The Story of Lasagna, Pizza Bread and Feeding Kids

I grew up on an acre of land in New York.  The property had many, many deciduous trees scattered throughout.  They were mostly oak with a cluster of sassafras and birch trees.  The fall foliage was incredible - but then the leaves came down.  Somewhere along my childhood my mother invented a social event: the leaf raking party.  She made lasagna while we invited friends over to rake leaves.  The yard was done in half the time and then everyone would gather around the table for a delicious dinner.  That definitely left an impression on me, mostly that if you offer to feed teenagers and young adults they will come out of the woodwork.

These days I have a much, much smaller yard and a lawn mower that picks up the trimmings.  This definitely frees up our Saturdays so we can take in a little college football.  This past weekend we had the opportunity to see a Duck football game and then visit with Emily for a bit. Since the game was over by late afternoon, we planned to bring some groceries to her house and cook a quick meal for her and her friends.

To give you an idea of where Emily lives, she is in a house with 44 other young women.  This house has a brother house with 28 young men living there.  Given that there is usually a cook on premise during the week you can imagine the size of the kitchen.  The kids are on their own for meals on the weekend, so we figured we might be feeding more than our own children Saturday night.  We asked Emily for a meal suggestion and she came up with pizza bread, an easy recipe my sister-in-law gave me when we started hosting team dinners.  So John had made up six batches of pizza dough that could rise while we were at the football game.  We tossed the other ingredients in a cooler, along with salad fixings.

After the game we made it back to the house and began to unload the coolers.  This cooking area is set up so a counter spans the length of the kitchen.  This counter has about ten stools where the kids can sit and look into the work area while eating or talking.  Once we had assembled the pans and cutting boards, we went to work.  Three of us rolled out the dough balls and began to assemble the loaves.  Kids started to congregate and socialize, partially out of curiosity about these parents cooking away, partially because of the marinara smells wafting in the air.  Emily would greet them all, make introductions and invite everyone to stick around and try some pizza bread.  Once all the loaves were out of the oven I had to make a decision: do we set the dining room table and invite everyone to join us?  Should I simply bring the platters to the counter where all had assembled and forgo my vision of a family-style dinner?  Looking at the group I decided to simply serve at the counter and keep it casual.  I feared we might lose a few in the transition to the dining room.  So we set out bowls of marinara for dipping and plates of sliced pizza bread.  I took a spot along the counter and listened to the stories the kids told, met some new gals and a few of the guys, and simply took in all the energy.  It was not the meal I planned per se, it was even better.

The older I get, the wiser I realize my mother was when raising me.  She knew if you cook a meal for young adults, make extra.  She also knew that if you want to know what is going on your child's life, invite a bunch of his or her friends over and simply listen.  Somewhere along the way I lost count of how many we fed that night, but I know stories were told and we laughed a lot.  So I continue to apply the things my mom taught me: hospitality is another word for love and when it comes to feeding young adults, cook a lot of food.  We didn't have to rake leaves this weekend, but the tradition of feeding the kids and their friends continues.

I Hate Shopping

I do not find joy in shopping.  It doesn't matter if it is shopping for food, clothes or cowboy boots,  "Retail Therapy" in not in my vocabulary.  I often try to bribe one of my children to go food shopping with me just to make the experience a little more pleasant.  There is probably one exception to this rule of mine and that is if the shopping means I get to spend time with someone I care about, then I will make the sacrifice.

I remember the days of going to Toys R Us
and getting all the gifts for the children.
I didn't realize how easy that was at the time!

Now, you might think this next fact is totally contradictory to the above statement, but hear me out.  I enjoy Black Friday.  I am sure most of you just cringed with that thought, but let me explain.  When the kids were little I could get up at 4am, do all the Christmas shopping and still be back by breakfast.  In those days I longed to do anything by myself, especially since that meant I did not have to contend with the three car seats while listening to Disney songs on the radio, so it worked.  As each of the kids hit middle school age, they began to join me on this annual expedition.  At first I thought, "ugh, now I can't buy their gifts!"  Soon I realized that at the same time they showed interest in joining me, their Christmas list desires usually meant buying them one gift rather then the little things I used to  pick out.  And so it began, a morning in which all three kids willingly wake up before dawn to join me for Black Friday.

Keep in mind, the part about shopping that I like is spending time with people.  We now have a system down pat in which all three kids participate.  We start by making out our strategies after all the Thanksgiving festivities are done.  We each make a list of what we need to buy to eliminate impulse shopping.  Emily prints out the store maps detailing where the items we are interested in are located.  Jack and Smyth help me scan the circulars in Thursday's newspaper and making lists.  Once we have gathered all our data, we make a plan.  So for me, the enjoyment of Black Friday begins with the team work the night before.  The kids each figure out their Christmas budgets and make their lists of people to buy for, all the while I listen carefully to see what each really wants this year.

