Monthly Archives: December 2014

2014: The Ox-Bow Incident (sans rustlers)

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Have you ever run a road race? Now that I have fully embraced the notion that somebody has to be last and it’s not the end of the world if it’s me, I really really enjoy them. The best part is seeing the finish line up ahead. Except seeing it doesn’t always mean that’s the end.

…

One summer when my Uncle Paul and cousin Kirsten were in town and I was home from school, we decided, as a family, to go out and run the Dexter-Ann Arbor 5K. It was a blast. Ab and I putzed along somewhere near the back, but my Uncle Paul is a pretty devoted runner and he was lined up near the front of the pack. My brother Tom lined up with him, but was pretty disgusted when they got going and Paul seemed to him to just be putzing along at a pace hardly better than the one Ab and I had set. Tom could do better, go faster. And he did. As he came around the bend toward the finish line he was thrilled and started sprinting– piece of cake! Except that what he was completing was only the first, and smaller, of two loops. And he was TOAST. Paul passed him up shortly after that and poor Tom had to drag himself another two miles only to cross that same finish line again.

Thank goodness for rachelv.blogspot.com ... the place I kept all my pictures before Facebook was a big deal.
Thank goodness for rachelv.blogspot.com … the place I kept all my pictures before I used Facebook… and Instagram… and Under the Tapestry.

That was a fun day. I couldn’t stop laughing. I laughed so hard my cheeks and my abs hurt.

Oh how I love that story!

…

Fast forward a few years to a St. Patrick’s day while living in the metro DC area and I decided to run a little St. Patrick’s Day 8K through downtown. A super fun run, as any downtown DC run tends to be (for a nerd like me), that ended right at Freedom Plaza on Pennsylvania Ave. I was rocking it that day. And as I came down the final straightaway, I could hear music and see the balloons arched over the finish line and I was keeping up with a big pack and feeling great and… turning left? away from the finish line? what the?!

Just like Tom, except not quite so bad. There was just a little out and back down a side street to account for the distance we hadn’t quite made. I was fine, I still finished, and still in good time (for me… good time is relative in running, remember), but not quite when I expected or how I expected.

 

Twenty Fourteen

Did you ever have to read The Ox-Bow Incident in school? I did. I only remember it very vaguely. Pretty sure there was a lynching and it was awful, but what really stuck with me was what an oxbow actually was. In the context of a meandering river, anyway. And maybe that’s what 2014 was. An oxbow. A bend in the path. An extra two mile loop or out and back down a side-street that I didn’t see coming.

I expected a positive pregnancy test in 2014. I expected to be a mother. I could see the balloons over the finish line and hear the music. But there was a bend in the road and here I am on December 31st, out of sight of that finish line once again.

 

Twenty Fifteen

I don’t know what the finish line is going to look like when I do get there. I don’t know if the balloons will still be inflated or the music will still be playing. I don’t know how long it’s going to take or how difficult the journey is going to be to get there. Maybe it’ll be a quick out-and-back… maybe it’ll be a two mile slog on tired legs… maybe something else entirely. Maybe the oxbow will cut itself off and form a free-standing lake. It’s impossible to tell at this point.

What I do know, though, is that the course I’m on is not as limiting as I’ve made it out to be. My single minded focus on “I want to have a baby” has really limited the life I’ve allowed myself to live for far too long (flare for the melodramatic, once again). I’ve made small steps outside the lines in the last few months, but I could, and should, go further.

For example, my therapist recently asked me what I hoped to have accomplished one year from now, assuming I still wasn’t pregnant. I had no response, but immediately burst into tears. That was pretty telling. (He keeps kleenexes in his office for moments like those. It’s all good.)

So in 2015, we’re taking a bit of a break. I’m going to give my body and my mind a rest. I’m doing other things… I’m running, meditating, and reading. I just got a new full color, hardcover book full of photographs and amazing text about women healers of the world– so excited. So much learning! And being. And learning to just be.

 

When I announced my non-pregnancy the other day (oh snap, it would have been darkly hilarious to do a photo shoot with the negative test… I can see that now. maybe next time), my Aunt Susan said to me, “I can tell you for sure: life is an interesting line, but rarely a straight one.”

And in that comment, she summed up my 2014 perfectly.

