Bat Girl!!

These days Natalie loves dressing up; unfortunately all of our dress up clothes are of the male variety, so she alternates between cowboy, football player (with a helmet that must weigh as much as her head!!), pirate, and my favorite, batman/girl. Right now she has on a pirate bandanna and wants me to put one of Noah's cowboy boots on her. She can only walk with one of the boots on--if you can call it walking!!

Anyway, during my recovery, I have been able to catch up on some of the reading I've been wanting to do. I just finished John Adams by David McCullough, which was excellent--it really is history that reads like a novel. We also rented the mini-series, which I also highly recommend. I've also recently read Mozart's Sister, which is fictionalized history by Nancy Moser. I believe that there are other titles in this series maybe about Jane Austen and Martha Washington.

I, obviously, haven't been doing much cooking lately, but I'm looking forward to fall and was wondering if you ladies have any favorite soup recipes. I LOVE soup! When you serve soup, do you serve it as a meal by itself --or with bread-- or sort of as a first course?

want to know more about God?

Hi ladies!
I wonder why the blogging on this site has slowed down...(says me, the great blogger!)
Just wanted to bring to your attention a marvelous book I read while at Joel and Shelley's last week. The Shack; maybe some of the rest of you have heard of it or read it. It's the best theological presentation of God I've read maybe ever, and you guys know that I'm pretty conservative when it comes to things like this. It starts off pretty gruesomely, with the abduction and murder of the protagonist's little daughter, but that is just to set the scene for the worst thing that any parent could imagine, and the rest of the book is how God sees that circumstance. For anyone who has grappled with the questions of "what kind of a God are you anyway that could allow things like that to happen?" this is a good book to read. I highly reccommend it and would be very interested in others' opinions.

Naptime and a good book.

Another (short--because both boys are sleeping) post:
I read Water for Elephants and it was really, really good.
I recommend it.

Shelley, I'm thinking of you as you recover!
kak

another good book

Congrats to mom for posting! Yay! That cake actually looks good, too!

Here's a post from my blog about a good book that I just read:

In other news, I just finished a book called A Good Indian Wife, by Anne Cherian. It was a fictional novel that delicately explored arranged marriages and the Indian traditions behind them. I found it fascinating for a few reasons:

1) Duke and I witnessed an arranged marriage ceremony when we were in highschool. An Indian friend of my parents, in India, arranged the marriage for their oldest daughter (who was Masters trained, upper 20's), and we were all invited to Madras/Chennai for the wedding. My dad, Duke and I went, and we witnessed the engagement ceremony, and the wedding ceremony, all held in the same day. That had a huge impact on me. How could someone trust their parents enough to let them arrange their marriage? Their future? Fascinating topic. (Duke and I went back to India, years later, just the 2 of us, and we happened to have supper with the parents of the bride, who are my parents' age. They have been married for 35 yrs, and their marriage was arranged. They said that they got married and learned how to love each other later, as opposed to our western way of doing it--fall in love then get married. Like I said, interesting topic.)

2) The other reason why I liked the book is because the American side of the story took place in San Francisco. John and I LOVED San Fransisco, and almost moved there. It was either SF or Dayton, OH... SF or Dayton (picture my hands in the air, weighing the two different cities).. MMmmm, let me see. Dayton!! (Actually, Dayton gave us a job, while SF would have been a harder life for us, I would have been the bread winner, working a lot, we would have just had a baby... We wonder, sometimes, though, what it would have been like had we moved to the Berkely/Bay area.)

So, here I am finally, posting on the Blockladies blog. Yay! (Thanks to Miriam and Corey who have spent much time helping me get to this point!)
I wanted to share this chocolate cake recipe with you ladies; we had it when Duke and Cor were here recently and they loved it. It's low fat, in case anybody's interested in such things. Here goes:
3/4 C flour
3/4 C white sugar
1/3 C and 1/4 C unsweetened cocoa powder
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp instant coffee granules or powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 C low fat milk
1 tbsp melted butter
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
1 2/3 C boiling water

oven: 350; nine inch square baking pan; spray with non-stick spray.

Combine all dry ingredients. Combine milk, vanilla and butter; pour into dry mix. Stir until just blended, pour into baking pan. May be thick and lumpy; that's okay.
Combine brown sugar and 1/4 C cocoa and sprinkle over batter; gently pour boiling water in a zig-zag pattern over top; do not stir. Bake about 35 minutes. Top will be cake; bottom like pudding. Great with whipped cream or ice cream. Enjoy!

Corey's comments on Ex Mex

Corey just posted his comments on Ex Mex: From Migrants to Immigrants by Jorge G. Castaneda on his blog.

Check it out here

I found his comments very informative. He thinks a lot like me.

More Stuff from me

I thought that I'd post a simple recipe that I've made a few times lately. The original recipe has proportions, I'm sure, but I've long since gone to just throwing it all in a bowl and mixing it together! (Unless I am making it for our main course, which I have occasionally. Then I will layer each ingredient in each person's bowl, making it look nice(ish).)

Southwest Salad
romaine lettuce
black beans
canned corn
shredded cheddar cheese
salsa
crushed tortilla chips
ranch dressing

Put the lettuce in a big bowl, or if making individual salads, in each person's bowl. Dump or sprinkle black beans and corn on top. Toss on some shredded cheese. Add a couple big plops of salsa in the big bowl, or a few spoonfuls on each small bowl. Add some crushed tortilla chips on top, and when you are ready to eat, drizzle some ranch on top (I use peppercorn ranch for the extra kick), mix it all together, and eat! This salad is super yummy (even my kids will eat it!) and e-a-s-y to throw to together. If anyone tries it, let me know what you think!

On to books. I just finished Culture Warrior by Bill O'Reilly. It's probably more along the lines of something "Carissa" would enjoy, but it made a lot of very good points and valid arguments about the war that secular/progressive people are fighting against the traditionalists in our country. I also finished Chains Around the Grass by Ragen. It was my least favorite of her books-- I don't really recommend it. It was sort of depressing!! I'm reading The Covenant right now, and I have Atonement, by Ian McEwan lined up next. (I heard a lot about the movie, but not much about the book. Has anyone seen/read it?)

Well, I guess that's it from me for now. I hope you guys are enjoying the rest of your summer!! Before we know it, it will be gone... *sigh* :)