The Great Gnocchi Debacle

The recipe looked so easy, with just two ingredients (baked butternut squash and flour: mix them together and form into balls). I spent almost an hour prepping all of the little gnocchi pellets early in the day and put them in the fridge, as the recipe suggested. I prefer cooking before I have a hangry family clustering around asking what I'm making and when it will be ready, over and over, so I like to prep as much of dinner early as possible. With the gnocchi pieces formed beforehand, I could simply dump them into boiling water to cook for 4 minutes, butter and herb them, and have an easy dinner in next to no time. 

Top 10 of the Week

 Top 10 of the week: 

1. Monday: I enjoyed a refreshing fun hill run with an awkward after-show (details below).
2. Tuesday: The canal by our house filled with water!
3. Tuesday: Jay played in both the band and the orchestra at his second trimester school concert.
4. Tuesday: I helped with a Relief Society activity.
5. Wednesday: I weeded and cleared our garden.
6. Friday: I went on my longest run in almost five months-- 7 miles!
7. Friday: Rose, Amber, and I went to the library together after school and piano lessons.
8. Saturday: Jeff had a track meet, the kids roamed the countryside, a Netflix black hole for me.
9. Sunday: We stayed home and watched stake conference via Zoom. 
10. Jeff had three less-tired/more energetic days this week amidst his brutal slow long Covid recovery. It was very encouraging!

Windy Weekly

We really only one word to describe most of what happens in March: WIND. For better or worse, the wind invades, accosts, and blows through nearly every March memory. I read through my journal from this week and I hardly mentioned the wind because it feels redundant, haha. Full disclosure: we did have 2 non-windy days this week. 

Sunday, March 6th: Rose made cookies today and they melted into one big blob on the cookie sheet, so we cut them up into bars. After dinner I said "thanks again for making cookies, Rose!" Everyone joined in thanking her. A pause. Should I go for it? I asked myself. Yeah, I need to do this. I said "since nobody got my hint... Rose made us cookies and we all thanked her. I made everyone dinner, annnnnd...." I paused and rolled my hand to encourage a response. After a few beats they picked up on it and chorused "thank you for the dinner, Mom." 

March Rollercoaster

The first week of March always requires me to make rapid gear shifts, but this one was a doozy, even for March. The constant woosh and rush of wild March wind makes everything seem more urgent, more desperate, and less comfortable. My journal entries always seem to be more detailed when I'm in crisis mode, so this is a copy-paste-and-edit-for-coherence journal post.

Monday, February 28, 2022: What a day. I had a lot of housework on my list today (laundry, meal plan, grocery shopping, vacuum, make bread, make dinner). Right after the girls caught the school bus this morning, Jeff texted and asked if I would come help out at track practice in the afternoon, since one of the assistant coaches was out with a back injury. I reluctantly said yes. So I rushed through all of my work (and fit in a run and a short yoga sesh) and even managed to put dinner in the instant pot and rice cooker before picking Jay up from school. After I had dropped Jay off at home, I turned around and drove back to the school for track practice.

February Books

I read a dozen books in February.