 

Incidentally, I’ve always had something of an affinity for straight lines. Maybe that’s why this whole meandering business is so difficult for me. Once upon a time, I even got intervented on for it. (Intervented is not a word, but I don’t think to say “intervened” really sums up what it’s like to have an intervention in your honor.) My friends Danielle and Stephine teamed up with my mom to ban me from purchasing any more horizontally striped shirts. (In all the colors. From Old Navy.) In retrospect, it was a good call. Still a good call. It was kind of all I wore for most of high school. I had to switch to solid colored polos after that. (Confession: I’m wearing horizontal stripes right now. Not kidding. Relapse.)

 

Man, I’m cool.

 

Anyway… here’s to accepting 2015,  however it may come! Happy New Year!!

 

Unrelated, but awesome, picture of super Curls!
Unrelated, but awesome, picture of super Curls!

What Hatha Yoga with Rudra Taught Me About the “Like” Button

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A friend of mine from back in the day (Y-town for LIFE) recently posted an interesting entry on her blog and it got me thinking for days. It just kept popping back and back and back into my head. I loved what she said, but I also had a million alternative thoughts about the topic floating around and kind of wanted to write a rebuttal. It’s one thing to just come out here to this space and point-by-point rebut someone like Matt Walsh whose goal in life seems to be to get people riled up (and is he ever good at it!), but it’s different when it’s the musings of a friend… so I asked her what she thought.

I hemmed and hawed about it for a while because I didn’t want her to think I was some sort of jerk, but I just felt like I had so much to say and I wanted to discuss… here… with you… I finally got up the courage to send her a message while I sat on the runway in Lacrosse waiting to be re-fueled and re-flight planned and was just about out of things to do so I messaged Kacey. Her response was so excellent! She was totally cool with me running with her topic du jour (she’s kind of just cool like that in general) and so here we go! (Let’s check real quick on the jerk thing… Kacey? Or perhaps we should wait until the end…)

 

Kacey’s basic premise, and please forgive me if I’m misinterpreting, was that social media platforms like blogs, Facebook, Twitter, and the like, tend to be self-centered and focused on a culture of “look at me!” … that the desire for shares and likes and comments and such is really a desperate need to be acknowledged. And that that’s why many of us do it– to get the like or the comment or the share, to be acknowledged.

I don’t necessarily disagree, exactly, my rebuttal is more the notion that, at least in my mind, that all of that is ok. It’s ok to ask people to acknowledge you. (Hence the large number of times I’ve actually used the phrase “ACKNOWLEDGE MEEEEE!” both in this space and in real life… it’s like Kacey was speaking directly to me!)

It was so interesting to me that Kacey and I could do the same thing (blog) and use the same types of social media and ultimately take away such a different message from it. I was fascinated by that and I kept turning the notion of WHY that was over and over and over in my head until I think I finally stumbled upon something when I received an email reply from my long lost friend Lotisha who is Pauly-Shore-style in the army now. Literally.

…

Lotisha and I were labmates back in DC and I just adore her. She’s the tiniest person with the biggest attitude and after I got over being terrified of her I realized that I actually looooved her. And one of the things Lotisha and I loved to do together (besides give mice gonorrhea) was take fitness classes. Mostly through Montgomery County. And it was with Lotisha that I took my first ever yoga class. Hatha Yoga with Rudra.

I went into yoga class expecting a workout with emphasis on strength and flexibility. Rurda, however, was a sweatpants-wearing, afro-haired, Costa-Rica-yoga-retreat-bound man who was way into yoga as a practice, not just as an exercise, and during our first class he taught us what the word namaste meant.

According to Rudra, saying namaste to someone else or even to yourself was equivalent to saying “I salute the inner light within you.” I of course looked it up after that and it’s hard to say if that’s true exactly, except that it is widely acknowledged as a respectful greeting or goodbye. Regardless, I like what Rudra said. A lot. (Now. Then I was all “oh snap, this is weird, I don’t think I like it,” but I was wrong as I so often find myself to be.) And I think, to me, the “like” button is really more of a namaste button– a way to acknowledge the “inner light” of another person’s activity, selfie, food choice, witty quip, photo-of-babies-doing-baby-stuff, whatever. The thing about it, whatever it is, that resonates with me.

