Roger Ebert on Danny DeVito:

[H]e has a way of making the taller people around him seem unsure of what to do with their legs.

From Roger Ebert’s review of City of Angels:

Angels are big right now in pop entertainment, no doubt because everybody gets one. New Age spirituality is me-oriented, and gives its followers top billing in the soap operas of their own lives. People like to believe they have had lots of previous incarnations, get messages in their dreams and are psychic. But according to the theory of karma, if you were Joan of Arc in a past life and are currently reduced to studying Marianne Williamson paperbacks, you must have made a wrong turn.

When there’s a trend toward humility and selflessness, then we’ll know we’re getting somewhere on the spiritual front. That time is not yet.

From Roger Ebert’s review of Crime and Punishment in Suburbia:

The MPAA [ratings board] counts the beans but never tastes the soup. Make a worthless movie but limit the nudity and language, and get a PG-13. Make a movie where the characters live with real problems and try to figure out what to do, and God forbid our children should be exposed to such an experience.

From Roger Ebert’s review of Gangster No. 1:

[These events] have been called Shakespearean, which is fair enough, since just about everything is Shakespearean.

From Roger Ebert’s review of Household Saints:

The fact is that modern people do worship false gods and that a life devoted to getting a big car and a town house is seen as eminently more sane than a life devoted to God.

From Roger Ebert’s review of Joe Versus the Volcano, on Tom Hanks’s character:

[H]e is an island of curiosity in a sea of mystery.

Roger Ebert on citizens of a Newfoundland town, in his review of The Shipping News:

But, lord, the characters are tireless in their peculiarities; it’s as if the movie took the most colorful folks in Lake Wobegon, dehydrated them, concentrated the granules, shipped them to Newfoundland, reconstituted them with Molson’s and issued them Canadian passports.

RIP, Roger Ebert. Thank you a million times for changing the way I watch and think about movies, and for teaching me to judge a thing on its own merits.

Note: I would have linked the movie reviews, but Ebert’s review site seems to be down, unsurprisingly. Also, this is my 999th post. !!!

Sadly, I probably only ate three or four of those sandwiches before the coffee shop closed. Shortly after that, the Navy decided they needed Troy elsewhere and we left Canada. I tried many times to recreate that sandwich at home but could never quite do it, even though I already had a go-to hummus recipe. Eventually I gave up, deciding that maybe it was the bread, or the ambiance of the place, or the company in which I ate it that made the sandwich so tasty.

Today as I was scooping some hummus onto a plate for Elliora’s lunch, that sandwich popped into my head for the first time in probably a decade. Thinking, Eh, what the heck, I threw a quarter-cup of the Trader Joe’s hummus in the food processor with a quarter-cup of sunflower seeds and some toasted flaxseed because it happened to be sitting next to the sunflower seeds in my fridge. I added a squeeze of lemon juice and whizzed it all together as best I could, scraping the sides of the processor bowl a couple of times to make sure it all got mixed in. Then I spread that on toasted multigrain bread and topped it with a few spinach leaves because I don’t have any cucumbers at the moment.

The first bite had me laughing, because it tasted EXACTLY like I remember the original sandwich tasting. Which seems ridiculous, right? The original recipe included cucumber slices, not spinach leaves; and I’m pretty sure flaxseed wasn’t involved (although who knows, maybe it was). What are the odds that I would off-handedly, randomly create an accurate replica of something I haven’t eaten since last century, when all my previous attempts at the time failed? So I’m thinking one of two things happened here: either I really did manage to fairly accurately recreate that sandwich, or it’s been so long since I ate it that my taste buds were fooled by a good-enough facsimile.

Either way, I don’t really care. I’m happy to have a delicious new sandwich filling—one that has the power to transport me to Bank Street in 1999, sitting in a cafe that doesn’t exist anymore, watching the rain through the windows and thinking about that cool kitchen gadget at the Glebe Emporium I wish was within my budget.

Elliora: DADDY I NEED RAISINS.

