Don’t waste your money!  Or someone else’s.  Use the money to buy nice curtains or a nice rug.  Something that will have permanence in your baby’s room.  That will be able to stay in there when they grow up to be 8, 12, and 16.

A changing table is effective and necessary.  You need a place to store diapers and wipes and diaper rash cream and of course, a place to change your little angel.  But I’m going to let you in on a little secret.  The best one passed along to me when I was pregnant and thinking about buying one…

The only changing table you will ever need is a bureau.

Yup.

That’s it!

Use an existing bureau in the room you’ve deemed the nursery, or buy one that will last forever in your child’s room.  Then plop a changing pad on it, with a little changing cover, and set up a little box on the side of it and stuff it with all of your necessities, cream, mineral oil, wipes, powder, etc.  And purchase one of those diaper hanging bags, about $10, and you are good to go!

You will save yourself at least $200 and the hassle of trying to resell it once you no longer need it and the heartbreak when you realize that you’ll only get $15 for it, even though it’s in beautiful condition!

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, by Mark Haddon

I would recommend reading this book.

As a matter of fact, I would highly recommend that everyone out there read this book.  Not because it’s great, because it isn’t.  Not because it’s compelling, because it isn’t.  Not because it’s funny, or captivating, or philosophical, because it isn’t.

Everyone should read this book because it puts you inside the mind of a person with autism and it does so brilliantly.

I grew up with a best friend with autism.  And I believe that unless you live life with or really closely with someone on the autistic spectrum, it is very difficult to relate, understand and sympathize with their reality.

And this book thrust you right into their world, allowing you to live their experiences.  The crowds, sensory overload, claustrophobia, the need for order and timetables, the fear of strangers and anything unfamiliar, not wanting to be touched…

This snapshot was a very realistic portrait of the inner workings of the mind of someone on the spectrum.

I don’t understand why it was chosen recently to be made into a Broadway show.  I personally would never go to see it.  Like I mentioned, I’m happy I read it and recommend it to anyone.  But, the book is fraught with anxiety.  I cannot imagine willingly going to a show to watch 2 hours of someone screaming, groaning, banging their head against a wall, hiding in small spaces, and the agony they go through when they are faced with the overstimulating streets and train stations of London.  No thanks!  Also, the story is a sad one.  It doesn’t have a happy ending, so you wouldn’t walk away from the performance feeling like all is well.

But the exposure to an autistic mind is invaluable.  You will come away from this reading this with a completely different outlook on those with autism and the people who are close to and care for them.

Read the book, skip the play!

I can still smell them in my kitchen, days after they’ve been baked and gobbled up.  Such a wonderful smell; they should make a candle scent of it!  And the taste of these cookies…..oh my goodness!!

Let the sweet adventure begin!

 

COOKIE BATTER:

In a stand mixer add 1 1/2 cups of packed brown sugar to 1 cup of soft shortening.

Then you’ll need 2 eggs,

added one at a time, while beating the mixture.

*(Don’t forget to scrape down the sides with a spatula between additions of ingredients!)*

Then add in 1 teaspoon vanilla and beat.  When fully incorporated, stop mixer and move on to the dry ingredients.

In a large bowl, whisk together 2 3/4 cups of all-purpose flour,

with 2 teaspoons of cream of tartar,

1 teaspoon baking soda,

and 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt.

Add about 1/3 of dry ingredients to wet in stand mixer, at a time.  Mix between additions.

 

CINNAMON MIXTURE:

In a medium bowl add 2 tablespoons white sugar,

with 1 teaspoon cinnamon.

Have your adorable baby use her little pink whisk to mix it all together!  (Makes the baking process that much more enjoyable.)

Form a ball of cookie batter, using a cookie scoop or your hands, and roll in cinnamon mixture.

Place on greased cookie sheet.

Bake in preheated 350 degree oven for 14-18 minutes.

Makes 24 cookies.

Bon Appétit, Ma Chérie!

 

 

 

Not that there’s anything wrong with a guy as a roommate…but, it will keep other guys at bay.  It intimidates them.  And they pretty much automatically assume there’s a love interest in one or more of the parties involved…

So……

your choice!

Happiness is not having what you want, but wanting what you have!

So, I of course learned the right way to hull a strawberry after 2 decades of doing it wrong.  Because why would I ever do things the easy way the 1st time?!

There’s a “right” way to hull a strawberry?

Not necessarily.  Meaning that you won’t get into any type of trouble for not hulling a strawberry the way I’m about to show you.  It just means that this way will save you much pain under your fingernail (if you were also using this method), and save you a lot of time.