 

Of course like any other living, breathing human, Facebook also infuriates me at times. It incites major jealousy, constantly feeding my little green monster (30-ish? on Facebook? there’s LOTS of babies, of which I can have none). And, although this may surprise you, this big square head of mine doesn’t often photograph very well and the pictures I do end up posting tend to be the very best chin down, tongue-to-roof-of-mouth, least squinty eyed, minimal frizz, good angle photos that happen. When given the opportunity to paint yourself, why not paint your best self… the self you feel most comfortable with? Leave the dirty laundry for the old blog.

The important thing, for me anyway, is the attitude I choose to approach it with. I can’t possibly be the only one painting my best face out there… which means other people probably aren’t always as gorgeous/happy/un-double-chinned as they appear. Right? (Although I suspect the babies are for the most part real. The monster! So green!) The thing is, I see these perfect posts, these lovely brush strokes on social media because I choose to and because I enjoy it. I am apparently totally cool with voyeurism and I love to see what people are up to. I also love that it keeps me connected with people I otherwise wouldn’t be connected to. Like Kacey! And her blog!

Even amongst the perfect pictures and the happy statuses though, we do still catch glimpses of the truth. And when we recognize those things, those little winks that were meant just for us, we can acknowledge them in another way altogether– it’s the behind-the-scenes connections that might be a little more meaningful.

Because of Facebook, I re-connected with Dawn. Erika recognized my hurt and cheers me on day after day. Kacey and I are blog buddies. Nicole and I became friends, like real friends, long after college.

Because of Twitter, I got a couple blog posts re-tweeted by the Chris Lema and traffic, traffic, traffic on account. It let me keep up with my friend Dr. Kanth on his interview journey.

Because of Instagram, I get to keep up with #ohellabella and to see a #dailydoseofaddisyn. I also get sneak peaks into Mindy Kaling‘s life (yessss!).

And because of this blog, regardless of whether you like it, read it, share it, comment on it… or not… I have an outlet. I can share my words with anyone who happens to stumble across them. I share my ideas with people who are free to agree or disagree. Read on or roll their eyes. Whatevs.

 

That’s the beauty of the internet. It’s let’s us connect.

Or not.

 

Namaste.

Or keep scrolling.

 

You choose.

 

End rebuttal.

 

How about now, Kacey? Not a jerk, right? Just more rambling along the same lines. We’re all friends here 🙂

December Twenty-Sixth

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When I was in fourth grade, my Grandma Mormor (which as an adult I recognize is like saying “Grandma Grandma” since Mormor is the Swedish word for grandmother… but I don’t care) passed away over Christmas break. We weren’t planning to go to Marquette for Christmas, but when an aneurysm in my grandma’s head burst, sending her straight to the hospital with a severe hemorrhagic stroke, we packed up our clothes and our Christmas into our blue van and drove straight up to the UP. Although she came through a surgical repair successfully, another stroke left my grandmother brain dead and life support was removed the day after Christmas. She was only 60 years old when she passed away on December 26th. I chose not to go to the funeral because I was scared (of the funeral? of death? of my grandmother’s body? I don’t know…), but I regret that now. I did write her a letter that was placed in the coffin. Regardless of whether I was there or not, she knew I loved her, and that’s all that really matters.

My Grandma Mormor’s birthday was February 24th and I always think of her then. She was happy and gorgeous and made amazing oatmeal on her kitchen stove. Her house always smelled good and she wore a floral apron in the kitchen. I know other people have other memories of her, but mine stop at the age of 8 and it’s all beautiful to me. I also always think of her on December 26th… the day she died. She would have died on Christmas, maybe Christmas Eve, without artificial prolonging of her life. But nobody wanted that, so she was allowed to pass on the 26th and the 26th always had something of a pall over it. It was not a good day.

Until 2011.

On December 26, 2011, my sister’s first child, her daughter Emma, was born. To me, it seemed like the universe had righted itself again. December 26th was no longer a day for mourning, but for celebrating this amazing little life that came into our family. Today, Emma is three and more amazing than ever and I am so grateful for the gift of timing the universe gave our family.

Perhaps it’s just a coincidence, but December 26th feels bigger than that.

This year, December 26th also marked 14 days after IUI— the day I could take a pregnancy test. Something else to make the 26th of December even more significant. My sister found out she was pregnant with Emma on my dad’s birthday. We were both excited about the possibility of me finding out the same on Emma’s birthday.

