Spring Has (almost) Sprung

Happy (belated) Easter!

And if you are not Christian, happy Passover!

And if you are neither Christian nor Jewish, happy Ridvān, Theravada New Year, Hanuman Jayanti, Mahavir Jayanti, Akshaya Tritiya (I'm early on this one), Vaisakhi, and Spring Equinox! And if you're still not happy, then Happy Monday, motherf@#ker.

Spring winked its coquettish eye at us over the weekend before sneaking back behind the folds of gray clouds and gusty wind. But while she was hanging out this weekend, we did some spring like things out here at Camp Crystal Lake.

It started with Roo waking up and leaving her comfortable bed to lay in the sun.

Go away; I'm sun bathing.

T. and I decided to take full advantage of the gorgeous Saturday weather to take a trip to Ikea. Yes, this was dumb, but it was Saturday and we'd only had two cups of coffee each, so we were obviously not thinking clearly.

Ikea art. It's deep. Super, duper deep.

We got a new lantern-stool for the back porch, a shade for the office deck door, an arm chair (that has not yet been assembled), and an ice cream cone. Just one cone; Trevor declined to participate, citing the fact that we were on our way to eat lunch, but is there a rule against eating an ice cream cone before you eat lunch? The answer is no: there is no rule against that.

We got home and did some homey things, which included cleaning the windows and putting in the screens, sweeping up, and hanging our new flag.

U.S.A.!

Now to be fair, Trevor did 89.76% of this work. I helped wash the windows, and I did a little sweeping. But he pretty much did the rest.

I did, though, bake a cake for Easter at the Bosco's place, and that took up a bit of time. It was a two-layer cake decorated like a lamb face. I'd gotten the idea from a post by blogger & baker Lyndsay Sung on the Handmade Charlotte blog and figured I'd give it a whirl since the tutorial made it look so easy. And adorable.

My first cake turned out beautifully, but my second, not so much. Check it out:

Guess who's got two thumbs and forgot to grease the cake pan?

But since the top I'd cut off my second cake was still in tact, I just plopped it on top of my first cake and had a rounded lamb face instead of a flat one. Because lambs are three dimensional, suckers.

Boom.

I dyed my frosting a pink that was more bubble-gum than baby-girl, but the rosettes I made turned out pretty good.

I finished the rosettes,

which actually looked like the tutorial!

and then made my little lamb face out of fondant:

Just the ghost of a smile

And it was done!

Thank you, Coco Cake Land, for an adorable cake that was actually pretty easy to make! 

Little does this lamb know that she's about to get a knife to the face.

It was a lambgasm at the Bosco's Easter Brunch

And what, you might ask, did I do with that sad, sad cake that fell apart on me when I tried to get it out of the pan? Did I heartlessly toss it in the trash? Did I feed it to the neighborhood flying squirrels? No. I put the pieces on a pretty dessert plate and spackled them with leftover frosting.

They sure as hell aren't pretty, but they're tasty!

And what are we doing now? Well, Trevor should be getting into the Jeep and heading home from the Metra station right about now. I am sitting on the back porch, listening to the neighborhood come alive in pops between the short, weak showers of rain. I am also humming along to The Best of the Animals.

I am anxious to see more of the flowers that are shooting up,

Roo is also very anxious. She is hoping that they sprout peanut butter flowers. She might be disappointed.

And I am enjoying Roo as she flies around the backyard like a furry, three-legged Flash.

See that blur under the trellis? That's her. I clocked her at about 62 MPH.

Hopefully we'll get more nice weather this week so Roo and I can hang out some more on the porch. And I might do some grading. And I will likely eat some cake scraps. And finish my audiobook.

Maybe I'll see you around.

Another Excuse to Go Shopping. Like I Needed One.

We are finishing up our sixth week of rehearsals for Cabaret, and so far I have learned a number of things.

First and foremost, I've learned that I love this, and I love it because it's fun. It's, like, a whole hell of a lot of fun. Now, I'd hoped that it would be fun, and I suspected--after the surprisingly pleasant audition experience in December--that it would, indeed, be fun. But I'm still getting used to how much of a good time I'm having, all the while knowing that it's not easy (at least, not for me). I love the warm ups, the rehearsals, the seemingly incongruous preciseness and creativity of the process, the singing, the notes--all of it. I never thought that I would find something other than teaching and writing that I knew was work, but was still a really enjoyable kind of work.

Four of my cast-mates and I ran lines last week at a chocolate shop. I hated it. It was awful.

More of the cast, working...

...working...

...and eating cupcakes, which absolutely counts as working.

Another thing I've learned is that Roo is unimpressed by me. Totally bored of me, truth be told. I try to get her to run lines with me and give me feedback on my dance routine. I use our vigorous mid-day walks to practice singing with breath control (simultaneously singing and dancing has been my biggest challenge [because I am...um...not as young or as fit as our amazing Kit Kat girls. And we'll just leave it there]). But Roo just sort of ignores me and turns her attention to squirrels, sticks, and post-walk rug-rolls.

