Fact: I am making bread while lying on the couch. How, you ask? It seems that there are machines that make bread, automagically. It is a brave new world, y'all. Today is Matt's and my 13th wedding anniversary, and he brought me one of these contraptions. It is shiny and serious looking, and it has a little window in the top so you can spy on the dough. I haven't tasted the bread yet, but through the window it looks like it will be tasty. I'm hoping that I can save some dough (oh ho!) by making bread for sandwiches. Anybody know if this will actually be cheaper than buying store bread? There's some kind of "bread machine flour" that the thing likes, it may be more expensive, I don't know, but the manual says all-purpose flour is okay too. We'll see! If I get brave I might try it with the fruit and nut dispenser.
Opinion: John McCain looks tired. While my bread friend is toiling in the kitchen, I'm watching the repubs. He just finished his speech. I know all the commentators have been going on and on about how boring a speaker JM is, but wow. I feel like somebody slipped me a roofie. And not in a fun way. Then they dropped the balloons and confetti, and all the McCain and Palin family members were standing up on that black stage while crazy lights flashed around them, and the whole effect was just. . .mournful. John and Cindy and their kids looked like people in a bar when they turn the lights back up at 2am. And I thought, they're not feeling great about this. At that exact moment, Wolf Blitzer intoned, "Well, when you drop that wonderful confetti and balloons, Anderson, it just really gets the party going." Only, his tone sounded like he was saying, "I will never feel joy again."
Extracurriculars: We are getting our back-to-school activity schedule lined up. Laura has an art class on Thursdays (she thinks it's called "mixed-up media"), and she's about to start Jump Rope Club at school. This will be cool, I think. On Mondays, they get together after school and learn "individual and group rope techniques." The club runs the whole year and only costs $15. Woot! For this they get a t-shirt and a jump rope, and they can perform at school functions. I am not huge on having lots of extra activities. We try to keep it to one thing at a time. Do y'all try to limit these things? Last fall Laura did soccer (ugh), then gymnastics through the county parks and rec, then we started up swimming again in February. She's also taken gymnastics at a private gym. But around here it seems like, unless your kid gets to be on an invited gymnastic team at one of the gyms, the classes just don't really do anything. And I don't think she will be the next Nastia Whatshername. So we're trying some new things--I'm excited! My Frenemy Neighbor has also offered to give her piano lessons, so I'm considering that, kind of.
Sorcery: The other day, Laura took her new thermos to school for the first time. When she got home, she said, "When I drank my milk, it was like it just came out of the fridge! How did you do that? Are you some kind of wizard?" The answer is YES.
Thursday, September 4, 2008
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5 comments:
"A bread machine?!!" Your mother told me that no gift for a wife should have an electrical cord! So are you just the best wife ever, or does Matt have husbandly powers that the rest of us lack?
I don't really think I'm saving much money by making bread, but having a fresh warm loaf ready makes a frugal dinner of soup or stew seem suddenly luxurious. On the other hand, I have had plenty of bread machine flops -- partly because I got mine at Goodwill and haven't been able to get a manual online.
OH, and I also don't usually make sandwiches with my machine bread because I can't cut the slices thin and even enough. Maybe if I had one of those slicers they have at the bread store!
Yes, in defiance of conventional wisdom, I think an appliance can be a good gift. As long as it is not an iron.
And Carrie, I think you're right about the bread seeming like an extra luxury. I know it gets my people excited. And I realize that any bread savings will need to take the cost of the bread machine into account :(, because Matt didn't buy it at Goodwill. Do men ever buy things at GW?
My sister and I still laugh about the time I made (not) banana bread in the bread machine. Threw in all the ingredients, oh so simple, turned it on, smells great, now it's finished...forgot to put in the mixing paddle, clump of tasty smelling goop. It's a fun appliance though.
I'm pretty in favor of one activity at a time, too. Though I've agreed to let Samuel do soccer AND a math club for the next couple months. Thank goodness for grandparents and their taxi service!
You're brave, Sara! I have all these recipes that came with the machine, but so far it's strictly white bread around here until I understand the thing a little better!
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