I’m not pregnant though. No need to test. (I did, just in case, but it was negative. No ambiguity here.) Remember, I said I’d tell you either way. I was hoping for the other. But a promise is a promise.

 

I guess the fact of the matter is that we all struggle, in our own unique way. Maybe we don’t want children and others see our familial choices as incomplete. Maybe getting pregnant is easy, but the timing is poor. Maybe the timing works out, but our child isn’t as “perfect” as we would have expected. Maybe everything seems just right, but postpartum depression settles in. Maybe things get tough with your toddler, your adolescent, your adult child. Maybe you can’t get pregnant at all.

The good news is that you don’t have to get pregnant to have a family. And families are beautiful and imperfect, no matter how they come to be. There’s no right way, no wrong way, when you fill a home with people (or animals!) who love each other, it really doesn’t matter.

I know all of that, intellectually. But to really know it… that’s tough stuff. So for now, I’m going to let myself just be a little sad. Really sad. Disappointed. Confused and upset and frustrated and guilt-ridden. Just for a little while.

 

I’m also going to drink enough wine and take enough cold medicine to make up for all that I passed up over the last couple of days on account of the potential for pregnancy– a little Christmas cheer to go with my Christmas cold.

All in good time.

Merry Christmas 2014

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And here we are, it’s Christmas Eve! Perhaps one of the best things about getting married (besides the whole commitment to spending the rest of my life with the person I love and all that…) is that I get to celebrate Christmas even more.

And always with this guy!
And always with this guy!

We did the Vonck thing last weekend with my parents and siblings and nieces and aunts and uncles and cousins and grandparents and puppies on that side of the family.

You can kind of tell that we're related... and that we enjoy our time together, eh?
You can kind of tell that we’re related… and that we enjoy our time together, eh?

Tonight, we start the party Stankowski-style, which as I have mentioned before is big, big, big.

No matter the “side” or the location or the event, as the Muppets say (in the best version of A Christmas Carol ever produced EVER): wherever you find LOVE it feels like Christmas!

{Source}
{Source}

And it’s so true! Love, love, love… every where! In every way!

And to quote another immortal soul, one Mr. Frank Sinatra:

I wish you shelter form the storm
A cozy fire to keep you warm
But most of all, when snowflakes fall
I wish you love

That is truly my Christmas wish for you. For everyone. For myself even. Lots of love.

And especially for my sister’s dear friend Jackie, who I unfortunately did not get to meet when I was in Midland for a few days– I really hope she knows how much she is loved! To be loved by my sweet and fisky sister, that’s a big deal 🙂

Claire knows it's a big deal to be loved by my Shabsky Balu-- look at that happy little face!!
Claire knows it’s a big deal to be loved by my Shabsky Balu– look at that happy little face!!

I love all the rest of you too and I thank you from the very bottom of my heart for hanging out with me for another year here at Under the Tapestry.

My goal for 2014 was to convince you that I am truly unhinged, but full of love. (The best kind of unhinged, really.) If I haven’t done that yet, let me just send you a quick Christmas card…

Created using Minted
Created using minted. I’m so so so pleased with minted. Highly recommend!

Transition to crazy dog lady — complete!

Oh how I love that pup!!

 

Wishing you and all of your furry (or scaled or feathered or whatever) friends a very merry holiday season full of love, love, love!

Pamela and Bernadette — the flour and the fiction

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Dang, guys… you and your friends and your mom and your dog are all basically freaking awesome. I write some of the craziest, silliest, saddest, weirdest, yet super honest, stuff and you’re awesome about it. Every time. The more whatever-est it is, the more supportive you (and your friends and mom and dog) are and I’m so super grateful. Huge props from me… and my therapist, who agrees that the catharsis of Under the Tapestry is probably the number one factor keeping me out of the loony bin. I mean, I assume he’d agree based on his positive comments regarding the post and the response to it. However, “loony bin” isn’t a phrase he tends to use all that often (i.e. ever– professionalism or whatever). So thanks for that. I’ll let you know either way in a couple of weeks and we can all cry happy or sad tears, eat happy or sad ice cream (with lactaid), and think happy or sad thoughts together.

