Christmas

Z in his new wagon, with the fun toy from Grandma.
When it was time for his nap, he kept shouting, "I pay! I pay!"
and cried himself to sleep.

Fun marker keeper, handmade by Aunt Em

How to make paper airplanes. We hoped to combat the lure of the Wii, but so far, that siren song has been awfully strong.

Stuff White People Like--a big hit

A big Christmas snowfall, plus mild temperatures, made it the perfect weather for the creation of snow creatures

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Halfway to 70

Yesterday was my beloved's bday.

We celebrated by:

Going to church from 10-12. Thank you, stake conference!

Playing Ticket to Ride while baby Z took a nap.

Sharing dinner with dear friends, which included honest and invigorating conversation.

Eating German Chocolate Inside Out Cake. Yum! Rich. Divine.

Opening presents. The best, by far, was T's present to his dad. He picked out some awesome fabric and together, we made pajama pants. He was so proud. He marched through the fabric store, telling anyone who would listen, "I'm making pajama pants for my dad for his birthday!" And he was thrilled that he dad would never be able to quietly sneak by him in the night. Those pants are exciting!

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Another thing I realized this week

AJ was talking about work. About meetings. About consultants coming in to analyze the company inefficiencies. About development budgets. And I realized that I have very little idea of what his days really are like. On the other hand, my days are completely known to him. It's about driving kids places, making meals, picking up, reading books with the kids. It's what he does when he is home.

My world felt completely subsumed in his. And I felt resentful about it.
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Memorial weekend planting

We have a lot of landscaping rocks in our yard. I don't like them. They are unsightly. Ugly weeds grow up in them. I wanted to get rid of them all, but it is hard work to shovel them up and discard them. So, I was very happy when AJ's dad suggested that we put some shrubs in the sections of our yard with rocks. Even though they are small now, I feel so much better about our yard. I can't wait to see them grow. AJ's is even happier because now that the pressure is off him to find a way to get rid of the rocks. In total, we planted 12 shrubs, one clematis plant at the base of our mailbox, loads of dark purple petunias in the window boxes, and several black eyed susans in the free standing flower boxes near the front door.

Window box petunias and three moonshadow euonymus shrubs, which will grow wide and not tall. They have pretty variegated leaves.

I hadn't realized that the trellis off our deck has legs in order to train vines up and around. When AJ's mom noticed, I was excited to try to grow a wall of green. We planted two honeysuckle plants.

AJ's mom also suggested a clematis at the base of the mailbox to grow up and around it.


Four new shrubs on the front corner of our lot. They don't look like much, but it is a vast improvement. The meadowlark forsythia on the left will get to be 10 feet tall by 10 feet wide. We also planted two goldflame spirea. and one bridal wreath spirea

We planted three sixteen candle clethra around the house too. They will bloom with long spiky white flowers.

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Sisters' Week

One of my sisters is really hip. And cool. And as such, she has a cool and hip blog, which lots of people visit. She decided to let all of her less cool sisters in on the action by having Sisters' Week. We each got to contribute a post. Collectively, we made up the You Are My Fave: Sisters' Edition.

Now, when I try to tell people how the 7 of us are so different from each other, I will just point them to Mel's blog for evidence.

And I just had to steal her photo of us taken when I was a junior in high school. 1989.
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Treasure Trove of Pictures

Part of my three weeks away from Minnesota was spent in Seattle. My dad grew up there and my grandparents still live in the city there. They moved to a retirement/assisted living community probably about 10 years ago. My grandpa is now 88 and my grandma 86. My sister and I decided that to see each other, we would meet up there this summer since my grandma's health hasn't been good and because we don't know when we will be able to see them again. Then, two other sisters and my parents also joined us, making it quite the family gathering. I left MJ and T with AJ's parents and flew there for an extended weekend.

Part of what I wanted to do while I was there was talk to my grandpa about his life. That didn't turn out too well. Mostly, it was just too chaotic. Even when there were just adults in their home, two people would be off on the side gabbing. I would sit right next to my grandpa and asked him lots of questions, but it was hit and miss and we didn't record anything.

But, another objective was to look through old family photos. They have a storage closet in the basement of their building, with boxes of pictures that I don't think anyone has looked at in years, if ever. We brought a scanner and laptop and convinced my grandpa it was worth it to get them out. And boy, was it worth it. We found sooo many great photos. There were several times I gasped in pure amazement and joy at our discoveries. The above picture is my grandparents on the their wedding day in 1945.

I was particularly interested in finding any photos of my grandpa's dad, Jocko--one of the Giacomos in the family. He came to the US when he was a kid, and always lived in communities of Italians. He was Catholic, at least on paper.

This group of men on their beer and french bread picnic is one of my favorites. It was probably taken in the early 1900's because my great grandpa (sitting on the left with the white shirt and suspenders ) looks so young. I love his curly hair--part of my family's heritage.

