Water in the Park, and a Recipe

It was a bright sunny day today, so the kids tried out the wading pool at Memorial Park nearby. Evidently we weren't the only ones who thought it was the perfect day for playing in the water - it was crowded! But the kids had a wonderful time. Can you spot J here?

We'd brought some water toys for the kids, so it was a good lesson in sharing and taking turns, with all the kids there. Apparently, they didn't use to allow any toys in the wading pool, but no one stopped us today, so it was ok. What's the fun without any toys?



We brought a picnic out for lunch too but E was only interested in the grapes. When J was in the water and I asked him if he wanted any food, he said "I'm having fun now, Mum." Like that was the silliest question to ask. Anyway, he did make it a point to remind us not to finish up all the food, so he'd have some too!

We've also discovered Quaker's Granola Bites - and the kids and K love it!!! Here's E, quietly sitting at the sofa, enjoying her bowl of granola bites.

I've been catching a lot of Rachel Ray on TV - she's quite big here, and is most famous for making 30-minute meals (meaning she makes an entire meal, inclusive of food preparation time, in 30 minutes)! Every time J sees her show on TV, he tells me "Your favourite show, Mum!" So tonight, I tried out a recipe I caught on TV some time ago, with a few modifications (Rachel Ray's original version didn't have the shrimp, and she used broccolini). I'm putting the recipe here, just so I don't forget it and can replicate it again later. K and I loved it!


Pasta with ricotta-sauce, sauteed shrimp and broccoli.

1. Cook pasta according the package instructions. Just before draining, reserve about half a cup of pasta water.
2. Sautee shrimp and broccoli in extra-virgin olive oil and butter. Season with salt, a little pepper, a pinch of sugar and some dried basil. (Yum already.)
3. To make the sauce, mix about a tsp or two of thyme, lemon zest, juice from one lemon (or maybe less? Taste and see), about half a tub of ricotta, a couple of small handfuls of grated parmesan-romano and about a quarter cup of the reserved pasta water. Toss everything (the shrimp, broccoli and pasta) in the sauce. If it's too dry, just add a little more pasta water. To serve, top with more grated parmesan-romano and chopped fresh parsley. (I left out the lemon this time, cos we didn't have any. I forgot to buy from the supermarket, and the lemons on our tree weren't ripe yet. But K and I both agree that the lemon will give the meal an additional lift.)



Yum Yum Yum! K and I loved it. Rachel Ray rocks. J didn't like the broccoli, of course. And E ate only broccoli and some shrimp (no pasta). For the kids, a meal in parts.

Ok, so this isn't the best picture of it, but it was near the end of the meal. I had, once again, forgotten to take my camera out earlier. It's tough to remember when you have two kids at the dinner table asking (or yelling) for different things. E always salivates at the sight of broccoli so she's yelling for us to give her some, while J insists that he won't eat it and is whining for us to take it off his plate.

We Are Cooking!

It's been a while since a new post! K was busy last week with a pretty big paper, so we kept a low profile. It was a pretty quiet week.

The kids have had water play outside all week. What will we do when the cold weather comes?


Some random updates:

1. The good news - E slept through the night two nights ago. For the first time in more than a month! The bad news - she woke up at 6.30am and was ready for the day. 6.30am! It was super bright already by then.

2. We went down to the LA Farmer's Market again on Saturday so that I could attend a cooking class at Sur La Table: Summer Pies and Tarts. I forgot to bring the camera along, but I've just recreated a Mixed Berry Galette at home today. Pie crust from scratch. It's not perfect... but it's from scratch. And yes, it's supposed to look rustic.

3. J had his first taste of cooking. Well, preparing food, at least. K promised him he could help make meatballs, so he was really excited. And as K was getting everything ready, he was running around, chanting, "We are cooking! We are cooking!". So here he is, making meatballs. His are on the yellow tray. (Ok, so they're not quite balls, but who cares.)

