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Found on the Back: Parenting Advice

This parenting advice came out a long time ago.

Newspaper Clipping

Judging from the knit on the pants, it isn’t new. Shall we take a closer look at those pants?

Herringbone pants and Parenting Advice

It would be easy to dismiss this advice based on the pants alone. But that would be a mistake.

Also, don’t judge the parenting advice based on the quaint old-fashionedness of this little gem.

Interest in his generation and parenting advice

As you get over the phrasing, you’ll see that the actual recommendation is to talk to your child about things that they are interested in. (Or not interested in depending on your child and the suggestion of asking about school.) Novel parenting advice, huh?

This next little bit, however, gets forgotten.

Child's impression accuracy and parenting advice

I remember learning about this in English class throughout my schooling. Context clues. Your child is not going to view things through an adult perspective. They will not understand the implications of everything else going on.

Yep, I know.

I get it.

I recently spent hundreds of hours studying for and passing my CBAP exam. By this point you are asking what studying to become a Certified Business Analyst Professional has to do with ancient parenting advice. It’s ok. I’m going to explain.

When analyzing a problem to be solved, remember to look at the problem from all viewpoints. (You never know where you are going to get information that will help you in another part of your life.) Therefore, I believe all of my kids when they tell me something. So when all 3 of them run up to me to tell me the story of why my youngest is crying, I know that each and everyone is telling me the truth.

It’s their version of the truth to be sure (And frankly sometimes it is not the truth. Kids lie. It happens.) But this is when when having some experience helps.

If I only listened to my oldest, I would know that he absolutely did nothing in the entire situation and he was an innocent bystander.

Listening only to my middle child, only, I would know that his behavior was driven by his sister being “annoying”.

If I listened only to my youngest, I would know that the world was ending and that each of her brothers was the “worst brother in the world”.

Same situation. Each one of them was there. A lot of times, I either witness these interactions because I’ve either watched them or listened to them play out.

Which causes me to have my own viewpoint.

A quick PERT analysis of the situation…((Optimistic estimate + pessimistic estimate+ (4 x most likely estimate))/6) means that they all need a lecture about what their role was. Usually followed by a piece of advice to change a behavior that escalated the situation.

The advice in the article suggests using other adult’s opinions to help understand the context further.

Old or new, parenting is still parenting. I am old enough that my mom could have read this same advice. She could’ve applied it to parenting me and my siblings.

From one generation to the next, some things never change.

If you like this “Found on the Back” check out these other ones: True Crime, TV advertisement, Grocery List.

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A Poem By My Son

My middle child came up to me to me this evening and told me that he had something to read to me.  I sat in front of my computer and listened to him.  Tears started to well up in my eyes.  I asked him if and where he would like it shared.

“On your blog?” he asked tentatively.

“Of course,” I replied.

Here it is:

Bedtime Stories by Miles

In that room, among toys, and a bed,
are trapped words.  Ordinary words.
Stuck on the pages like flies on fly-
paper.  We free them.  The words
fly from my mouth, and swirl in the
air landing on every surface.  I read
my sister stories of bad cats and silly
walks and books that help you fall
asleep.  I kiss her forehead.  She hugs
me tight.  The words, at ease, come back
to the page.  With ease, my sister
Caroline
slowly
falls
to
sleep.

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Happy Blogiversary To Me!

It was one year ago today that I announced the beginning of this blog to my Facebook friends.  We’ve come a long way since that first post about Danish Puffs.  Danish Puff Dessert RecipeDo you remember those days?  It was me with a basic plan, a camera I wasn’t sure how to use, and no real knowledge about how to blog.

Just for fun, let’s get into stats.

I have published 121 Recipes to my blog:
10 Bread Recipes
4 Breakfast Recipes
40 Dessert Recipes
2 Drink Recipes
27 Main Dish Recipes
4 Preserving Recipes
1 Sauce Recipes
30 Side Dish Recipes
3 Snack Recipes

9 Worst Recipes:
  1. Egg Foo Yung
  2. Sweet and Sour Bean Combo
  3. Peach Cottage Cheese Loaf
  4. Popcorn Balls (just because I have lots of other recipes and no one really ate these)
  5. Zippy Beet Salad
  6. Swedish Ham Balls
  7. Cornmeal Scrapple
  8. Hamburger Dinner Mix (I would do this again with proper seasoning, but not as the recipe stands)
  9. Banana Cream Sponge Cookies

Top 11 favorite recipes:
  1. Kringla-I asked my family which recipe was their favorite.  This was everyone’s first answer.
  2. Hot Chicken Salad-My husband’s new favorite meal.
  3. Apple Walnut Cookies-These are delicious even after sitting the freezer for months.
  4. Bread and Butter Pickles-These are the best bread and butter pickles I’ve eaten.
  5. Banana Bread-It’s classic for a very good reason.
  6. Whiskey Slush-Could I count this as a make ahead freezer meal?
  7. Cherry Meringue Pie-This might be better than lemon meringue.
  8. Darned Good Candy-I’m feeling like I should  be making a batch again.
  9. Tropical Delight Salad-There had be a Jell-O recipe on the list and this was my oldest’s favorite
  10. Sour Cream Lima Beans-I’ve determined that most anything baked in sour cream is good, but bacon makes it even better.
  11. Hot Brandy Sauce-Thinking about it makes my mouth water.Kringla Recipe
Number of groundhogs:

1, 2,0,4,3,2,1,2,3,2 (It’s a long story)

Backlog of recipes:  51

Yep.  I have 51 recipes that I’ve made that I haven’t shared yet.  The list keeps growing.  There are still a lot of recipes to make.