There were several pictures that it seemed like my grandpa had never seen. We found an exquisite picture of his parents on their wedding day in 1913. He snatched that one up so fast and then make several color copies of it because he didn't want it to be lost. Unfortunately, the scan of it didn't turn out too well because of the high gloss on the photo.

We took a bunch of stuff back to our hotel to look at one night, and the next morning, he asked us if we had found the small framed picture of his mother. It was taken when she was older and was in a pretty oval frame. Yes! we exclaimed. We had it, we could bring it to him. He was excited about it and wanted to put it up in his living room.

After we had gone through everything, scanned many photos, and were preparing to take it all back, my mom was looking for the framed photo of Mabel, his mother. She had set it out special knowing how he was looking forward to it. She couldn't find it. It wasn't where she left it. We all started searching. We search through the entire hotel suite we were all staying in. My mom called the front desk to ask about a lost and found. Was there any way she could have taken it to breakfast? We looked inside the sofa bed. We pulled the drapes back. We tried to get my sister's three year old daughter to cough out its location. Tempers flared and we snapped at each other. I was on the verge of tears because I was so upset about it and because I wasn't getting enough sleep. Finally, my sister found it tucked upside down in the corner of one of the drawers in her bathroom. It turns out that the box my mom set it on was just the perfect height for a curious 16 month old. He must have picked it up and found a special place to put it. I was just so grateful we found it and we all vowed not to ever tell my grandpa that it was lost for a while.

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4th of July

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Giacomo

My father is James. James Jr. His father is James Sr. And my great-grandfather is Giacomo. Giacomo is the Italian version of James. Going back from my great-grandfather, I have several other direct male ancestors named Giacomo.



Giacomo was born in France in 1882 during a period of economic difficulty in Italy. His parents Giovanni Battista and Margharita left their tiny village of Coassolo in northwestern Italy at the foothills of the Alps to seek work in eastern France. My father believes that after a few years in France, the family returned to Italy where Battista, as he was called, secured a passport and travel arrangements to the United States. He was drawn there with the promise of work in the coal fields of Illinois. Once he found a job in Coal City as an underground miner, he saved some money and then sent for his family. In 1887, Margherita and Giacomo travelled to the United States to join Battista. My dad has a copy of their joint passport--they left out of Le Havre, France, and disembarked in New York City, travelling only with their two suitcases. Giacomo, who came to be called Jocko, was 5 years old at the time.

In 1894, Battista died in a mine collapse. My father believes that at this time, Margherita was encouraged to move to the state of Washington by her brother Pietro. She took her son and moved to Washington, about 100 southeast of Seattle.

Jocko eventually became a bartender in Ronald, then took a job maintaining mining equipment in and around the mines. He eventually moved the tavern to Roslyn, where he set up a grocery store. In early 1910, the 27-year old Jocko married Carlotta Bianco, who died in 1911 several months after giving birth. I found the three of them in the 1910 census. Evidently, Jocko's mother Margherita wrote to an Italian family who had also immigrated to Coal City (originally from another small village in northwestern Italy) , inviting them to send Mabel Barbara Viano by train to Washington, in order to meet Jocko. In early 1913, the 30-year old Jocko and 23-year old Mabel marry. Mabel in my great-grandmother.

In late 2005, I travelled with my parents and two of my sisters to Coassolo. My dad has been working on our Italian family history for nearly 40 years--ever since he travelled to Italy at the end of his mission to France in the late 1960's. No one else in his family has helped him in the research, and I think he was motivated to take us there, hoping that someone else in the family would catch the bug. In Coassolo, we were able to visit the tiny municipal building where the office workers there permitted us to enter a back room and look through the dusty vital records that dated back to 1860. We sat there for portions of two days, combing through the records, looking for family names, and writing down all the information that we found.

It was exciting to see the Italian variation of my birth name--Bellezza--in the handwriting of a person from 150 years ago. As it turns out, the surname of Giovanni Battista was Bellezza Fontana (the beauty by the fountain), and is unique from other variations of Bellezza. When Jocko came to the United States with his parents, the name was changed to Bellessa.

I have a couple of strong memories from our time in the Coassolo Municipio. One of the pieces of information that was included in the vital records was the job of the decedent or the parents of the newborn child. Almost every single record listed a job of contadino, or peasant.

The other recollection I have is of the death record of an infant with one of the surnames we were searching for. The child was only a few days old. The next death record that was listed was of the child's mother. And her death occurred shortly after the baby. I was acting as the record reader, with my mom transcribing, and we both got choked up with this information.

I hope that our son will be born this week. We have been thinking about what to name him, and as with our other two children, I have been fence sitting, unwilling to make a decision. I keep thinking that perhaps a better name than those we have thought of will come to me somehow and that I should keep an open mind just in case. I have thought for some time, though, that I would like him to have the middle name of Giacomo. Not only would this honor my dad and grandpa, but it would pay homage to my Italian heritage.

