My little one came home from school with a project. Their class was making a “culture blanket” out of pieces of paper and they want the students to come up with things from their culture to populate their square of the blanket with. For families who are more recent immigrants, I feel like this is an easier assignment. But as people whose ancestors are more distant immigrants, this was a bit harder. So much of our pre-immigration culture has been washed away by the melting pot. My husband’s father’s family is Italian (and a little […]
Happy New Year!
Welcome to January 2023! I’m hoping I’ll be able to do more this year, both with the blog and with my research. But as the last year, so this year too, as far as needing to balance these goals with being a stay-at-home mom. I was able to read 68 books by the end of 2022, so I am hoping to do more by 4 books this year, averaging about 6 books per month. So far, for mid-January, I have already read 4, so this is definitely achievable. I just hope I can do more […]
When Shall I Have Time Again?: An Update
When I started this year, I had a goal of finally writing more for this blog. I was hoping that most of the new posts would be the book reviews that I have been putting off. Sadly, that has not been the case. The few blog posts I have done have been about motherhood, the general lack of support systems in place for both working and stay-at-home parents (particularly moms), the daily grind of being a “SAHM”, and while these topics are important, they are not what I set out to do with this blog. […]
Experimenting
I’ve been playing around with my new stylus and making calligraphic images. It is definitely harder to write on a screen than it is to write on paper, but this was a fun experiment. And maybe it will lead to more? We’ll see. First – another cuppa.
No Villages, Just Venting
How many headlines have popped up on my feed since before my child was born proclaiming how tired, angry, frustrated, and overburdened mothers are – especially now that we are in a pandemic? I’m tired of them. These headlines and the stories behind them are all venting with no solutions. I remember back a few years ago when I was talking with one of my younger managers. I had just broken the news that there was going to be a policy change. I had been upset myself when I heard about the change, but after […]
New Year, Same Old Goals
Happy 2022! Or at least… Well, lets hope for turning over a new leaf. I can’t say that 2021 didn’t bring about some interesting changes to my life, or that those weren’t amazing changes. But change is a double-sided coin. My child was born at the beginning of the year, and as prepared for that as I felt, there were definitely moments. Childcare being too expensive and (as I continue to feel) dangerous for the unvaccinated, I found myself trying to pull off the Herculean task of working from home with a baby on my […]
New Adventures, New Directions
Starting in September, we will have relocated to NYC. In addition to continuing to do 2 book posts a month (a goal, I know), I’m also planning on doing at least 1 tea or coffee shop spotlight each month as well. At least one of the two book posts will be part of a new series I am starting using the Tortall books by Tamora Pierce as “sacred text”. If you’ve ever listened to the podcast, Harry Potter and the Sacred Text, this is in that same vein. I’ll readily admit that I completely adore […]
6 Months On – And So Many More to Go
I’ve been seeing a few people doing check-ins on their blogs or social media accounts in the last few weeks – so yes, this is somewhat jumping on the band wagon. I went back and reviewed what I wrote back in March to see if it really gave any insight to what I was thinking, and other than being worried about what people would do financially, it really didn’t. (You can read that post here.) What do I remember from March? I remember thinking that we might have a tour program by July. (While this […]
Baking in Self-Isolation
When we realized that Stay-at-Home could potentially come down the pipeline, but it wasn’t mandated yet, we decided to make the most of our last trip to Vermont by stopping at King Arthur Flour on the way home. This was the best choice we could have made. We stocked up on various flours: pastry flour, artisan bread flour, high gluten flour. We grabbed some superfine castor sugar so I can attempt some more intricate pastry work while trapped in the house. We grabbed King Arthur’s pre-made cookie dough. (Two more cookies consumed and that will […]
From the Socially Distanced Desk
It seems a little strange how the last few weeks have progressed. On some level, it makes me want to go back and read Laurie Halse Anderson’s Fever 1793 all over again. On the opposite hand, I really don’t. Somehow it has become far too relevant. Three weeks ago, we had a large church gathering, during which we had ensured that no one shook hands (it’s flu season anyway), and the deacons deployed hand sanitizer at the doors because it was probably a good call. Two weeks ago, things were sort of ramping up from […]