I had no idea how long I would need to cook my first COOKED dinner in ages, and I started perhaps a bit too early. However, it all worked out fine. Even have dinner for tomorrow night prepared, and waiting in the fridge to be placed in the oven for the appropriate amount of time.
Tonight's dinner met with 4 Thumbs-Up, tho not enthusiastic ones. They didn't hate it is what that boils down to, which is good.
I also goofed and picked up dried basil rather than fresh basil, and I know there is a difference in flavor. If I make it again, I will know better next time. However, I have leftovers for lunch tomorrow, which means one less meal I have to think about, and this, too, is good.
Also made a cake, in a very pretty flowery bundt pan. AND freshly whipped cream on the side.
I even wore an APRON! ;-)
Monday, September 07, 2009
Week one of my Triumphant Return to the Kitchen
Getting ahead of myself? Possibly! However, an inspiration is an inspiration and I am going to go with it until we either go broke, there is a complete mutiny from my crew, or we get so fat we can no longer fit through the doors.
My menu is planned. My list for the store is complete, and I am going to spend this afternoon making dinner for the next two nights. Here's what I have planned:
Monday: Chicken in a creamy basil sauce, with rice and broccoli.
Tuesday: Sausage and beef empanadas with corn.
Wednesday: Dinner sausage with sauerkraut (Schwanns. No thinking involved!)
Thursday: Parker has baseball. Sandwiches for all...
Friday: Corn Fritatta with cheese
Saturday: Steve's Birthday... he and I are going out. Kids get Pizza
Sunday: Steak au Poivre.
Julia, while amazing and fabulous and brilliant, is a bit too rich for the likes of this family. So I am pulling my recipes from the Better Homes New Cook Book, and a little artsy one called Come On Over.
You will notice that, in reality, I am only COOKING 4 of the 7 nights. Yup... but that is still a HUGE increase over my standard percentage. My battle cry for a very long time has been "I don't cook. I fix".
Well, I am trying to "fix" that!
My menu is planned. My list for the store is complete, and I am going to spend this afternoon making dinner for the next two nights. Here's what I have planned:
Monday: Chicken in a creamy basil sauce, with rice and broccoli.
Tuesday: Sausage and beef empanadas with corn.
Wednesday: Dinner sausage with sauerkraut (Schwanns. No thinking involved!)
Thursday: Parker has baseball. Sandwiches for all...
Friday: Corn Fritatta with cheese
Saturday: Steve's Birthday... he and I are going out. Kids get Pizza
Sunday: Steak au Poivre.
Julia, while amazing and fabulous and brilliant, is a bit too rich for the likes of this family. So I am pulling my recipes from the Better Homes New Cook Book, and a little artsy one called Come On Over.
You will notice that, in reality, I am only COOKING 4 of the 7 nights. Yup... but that is still a HUGE increase over my standard percentage. My battle cry for a very long time has been "I don't cook. I fix".
Well, I am trying to "fix" that!
Sunday, September 06, 2009
Long time, no blog
We're about to start the 5th week of school. So much for my promise earlier this summer that I would get back into the swing of blogging once school started. The best laid plans, right?
School has turned out to be a much better situation that I had feared. Isn't that usually the case?? One of the classes I have to teach will be, I am sure, only slightly less painful than poking myself repeatedly with something sharp, but the kids are good, I've settled into my classroom enough that it is feeling like HOME, and I have some wicked cool new gadgetry to use, so its all good. (if you are not following me on Twitter or following my updates, our SmartBoards and Doc. Cams were installed this last week. OH SO FLIPPING COOL!!!)
I spent the day today with my friend Nicole. We had a 'girls day' of shopping (got some make up and a new pair of silver hoop earrings) and then we saw Julie & Julia. I have the book on my bedside table and it is my next read. Movie then book... generally I don't like to do things in that order, but oh well.
In short - LOVED the movie!! It was cute, laugh-out-loud funny at times and certainly inspired me to go dig out the Julia Child cookbook my parents gave me back in 1992. (Yes.. it was VERY very dusty!) As with most aspects of life, the movie made cooking look SO easy and effortless. Ahhh - were it only so! One little highlight for me toward the end of the movie was a shot (cameo??) of my childhood-neighbor-turned-published-author-and-famed-NYTfoodie Frank Bruni! I'd heard he was in the film, but when I didn't see his name show up in the IMDB list, I thought perhaps an article of his was shown or something.