Yesterday, I had a conversation with a group of women about baby names, and I started second guessing Giacomo. It is unusual, it doesn't go with our last name at all, and doesn't really go with any of the first names that we're thinking about. AJ has said for quite a while that this is a name that our son won't want to tell his friends about. In the middle of the night, when I had to get up to go the bathroom, I thought perhaps we should just go with the English equivalent of James.

But, in the shower this morning, I was thinking about it again. I wish I knew more about the lives of my Italian ancestors. Only the barest facts of their lives can be put together from the information I am able to collect about them. But, even that skeleton of information is sobering to me. For example, just a few weeks ago, I found the death records of three small children in one family. Ursula died when she was 18 months old, and just a few weeks after another sister was born into the family. A few years later a son was born--Giovanni--but he survived for only a week. Another little boy--Giuseppe--was born 2 years later but he died when he was about 6 months old. All these, in addition to the death of first born child Maria Catarina at age 4. So, out of 6 children, only 2 survived past early childhood.

I think about the contadini in the rocky and barren hills of northwestern Italy. And I think about leaving a country behind with only two suitcases for a "good job" as a coal miner, which in a few short years would lead to the death of a husband and father.

I want my child to be connected to my Italian ancestors. I want them and the hard lives they had to be remembered in some small way. I think we will keep the name Giacomo.

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Christmas 2007

Ahh--I am currently enjoying one of my Christmas presents from this year. AJ's sister E gave me a set of 800 thread count sheets. I am sitting in my bed, in the lap of luxury. I definitely don't want the kids to touch them with their grubby hands, and even felt a little twinge of initial reluctance to let AJ share them.

Christmas was great this year. T didn't wake up until 7:45 and MJ around 8, so it wasn't too early. The kids were so excited and fun, but they really didn't go crazy with presents. We enjoyed a relatively calm morning being together, eating breakfast, and spreading out the presents over the morning.

Fun things from Christmas:

MJ was so concerned about how her good behavior weighed against her bad behavior for the year. "Santa thinks we were really good this year. We must have been really good this year." She seemed to think that they didn't deserve the presents they had gotten. Later she said, "I just keep thinking about all the bad things I did this year." And the next day she talked to me about it again--"why did Santa bring me all those presents when I was bad?" I felt a little bad myself that she was feeling so much guilt. I tried to talk to her about how we all do things that aren't right and then we try to do better. I think that a lie she told a lunch room aide "I am allergic to peanuts" was weighing especially heavy on her mind. It happened recently and kind of ballooned for her as we tried to figure out what actual events transpired and what the cause of the lie was.

Another thing she said. "I didn't even send my note. Santa always picks out just the perfect presents. He knows just the things that we like to do!"

T is really into singing Rudolph this season. My favorite part of his song is "Then one foggy Christmas Eve, Santa came to say (Yo ho ho),..." A kind of quasi-pirate Santa. Last year, he would gruffly say, "Yo, ho ho! What do you want for Christmas?" And if we didn't answer, he would say, "I SAID, YO HO HO! What do you want for Christmas??" I'm glad that the Yo ho ho carried over to this year.

Both MJ and T got scooters and helmets for Christmas. MJ's is going to take her some time to learn to ride it since it has just two wheels. But, T's has two back wheels and he has been riding it around the house non-stop. Towards the middle of Christmas day, he started taking his scooter everywhere--downstairs to watch a movie and then later, up to his room when he went to bed. He parked it in the doorway of his bedroom when he got into bed, with his helmet hanging off the handlebars. A little bit later, he told AJ that he needed to go the bathroom, and AJ said ok. So, he jumped out of bed, ran over to his scooter, grabbed his helmet to put it on, fumbling with the chin strap, and then scooted over to the bathroom (5 feet from his doorway). Then he parked his scooter in the bathroom doorway and took off his helmet, carefully hanging it on the handlebars. When he was done in the bathroom, he ran back over to the scooter and began to repeat the whole process until AJ told him to get into bed.

He also had a great time dressing up and playing with the awesome cape that Grandma made. It's two sided-one side red and one black so that he can alternate between good and bad roles. When he has the black side out (almost always), it has the look of a magician or a vampire. When he opened it, he swished the new cape from Grandma on and off his shoulders saying "I can fly with this outside in the wind". He got some other dress up accessories. His favorite outfit was to put the neo-prene Batman mask and black cape on, and then use the new foam sword and shield set he got. He has found us a lot more willing to play fight now that he is using foam sword and shield rather than his wood one and now that we have a means of defense: happily, the set came with two swords and two shields so that he can play with another person.

And a blast from the past: when T opened his fleece blanket from Aunt E with his name on it, he said, "I can't bee-lieve it!" This is exactly what MJ said when she opened a princess quilt for her third birthday.
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Advanced Maternal Age All the Way!

When I talked to my dad on my birthday on Sunday, he said that 36 is a great age. Old enough, but young enough. I'm not sure I agree with him. Personally, I think I will come into my own a bit more in my 40's when my kids are older.

