Friday Food: The Pasta That Keeps on Giving

Happy Halloween! I'm taking Pippi Longstocking and a Green Bay Packer football player trick-or-treating tonight. Everyone else is traveling. I think we'll get plenty of candy, even with only two collecting.

Friday 

Short version: Pasta and meatballs, green salad with vinaigrette, chocolate pudding with cream

Long version: This was the only night my sister and her boyfriend were here that I actually cooked for them. I was going to make spaghetti and meatballs, except I found that I didn't have quite enough spaghetti. I didn't have quite enough of any pasta shape to use a single kind, actually, so I ended up using some penne and some large elbows. They cook at about the same rate.

This was also the day we went rappelling in the canyon.

This qualifies as Peak Color for this area.

We didn't get home until around 5 p.m. The only thing that was already ready was the pudding. I made the meatballs and sauce as quickly as I could, but the sauce still has to reduce. This meant we didn't sit down to eat until 6:45 p.m., which is shockingly late for us.

The sauce also made an unholy mess spattering all over my stove, which my sister very kindly cleaned up for me. This is one big reason I prefer to bake it all in the oven.

I made so much pasta that it reappeared all though the week, as you shall see.

Saturday

Short version: Halloween restaurant food

Long version: This was the night of the Halloween celebration in the village. I bought dinner for everyone at the restaurant that opens for this event. They had a buffet with hot dogs, Frito pie, and baked potatoes, plus, as always, a ton of desserts.

Sunday

Short version: Leftover pasta or tuna quesadillas, chocolate ice cream

Long version: I spent all afternoon at flag football games.

In what are apparently now my flag football shoes.

I didn't get home from this until after 5 p.m. at which point I just heated up the leftover pasta and left it at that.

Well, except A. asked if there was anything without wheat in it that he could have. He'd been eating a lot of bread and pasta and things, which is not something that agrees with him in large quantities. I found the last of some tuna salad I had made for lunch and heated that up in corn tortillas with cheese for him.

I had not made another dessert for Sunday, but we did have chocolate ice cream still, so that is what they had.

Monday

Short version: Guacamole and chips, then beans and sausage and lamb-y rice

Long version: I had a ridiculous afternoon of driving hither and yon. Our house is equidistant between two villages. It's ten miles from our house to each village, which means the villages themselves are 20 miles apart. I went from our house to the school in one village to pick up the confirmation kid, took him to the other village for confirmation class, went right back to the school in the first village to pick Poppy up from cheer practice, then stopped briefly at home to make the guacamole for everyone to eat while I was going back to the second village to pick up the confirmation kid.

I drove a total of 80 miles between the two villages in a span of one and a half hours. Good thing I made dinner ahead of time.

I had cooked a big pot of pinto beans in the morning. I used some of those, plus half a package of loose breakfast sausage, onion, garlic, and tomatoes, to make a saucy skillet of beans that then topped rice cooked in lamb stock.

I did not make a vegetable. I meant to put out grapes, but I forgot.

Tuesday

Short version: Pasta bake, grapes

Long version: I was gone yet again before dinner, this time with Poppy at her First Communion class. Luckily, there was leftover pasta. I had also made a little pesto the day before with the last of the garden basil, so I mixed that in with the leftover pasta, along with some grated asadero cheese, and had the eldest child put that in the oven for me to bake while I was at class with Poppy.

And I remembered the grapes this time.

For A., I scrambled some eggs and added some of the beans and sausage to that for him to have in corn tortillas and cheese.

Wednesday

Short version: Grilled cheese sandwiches, baked beans, green salad with vinaigrette

Long version: I was asked the day before if I could sub at school this day. Luckily, I had already made baked beans with some of the pot of pinto beans, which made for an easy and filling dinner with the addition of the grilled cheese sandwiches.

Thursday

Short version: Fried fish, leftover baked beans, leftover rice, tomato and cucumber salad

Long version: I had four pollock fillets that had been in the freezer for several months that I wanted to use. They would not have been enough on their own, but with the leftover baked beans and rice, it was enough. I just put them in an egg wash and then flour seasoned with Old Bay before pan frying them.

I harvested the tomatoes before the first freeze on Tuesday night, which means I now have quite a few tomatoes in the kitchen. Some of them went into a salad with cucumber, pickled onions, and more of the vinaigrette.

Of note: I finished the last bit of the pasta for lunch this day.

Refrigerator check:

This needs some organizing.

