Random Photos

So I have photos. And I want to post them. So here you go.

We made cinnamon buns last weekend. We used this recipe at Vegan Yum Yum. We didn't use a big enough dish and didn't bake them long enough so the inside rolls were kind of gooey and not fully cooked (I think it's mostly because they didn't have enough room to expand, but then agian I'm sort of a bread novice), but the outsides pieces were pretty damn good. Definitely going to try it again with a bigger pan (or 2).

Here they are basking in the yellow glow of our stove light.






Liam's first birthday was in January. At first, we were going to have it at our house, but enough people RSVPd yes that we decided to move the party to a hotel near our house. All we had to do was rent a room for the night and they let us use the pool area the next day. There you go. A cheap pool-party birthday.


Liam wasn't actually too into the cake. He ate some, but like any food, he tired of it after a few bites and wanted something else (this is a blessing in disguise because it means he loves eating new foods).


Sledding in the back yard.


And I made a snow angel.


This was Anna's idea. I thought it looked cool.


She still loves her stuffed friends. George is laying on Rocky (the dog) who is laying on Buddy (the bear).


Anna's frosty window in the morning.




Jen and Liam.








Anna likes to help in the kitchen.


And I suppose the secret is out now. That's right. I'm pregnant.

OK. Not really. Seriously though, my gut is not usually that pronounced. But it is what it is. What can I say? I like food, beer and I don't regularly exercise. Sue me.

Actually, I sort of wear my weight with pride. I haven't lost a single pound since choosing veganism over seven years ago. That's not to say that you can't lose weight by going vegan, but ... well, look at me. I'm not exactly wasting away over here.

I'm still watching Ella on Friday's, much to my kids' delight. Liam has taken quite a shine to her. He even wants to hug her now when she comes over. It's awwwwwdorable.

Uber

Hase over at Vegan Macht Glucklich gave me this award:


I'm flattered. And I'm positive that her blog is awesome, but I can't read German. I took a year of it back in high school, but I've lost almost all of it. Danke, Hase. (I remember that much, at least.)

I'm passing the award on to Half Pint Pixie, whose blog is consistently informing, entertaining and engaging. She's vegan, a proponent and practitioner of attachment parenting, and Irish. She was one of the first vegan blogs I started reading and probably one the first people to read my blog (thanks to the Vegan Freak forums).

So, depending on what language you speak, there are two more blogs you should read.

These Thy Gifts...

I'm atheist, so I don't think my family would ever ask me to say grace before a meal. But if they did...

(click to view larger size)

Comic from Abtruse Goose.

(hat tip to Vegan.com)

Yestertime

A quick google search showed that a word I thought Anna made up this morning is actually quite common on the world wide web of everything we call the internet.

Yestertime.

She just said it out of the blue during breakfast (in between an open-faced peanut butter sandwich and frozen blueberries).

It's in the Urban Dictionary, which I guess must mean people in urban areas use it all the time. She's such a urbanite, that two year old daughter of mine.

Mixed Media

Today, Anna drew a picture for her mother. She sat down at her little table and I got out her briefcase full of markers and crayons. She prefers the markers. They're easier to draw with, plus they make her hands and clothes all sorts of fun colors. Sometimes they make mommy and daddy's clothes colors too. Cool!

So she drew and drew and drew and I'm not going to lie to you, I suggested different colors and told her that maybe she could fill in some white space here and maybe she could make some dots instead of lines, lines instead of circles, circles instead of lines.

These were all suggestions, mind you. In some cases, she chose to follow them, in others she ignored me completely. That's cool.

So after going with the markers for a while she decided to color with some crayons. I said, "Ooooooh, you're going to do some mixed media, huh?"

And she said, "Yeah, Anna mixed media."

It's times like these that I look at my daughter and I want to just hug her for the rest of her life. But she wouldn't get much sleep. And eating would be hard with me attached. So instead I just smile and die a little inside.

Here's what she drew:

And here's a closer view.

It's really hard to see the crayon, which is why crayons suck and why Anna prefers markers.

A Selective Interpretation of Our Backyard

Back at the end of June I took some photos of our back yard. It was green back then. Now it's mostly brown and lifeless, since it's been really dry this summer and I refuse to water grass since I see it as the most useless waste of water possible.

So yes, these photos are really old. But let's just let them be a reminder of simpler, greener, moister times.

Our house hadn't been painted yet when I took these photos, so if you look in the background of some of these photos and see what our house used to look like you can see why we had to paint. And in a roundabout way, you can understand why my blogging has been very rare this summer.

Anyway, here are photos from late June.