Sunday was a great day though. If we had to have church all year at 1 pm, at least it was a year when my birthday fell on a Sunday. I lounged about in bed reading until my family brought me breakfast on one of our Target cafeteria trays--no flower in a vase, but yummy eggs, fruit, and hot chocolate. Then I enjoyed my breakfast in quiet while they went and wrapped presents. They all came back and we opened presents. This year was the best book haul I have had in a very long time. My mom picked out 3 books off my Amazon wish list, including a book to fuel my Lost obsession (season 4 premiers on Jan 31st!) and two books for my book group this year. AJ got my a bio of Virginia Woolf and one of my sisters got me a book edited by Ira Glass (I love This American Life) called The New Kings of Non-Fiction that she read and really liked. Getting books made me so happy. I love new books!

MJ and T each picked me out some jewelry, and although I don't often wear jewelry, I was pretty excited about their presents. I wore some thin silver bangles (I had a set almost identical to them in the 80's) and a black shiny necklace to church on Sunday. MJ picked me out a silver chain with a cubic zirconium pendant that I wore yesterday, but best of all is the big chunky bracelet with big plastic yellow rectangles. AJ said that both of them were going back and forth about what to get me, switching one item for another. But, this item was always T's top choice, and no matter what AJ said, T needed to get that for mommy. I love it. I had it on yesterday with a black top--it looked like I was rooting for the Steelers.

AJ also picked me out some new pj's. I guess my beloved Old Navy pajama pants are headed for the dust bin--I've had them for probably 7 years and I love them. They are so comfy and perfect, but they are starting to fall apart.

My sister with the curliest hair also framed a quote for me: "Life is curly. Don't even try to straighten it out." I agree! For the most part, I've always thought that I've been given curly hair, it's not really made to go straight, and I should take what I have and make the best of it. Three of my sisters that also have curly hair have betrayed their roots by straightening. I refuse to do it. Even in the late 90's when NO ONE was wearing their hair curly, I refused to straighten. And I like the generalization to life too.

AJ was excited that his mom got me a book light--I often lay in bed reading after he's going to sleep, justifying it by saying that it doesn't bother him. But, I'm sure it's not the same as going to sleep with it completely black.

I had to leave for church a little early since I was playing the organ. I was happy that the music chair let me talk her into replacing I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day with Hark the Herald Angels Sing. It's not that I dislike the first (which I somewhat do), but it's that she has a preference for the peaceful, solemn Christmas hymns over the exhuberant, joyous ones (that need a trumpet stop). We didn't sing Hark last year, and she didn't put Far Far Away on the docket this year (she said it's too hard for the congregation to sing). Anyway, at least we got to pair Silent Night with a more upbeat, vigorous song.

I actually liked Gospel Doctrine on Sunday. That was a plus.

And then, despite a lot of snow falling and wind blowing, we made it up to Maple Grove to eat dinner with K and D and family. We had a great time as usual and super good food.

By the time we got home, the kids were really tired out and went straight to sleep.

A good day. Good family time, fun presents, tasty food, and time with good friends.

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Gendered Division of Labor and the Specialization of Roles

Since I am currently not working outside of our home, I have the lion's share of responsibility for all things domestic. I take charge of meals: meal planning, grocery shopping, and making dinner. I do all the laundry, save for folding socks, hanging up shirts, and putting clothes away. I am primarily in charge of tidying up the house and doing the heavier cleaning: vacuuming, bathrooms, etc. I do the day to day maintenance.

During the Christmas season, I have taken on most of the Christmas tasks: I have thought through all the kids' presents and done the research to find them, and after getting a "that sounds good" from AJ, ordered them online or purchased them. I have planned the Christmas meal and Christmas week meals and done all the grocery shopping. I got the family photo into a card and ordered it and picked it up. We did collaborate on the writing of the Christmas letter, but I bought a new printer cartridge and printed all the letters and address labels. I personalized the majority of the Christmas cards. AJ set up the tree with the kids and put the lights on the tree. He did most of the tree with them at the beginning of the month. I took take of almost all of the extended family gifts that we gave this year, with the exception of AJ's brother, whose present he ordered and had shipped to his house. I made 5 batches of cranberry salsa to give to all the neighbors and our visiting/home teaching families. AJ has started to deliver them.

And then, in addition to all this, I was in charge of our RS enrichment dinner and program.

I don't think of myself as particularly good at any of these tasks. Although for the most part, I don't mind doing them, but I don't particularly love doing them either. I have done them because they need to be done. When I don't take charge, things slide. We have scrambled eggs for dinner. The house is a mess. This has happened in the past. And this year, we would not have done the same things for Christmas if I didn't do them. And, this is understandable. I stay home. I have all this flexible time that AJ does not. He is working full time.

And the fact is, AJ does do a lot at home, especially with the kids. Every day, I am grateful that he can help get MJ ready for school and onto the bus before he leaves for work. His hours are reasonable--he is almost always home for dinner by 5:30, and he doesn't have to travel a lot. He often puts the kids to bed. MJ and T absolutely love being around their dad and spending time with him.

