Sunday steak dinner

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Dinner was good. Real good. We ate outside, enjoying each other's company, our deck, our leafing-out-like-it's-on-steroids Sugar Maple, a beautiful night, good food. We talked about how much we love the boys, how precious and dear and smart and charming they are (we think so), how heart-achingly proud we are of them. Jack, my bean-pole blondie with few and far between teeth, came downstairs to tell me good night. Clad in a one-piece, green- and blue-striped long john, mussed hair, a proud smile stretching his face, he hugged and kissed me and said, "Mom, I scored the first run of our season. Me!" As if he surprised himself. And he probably did. And these are the moments you hope for, for your children. You raise them, prepare them, teach them, love them, soothe them, throw them out to new experiences and hope desperately that the foundation you've provided is enough, win or lose. Today it was, and I know that boost will fill Jack's reservoir of confidence, his sense that practice and just getting out there and trying, even if you're scared, are worth it. It was magnificent, and I toasted him tonight. I smothered him with kisses, firmly sent him to bed because he was so tired and cannot wait to see him tomorrow. He's made it up another rung of the ladder of growing up, and I am just bursting. Enough kvelling. Dinner! Don't you love my sear marks on this filet?  I don't often grill my steaks, preferring my Lodge on the stove-top and in the oven, but tonight, it just seemed the right thing to do. And I'd forgotten how delicious this pesto is, and YO on this Grgich Hills Petite Sirah! WOW!

NIK_3087

Em-i-lis' Mint-Pistachio Pesto

roasted sunchokes with chives and marjoram

Happy update, Lillet rosé, bedtime approaches, thanks

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Readers, I was THRILLED to hear from my always-informed, beautiful friend, Donna, that the six year old Afghan girl I wrote about yesterday has been released from her repayment marriage because a kindly donor paid her father's debt. No one seems to feel 100% that ultimately the repayment will be honored without her having to marry the random older guy, but we can remain thankful for Samaritans and hopeful that the deal stands. However, the awful realization is that most of these girls don't have articles written about them and don't have generous folks saving them from living hells. Lillet rosé is the greatest aperitif because you pour it, cold, over an ice cube and serve. I mean, it literally could not be simpler to start your evening off right. If you want to put in some effort and go fancy, you can garnish the glass with a slim wedge of ruby grapefruit but that's not necessary.

My dear friend, CF, mother of two precious girls who, nevertheless, fray her nerves because she's with them all the time (C is a wonderful, at-home mom; no, I don't mean that she's wonderful only because she stays at home, I mean that she is a wonderful mom and one who stays at home with her kids) as the boys do mine, both felt beyond frazzled by 3pm today. It was exceedingly fortunate that we parked next to each other at carpool because we laugh-cried hysterically for about ten minutes. It was the best medicine. I know that right now, she is as excited about bedtime approaching as am I. Our kids are real talkers. Mine, for example, did not, ever, stop talking today even when I asked them to and finally exhausted me by playing-singing an extremely loud game-song in the shower called "YOU BUMP YOUR BUTT, YOU BUMP YOUR PENIS." I didn't ask or investigate.

With the greatest, most heartfelt sincerity, I would like to thank all of you, those I know and those I've never met, who wrote to wish Em-i-lis a happy 2nd birthday. Your thoughts were insanely loving and kind, and hearing from you meant the world to me.