Category Archives: Engineer
Merry little marry courthouse wedding quiz
Last night I took a quiz on Facebook that determines from which area of the US my American English accent derives by asking several pronunciation questions. One of the questions was, “How do the words ‘Merry,’ ‘Marry,’ and ‘Mary’ sound to you?” I didn’t have to think about it. I pronounce them all the same, but the meaning of one of them was totally lost to me. Mary is a name. I know that one. Merry is joy, happiness and usually precedes the word Christmas. Got that one, but what the hell is Marry? I made the god-awful mistake of asking Kurt. I should really know better because he’s NEVER going to let me live this one down. I spelled out the version of marry that confused me. He raised an eyebrow and looked at me as if I was from the same planet as Mork. He may have actually been gauging to see if I was testing him or really didn’t know, then he showed me the shiny new ring on his left hand. “You don’t KNOW?” Oh yeah. Marry, as in, I’m now married. I’m a dork, and I’m sure to make a lousy wife.
I know some are very surprised that we actually did the ring thing, but you’ll be relieved to know that we waited to the bitter end to decide if we wanted rings or not. I don’t know why I brought it up but a week or two before the date we set for our wedding day, our tenth anniversary, I asked Kurt if we should get rings. “Do you want rings?” he asked. “I don’t know.” I said. Part of me figured since we’re already going through the ceremony we might as well get the rings too and the other part wants to hang on to the rebellion and say, “Fuck you society! I’m not wearing a fuckin’ ring, deal with it!” But then I don’t want to spend the rest of my life explaining why we got married but don’t wear rings, even though we spent the last ten years explaining to people that it’s possible to have a baby without being married. It’s actually been done for hundreds, nay thousands of years. It’s not some recent scourge of society caused by television. It’s merely two people living together without the pre-approval of a church or government meddling, both of which result in nothing more but some paper signing. Does this magically cause women to ovulate differently and produce non-bastard eggs that will somehow fair better through life based on some mystical notion beyond societal pressures?
The morning of the day of our ceremony Kurt and I finally made our decision after going to a jewelry store. Even there we were both looking at each other, should we? Rings? No rings? The sales lady behind the counter asked us a few questions and looked somewhat disapprovingly at ME when we told her that we were getting married that day, as if I hadn’t done my job as a woman to pick out the rings with enough time. She didn’t seem to get that it was ok with me that the ring wouldn’t fit for the ceremony. Never mind nether of us knowing if we wanted rings, I frankly I didn’t want to get married at all.
Washington State in its infinite psychosis won’t grant homosexuals to marry, yet will grant them a domestic partnership which extents employer health benefits to their significant other but wont grant heterosexuals who don’t want to marry the same benefit unless:
- Share a common residence; – Yes.
- You’re both at least 18 years old; – Yes, and we sometimes act over 18 as well.
- Neither of you are already married or in a domestic partnership; – Yes, we pass this hurdle too.
- Both of you are capable of consenting to a partnership; – Yes. Neither of us is a farm animal. He just acts like an ass.
- You aren’t related (nearer than a second cousin); – The tree branches don’t even come close to touching. I’ve checked.
- You are either both of the same sex or one of you is at least 62 years old. – Does it count if we’ve been having the same sex for ten years? Or if he acts 62? He does an awesome “Grandpa Simpson” voice. Shit, damn, fuck!
No matter anymore, we’ve tied the knot. I sent out an email notice to our families and the majority of our friends with the subject titled, “Public Announcement”. I sent out Kurt’s watered down version of what I wanted to say.
We would like to inform you all that Kurt and I are getting married on the 25th of February (our ten year anniversary) so that I can continue to stay home with Sophia and still have health insurance. We aren’t doing any sort of ceremony. This will just be a document signing in front of a judge.
My version went like this:
Kurt and I are getting married on the 25th of February (our ten year anniversary) so that I can continue to stay home with Sophia and still have health insurance. We aren’t doing any sort of ceremony. This will just be a document signing in front of some judge. If you feel compelled be there to hold a gun to mine or Kurt’s back to insure we go through with it, or wish to harass the judge by listing the myriad of reasons why Kurt and I shouldn’t get married because it would undermine the sanctity of the whole institution, I’ll make sure to send you more details as we make arraignments.