However, the movie DID inspire me a bit tonight. The plan was for my throw-it-together Mexican Salad - bagged salad, Tyson grilled chicken slices, corn, avocado, dressing. Toss it, call it dinner. The bagged salad comes with tortilla strips but tonight, in homage to Julia, I decided to make croutons. And I had a little helper in Christopher. We had the BEST time, chopping the stale French bread I had in the fridge, melting the copious amount of butter, and stirring until the magic happened. I wish I could replay the scenes for you - it was not just the butter melting during our team-work fest!
So.. I pledge to myself, and the 3 of you who READ this blog... I will do better both in the kitchen, and on my blog. Thanks Julie.. and Julia.. now I have a bit of inspiration! (and be warned, you may hear about my culinary disasters because you KNOW there will be a few!)
School has turned out to be a much better situation that I had feared. Isn't that usually the case?? One of the classes I have to teach will be, I am sure, only slightly less painful than poking myself repeatedly with something sharp, but the kids are good, I've settled into my classroom enough that it is feeling like HOME, and I have some wicked cool new gadgetry to use, so its all good. (if you are not following me on Twitter or following my updates, our SmartBoards and Doc. Cams were installed this last week. OH SO FLIPPING COOL!!!)
I spent the day today with my friend Nicole. We had a 'girls day' of shopping (got some make up and a new pair of silver hoop earrings) and then we saw Julie & Julia. I have the book on my bedside table and it is my next read. Movie then book... generally I don't like to do things in that order, but oh well.
In short - LOVED the movie!! It was cute, laugh-out-loud funny at times and certainly inspired me to go dig out the Julia Child cookbook my parents gave me back in 1992. (Yes.. it was VERY very dusty!) As with most aspects of life, the movie made cooking look SO easy and effortless. Ahhh - were it only so! One little highlight for me toward the end of the movie was a shot (cameo??) of my childhood-neighbor-turned-published-author-and-famed-NYTfoodie Frank Bruni! I'd heard he was in the film, but when I didn't see his name show up in the IMDB list, I thought perhaps an article of his was shown or something.
However, the movie DID inspire me a bit tonight. The plan was for my throw-it-together Mexican Salad - bagged salad, Tyson grilled chicken slices, corn, avocado, dressing. Toss it, call it dinner. The bagged salad comes with tortilla strips but tonight, in homage to Julia, I decided to make croutons. And I had a little helper in Christopher. We had the BEST time, chopping the stale French bread I had in the fridge, melting the copious amount of butter, and stirring until the magic happened. I wish I could replay the scenes for you - it was not just the butter melting during our team-work fest!
So.. I pledge to myself, and the 3 of you who READ this blog... I will do better both in the kitchen, and on my blog. Thanks Julie.. and Julia.. now I have a bit of inspiration! (and be warned, you may hear about my culinary disasters because you KNOW there will be a few!)
Saturday, August 08, 2009
A personal vendetta?
The trauma and drama that began 4 days ago played out to its end last night. In my never ending attempts to get BACK to the school that I have considered my home for the last 7 years (crazy, dysfunctional and such as it is.. it is home) I offered to cut my contract in order to take a part time sped position and a part time Language Arts position, knowing that SpEd will up the staffing by the 3rd week of school and soon I would be back at a full contract. I left this message with the administrator on voice mail. My call was never returned. Nor has anyone ever replied to the numerous emails I have sent.
And my whole rant about how this was NOT on the Principal's head, that this whole issue come down to the special ed department being woefully understaffe, well, THIS part falls solely on the administration. She had it within her power to fix 2 potentially very BIG problems and chose not to. According to a source, she "will not have me back on her campus". So this has nothing at all to do with my ability to teach (which I could assume from the start since in the 4 years of her being at this school, she has been in my room 3 times) or with doing what is best for special ed kids, but what is best for HER.
There will be staffing allocated for special ed after the 2nd week of school. I got THAT much done for my former students and team members... but it will not be me filling the position. As we all know, these are not easy positions to fill, so just because the staffing allocation will be there, it could be a long time before there is a person in that position. This is her personal vendetta against me being played out and it is the kids who will suffer for it.
And my whole rant about how this was NOT on the Principal's head, that this whole issue come down to the special ed department being woefully understaffe, well, THIS part falls solely on the administration. She had it within her power to fix 2 potentially very BIG problems and chose not to. According to a source, she "will not have me back on her campus". So this has nothing at all to do with my ability to teach (which I could assume from the start since in the 4 years of her being at this school, she has been in my room 3 times) or with doing what is best for special ed kids, but what is best for HER.