Hold the strawberry in one hand.  Then simply take a small spoon, dessert spoon, and slide it under the stem of the strawberry, while using the thumb of your other hand to push the stem, as it loosens, onto the spoon.  And you’re done!

Garlic Scapes are a little-known culinary delicacy that are spectacular in taste and texture.

When you plant garlic cloves in your vegetable garden (or in this case when one finds its way near the arborvitaes and takes root!) you will be lucky to harvest garlic scapes from each plant in mid-June.  The garlic scape is the plant’s way of flowering and eventually turning to seed.  Once you see the garlic scape come spiraling out of the garlic plant, you snip it off.

There are 2 benefits to snipping off the scape.  The 1st is that now that you’ve removed the garlic plant’s ability to flower and reseed itself, it will now focus its energies on growing a larger bulb.  The 2nd benefit is that you can now cook with this delicious product of your garden!

Cook with it?  What do you use it in?  How does it taste?

Use it as you would a scallion!  It has a similar oniony taste, though it’s not as strong as a scallion.  It’s texture is fantastic, too.  It has a lot of crunch, which is a great addition to any dish.

Who knew?!

That Old Cape Magic, by Richard Russo.

Yes, this is an acclaimed, accomplished author.  And yes, he is verbose and can write well.  But, no, that doesn’t mean that every story he tells is a good one.  And this one was not one of his good ones…

I was going on my yearly vacation to Cape Cod and brought along this book in hopes of it being a great beach read, one that would be fraught with information about the area.  Not so much…

 

 

 

****SPOILER ALERT****

 

The book revolves around a character, Jack Griffin, who is in his early 50s when both of his parents die.  He is relatively happily married, has a lovely daughter, a good career and really the only thing in life that hasn’t been pleasant are his parents.  But rather than releasing him with their death, he cannot let go and you find out that all along he has had issues dealing with the childhood his parents created for him.  He goes to a wedding in Cape Cod for his daughter’s friend and this area being the vacation spot for his family growing up, he decides to bring his father’s ashes with him to scatter.  But, instead of burying the past, he unearths some repressed memories, goes through a mid-life crisis, and walks out on his wife.  A year later finds him living a new life in LA, with a new woman and coming out to Maine to attend his daughter’s wedding.  This time he has the ashes of both his parents in his car and means to drive to the Cape to scatter them both.  After a completely unrealistic, over-the-top, disaster of a wedding weekend, he manages to “bury” his parents and rekindles the relationship with his wife.

Should’ve been called “That Old Maine Magic” because The Cape just brought about misery for the characters involved in this book and Maine helped heal and brought hope for a brighter future.

Not a worthwhile read!

The Engagements, by J. Courtney Sullivan.

This book was like reading the script to the movie “The Breakup” with Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaugh.  That movie was a bit too real;  the fighting, the hurling of insults, the obvious pain, the fact that it was not even remotely an escape from everyday life.

Although the storyline of Frances Gerety, the real ad woman who coined the phrase, “A Diamond is Forever”, was interesting, the four fictitious relationships that are explored paint a rather bleak portrait of marriage.

One leaves her husband & country for a fling, one never feels deserving of his wife, one marries the friend of her true love when he’s killed, and one is an extremist who can’t handle the thought of “defining” a relationship and so looks down on anyone who does.

If you are looking for a book about the history of the diamond, try Blood Diamonds.  Or a journey through the world of diamonds, the advertising of and promotion for engagements rings, etc, read The Heartless Stone.

Since this is neither a work of history nor of entertainment, I would suggest another pick!

 

Did you know that if you offer to babysit multiple children it will actually give you time to yourself?

How does that make any sense, you might ask?  Why would I add to my load of kids?  More kids, more problems, more fighting, more bodies to keep an eye out for…

The opposite is actually true.

It’s called subtraction by addition.  What this essentially means is that you are subtracting the amount of work you have to do by adding more kids to your brood.  The friends that you invite over will be the “entertainment” for your child/ren and keep them preoccupied for hours!  All of a sudden you have all of this free time; time for yourself.  Granted you can’t go anywhere, but still, you don’t have to be a playmate and you don’t have to be a referee.  Kids are always better behaved with people over, especially other kids.

So, take a load off.  Sit and read a book.  Get a head start on dinner.  Call a girlfriend.  Rock out to some great music.  And let the kids take care of themselves.

Just remember…don’t invite the kids’ parents or that’ll defeat the purpose!