Because we needed two witnesses, I also sent out another email for friends working close enough to the courthouse or on maternity leave to stop by and make their mark on our marriage paper.
We are required to provide two witnesses for our wedding ceremony (official paper signing), which will be on Wednesday February 25 at 4:30pm in *name of place that passes as a city*. We can have more people, but Kurt and I don’t want to make this too big a deal. Please let me know if you’d like to be our witness on the above stated Wednesday. You will have to sign an official looking paper with your real name (no aliases) and it will be recorded with *name of local county* with official looking seals (not the cute little furry animals, sorry).
Unfortunately the officiator will not be an Internet ordained *name of out-of-the-closet-but-not-in-a-gay-way atheist friend* doing a combination of Princess Bride and the episode of friends in which Joey recites the speech he wants to give at Monica and Chandler’s wedding because he said he wouldn’t be able to keep a straight face.
“Mawage. Mawage is wot bwings us togeder tooday. Mawage, that bwessed awangment, that dweam wifin a dweam…”
“And wuv, tru wuv and the giving…and the caring.and the receiving and sharing of the loving kindness that will be given in such a caring and loving way with deference to the spirit of a loving, caring, sharing and giving relationship, will fowow you foweva…”
So we’ll have to settle for some stuffy Judge with the *local county* District Court.
Several people have told us we need to have a party to celebrate our ten obnoxiously long years together, but our house just isn’t big enough for that, and we’re doing this on a Wednesday.
After I sent out the we-won’t-have-a-party email Kurt decided that it would be fun to invite anyone that does come out to Buca di Beppo. That was a fun time fitting for a ten-year anniversary. As always, we told many stories and either referenced or retold some old ones.
One story that I haven’t written about previously is how Kurt received the nickname Terry. It’s a benign nickname, but I had to ask permission before posting it on the internet, so keep your pants on you might like this one.
Kurt and I were up in Canada for a motorcycle thing with a bunch of friends. We were in the narrow bathroom of our hotel room getting ready for the day. Both of us were nekkid and we passed each other butt to butt. That’s odd. I thought he was nekkid. I looked over at him and he was indeed nekkid. “What?” he asked. “It felt like you were wearing a towel.” I’m brutal, I know. Poor Kurtie. He was mortified, so much so that he told EVERYONE. And they laughed and dubbed him Terry. He’s an odd human. I wasn’t going to tell a soul.
By the way, our rings are inscribed with, “Kurt is my lobster”, and “Erica is my lobster”. We thought about inscribing angry messages like, “Society made us do it” or have it reference Lord of the Rings, “One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them, one ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them.” We were limited to about 15 to 20 characters so the latter was right out. We settled on something that reflected our ten years together instead of our forced conformity, except that I sent Kurt out to have them inscribed without me and he forgot to have the date of our first date included. *sigh*
Related posts:
Laundry Basket Race to Milestones
Sophia has changed quite a bit in the last month. She made her first baby sign on Thanks Giving day after I gave her some pumpkin pie and she gobbled it up. Other than her sign for ‘all done’ she didn’t use signs at all until around fifteen months and then she only added the sign for ‘more’. It only took a couple days of making the sign correctly before she become so confident about it that she would drink from her tippy cup while making the sign one-handed against the tray of her booster seat. Creative little bugger. It was the baby version of a NASCAR fan being too busy drinking his beer to actually clap. Now it doesn’t sound as impressive, does it?
Watching her do the sign for ‘more’ is so cute. Sometimes she puts everything down, looks down at her hands to make sure she has them aligned properly, and brings them together as if it takes all of her concentration. After the first time she’ll look up and continue making the sign a few times until I say, “Oh you want more, ok.”
The sign for milk is supposed to simulate milking a cow, but Sophia has a problem making that sign. Instead, she does something similar to flicking a booger off her thumb. It took me a while to figure out that she was in fact trying to make the sign for milk. She only used the sign for ‘eat’ the one time, and after learning ‘more’ she uses that for ‘eat’ as well. If I’m not paying close attention to her she comes up, grabs my hand and bites me to let me know she’s hungry. After several times of telling her not to bite me, last night she took my hand and licked me. Much better, I guess. If I can only choose between the two, I’ll take the latter.