When I say cathartic, I mean it, and it’s amazing how fessing up to that one dark moment seems to have released so many additional words that have been queuing up for a while. (Queuing because it’s my goal in life to become British. Obviously.)

So with the exception of on-the-internet I am, in all other respects, an introvert, which means, for the most part, I don’t love social situations on account of I’m incredibly awkward. Seriously.

Except it’s a little more nuanced than that because I don’t find being overly familiar with someone whose willing to be overly familiar right back a problem. For example, I’ll probably make a lame joke if we try to talk about the weather for 10 minute at a party, but if I run into you in the bathroom and you confess that you’re suffering from diarrhea, we’re basically going to hit it off right away. Probably I’ll tell you about all the GI distress I’ve struggled with and we’ll laugh and say, “ha ha ho ho hee hee– clearly we were meant to meet like this!”

(Quick fun fact– I just got a text from a brand new, way too quickly overly familiar friend that said “Well let’s just say maybe our meeting was meant to be.” With the exception of the “ha ha ho ho hee hee” I’m basically just writing from real life, yo.)

Books are what makes my introvert heart particularly happy because when you have read the same book as someone, you automatically have an intimate connection that you don’t have with just any random person on the street– no GI involvement necessary. And I think, after much consideration, that is why I like book clubs so very, very, very much.

It’s a social situation, that’s awkward, but it’s a bunch of other people who read the same book as you which means their mind has been in that same storied place and let every one of the same words and characters and thoughts and ideas tumble around in their brain just like you did. Maybe even some different thoughts or ideas about the very same words and characters. That’s intimacy right there. It’s also something non-small to talk about. An introvert-who-paradoxically-also-craves-social-connection’s dream.

So I basically love book clubs. I love everything about them. Everything except the social anxiety inducing process of identifying potential members, inviting identified potential members, and hosting a get together with all accepting invited identified potential members.

I guess you could say that it’s getting to the point of comfort with people that we can begin to relate over books that’s the hard part.

Despite the my awkwardness and the necessity to participate in uncomfortable activities (like talking to other humans who didn’t already know about my secret nerdiness) to get to the good part, I managed to start a third book club and we met for the first time a couple weeks ago to discuss The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler.

Success!

Everything about a book club is truly a celebration of the nerd-tastic to me and I spared no expense on Saturday. While reading the book on my Kindle, I highlighted any mention of the snacks and drinks served by each host. At game time, I noted the highlights, looked up recipes, and managed (with the tremendous help of my dear friend Amy) to whip up a feast fit for even the picky perfectionist Jocelyn. Granted, we’re not classy enough for the wine selections mentioned in the book… but everything else! Moscato and sweet white and sparkling pink to be served over ice (am I making your teeth hurt?) for my crew!

We had creme de menthe squares and lemon bars and molasses cookies and almond crescent cookies and cheese and crackers and venison sausage (Wisconsin, yo… and Matt got a deer!) and bottle after bottle after bottle of delicious wine.

It was a delicious menu, to be sure, but I was a bit concerned going into the event because I didn’t just want to make and serve it all… I also wanted to eat it all! So I endeavored to make as much as I could gluten-free and dairy-free. That’s where Pamela comes in…

Pamela the miracle worker.

Pamela the business-woman.

Pamela the magician and creator of the most amazing gluten-free flour I’ve ever tried:

Pamela’s All Purpose Flour – Artisan Blend

It says it can be substituted cup for cup for regular flour. Hard to believe, but in this case, finally true. The lemon bars, molasses cookies, and almond crescent cookies were all amazing… I don’t even think you’d know the difference if I didn’t tell you (although Seth swears that he can). Huge victory for me and by little buddy Noah this Christmas season– can’t wait to share all the recipes with his mom!

So Pamela was the first champ of the evening. I cannot recommend that amazing four highly enough if you struggle to bake gluten free!

And then came Bernadette. Not a flour. She’s the fiction.

At book club, people came and went… some stayed the whole time, others popped in for a bit and left early, but once everyone was all gathered around in my living room (doh! not enough comfy chairs!) we popped the movie version of the Jane Austen Book Club in and watched for our friends who hadn’t had a chance to read the whole book.

