Friday, March 23, 2018

7 Quick Takes about Funny Names for Vegetables, Shameless Escape Attempts, and Thinking About Opening an Art Museum in the Dining Room

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?

1


If you haven't ever cooked with baby bok choy before, I highly recommend it. I say this because first of all, your kids will call it "bonk choy" when they're being dead serious and it's hilarious.

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}

Second of all, when you cut off the stems you'll get this nifty little rose-shaped things.

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}

I made a bok choy stir-fry this week and set the stems aside, but Phillip, not knowing that I wanted them, tried to throw them away. I admit I may have been overreacting when I screamed and dove across the kitchen to save them.

My 13-year-old, curious, asked, "Why do you want those?"

"They look like they'd make cute little stamps to do with your younger siblings."

"See, Mom? You are crafty."

I thanked her (although 'crafty' is probably the last way anyone would describe me) and then asked, "Wait, did you say 'crafty' or 'crappy?'"

"Both," she answered.

2


Right now my house is full of these things.

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}

The preschooler figured out how to fling these fuzzy ponytails across the room using the slingshot method, and he's getting pretty good at it.

The evidence of his practice is all over the house, and it's pretty impressive how far and high he can shoot them. Right now there's a bright blue one perched on the windowsill at the top of our two-story living room.

Judging by how often I get around to dusting the ceiling fan that's at the same level, the ponytail is now permanently a part of the window fixture and we should just start decorating around it.

3


Well, it's the beginning of the end. My 1-year-old figured out how to crawl out of the Pack n' Play we use as a naptime crib.

The other day I put him down and went upstairs to read to his siblings, and several minutes the door swung open and he was standing there with all his stuffed animals in his arms like, "Hey, what's up?" It's like he wasn't even aware he was not supposed to be there.

I thought maybe that was just a one-time thing but now he's getting really fast at it. Yesterday I changed his diaper, put him down for a nap, and before I'd even reached the trash to throw away the diaper he was already halfway up the stairs to go play.


4


At my annual physical they called me in to the exam room right away, but then I had to sit there for 25 minutes waiting for the doctor.

Which ordinarily would have been fine except for the fact that it was really cold in there and I was freezing my butt off in a tissue-paper thin gown the whole time.

It was extra-ironic because one of the things I wanted to talk to the doctor about was the exaggerated cold response of my Reynaud's, which makes my fingers and toes go numb whenever it's chilly.

5


In an effort to help us all live more sustainably and keep things out of landfills, I recently learned that an organization in our town is sponsoring quarterly "fix-it" events. You bring in your broken stuff and their volunteers try to get it in working order again, for free.

One, that's a great idea.

Two, does anyone know where I can rent a huge flatbed trailer so I can put my entire house on it and bring it over there?

When I used to see those "oversize load" trailers carrying houses on the freeway I used to think they were modular homes on their way to the assembly site; now I know that they were just moms like me on their way to the fix-it shop.

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}
"Don't mind me, just on my way to the fix-it!"
Photo for illustrative purposes, courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

6


Speaking of things that go into the landfill, let me talk a little bit about party favors.

You know the cheap plastic kind that they make in China, ship all the way over here, and sell at Party City in a bag of 100 that costs a dollar? Then they go home with your party guests and break after .02 seconds so you throw them in the garbage?

I'm sorry, but I just don't understand the point.

We recently received some of said cheap plastic party favors and I launched into my standard lecture (see above.) "On a scale of 1 to 10," I asked my daughter, "How much joy would you say that lame plastic thing brings you?"

Now when my children like something, they say that it "brings them 10 joys." This is going to make it significantly harder to KonMari the house now.

7


Sometimes I wish my house was an art museum so that when I came across things like this I didn't have to clean it up. I could just hang a plaque beside it that said:

When My Mom Was in the Shower
2018
Mixed Media: red oil pastel, graphite pencil, Mickey Mouse sock on hardwood and drywall.

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}
It's, like, conceptual art. You probably wouldn't get it.

At least thanks to Google I've learned how to remove all of this and have mentally added it to my list of how to clean everything out of anything.

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5 comments:

Jenny Albertson said...

It’s the worst when they start climbing out. My son started climbing out of his crib so we lowered the mattress to the floor. Now it’s more of a padded jail cell than a crib. But for some reason he still can’t climb out of the pack and play.

Jenny Evans said...

It's probably like a flamingo thing, how they don't fly out of the zoo even though they could. Maybe I'll try planting a row of hedges around the perimeter as a visual barrier of his Pack 'n Play...

Laura @ Life Is Beautiful said...

Oh man, the doctor's office one happened to me this week at the OB! I was sitting there with a paper sheet over the bottom half of me while helplessly waiting and watching my 20 mo old "swim" on the floor of the exam room....

Rosie said...

During the summer we end up sending guests home from parties with things like a grocery bag full of beers, an arm full of kale, a gallon of tomatoes... I figure they might not be as popular with the kids as plastic trash, but at least if they don't eat them they'll decompose ;)

Rachel said...

We eat baby bok choy a lot, and we've done rose stamps with the kids, they turn out really cute!