Troy: You’re supposed to ask nicely, like, “Daddy, can you please get me something?”

E: Daddy, can you please get me something?

T: No, you’re supposed to say, “Can you please get me the thing I need?”

E: Daddy, can you get me the thing I need?

T: I mean, you say the thing you need, like, “Daddy, can you please get me raisins?”

E: Daddy, can you get me raisins?

T: Can I get a “please” in there?

E: Please in there.

T: No, I mean, can you say, “Daddy, can you please get me raisins?”

E: …DADDY I NEED TOMATOES.

Oh hai there. Yes, I’m still alive. Just out of the habit of telling you all what I’m doing.

So…what have I been doing? Well, taking lots of sunset photos, as usual.

Annalie has also been taking sunset photos. I’d show you the photos she took, but I haven’t downloaded photos off that camera in weeks. I love Instagram along with 100 million other people, but it’s made it way too easy for me to be lazy about taking pictures with my real camera.

Homeschooling is going really well lately. Annalie mostly does her daily lessons without complaint nowadays. It probably helps that she’s almost nine years old (!), and that she can do them in a blanket fort if she wants to. Also she’s not allowed to watch any TV or movies or play any computer games until she’s done with lessons and reading and her daily chores. (It’s all about knowing what exactly motivates your particular kid. If you’d told me I couldn’t watch TV till I’d done my chores and homework, I’d have shrugged and retreated to my room with a stack of books, content.)

A lot of art is going on lately, too. Annalie always loves to draw and paint and create, but she seems to go through occasional periods when she is creating more or less constantly. It’s like she wakes up in the morning with ideas, scenes, pictures she dreamed up and she can’t do anything else until she gets them down on paper or canvas.

And then sometimes, we’re eating dinner at a restaurant where the tables are covered with paper and Annalie picks up a couple of crayons and casually whips out a portrait of Lady Gaga before our food arrives.

Annalie’s Christmas-mermaid self-portrait. (What? “Christmas-mermaid” isn’t a thing?)

I love this beach scene. There are so many amazing things going on in it: the detailed sand castle, the far-away sailboat, the plumes of smoke billowing out of the cargo ship, the different colors of blue of the water and sky, and the huge crazy sun dominating everything else.

I thought the sun in the picture went rather well with the ceramic sun—purchased by Troy in some Mediterranean country while on a deployment years ago—that hangs in our front hallway. I’d tried several different paintings and photographs in that spot, but nothing looked quite right. I framed the drawing and hung it up, and it works perfectly.

My mom gave Annalie a stack of a dozen small canvases for Christmas, and I think it might have been Annalie’s favorite gift this year. She hasn’t been hoarding them, but—atypically for her, the kid who uses every sticker on the sheet in two minutes flat—she hasn’t blown through them, either. The first time she used them, Brenda and Bug were here visiting, and she generously and excitedly shared her gift. The two canvases on the left are Bug’s; the two on the right are Annalie’s. (Re: the canvas on the top right, Bug’s real name starts with H. Awwwww.)

I think this is my favorite thing Annalie has drawn recently. She made this awesome Narnia-themed birthday card for friends who had a Narnia-themed birthday party. Look at it! Aslan, Reepicheep, Susan’s bow and arrows! The Dawn Treader! The painting in the Scrubb family’s guest bedroom that drew them back into Narnia! What really impressed me about all of this is that it’s been probably a year or more since Annalie has seen any of the Narnia movies and even longer since we read the first book. (And can you tell that Annalie has recently discovered Cake Boss on Netflix?)

Why yes, I do have two children, now that you mention it. This one is just harder to get photos of these days, because she’s constantly in motion. She is something else, this kid. When we ask her how old she is, she tells us, “Six.” If we try to insist she’s two, she shakes her head and airily replies, “I’m not two. I six,” before wandering off to climb on something she shouldn’t be climbing on.