Stuff in our rain garden that we made (well, we had someone do it for us) to keep our basement from flooding (that was a few summers ago and so far, no flooding!). These are all native, except for the bushy fern in the second photo ... at least I don't think that one's native.




I love our Columbines. These two photos were taken before I all but destroyed this plant with scaffolding while I power washed the old paint off our house.




This year, I decided to leave a couple patches of grass unmowed, just for the hell of it. The first time I mowed my neighbor told me I missed a spot. I replied that I tried that. She probably thought I was joking. Well, who's joking now!

One of the patches is a square on one side of the back yard. It did pretty good until it stopped raining. It's now a patch of long, brown, horizontal grass.






The other patch is a nice long strip of grass that goes down our little back yard hill and everything. 


I think next year I'm going to try my hand at a little labyrinth for Anna to play in. Because the kids we have over always gravitate to the long grass. They're fascinated by it. Which I guess makes me a big kid.

Oh, our pepper plants. My dad gave me a few young ones and I planted them and we actually got a few peppers out of one of them but they were sort of rotted and didn't get that big. Harumpf.


And here are some assorted flowers. Some native, some not. I have no idea what any of these are called. But some of them are pretty.

Like this one. I see this one and all I can think is, "Feed me, Seymour!"






I had to get on the hood of my car to get this whole thing in the frame. It eventually flowered. Last year it was about an eighth of this size. It actually has gotten bigger than this as the summer went on.



Cute lil roses. 


And these are Anna's rocks. She likes to find rocks by the house and put them on this cement slab we have in the middle of our back yard that's surrounded by day lilies on three sides.


And finally, Anna picking raspberries.

The Kid Makes Me Laugh

Couple funny things that just happened in the last 10 minutes:

Anna woke up from her nap and we came downstairs after some playing on mom and dad's bed. She took her two favorite baby dolls and sat them in the chair and wanted to feed them. So she got a spoon and a bowl and pretended to spoon food into their mouths.

So that's all pretty normal, but then she put the spoon in babies hand and said, "feed Anna" and pretended that the baby was pretending to feed Anna food.

Atta girl! She's already creating metafiction.

I laughed at her, of course. Then she laughed at me and said, "Daddy laughing." She then said, "num num num" (or "nom nom nom" as I've seen it spelled) over and over and pretended to shovel food into her mouth. 

Atta girl! She's already misinterpreting why people are laughing at her. Well, maybe that's not so great. But I find it funny.

So then she climbs up into the high chair. And while I put on her bib and tray I describe the process by which I made the mashed potatoes I'm about to feed her. I finished with something like, then I mash it all up and you get to eat it.

To which she replies, "Yay! I'm proud of you."

It would be fitting, I suppose, if she started making sarcastic insults at age 2, but I choose to believe that her pride in me is sincere.

Speaking of funny, this photo of Anna makes me laugh really hard.

All Work and No Blog...

...makes Al go something, something.

Crazy. I'm going crazy. Because not only am I not blogging, I'm not reading blogs either. I feel like a part of my life is missing.

But I'm working on the house and I'm actually taking some photos for money. And I'm out of town for the next three weekends. So it's busy.

I feel like a broken record, but sorry again for the lack of blogging.

I promise I'll post the potato salad recipe tomorrow. Maybe.

Sliver

Not only is it my favorite Nirvana song, but it's also something I removed from Anna for the first time ever today.

She had a moderately sized sliver in her palm for who knows how long and Mrs. Piggy saw it tonight. So I got out the tweezer and Anna held still and let me pull it out. She's such a trooper.

Anna's new word today (there are, in fact, many new words every day, but this is the one I like best): Cooperate.

North Dakota's State Dish

I'm on vacation in North Dakota.

I made vegan potato salad. If you grew up an omnivore in the midwest and you are now vegan, you need to make this potato salad. Even if you didn't like potato salad.

I'll post the recipe soon. Then you'll make it. And you'll thank me.

That is all. Sorry for the lack of posts. Like I said ... vacation ...

Hi.

Happy Independence Day, fellow Americans!

"Loyalty to the country always. Loyalty to the government when it deserves it."

-Mark Twain

I interrupt this blogging hiatus to apologize for the lack of posts recently. It's going to be a couple weeks more until I get back on the blogging wagon. So, sorry.

And here are a couple quote for you this Independence Day from Mark Twain's successor:

"There is a tragic flaw in our precious Constitution, and I don't know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be president."

"1492. As children we were taught to memorize this year with pride and joy as the year people began living full and imaginative lives on the continent of North America. Actually, people had been living full and imaginative lives on the continent of North America for hundreds of years before that. 1492 was simply the year sea pirates began to rob, cheat, and kill them."

-Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

This Old House

My housework is going into overdrive starting today. I get to pressure-wash the old paint off our stucco for the next few days. Yay!

So blogging will be light.

It feels weird to do stereotypically manly things. I'm used to taking care of my daughter, doing the dishes, doing the laundry and cooking meals. It's like I don't even know who I am when I do manual labor. I tap into a part of myself that reminds me of my dad. I mean, reminds me A LOT of my dad. When I wear a respirator while scraping the lead paint off our trim, I can smell my breath ... and it smells like my dad. Weird.

Also, I can totally see now why my dad went to the bar for a couple drinks after a hard day of painting in the summer. I really want to as well. But by time I'm done working and then done eating it's time to go to bed.

Speaking of my dad, I meant to write something near Father's day about him. About how I feel like I'm taking on certain aspects of his personality and mannerisms. Also, how he planted several seeds of animal rights in my brian at a young age. My dad is faaaaar from a vegan or vegetarian, yet he taught me to respect animals. There are a few specific examples. I'll write about them later.

Oh, Steven...

It occurred to me this last weekend, when I quoted Steven the Vegan to my parents and siblings, that not everyone has seen the hilariousness that is...

Cooking With Steven the Vegan


So there you go family (and anyone else who hasn't seen the video). Now you'll know what I'm joking about.

I actually have a point of contention with this video. I'd argue that if a monkey made me a sandwich - even if the contents of the sandwich were vegan - I wouldn't consider the sandwich vegan. Because chances are, the monkey would have to have been trained and forced to make the sandwich for humans. That's animal exploitation. I can't get behind that.

My friend Tony asked me once a while ago, "Do you ever turn off?" I think I have now definitively answered a big fat NO to that question.

Anyway, watch the video. It's funny.

So, I Guess I'm Raising a Terrorist

Here is the most frightening job description I've heard in a while, as told by a University of Minnesota student via the City Pages:

What they (the FBI) were looking for, Carroll (not his real name) says, was an informant—someone to show up at “vegan potlucks” throughout the Twin Cities and rub shoulders with RNC protestors, schmoozing his way into their inner circles, then reporting back to the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, a partnership between multiple federal agencies and state and local law enfocement. The effort’s primary mission, according to the Minneapolis division’s website, is to “investigate terrorist acts carried out by groups or organizations which fall within the definition of terrorist groups as set forth in the current United States Attorney General Guidelines.”

If this kid's efforts resulted in an arrest, he would be paid money.

Read the City Pages article here.

Also, and I have to say this because it bugs the hell out of me, the first sentence of that paragraph I quoted up there is grammatically incorrect. It should say, "schmooze his way" and "report back".

But I digress.

I've decided to write a letter to the FBI, since they're probably reading this post seeing as how I've put the word "terrorist" in the title (Sweet! My readership just went up!).

Dear FBI,

Our next potluck will be at Como park, on June 21st, 1:00 p.m. at the picnic tables near the playground. We're having it by the playground because a lot of us have children. My little one (can you believe she's almost 2?!) loves slides and tunnels.

Oh, about the food. I'm bringing some spinach enchiladas. I think Jane will bring her kick-ass cookies again. Brett, Isabelle and their son Greg will bring the fruit salad. So ... let's see, maybe you could bring something to drink? Or maybe another main dish?

Could you wear your FBI windbreaker so we know who you are? Oh no, wait, that's right, you're just an informant. Well, I guess you'll know who we are by the pipe-bomb pieces and various explosives sitting next to our children's strollers (little Frank loves playing with the putty!).

OK, well, hope to see you there!

Al

p.s. Just in case a humorless agent actually reads this, I am of course joking. I have never made - and do not how to make - a bomb. I do not know anyone who has ever made - or knows how to make - a bomb. All of the vegans I know are nice, friendly, non-violent people.

Please leave us alone.

Thanks.

Veganism on Network Television

This fall or winter, ABC will air a new animated series called The Goode Family. One of the creators is Mike Judge, the guy who brought us King of the Hill.

It's about a vegan family, "obsessed with doing the 'right' thing, whether it's environmentally, politically or socially. Unfortunately, their efforts often have unintended comic consequences." (That's an ABC quote, and damn is it lame as all hell.)

Co-creator/executive producer John Altschuler says in the preview for the series, "It's so hard to be good. You gotta eat the right things. You gotta wear the right things. You gotta buy the right things."

He's right. You do gotta do those things. Or at least you should try to do those things.

Of course, they're going to poke fun at people who try to be responsible citizens of the world. This doesn't bother me too much, as long as they do it intelligently and don't fall into the "crazy hippie" or "miserable vegan" trap. I don't know any crazy or miserable vegans. It feels good to do good. It is hard some times, but it's worth it. I hope that's where they go with the show.