There will be staffing allocated for special ed after the 2nd week of school. I got THAT much done for my former students and team members... but it will not be me filling the position. As we all know, these are not easy positions to fill, so just because the staffing allocation will be there, it could be a long time before there is a person in that position. This is her personal vendetta against me being played out and it is the kids who will suffer for it.
Thursday, August 06, 2009
Do-gooder thrown under bus. Story at 11.
I will preface this self-pitying rant with the acknowledgment that I do realize I should be thankful, in this economy, that I have a job.
That's about where my thankfulness ends.
I have said for years now that no good deed ever goes unpunished. I know that this is not a very Christian way of looking at the world, but I have seen it time and time again, and have been chanting this as a mantra for the last 6 years. Every time our school psychologist would qualify a kid for special ed just because it was to 'be nice' that family ended up biting us in the butt. I know that no good does from doing-good. And yet, I tried.
When our district cut staffing at my school, the least senior member of the team was the one to be reassigned. She had no say in where she would be reassigned. And I blogged before about how important it was for her to be able to stay at the school we taught at because her daughter goes there etc.
I also did not believe for a moment that, when I agreed to take her place as the person reassigned, our staffing numbers would remain dismally low. I mean... come ON??!! 9 grades (K-8) in a school that grew over the summer by 300 students?? No flipping way 2 Special Education teachers can handle THAT!!!
So - my good deed - offering to go to a different school so that my co-worker could do what is best for her family.. Yeah - now I am the one being bitten in the butt.
The school to which I have been reassigned... circa 1954. Fine. I can handle an old building. Ok, so my room smells bad. (really bad.. MOLD bad) Fine.. so there is NO WHERE for me to put my stuff.. Ok, so the new Principal didn't even know I was coming or that I was new to the campus and forgot to INTRODUCE ME TODAY during our first staff meeting. Fine.. I'm there to teach, right?
LRC right?? Learning RESOURCE Classroom. Not self-contained. Not Lifeskills, right?
Not so fast.
Yeah - it is called LRC but evidently my new caseload is just one step away from self-contained. This is not the population I either wanted to work with, or am good at. I won't be helping kids maneuver through their Social Studies text books... or helping them with their science or math.. I will be working with kids who do not know that "A" says "A". I will have kids who need paraprofessionals at age 13.
There are people in this world who are great at working with this population. There are folks with the patience to teach and reteach the same things for an entire year.
I am NOT one of those people.
Had I known... I would have let the other gal figure something out.
It is going to be a very unbearable 182 days.
That's about where my thankfulness ends.
I have said for years now that no good deed ever goes unpunished. I know that this is not a very Christian way of looking at the world, but I have seen it time and time again, and have been chanting this as a mantra for the last 6 years. Every time our school psychologist would qualify a kid for special ed just because it was to 'be nice' that family ended up biting us in the butt. I know that no good does from doing-good. And yet, I tried.
When our district cut staffing at my school, the least senior member of the team was the one to be reassigned. She had no say in where she would be reassigned. And I blogged before about how important it was for her to be able to stay at the school we taught at because her daughter goes there etc.
I also did not believe for a moment that, when I agreed to take her place as the person reassigned, our staffing numbers would remain dismally low. I mean... come ON??!! 9 grades (K-8) in a school that grew over the summer by 300 students?? No flipping way 2 Special Education teachers can handle THAT!!!
So - my good deed - offering to go to a different school so that my co-worker could do what is best for her family.. Yeah - now I am the one being bitten in the butt.
The school to which I have been reassigned... circa 1954. Fine. I can handle an old building. Ok, so my room smells bad. (really bad.. MOLD bad) Fine.. so there is NO WHERE for me to put my stuff.. Ok, so the new Principal didn't even know I was coming or that I was new to the campus and forgot to INTRODUCE ME TODAY during our first staff meeting. Fine.. I'm there to teach, right?
LRC right?? Learning RESOURCE Classroom. Not self-contained. Not Lifeskills, right?
Not so fast.
Yeah - it is called LRC but evidently my new caseload is just one step away from self-contained. This is not the population I either wanted to work with, or am good at. I won't be helping kids maneuver through their Social Studies text books... or helping them with their science or math.. I will be working with kids who do not know that "A" says "A". I will have kids who need paraprofessionals at age 13.
There are people in this world who are great at working with this population. There are folks with the patience to teach and reteach the same things for an entire year.
I am NOT one of those people.
Had I known... I would have let the other gal figure something out.
It is going to be a very unbearable 182 days.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)