My problem is not so much what AJ and I do at home . What I have been thinking about lately is how a lot of what I do could fairly easily be done by just about anyone. I could hire someone to clean my house. I could have my groceries delivered. Another person could cook meals for my kids. My domestic skills are, frankly, nothing special. The only thing in the domestic sphere, really, where I feel I could not find a substitute is the things I do with my kids. And that goes for AJ too as a dad. But, I can outsource some of the childcare. It's true. And T has recently started preschool. I can see how things will be quite a bit different when my kids are in school.

At the enrichment dinner last week, we had a conversation at dinner about staying at home as a mother. One person, whose youngest child will be in 1st grade next year, said that she is so tired of people asking her if she will work next year and what she will do with her time. She says that she will do the same thing as she does now. (Obviously, this is not entirely true. Her child will not be there. She will not have to worry at all about what he is doing and taking him with her wherever she goes.) She mentioned going to the grocery store as an example. The shopping will still have to be done. I admit, I often wonder what the days of stay-at-home moms whose kids are all in school look like. I'm sure that good things are done, I just can't really imagine what the rhythms of that life would look like.

The only thing keeping me home right now is my kids--and even then, I daydream about working. I hope to find a part time job with a flexible working arrangement in the near future. I can't imagine choosing to stay home when my kids are in school. I don't really like domestic life. I really don't know what I would do with my time all day. Clean my house? Do my grocery shopping? Add a few volunteer activities? Be the super-involved mom, planning out everything for my kids? I can't think of anything I would like less.

Anyway, back to my problem. My problem is that I don't want to specialize in domestic management. But, it's what I'm doing right now. I resent that the tasks I do on a regular basis--what I am specializing in--could be easily done by many other people. I want to specialize in being the mother of my kids, just as I want the same for AJ as their father. But, I also want to specialize in something else where I can use my human capital built up by many years of education, where I can contribute to my family income. It's what AJ is doing. I see his career stretching out years into the future. The ways that he is learning, the growth and trajectory that he can expect. He is specializing and it is benefitting our family. I am grateful for what he does. I just wish that we could share the domestic and economic spheres more. I don't really want to be in charge of the domestic stuff. I don't really want to be the household manager.

At this point, I am tired of the extended domestic lifting I have been doing. I am tired of doing the dishes and sweeping the floor yet again and doing the Christmas planning. I don't want to bend over to pick up the Uno cards again and all the other stuff on the ground at 30 weeks pregnant. It seems that the things I do at home are seldom recognized, and that within a short time of me doing tasks, the floor is messy again, T has written his name on the wall again, the laundry room floor is messy and dirty. I really dislike that. But, Christmas is around the corner. If the house is messy for Christmas, then I will be cranky. I know that about myself. So I will probably go back to picking up and doing the dishes later tonight. But, I am also going to strategize for how I can find a job. And I am going to finish reviewing that paper for EEPA.

This is all a big jumble. I know that. I just needed to get some thoughts out. I was hoping that it would make me feel better.

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Pie Addendum

As an update to my Thanksgiving post, I found out that at my grandma's house this year, the grand pie total was 35, with 28 different varieties. Amazing. They also managed to get 42 family members to the temple and completed 418 sealings and baptisms. And to think that AJ has never been to Franklin for Thanksgiving. We've got to make it out there sometime soon.
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Thanksgiving Pies

I just put the pecan and derby pies in the oven. Last night, I baked an apple pie, and later this morning, I will finish with the pumpkin chiffon and lemon fillings. I have settled on 5 pies for this year, to share in a gathering of 7 adults and 4 children. I don't think that's overdoing it. I think around 1/2 a pie is just about perfect.

In my family, Thanksgiving, as for many families, is full of food traditions. My mother is the oldest child of 11. She grew up on a farm. A major Thanksgiving gathering at her childhood home, with her mother still at the helm , still takes place each year. I would guess that over the years, they have averaged 40-50 people each year, and it's probably gone done a bit since now there aren't quite so many kids.

Thanksgiving at Grandma's house was always entirely predictable. The stuffing recipe never varied, and was never fancy. The mashed potatoes never had garlic or rosemary, just butter and milk. And I always went back for seconds. And the rolls were just plain divine. With enough leftovers so that we could have turkey sandwiches later. That must be something like 150 homemade rolls. Amazing. It's been many years since I've eaten Thanksgiving dinner with the W family, so maybe something like Wild Rice-Walnut-Cranberry stuffing (a dish I'm making this year) is now on the menu. After all, the family has grown up and expanded, and there are several amazing cooks in the family with broad-ranging tastes. But, my guess is that no matter what more exotic dishes are on the table, all our old favorite stand-bys are there as well.

