wacky wednesday - piano blues

I begged, pleaded and made deals with my parents for over a year before they finally realized my "request" for a piano was not a passing whim. A friend of the family had an old piano they weren't using and my parents borrowed it thinking I would give it up in a few months like my older sister had with the guitar. I didn't care that the piano was old and scratched up. It was a real piano and I could play it to my heart's content!

I started taking piano lessons that summer from an "older lady" (she was probably in her 40's... I was ten...) who lived a few miles from our house. My mother didn't drive then so I had to ride my bike to and from her house once a week. It was hot but I didn't care. I loved learning to play using both hands and even my feet sometimes! And, seriously, I didn't mind practicing... ever.

I played for a couple of years until our friends wanted their piano back. I was sad to see it go but by that time I was also playing the flute in band. There are only so many practice hours in a day! However, learning to play piano is something that engages your mind like nothing else does as you read two lines of music simultaneously with your eyes while playing them with your hands. I feel fortunate to have been able to learn to play and although I cannot play very well now, I don't regret the hours spent practicing as a child. 

As a parent, I wanted to have a piano in our house. In fact, when we bought our house, I had a spot in mind for the piano. Unfortunately, a piano wasn't in our budget and our daughters were busy with other activities, including music through high school - one played the clarinet and the other played the violin. 

Years after the kids grew up and left our home, we unexpectedly got a piano. Friends of ours needed a place to store an extra piano and asked if we knew anyone who had room and would be willing to do that. I jumped at the chance to finally have a piano again and have enjoyed "fiddling around" on it.

I recently read several articles in major newspapers reporting that piano stores across the nation are closing due to lack of sales. The best year for new piano sales in the United States was 1909 when more than 364,500 new pianos found homes. In recent years, that number has dropped to less than 40,000 annually. 

There are several factors playing into the decrease in piano sales but the primary reason is fewer kids are learning to play, an indicator of a changing society. People are more interested in things that don't take much effort so playing an hour a day to learn piano is not what kids want to do. Computer technology has changed what kids are interested in. Fiddling around with a digital keyboard is fun, learning to play piano correctly is not. 

Things like smaller homes, emphasis on youth sports (rather than music studies), larger number of latch-key children and children who split their time between two parent's homes also contribute to fewer kids taking up the piano.

Despite the many reason for not playing the piano, two of our sweethearts LOVED playing "our" piano when they visited last fall! It is a joyful noise! It makes me sad, though, that pianos won't be readily available for other children to learn to play.

wacky wednesday - progress???

Paper grocery bags (the kind without handles) used to be the norm. After carrying their groceries home, people used the paper bags for all kinds of things - to line their trash cans, carry books to the library, make Halloween costumes for their kids and book covers for text books, to name a few. 

Then plastic grocery bags came on the scene and were lighter, supposedly stronger and didn't kill trees. Although grocery stores still carried both - remember being asked, "Paper or plastic?" by the bagger? - the clear implication was to save the trees and use plastic. Apparently saving trees was a higher priority to the environmentalists than the pollution from using petroleum and chemicals to make the plastic bags.

Eventually grocery stores had the brilliant idea of selling reusable cloth or coated plastic grocery bags with their logo and brand information imprinted on them. That's right, consumers paid for bags to carry the groceries they just purchased home and, at the same time, advertise for the grocery stores. 

The reusable cloth bags remained popular with some folks but most didn't want to bother with washing the bags when they became soiled and went back to plastic. But plastic was okay because the bags were now recycled and made into new bags. And we're still saving trees.

Or at least we were until the ten-foot long receipts came along. 

I think Brian Crane who draws the comic Pickles is spot on in his October 20, 2014 comic. And it made me chuckle! The receipts could be upcycled!

        PICKLES by Brian Crane

wacky wednesday - tomato, tomahto

Our North Carolina sweethearts and their parents are coming to visit us this summer. When I asked if there was anything special they would like me to make while they are here, our daughter immediately requested an old family favorite... manicotti... and her husband quickly agreed.

The recipe has been handed down from generation to generation. I got it from Nona (you remember my mother-in-law, right?) who got it from her mother-in-law (my husband's grandmother whom I never had the pleasure of meeting) who got it from her mother. It may have gone back farther but Nona only knew for certain it went back to her grandma-in-law. So my grandchildren will be eating manicotti made from a recipe from their great-great-great-grandma. Wow!

Nona and I made manicotti together at least a half dozen times. It took that many times for me to get a written recipe with accurate measurements rather than "some of this" and "a little of that."

Nona wrote the recipe on a piece of paper one time we made them. Although I keep a typed copy on my computer, I always use the hand-written one when I make manicotti - it's like she's with me.

Many people buy dried manicotti tubes in the pasta section of their grocery store, cook them and then fill them. Our family recipe starts with making the pasta which is really more like a crepe when it's cooked.