4. 9 days and counting. Yay! We've seen the longest stretch of cooking and having dinner (and most lunches) at home. We've never had to cook so often before, but eating out here is not only quite expensive, the food's not all that great either. Food courts here are bleah. And with E, it's lots easier to eat at home even though it means a huge clean-up afterwards.

5. We checked out the Rancho Santa Ana Botanical Gardens today, just a five-minute drive away. J insisted on getting a green rubber lizard at the gift shop. It appears we are at that stage of a boy's life already, when he's fascinated with creepy crawlies. He says it's a good lizard because it eats mosquitoes and flies. And he decided it was a girl lizard and named it Ammam.

Conversations in Pilates Class

I've managed to attend pilates sessions quite regularly. It's been interesting talking and listening to the ladies and instructors there. Some recent conversation topics:

1. Jury duty - apparently you get called up for jury duty about once a year here. And some people, like my instructor, don't like it at all, cos it's just takes up time and she'd rather be working. Another lady in my class was looking forward to serving hers though. Since juries are an alien concept in Singapore, it was quite interesting to meet people who do serve on them. My instructor was dismissed from jury duty just a few days ago - some case about a superintendent who brought a knife to school!

2. Self-defence - the ladies talked about this today too, like how they never park beside vans (so as to avoid being abducted), and how they walk with their keys held facing out (so as to inflict more damage if attacked), and how they (well, one of them) only goes for walks with her dog (for protection). It's a reminder of how much more unsafe this country is. I was just reading an article about a boy who was snatched while he was playing on the street outside his home! At church, before we leave the kids at Sunday School, we have to sign them in, get name-tags for them and corresponding tags that we're supposed to show before we can pick them up. And at J's summer camp application form, we had to put down a password that we have to give to the camp counsellor before picking him up. It's kinda creepy, but I appreciate the precautions.

3. It doesn't seem like it, but this is a country at war. There are small reminders though. I've met a lady whose son is serving in the military in Iraq. And in some of the neighbouring towns, there are banners along the roads that salute and name people from that town who are serving in the military. When we were at the Shamu show at SeaWorld, they called for members of the military (past and present), people who had family members in the military, and people from countries allied to the US, to stand up, and gave them an ovation. One of the ladies in my pilates class said that after 911, she took out all her nice crystal and china and started using them. It's pretty sobering. 911 happened to this country, and these people. It makes real what we read in the papers and see on the news.

Current Faves

E's current faves: Corn on the cob, fried chicken and most of all, feeding myself. Imitating Kor kor as much as I can, even holding onto a car as I fall asleep, just as Kor kor does.


She cried and cried when I tried to feed her dinner yesterday, and it took me forever to figure out that she wanted to feed herself. Once she's set her mind on something, there's no changing it. So this is the glass half full - she's learning to feed herself a lot earlier than J ever did. And making more of a mess of the floor than J did too.

She wants everything he has, so I always have to have two of everything. Two cups of apple juice, two cups of milk, two bowls of fruit.

J's current faves: Herbie Fully Loaded. Climbing trees.

We just rented the movie this evening and he was rapt! He loved watching the racing cars. And I think he was actually rooting for all the cars apart from Herbie because they looked like real racing cars, and Herbie didn't. After watching, he was so inspired, he insisted on having a car race with his toy racing cars.

The weather over the past couple of days has been great, much cooler than it was last week. Unfortunately, it looks to be only a brief respite, it'll get hotter by the weekend. Anyway, we took advantage of the nice weather to bring the kids out to Memorial Park nearby around 7-plus this evening, where we caught a children's concert.

But as you can see, J was more interested in climbing trees. Proof that he's a city boy: he calls out "help me, help me" the WHOLE time.

I've been trying really hard to think of ways to keep J occupied - school doesn't start until early September, so we have a couple of months to go! We just managed to sign him up for summer camp at the Claremont Club nearby - it'll be a half-day programme for a week in July and a week in August. Still more than a week to go before the July camp starts though. At least he'll have Herbie to occupy him over the next couple of days.