Living far away from the west for many years, we have had many Thanksgivings without family. In some years, members of AJ's family have come to visit. This year, his brother E is here. We've both made our own Thanksgiving dinners many times and shared Thanksgiving with others. Early on, I learned that, with their recipes, we could just about replicate the Thanksgiving dinner of the W's. Since then, although we've never completely abandoned tradition with Mexican food, for example, we've tried all sorts of variations of traditional dishes. AJ is always in charge of the turkey, and last year he went with Caribbean flavors. I think he used 20 lemons. This year, we decided to try brining the turkey. We'll see how it turns out. We like mashing Yukon Gold potatoes with cooked squash--the golden color is so beautiful on the plate.

But, the one Thanksgiving food area where I haven't deviated (not too much, anyway) is pies. Pies were the crown of a glorious meal at Grandma's house in Franklin. And here, the W family swept tradition under the table. Why have baked pumpkin pie when you can have pumpkin chiffon or coconut cream or raspberry silk pie? There were always a couple of baked pumpkin pies at Grandma's, but they were the only ones with a few slivers left by the time Sunday afternoon rolled around and we were getting ready to drive home. With so many people attending, it was easy to justify making 30 pies. The variety was enormous. Only the very most highly desired pies--like banana cream--were repeated.

Making pies was a ritual. I remember watching my grandma and several of her sons and daughters rolling on pie crusts on her kitchen counter. And I can't forget the large container of lard that was used as the fat in the pie crust. Because of these childhood experiences, having some pie variety on Thanksgiving is essential for me.

One of our first Novembers in New Jersey, we ate Thanksgiving dinner with a family from our ward. I volunteered to bring, among other things, some pies. That morning, I got up early and started to make pie crust. I called Franklin to solicit some advice. My mom and my grandma and all her family made it seem so easy. I finally got some crust together, but was left with a mess and lots of stress. And it just didn't taste as good as theirs, of course. The pies were pretty good, but I felt like I was failing my W family, in a sense.

When we got to our dinner locations, I found out that the host had purchased some pies!!! And some of the other pie contributors used Pilsbury pre-made refrigerated pie crusts. And they turned out to be pretty good, unlike frozen crusts that I had tried earlier. I'm sure that the W family and other highly discriminating palates could easily tell the difference, but to me, it was a revelation. My pies didn't have to be just like my family's pies.

At that point, I decided to continue the pie making, but to leave the crust making behind. I still tend to apologize about it when we bring pies somewhere. I guess it's time I stopped. Giving up the homemade crusts felt like a big concession and almost a traitorous act, but in the end, for me, I decided it just wasn't worth it. In a way, it's sad that a domestic art like making pie crust hasn't survived from their generation to me (although lots of my sisters and cousins are experts at pie crust now), but in another way, it feels like just another way that I've blending my family traditions with my own predispositions and talents. I know my pies don't taste as good as those my W family will be sharing today, but for me, they're good enough.
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Verona

There is no world without Verona walls,
But purgatory, torture, hell itself.

Hence banished is banish’d from the world,
And world’s exile is death;
--William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act III, Scene III

Verona is probably best known as the setting for Romeo and Juliet's tragic love story as immortalized by Shakespeare. But it is full of many other interesting things. I got to spend a day in Verona all by myself the day before AJ and MJ got in. C and I had planned on taking T and going together on an ITR trip, but he was still sleeping in, and we decided to let him sleep rather than waking him to go.

ITR trips are fascinating to me. ITR stands for Information, Tickets, and Reservation Office and it is a service provided to those affiliated with the military. They set up all sorts of trips, complete with bus transportation, guides, and hotels if needed and all you have to do is sign up, pay your money in dollars, and you're set to go. It is a really easy way to see the sights in a foreign country you have been assigned to live in. I can see the great service that it is, but I personally think it's "cheating." All the research, trying to decide what you want to see and do, all the travel planning are completely out of your hands. I feel a little snobbish towards those who would only choose to use ITR for their travelling.

AJ's parents have gone on a few ITR trips, but they have done A LOT of travelling on their own. On the other hand, the woman I sat next to on the bus almost only travels with ITR. She went to Provence that way. And there were several people on this trip who were planning on going to Rome over Thankgiving. (That's probably an 8-hour bus ride. UGH. Train is much better.) When we were in Italy before, we went on an ITR trip to Florence. It was a bitter cold day and a long bus ride to and from Vicenza, so we didn't get to see Florence like we wanted.

Anyway, Verona is only an hour's drive from Vicenza, so it is much more doable. I think T would have been fine on the bus, but it was sure nice to go on my own. After driving through the city, we went to the Giardino Giusti, a Renaissance era garden of a wealthy Veronese family. It seemed to be dedicated to Bacchus, as there were several statues of him around. At the top of the hill, there was a giant monster like face with its mouth open and they could light a fire inside the mouth. Supposedly, it was a place where philosophers and other thinkers gathered to talk (and party too). There were rows of tall pointed cypress (I never really knew what they looked like before) a lot of shaped hedges, and a small maze.