This last month she’s gone back to insisting that she feed herself. Thankfully, if I’m serving oatmeal or muesli I’m allowed to fill her up most of the way before she demands control of the spoon. Sometimes she’ll allow me to help her scoop up a spoonful of food for her to put into her mouth, always sideways or upside-down, of course.
She seems to have given up her old “tur lur lur shlur lur”, which I loved, and has taken up, “Doodle oodle loodle loodle”. Her original multi syllabic vocalization was for analyzing objects and it was quiet, almost whispered. It was cute and I loved it. It served as a great warning that she maybe getting into things I didn’t want her to get into. The new multi syllabic vocalization is more of a statement. Nah, a proclamation. Doodle oodle loodle loodle says, “I’m going to run around the house with your dirty panties on my head and there isn’t a thing you can do about it, mother.” Yes, she’s that snooty, and yes she has run around with my DIRTY underwear on her head.
She has a thing for putting stuff on herself. The new tote that her gramma gave her belongs on her head. Good thing it has a window. She walks around with ribbon like a seamstress with measuring tape, around the neck it goes. And she loves shuffling around the house with my slippers on her tiny feet. She puts her own shirts on by holding them up to her chest and walking around the room using her chin to hold them in place. It’s hilarious!
She managed to get her own pants on once. She analyzed the waistband round and round in circles until she finally put a leg in, then the second leg. She had one leg in for each pant leg. They were only pulled up to her thighs, but technically, they were on. Unfortunately, they were on backwards.
With her determination to do things on her own I’ve started having her put her own dirty diapers into the diaper champ and turn the handle. Sometimes she needs help with the handle, especially when the champ starts to get full, but she does it on her own after every diaper change. Even at the swimming pool, she puts her diaper in the pail they keep for that specific purpose. She’s such a great little helper!
I think the most noticeable change is that Sophia now allows barrettes in her hair, sometimes. It took a combination of allowing her to play with the other barrettes I keep in a bag, running to the nearest mirror to show her how cool the barrettes look in her hair, and wearing one of her tiny barrettes in my own hair before she would keep them in. But now instead of looking like this:
She looks like this more often:
But even better than that, she finally said her first word. Last night I was folding laundry while Sophia played in the empty laundry basket, climbing in and out. She picked it up, carried it to the other side of the room, and continued climbing in and then it slipped. She fell, hitting her head on the wood bed frame. After the crying began, I went over to pick her up, give her a big hug, and do the ‘kiss it better’ mommy thing. Kurt came up to see what happened and by the time he reached us she was ready to play in the laundry basket some more. Kurt took the opportunity to turn the laundry basket into a toddler car. Unlike most other fathers Kurt’s laundry basket toddler car had a slow gentle ride complete with a backup beep. After one cruise around the bedroom, I told Sophia, “We need to show daddy how this car really handles.”
I took control of the laundry basket car. “eeeerrrr” The car backed up. “EErrrr” Went around the corner. “yyeeerrooowww” Drove past Kurt and into the other room. “EERRRR” Blue laundry basket break marks into the next room and a sharp u-turn. Toddlers are fun to watch with the proper laundry basket driver because when they break hard enough the toddler bends in half and can touch their toddler toes with their giant toddler melon-head.
After we were done with the basket rides, Kurt and I were sitting on the floor with Sophia standing in front of us. She faced Kurt and said, “Da-E”. Kurt and I looked at each other, “Yes, daddy.” I told her. She turned to me and pointed. The expression on her face read, “And who the fuck are you?”
I’m just the one that she bites when she’s hungry and clings to at social events. *sigh*
About three weeks ago Kurt swore that he heard Sophia say, “Hi daddy” when he arrived home from work. I was standing right there but since I’m used to the usual “tur lur lur” and “Doodle oodle loodle” I didn’t notice. He thought he had heard it again about a week later but I was upstairs. This time it was clear and it was right in front of us both.
Earlier in the day I swear I was hearing her say, “key key key” which I assumed was her calling the cat, but I didn’t see the cat anywhere around nor did I hear him whining. I guess I’ll learn what it means later.