I'm going to nap now. Go away.

I've also learned that in the time it takes me to clean (really scrub the hell out of) our three piece bathroom, I can get through the full Cabaret soundtrack; but I need the bonus tracks on the original Broadway recording if I'm going to clean the half-bath, too.

I have learned that I only need the barest possible excuse to go shopping; I have used this play to shop for various legwear (tights, leggings, pantyhose), make-up (glitter eyeliner, false eyelashes), and green nail polish.

If someone should ask me why I think it's pretty, "I think it's pretty," that's what I reply.

Now to be fair, before this play, I already owned four bottles of green polish. So it's just three new bottles. That's not so many. Right? (please say "Right.")

And finally, I've learned that this is going to be one kick-ass show.

 

It's a good show right now. But we have two more weeks of run-throughs, techs, and dress rehearsals, and we start with the full band next week in addition to our amazing pianist, Julie. So by opening night (Thursday March 6--get some tickets, why don't you?) we will be ready to knock your socks off. And not even your proverbial socks. Your literal wooly footwear. Get ready.

Get your tickets now! Like, NOW.

Brain Vacation

Happy new year!

Welcome to 2014.

You may have noticed that my last post was in October. And you may have also noticed that it's been a while (let's just say ten weeks).

I know that some of you have noticed (hi, Cuff!) and I must apologize. The semester chugged on and I meant to post something around mid-term, and then around Thanksgiving, and then--for sure--over the winter break. But during the break I sort of shut off my brain and subsisted only on holiday food (there were a whole hell of a lot of cookies up in here), Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes on DVD (I made it 3/4 through season six--just before Willow gets really, really [really] bad), and Christmas gift wrapping (I used approximately 378 little pieces of Scotch tape).

But I am ready to emerge. And to warm up, I wanted to share with you a quick review of what our past couple of months have looked like.

My friend Lisa took me along with her friends to a painting party at the local pub. Everyone gets an easel, paints and brushes, step-by-step instructions to paint (we painted a snowman), and a server to get you glasses of wine or bottles of beer. It's pretty terrific.  

Lisa on the right and some of her painting pals across the table

I begin with an outline

Some blue sky

Some color

A nose

He looks surprised, doesn't he?

That's better

Stripes

Et, voila! A snowman!

The girls' almost finished products

A line of snowmen. All so similar, but unique, just like each one of us. (awwwww)

That got the holiday season off to a very nice start. I still had to grade my students' final assignments, but it was things like this that made them all fun to look through:

In case you can't tell, that's me.

One of my exceptional creative writing students turned in her final journal and drew a little portrait of me with her reflection. It's, like, the best thing ever.

I partied a little with my English department colleagues:

And yes, we wore the paper crowns from the Christmas crackers

We are such a good looking department!

And Missy (left in the maroon dress) treated us to some terrific tunes from the Dickens Carolers.

I was finally done grading and started to look for holiday decorations. We never got farther than wreaths and a stocking for Roo over the mantle, but I did find Trevor and my likenesses at the craft store:

Me (the teacher) and Trevor (I guess, king of Ireland?). We are really a cute couple.

I got to attend Bosco's Christmas pageant and see his school, which was so much fun in a lots-of-children and thank-goodness-I'm-just-the-aunt kind of way.

Bosco waits for instructions on the wall (and yes, there might be a finger up his nose but who cares?!)

Bo gets some bells

And they sing! (this is them at their most organized)

Some angels on the sidelines

I'll smile and look cute when you're not looking at the camera, okay?

And then when you're smiling at the camera, I'll eat my fingers. Good plan.

This is my classroom!

There followed a lot of shopping, which I enjoyed, and then wrapping, which I also, strangely, enjoyed. And then Christmas, Christmas, Christmas. I realized now that we didn't take very many pictures.

But, what followed Christmas was five days of Trevor off work, so there was a lot a lot of cozy home behavior.

I made some lumpy but delicious pancakes.

We made Roo wear these reindeer antlers and she hated them.

 

T. made a lot of fires and we did a lot of lounging around next to them.

Hello.

I finally finished Roo's sweater. She is not a fan of it.

But she looks so cute, doesn't she?

And I did a lot of knitting. And drinking tea. And eating cookies, which are not pictured because I ate them all before taking this picture.

You may have noticed that Roo had a shaved patch on her arm--sure mark of a doggie IV. That's because on December 20 she got into all of the Christmas chocolate we had on the kitchen counter and we had to take her to the emergency vet. She got her stomach pumped and spent the night (the vet said she didn't sleep at all, but stayed up all night watching everyone). She thought it was an adventure. Trevor and I thought it was really scary. So, everyone wins for the holidays.

And now, I have my first class of the semester in about 90 minutes. So, I should probably shower up and get out of the house. So, bye.