It’s the same general story, of course, by the characters in the movie were basically mutilated… especially Prudie’s poor husband Dean who really got the short end of the movie stick, I must say. But besides that, at the end of the night, as five girls remained (some of us tipsy, myself included), four of whom were introverts (Amy, let’s face it, you’re as extroverted as they come), we all decided that the best character in the movie, the one we all endeavor to be like, was Bernadette.

Granted, book Bernadette was probably a good twenty years older than movie Bernadette, but that didn’t change the fact that she was a woman who was 100% comfortable in her own skin… no matter what. And we all loved that. Who wouldn’t?

Maybe someday it will be the norm for us, that level of self-comfort. I hope so! But more importantly… it is my sincere hope that we, at the very least, become that way around one another in relatively short order. Wine will help at first, of course. Wine and gluten-free cookies. But a bunch of introverts out of their shell on account of books? Seems like a recipe for comfort to me.

Perhaps someday I’ll even write all of us into a book. A couple of teachers, an environmental policy specialist, a science writer, some doctors, a nurse, a healthcare administrator… and the recurring and fascinatingly flighty Sister Doctor. You’ll read it, right? Somebody’s going to need to start breeding dogs and dating a sci-fi enthusiast… then we’ll have it down.

A brief, failed experiment.

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Want to hear something super sad?

Probably not. But it was all so melodramatic in my mind that I’m going to tell you anyway.

On Friday I went to Madison for another round of IUI (undefined acronym, I know, you can look it up if you really want to know). TMI, I know. And sad in it’s own right. But here’s the really sad part… afterward, as I was laying there on the table for the requisite 10 minutes (nothing romantic about baby making this way, let me tell you), tears just started rolling down my cheeks and, because of the angle my head was at, they welled right up in my ears until my stupid ears were full of stupid tears which made me cry even harder because it felt bad.

The whole thing was, as I said, very melodramatic.

Fortunately, I had not worn mascara that morning. Not because I didn’t want to, but because I forgot to bring it with me and we had stayed the night at my sister- and brother-in-law’s in Madison (super grateful for their hospitality despite their absence– Sister Doctor is busy criss-crossing the country in search of a surgery residency… everybody wants a piece of her, so proud!).

I was in full on self-pity mode pretty much the rest of the day (confession: kind of still am) and I decided in all of my upset that makeup was super stupid and that I just wasn’t going to wear it anymore. So I didn’t on Saturday, despite going to a lovely Christmas party Saturday evening. And I didn’t on Sunday, even though we went to church and out to dinner. Even on Monday, today, I managed to head to work sans makeup.

But I think that as of today, this experiment is going to be over.

(If only all of my experiments in grad school could have failed this quickly…)

Not so much because I feel like I need makeup for anyone else, necessarily, but because I feel ugly and tired. How is that mascara can make a person feel untired as opposed to just looking untired, I don’t know. But I’m pretty sure that is the case.

And I’m pretty sure that tomorrow, I will wear mascara. At least.

It’s such a struggle though. I don’t want to need to wear makeup, for myself or anybody else. I don’t enjoy putting on makeup like a lot of people do, I just don’t. But I honestly feel better when I’m wearing it… better… prettier… more put together… I don’t know what.

Am I conceited or just insecure? Am I wearing makeup because of societal pressure or am I not just to prove a point? I don’t know what the answer is.

Maybe it doesn’t really matter either way.

Maybe mascara really isn’t the point at all.

I may be stretching this analogy… I am definitely stretching this analogy… but I feel like that mascara is the family I want so badly. I don’t know what I’ll look like with a family, but I’m pretty sure I want to put it on and wear it forever and ever. And in this case I am certain, it’s not societal pressure that’s fueling my desire. It’s legit. And I’m sad. Sad enough that some days I can’t even wear mascara because then that, too, would be pooled up in my ears.

Christmas is feeling especially tough. I want to be pretty in photos… by wearing makeup. But I also want to emulate the beautiful photos of happy families lining my cupboard fronts, a new one each day, beautiful moms and dads with their beautiful and happy babies. I love seeing them, I’m so happy for them. But it also makes me want (to be pretty) and not want (because I feel like crying) another coat of mascara all over again, every day.

On Thursday evening, Seth and I are heading to my sister’s house in Michigan. We’re going to celebrate my niece’s third birthday and Christmas with my mom’s side of the family. We’re going to have a blast and there will be a whole lot of love, but the nagging feeling inside me won’t go away until after the Christmas holiday when I find out whether the IUI worked or not.

