Recipe Revealed

For those of you who are brave enough to try cooking with quinoa, here is the recipe I raved about last month: (for the photo, follow this clue)

Black Beans and Quinoa
1 t. oil
1 chopped onion
3 garlic cloves, crushed
3/4 c. rinsed quinoa
1 1/2 c. broth
1 t. cumin
1/4 t. cayenne
salt and pepper
1 can corn, drained
2 cans black beans, drained
cilantro
Saute onion and garlic in oil. Add quinoa, broth, and spices. Bring to a boil, cover, reduce heat, and simmer 20 minutes. Add corn, black beans, and cilantro.

Vegetable Salsa
1 zucchini
1-2 bell peppers (red, orange, or yellow)
1 c. cilantro
1/2 sweet onion
1/2 jalapeno
1 can pink beans, rinsed and drained
1 t. cumin
1/4 t. chili powder
1 t. salt
juice from 1/2 lime
Finely dice all vegetables and mix in remaining ingredients. You may want to add a tomato or avocado or increase the amount of the spices.

Thank you again, Serena. It was delicious!

Top 10 Clues for a Successful Move

Don't ask if we're all settled in yet. The answer should be obvious.
Alright, here are the top 10 clues:

10. On your last day in the old house, do not ask your kids if there's anything they want to do one last time before you move. Both the boys managed to yank out a not-so-loose tooth and we ended up having one more visit from the tooth fairy, as if we weren't busy enough that night.

9. Expect the unexpected. On the day of our move, Daniel came home from Kindergarten with The Surprise Box. "Please help your child find an item to put in the box and write three clues to encourage the other children to guess what it is. You must return it tomorrow! Have fun." Yeah. Very fun.

8. Make sure you know where the cat is before it's time for him to go to his overnight bungalow at the vet. Otherwise, as you can imagine, you will be frantically searching for him when you really should be focusing on actually moving.

7. Choose a funny person to be your realtor so he can entertain you while you sign papers and wait for your thousand copies to be made. (Thanks, Del.) You may also want to do some hand exercises in the days leading up to your closing. Oh yeah - and they'll need your signature WITH your middle initial as well as WITHOUT.

6. Wait at least 10 minutes before depositing your check from the title company. If you don't, they will probably call you right after you leave the bank and say, "Hold on to that check for a bit, will you?" Just imagine the stress you would have if that happened...

5. Be prepared for a warm welcome from all your new neighbors. No, I'm not talking about the human ones. Among the array of creature neighbors we've met so far: chipmunks living in the front yard, woodpeckers, box turtle, wolf spiders and a possible black widow (never could get her to roll over before we gave up and smashed her - just in case.).

4. If it looks like a lazy susan, it probably is a lazy susan. Push harder.

3. Remember to use deodorant on your first Sunday in the new ward.

2. Do not, I repeat, do NOT believe anything Verizon says about transferring your phone service.

And...

1. Do not promise your kids you will take them on the ward campout that takes place two days after you move. Trust me, you will be exhausted. (Or, at least, your husband will be - if it's the Father-Son campout.)

Cornered: My Life in Boxes

I'm starting to feel a bit suffocated. I may not have mentioned this here before, but...we're moving. Not far, just under three miles away. Nonetheless, everything still has to be packed, ready and accounted for. We have been pecking away at the packing a piece at a time. A box here, a box there, as we decide which of our precious things we can live without for a month, for 3 weeks or, now, for 12 days. My husband jumped the gun on our bedroom lamps. He packed them up on Wednesday morning before heading out on a business trip. (Side note: today is our anniversary and he is spending it in our honeymoon location-San Diego. I, on the other hand, am spending it here, surrounded by boxes and hungry children. But, back to the matter at hand.) So off he went, and as I got into bed that night I realized that, if anything startled me in the middle of the night or if I just had insomnia, I would not be able to reach over and switch on the lamp. So I have borrowed a decorative nightlight from the baby's room for the next 11 days.

It's fascinating to me to see our daily life gradually being reduced to brown cubes with Sharpie writing on them. As you might guess, I am starting to wonder why we have all this stuff. And why on earth are we going to the trouble of playing Tetris with it to get it neatly and safely packed into boxes, just to take it to our next home and not know where to put it? In case you're wondering, yes, we have had one of those moments when we discovered we had packed something we shouldn't have and had to hike Mount Cardboard to find and extract it.

Packing has been an interesting study in priorities. Books have been packed away, but the TV is still up and running and the DVD collection remains readily available. Piano music has nearly all been packed, but the CDs are still in use. Only the essential dishes have not been packed, which begs the question, "Why do we have more than the essentials?"

We have every intention of being extremely organized in our new house. A place for everything and everything in its place. Of course, once we get settled, we will realize how much more space we have and we will start to buy things and fill the empty space until we are once again...cornered. The circle of life. (Or at least one of them.)