza, namely: 1/ does parchment paper placed on top of my pizza stone negate the crisping power of the stone? 2/ Is the new baking steel now more legit than the long-favored baking stone? These questions jumped to the front of my mind when Andrew mentioned he occasionally teaches pizza-making classes out of his apartment! I was delighted he allowed me to corner him for a few minutes with pedestrian-sometimes-baker concerns. Please forgive me for finishing up this long tangent, but for those of you who also love homemade pizza: Andrew recommended getting a super peel to solve the depended-on-parchment problem, and verified that the baking steel was the real deal, not just a trend.
Anyway, there we were, waiting for Molly to sign our books, surrounded by more books, lined up next to people who were just as curious about the next food-book event in Wellesley: a book signing with Jeni from Jeni’s Ice Cream, talking about dough, and good writing. It was my ComicCon moment: the happy glory of these are my people and we are happy here.
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Weekend Visualization
“On a good working day, working from nine o’clock in the morning to two or three in the afternoon, the most I can write is a short paragraph of four or five lines, which I usually tear up the next day.”
-Gabriel Garcia Marquez, in an interview -
My daily tote
I bring you: my daily diaper bag! It has been this, with very little variation, for forever. I don’t carry a purse in addition to this…I guess I am a minimalist. I don’t plan for contingencies or emergencies. If they happen, I rely on the goodness of God and strangers or MacGyvering things.
For better or worse, I don’t carry lipgloss or perfume…though I sometimes aspire to be that kind of woman. Before Joan, this would have included reading material; I think it will again once she can walk on her own…pretty please.
Diapers & wipes: two dipes for Joan, one for Lux.
Changing pad: I zipped this off of the Skip Hop pronto (best gift for new moms, by the way) back when Lux was young. Haven’t looked back.
Chocolate Date Coconut larabar: both Lux and I will accept and be satiated by this delicious creation in any circumstance.
Apple: now accepted by all three of us as a nice snack. Easily shared.
Bubbles, silly putty, crayons, rings: Entertainment for constrictive spaces like restaurant tables, or stalling at the park for awhile.
Lunchskin: dishwasher safe and reusable! Usually packed with nuts, dried fruit, and crackers.
Hats: late winter-spring weather fluctuates so much! Hats can fix almost any Mom-miscalculation. These will soon be replaced by sunscreen and sun hats.
Baby Baggu: such a great brand. Love them.
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Two So Far
Simply on a street-and-bystander level, I like the respect that comes from having two kids. The unsolicited advice seems to have vaporized. No more “oh just wait until you have two/she’s older/she’s starts walking” etc etc. The sight of me coming down the street with the girls seems to garner some awe. Perhaps a fleeting moment of pity. A few “My, you really have your hands full.” Not exactly compliments, but there is a little music to them.
Almost every month we drop a bag of stuff at Goodwill, but for the first time recently, a couple of the things that went were things I really liked. That’s a good sign. It’s bad if you’re purging junk–how did it get into your home the first place? But if you getting rid of things you like because they’ve come to the end of a good life, been rendered irrelevant or replaced with a better fit (like our kitchen table), then things are really getting shipshape.
But I did cringe to see go the table we found as newlyweds at the Cambridge Antique Market. We bought it from a dealer who meticulously wrote full paragraphs on the tags he attached to each item. Before we purchased the table we spent twenty minutes just reading the mini histories he had recorded. Each side of the table folded down completely. That was great for our old apartment where dinner parties began with drinks on “the sideboard” and then we sat down to dinner at the now-table.
But the flip side is that we have a new table that fits our small kitchen and the four of us just right.
This brings me to another perk of two: cleaning my house. I’ve realized I cannot not clean my apartment just because I have a child under foot. Because they’re never not under foot. I’m allowed to say, “I can’t read Curious George right now, I’m cleaning.” I’m allowed to expect Lux to entertain herself that long. I’m allowed to shrug my shoulders at her bored-face and let her find her own fun.
After a few real miscalculations, I’ve banned errands that implicitly value my time below minimum wage. A 40-minute trip to a consignment shop for a chance at $8 in store credit? No thank you. When I get a gift for the girls in the mail, I send a text message or email to say thank you right away, and leave it at that. The gracious days of a written note have slipped away, at least for a while.
I’ve started answering the phone again. If I don’t pick up now, my wary thinking goes, I might have to listen to a voicemail later. So I pick up.