Patience… patience…

This experiment, the one where I try to start a family, is turning out a lot more like grad school– long, protracted, painful. While the results were equivocal, at least the mascara experiment was quick.

Always with the patience. The best things in life are worth waiting for, or so I hear.

gobble, gobble… gluten-free gingerbread recipe

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Great news, everyone! Curly really loves gingerbread…

Curly with Blanket

…little punk.

Except who can blame her?! I make seriously good gingerbread cookies.

I recognize that people typically think of gingerbread in terms of the little gingerbread man and a Christmas cookie. Or as a Shrek character. (Not the gumdrop buttons!!!)

Gingerbread for me, however, has long been a Thanksgiving staple thanks to my Grandma Rita’s famous turkey cookies. More good news, though– once upon a time, my Grandma Rita gave me her cookie cutter and since then, I’ve made my own gingerbread turkeys every year!!

Gingerbread is delicious, of course, and already kind of win because the Betty Crocker Cookbook recipe is dairy-free (shortening– better living through chemistry!) and the spices are just the most perfect combination of holidays ever imaginable– cinnamon and ginger and cloves and allspice. MMMM! They’re just so good!

So I made some this year:

Oh snap! Look at these little beauties! Soft and chewy and spicy and delicious!
Oh snap! Look at these little beauties! Soft and chewy and spicy and delicious!

And people were impressed, but I was so so so sad because they smelled so very, very delicious, but I knew I shouldn’t eat them… all gluten full and all. (Note: I did eat one– the one that Curly licked. We share lots of germs, Curly and me… but no more! We packed them up real fast after her little tongue found its way up on the table.) So I was desperate to find a gluten free dairy free recipe for gingerbread cut out cookies. And on Thanksgiving Eve I had great, great, great success!!

A Thanksgiving miracle…

I haven’t actually shared any recipes in this venue in the past, but I thought maybe this one was worthy of it. Maybe it should be a separate section of the old blog if it ends up being something more frequent, but we’ll see…

So! Real quick! I present to you:

Gluten-free, Dairy-free Gingerbread Cookies

3 1/2 cups Pamela’s Gluten Free Flour Blend (omg, this stuff is a-freaking-mazing)
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup molasses
12 Tbsp shortening (oh Crisco, how I love you and your dairy-free-ness) + 2 Tbsp water
2 Tbsp dairy-free milk substitute (I used almond)
2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground allspice
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground cloves

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Cream together brown sugar, shortening, and water. Add non-milk milk and molasses and mix until well-blended. Add soda, salt, and spices. Add flour and mix until lovely, soft, pliable dough forms. It’ll be like that– real nice.

Roll out dough on floured surface with floured rolling pin, just like any other cut out cookies, even the gluten full kind. Cut out cookies and place on parchment paper-lined baking sheet.

Bake 10 – 12 minutes (10 was perfect, perfect, perfect).

Look how nice they turned out! Oy! And so delicious!!

Gluten-free gingerbread-- just like the real thing! No joke! So good!
Gluten-free gingerbread– just like the real thing! No joke! So good!

So, to give credit where credit’s due… this recipe is essentially a mash-up of my original favorite from Betty Crocker’s Cookbook (which I highly recommend using if gluten does not present an issue for you) and Pamela’s Gingerbread Cookies (which would probably be fine as written except who wants to go out and buy Pamela’s Bread Mix just to make cookies when flour is already in da hiz-ouse… plus, gingerbread with no allspice? puh-leez!).

For the fancy turkey frosting, I just used the stuff that comes in a can and goes on sale this time of year. Mini chocolate chip eye balls on the regular cookies, left off on the others since chocolate chips aren’t dairy-free. Those bitty little red hots are super delicious on them too. I hope you bake them… I hope you love them!!

Most importantly, I hope you had a lovely turkey day and that someday we can spend it together munching on deliciously spiced gingerbread turkey cookies!

 

PS: Brown paper grocery bags with the bottoms cut off and opened up on the table make the best ever liners for fresh out of the oven cookies. My mom’s been doing it forever and ever and it’s basically genius! Try it next time!

Ughs and Hugs

Long-Winded Metaphors, , , , , , , , , , ,

Confession: when I was in Miss Dimitroff’s class in fourth grade, I anonymously put a suggestion in the suggestion box asking that she not call us “honey” and “sweetie” and the like because not everyone liked being called things like that.