Check out the preview for The Goode Family here.

Even if the show takes the easy route of vegan-bashing now and then, the fact that a vegan family is the subject of a major network sitcom is encouraging. Maybe this means that in a few years when I tell servers at restaurants that I'm vegan I won't have to then explain to them what that means.

But it probably also means that when people think "vegan" they'll think about that wacky Goode Family who are always so high-maintenance, condecending and miserable.

It's a double-edged sword. But at least it's a sword!

Hide and Seek

Anna likes to play hide and seek with me. It usually involves me standing in her room and then her running in and finding me, usually saying "peek!" when she does. But today she ran into our bedroom and proceeded to shut the door on me. I stayed in the hallway and heard what sounded like our closet door sliding shut.

I walked in and sure enough the closet door was almost completely shut. The light was off! She was actually hiding from me. It was awesome. If I hadn't heard the door close, I probably would have freaked out looking for her.

It reminds me of the time my mom was playing hide and go seek with me and my little brother Matt. She found me right away, but we could not find Matt. We looked for a long time and he was nowhere to be found. He was probably 3 or 4 years old at the time.

I can't remember how my mom found him. Maybe he was pounding the dryer door from the inside because he couldn't open it, or maybe it was the only place in the house she hadn't looked.

Anyway, our dryer is safely tucked in our basement, or as I affectionately call it, The Dungeon. The door to The Dungeon is always closed, and it will probably be locked once Anna gets really curious. The Dungeon is no place for a child.

Win a CD!

Wanna win a CD?

Three of my brothers are in a band by the name of Grampa's Amp. They're running a CD giveaway every month. Go to their website and click on "Win a CD!" to find out how you can, um, win a CD.

I don't think I typed the phrase "Win a CD" enough in this post, do you?

Win a CD.

There. That's enough.

Muu Bauu

Quick update on the sickies. "Muu Bauu" means we're feeling better already. (In case you're wondering, it's the lack of consonants that does it.)

In fact, Anna didn't even want to go to sleep tonight she was having so much fun playing piano and watching us dance to it. Then Jen played some and Anna danced like crazy. So hopefully she's back to normal now. Phew!

Mrrrmrrra Bflugh

That's how I feel right now: Mrrrmrrra Bflugh.

Anna and I are under the weather. It's the kind of sick where I go from walking around in my v-neck t-shirt and still sweating and wiping my brow (which my wife must find oh so attractive) to pulling my hoodie over my head and still shivering.

We have what you might call the fever.

Anna cries at seemingly nothing (if her eyes hurt as much as mine do, then that's why she's crying), wants her blankie all day long and asks to cuddle every chance she gets. Oh, and she wants to watch TV, because it gives her something to do while she's cuddling.

So we've been watching a DVD I made of our first wedding anniversary (about a year before Anna was born) and ... well, those sure were simpler times. There are milliseconds where I feel, while watching my wife and I, so carefree on the North Shore of Minnesota, hiking out on the Gunflint Trail, not worrying about nap times or how late we can stay out ... there are milliseconds where I long for those times, but then I feel Anna's head on my shoulder or in my chest or on my lap (she has a lot of different cuddling positions) and those feelings are swept away by fatherhood and the extra level of depth that it has given my husbandhood.

So anyway, we're sick now. But we're getting better.

But given the fact that we're sick and that I'm shooting a wedding this weekend that I need to pack and prepare for (it's out of town), blogging is not high on my to-do list right now.

And it probably won't be next week either, since I'll be working on the wedding photos and finishing up the design work I've been doing for a friend's book of poems.

To hold you over, and to gain your sympathy, I'll leave you with a photo that I'm going to take of myself right ... now:


Yeah, I'm in the hoodie mode right now.

Did I say gain your sympathies? Sorry, I meant scare the living bejeezus out of you with my unibomber impression.

Mrrrmrrra Bflugh.

Uh-Oh...

Anna and I were on the freeway last night and I had to abruptly stop to avoid rear-ending someone. I glanced in my rearview and could see the person behind me swerve into the left lane to avoid smashing into me.

It was tense. I let loose a couple expletives (the "f" and "s" word, if you must know). I cringed, waiting for Anna to utter her first swear. Instead, she corrected me and said, "Uh-oh spaghettios!"

"Yes," I told her, "that's exactly what I said. Uh. Oh. Spaghettios."

Yeah, I know. Spaghettios aren't vegan. But she sounds damn cute when she says it.

Song currently stuck in my head: John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt (la da da da da da da!).