I’ve had another string of busy days following each other. I didn’t have Jasper last Wednesday because he was off on Emma’s family’s ski trip, but they came back Thursday, and I babysat Saturday night, so Al & Emma could have their valentines’ day. It was an easy night. I showed up a little after 5:00 and Jasper had had dinner, so we just played a bit and he went to bed at about 6:30. Then I ordered a pizza and Mark picked it up on the way over. We ate and then I asked if he wanted to grab the baby monitor & we’d go downstairs and watch TV. He decided to go home instead, so I just read until the kids came back about 9:30.
In the car on the way home from skiing
Then Sunday morning Mark & I got up and drove to the Harvard train to go to Chicago for CSO. The soloist was Sheku Kanneh Mason, a cello prodigy from the UK, who got famous outside the classical music world when he played at Harry & Meghan’s wedding. The second half piece was a symphony by Carl Nielsen that Mark said is not played much due to its difficulty. There was one part of it where the two halves of the symphony were playing different melodies and different tempos, and a lot of spots where the strings had to very very very slowly draw the bow, just enough to make a drone. They opened with Beethoven that you might be able to hear by clicking the pic – don’t know how long CSO will have the audio available. Looks like the cello piece might be on YouTube, too.
In retrospect, one thing that struck me as a little weird was Kanneh-Mason was dressed a lot more informally than the rest of the males on stage. He was wearing an open neck shirt and plain brown pants while most of the other males had on jackets and ties, and some were even in white ties. Sort of like this pic from a different show at CSO than the one we saw on Sunday afternoon, although this is a fancier shirt. He did have flashy socks on when we saw him, too.
We had brunch at Publican Quality Meats before the symphony. I got the breakfast sandwich and Mark got the butcher’s breakfast, eggs and potatoes and bacon and a sausage and toast.
Coffee while waiting for the rest
Breakfast sandwich
Monday I had Jasper because Al & Emma’s daycare was closed for Presidents’ Day. We had a fun day. First I loaded him into his chair that attaches to the kitchen counter, gave him some applesauce and yogurt for breakfast, and then he helped me make carrot cake scones, a King Arthur recipe that popped up in the cycle of pictures and recipes on my oven, and I looked up online. I made a maple glaze instead of cream cheese. I gave Jasper measuring cups and spoons to play with a bang on as I used them. I stuck the shaped scones in the freezer and baked and glazed them while he was napping. We split a scone for lunch, I tried to eat the most icing-y parts, and gave him the rest. I also cut a no-icing slice off the back of a 2nd one for him.
I know I said I’d get pic of Jasper, but as usual I only got food.
At the end of the day, we’d been sitting together again at the counter watching the new Peanuts show, Welcome Home, Franklin and he was having a cheese & teething crackers snack. Emma texted she was on the way and he was wriggling like he wanted out of the chair, so I picked him up and that got him eye level with the scones on the shelf under the microwave. He started pointing at the scones so I put some in a box for him to take home, and when I snapped the lid on he started crying. So I put him back in the chair and gave him another hunk of scone. I guess they are a success. Maybe I’ll have to make more for next week.
Tuesday I worked the election. It was really slow, because not everyone actually had anything to vote for. The Clerk said they only had 16 polling places open in the whole city, and there are usually over 100. The Ward where I worked has about 500 registered voters, but their only election was for school board, and only about 1/5 of those voters are in the school district. I worked the morning shift and when I left at 1:30, we’d had zero voters. I guess they had 2 absentee ballots to process, and one in-person voter all day. So an easy closing.
George helping me make sure the election supplies tote was all in order.
On the way home after the election, I did a little extra grocery shopping, then dinner was clean out the fridge night. There was one black bean & corn enchilada left, and I made the leftover filling into some corn tortilla quesadillas, with the last 4 corn tortillas. There were also a couple of hunks of the big sub sandwich I made last Friday when Mark & I had dinner upstairs so Pia and her friend could take over the kitchen. There was a little corn and half a red bell pepper so I made those into corn and red pepper rice. And I finally made this kale salad I’d been wanting to try.
Wednesday was my easy day. We started with a long walk to the library and Colectivo for coffee. Where we talked with a young couple with a two-month old baby. That was fun. I also made another edition of the brown butter chocolate chip cookies. This batch has Heath chips and chocolate. I made them smaller so each cookie is not such a big commitment. Kale salad to cookies, that’s life ain’t it?
