sueeeus

by sueeeus maximus

ahem.

It all started with the arrival of a new nephew.  Well, actually, there are two new nephews.  The first one is home from the NICU after 3 weeks and two surgeries.  He’s a trooper and may be turning the pages of medical history (we all hope) with his miraculous recovery from hydrocephalus.  He is doing very well.  A beautiful little boy.

The other nephew arrived ten days early, while I was camping at the ocean.  We cut the trip short and scurried home, after which I couldn’t concentrate on anything but getting over to see my sister and her new love.

So, after a flurry of mad dashes to places like Trader Joe’s (to stock up on provisions –oh, if only there were a TJ’s closer to my home, sigh, I’d shop there all the time –the best find of the trip was fresh thyme, oregano, and basil all growing together in a lovely pot for $8, oh my) and WalMart (to acquire a new dutch oven at a fraction of a fraction of the cost of its French counterpart, and oh, how I really really don’t like WM, but at times like these, with bargains like this, I look the other way and venture in) and Costco (my main stay, because where else can you get 10lbs of 91% lean ground beef, 10lbs of chicken breasts, 10lbs of chopped steak, 6lbs of pork, 5lbs of shredded parmesan cheese, a gallon of extra virgin olive oil, a truckload of everything else I needed, plus the perfect cookbook for the occasion?)…  

…after a flurry…  …I loaded the minivan with my boy, said provisions, a small chest freezer, some baby gifts (who can resist buying more baby gear?) and a portable dvd player, and set out across the land.  Over mountains, rivers, through a desert and across a lake, back to the wooded lands of my youth.  I must say, as much as I am against one’s child being glued to a video, I was very thankful to have that gadget along.  He has learned to undo half of his safety buckle, and I am in desperate need of finding a way to teach him to do as he’s told.  These things are not so simple with two-and-a-half-year-olds, it is clearly evident (to me).

The baby is a delight.  He’s a wee tiny thing, who looks so very much like his daddy, with a few traces of his mother’s characteristics blending in.  What is it with the women in my family?  Are we just carriers for our offspring who are mini-men replicas of their fathers?  (We all secretly hope that if/when we have another child, they might at least look a little bit like us!)

I had an ambitious mission.  Armed with my cookbook, a crock pot, my enameled cast iron, and the aforementioned  truck van load of provisions, I set out to prepare 20 casseroles (4 each of Creamy Chicken,  Chicken & Black Bean, Baked Mac & Cheese, Shepherd’s Pie, and Moussaka), 8 crocks of soups and stews (Split Pea, Black Bean, Tuscan Bean, Navy Bean, Beef & Barley, Beef Stew, Pork Stew, and Chicken Tagine), triple batches of Bolognese, Roasted Red Pepper Pesto, Indian Curry, and White Wine Alfredo sauces, and two dozen Twice Baked Potatoes.  The grand plan was to stock my sister’s freezer(s) with food that she only needs to warm up, thus allowing her more time with the baby and less time in the kitchen.

I have to say, almost everything from this cookbook turned out fabulous.  The Chicken Tagine was my favorite.  Green olives, apricots, cinnamon…  Oh YUM!  It was amazing.  A M A Z I N G.  Really.  It was that good.  The Pork Stew was interesting as well – it called for leeks, fennel, and prunes.  Of course all the pea and bean soups were wonderful, as they always are.  I tried to be true to the recipes, but I do tend to use garlic aggressively, wherever it’s called for, and the fresh thyme and oregano were SO much better than their dried and withered counterparts.  Thank you Trader Joe!  The one recipe that needed help was the Roasted Red Pepper Pesto.  It called for shallots and garlic, but neither were roasted.  Only the peppers were roasted.  I found this quite strong and bitter.  As it turned out, I forgot the key ingredient (parmesan) so I retrieved the batch from the freezer, and put it under the broiler until the whole concoction was roasted nicely.  This softened the flavors of the shallots and garlic.  With the parmesan properly added, it was divine.  Ahhhhh. 

There I was.  In the kitchen.  Barefoot.  Pregnant*.  Behind a hot stove.  All day, every day, for a week.  🙂  Actually, I finished two days early, since I discovered that my sister had her own crock pot so I was able to double up on some days.

…meanwhile…  To keep the young one entertained, I bestowed a gift of awe and wonderment (which proved useful as a punishment tool).   When he was good, he could dress up as Spiderman.  When he misbehaved, the suit was removed and put away, amidst much woe and anguish, weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth.  Sigh.  It’s so hard to be good when you’re two-and-a-half.  All you want to do is what you want to do, so it’s not much fun at all to obey your mother.

After a long morning of disobeying, running away, leaving doors open, breaking flower pots into thousands of pieces and waking the baby, one gets plain tuckered out and falls asleep in the middle of the floor (near the door which is constantly being left open during the great escape maneuvers).

Even so, at the end of the day, he’s a sweet and wonderful boy.  Cousins.  Two beautiful boys.

*In fertility related news, I have been trying to be unobsessive and cast my cares to the wind.  Failing that, I have been checking my bbt regularly, and it’s remained high.  This tells me that the corpus luteum is still doing its thing, pumping out progesterone, so I’m assuming all is well on the home front.  That, plus a couple days here and there of stomach woe, and general fatigue all day every day, are encouraging signs.   Meanwhile, my ob-gyn is out of the office until late August.  Not wanting to wait that long for my first appointment — goodness, I’ll be into the second trimester by then — I opted to make an appointment with one of his colleagues next week.  Now I will get to explain to him my whole metformin journey.  And I am convinced that it is the metformin that gave me the boost needed to conceive and successfully implant.  So.  Still crossing my fingers and hoping the best for this bun in the oven.