She flashes the ASL “I love you sign” two-handed, and tells us, “I love you too!” When someone is carrying her against her will, she demands, “PICK ME DOWN.” Troy has discovered that if he reminds her to use her manners when asking for something with the phrase, “Can I get a ‘please’ in there?” then Elliora will repeat her request for food or water or whatever and tack the phrase, “please in there?” onto the end. It makes us laugh every time. She makes us laugh a lot.

They both make us laugh a lot, these little geeklings of ours.

I think we’ll keep ‘em.

I’ve crocheted a few potholders recently. Some of them I’ve given away as gifts, but these two I’m keeping because the two crocheted potholders I’d been using for years both got burned on Thanksgiving.

Some star ornaments I crocheted for Brenda and Bekah, and a few crocheted balls. I’ve actually crocheted about 20 balls recently to give as gifts, but I haven’t take pictures of them all. Yes, I said “to give as gifts.” Only about three people got timely Christmas gifts from us this year, and that’s only because I ordered their gifts online and had them shipped directly. Everyone else probably thinks we suck and don’t love them anymore. And let’s just say I’m hoping to get our holiday cards mailed out before Valentine’s Day. I won’t even mention all the Christmas baking I didn’t do this year. Ironically, however, our Christmas tree is still up. (Was it just me, or was anyone else particularly unmotivated this past holiday season?)

An owly hot pad I crocheted for Brenda, at her request. It’s meant to look kind of like her book character, Little Hoo. I think it turned out pretty good, considering I was completely making it up as I went along.

I’ve painted some stuff, too. Have I taken pictures of most of it? Noooo. In fact, one person who had commissioned me to paint her a mug, oh, a couple of months ago sent me a very sweet note on FB, wondering if her mug had been fired. I have been very, very slow about shipping items to people lately. Lucky for me, people are mostly kind and understanding about this, but I hate the fact that I’ve been taking advantage of people’s good natures. If I have been slow about shipping something to you, please accept my humble, heartfelt apology and this reassurance: I’m so sorry I’m slow. It’s not just you. Everyone has been waiting forever for their pottery. I promise I will try to do better.

I hate to end a post on that slightly bummer note, so here! Please enjoy this photo of oranges wearing origami hats, folded by Annalie. She found a book and some paper that I had and has been folding all kinds of things entirely on her own. It’s kind of awesome to watch her figure something like that out without any help.

If you were here in my house, I would further brighten your day by feeding you a piece of rainbow cake, which I made on a random Tuesday because that’s how I roll. Here’s hoping you all had wonderful holiday seasons and that 2013 is full of random-Tuesday rainbow-cake goodness for everyone.

Wait. What!? How did that happen? Almost the entire month of December slipped away from me. I haven’t made any cookies, nor shipped any presents, let alone wrapped them. I haven’t even started Christmas cards. Seriously, how did two-thirds of this month get away from me like that?

So, um, if you’re reading this and you have a reasonable expectation of getting a card or a gift or cookies from me…they’re going to be late this year. Sorry about that.

I hope you’re all having wonderful holidays so far, and that all the joy and wonder of the season is yours, even if you’re way behind on your to-do lists.

Elliora turned two last week, and I didn’t even mention it here. Poor neglected second child. (Poor neglected blog is probably more accurate.)

She had a good birthday on the actual day (the 29th). She wore her fancy new dress, we went to lunch at the restaurant of her choice, she got a cool scooter from Gramaw, she blew out two candles on a brown-butter crispy treats cake. With sprinkles.

We had planned the birthday party to fall on the Saturday after her birthday so my mom would still be in town. Those plans were derailed when Annalie got sick with what seemed to be a stomach bug the night before the party. She continued to be sick all night long, so we let everyone know that there would be no partying.

Poor Annalie felt so bad for messing up the party plans, but I think she was quite relieved when I told her we wouldn’t have the party without her. She was worried we’d quarantine her upstairs in her room while the rest of us had fun downstairs.

