An admirable profession

 

Image courtesy magazineart.org

"I enjoy doing housework, ironing, washing, cooking, dishwashing. Whenever I get one of those questionnaires and they ask what is your profession, I always put down housewife. It's an admirable profession, why apologize for it. You aren't stupid because you're a housewife. When you're stirring the jam you can read Shakespeare."

—Tasha Tudor, The Private World of Tasha Tudor

When people ask me what I do, I find myself answering, "I'm just a mom," and then going on to tell them, "But I used to be a technical writer," even though the truth is that I'd a thousand times rather be doing what I'm doing now than go back to writing software manuals. 

Why is being a housewife or a mom not enough for us? What do you say when asked what you do?

Red Chief says

"My room is a skyscraper elevator"
"I want one graham cracker. Not two of them. Just one."
"I want to plant a library in my backyard."
"I would like to eat you, cat."
"The power came in." (After having been out.)

Microwave banana pudding

Click image to enlarge.

Image from The Children's Object Book.

I've done chocolate, vanilla, and tapioca pudding in the microwave so far. This week I moved on to banana. This time, instead of dividing it into cups, I poured it into a graham cracker crust. It should make a nice dessert.

———

Microwave banana pudding

1 ripe banana
2 cups water
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
2/3 cup instant powdered milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
6 drops yellow food coloring (optional)

Break banana into four pieces and put in blender. Add water and lemon juice and blend until smooth. Whisk together dry ingredients in microwave-safe bowl. Whisk in banana mixture a little at a time. Add vanilla and coloring.

Microwave 3 minutes. Whisk well. Cook at one-minute intervals, whisking well between each, until pudding is shiny and thick.

———

Edit: The pie turned out kind of gray, so I added lemon juice to the recipe above. I'll update this post next time I make it and report whether it helped.

Lemon mug cake

I like cake almost as much as Mr. Ratburn, so I've been enjoying the recent trend of cakes made in the microwave. Warm cake in a mug: five minutes from cupboard to tummy.

I don't like the recipes that call for a cake mix divided—what a pain to divide it all out, and I rarely use cake mixes anyway, since cakes are so easy to make from scratch. I've enjoyed this chocolate cake very much, but yesterday I had a craving for something a bit lighter. Luckily this lemon cake recipe was waiting for me after a quick search. I've adapted it slightly. See nutrition information here.

———

Lemon Mug Cake

2 tablespoons butter, softened
3 tablespoons sugar
1/4 teaspoon lemon extract
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
pinch salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 egg
1 tablespoon lemon juice
3 tablespoons flour

Cream together butter, sugar, lemon extract, vanilla, and salt with fork in a large mug. Add baking powder, egg, and lemon juice, and mix well. Add flour. Microwave 2 1/2–3 minutes.

Letter K

Here's our preschool plan for letter K:

• Craft paper uppercase (key) and lowercase (kite) Ks 
• Sing the "K" song (the K sound to the tune of "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star")
• Watch some Sesame Street movies featuring K
  
• Letter K on Starfall
• Read Curious George Goes Fishing, Arthur's Baby
  

I was worried about my ability to make keys, but they were good enough for Red Chief, who was delighted with them. We used pipe cleaners to make the K on the kite. I let Red Chief paint the kite red instead of using red paper, which pleased him very much.

Attending a Mormon church service

I wish other churches had movies like this, because everyone does things differently and it's nice to know what's expected of you before you attend. What things are the same or unique about your church services?

Letter J

Here's our preschool plan for letter J:

• Craft paper uppercase (jar) and lowercase (jellybean) Js 
• Sing the "J" song (the J sound to the tune of "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star")
• Watch some Sesame Street movies featuring J
  
• Letter J on Starfall
• Read The Tale of Johnny Town-Mouse, Just Me and My Dad, The Wonderful Pigs of Jillian Jigs
  

Waxed paper made a very nice jar. We didn't have any real jellybeans, so we had to make do with ones cut from paper. He still really enjoyed gluing the little things everywhere.

The latest model*

Look who joined our family on Saturday. We picked her out at the local animal shelter for her  qualities of patience, cuddliness, adaptability, and purring.

The kids love her and would never leave her alone without my intervention. She hasn't hurt them yet and even lets Red Chief carry her around, although she doesn't look terribly thrilled about it.

Oh, and if anyone has tips on getting her to stop scratching the couch and carpet, I'm all ears.


*Bonus points for naming the book this post title comes from.

Last-few-days-before-the-store menu plan

I can't remember exactly when I went to the store last, but the fridge is pretty bare. Staples I'm used to having around such as cheese, yogurt, carrots, onions, and other vegetables are gone. We have potatoes to use up, plenty of eggs whose date is approaching, and enough milk and fruit. There is plenty in the freezer—we could probably eat a week out of the freezer if we didn't mind a bit of repeating.

I'm glad to have cleaned out the fridge, freezer, and pantry a bit since the new year. Note to self: wipe out the mostly-empty fridge before my trip to the store on Thursday!

———

Monday breakfast: hash browns and eggs
Monday lunch: burritos or corn dogs
Monday dinner: strata (to use up a bag of frozen bread cubes and several eggs, altering recipe to use what we have) and frozen vegetables

Tuesday breakfast: waffles and applesauce
Tuesday lunch: strata
Tuesday dinner: gumbo and corn muffins (from freezer)

Wednesday breakfast: oatmeal and boiled eggs
Wednesday lunch: sandwiches
Wednesday dinner: Pulled pork on buns (from freezer) and apples

Thursday breakfast: Pancakes and fried eggs
Thursday lunch: Alphabet pasta
Thursday dinner: White bean soup, spinach, and no-knead bread

Microwave tapioca pudding

I love homemade tapioca pudding, but I don't like standing over the stove stirring it for twenty minutes. Since my experiments with homemade microwave pudding turned out so well, I tried making tapioca in the microwave, too.

I start out with water instead of milk, then add dry milk powder after several minutes. This keeps the mixture from bubbling out of control. If you decide to use regular milk from the beginning, you'll need to watch it much more closely and stir more often.

So many people seem to either love or hate tapioca pudding. Where do you stand?

———

Microwave tapioca pudding

3 tablespoons minute tapioca
2 3/4 cups water
1/4 cup sugar
1 cup instant milk powder
1 egg
pinch of salt
1 teaspoon vanilla

Combine tapioca and water in microwave-safe bowl. Cook on high power for 8 minutes.*  Whisk well. Add remaining ingredients except vanilla. Whisk well to combine. Microwave for 2 minutes, watching to see that it doesn't bubble over. Whisk well. Microwave for another two minutes; whisk well let cool for about 30 minutes.

* That's just my microwave. They're all so different; mine tends to be a bit slow, so adjust accordingly.