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55 Flash Fiction Friday: Mawage is wot bwings us togeder
I didn’t want to do it, not because I wasn’t sure he’s the one nor for fear of commitment. We’ve been together longer than many of our friends. We’re committed to each other in every way but on paper, so why bother with the formality? Two words, health insurance. Happy tenth anniversary to my lobster!
Flash Fiction Friday is hosted by g-man. You may also visit Flash Fiction Friday 55′s, a blog dedicated to hosting 55 Flash Fiction Friday posts.
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Hallmark’s New Anniversary Gift Guide
For the ten year anniversary nothing says love like a bottle of Tinactin for him. In return he’ll slowly and as sexily as a man can, strip his socks off.
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Vegetable uses
Kurt eats out everyday for lunch and the though of what he chooses to eat makes me twitch, so last month I got the itch to try to get up every morning to make Kurt’s lunch. I think I managed to send him off to work with a homemade lunch twice before getting into an overly tired funk. No, I’m not pregnant. No, we haven’t started trying to conceive a second baby.
The second time I sent Kurt to work with a packed lunch he sent me this email:
I’m eating the lunch you made me.
I thought you were trying to make me healthy, then I saw that orange thing in the container.
Are you trying to kill me?
I had packed a large carrot in his lunch which was chopped to fit into the container. This was my reply:
Oh don’t eat THAT – that goes up your bum.
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Smurfy French
Kurt hummed the Smurf song over an over again just to annoy me, and then said something Kurtesk. I replied with the usual, “I hate you.”
Non-French speaking, Kurt: Moi?
Only took one quarter of French in college and not remembering or caring to use the correct word, Erica: Yes, moo-woo!
Kurt, laughing: What the hell is that?
Erica: You, of course.
Kurt: Moo-woo?
Erica: Yes, Moo-woo.
I think the proper word is supposed to be “vous”, but I don’t know how to pronounce it because the French use too many damn vowels! I bet they’re awesome at Wheel of Fortune. They own all the fuckin’ vowels already.
What is the proper French word to use on a Yooper anyway?
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Tying Knots
We went to the county courthouse on Friday to the licensing section of the administration building.
Me: We would like to get a marriage license.
Lady: Will you be getting married within 60 days?
Kurt: Yes, we want to get married before she’s born (pointing at Sophia).
Both ladies at the counter had an understandably confused looks on their faces. One of them stood up slightly to see over the counter to check how pregnant I am. I’m not. I stood there with a smirk on my face and shaking my head. They finally got it. Kurt’s just an ass.
Kurt: What, can’t you postdate it?
Lady (laughing): No, it doesn’t work that way.
She handed us a paper to print our names on, then as she handed us the forms to fill out she asked us to hold up our right hands. Kurt, holding Sophia, also held up her hand for her.
Lady: Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth so help you God?
Kurt answered yes without flinching and later told me he didn’t even hear the “so help you God” part. I however grimaced and answered, “Sure”, then under my breath, “whatever”. *gratuitous eye roll*
May the Invisible Pink Unicorn strike me down should I ever tell a lie.
Because of how the health care industry is rigged up here in the U.S. where insurance is doled out by employers or can be purchased at an exorbitant rate and still requires copays and has coverage limitations since no insurance company wants to actually pay out in the event that someone comes down with something as expensive as cancer, Kurt and I are getting married. Romantic isn’t it? No, I don’t have cancer, but I do need health insurance.
I don’t recall ever saying I would never get married, but since I had a job with benefits and never intended to be a stay at home mom, we never planned on getting married. There was also my ex-husband, who continues to be a royal pain in my ass. He has finally put HIS house that’s still in MY name up for sale. Only it’s the worst fucking market EVER, he refuses to list it with an actual real estate agent, and he’s put so much money into the dump that he believes it’s worth more than it is. Oh, and he has lost his “job” so now I’m watching my credit report like a hawk. Six dings so far on my credit so far. Bastard!
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Mamma wellness fifteen-month checkup
This morning I made it clear that I truly needed a break from the child. Kurt stayed home from work and I locked myself in our room. I told Kurt that this arraignment wasn’t going to be a good substitute because I would just be a prisoner and if the princess was having a bad day, I could still hear it all. Not exactly the most relaxing situation especially when I feel bad that his taking this day off would be no different than the weekend we just had where I got to sleep in a bit but otherwise had to hear all the lamenting and gnashing of teeth once I come down to the kitchen for food.
