Pumpkin Carving: Get Your Template Here

Lo those many years ago, before we had children and were still living in the Big City, my husband and I received a gift. It looked like this:

I swear to you that in all of my life up until that moment I'd never heard of any such thing. People didn't just carve faces on their pumpkins? Happy faces? Sad faces? Scary faces? There were designs? This was beyond my frame of reference, friends. I came from simple pumpkin carving folk.

So we tried it, my husband and I. We broke out of our comfort zone, and sharpened our knives, and did us up a fancy jack-o-lantern. And we liked it! Our jack-o-lanterns were so cool! So fun! We reused those templates so many times that it's gross. Totally.

When our kids grow up, they'll probably get married to a lovely woman who wants to carve a simple, smiling jack-o-lantern and they'll be all "What? No scary spider? No bat?" It's a complicated world, isn't it?

As I was looking back through my photos I realized I don't have many photos of our creations. So this year, I will start. But here you can see a couple examples, if you look past those pesky kids in the photos.

(It's hard to see it, but that one on the left is an excellent and scary skull.

The one on the right, well, who knows?)

(Here you can see the cool spider - I like this guy and

I am no fan of spiders, let me tell you.)

If you'd like to create your own fancy jack-o-lanterns this year, you can find these books everywhere now. They probably sell them at your grocery store. Or maybe Target. But if not, or if you prefer to search from the comfort of that chair you're sitting in, here are a few links to try.

• Better Homes & Gardens
• DLTK's Growing Together
• Celebrating Halloween

Happy Carving!

Easy Cheesy Mostaccioli

This recipe is a family favorite. It's a favorite for me, because it is so darned easy-- literally all you do is cook some pasta and brown some meat. And a favorite for the kids, because it is so darned cheesy. I love to bring this dish to new moms, sick families, and potlucks!

Ingredients:
1 box penne or mostaccioli pasta
1 lb ground beef (if you're ambitious, it's also good with 1/2 lb beef and 1/2 lb mild sausage)
1 jar spaghetti sauce (I use Prego Hearty Mushroom)
1/2 large onion
2-3 cloves garlic
olive oil
1 can cheddar cheese soup
2 cups shredded sharp cheese
dried oregano
dried basil

1. Preheat the oven to 385 or so, if you are planning to bake the dish for immediate consumption.

2. Get the water started for the penne. Don't forget to salt it a tish!

3. Grab a large skillet and put it about 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Finely dice onion, and saute. (Cook it until it becomes transparent.) Add 2-3 minced cloves garlic. (You can skip the onions and garlic if you want. But they really add something.)

4. Add raw meat to onions and garlic. Brown meat, adding basil and oregano to your taste.

5. When al dente, drain pasta and add it to a large oven-safe dish. (Something about the size of a La Creuset, if you are so lucky as to have one. I've got an old Corningware dish I'm rocking over here.)

6. On top of the pasta, add the cheese soup straight from the can, the spaghetti sauce straight from the jar, the browned meat, and 1 cup of the shredded cheese. Mix that bad boy all up.

7. Spread the other cup of cheese on top.

8. If you're going to eat it tonight, cook it. This will take about 30-45 minutes, depending on how crispy you like the top. Everything you put in the oven was already cooked, so experiment to see how "done" you want it. If you're not cooking it tonight, wait for it to cool some and cover it appropriately for the fridge/freezer. If you're potlucking it, slap that stuff right into your crock pot-- it will heat up nicely on high after about 1/2 hour or so.

Viola! Easy Cheesy Mostaccioli!

The Monkey Book

Hubs and I are readers. (Well... that's not completely honest. Hubs is a reader. I was a reader. I used to finish several books a week-- and in the past year or so I've really struggled to finish much of anything. )

Anywho.

We're readers. We love to read, love to collect books, love to talk about what we've read-- it's been a major part of our relationship since we first began dating. When we wed, books we loved were the centerpieces at our reception tables. Books played heavily in our courtship-- they were the language we used to communicate to one another about who we were-- where we were coming from.

He had me read books, I don't remember which ones, and then we'd talk about why he loved those books and what spoke to him from them.

I would do the same. I don't remember most of the books I had Hubs read.

But I remember I asked him to read Ishmael by Daniel Quinn.


We'd only been dating about three months or so when I passed it across the table at lunch one day.

"I really loved this book," I told him. "I hope you like it, too."

If you haven't read Ishmael, it is a book about a man who answers an ad placed by a mysterious "teacher." That teacher turns out to be a gorilla named Ishmael who can communicate telepathically with our narrator.

(Yes, it is really important to suspend one's disbelief to appreciate this book. Do you really think there are folks on an island somewhere living the plot of Lost? O.K. then!)

Once Ishmael and the Narrator begin their curious relationship, a fascinating dialogue ensues about the fall of man, the incongruity with which modern society conducts itself, and how humanity can begin to redeem itself.

This book really spoke to me on so many levels. It challenged me to be a better person-- a "Giver" instead of the "Takers" Ishmael describes. It made me think about our society, our culture, our history, and our responsibilities as a civilization.

