Dinner Guest #45 - The Y. Family

Sunday, November 18, 2011

Eight years ago, I laid in bed late one night in our home in Fullerton, California, while Ryan studied for his optometry exams in the next room.  All of a sudden, I was wet.  Yucky wet.

I got out of bed, water streaming down my legs, and knocked on the bathroom door.

“Ryan, I think my water just broke.”

Many hours later in a hospital down the road, our daughter Kate was born. 

This Sunday we celebrated Kate’s eighth birthday.  Or rather, all week long we celebrated Kate’s birthday.  On Friday, she brought school-approved, nutritionally acceptable treats to her class—Pirate Booty.  Saturday night, Kate went on a dinner and ice skating date with Mom and Dad.  Sunday morning, Kate woke up to a breakfast in bed of scrambled eggs, bacon, Pillsbury orange rolls, and orange juice.  Sunday night, at Kate’s request, we had the Y. Family to dinner.

Kate met one of the two Y. Family girls in kindergarten.  Several play dates, art classes, and birthday parties later, we have gotten to know this cute family better.  They fit the Canadian stereotype I discovered a few years ago:  Canadians are simply very nice, easy-going, well-mannered people.

A few days before Sunday, Kate wrote up the menu:

1. Fruit Dip with fruit
2. Roasted garlic mashed potatoes
3. Brazilian white rice
4. Feijoada

If no one else had been invited to dinner, I probably would have cooked up Kate’s request as written.  However, I wasn’t going to subject our guests to Kate’s quirky fantasy foods on their first meal at our home.  Instead, I compromised.  I served chicken enchiladas with tomatillo sauce, Feijoada, Brazilian rice, grapes, and chips with salsa, black bean dip, and hot nacho cheese dip. 

Kate does not like birthday cake, so I did pick up a traditional grocery store, wildly-decorated sheet cake for dessert.  Kate wanted apple pie.  A smarter mother would have bought a pre-made pie at Marie Calendars and called it a day.  I wasn’t that smart.  I battled with a difficult pie crust, rolling it out, scrapping the dough and starting over at least three times.   However, I ultimately prevailed and served up hot apple pie with a crumble topping and eight pink candles.  Kate was happy.

After a few hours of playing and chatting around the kitchen table, the Y. Family headed home.  I felt very lucky that they were available and willing to spend the evening with us.  I hope all of Kate’s birthdays are this easy, but I wouldn’t be surprised if next year she says,

“Mom, I want a BIG birthday party!”

Dinner Guest #44 - The J. Family

Sunday, November 11, 2011

Last February on a sunny Saturday afternoon at the local playground, I decided to teach Kate one of my childhood gymnastic maneuvers:

SKIN THE CAT

I hung from a metal bar with straight arms, brought both legs up and through into an inverted position and dropped to the ground.  It wasn’t a pretty, Olympic performance, but not bad for an old Momma.  Kate quickly mimicked my movements, but dropped unexpectedly onto her wrists and cried out,

“I’m in pain!”

Just by the way Kate was holding her wrist, I knew this was no ordinary bump or bruise.  Several waiting-room hours later, we left the Urgent Care office with x-ray films and a big white puffy splint wrapped around Kate’s wrist and forearm.  Unfortunately, the physician and radiologist could not agree whether Kate had broken a bone or not.

Lucky for us, we consulted our friend, neighbor, and hand surgeon:  Dr. J.  Not only did he recognize  the crumbled wrist bone on Kate’s x-ray, the following week, Dr. J. treated us like royalty in his office.  Kate loved her pink cast and still keeps the smelly, signed carcass in her bedroom drawer.

This Sunday we had Dr. J., his wife Mrs. J., and their three beautiful children to dinner.  I served garlic chicken pasta, sweet potato casserole, green beans, parmesan rolls, and grapes.  Ryan deserves the IRON CHEF award for the three days he spent making homemade ice cream for dessert.    He made two flavors:  chocolate peanut butter cup and vanilla Heath Bar swirl.  During the final countdown of ice cream churning, we weren’t sure if the pesky batter was going to freeze sufficiently, so I threw together a batch of lemon bars as a back-up. 

During dinner, Dr. J. and Ryan talked about nerdy, non-fiction books on economics while the kids secretly played with their food at the card table next to us.  My favorite point of the evening was discovering Jack, Rock, and the J. Family’s oldest son crouching behind Jack’s bed with swords in hand as they hid from the girls.

It’s hard to appropriately thank a doctor for healing one of your child’s bones.  When the cast came off, Kate made Dr. J. a card and delivered some goodies to his office.   For our family’s first broken bone, it was a relatively smooth and easy experience.  However, we hope, for our bones’ sakes, we only have to see Dr. J. again for good times OUTSIDE the office.

Dinner Guest #43 - The C. Family

Sunday, November 4, 2012

It took several years, but I finally accepted that I will not have any more children.  I will never be pregnant again, wake up in the middle of the night to give a newborn baby a bottle, or change my child’s diaper.  However, I often find myself joking with friends,

“If someone handed me a baby, I’d take it in a second.”

From time to time, I meet small children who have a similar look to mine:  blond hair, blue eyes, and fair skin, and I think,

“Oh, I’ll take him.”

