12.01.2009

 

Measuring, eating, decorating, and running

December began with a great 30-week prenatal visit, Kent's first visit to the midwife since the beginning of my pregnancy. He did a wonderful job of watching what was going on without grabbing things, listening to and then imitating Dean's heartbeat, and helping my midwife measure my belly (30 cm, right on track). He was sort of all over the place the first time he came to an appointment over the summer, but this time I was prepared with books and toys and had talked to him a lot about what to expect. He even called my midwife by name when she walked into the room. I think he'll be coming to a lot of my appointments from here on out, because they're generally short and also because I don't have much notice to get a sitter — though now that I know how well he did today, I'm not worried at all about bringing him back.

Tonight, we had an amazing dinner of Vietnamese spring rolls, edamame, crispy noodles, cream cheese wontons, and the perfect cup of hot tea. It didn't take me as much time or effort to get it all together as I had feared, and I somehow managed to do a delicate dance with two saucepans (one hot water, one oil) alternating on the same burner to get everything cooked. It wasn't out of necessity, it was just the one good burner that heats up really quickly, and it was nice to just leave it hot and cook things one at a time: rice noodles in water, then crispy noodles in oil, then fried tofu in oil, then edamame in water, then wontons in oil. Whew.

Sounds crazy, but I think I'm starting to perfect the spring roll dinner routine. My least favorite part is grating carrots (one of the things we stuff inside them), so I had Jack do that when he got home. Grating carrots really annoys me, probably because I grate my fingers pretty often, and because little bits of carrot go flying around the kitchen. I'm happy to marinate and fry the tofu, cook noodles, chop up all the other veggies and herbs, mix up a sauce, and make sides, but somehow, that carrot business is too much for me to handle. I'm eternally grateful to Nikki for introducing us to spring rolls and placing within my reach the ability to recreate them.

We opened the Advent calendar after dinner (Kent gets all the chocolate to himself, while Jack and I will eat better chocolate), hung up a few decorations including last year's cinnamon ornaments, and put in one of the Winter's Solstice albums from Windham Hill. It's low-key, mellow Christmas music, mostly instrumental, and yet Kent somehow managed to get revved up and ran furiously up and down the hall wearing a Santa hat while we listened to it. Now, he's a little quieter and is reading a stack of books with Jack so he can wind down before bedtime. We hope.

The highs and lows of Kent's energy level are astounding to me. He shifts from running and yelling to completely still quiet in about five minutes. The running and yelling is hilarious, but the completely still quiet is certainly easier to appreciate after a long day.

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Comments:

So happy the spring rolls are making the three of you happy! :)

The wontons and edamame sound delicious too, your family sure is lucky to have such a food friendly momma around to feed them all. I'm sure Dean's rocking out as well, even though he may not know it yet. ;)
 
ooh, I love those Winter's Solstice albums.

I hate grating carrots, too. One of my very few splurge items is buying grated carrots. I love them for Vietnamese lettuce wraps. MmmmMmm.
 
hey if you ever need somebody to watch him when you have an appointment (even ifs its last minute) i'm more than happy to do it.
 
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