After years of practice I can get my "crepes" to be almost circular. But that was not always the case. At first some were long and skinny and others had a thin, finger-like projection coming out of them. Seriously, it's not as easy as it looks! But Nona never laughed, she just said, "Try again, you'll get it soon!"

I have many happy memories of us working and laughing together so it is only natural that I would think of her every time I make them. As I was making the "crepes" I remembered Nona, who was Jewish, telling me she learned to make blintzes - which are essentially crepes - from her mother. Hmmm. Before long I had made 38 "crepes" - about a third of what I will eventually need this summer.

Once the "crepes" had cooled, it was time to fill them. This process takes over my entire counter as I portion out the filling and then readjust if I run short or have extra left over. As I filled them, I was reminded of making enchiladas - a very similar concept and process. And, really, isn't a corn tortilla similar to a crepe or a blintz?

I could almost taste the gooey, stringy deliciousness these will become once they are cooked and covered with sauce!

The final step is rolling the "crepes" creating a tube-like pasta that is already filled. This step reminded me of Chinese Spring Rolls because the trick is to "make them snug but not so snug they tear!" Have you ever gotten a Spring Roll that split?

After they are rolled, they get stacked between sheets of waxed paper on a tray, wrapped with plastic wrap and then put in the freezer for a day or two. After they are completely frozen, I put them in a ziploc bag and pop them back in the freezer. I can then pull out as many or as few as I need at a time.

As I was cleaning up (you can imagine the mess on my counter!) I began thinking about ethnicities and food. It seems ethnicities and cultures, although very different in many ways,  have commonality in some of their foods. A Jewish blintz, French crepe, Italian manicotti, Mexican enchilada and Chinese spring roll are all basically a flat starchy substance rolled with a filling in the center and served with a sauce of some sort. The flavors are very different, but the concept is the same. 

You say potato, I say patahto.

wacky wednesday - breakfast with sweetheart number 4

When we were in North Carolina in December, we took each of the boys to breakfast one by one. (breakfast with the boys) I visited the sweethearts a couple of weeks ago and it was Lexie's turn to go to breakfast.

Part of the fun is the anticipation and deciding where to go. Every time I talked to Lexie on the phone in the weeks leading up to my visit, we talked about going to breakfast. And every time we talked about it, her restaurant choice changed. I couldn't wait to find out the final answer!

Lexie (age 7) chose Dunkin' Donuts for her breakfast outing. She was so excited that the first words out of her mouth when she woke up were, "Can we go to breakfast NOW?????" After getting dressed and getting directions, we were off. On the drive there, I asked her how many donuts she wanted. Her quick, no hesitation response was "THREE!" And she also wanted coffee.

I convinced her to start with two donuts with the promise that she could get another one if she wanted it after she ate the first two. The woman at the counter took our order and made Lexie "special coffee" (a little coffee with warm milk and sugar).

She chose a bar-height table and we sat down to eat breakfast and chat. She read all the signs on the walls and windows to me. Then we got down to business. She likes playing with her friends and reading the best at school. Frozen is her favorite movie and it's Elsa over Anna all the way because "she sings the good songs and she's so pretty!"

By this time Lexie had finished her two donuts and wanted a third. I encouraged her to go up and order her donut herself but she wanted me to do it. As I watched her sitting at the table while I went up to the counter, she reminded me very much of her mother as a child - kicking her legs against the chair and smiling at the other customers. Sigh. They grow up so fast.

Lexie celebrated her seventh birthday the week before our breakfast. She insisted she felt "older" when she woke up on her birthday and she might even be a little taller. But other than that, being seven was about the same as being six. I asked her old she thought I was and she said, with absolute certainty, "39!" YES!!!

The donuts and coffee were gone and it was time to go. As we drove home I was already looking forward to the next time she and I will go to breakfast, wondering what things we'll talk about then. One thing I know for certain - kids like to talk, especially when someone is listening.

wacky wednesday - should we or shouldn't we?

For the past six or seven years I have wanted a gas-burning fire pit for our patio. It would be relaxing to sit with my sweet husband around the fire pit gazing at the stars as we talk about our day. It would be fun to invite friends over for Happy Hour around the fire pit. We could make s'mores. The sweethearts could roast hotdogs on a stick.

But no matter what idyllic scene I conjured up, my sweet husband put the kibosh on it. It would just take up room. We wouldn't use it (remember the stationary bike?). Propane ones are expensive. It's too hot for one most of the year.

But I am not one to give up so easily.

I found directions for making one on Pinterest (that plethora of ideas and directions or huge time-waster, depending on your point of view!) and purchased the supplies. Total cost - $15 and change.
It took me less than half an hour to put it together.

And voila, we had a fire pit!

Okay, it's small (only about eight inches by six inches) and sits on a table. But it roasts marshmallows for s'mores. And provides great ambiance. It doesn't take up much space and is easily portable. The cost was certainly not "expensive." We can use it year-round, even in the hot summer after a night-time swim.

Problem solved.