Stupid Artificial Christmas Tree

November is the month of gratitude. I love reading all the daily thankfulness posts on Facebook or the magazine articles on the art of gratitude. Perhaps it's over done, but I guess I like the fact that people are trying to slow down and appreciate the blessings in front of them. Gratitude is definitely a gift we have to cultivate.

After a wonderful day yesterday of eating turkey and catching up with family, I found myself already moving ahead to all the things I need to get done in December, the biggest consumption month of the year. I wrote handwritten Christmas cards last night until my hand cramped. I finished getting all the supplies for my advent calendar for my boys. And the hubby and I got into an argument this morning about why our stupid artificial tree is so much damn work. For him. Grrrr!

Thankfulness has already fled, my friends.

So I gathered my cup of coffee and retreated upstairs to write. I wanted to write something really meaningful, long-lasting, funny even, and far away from all the things in this house that are overwhelming (cleaning and laundry, Christmas decorations, shopping lists, etc.), but it's difficult to do much of anything when your spirit is overwhelmed. It's paralyzing.

I'm taking up a new strategy. Forget December. I'm staying in November forever--the month of being thankful for what is right in front of you. Quality time with my kids on a rare day off from work. A full fridge with Thanksgiving leftovers. A husband who makes me crazy, often daily, but knows the real me and loves me anyway.

The tree can wait. Right now, I'm going back down to snuggle with these fine loves. Three of my finest blessings.

{An Imperfect Adventure}

Every kid needs an adventure. Parents, too. So, after school today, instead of going straight home to do homework and start dinner, we fled to the hiking trails of a nearby state park.    

We bounced along trails. We climbed over huge logs. We shimmied closer to ponds to see frogs and fish and floating leaves. We found walking sticks, then picked up even big walking sticks. We hiked and hiked, letting the colors tagged on trees guide our way.

Sound perfect? How about I share a few conversations on the trail and you can be the  judge if it was a perfect day (or if I am even fit for parenting)? Okay, go.

..........

Tuck: This walking stick is giving my penis a massage.

Mom: Excuse me?

Tuck: A penis massage.

Mom: Quit riding it like a broom. It's a walking stick. USE IT RIGHT!

..........

Cooper: We've been walking for a long time. We might be lost.

Mom: We're not lost. These trails are just long and we've been changing trails. We have to keep going forward to get back.

Cooper: I think we're lost.

Mom: We're fine. Just keep walking.

Cooper: WE'RE GOING TO DIE OUT HERE! (He starts crying).

........

Mom: Stop hitting me with your walking stick, Tuck.

Tuck: Oh, sorry, Mom. (Hits me again).

Mom: If that walking stick hits me one more time, I am going to get very angry.

Tuck: Okay, okay. Jeez! You're going to have to get a lot tougher if you want to stay on this adventure.

.......

Cooper: We made it off the trail. Finally! Hey, I don't see our car.

Mom: Oh, crap. We must have come out on a different trail in a different parking lot. I wonder where our parking lot is?

Cooper: Do you even know where we are? (very accusing tone). It's almost dark. 

Mom: Hey, I see a car at the top of the parking lot. It looks like someone is in there. Let's go see if she can help.

Cooper: Tell me we're not getting a car with a stranger. 

..........

Mom: Thanks so much for giving us a ride. Sorry to interrupt your evening.

Nancy (the stranger): No problem. It's a great day for a hike. You're a few miles from your parking lot though. Glad I was here. It's almost dark.

Cooper: Hey, Mom, look at this. It's a vibrating back massager and it works.

Mom: (in an aggressive whisper) Cooper, put that down right now. I mean it!

Cooper: It's got three speeds. It can fly like a spaceship.

Mom: Thanks again for the ride. Did I mention how much we appreciate it?

...........

So, that's it. The adventure. Tomorrow we might go back to doing homework and getting dinner ready, but for today we just enjoyed the sunshine and each other. I'm thankful.

{Skippy's Apricot Cake}

When I was a kid, my Mom used to sing the song, MacArthur's Park, to me at bedtime. It was a really strange song about cake being left out in the rain (a metaphor for love, I think), but I used to love to listen to her voice singing it. She got the solo in high school because she was the only one that could hit the really high note in the middle of the song. Dang, I love that about her.

Although my Mom can certainly sing about a cake, she never was a baker. That's my love. I've always adored how you can take a recipe of simple ingredients, stir them in the right order, and out pops this masterpiece you've created. Cakes, cookies, scones, muffins, bread. Almost everything tastes good right out of the oven. I love it all, especially if it is a family recipe passed down for generations and baked with love.

I have been devouring this cookbook, Make the Bread, Buy the Butter, which walks you through whether you should buy it or make it homemade. I've made three batches of homemade yogurt that is to die for, but that's a topic for another blog. I was also pleasantly surprised to find a cake recipe tucked in the afterward section of this cookbook. It is a recipe her Mom loved to make growing up and the author found six, handwritten copies in her mother's recipe file. She says, "The cake is a wonder, the recipe a treasure.....it clearly wasn't the brainchild of my great-aunt Skippy, though in our family she got all the credit."

This cake is baking in my oven right now. It will be ready in exactly 10 minutes and then I am ready to try it for myself. I'm giddy. Family recipes do that to me. If you're the same, I'm jotting the recipe down below.

Skippy's Apricot Cake

1 box Duncan Hines Lemon Supreme cake mix

1 cup canned apricot nectar, such as Kern's

3/4 cup neutral vegetable oil

1/2 cup granulated sugar

4 large eggs

Glaze: 1 cup sifted confectioners' sugar + 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Preheat oven to 350. Grease your Bundt pan or 9-inch tube pan. Stir together cake mix, nectar, oil, and sugar. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Pour batter into pan. Bake for 50 minutes. Just before baking time is up, mix together the glaze ingredients. When cakes comes out of oven, immediately turn it over onto a cooling rack positioned over a cookie sheet or large newspaper (anything that will spare you having to scrub your counter later). Pour the glaze on top of cake while it is hot out of the oven. The glaze will melt and flow down the sides of the cake and harden into an irresistible lemony glaze. As my mother wrote on each copy of her recipe: "Makes 12 large slices, 24 lady slices."

Happy baking, friends.

"MacArthur's Park is melting in the dark, all the sweet green icing flowing down. Someone left my cake out in the rain. I don't think that I can take it, 'cause it took so long to bake it, and I'll never have that recipe again. Oh, no."