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T. had his belt test in martial arts. He is now a yellow belt. Congratulations to him! He rattled off the five animals and the six principles of conduct like it was no problem at all. I'm not sure who was more surprised by that.
Track was uneventful.
We had lunch at Papa Razzi, and the server asked me about the loyalty card, so I got to use up $10 worth of points. That was kind of nice.
We stopped at the Paper Store for Tys for party favors, and some paper plates. Then we went to Roche Bros for veg plate, fruit platter, american cheese, and a box of crackers. I also got some mandarines and some grapes. With that, and what R. had already picked up / gotten out of the basement / I had ordered from Amazon weeks ago, we headed off to Planet Gymnastics for A.'s birthday party. 13 kids total including my 2. Everyone was really nice. Two kids were dropped off -- everyone else stayed and everyone knew somebody so lots of really nice adult conversations. Nice to catch up with people who I like independent of their kids and my kids liking each other / sharing an activity.
The cake is almost all gone. We sent the ranch dressing from the veg plate home with someone who was excited about it. I used some of the contents of the veg plate in a black bean soup (with bacon and beer) that I'd been thinking about making for a couple days (I'd already cooked the beans).
Busy day! I'm glad everything went smoothly. Planet Gymnastics really does a nice job helping the kids have a good time at a birthday party and stay safe while doing it. And they work super hard at setup and take down of the food and so forth.
ETA: Because I made a black bean soup (with bacon and beer! Really! And posted the recipe in my cookbook and everything!), I got into the canister of peppers. And it was so covered with stuff and blocked by stuff, I didn't even try to put it back. R. and I went through the stuff, and the stuff in the junk drawer and threw a lot of things away and made space for what needed to be moved so that I could access the canister more easily. Yay! Decluttering!
I posted recipes: black bean, bacon and beer soup (that turned out really well for a first time effort and a made-it-up-on-the-fly recipe), suikerbrood (second effort turned out well enough I'm willing to go with the proportions I used). I haven't posted the navy bean and barley salad recipe, because I just don't feel like that's a real recipe yet, versus an improvisational thing. (<-- Yeah, I know. I shouldn't care.) Next up is probably the navy bean, barley and fennel soup that I've been thinking about.
I have a stash of sort-of-disposable sort-of-reusable plastic ware (think: the kind of thing you get when you get thai takeout or chinese takeout and you don't really want to throw it away because you could wash it and use it again) that was intended to support throwing large-ish parties that still hasn't happened. In the meantime, I am contemplating participating in the bizarre behavior that is prepping days or even a week's worth of meals ahead of time and then just pulling them out of the fridge, nuking them and eating them. I think I've got a bunch of ideas for bean and grain recipes that would be basically perfect for this (starting with soups / stews and bean/grain salads, and then moving through korma and similar). But it feels a little too crazy / ambitious still. But you never know. In the meantime, when I ran out of appropriately sized rubber maid and frigoverre, I sent R. down to the basement to retrieve one (for the leftover cake). Dammit, I'm not letting things sit around waiting any more.
Track was uneventful.
We had lunch at Papa Razzi, and the server asked me about the loyalty card, so I got to use up $10 worth of points. That was kind of nice.
We stopped at the Paper Store for Tys for party favors, and some paper plates. Then we went to Roche Bros for veg plate, fruit platter, american cheese, and a box of crackers. I also got some mandarines and some grapes. With that, and what R. had already picked up / gotten out of the basement / I had ordered from Amazon weeks ago, we headed off to Planet Gymnastics for A.'s birthday party. 13 kids total including my 2. Everyone was really nice. Two kids were dropped off -- everyone else stayed and everyone knew somebody so lots of really nice adult conversations. Nice to catch up with people who I like independent of their kids and my kids liking each other / sharing an activity.
The cake is almost all gone. We sent the ranch dressing from the veg plate home with someone who was excited about it. I used some of the contents of the veg plate in a black bean soup (with bacon and beer) that I'd been thinking about making for a couple days (I'd already cooked the beans).
Busy day! I'm glad everything went smoothly. Planet Gymnastics really does a nice job helping the kids have a good time at a birthday party and stay safe while doing it. And they work super hard at setup and take down of the food and so forth.
ETA: Because I made a black bean soup (with bacon and beer! Really! And posted the recipe in my cookbook and everything!), I got into the canister of peppers. And it was so covered with stuff and blocked by stuff, I didn't even try to put it back. R. and I went through the stuff, and the stuff in the junk drawer and threw a lot of things away and made space for what needed to be moved so that I could access the canister more easily. Yay! Decluttering!
I posted recipes: black bean, bacon and beer soup (that turned out really well for a first time effort and a made-it-up-on-the-fly recipe), suikerbrood (second effort turned out well enough I'm willing to go with the proportions I used). I haven't posted the navy bean and barley salad recipe, because I just don't feel like that's a real recipe yet, versus an improvisational thing. (<-- Yeah, I know. I shouldn't care.) Next up is probably the navy bean, barley and fennel soup that I've been thinking about.
I have a stash of sort-of-disposable sort-of-reusable plastic ware (think: the kind of thing you get when you get thai takeout or chinese takeout and you don't really want to throw it away because you could wash it and use it again) that was intended to support throwing large-ish parties that still hasn't happened. In the meantime, I am contemplating participating in the bizarre behavior that is prepping days or even a week's worth of meals ahead of time and then just pulling them out of the fridge, nuking them and eating them. I think I've got a bunch of ideas for bean and grain recipes that would be basically perfect for this (starting with soups / stews and bean/grain salads, and then moving through korma and similar). But it feels a little too crazy / ambitious still. But you never know. In the meantime, when I ran out of appropriately sized rubber maid and frigoverre, I sent R. down to the basement to retrieve one (for the leftover cake). Dammit, I'm not letting things sit around waiting any more.