I put the "tea" in Party!

And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball

~T.S. Eliot

Every summer I have a tradition of putting on the Auntie's Mad-Hatter Tea Party. Everyone is required to wear a hat. Now I'm a bit of a fanatic when it comes to tea parties. All of the things I make for them are from scratch, and I scour the internet for recipes on all sorts of things months ahead of time, and cook them all up to get them "just so". My list is ever expanding. So is the guest list, and the number of antique tea cups I've slowly been collecting from various stores. Don is somewhat of an enabler to my problem, the first year I had one he came home with a beautiful white porcelain, flowered tea set for me, as a surprise. This year for Christmas he bought me silverware specifically for tea parties.
Now, let me explain myself. The reason why I'm so drawn to them is because they remind me of a simpler time. A time when people cared what their food looked and tasted like, and everyone, not just those who could afford five star restaurants, was entitled to that. It was a time to sit and sip your tea, go over the local gossip, and have everything slowly meander into perspective. It was a way of life that's unknown to our instant messaging, instant meal, instant gratification way of life.
I've dreamed of someday being experienced and good enough to host a tea party for as much as 20 people, someday. Well, someday has come, and much earlier than I expected. Lily is having a baby, next month. And I called my mother-in-law to see what she thought about throwing a baby shower. Being the predictable person I am I suggested a tea party theme. I'm getting good at it, and kind-of proud of it. I told Lily to give me a guest list. Little did I know that it would extend to 60 people. I have to admit I was a bit floored. I didn't know baby showers could be so dang big. I still panic when I think about it. What calms me down is that it's not at my house, I don't have to make the invitations...and...and that's pretty much it. I am in charge of the menu. I think I can handle that. I'm not sure. I'm scared. But when I start looking at recipes, my inner caterer gets excited, and tells me that it's no problem: with a little preparation, work, and quadrupling the recipes I've found, it should work out, and I'll probably have fun in the process. Besides, I have some tricks up my sleeves that even Julia Childs would be envious of. Okay, she probably came up with them. Dang Julia.
So, for inspiration I looked at some of the pictures from my last tea party. Every year I do a different theme, and this year it was French. Memories of Edith Piaf crooning, dancing with nieces, sidewalk chalk, white linen table cloths, chocolate fairies, fancy hats, flowers, mint chocolate truffles, quiche, crepes, and my dad sneaking food (although he's much too macho to go to a tea party, this was before the party actually started), sipping cool lemonade and iced tea, all floated back to me. All of these things equate to happiness, and I get all warm and fuzzy when I realize that I threw the whole shin-dig together. And I realize that life doesn't get any better than that.
I think...it's time for another one.
Here are some pictures from this last summer's tea party. I would suggest playing the song, "La Vie En Rose," while looking at the pictures. It' s the first song on my playlist.




Wish me luck! I'll keep you posted on how it goes!

My Life as Enna

Almost four years ago my little niece Madeleine was born. As soon as she could talk, she gave me a new name: Enna. It's a name that fits really well; and I like to think of it as an upgrade. I'm surprised by how well it's caught on: Don uses it, as well as Aubrey, Larry, and even some of my in-laws.
Madi and I had the following conversation last week:

After seeing the ultrasound pictures of my baby on the fridge, Madi asked the following question:
"Is that a baby?"
"Yes it is."
"Enna, is that your baby in your stomach?"
"Um-hmm."
Madi thinks for a moment, and then looks at me seriously with her luminous, black pearl eyes.
"I have a baby, too!" She pats her tummy with her little hand.
"O-oh." I hide a smile and raise my eyebrows. Last week it was a kitty. I don't have the heart to tell her that she doesn't have a baby or a kitty in her tummy. I'll let her mom handle that.
"Yep." She verifies, and then offers some sage advice, "and we can't make the baby cry, or we be so sad."
"Yes. We be so sad," I agree.
I'm so glad I've been upgraded.

A Fench Proverb

*Note: A series of events, and events that have been uneventful (both of which have had nothing to do with Lemony Snicket), have led to the following post. Every once in a while I'll get urges to do things. Today it is to write.

The French have a saying,

“Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.”

Which translated is: the more things change, the more they remain the same. The first time I heard that philosophy, I couldn't quite wrap my head around the it. I think I've finally figured it out.

