Child's Play

Memorial Day has come and gone, but it was a nice one. I joined Eric & his family - and Adele, Steve, & Ian joined us too - for a BBQ in his back yard. You could say it was a somewhat low key affair in that there were no pretentions, the food was modest as were the accomodations. But especially amongst the kids, spirts were high.

Garrett & Ethan helped participate in their own way. Garrett is the BBQ Master. He used his Hand Grenade style lighter to light the charcoal and then cooked us up a bunch of terrific hot dogs. Ethan helped shuck corn and carve up watermelon. As did Gabby and Miles.

The fun truly started once Adele, Steve, & Ian arrived though. Gabby and Miles were looking forward to Ian with great anticipation and they were not disappointed. Nor was Ian. You see, Ian is an only child. He leads a very active and productive lifestyle, but one of discipline and purpose. Eric is the sole custodian of four, on the other hand, so you can say that chaos rules. Don't get me wrong... they're good kids, but very smart and active and they have each other to bounce and enact ideas off of. More than one man can keep track of.

So you can imagine Ian's impression when he is turned loose in this environment. The first time he came up, he was a little bit isolated; especially when the Nerf Automatic weapondry was brought out. (He lives in a very passive home.) He was intrigued but did not know what to do with the exposure. Not this time though.

They played superball handball against the living room wall. They ran around on a self-administrated game of "Scavenger Hunt." I'm not sure what else they were up to, but I can tell you that the bursts of high-spirited laughter were eminating from all corners of Eric's home. When Ian was asked if he would like to be left behind to live with Eric's kids instead of coming home with Mommy & Daddy, it only took a moment's thought before he responded "yes."

I think that the situation was summed up very nicely by Adele in her Thank You e-mail to Eric later last night.

Ian especially had a great time. Apparently he was
very enthusiastic about the way your kids play. When we got home he
whined and whined that all I ever taught him to do was to sit on the
couch. I guess he forgot that this weekend he went out to dinner, to
a musical theater performance, went glow in the dark mini golfing and
got a new bicycle. Anyway, I got the impression that he much prefers
the chaos over at your house. I've got to admit, it did look awfully fun!


She's right. It did.

Beware the Bracelet... a B-B-Q Warning

Given my dessert "transgression" on Saturday night, I felt it was imperative to eat healthy on Sunday evening. But Eric was coming over. That's always cause for a celebration. And so I decided to finally clean out my BBQ of the old ashes and make dinner outside.

First I grilled the vegetables. Fresh tomatoes from the farmers market, topped by salt & pepper, Italian Bread Crumbs, fresh grated parmesan cheese, and fresh chopped green onion.
I decided to make a five-color-vegetable side dish along with the tomatoes for health reasons, but also to add bulk to the meal. Red Peppers (red), corn (yellow), carrots (orange), purple onion (purple or dark), cauliflower (white), Bok Choy (green), and Asparagus (green) were marinated in Moondance Marinade, then cooked in my grill top wok.
Once the vegetables were complete, I took chicken breasts (skinless & boneless) which I had pounded flat earlier (best to do that between two sheets of either waxed paper or Saran Wrap) and marinated in a Citrus marinade. When you pound the breasts flat, they cook faster and more even. Also, they look like bigger portions and I, for one, am likely to eat less.
All of my dogs approved of me cooking chicken.
So did I. But the one thing that I did not approve of in the process, was burning myself. I recently - on doctor's orders - added a Medic Alert bracelet as standard dress. It hadn't occured to me that it would heat up and burn my wrist. It did. And the worst part was that it got so hot that I could not get the clasp undone to take it off. Days later, I am still suffering, even though Sandy & Christiane gave me ointment that does help.

No, in the "heat" of the moment, it did not occur to me to run inside and put the bracelet under a stream of cold water. Don't bother me with the obvious - lol.