Mmm, doesn’t that look good?

Tim’s class is having an American Indian celebration today (I guess we’re not teaching them it’s “Native American” anymore?) Each family was asked to make an authentic recipe, and we were assigned cranberry bread (which is, according to the recipe, a “contemporary Iroquois recipe.”)

Sadly, this is not a picture of our cranberry bread, it’s someone else’s cranberry bread that I grabbed off Flickr (thanks, metamerist!) The recipe I have called for a can of whole berry cranberry sauce, liquid drained and reserved. Except there was no liquid when I opened the can- it was just the usual gelled sauce, but with whole cranberries in it. I did the best I could, but it came out a dense, gooey on the inside block. I’m not nearly experienced enough to have a clue how to fix it, and besides, I only had ingredients (and time) for the one batch.

So off to school went Tim with our sad excuse for cranberry bread.

At least I didn’t get stuck making the mutton stew like my friend Sharon!

He’s so funny, noticing all the detail he wasn’t seeing. I don’t remember being so thrilled getting glasses at his age, but it’s fun to watch him!

My computer is set up in my bedroom. At night before I go to sleep I put it on standby, but I leave it and all peripherals powered on. Every once in awhile my all-in-one printer, which is hooked up to the phone line for the fax, lights up. It does this just before my phone rings, which is kind of cool, and sometimes at night it lights up but the phone doesn’t ring. I just figured there’s some kind of signal hitting it and didn’t pay much attention.

Then early this morning, while I was asleep, something even weirder happened. I woke up to a loud rushing noise and a strong wind. My first thought was that it had started pouring rain and a window had blown open, but I quickly woke up and knew that couldn’t be true.

Somehow our ceiling fan, which is controlled via a remote, had turned itself on at full speed. The remote sat untouched on my night table, there was no way I could have accidentally knocked it.

Spooky.

Pat’s in Stockholm on business this week. Neither of us had ever traveled abroad, and I admit I’m jealous. But I comforted myself with the knowledge that Sweden in January is cold and dark. Plus, according to the airline, his 7+ hour flight didn’t even include a meal! I can’t sleep on planes, the food service is what keeps me happy.

So this morning I wake up to the following in my email:

… What SAS meant when they said no food service was that you got unlimited drinks, a snack, a choice of dinner between chicken, salmon, and pasta, another snack, and a light breakfast of rolls, ham, cheese, and yogurt.

The service was really good and you were given metal flatware (including a butter knife) and glass glasses for your drinks.

At least it’s still cold and dark.

Book club here tonight. The place is neat, took care of that yesterday, but not so clean yet, so I’m in avoidance mode right now.

Time management experts might say I should hold off playing on the internet till the vacuuming is done, and use it as a reward for myself. But experience shows I rarely listen to time management experts, and shit still gets done by the time it needs to get done.

Besides, by the time they get here it’ll be dark and the dust isn’t nearly as obvious when there’s no daylight.

The moon looked so pretty sitting up there in the tree!

Our Christmas tree ready for the Big Man in Red.

The house all lit up so the reindeer can find us!

So, yeah, I couldn’t go to my book club meeting last night. Something came up involving one of my kids and two different emergency rooms. Don’t worry, all is well, but I’m not going to go into details here. At this point I’m just wondering how the insurance company is going to handle this. Not easily, I’m sure.

One week till Thanksgiving. I suppose I should go gather the fixings for my corn pudding. I’m so glad we’re not hosting this year, especially because as it turns out we have no table and chairs for the holiday.

Maybe I’ll make a pie, too.