Another Goodbye

K's parents left for home today.

We sent them to the airport this morning. This time, J was quite distracted with a new toy that they had gotten for him, one that he had wanted for quite a while, so it didn't quite sink in that they were leaving then. It did sink in later though. He was much quieter and more subdued today. At dinner time, he morosely put his head in one hand. When I asked him what was wrong, he said he missed Ah-ma and Kong-kong.

And even though E is so young, it does seem to register with her too. She was more cranky than usual, especially around mealtimes. Maybe she felt the loss more because K's parents clearly weren't at the dining table with us.

Poor babies. They miss their grandparents. And K and I do too!

The Getty

K had a field trip to the Getty Center today, as part of one of his courses. So we tagged along too. We went to the Family Room, which is basically a series of small cubicles for kids to do their thing. They got to make animal masks (J's in a lion mask below), lounge on a French renaissance-style bed, play with a bunch of tubes to make a sculpture, and trace pictures of different insects.

You have to admit - J's doing a really good job of lounging.

In between, the kids had to entertain themselves somehow, so they discovered pole-dancing. All by themselves. My kids - pole-dancing at the Getty. Bet no one else can say they've done that there.

This is the first time we've tried to bring the kids to a museum. It wasn't really a success, I have to admit. I brought J into a room of French tapestries, and all he kept asking me was "What can I do, Mum?" Still, the Getty is beautiful architecturally, and has lovely gardens.

Baby tomato update: This one lone fruit was all that survived the onslaught of the squirrel. K, being the gardener, had the honour of eating it. He reports that it was sweet!

The Pilferer

So we were away for just three days. And what do we find when we come home?

Someone/something has nibbled on our baby tomatoes! We think this is the culprit:

Can you spot the squirrel?

One of our plants had toppled over under the weight of the tomatoes growing on it, and that's the one that was nibbled upon. K's parents have tried to bolster the remaining plants with more soil below so that they won't topple over too. Anyone who has any other suggestions as to how to get our tomato plants to grow tall and proud, with plenty of fruit for us, pls leave a comment or email me.

Squirrels are not cute.

Solvang is too cute

We arrived back home yesterday afternoon from our roadtrip up to Solvang, a cute little town close to Santa Barbara. Solvang's like an ode to all things Danish, complete with windmills (yes, there are more than one!), cobblestone streets and all.

Solvang's close to plenty of wineries, so that's what most people do. We were looking forward to going berry-picking, but the farm was closed on the days that we were there. Very disappointing! Still, we managed to bring the kids to check out a miniature horse farm. Very cute. The farm breeds horses for sale, but of course, J and E didn't need to know that.





We were in Solvang for Fourth of July too, so we caught the parade in town before heading back to Claremont. It had a very small-town feel to it, which was nice - different from the organisation and scale that we see in our National Day celebrations. Everyone just started lining the main street, plonking down wherever there was room, and waited for the parade to start. Someone gave E a small little American flag, so she was waving that too. We saw cowboys on horses, a school band, Harley Davidsons (including a little kid on a little motorbike) and two Nordic boats go by. Not what you would see in a parade normally. We drove back to Claremont and then caught the fireworks here, so K was very happy. The kids enjoyed it too.





It's a heatwave right now! Here's how we try to keep our cool:

Wear shades! Although E usually only has it on top on her head (as would any fashionista), or in her hands.

Eat lots of ice-cream. In sugar cones. Preferably while wearing as little as possible.

