Eating well

My mom and dad have long had a set of double old-fashioned glasses that are etched with the inscription: Living Well Is The Best Revenge.

I think eating well is equally marvelous, and despite the harried pace I've lived of late, the quality of my dinners has not suffered one bit. Touché, Life.

Last night, Tom came home to find me outraged over the mixer. Because, the fucking frosting. You know when you dig in your heels about something, even if what you're digging in about is not remotely proportional to what you're digging in to?

Having done all the baking and made all the frosting, I just could not deal with more. No more than a 1x frosting recipe would I make! Not this gal. So I whipped up the damn 1x amount and then spread it atop the cupcakes in paper-thin whirls. Apparently, it and the minus-one-ingredient vanilla cupcakes were hits today. A win.

But anyway, T found me nearly apoplectic in the kitchen and suggested take-out. I nearly cut his nose off. 

"T, the LAST thing I need right now is shitty take-out," asserted I. "I will figure something out, so help me god. I mean, the vegetables in our fridge need tending."

It was abundantly clear that he picked up on my madness (finally, I see what it takes) because the man offered to GO OUT TO Whole Foods and pick up something fresh.

Will wonders never cease?! I immediately agreed, lest he change his mind, and said that if he'd bring home some fish, I'd take care of the rest.

An hour later, we supped on plank-grilled salmon with a mustard-maple glaze and a mushroom and freshly-shucked English pea saute with Humboldt Fog, a marvelous ash-infused goat cheese from Cypress Grove Chevre. I delighted in smearing the cheese on slices of warm baguette and then spooning golden mushrooms and buttery peas over it all.

Revenge indeed.

Today, Ol wore his gaudy and wonderful Pot of Gold hat to school. I delivered the cupcakes, warned the teachers about the possible vanilla cupcake fail and hurried home to do many things that I don't recall now except for having started my Corned Beef and Cabbage for tonight.

I make this recipe every year, and every year, I love it that much more. When the boys got home, Jack said "it smells SO bad in here," and Ol said, "I just want cake!" and then Tom called and said, "I have a last-minute work dinner tonight," and I thought, "Well, revenge on all y'all because this girl gets your shares."

And I did.

Hosting yet another Star Wars birthday party

Despite having already hosted three Star Wars birthday parties, my boys' love of Jedi, Sith and the Force remains strong. As such, as my Ol approaches 6, we celebrated with a fourth Star Wars (SW) shindig. 

You might recall my previous summation, Hosting a Star Wars Party For a Seven Year Old, which detailed my first foray into SW celebrations. Great party, and I've built on that foundation since. 

To avoid boredom and repetition, I've upped the ante for each party: different invitations, a variety of decorations, new saber hilts and never the same cake twice.

Whether you're hosting your first SW party or your fourth, here are some more creative ideas to consider.

Light Saber invitations

I saw a picture of these on Pinterest and decided to recreate.

moveable Light Saber invitations

I like them because they move which is a fun feature and because they still fit in a standard envelope. I made cardboard models for all the pieces (there were about seven), traced those onto colored cardstock, glued things together and bought a party info stamp to minimize what I needed to write.

Cardboard models of each piece; makes tracing convenient.

The "mechanism"

I used a sparkly black pen to write on the green saber blades, and a silver Sharpie to address the black envelopes. Paper Source was my source for all supplies. 

Star Wars decorations

From Amazon, we bought a bulk box of 20" x 30" foam core boards. I wanted these to make the wings for two TIE fighters: the standard TIE and Darth Vader's personal plane. I also bought some 10" paper lanterns to use as the cockpits for the planes and a 16" paper lantern to make the Death Star.

One foam core board divided in half, width-wise, yielded two 15" x 20" boards which I scored and had Tom bend and secure into the shape of Darth's TIE wings. Recreating the standard TIE's hexagonal, but not uniformly so,  wings took about two-thirds of one large board, so the standard TIE actually required two boards.

crafting a standard TIE fighter

That was fine because we used the excess to create the supports that held the paper lanterns to the wings and also kept Darth's bent TIE wings in place. We just hot-glued all that together.

It took nearly two cans of matte gray spray paint to cover the planes and Death Star completely. T cut a thin dowel into seven pieces, spray-painted them bright green and finagled them together with hot glue and a prayer to make the laser burst, death ray coming from the Death Star. The depression was made by gluing a small Whole Foods plastic container into the hole of the paper lantern.

16" paper lantern painted gray; plastic Whole Foods container glued into the lantern hole and attached to a wooden, painted-green array of wooden dowels.

Vader's TIE fighter

Light Sabers

You've seen them before: swim noodles cut in half, hilt wrapped in duct tape, and then detailed with strips of foil tape. These are always a hit, and you can rest assured that the kids will expend great deals of energy beating each other up without really harming one another. 

Now, because I simply did not feel inspired to come up with yet another, totally different Star Wars-themed cake, I embraced Oliver's St. Patty's Day birthday and crafted him a pot of gold. He was thrilled!

How is he about to be six??

Em-i-lis 2.0

Welcome! Bonjour! Benvenuto e ciao! Willkommen! Welkom!

About this fantastic new site: It was designed by the inestimable Elan Morgan who is the multi-talented woman behind Schmutzie, a blog I love dearly. If you appreciate thoughtful, honest, excellent writing and photography and cats, you should visit Schmutzie and follow Elan there or on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram. 

Em-i-lis is still the same site you've come to love but I want to walk you through the new features:

1. Recipes are now tagged and categorized for much broader, more user-friendly search and perusal. Let's use my Bucatini with Caramelized Shallots, Brussels Sprouts and Speck as an example. You'll find this in Pastas and also in Lunch and Dinner, categories in the drop-down menu in Recipes up above. Say you find it and then want to see what other recipes include Brussels sprouts. Simply click on "Brussels sprouts" in the tag area following the recipe, and you'll then be brought to a compilation of all Em-i-lis Recipes that contain B. sprouts. Awesome, right?!
2. Community Questions: In the right side bar, you'll see a gray box with Community Questions written in it. Submit any burning question to me and I'll answer it! All Community Questions and Answers can be found by clicking on the live link in the side bar OR by going to the Recipes drop-down menu and clicking on Community Questions.
3. Classes & Reviews: If you are interested in scheduling a jam- or pie-making class (or another how-to in which you're interested) or attending one I'm teaching locally, check the Classes & Reviews section for contact info and upcoming events. You are also welcome to leave a review if you've taken a class of mine but not reviewed it or to read those previously submitted.
4. More Writing: This section includes Featured Writing Elsewhere (my work published on HuffPo, BlogHer and so forth) as well as the Essays I've published here on Em-i-lis.
5. The badges in my right side bar show you where I've been published or featured; the Huffington Post badge links you directly to my author page there.

I'm thrilled with all this new, more interactive functionality and hope you enjoy it too. Let me know!