We decided to reschedule, and hope everyone could still make it. Luckily, most everyone can. (Except my mom, who flew home on Sunday. I’m trying not to be too bummed about that.) Elliora’s Second Second Birthday Party is this Saturday. Fingers crossed no one gets sick.

Do you read Balancing Everything? Jessica (AKA kerflop, AKA verymom) and her family have dealt with a number of health issues in the past year or two, a couple of them involving surgery. The most recent one involved Jessica learning of and having surgery to repair a hole in her heart that was—atypically—causing her to experience frequent blackouts.

I’ve been reading Jessica’s hilarious and heartfelt take on homeschooling, gardening, ineffective-but-well-meaning housekeeping, and life with kids for years now. Even though I’ve never met her in person, I feel like we’re good friends once removed, because of our mutual friendship with Heather. I’ve been following along with the health dramas and ensuing financial stresses, praying for her and her family, wishing I could do more.

Then a couple of her good friends decided to give Jessica a rash and a ray of sunshine in one fell swoop. They took over her blog and set up a donation button, compiled a list of businesses who are donating a portion of their profits to help Jessica’s family cover their medical expenses, and asked for donations to a charity auction.

And that’s where I come in. I donated a custom-painted piece of pottery to the Operation Pay For the Hole auction to help Jessica and her family pay for recent medical expenses. The auction closes on the 10th, which means as long as the winner contacts me promptly, I would have time to paint and ship the piece in time for it to be a Christmas gift! There are some other neat items up for grabs, including a handmade bag and some beaded yarn and crocheted earrings I’ve got my eye on. Why not check it out? ‘Tis the season for helping our fellow bloggers, right?

A couple of weeks ago, we went to Oregon to visit Erin and Rocco and INDY! Annalie was pretty excited, as you can see in this photos I took on the shuttle from the parking lot to the airport.

The reason we were all able to go on this trip is because I found a great deal on tickets on a bargain airline. The flight times sucked, which is probably one of the reasons the tickets were so cheap. We arrived in Portland after midnight, and then had to drive for over an hour to get to Erin & Rocco’s town. (How to tell a true friend: you say, “The flight times suck,” and she says, “No problem, I’ll leave the baby home with Rocco and drive almost three hours round-trip to pick you up and drop you off at ungodly hours! It will be worth it to see you guys!”) When we arrived at 2am I took some photos of the funky-cook projection nightlight. Because what else do you take pictures of at 2am?

We woke up early to a gorgeous, chilly fall morning. Erin and Rocco’s new house is sort of out in the country, on a property with lots of fruit trees and blueberry bushes and grape arbors.

Elliora and Annalie had a blast exploring. The wet weather and lack of rain boots didn’t even slow them down. (Why didn’t we bring rain boots with us to Oregon in November? Because both girls had just outgrown theirs and we didn’t have a chance to buy new ones.)

We did some experimenting with bubbles, with a kit Erin bought for Annalie. (I have many more photos of the bubble-blowing that I took with my real camera, but let’s face it, I’m probably at least three months away from Flickring those, sadly. I keep uploading photos, but I’m doing it at such a slow rate that I’ve been three months behind for the last five months.)

We played outside a lot. We chased the kitties…

…admired the awesome wallpaper hung by the previous owners that Erin and Rocco had the good sense to keep…and accidentally turned some of Rocco’s paintings into stained glass windows when we used them to block the light in the bedroom for Elliora’s naps.

Erin and me.

Indy smiles.

We took a quick trip to the ER where a googly eye was removed* from Elliora’s nose. We think she stuck it up there a day or two before we flew to Oregon. She was totally fine, and has promised not to stick things up her nose anymore.

*The doctor described to us how they could stick a long, thin tube up E’s nose past the obstruction, then inflate a balloon that was in the tube, and that would push the object out…or I could try just covering E’s mouth with mine and blowing hard, and that might dislodge whatever was up there. So I did that, and it pushed the googly eye almost all the way out. Troy said, “Huh. I guess maybe we could have consulted Dr. Google on this one.” So if your kid ever gets anything stuck up his nose, now you know something you can try before you head to the ER.