Okay, your turn! What'd you eat this week?

(Not) Free Falling

My sister was here visiting over the weekend with her boyfriend, who is a climbing enthusiast, as well as a climbing teacher. He happened to have a children's harness and all the equipment for climbing with him, and we happen to live near(ish) a canyon with lots of rocks and cliffs.

This was inevitable.

A couple of children weren't feeling well this day, so only Poppy and the middle boy went. The climbing in this canyon is too advanced for kids, but they could rappel down in some places. So that is what they did.

This started, of course, with lessons in safety equipment, how to tie off the rope at the top, and the proper form. I was reassured by how professional and clearly experienced my sister's boyfriend is, not only with climbing instruction in general, but specifically teaching kids. 

My sister rappelled down first, so that she could hold the rope at the bottom for the kids, and also encourage them from down there. Her boyfriend was at the top, getting them started and instructing them as they went.

Small girl, big rock.

Poppy was initially very nervous, but she made it all the way to the bottom and declared it so much fun after her first attempt that she wanted to do more. Middle son was extremely enthused about it all from the get-go.

They rappelled down the same place twice, and then our personal climbing instructor found an even bigger cliff that we could easily access for rappelling*. 

This one was . . . well.

That's a big cliff.

Nothing daunted, down the boy came.

Starting the descent.

He ran the harness back up for Poppy, and she started down.

Not quite halfway.

Poppy had a problem a bit more than halfway down when she got her hand too close to the metal device on the rope that will stop the rope from moving if you need to brake entirely. She got the skin between her thumb and forefinger caught in the device. All her weight was on the rope, so she couldn't get enough slack to get herself free. My sister had to free-climb** from the bottom up to the ledge closest to Poppy, balance with her knee up to set Poppy higher, and then free Poppy's hand.

Super-aunt saves the day.

Poppy wasn't hurt and continued down. Despite that little mishap, she announced that rappelling was the most fun thing ever and she wanted to go the next day. Her brother agreed. We were busy with other things the next day, however, so they didn't get to go again, but it was fun to watch them try something new (and initially scary) and enjoy it so much.

* Being able to get to the top of the drop safely and back up is just as important as being able to get down it. For obvious reasons of not leaving children in the bottom of an inaccessible canyon.

** If my sister hadn't been able to get to her, Poppy could have also been pulled back up to the top, but as she was closer to the bottom and reachable, this way was faster.

Snapshots: Halloween Lead-up

I forgot to show you my pie weights from when I made Poppy's birthday pecan pie. 

Easier than trying to transfer beans in and out.

I subbed a couple of days at school this week. I was there just after they finished taking the year's pictures. We're such a small school, the high schoolers just take all the photos. They set up a nice little photo scene in the media building. I was pleased to see they included several books from my library.

They should have had each of the kids choose their own books for their photos. I would have loved to see what they picked.

The media building also has all the senior class photos from the past twenty years or so. Again, these are very small groups of seniors, so they all get to choose the setting for their photos. I was very amused by the 2012 class of all boys, who were clearly so over school and ready to be gone.

To the point that they didn't bother with any nice poses and smiling, instead just walking away from the camera. 

Over the years, my sister has brought us quite a few little Halloween decorations, which we put up last weekend. My favorites are the lights.

It's hard to see, but these are a small battery-operated string of purple bats.

There's another battery-operated string around the plants at the left above the couch, and then the ones around the window are ghosts.

Friendly ghosts, of course. And they are actually a nice glowy yellow in real life, but the camera makes the light look very white.

Our village had their Halloween celebration last night. This year, they rented a couple of bounce houses.

Appropriately themed.

Poppy and her friend were the first to get to these, and were bouncing by themselves for about twenty minutes before anyone else showed up. It had rained hard the night before, and those decorative skulls and jack-o-lantern faces apparently had water either on top of them or inside of them, because when the girls started bouncing, water started streaming from those onto the ramps below. Which of course made them incredibly slippery.

Since no one else was there, I just told the girls to keep bouncing and they eventually shook all the water out or off. I then dried it off with a towel I keep in my car so it would be safe for other kids to climb in. Public service!

And last, flowers. These might really be the last flowers.

Tired cosmos.

And this week's altar arrangement, which is mostly leaves with the last sunflowers of the year. And this time I think they really are the last ones. (I keep saying that. One of these weeks, it will be true.)

There you have it! My life, snapshotted.