Sophia actually had a good morning which was a relief, and Kurtie being the sweetheart that he can be when pressed hard enough brought food to me. The first thing he brought was an apple and knife with which to cut it. A few minutes later he literally brought me, the prisoner, a glass of water and piece of bread, the heel no less. Smart ass. Then he brought me scrambled eggs with cheese. He’s so awesome.
This morning Sophia at almost sixteen months had her fifteen-month check up. I scheduled it rather late because I had her get a flu shot before we left for our Christmas trip and since it was her first time it was a two shot deal. They give two separate half doses thirty days apart.
Sophia is thirty-one inches tall and twenty-one pounds. Not much of a height change since the last visit. The doctor said that should be seeing another growth spurt soon. She is at the fiftieth percentile for height and twentieth for weight. As usual, the nurse read a list of questions to determine is Sophia is progressing. She’s walking and climbing? Yes. Does she drink from a cup? No. the nurse advised that we switch her to a cup to avoid problems with her teeth and ear infections. Does she feed herself? Yes. Does she use any words? No. Does she know her body parts as in can she point to any body parts? No. That’s not something I’ve purposely worked with her on. I’ve been concentrating on colors, number, letters, and shapes. None of which can she identify. I really don’t think she’s paying any attention. Does she enjoy listening to you read? No, not really. She could care less. The nurse gave us a look and Kurt quickly jumped in with, “She’s not autistic, she listens and can obey commands.”
After the nurse left the room Kurt started making kissy sounds at Sophia and she being super ultra cute, leaned in so that Kurt could kiss the top of her head. It became a new game and the two of them did this several times. It was disgustingly cute. She got off my lap and started exploring the room. When the doctor came in she freaked out, slipped on the floor, and hit her tooth against her lip. Good thing we were already at the doctor’s office. *sigh* Her mouth bled but not badly. On the up side, her crying allowed me to see that she has two molars coming in on the bottom. She only has two teeth on bottom so there is a big gap between them and the two new teeth.
Despite it being my day off from baby, I had to go to the appointment with Kurt because he insisted that I bring up a medical issue that I’m having while there. We also asked about Sophia’s lack of language and her extreme clinginess to me. I told the doctor that Sophia doesn’t say ANYTHING. Nothing at all. I don’t count that when I went to Alaska in early December that while she was crying one night I distinctly heard, “ma ma ma” because she also runs around the house saying, “ma ma ma” and sometimes, “da da da”. It’s like saying her other favorite consonant combination of “tur lur lur shlur lur” or “ba ba ba” are also words. Just for the record, I’m rather fond of the “tur lur lur shlur lur”. It’s the one she uses very quietly while analyzing the intricacies of an object as she dissects or disassembles it. I like this one because if she happens to be out of my sight I know I need to check on her to make sure whatever it is that she’s destroying is Kurt’s and not mine. I love you Kurtie. *cheesy grin* She also uses those sounds to talk to her food while she inspects it’s consistency.
The only “words” she has EVER used is the sign for “all done”, which she actually invented before I started using signs with her and just happens to be very close to the real sign. She uses that one very regularly. She regularly claps her hands to show she has accomplished something she’s proud of and sometimes, very rarely, she’ll clap her hands to mean “more”. Only one time has she EVER used the sign for eat and that one was very clear and deliberate. On Thanksgiving, we had some awesome pumpkin pie from an actual bakery as opposed to Costco or some other grocery store which simply isn’t the same quality and Sophia LOVED it. She made the sign “eat” a couple times for the pumpkin pie after a few bites and never repeated it EVER again.
On a side note, I gave her an adult bite sized chunk from my slice of pumpkin pie and set it on her tray. Instead of picking the whole thing up like a regular toddler and smashing it into her face or maybe taking bites of it, my child took tiny pinches off the top and turned one adult bite into about 42 baby bites. Ok maybe 42 is a bit of an exaggeration, but you get the idea.
The doctor said to wait until 18 months to see if maybe there’s an explosion of words. He says that kids often go from zero to six words quite literally overnight and at this point she should have a three to six word vocabulary.