Back from the dead

"If there were water
And no rock
If there were rock
And also water
And water
A spring
A pool among the rock
If there were the sound of water only
Not the cicada
And dry grass singing
But sound of water over a rock
Where the hermit-thrush sings in the pine trees
Drip drop drip drop drop drop drop
But there is no water"

from T S Eliot, The Wasteland (1922)

When we first moved into our house on Indian Hill Boulevard, it had not been lived in for over a month. Despite the sprinkler system, many of the plants in the front and back yard had not been watered. And the plants had not received any rain; Fiona's earlier post already noted how the past year has been the driest on record, since the 1880s. I didn't even bothered about the plants that I thought were already dead. There were some, in the front yard, that were completely brown and dry. In the back yard, there were bushes that still clung on to life, but I paid a lot more attention to the plants that I had bought and planted myself -- the lavender, tomatoes, gardenias, geraniums and baby's breath -- or to the plants that I wanted to use and thus wanted to survive, like the rosemary and the lemon tree.

Over the past month, the plants have surprised me. Some that I bought are now long dead; they probably didn't even survive the shock of my amateurish transplantation. Some are clinging on to life, and others, like the geraniums and the tomatoes, appear to be thriving (for now).





















Some of the plants that I transplanted withered away quickly, but soon came back again. I have two baby's breaths in the front yard. One thrived right from the beginning, but the other died (or so I thought) within a few days. Its tiny, delicate flowers turned brown and all dried up into a small, pathetic patch of brown. But I kept watering it (it was just next to the surviving one anyway), and eventually, new branches and flowers emerged. Now, the earlier survivor is showing signs of decline, while the fighter has grown stronger. Its roots have taken hold, and I think it will survive and thrive.


But it is the plants that I had earlier given up on that have surprised me the most. Out in our front yard, there was a brown, dry little shrub that had been planted by the previous tenant. I didn't even know what it was. It was lifeless, shriveled up and ugly. I never watered it. But something must have happened as I was watering the other plants around it. A few weeks ago, I noticed a new branch coming out of it. A week later, a new flower -- I think it's a geranium, though I cannot be sure -- began budding. New branches have started growing, and I have resumed watering it, cheering it, rooting for it to grow strong once again.


A similar experience happened in the back yard. I had always paid more attention to the rose bushes there, since roses, in their haughty and prickly self-assurance, unfairly arrogate more attention. There were some other shrubs and bushes in the back yard, but these I did not tend to much. But a few days ago, I noticed a new flower coming up from some of these neglected bushes -- a lovely species of lily, I think. In a similar way, our lemon tree, which only had a few lemons when we first noticed it, has started to put out a lot more tiny, baby lemons and blossoms.

















Life clings on, survives, and even thrives, in unexpected and neglected places. These unexpected occasions of luminous grace have added a heightened dimension to the beauty around me. I want these flowers and plants to bloom and grow. I enjoy the colour they bring. But in a deeper way, I am grateful for the reminder they have served to me, of how surprising true life can be.


In the hardest and driest of soils, a plant can cling on, waiting only for the water from a distant rain or a clumsy gardener to struggle back to life, and not to some half-hearted attempt at life, but a full blossoming of what God intended its life to be. The flowers don't come half-formed; the lemons don't stay green, but ripen to their glorious buttery yellow.


And so it is in the serest and most arid landscape of all -- the broken human heart. One of the characters in Eugene O'Neill's play, The Great God Brown, declared: "Man is born broken. He lives by mending. The grace of God is glue." Perhaps it is not so much glue that we need, but water. Plants which I had given up as dead can struggle fully back to life, with just a little watering. Surely God's watering can accomplish even greater things in the dusty and bitter soil of a human heart. New life can spring from the unlikeliest of places. New fruit can emerge from the driest and dreariest of lives. And in the seasons when there is no water, only the sound of "dry grass singing", we can wait -- impatiently, thirstily, angrily, but always expectantly -- for the rain to come once again.

E's postscript

I. HATE. DRESSES. YEEEECH.


F: She sees me holding a dress, and takes off running. Then after I catch a hold of her and put her in it, she starts tugging at it, like I've put her in a straitjacket, complaining all the while. Then all of us have to assure her that she looks very pretty. And still she's complaining. She only settles after her Kong-kong takes her to the mirror to put some powder on her face. Only then is she convinced that she looks good enough and she quietens down.

Pretty what, right. SIGH.