annie blog

Me:  So, J, how was orientation?

J:  It was fine.

Me:  Did you find your piano class?

J: Yes.

Me:   Did you meet your piano teacher?

J: Yes.  She was very nice.

Me:  Did someone help you find all of your classes or did you remember from our walk through yesterday?

J:  Yes.  Someone helped me.

Me:  Who helped you?

J:  She was a   (please leave your answer in the comments — a, b, or c) .

Answer choices:

a.  girl with tall ears and eyes the color of the horse shoe marshmallows in Lucky Charms.  Can I have Coke when I get home?

b.  girl with a boy’s name who was the size of a dwarf.  Can I have Coke when I get home?

c.  girl with a pointy head and a ring on every finger.  Can I have Coke when I get home?

Okay, y’all, fill in what you think J said about his helper….the conversations I have with that boy entertain me no end.

Here on my blog I frequently talk about how crazy I am and how nutty life is, etc.  The truth is that, while I do have a crazy side, most of the time the rational, logical, calm side of my nature prevails.  It’s a good thing, too, because Rational Annie is in high demand with these males with whom I live.

That rational side is holding on by her fingertips today, though, just barely holding on.

Why?  Because I dropped my freshman off for orientation today.

So, basically, the only sane thought that I’ve been having this morning is that it is okay for me to not know exactly how to feel today.  That is what my rational self is saying….well that and my rational self is also repeatedly telling my irrational self to

JUST STUFF IT, ALREADY.

Irrational Annie isn’t buying it.  Nope.  She’s stomping on the floor and banging on the door and grabbing a brick so that she can bash the window out.  Dang it, I hate it when Irrational Annie shows up.  All she does is complicate things.

I know that it will be fine.  Don’t worry, I’m sure that J will have a good morning and that Rational Annie will prevail. And, just to prove it I’m going to quit nibbling on the baguette in the kitchen while pacing the floor and instead do a push up or two…..or twenty.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Happy Thursday, y’all.

I’ve been making homemade waffles lately for the boys to eat for breakfast.

Now, I’ve mentioned here before about how cooking is a coping mechanism for me.  There are many unknown things in life, right?  There is so much that we cannot control — things we can neither anticipate or perhaps even deal with when they land in our laps.  This plays right into my slogan…

Life is Messy, Y’all.

(I think I should print this up on bumper stickers…)

So, what can I do?  Well, I can fry chicken.  I can bake (but not now in the blazing heat).  So I compensate for not baking by making waffles.

These waffles are a hit with my boys.  My 3rd son, C, even asked if we could only have these waffles in the future.  That was a sweet compliment, as I told him at the time, but not very realistic.  You see, the winds of change are a’blowing, as they say, and in 2 weeks I’ll have 4 boys in 4 different schools.  I’ll also be doing a little job of my own, at yet another school.  So, promising homemade every time didn’t seem realistic to me.  These do freeze well, though, and if you make 1/4 cup waffles — which will end  up about the same size as a store bought frozen one — you will end up with 24 or so.

Waffles

2 1/4 cups all purpose flour

1 t. baking soda

1 t. baking powder

1/2 t. salt

1/4 cup butter or oil

1/4 brown or white sugar

3 egg yolks

2 cups buttermilk

3 egg whites

Method:

Sift dry ingredients together into a smallish bowl.  Cream butter and sugar in the bowl of a mixer until fluffy.  Add 3 egg yolks and mix until incorporated.  Add the buttermilk and sifted flour mixture to the egg/butter/sugar mixture alternating 3 times between dry and wet.  Scrape down bowl and mix a bit more.  In another bowl, using whisk attachment, beat the egg whites until they are stiff but not dry.  (I can do this easily because my husband snagged an extra kitchenaid mixer bowl from the curb a few years ago.  Isn’t he awesome?)  Fold the egg whites into the batter mixture until no white streaks remain.

Pour onto the waffle iron using 1/4 – 1/3 cup measure.  Cook until golden brown.

Happy eating, y’all!

I recently read on a blog that

July brightens, September threatens, and August sits there waiting like a benediction.

Beautifully expressed, right?

Only, I’m thinking that these folks must go to school in September instead of August.  So, August isn’t so much a benediction for me as it is a time of daily increasing uneasiness.

I’ll spare you my complaining abut the passage of time.  Only, I think you should know I’ve decided that I’m renaming August. From now on it shall be known as Nervous.  Then everything will make more sense.

Speaking of making sense, we’re about to have the grandaddy of all clothes try-ons in about a half an hour.  It will not be a popular event.  In fact, I’m guessing that I’ll have more than one complaint from boxer-clad boys.  But it will be helpful to me, since knowing what clothing fits which boy in both warm weather clothing and cold weather clothing will make things much easier for me both now and in the future.  I’m assuming, of course, that the weather will eventually cool.  (It will, won’t it?  Come quickly Autumn, I beg you.)

Doing things to make life easier = making Nervous (August) a little better.

Happy Monday!

This is what happens when I get a Mel Torme CD from the library.

His scatting cracks me up.

Happy Sunday!

Here is one of my favorites…

I just love that harmonica.

And here’s the official video for their new song “So Long, Honeybee, Goodbye”.  It has some St. Louis places in it.

Happy Saturday!

All I know, which isn’t much, mind you, is that if you had told me that, 16 years from the date of my marriage, I would be registering my son for high school — well, I’d have been shocked.

Now, I don’t know if the smelling salts would be required just for that initial nugget of information.

But, if I’d been told that, these guys would be coming my way….

followed by this little buster, 4 years later,

well, the possessor of the smelling salts would be needing to have them handy.

Especially if you told me that the oldest one, the one I’d be registering for high school on my 16th anniversary, would also have autism, well, I might have uttered, “You mean like Rainman?!!!!!!!!!!??” before slumping to the floor.

Which is why it is good that we don’t know what is in front of us.  Because we could never, ever know how great and hard life can be, even (maybe especially?) the unimagined parts.

High school registration will never be my favorite memory, that is for sure.  Though, I’m already laughing about it which is, I suppose, a good sign.

All I know is that I love my guys….especially this one.

Life is wonderful and funny, isn’t it?

Happy Friday, y’all!

Pokey Lafarge and the South City Three at the Whitaker Music Festival

I’d love to see them again.

Happy Thursday, y’all!

1) The other day, J asked me, “So, Jack was a member of the BeNimble family, right?”

He asked me this, seriously.

2) Recently, E, when asked about his future (including perhaps getting married one day) exclaimed, “NO!  I’m not interested in ladies and children…..I’m going to…..discover Leviathan!”

I would have pointed out that the two were not mutually exclusive had I not been laughing so hard.

What a hoot.

Hope that y’all are having a happy Wednesday!

I love figs.  My mom, Mama Suzie, knows this and makes me fig preserves.

They are yummy.

So, this morning, after making homemade waffles for the boys….(otherwise known as coping mechanism for a baker who cannot bake because she might literally melt) I decided to use half a waffle as a vehicle for eating fig preserves.

This is what I came up with.

Waffles + Cream Cheese + Fig Preserves = Happy Annie.

I’d love to try this with goat cheese instead of cream cheese and throw some toasted pecans on top.  I’m thinking that would be delicious.

That reminds me of one of my other favorite pancake/waffle toppings — bananas sauteed with butter and cinnamon sugar, sour cream and a sprinkling of toasted walnuts.

What’s your favorite thing to put on waffles?