Research and strategy, together as a team.
That is the part I enjoy!

We view Black Friday as a competitive event in a way.   We aren't competing again each other, but the preparation and execution of Black Friday is like training for a football game.  We don't necessarily go out and practice, but we do come up with something close to a playbook and study it carefully.  We itemize the "plays" in order of importance and scarcity and then commit the strategy to paper.  This preparation part is the key to me enjoying the morning.  Sitting around the table with the kids figuring out the plan of action all the while enjoying the side bar conversations, that is the best part.

Once we are out the door, we operate like a well oiled machine.  We know what to expect at each store so we put our plans into action.  Sometimes that involves having someone immediately grab an empty cart and stand in line while the rest of us scurry about the store grabbing the items on our list.  We use our cell phones to track each other's where abouts and meet back to unload at the cart.  We will rotate out who stands in line so everyone gets a turn shopping.

Teamwork gets us through our list efficiently, with the
goal of not having to go back to the malls between now
and Christmas.

Oddly enough I am at the point where I don't need to go out on Black Friday since the kids typically want specific items.  Yet I find myself wanting to be part of the process just to be with them.  We have made it a bit of a tradition and end up telling stories about it throughout the year.  So when I say "I hate shopping" I really need to clarify that I only hate mundane or pointless shopping, because apparently I have a like for waking up at pre-dawn hours and joining the masses for the busiest shopping day of the year - but with some great company.  And if I played my cards right, I will not have to go out Christmas shopping for another 364 days, and that thought makes me very happy.

Family Traditions

Just the kids on Christmas Eve...
too many adults to get in one picture!

I have always been intentional about creating “family traditions.”  We moved away from our immediate family, which meant we had to come up with things that could morph into traditions.  Some have worked, such as inviting anyone from church who didn’t have a better plan, to come to our house for Christmas Eve.  Other attempts at creating a family tradition have not fared as well, such as waiting until Easter to color eggs because the week before was too busy.  Nothing like having the house smell like vinegar, clothes stained and everyone’s fingers a weird shade of purple just as company arrives.  Lesson learned.

My children are all teenagers now, which poses it’s own set of challenges, but I have noticed how some of the traditions have become important to them.  For several years we invited friends over on Halloween for a chili dinner, followed by some trick or treating.  When the kids returned to the house, they set up this elaborate inventory and trade event.  A few years ago I wasn’t feeling well and wanted to bag the whole thing.  My daughter looked at me in disbelief and said, “make a list of what needs to be done and I will take care of it.”  Mind you, I wasn’t canceling Halloween I simply didn’t want to entertain.  The next thing I know the house was sort of clean and she made me a shopping list.  Clearly she wasn’t letting go of this tradition.

Our Annual Labor Day at
Cannon Beach tradition

Two years ago I booked a white water rafting trip down the Deschutes.  Needless to say we had a blast.  This past year I asked the kids if they wanted to do it again to which one of my boys said, “It’s tradition.”  I didn’t realize doing it once made it tradition – but I will go along.  Really any day in which we are all together and they get a long sounds like a dream come true.

Recently a friend told me my son was over at her house hanging out with her son.  After a while my son got up and said he was heading home because his family was “doing something fun” so had to go.  I have no idea what exactly he was referring to, but I like the idea that he felt an urge to come home and spend time with his family.  They might groan when I tell them not to make plans on a certain day so we can have family time, but part of me thinks they actually appreciate it. 

For years the annual Christmas Tree Hunt
ended when someone was in tears.
Somewhere along the line they learned
the fine art of compromise.

This all sounds rather Norman Rockwell-ish, because I can gloss over the time we went on a camping trip without Emily’s bag.  She was left to sort through the boys’ extra clothes and call it good.  Or there was the time when the kids were little and we were on a road trip through California when we suddenly realized Emily’s Pocahontas sleeping bag flew off the top of the car.  Bad things didn’t always happen to Emily though.  We took an extended trip to the east coast one summer and somewhere along the line lost Jack’s special blanky.  Imagine a preschooler on a long vacation without his most precious belonging.  Or there was the time the kids were all working with John in the garden when we noticed Smyth was eating the food scraps in the compost pile.  So you get the idea that not everything we do turns out well.

 I wonder now that we have one away in college if traditions like pumpkin picking and Christmas tree hunting will continue?  Will these traditions morph as they kids get older or will they want to cling to the way we have done them in the past?  Time will tell what traditions we keep, but I know with certainty that I want the kids to have grown up with certain constants in their lives.  So many things around us change, but I hope they have the sense that it doesn’t matter precisely how we did it, but that we did it as a family.