A few people have suggested I get this DVD or that set of children’s songs to help Sophia. I don’t think they understand when try to communicate that, “SHE DOESN’T CARE!” Oh, and I don’t like children’s songs. I know I’m such a scrooge, but don’t find them in any way cute. They are actually quite irritating to me, so they don’t get airtime in our home. And even though I take Sophia swimming twice a week where we recite nursery rhymes, for the life of me, I can’t remember any of them, so they don’t get airtime at home either.
I don’t watch TV during the day. I occasionally put on a Baby Einstein DVD, but Sophia shows no interest in them whatsoever. She’s more interested in playing with measuring cups, boxes, and her favorite Christmas present, a $3 box of alphabet flashcards from Kurt’s mom. She may in fact be listening to the DVDs but it’s not obvious and probably not as effective as listening to my voice. She does listen and often obeys when I tell her, “That’s not ours put it back on the shelf.” The only exception to Sophia’s personal TV rule is still M*A*S*H. Oh and the other day I saw a Biography on Lindsey Buckingham in which they played one of his solo songs and Sophia danced to it. She bent her knees to the beat in a very ‘white-man’ sort of dance. My dad, a Fleetwood Mac fan will be so proud.
About Sophia’s extreme attachment to me, the doctor looked up some info on Separation anxiety though it’s not what we described as the problem. Kurt told him about me not being able to leave the room at home and about the times Sophia is fine with him *until* I show up. I described how we went for a walk on Sunday. I became too tired to hold her so Kurt took over and she screamed and cried the entire time he held her despite me walking alongside them. The funny part was while I was holding her I tried to get her to walk along with us, but as I set her down it was like putting a cat in a bath. Her legs came up higher and higher as I bent lower and lower, so I passed her off to daddy. Kurt mentioned how nice it was to walk along though nature with the grass, trees, fresh air, and screaming toddler. Beautiful, just beautiful, it really warms the heart.
The doctor couldn’t think of another term that fit this situation or for this age group since a certain amount of toddler clinginess is normal. He gave it to us with the idea that it could give us some hints. The basic gist of the handout is to not be emotional when separating. That’s not too difficult especially when all I need to do is go to the bathroom. It’s not that emotional an event for me. It also said not to sneak away when the child isn’t looking. Again, I’m just going to the bathroom. Do I really need to announce my departure upstairs when Kurt is home? When it’s just Sophia and I at home, I do tell her I’m going to put laundry in the washer or get groceries from the car. She takes it well sometimes. Other times, not so much. And it said, on return don’t pick the child up. What? Not even to say good morning on a day that Kurt gets up with her instead of me? Yeah, I don’t think this applies to our case. It’s not as if I pick her up after I get groceries out of the car. I have her follow me screaming in to the kitchen while I put things away. Sometimes she’s fine with the whole process, sometimes she gets distracted by taking groceries out the bag for me and distributing them throughout the house, and other times I really want a couple shots of rum.
If anyone still thinks I’m just caving in to the desires of the princess I swear I’ll go get copies of the security tape from the last two times I’ve taken the demon seed to Target. She wanted to play with stuff on the selves and wouldn’t obey when I told her to stop so I put her in the cart. She didn’t want to sit in the cart, so she tried standing. I wound up carrying the screaming child like a football so it wouldn’t seem as if I’m condoning her behavior, and so she wouldn’t kick me. I proceeded to retrieve the items I wanted before leaving and everyone smirked at the lady carrying the evil tantrum child. I think they’ve all been there.
After the doctor left the room enough time passed for Sophia to get comfortable exploring the room again before the nurse appeared again to administer shots. When Sophia saw her, she literally shrieked and hid her face against my leg. I can’t say that I blame her on that one. Oh, and my own problem I went to this visit to discuss – I didn’t bring it up. I have no idea where Sophia gets her stubbornness. It surly isn’t from me.
This exceedingly long post was made possible by Kurt giving me the day off and is brought to you by grey hair and possible hearing loss. I dedicate this to one of my stalkers most dedicated commenters, Susan, and her family consisting of Hubby Henry, seventeen month old Chloe, and baby girl in the belly due in May.
