Bring us your bluest moon

I finally found a version of shakshuka I hadn't tried yet: Mexican-Style. And lo, it was good.

I will not rest until every nation on this green earth has given me its eggs-in-tomato-sauce recipe. Do you hear me, Luxembourg?

Between the science fair and the surprisingly complex Warrior Cats fan art and the fact that I recently overheard her mumbling to her math homework "You're throwin' easy ones at me tonight, book," I've had several twinges lately about how much of a Big Kid my big kid is these days.

Fortunately, I was just reminded that according to one important metric--"Can we have balloons in the house that do not result in tears?"--ours is still very much the home of small children.

Which of these should be called Balloony and which Balloona? How strong are your feelings on this subject? How vociferously and for what duration can you defend your position? If you answered "not very," you are likely not a small child.

So that's a relief.

Anyway, I hope you all are braced for the impending SUPERBLUEBLOODMOONMAGIC. Apparently the last one of these occurred in December of 1982, which is the month my brother was born, so I suspect he has something to do with this. We are ready.

Probably.

My personal dystopia is dry and crumbly

Most of my meal plan this week was filled under the heading "Tastes Better Than It Photographs," which is par for the course in January. Sometimes yummy stuff looks dark and gloopy! I'm fine with it.

Edamame Pasta Salad, both children ate this, which means my steak of not having any idea what my children will or will not eat continues uninterrupted.

Cock-A-Leekie Soup with Puff Pastry. I decided to go straight to the Scotland.org source this year for my Burns Night recipe needs, but I prefer the version of this soup that has prunes. Still an intensely buttery bowl of goodness.

SCIENCE TIME: Anna has proven definitively that you should not leave any ingredients out of cookies. Just go ahead and put everything in there, trust us.

Please take a moment to consider what a world without eggs would look like. 

Exactly as I imagined it

As far as cults go, it smells terrific

My brother gifted me a Texture subscription for Christmas, which means I have unlimited access to basically every magazine currently being published. All the information in the world! So far I have used it exclusively for recipes. For example: Golden Turmeric Fish from Better Homes and Gardens.

Don't worry, I put a bunch of stuff like "Smithsonian Magazine" in my Favorites category so that future phone hackers will know how cultured I am

Also, that dish above is just a red herring snapper, because between Girl Scout cookies and a cookie-based science fair project, the truth is that we as a household have now converted to an All Cookie Lifestyle.

Join us

It's the wave of the future

Like a well-oiled machine

Well, we did it. We were very brave and returned to school despite LEGITIMATE WINTERNESS.

Not pictured: me, in my Farmer Boy cosplay

As promised, I fought off this arctic charge with the power of casseroles.

Homesick Texan's Chicken Spaghetti

Southwest Veggie and Rice

Anyway, we only had one sick day and one ice day and one holiday weekend day and one accidental late pickup this week, so I would say we're 100% back on track, schedule-ly speaking.

Probably also waffle-making words now that I think of it

Listen, for a Central Texan, this text from yesterday contained some very strong words. 

Stew-making words.

Of course, it was a sunny 65 degrees during the actual stew-making, but the point was to fortify ourselves for the inevitable school cancelation ahead. Success! School is canceled, and I am fortified. I am also faced with the fact that in the past TWENTY-SEVEN DAYS both of my children have attended a full day of school at once TWO TIMES. 

Twoooooooooooo

tiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiimes

!

So I guess they are homeschooled now. We are studying...thermodynamics.

And logistics.

Nano-resolution, check

I decided to give exactly one meal over to a Very January Resolution recipe, and the winner was: Eating Well insisting that slices of sweet potato are basically the same as toast, when you think about it.

That's a extremely January belief system you're operating under, Eating Well

Then some weather blew in, and it was carrying the devil's own pollen.

And the only relief for such a thing, of course, is Gingery Ramen with Eggs.

Anyway, the girls have been back in school for four days now and have spend one half of that time trading off being too sick to actually go. In case you were curious about how productive my back-to-the-grind week has been.

Not terribly!

New year, same us

Our winter break ended mere moments ago with the arrival of the school bus, so we have finally joined the ranks of the back-to-the-grind, like, eight weeks or so behind the rest of the world.

Au revoir, mountain retreat. Bonjour, consistent wifi!

Of course, we immediately buckled down to undo the weeks of holiday decadan--no I'm just kidding, we celebrated our last day of vacation with pancakes and pizza and ice cream.

And kitty kisses.

Drifting along with the tumbling tumbleweeds

Okay, we did not last very long in the cave. 2018 seems like a good year to shake things up, so we decided to go hard the opposite direction and take to the mountains instead.

It was great!

Very triumphant.

But then, inevitably, the Mountain Madness set in.

Plus, we kinda missed our waffles.

And our falafels.

And our shopping!

And our...concrete...things.

So now we wait and see where the wind will take us next. 

Probably back to our cats.

And our Twitter.

Hello! (hello! hello! hello!)

On the last day of 2017, it snowed in Austin. Again. Very distressing!

So I made our black-eyed peas road trip-able.

And we fled.

To a cave!

It's kind of dark down here and I just learned about a little monster bug with a lot of legs that eats crickets but we're cozy and it's nice and quiet and I don't get any reception to check Twitter.

2018 mood