In this world all things are made up of the same thing: energy. Atoms are the basic building blocks for all elements, and elements make up all things depending on their combinations and numbers. In mathematics numbers are the building blocks. And if you put them into ratios, such as Aristotle's Golden Mean, then it puts things into a different light. As you Divinci Code readers, and mathematicians are familiar with, the Golden mean has been used in hundreds of things. People are obsessed with it, and for good reason: it's everywhere. The nautilus shell's spirals are in complete proportion with the irrational number of 1.618 (the golden mean in it's decimal form).

The spiral that goes into your inner ear follows the same pattern, as well as the placement of seeds on a sunflower. But the ratio stretches to more than spirals. Let's take, for example the Fibonacci sequence (1,1,3,5,8..etc), and it's tale-tale (no pun intended) story of the reproduction of bunnies. The Golden Mean's chords are also sang in the Notre Dame Cathedral. Architects of the Pyramids and Parthenon have used the ratio in an effort for man's creations to imitate God's. Pythagorean used it with his famous and fundamental triangle. If you were to take a measurement of your head and compare it to the length the rest of your body you will get 1.618. If you do it with the rest of your body, you will be doing the same study as Leonardo Da Vinci's Virtruvian man.

Rembrandt, Michelangelo, Raphael, all were dedicated users of Phi, the Divina Proportione. 1.618.

I mentioned before that the golden mean had a name attached to it...Aristotle. He claimed that it is the middle ground between excess and deficiency. One of the first philosophies of moderation. And while the golden mean is looked at as a Greek standard of beauty (if every aspect of your face were in proportion with this ratio, you would have the most perfect, and beautiful face), it would be suggested that moderation is beautiful. That's what Keats was saying with his famous poem:

Beauty is truth, truth beauty, that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

Although it make look like it, I am not obsessed with the number Phi, I'm merely illustrating that it's everywhere...is it a divine proportion? Evidence of intelligent design? A number to moderately live by? An ideal form of calculated beauty? I'll let you answer that. My part is to show that all of these tangents have a common center, like spokes to an ever-turning wheel. They are all variations on a theme. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

Perhaps whomever created everything in this world, created human nature as well. Our lives are daily changing. The only thing that is constant is change. Some changes occur over a prolonged period of time, making the transformation subtle. Others happen in the blink of an eye.

But we are all dancing the same dance: we're born, we live, we die. The sexes with their various complexities can be boiled down to two simple facts: overall, women think more with their heart, and men, more with their head. And in spite of all of the advances in mathematics and technology there will never be an engineer who can bridge the gender gap. Buttered bread will always land face down. Laughter will always be the best medicine. Cultures will always be intolerant of other cultures. And love will always come with a pair of rose colored glasses. These are absolutes; proof that some things are certain. Some things are constant. And from consistency, it's possible to find understanding.

I'm not sure why, but there's something comforting in this thought. It gives rhyme reason and reason to rhyme. It's a soothing philosophy, one that's meant to wash over souls like undulating waves. Something you can hold onto when you feel like your world is spinning out of control. And from this point of view, change doesn't seem so bad.
...But then, you've heard all of this before, haven't you?

La vie est belle. Life is beautiful.

Oh, Baby!!