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Toddler Breakfast Good Eats
For our unexpected Christmas time at home Kurt and I bought a few groceries that we knew we could finish within a week and things that don’t spoil. On Kurt’s annoying additive infested list, canned soups and boxed Mac & Cheese. On my list, bulk steel cut oats, eggs. We’re truly like yin and yang. I want to get rid of all that crap but every time I take him shopping with me he buys more of it. I swear if I have to smell Mac & Cheese cooking with nasty cut up chunks of unidentified leftover animal parts (hot dogs) I’m going to heave. That shit is nasty! Any “meat” that expands when cooked just ain’t right. Think about it, what fuckin’ steak puffs up when cooked?
Anyway, tired of only being able to feed Sophia zucchini omelets and Dutch Babies (recipe to follow) for breakfast I decided to force some oatmeal in her. I’ve heard steel cut oats have more nutritional value because they’re less processed than regular old-fashioned rolled oats, so that’s what I use. They texture is a little different and they take twenty to twenty-five minutes to cook verses five to ten, but other than that it’s all the same to me. One part steel cut oats to three parts water cooked until tender, add raisins and/or dates, add milk for preferred consistency, and brown sugar or maple syrup for preferred sweetness, and viola!
I put three tablespoons of oatmeal into a bowl for Sophia and offered her some on her spoon. She pushed the spoon away. Oh no you don’t, you’re going to at the very least try a bite you little shit. I know many people insist that all things should be pleasant joyful experiences for kids. Everything from eating to toilet training is supposed to be made into a ‘fun game’, but at some point I want my kid to try new stuff and she just isn’t doing it on her own. One stupid bite that’s all I want. If she doesn’t like it that’s fine, we can go back to the standby and try it again another time, but just take a fucking bite!
Holding her arms down I used a heat seeking missile spoon to find an opening somewhere around the mouth area. She turned her head back and forth, looked at the ceiling and fought it off until the spoon found it’s perfect opportunity. She paused. She chewed. I readied another spoonful and this time her mouth was wide open. I knew you’d like it you stubborn little shit.
After coming back from Christmas vacation, I tried another oatmeal like breakfast food with Sophia. I learned of it in the “What to Expect When you’re Expecting” book that a friend gave to me, it’s called Morning Muesli, or just Muesli.
- ½ cup old-fashioned rolled oats
- ½ cup calcium-fortified apple or orange juice (this sounds gross to me so I use milk instead)
- 1 cup vanilla yogurt (I use plain yogurt)
- 3 died apricots, chopped
- ¼ cup raisins and/or dates
- ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- Maple syrup or brown sugar to taste
- Fresh fruit of your choice
- 2 tablespoons chopped walnuts, almonds, or pecans (I leave these out when feeding Sophia for now)
Mix all the ingredients together and enjoy. I make mine the night before so the oats absorb most of the moisture and I wind up adding more milk. I don’t add the fresh fruit until it’s time to serve.
DUTCH BABIES:
INGREDIENTS
- 2 or 4 eggs (the more eggs the more quiche-like it is)
- ½ cup milk (or half-and-half)
- ½ cup sifted all-purpose flour
- 1 pinch ground nutmeg (optional)
- 1 pinch salt (optional)
- 2 to 4 tablespoons butter (depends on how rich you want it and salted or unsalted can be used)
- 2 tablespoons confectioners’ sugar for dusting (optional)
DIRECTIONS
- Place a 10 inch cast iron skillet inside oven and preheat oven to 475 degrees F (245 degrees C).
- In a medium bowl, beat eggs with a whisk until light. Add milk and stir. Gradually whisk in flour, nutmeg and salt.
- Remove skillet from oven and reduce oven heat to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C). Melt butter in hot skillet so that inside of skillet is completely coated with butter. Pour all the batter in the skillet and return skillet to oven.
- Bake until puffed and lightly browned, about 12 minutes. Remove promptly and sprinkle with powdered sugar.
Dust with powdered sugar and serve with warm maple syrup and wedges of lemon
Or pour on clarified butter, sprinkle on lemon juice and dust with powdered sugar
OR dust with powdered sugar and serve with strawberries and whip cream on top
Serves 2
When I make this for Sophia I only use enough butter to coat the pan, I leave off all the sugary parts and just top it with frozen fruit that I’ve warmed up. I’ve tried to make this with wheat flour, but it just doesn’t come out the same.