Then, we walked over the river and went into the main city area. We saw the Gothic tombs of several of the members of an important Veronese family, Della Scala. The three males were nicknames Cangrande, Il Mastino, and Cansignorio--Big Dog, The Mastiff, and Mr Dog. They were memorialized with big statues on pedestals.
And surrounding the area was an iron gate with each little intersection including the Scala family crest, including a symbol of a ladder or scaletta in Italian. You can't see it well in the photo, but here is the crest.
When Dante was in exile from Florence, he stayed for quite a while in Verona with Cangrande hosting him.

And of course, we went past the Romeo and Juliet sites. I saw Juliet's house the last time we were in Verona, which was a good thing because it was completely mobbed this time around. I find the great tourist attraction to this pseudo-historical site to be laughable. There is a home that would have been similar to Juliet's home, complete with balcony, which tourists come to gawk at. The name of the family that owned the home was the Cappellos, similar to Shakespeare's Capulets, which probably triggered its original link to the fictionalized Juliet. In the small courtyard, there is a statue of Juliet, and supposedly, if you put your hand on her right breast, you will have luck in love. (Ugh. What kind of horrible tradition is that? I refused to participate and I didn't let AJ either. I can't remember if he wanted to or not.) As a result, the finish on her right breast is completely worn off.

I also saw the Roman era arena. It is right off the main piazza at the entrance to Verona's city center. It doesn't have the majesty of the Colisseum, mostly because the interior was currently set up with lots of chairs and a stage--it is used during the summer season as a performance venue. AJ's parents saw a performance of a Romeo and Juliet opera there this summer. With the Colisseum, you can see all the excavated cavities under the main arena floor.
And here is a medieval bridge, the Ponte Scaligero, built by Cangrande. After the Germans blew it up, the Veronese dredged the river to salvage the masonry in order to rebuild it.

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Market Day

Tuesdays and Thursdays are market day in Vicenza. Starting around 8 in the morning, the entire piazza and up the side streets are filled with vendors hawking their wares under tents. Just the sheer logistics of getting their goods in and out of selling areas is remarkable. I love walking around, looking at all the clothes and the people who are are out shopping. There is always a good lively crowd--older women in heels and suits with perfectly coiffed hair, mothers with their babies in strollers, young people. It feels like the whole of Vicenza comes out for the market. Forget about Target or the grocery store. So much of what you need is right there. Clothes of all types, ties and scarfs, knick-knacks, kitchen pots and pans, tablecloths and blankets, plus produce, fish, cheese and flowers are all available within feet of each other. In a short time, you can gather everything you need.

I found a great bag that I have been using ever since, including our trip to Tuscany. I can sling over my chest, making it so much easier to carry that my other bag which constantly slips off my shoulder. And I got a poncho which I thought would work well for a winter pregnancy. I have been wearing it since then--it has been chilly in the mornings.

I think the picture that T took of Nana at the market is pretty good, by the way.

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Nove and Marostica

On Monday in the late morning, we made a trip over to Nove to look at the ceramics. TF took T to the zoo and playground in the area, and C and I went over to the ceramics stores. The warehouse type store is piled high with ceramics of all varieties, and I kept envisioning T running through the aisles. Happily, he was otherwise engaged. I picked up a couple of platters for gifts that I needed to give, plus a huge mosaic platter of Florence that I will put in our front room. Unfortunately, they did not have all of the colors of the chicken plates I wanted to get my mom for Christmas. I think we will go back on Monday so I can pick those up before we leave.

Then, we went over to Marostica for some lunch. T was very cranky, very contrary, but after eating, he seemed to be doing better. Marostica also has a city wall, but is unique because the wall was built up a steep hill with a castle at the top. You can see the wall in this photo. Not the best shot of the main piazza--there seemed to be cranes all over Italy. T had a great time swinging his sword around in front of the castle at the base of the hill too.

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Thiene

I enjoyed a quasi-feeling of having the day off on Sunday. On a General Conference weekend, a broadcast of the first session occurs at the church, but it doesn't take place until 6 pm. The men went over to the church at 11 to watch a taped copy of the priesthood session. But, C, T, and I went out for a walk. It was a beautiful morning and we walked over to a statue garden where a remnant of Vicenza's city wall stands. T had fun looking at the fountains, ducks, statues, and trees, and then we strolled over to a park-like area. It was very casual, very relaxing.

After lunch, we headed out to Thiene to catch the Renaissance festival we had bypassed the day before. It was exciting to see the Renaissance characters against an actual Renaissance backdrop. We saw jugglers on stilts (one of T's favorite--especially when they juggled with knives and threw them "way up high!"), men twirling flags, a whole piazza of children's games, and knights marching up and down the street. T also was excited by the knight's helmets with the plumes. But, what we mostly saw? Throngs of people. The streets were packed. I guess Sunday is family day anyway, and I'm sure the rain pushed everyone to Sunday as well. It was so so crowded. So, we didn't stay for too long. But, the highlight of the day was the procural of a knight helmet and sword (complete with sheath) for T. He was thrilled and has been thwacking at things non-stop since then. We decided to make a Renaissance dress for MJ too so they can go as lady and knight for Halloween.

