I don't get baseball

Of all the popular sports enjoyed in the US, the one I really don't get is baseball (okay, make that NASCAR racing and baseball, but today I'm talking about baseball). I've tried watching it on TV, and I've even been to a grand total of four live games. I'll admit I only went to those games because my kids were singing the national anthem (how many parents get to say their kid got to stand on center field at a San Francisco Giants game to sing the Star Spangled Banner?). But we did stay to watch the game afterwards, and we really did try to get into the spirit of things, cheering for the Giants along with the rest of the crowd. But each time, we ended up leaving early because it went on for too long, and just couldn't hold our interest long enough.

Baseball is not a difficult sport to understand. I'm sure there are a myriad of rules that I'm not aware of, but the basics are pretty clear and simple. But there are still so many things about baseball that I don't "get":

Seven Days of Dinner, April 23-29

We've got our first lemon of the season! Our dwarf lemon tree only gives us lemons every 2 years, so we're always glad when our tree bears fruit and we can enjoy lemons any time we want. In fact, I'm so excited at the thought of this year's lemon haul, I want to have a whole week's worth of meals featuring lemon! Here's what I'm thinking:

How to make paper flowers for a spring party

The Pea celebrated her 11th birthday last weekend with a movie night and sleepover for 7 of her school friends. We decided to decorate her birthday table in Easter-themed pink, yellow and green. The table looked gorgeous, but the wall behind it was plain and bare. Usually I put up a "Happy Birthday" banner or poster, but this year I wanted to do something different, so I decorated the ceiling instead, and hung paper lanterns and flowers at various lengths. Here's how I made the paper flowers:

I could drink ranch dressing. And I did.

I love ranch dressing. I pour it on salad. I mix it with chopped hardboiled eggs. I stir it into beef stroganoff. I would probably drink it, if I could.

And that's just what I did a few weeks ago, when my friend Citymama invited me and a few other bloggers to tres chic LaFitte Restaurant in San Francisco. Owner/chef Russell Jackson actually served us an entire 5-course meal featuring Hidden Valley Ranch; he even used it in our cocktails and dessert!

What's in your sock drawer?

Nothing should be so simple, right? The name should say it all! But in the spirit of disorganized clutter, there's always something extra you can stuff into a sock drawer! Aside from the assorted hosiery (socks, tights, stockings) you'd expect to find, here's what's in mine:

Pioneers, not snobs

To Rick Santorum, who suspended his Presidential campaign earlier today, I have only this to say: Don't let the door hit you on the way out. He was certainly an amusing diversion, but his views on women, on the separation of church and state, on foreign policy and on so many other areas are just so far removed from mine that I'm not sorry he's gone.

Seven Days of Dinner, April 9-15

The Pea celebrated her 11th birthday last Friday, and we celebrated with a trip to Tahoe for some skiing and poolside fun. Actually, the trip was for Spring Break and her birthday just happened to fall right in the middle of it, but that didn't stop her from commandeering the whole trip as though it was a 3-day birthday celebration. I told her the only person allowed to celebrate their birthday for more than 1 day is me (May is officially My Month since both my birthday and Mother's Day are in May), and our family tradition of letting the birthday celebrant pick the restaurant for birthday dinner was good enough.

Easter Treats

Now that the kids are older, Easter Egg hunts are a thing of the past, but I still like making Easter baskets and treating them to little candies and toys. I asked around on Twitter, although I received some great suggestions for older kids' Easter treats (books, money and lottery tickets, for starters!), in the end I stuck to what the love the best: Cadbury's creme eggs, a yellow Peep (with the bottom dipped in dark chocolate!) and a little toy. I got 3Po and Jammy some Lego Star Wars mini-sets that came in plastic models of the Death Star and Tattoine. I figured the planets looked enough like Easter Eggs to fit the bill. For The Pea, I added a Kelly doll dressed as the Easter Bunny.

What's in your wallet?

.... sorry, no Capital One credit card. But I do manage to squeeze a lot of stuff into my wallet. Technically, it's my purse, but last year I got tired of shlepping around a huge bag for my kids to throw their junk into, so I downsized. My streamlined purse contains just the basics I need to get around (plus a few things I need to get rid of):

Seven Days of Dinner, April 2-8

Normally I write my "Seven Days of Dinner" posts on a Sunday or Monday, so I have a plan in my head for the next seven evening meals. But my mind is on spring break this week, so I'm a day late. Fortunately, I already know I won't be cooking the whole week. Later this week we're going on our final ski trip of the year, and even if we weren't, we'd be going out to a restaurant to celebrate The Pea's 11th birthday this Friday. And since this Sunday is Easter Sunday, I don't have to think too hard about what to eat for dinner (if Alfie and I had our way, it would be chocolate bunnies and Cadbury eggs, but unfortunately we have to set a good example for the kids, so Easter ham it is).