Best Commenters:
  1.  Marilyn (My mom). She really is amazing
  2. Sheryl, awesome blogger and author of A Hundred Years Ago
  3. Jen Devers, supportive friend.
  4. Silver Screenings.  You already know I think she’s great.
  5. Diane Perry.  A great aunt.

Upcoming:

There are more recipes to publish.  I’m contemplating the idea of an eBook or a series of cookbooks.  I’m debating recipe contests.  I have pins to create for Pinterest.

Christmas Sugar Cookies and Peanut Brittle

Finally, I’d like to thank everyone for being so supportive of this little project of mine. A special thanks to everyone that has helped sample the food.  If anyone has sampled the recipes and would like to tell me what they think of them, please don’t hesitate to comment (Erika).  I’d love to see what you are up to in the kitchen.

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Fluffy Orange Salad and Old Movies

Ok, Silver Screenings, this one is for you.

Have you all met Silver Screenings?  I love their blog.  It’s funny and clever and does deep dives into some of my favorite old movies.  They didn’t even ask me to write this or even know that I’m doing this, but I’m sure they would appreciate it you clicked over and checked them out.  We bond over the classics.  Their stars probably ate some of the food I write about. 

Recently Ruth told me that she would love to see more Jell-O recipes.  Because I’m me, I happened to have this one ready to go in my archives.  As soon as you are done reading about this, make a nice big bowl of Jell-O and sit down and enjoy an old movie for a very vintage experience.  Just make sure your hair and lipstick are ready in case your husband comes home unexpectedly with his boss.  You know how these things work.

Fluffy Orange Salad.  It’s the hyper-pigmented fake orange creamy stuff dreams are made of.  It’s Florida sunshine and with a smattering of clouds. Light, fluffy clouds.  Let’s be honest, there is nothing healthy or wholesome about this “salad”.  It’s canned and processed and better than it should be.  I know it’s all artificial colors and flavors, but this isn’t bad stuff.  There are reduced fat and sugar options for all of the ingredients, which almost makes this qualify as health food…right?

I’m not sure exactly where great-grandma got this recipe.  Maybe it was part of a recipe exchange where they all typed out copies of their favorite recipes.  That’s the story I like.  I was intrigued by the name at the bottom “Pat Muchmore”.  My head is in a space today where I first thought perhaps someone named Pat Muchmore would do a movie with Stormy Daniels and hesitated before I Googled the name hoping for more information.  I’m guessing the 42 year old composer is not the author of this recipe, but I would like to imagine that the author of the bodice ripper is.  It’s like a novel in and of itself.  Iowa housewife secretly authors romance novels to escape her daily drudgery.

By now, I’m sure my poor mom is rolling her eyes and shaking her head at my silliness.  Let’s blame overtiredness and whiskey slush.  

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It’s Your Turn

I’ve been doing this blog thing for a while now and I’ve had this incredible freedom to basically do whatever I want.  I make the recipes I want and post them when I feel like it.  It’s been really nice.  But now I need to hear from you.

When my friend asked me for some rhubarb recipes, it gave me a renewed sense of purpose.  I got to use seasonal ingredients and made recipes that other people actually wanted to use.  I kind of liked it.

So before I do another post about a recipe that isn’t what you care about, how about commenting and letting me know what you actually want to read about.  Maybe you just really crave new Jell-O recipes.  I’ve got a million of them.  Maybe you still haven’t found the perfect cake.  I may already have it in my archives.  I still need to make that nut cake roll thing my other friend asked for, but it would be sad for me to make it and not be able to share it with her.

And just because I can, here are a bunch of pictures I took of my garden last month.  The cherry blossoms are turning into cherries, the daffodils are all gone, the celosia is bigger.

 

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Something New…

I think you all know that I feel that I found Mr. Right when I re-met my husband after originally meeting him as a teenager, but what if I told you that I think I’d also found Mr. Write?

We’d been talking about random joint projects for a while and have collaborated on game ideas and joke telling and all sorts of random hijinks.  Sometime in the next week, I will be posting a link to our hopefully fun new adventure.  It’s going to require some group participation, so I hope you are ready.  Marriage of the Year

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Where the Boys Are

Oh, Connie Francis.  Don’t you just love Connie Francis?

DocFile (25)

The song, the movie…In the age of #metoo and #timesup it seems important to explore the past to explain not only how we got here, but the emotional consequences of it.  I wasn’t really intending to go here with this post. I’m not going to spend time exploring it further, just offering up pieces of evidence that this has been a long time coming.