We came home and again listened to conference, with a slight break from 7-7:30 for dinner. After conference was over, AJ and MJ called and it was good to talk to them. AJ asked, "So, the question of the day: did you hear Sister Beck's talk?" I guess it was during the dinner break for us, and as it turns out, I think I'm quite fortunate that I didn't have that one take me by surprise. Even AJ said there were some thing that "made my blood boil." Unusual for him. It turns out that the talk has a lot of good material, but there are a few things that I'm sure I would have been very upset by. I spent some time on Sunday night and Monday around the bloggernacle reading what (so many) people were saying about it, and I was glad not to be in the middle of it emotionally. I also discovered that the talk I had walked out of in April 2004 when I was pregnant with T was a talk by her. Hmm. I'm sure I will post my thoughts on her talk somewhat later, but for now, I'm content to enjoy the Italian fall and not let any ire ruin my mental state.

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Rainy Day

After an excellent first day, both T and I were exhausted on Saturday. For some reason, I was awake early that morning from 2 am-5 am. I'm not sure if it was the jetlag or the pregnancy induced insomnia I have occasionally experienced, but I didn't get out of bed until 10. With T, it was more like 11:30. After we finally got out of the house around 1:30, we drove over to the post so that T could get a soccer ball to play with at the park at the piazza. By the time we were done there, it was pouring rain. A heavy downpour. We waited a while to see if it would let up and then finally TF ran out for the car and we jumped in. We had planned to go to the Renaissance Festival in Thiene, but decided to postpone the trip. Good choice, because the rain didn't let up all afternoon. We ended up driving back into Vicenza the long way because of multiple detours due to the soccer game there. I guess there is no calling off an Italian soccer match. But, I got to see the outskirts of the town, and one of Andrea Palladio's (famous Renaissance architect son of Vicenza) most well known villas, which has been copied many times over.

We relaxed the rest of the day. I took a small nap in the late afternoon, and then we booted up the computer to listen to the first session of General Conference, at 6 pm.

Oh, and one thing I did in the middle of the night, as well as the previous and next day? About 10 NYT crossword puzzles from TF's "Solvable" collection.
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Citta Della

On the first morning, T slept until 12 pm, 13 hours straight. After two failed attempts to arouse me, I finally opened the shades in his room and he eventually got out of bed. That first afternoon, we took a drive with TF and C around nearby areas. Our main stop was Citta Della, whose predominant feature is a still standing medieval wall that surrounds the city. Citta Della was originally used as a garrison for solidiers whose job was to protect nearby Padova. We were able to walk around the top of the city wall, check out the guard towers, look at the niches where archers could lob arrows down upon enemies, and look at the city and moat that still has water in it. T was very interested in the replicas of knight gear--chain mail, the helmets with the nose protection, shields, spears and swords, and bows and arrows. He was anxious to show Papa the room with the knight gear (after he had relieved himself on the nearby lawn, completely independently).

I especially liked the the CAUTION sign. Doesn't the outline of a person falling disastrously encourage careful footing? For me, it did.

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Italy Adventures

T and I made it to Italy last week. The weather has been absolutely beautiful and Italy is enchanting. We are looking forward to AJ and MJ's arrival tomorrow afternoon, and I have been working on the details of our trip to Pisa, Lucca, and Florence next week.

We got into Venice about 4:30 in the afternoon. Our flight from MSP was overnight, and T slept a good amount, but I didn't--there was a lot going on for most of the flight. The women in front of me, who were missionaries travelling to Africa, were so chatty. And when the loudest one in particular wasn't talking, she was digging through her enormous bag which sounded like it was full of aluminum foil covered treats. So annoying when you're trying to sleep. Anyway, we did pretty well getting through Amsterdam. T was a trooper and in good spirits. I was happy to see C after we got our bags in Venice. She helped us to the car and then we headed home. T and I both went to bed around 11 that night--pretty good when it was only 4 pm CST.

I fell asleep instanteously, and jumped out of bed at 7 am when I heard the church bells ringing the hour. I was anxious to get out exploring Vicenza, but decided to wait for a while to either find a guide or a map. TF took me for a walk around Vicenza, and in just that little time walking very near their home, I was awed and charmed--the aromas, views, and atmosphere was breath-taking. I can't believe that this is really where they live. I'm sure that the charm wears off with time here, with their everyday stresses of dealing with parking etc, but I am in love with their city. And it's such a great way to visit Europe with kids. We use AJ's parents place as a base, where we can have quiet days. And when we want to hit the museums or places further afield, they get to stay and enjoy time with nana and papa.

This is a view through the gate of the Teatro Olympico, dating from the mid-1500's, from the first morning's walk with TF.

This is a Palladian palazzo a few minutes walk from AJ's parents house.

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