In fact, I hated it. It made me incredibly uncomfortable.

I’m pretty sure that’s why my mom put me in that class though– to get a dose of the touchy-feely crap she thought I needed.

Was she right?

Probably.

Did I like it?

Not one bit.

So it was quite a relief when in fifth grade I moved on to the non-touchy, non-feely Mrs. Lavery aka Mrs. Slavery, as kids were known to call her. Man did I ever love that class. (That is, until I got that fateful haircut and things started going down hill… but besides that, it was good.)

Touchiness… feeliness… just not really my things. I’m kind of a cold fish. And I especially dislike hugs. Always have and still do.

Except when I don’t. Which seems to be happening more and more often. Because, as you know by now, I’m nothing if not a walking, talking, big-haired contradiction.

In high school youth group, everyone hugged at the sign of peace while on retreat. It was terrible. People did the same thing at the big CTA conference I was recently at. Terrible!

Then again… I ran five miles with my friend Marie on Thanksgiving morning. It was her first race and I was crazy, ridiculously, deliriously proud of her as she crossed the finish line.

Wooooo!! Marie!!!
Wooooo!! Marie!!!

So, once I was done taking photos of her crossing the finish line and crossed it myself, I ran up to her and gave her a big hug.

What the?

That’s not me.

Usually.

Except that in that moment it kind of was.

And now I find myself completely unsure  of my stance on hugging.

Another example… my friend and former co-worker Michele recently left her office next door to mine to pursue grad school at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee. When she left, I hugged her, of course, because it seemed like the thing to do. But if I’m being completely honest, although we miss each other very much and it was very happy/sad when she left, neither of us really liked it because neither of us likes to hug. Except… when I went to Nashville to visit Michele a couple weeks ago, the first thing I did when I saw her in her happy bright yellow sweater on a breezy and beautiful Nashville day was give her a hug.

It was an actual hug though, not just this arm around the shoulders... for real.
It was an actual hug though, not just this arm around the shoulders… for real.

No explanation there either. It was spontaneous. It just happened. And I didn’t hate it.

So I grumble and groan and tell people about how I hate hugs and terms of endearment and everything touchy-feely, yet… I’m always begging Seth for what I like to call “huglets” (you know, mini-hugs) and I hug on my pup and call her my little sweetness. I could squeeze my nieces’ cheeks until they were bruised (I wouldn’t of course… just saying it wouldn’t be entirely unpleasant) and I constantly hug their little mama, my Fisky Sister. And just on Saturday night, I noticed myself affectionately grabbing my newest cousin-in-law’s arm while telling her how beautiful she was at her wedding reception.

Is it age? Is it time? Is it comfort level?

Is it exposure to some sort of toxin? Do you think I have holes in my brain???

Who knows what it is. But I appear to be going soft. And I’m not sure how I feel about that.

Most of the time, I’m still awkward and kind of shy and mostly uncool and definitely more of an ugher than a hugger. It’s just that lately, there seem to be more of those moments when a spontaneous hug just happens.

Ugh. Hugs.

 

Except, hugs? Are all hugs really the same?

 

When I’m having a rough time and I talk to my dad on the phone, he always gives me a virtual hug. He says, “Ready for a hug? [squeeeeeez-ing sound!]” and I always feel better just knowing that my dad wanted to hug me. And lately, I’ve been getting and giving lots of other virtual hugs. (Related: Have you seen my friend Dawn’s most recent post?! Someday I’ll tell you about the conversations behind the scenes– talk about virtual hugs. My goodness.) And what that makes me realize is that we can hug people with more than just our arms!

We can hug someone with our words. With a smile. With a facial expression. With some cookies, a note, an email, a text, a phone call, a Facebook poke, a blog comment, a held door, an emptied dishwasher, a well-intentioned prayer, any other small thought or act of kindness. And even if you’re disinclined to actually touch, except certain people on certain occasions, like me, there’s still lots of ways to hug– to show you care.

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Physical hugs sometimes.

Metaphorical hugs always.

 

PS: It’s snowing at underthetapestry.com for the winter season! It’s so awesome!! Make sure you check it out! What a sweet option, WordPress!!