That’s how I feel about Hayden.  He’s an adorably cute boy in Rock’s primary class who looks like he could easily fit into our family.  He and Rock even act very similar.  They both like to make scary faces by pulling down on their cheeks and exposing the red interior of their lower eye lids. 

This Sunday we had Mr. and Mrs. C. and their three sons, Dane, Cade, and Hayden to dinner.  We have attended the same church as the C. family for several years.  Our children are similar ages and go to the same elementary school.  This past baseball season, we have run into the C. Family at the local little league fields on many Saturdays. 

For dinner I served Swiss Chicken, mashed potatoes mixed with Boursin herb cheese, sweet potato casserole, roasted green beans, and grapes.  For dessert, we ate pumpkin pie.

Before the C. family arrived, I made sure that we had plenty of “boy” toys set out to play with.  I knew a family of boys would not be digging into the princess dress-up chest.    After dinner the kids played with our five-lane matchbox car racetrack and chased each other around the house.  Ryan enthusiastically talked Las Vegas mobster books with Mr. C.  The low point of the evening occurred when Jack slipped and smashed his lip and teeth into the hard tile floor.  Screaming and bleeding, I had to whisk him into my bedroom, shut the door, and calm him down.

I’m pretty sure the C. family is not going to let me keep Hayden.  I didn’t dare ask such a ridiculous question.  He obviously went home with his family at the end of the night.  And the truth is, I am comfortably overwhelmed with my own three children.  My primary goal these days is to do the best I can with the ones I got.   Maybe someday, I’ll get to hold my newborn

GRANDCHILDREN!

Dinner Guest #42 - Mr. and Mrs. G.

Sunday, October 28, 2012

When I meet parents of teenagers, I often find myself thinking,

“That’s me in 10 years.”

Our neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. G., sent their son Neil off to college this past fall.  Their daughter Sara is 17 and will follow the same path in a few years.  Mr. and Mrs. G. are close to becoming empty-nesters.

This Sunday, Mr. and Mrs. G. came to dinner.  I served “Swiss Chicken,” a casserole-type dish made of boneless chicken breasts, swiss cheese, and cream of chicken soup, topped with stuffing.  In addition, I made a broccoli and mushroom salad, sweet potato casserole, and corn pudding from recipes I found in the Real Simple magazine my husband brought home from his office.  Mrs. G. brought grapes for the kids.  For dessert, I served pumpkin pie.

Outside of a casual “hello” at church, we rarely see Mr. and Mrs. G.  However it’s comforting to know we have friends just a few houses away.  I would have no problem asking Mr. and Mrs. G. for help if I needed it.  A few times, Mrs. G. looked at our kids and said,

“It goes by so fast.”

I’m sure she is right. 

However, it’s hard to grasp that my beautiful, energetic children who fall to the floor in cries and moans when I ask them to brush their teeth and scream when I trim their toenails, these same angel-demons who I look at and say under my breath,

“TEN more years, and you are out of here!!!”

will really be gone someday. 

And then, as Mr. and Mrs. G. have warned, I will walk by their empty bedrooms and cry because I miss them.  I appreciate friends like Mr. and Mrs. G. who remind me to enjoy this precious time with my children.  They help me to remember author Gretchen Rubin’s wise saying on parenting,

“The days are long, but the years are short.”

Dinner Guest #41 - The Uncles

Sunday, October 12, 2012

Marrying into a family of all boys took some getting used to--especially coming from a family of mostly girls.  Growing up in the Potter Home, no one EVER joked, referred to, or dare uttered the word penis at the dinner table.  After marrying Ryan, for many years, it seemed that we couldn’t have a Peterson family dinner without some reference to the male appendage.

This past weekend, my husband had the chance to spend a “boys weekend” with his three brothers.  They ate, watched movies, ate some more, watched college football, and laid out on their parents’ brown sectional like teenage boys.

On Sunday, the Uncles came to dinner:  Uncle Devo, Uncle Steve and Uncle Brad.  I got to experience a glimpse of the joy of cooking for hungry men.  No one counts calories, claims to be a vegetarian, or eats like a bird.  Everything gets eaten.

I cooked a Chicken Alfredo bow-tie pasta sprinkled with crisp bacon, spinach salad, sweet potato casserole, grapes, roasted green beans, and blueberry pie.  In turn, the Uncles brought me a box of pure Heaven:  one pound of See’s Nuts & Chews.  I knew once the box was opened, that I would not rest until they were finished, so I gladly shared my favorite chocolates with everyone before they made permanent residence on my thighs. 

My favorite part of the dinner was watching my children play with their Uncles.  Usually, the Uncles come accompanied with so many cousins that my kids could care less about adults.  However, in the absence of other children, Jack and Rock climbed in their Uncles' laps, played with their iPhones, and tossed balls back and forth.  Kate walked around with my camera and took pictures of everyone.

Shortly after dinner, the 2012 boys weekend ended.  Uncle Devo had to start his road trip back home to Utah.  Uncle Brad and Uncle Steve were headed to the airport to return to their families in Arizona.  After 13 years of marriage, the family dinner conversation with the Uncles has changed.  These are now married, working men with homes and bills and families they must provide for.  I can’t remember all the table topics, but this I know for sure:

No one mentioned the “P” word.