I see that I’m becoming manically efficient. With Lux, I was always doing these small trips to the grocery store, lugging one overpacked bag back with me on the stroller. I go to the store once a week. I spend enough to initiate free delivery. I’ve finally started planning more than one dinner in advance. Finally started my dinner journal that I’ve been meaning to do for a year or two. Finally typed up a list of my typical grocery list, with space for additions and printed it off.
I don’t say this to boast. Just puttering over the things here and there that seem to have gotten easier, and almost in awe of the things that are falling into place.
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17 / 52
“A portrait of my daughters, once a week, every week, in 2014.”
Lux: an impromptu art project during Joan’s morning nap is a nice new habit for us.
Joan: just before she ate a whole bunch of dandelion fluff. -
Weekend Visualization
Airplants at my friend Jennie’s house. Happy Weekend!“Try this with your partner: on a warm summer night, sit together in the living room and breath alternately. While you breath in, your spouse breathes out, and vice versa.
Alternate breathing is better for a relationship than couples therapy.”
-Sparrow, from the Sun magazine, issue #461
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16 / 52
Lux: so delighted that playground season has begun and she asks to go on the swings every time.
Joan: walking back home, we often take these breaks for Lux to leap off the back of the stroller and tease Joan for a minute or two. -
15/52
Conversation at the breakfast table -
These days
I enjoyed my friend Melissa’s post about eating her purse for dinner (spending more than she planned, saving the money on her grocery bill for a week). I thought of it because I did a similar act this week, though it was still in the name of sustenance. Rummaging in the pantry in the evening to make do without a trip to the store, so we could eat outside the kitchen as much as possible. I took the girls the greenway to judge how dead the grass is (quite dead) and ordered hot squishy squares of pizza for $3.30 from galleria umberto, served up by two old men who tie the box tightly with baker’s twine when you ask for it to go. Joan gave the pizza a cursory nibble before she switched to the grass. This made me very satisfied, “Here we are, all eating the same thing, what a happy family.”
Chocolate croissant, a brioche roll, “and some coffee for Mama” from The Thinking Cup, eaten slowly walking back home through the Common. It’s our usual, to the extent that Lux orders the croissant for herself. Do I have a spoiled city child? Potentially. Ice cream sandwiches and a movie with Joe, followed by belgians and sweet roasted nuts in the depths of State Park (“And one pickled egg please” ordered Joe. The waitress didn’t bat an eye and it arrived, bright pink, on a plate moments later). For a celebratory Friday night, Pad Thai takeout that came with a paper bag for Joan to chew on.
All in all it was quite well spent, and now I’m ready to restock the freezer with butternut squash cubes and blueberries and feel again that the house is well supplied with good and plenty. Good and plenty is a very brief feeling that I have for 48 hours after my weekly grocery trip, it dissipates at the same rate as the greek yogurt.
Things have felt a little crazy, but the kitchen has looked lovely which just goes to show you can judge a book by its cover in this day in age, but you can’t judge how someone is feeling by the the looks of their instagram account. The sunlight has been magnificent.
It feels as if everything is falling into place, even the earth and the moon, for a moment. There will be a lunar eclipse. You’ll have to get up at 3:08am in the morning to see it, but whatever it takes, right?
I’m feeling really really good about life these days.
The lunar eclipse is Tuesday morning–one of only two days this week, Holy Week, that does not have a church service at the end of it. A near week of church services, many of them in the dark or lit by candles with breathtaking music in movements of mourning and celebration.
However, it’s also my birthday week! So Joe and I will go out for to a long anticipated meal at O Ya instead of going to the Good Friday service. This amazing Japanese place has been on my list for a long time, several people have told me they had the best meal of their Boston lives there. We will not order any alcohol, the whole budget will be put toward tasting delicious things and watching delicious things be prepared.
How are you feeling these days?
Photos of Rishi Green Chai tea (my super favorite lately) and bread from a Deborah Madison recipe. I’m going to start linking to the foursquare of restaurants I mention. It disrupts the reading a bit, but it is worth it for those collecting places to try in Boston.
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This Week
Lux: a big-sister dictator for sure, but a benevolent one most of the time.
Joan: crawling as of this week! She’s so much happier to be mobile. What a relief.Two photos taken at Joe’s office, which we hadn’t visited in forever.