We eat cake, because someone is nine. (!)

So Grace is nine, and that's just almost more than we can bear around here. Nine. It must mean that we are - you know, old. Our aging aside, she had a nice birthday, with lots of calls from her loved ones and two kinds of ice cream and a movie at the theater and, as requested, her favorite chocolate cake. Next week is her party with her friends from school, some cupcakes to share with her classmates, and then it's business as usual again.

Our winter break has been peaceful and mostly indoors - it was -11 when I got up this morning, so not really sledding weather - and the kids are almost looking forward to school again in a few days. The adults are somewhat more eager to get back to business as usual.

We Christmas, and then we post-Christmas.

So how cute are my sweethearts, in their Christmas duds? We missed church (cancelled due to Midwest weather) but dressed for dinner anyway. Peter is quite the stylish guy these days, and Grace - always lovely in the Christmas dress of the year.

After the fun of Christmas food, (stollen and quiche, various rich desserts, yummy salmon... ) we've gotten deeper into the cookbooks, and yesterday we made heart waffles, with the vintange waffle iron from Nana. Upcoming: Grace's awesome birthday cake, chocolate with chocolate frosting. Frankly, a day where you play outside on your snowshoes and then eat chocolate dessert is a pretty stellar day. We've had several in a row!

Vanity hat blogging...

That Nana of ours? Chooses some awesome hats. Grace and I are now Warm Ear Twins.

Our week in gingerbread.

Peter's school hosted an all-kindergarten gingerbread house building extravaganza this week, and I've never seen 100 kindergarteners and a metric ton of candy coexist so peacefully. Each kid had a clean, dry, one-pint milk carton to use as a base, and they used frosting to glue on candy, graham crackers, whatever.

I noticed that many a kindergarten mother was the Project Designer, and many a kindergartener was relegated to the sidelines. Luckily I lack the desire to perfectly orchestrate each aspect of my kid's aesthetic life, and we ended up with a Peter Original, which is pretty fantastic.

Then last night, per Peter's long-standing request, we made gingerbread. I have a lovely Bundt pan that a friend gave me years ago, and it's now well-seasoned and pops out a gorgeous, detailed cake every time. We used a recipe from our trusty Williams Sonoma Holiday Cooking With Kids cookbook, which I dearly love because I'm confident I can make each of the recipes.

The kids sniffed the molassess and were alternately thrilled and dubious, and we added more ginger and cinnamon than was called for, but the cake was both attractive and really tasty - I think a homemade lightly orange flavored ice cream would go nicely but was not in a position to whip some up right the minute the thought struck me. Maybe next time.

So today's photo array: kid, gingerbread gingerbread gingerbread, mama. Enjoy!

Lucias and Starboys, oh my.

It's Saint Lucia's feast day, and we did her thing: our girl dressed like Lucia and our boy like a Starboy; we made lussekatter, the traditional Swedish buns that (as you can see!) mimic Lucia's sad pre-martyrdom situation of having her eyes put out during torture (mideval images of her include her with eyes miraculously restored, but carrying around a spare set on a plate); we processed to the Santa Lucia music, borrowed from Italian gondola drivers; and just for fun, we photographed the various Lucia images in our house. There's a candleholder, various ornaments, two tree-toppers, one Lucia and one Starboy on some vintage textiles, and one tattoo. See if you can match them up!

Snow day!

We have a snow day today! (Not pictured.)

It's been busy here, and I haven't posted any pictures or witty commentary from our delightful Thanksgiving, which was rich with grandparents and cousins. So in the spirit of that great scene in The Princess Bride where Indigo says, "Let me explain," and then pauses, overwhelmed by the task of describing recent events coherently, and then says, "Let me sum up," - well, let me sum up.

Halloween: fun! Parental trip to Montreal: good! Thanksgiving: very, very good. It was the first time we've had my side of the family all out to Nebraska and the kids did beautifully, the weather cooperated, and we polished off a 30lb turkey in record time. Lindsey and Elise are fabulous cousins and it was really joyful and noisy to have all the kids together in a herd. Peter's recent concert at school: quite nice. Today: snow day! School was cancelled last night for the kids, and I decided late in the day not to go in today since the roads are (as predicted) dicey. We're spending the day working-ish, napping, watching movies, and I took a brief run that was fun except for the driving snow. My knee is healing up very nicely (twice-weekly physical therapy is helping), and I'm expecting to slowly add mileage in the next couple of months and plan to run a half marathon in the early spring.

The kids are delighted by their first snow day of the year - we'd had only one small snow weeks ago, and now we are snow city, baby. We had great dinner guests last weekend (a dozen students and then friends of friends from Montana, on different nights) so the house is reasonably clean. It's finals week for me, so I'm really hoping the snow is plowed by tomorrow morning or I have to start negotiating with a bunch of students whose travel plans preclude later finals. I am looking foreward to the break, although I'm teaching a full load in spring plus an interterm class (my bad) so I won't get a ton of time off.

So: busy, winter, healthy, growing and stuff. That's our update.

Oh, mama.

So.... sometimes, a mama thinks to herself, you know what would be fun?

Something new would be fun.

Something a little different.

Something permanent, on her arm.
Something, possibly, like a Salvador Dali painting of Saint Lucia. Rendered in tattoo ink. Fun for the whole religion department! (Yep, that's my skeptical husband and my amused colleague, who kindly accompanied me, provided commentary, and filmed the whole thing.) (Which, might I just add? Hurt so much that most of the commentary involves comparing this experience to childbirth.)

While my parents are probably cringing and picking up the phone to call and ask me about Hepatitis B-slash-C, and bemoaning my general lack of sound judgement, I have to say, in my defense: my kids? Are pretty excited. As are my students, interestingly enough... after one of them raised his hand politely and said, "Dr. Wilder, I know this is off-topic, but what's with your arm?" and I showed them, the general consensus was that I look tough. Given that I am a mid-thirties mama with a non-threatening smile, this has to be good for me, right?

I'm currently working on a project with students involving religious expression and tattoos, and I've been thinking about this for a while. I like the saints, I'm drawn to Lucia; this particular rendering of her doesn't pull any punches. She's a martyr, which means that the traditional folk images of her, blonde and pretty with a crown of candles, serve to obscure the part where she was murdered and had her eyes put out. This image gives you a full sense of her martyrdom: the candles are represented, rather than fully drawn, and she is both present and not present.

On my arm, she is fully present. Honestly, I love how it turned out (less pink now than in the image above.) I think it's gorgeous. And it's fully hidden under short sleeves; I don't think I'll be socially unacceptable in most circles.

It's important to do something new every now and then. I think I'm good 'till mid-2010.