I couldn't wait to discuss it with him.

And he abhored it.

Hated it.

He called it "The Monkey Book."

He just could not get past the talking gorilla thing.

It wasn't that he disagreed with the ideas being posited. Or that he felt the arguments were poorly thought out. Or even that he thought it was poorly written.

It was the talking gorilla.

I took it extremely personally; I was heartbroken. I felt I had put myself out there, in the form of this text, to show Hubs what I thought about our world, and our place in it. And he had rejected it (me) because he found the delivery (me) to be cumbersome. Uncomfortable. Unbelievable.

Some years have passed, obviously, and we worked through it. Now, we giggle about the "Monkey Book."

I still love the book. And he will probably never love the book. But's that's okay, because even though it's not a book we share a love for, we share a history around it.

And that's one way a dialogue is built around books.

Tongue-Out Focused

See more Wordless Wednesdays here.

Go, Team!

When Hubs and I were working on our wedding, we saw all kinds of crazy things in wedding magazines. Crazy wedding favors, crazy flower arrangements, crazy dresses.

There's some CRAZY wedding stuff out there.

Somewhere we saw these hats that the bride and groom had custom made for themselves and their wedding party. They said, "Team Smith." (Or whatever their names were.)

As cheesy as we thought the hats were, we loved the Idea. The Idea that our new family would be a team, there to cheer each other on, support one another, take the hits for one another. Team Pair. (Obviously, we use our own last name.) And we have been Team Pair ever since.

When we had kids, we added to the Team. We have Team cheers. We have Team mottoes. We have Team Goals. And we have Team Rules.

We all adhere to the Team Pair Rules, which we came up with together:

1. Respect each other.
2. Use kind hands and kind words.
3. Share.
4. Do your part.

We are not perfect at using these rules-- even Mom and Dad can sometimes use unkind words in the course of a frustrating day-- but we do as well as we can. We have the rules posted on our refrigerator. We quiz the kids on the rules. When we discipline, we refer to the Team Pair rules. Pretty much everything we want our children to learn comes down to these four rules.

Our team approach has worked out fairly well so far.

Our children identify heavily as the "Pairs." They are proud to come from this family, and proud of our team. They support each other, take the hits for each other, and are learning that sometimes being a part of a team means putting your own wants second to the needs of the team. They understand that no matter what happens out there, in the non-Pair world, here we are a support system that loves them and believes in them.

We are not equals in Team Pair. Mom and Dad are the coaches and captains. Our say trumps all.

But they are integral to Team Pair-- their participation, their involvement, and their feedback makes the Team get better every day.

We are trying to teach our kids, and ourselves, that at the end of the day, your family is supposed to be comprised of those who love you, who believe in you. While we might not always agree with each other, or even understand each other, this space is supposed to be safe, welcoming, and... well, a TEAM.

Fall ing In Love

When I was a kid, fall was always my favorite time of year. I loved the new schools supplies, the seemingly endless potential of a new school year, and anticipation of the coming holidays. Fall was my season.

When I worked in student activities, fall was always my most dreaded time of year. I worked in higher education, and as such, my fall was full of late night student events, meetings, and work commitments. I finally moved into a less stressful, lower paying job the fall I worked three months in a row without a weekend off. Fall was my burden.

Once I demoted myself, I made a commitment to regain fall as a season. I called 2007 my "FOF"-- fall of freedom. We pumpkin patched, hot-air-ballooned, and fall festival-ed our booties off. But that first FOF was hampered by my health problems, my resulting anxiety, and then by recovery from major surgery. Fall was my trial.

Now that I am staying at home with the kids, fall has regained some of its former luster for me. I reveled in buying Noise's school supplies. I gingerly marked every individual crayon, marker, and scissor for my kids. We've trudged through pumpkin patches, apple orchards, and parades all over our county. We've baked and s'mored and walked in the woods as a rainbow of leaves gave up their fight all around us. We've cheered on our football teams, fired up the fire pit, feasted on the first soups of the season. Fall is my home.

I have fallen in love again, with fall.

Greek Salad: or How to Savor the Last Bounty from the Garden

I love this salad. It's full of veggies and I get to use cucumbers and tomatoes from my garden in late summer and early fall. I made this a couple of weeks ago while I was visiting my in-laws. Just looking at the pictures I get hungry for it again (even though my pictures are not that great). Another plus? It's really easy to make.

Ingredients: 2-3 cucumbers, several tomatoes, 1 can of quartered artichoke hearts, 1 can of small pitted black olives, 1 package of fat free feta cheese, 1 tablespoon olive oil
Peel and chop the cucumbers into bite size pieces. If your cucumbers are large and have seeds in them, remove the seeds before chopping. Chop tomatoes into bite size pieces. Add the artichoke hearts and olives.

Toss ingredients together in a large bowl. Add feta and toss again.

Just before serving, drizzle with olive oil and toss again.

Enjoy!