I thought it would be fun to have a little poll on the side of my blog and see what the majority of you thought we would have. As it turns out most of you voted for tornado. I'm sorry to say, you're wrong, well, partially.
Last Friday morning we went in for our 20 week checkup. After filing into one of the rooms I jumped up on the table, and proceeded to show my blossoming belly. The ultrasound technician squirted some warm gelatinous goo on my stomach.
"Today we're going to do a full check-up on your baby," he chirped. Then he started dabbing at the goo like a painter with a paint brush. People do weird things to you when you're pregnant.
He smeared the goo across my little bump.
"Your baby's head is down here...here are the legs, and here's the stomach. Everything looks normal so far..."
After manipulating the frequency and intensity of the ultrasound machine he went down his check list...heart, brain, spine, upper lip, umbilical cord, ten toes, and hands which were close to the face and held like a boxer. She weighed 12 oz. the same as a can of pop. Don and I relaxed more and more as the picture the technician was painting for us became clearer.
"So, what do you think you're having?"
"Uh...I have no idea." That's why we're here. Now for the love of Pete, just stop toying with me and tell me what my baby is!
"Oh, you have to guess, what do you think it is??"
"A girl. I think it's a girl"
"And you?," he turned to Don.
"I think it's a girl, too. Although I really want a boy."
The technician moved the ultrasound around my stomach some more. The goo was making it itch. And I wanted to scratch it like mad.
"It looks like you're having....
....a....girl. Yep. A girl. No little boy parts there!"
I grinned in contentment. A girl. My own little angel. My little Adelei. I knew it.
"Let's try and get a good shot of the face for you."
He jiggled the ultrasound up and down in hopes of changing the baby's position, and then reached for more goo before going down to the head.
"Nope, she's not taking her hands away. She's camera shy."
He tried the jiggling trick again. No luck. And a third time with no success. I decided to try, and took both hands and shook my stomach, "Come on baby!!" I encouraged.
The technician moved the instrument down. "Your baby...."
"...Your baby...is flipping us off." He said in wonderment.
I glanced sideways at Don, and we both started laughing uncontrollably.
"Sounds like she has a little bit of me in her!" Don exclaimed.
"I have a feeling she has a lot of you in her."
I giggled the rest of my way through the ultrasound. I couldn't help it. My little baby has some sass, and she's definitely going to need it to survive here. But, we're going to have to have a talk about her cute little middle finger when she gets here. The little tornado.
The ultrasound technician was kind enough to include a photo of our little girl's gesture so that we could document the moment. We also got a CD with a few more photos. And since photos are important, I've decided to include them on my blog.
My sweet little Adelei:

And, no, I didn't include the infamous 'flipping off' photo. You'll just have to come visit and see.

Celebrity Playlists: Baby Brady

You know how you can get on itunes and find playlist by various celebrities, like Brain Regan and Kate Hudson?? Well, I've always wanted to make one of my own, so today I did it. But it has a spin on it: I made a playlist for my future child, since my taste in music has done a complete 180 and changed from hard-core indie rock to soothing symphonies. (All of these songs are, of course, located in my playlist on the right side of my blog.) No one told me that being a prospective mother would calm me down so much (and, yes, it has). I stop at stop signs (even the really annoying one here in Millville that I believe has no business being there). I go the speed limit, wear my seat belt, eat wheat bread, get to bed at a decent hour, and floss. I've even been nesting. I thought that New Years would be the perfect time to go through the mountains of magazines, old assignments, and threadbare clothes that are hanging in my closet. I have been brutal, and Spartan. My mother would be proud. And now, pardon my pregnant self, but every time I hear a love song I don't think about a couple anymore...for some reason I think of a mother singing it to her baby. So, in the immortal words of Humphrey Bogart,

"Here's looking at you, kid."

Be Ok-Ingrid Michaelson- This song makes me want to dance. Not the cute dances I did when I was dating Don, but geeky, shake your belly pregnancy dances. Anyway, when I found out we were expecting, that week was midterms. Usually I hate them like poison. This time I was uncharacteristically calm...it was quite the perspective change. I knew everything would be okay.

I'd rather be with you-Joshua Radin-This is one of those love songs that I think a mother is singing to her child.

Rock & Roll-Eric Hutchinson-When I was driving down to see my girlies (thank you by-the-way Launi, Angie, and Crystal for the surprise baby shower!!) This song was playing on the radio, and I swear the little munchkin was dancing.

Breathe Me-Sai-Beautful song, shows how kids need someone to love them. They need mothers to string pretty words together, and fathers to show them how to be strong. And I really, really like her voice, it's grainy and smooth at the same time.

Angel Mine-Cowboy Junkies-If I could take all of my feelings towards prospective motherhood and put them into a song, this would be it. It throws all of my insecurities out into the open, and I feel vulnerable, apologetic, and somehow strong.

Dancing Cheek to Cheek-Fred Astaire-When this baby comes, I'm going to hold and dance with it cheek-to-cheek around my house. I do it with Jaden all of the time, and I can't wait until I can do it with my little bundle of joy. Besides, I'm a sucker for old songs. This will always be a classic, and I need to raise my kid right, dang it!!

God Only Knows-Beach Boys-Every good playlist should end with a song like this. I have a feeling that motherhood is going to make something worthwhile out of me, more than a Civil Engineering degree could ever do. It's also going to quadruple my white hairs, bags under my eyes, and laugh lines.