Lovely fall photos taken outside the hospital with some handy fall leaves. (Elliora with her Thanks For Being Brave While We Got That Googly Eye Out Of Your Nose cookies in the first photo, and looking like my mini-me in the second.) One nice thing about visiting Oregon when we did was that we got a little taste of autumn. It’s my favorite season, and even though I love living in San Diego I do miss out on fall when we live here.

Troy and Indy. Erin reading stories to Indy and Elliora.

At Indira’s daycare, the teachers are always describing her as “small, but mighty!” It’s a very accurate description. She’s little but boy is she determined and fearless. She and Elliora were quite a pair. Also, seeing Elliora next to Indy made us realize how tall Elliora has gotten!

Elliora, post-nap; Annalie, mid-sketching on the kitchen floor. This shiny, shiny guitar in the guest room made me wish it was 7 Days while we were there.

Erin and Annalie baked a delicious apple bundt cake one night. Mmmmm, bundt cake.

It was a fun whirlwind visit, and I’m so glad we went, despite the fact that in order to make it to the airport for our 7am flight, we had to wake up at 3:30am. Bleah. The good thing about such an early flight, though, is that we were back home by 10am and had an entire day to ease back into real life.

Back home in sunny San Diego.

a quickr pickr post

I know the rest of you Americans are deep in Thanksgiving prep this week, but around here we’ve got sheep on the brain. Elliora is turning two next week, and her favorite thing in the world right now is a certain British sheep whose name might rhyme with Shmaun the Shmeep. Brenda used that as inspiration for these super-cute sheep invitations. The “ewe” pun on the back was all my idea, though.

p.s. Click through to look at my shiny new banner! Brenda‘s all over my blog today. And in my house, actually! She and Bug are staying with us this week to celebrate Thanksgiving and to—fingers crossed!—help us finish unpacking the house. Woohoo!

I have a new favorite snack. I didn’t have a picture to show you when I sat down to write this, because I scarfed it all up and didn’t think of taking a picture. But I’m so dedicated to telling you all about tasty new snacks that I went right back into the kitchen and made a second batch. Because I love you all. (It seems this snack also may increase one’s love for one’s fellow man. I’m just saying it’s possible.)

I got the bones of this recipe from Catherine Newman. I seem to get a lot of my favorite recipes from her. In her introduction to this recipe, she describes how she and her kids consider this “an edible lace valentine that a friendly goat has sealed with a kiss.” I couldn’t have said it better myself.

I only made one serving for these photos, because that was all the goat cheese I had. But if you wanted to make more, you certainly could slice up a larger log of goat cheese (as Catherine demonstrates in her post) and increase the other ingredients accordingly.

Start by mincing or crushing a clove of garlic, and smearing it on top of the round(s) of goat cheese. (Don’t worry if some falls off onto the plate. It will flavor the oil.)

Sprinkle with fresh herbs. I use thyme and rosemary because I like them, but pretty much any hardy herb would be good. (If you use juicy leaves like basil and mint, they will darken unappetizingly over time, so it’s best to wait and add those right before serving. If you don’t have any fresh herbs, dried will work in a pinch.) Season with freshly-ground pepper and salt to taste.

Drizzle with a little of your favorite honey.

Pour good olive oil over the top. Don’t feel like you have to be stingy with the oil. I was using a tablespoon in this photo because I couldn’t pour the bottle with my left hand and operate the camera with my right at the same time.

Ideally, you will cover this and let the flavors mingle for an hour or two at room temperature, or in the fridge for longer. It’ll taste better if you do. If you don’t have the patience for that, though, I understand completely.

Spread the herbed cheese on good bread (not forgetting to soak up some of the olive oil) or on these strangely addictive raisin-rosemary toasts from Trader Joe’s. I need to find a recipe to make those at home.

Or mash it up and mix it all together.

Either way, it’s all good.