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Community at The Point

/ Sheila / Leave a comment

There’s a little art gallery/beading store/restaurant that I love here in Ketchikan. It’s called The Point, Ketchikan’s only “waterfront art cafe,”

The Point

and it is housed in a building that overlooks the water. You can have lunch and watch float planes landing, or see the big ships docked down the way. On a nice day, the water looks so blue it’s amazing.

The food is just the simple fare of lunch: soup, sandwiches, quiche, cookies. They serve artisan freshly baked bread with their soups, and the cookies are baked in house as well. In fact, from what I can tell, everything is done in house. Which is amazing, when you realize that it is more an arts business than a food business. Or at least that’s the way it began. Not sure these days that the restaurant side of the business isn’t taking top billing.

You can eat at The Point, or if you have a work meeting and want to order, they’ll deliver their full menu for the day to your office. Simple as a phone call and a credit card. And the food is so good, if you let staff know where you’re ordering lunch, they’ll show up with appetites.

But the best thing about this restaurant is that it’s local. Owned and operated by people who have been here for a long time, it reflects the personality of the place. Local artists are prominently featured in the gallery displays. Classes are held there, and at lunch you see a mix of people from town, from all ages and walks of life.

I think the success of the restaurant side of the business is a bit of a surprise to the owners. They seem to be growing in popularity and in menu offerings. I and others have asked if they plan to publish their recipes. I have a sense that they’re on to their own little “overnight” success story. And it’s refreshing to see a small town enterprise doing well…not a chain, another fast food place, not linked to national advertising: just a local effort that is paying off and is the result of hard work and risk taking.

Good for the entrepreneurs! And good for me at lunch!

Keep Trying

/ Sheila / 4 Comments

Little Riley is transitioning to table food.

Riley

She’s almost off baby foods completely, and is getting less of her daily nutrition from milk now, more from solid foods. Of course, she has a limited diet. Foods are introduced one at a time, and having only a few teeth yet, she is unable to tackle anything but soft or easily dissolved textures. Some foods she has already rejected, at least for now. She doesn’t think she likes peas. She loves pasta, and cheese, bananas and yogurt. Anything that doesn’t suit her taste is quickly moved off her tray to the floor. Surprising how early little kids learn to spit out what they don’t like.

But sometimes offering a food again gets a different result. Does she forget she already tried something and didn’t like it? Maybe her first round rejection was more a reflection of a bad mood, or she wasn’t really hungry. Who knows what a one year old is thinking when it comes to choice?

Sometimes I surprise myself with the same type of about face. I recently tried oysters again. And this time, for the first time, I liked them. I had locally harvested Coffman Cove oysters, renowned for their delicacy, and showcased on seafood menus. Not sure what made the difference: the variety of oyster, the freshness, or the preparation. These oysters were baked in their shells. The shells were easily opened after baking, and the oyster was delicate and delicious, spritzed with lemon and dipped in melted butter. What have I been missing all these years I thought I didn’t like oysters?! Turns out, I didn’t care for raw oysters. But this new taste has me excited to try them again, which I plan to do this very weekend.

Obviously, not everything we dislike at first will grow into a like. Sometimes I become more convinced, a second or third time around, that my first opinion of a food or experience was correct: never going to work for me, or be a first choice. If I’m starving, there are some foods I could eat. But that doesn’t mean I would select them, short of desperate need. In other cases, exposure equals acceptance. I’ve recognized that in many situations. I’ve had to warm up to some things, but eventually, I’ve moved a place or experience…or even a person…from the “dislike” to “like” column in my log of personal preferences.

Stephanie called me yesterday to say that Riley had eaten peas with her dinner the night before. Good job, Riley! Keep trying, and maybe you’ll find you change your mind about a food you dislike, or something even more important. I’m embarrassed to admit that I’ve sometimes been quick to judge, to form an opinion, to know how I felt about something, or someone. And then…a different context, or preparation, or even a different mood on my part, and my attitude shifts. Watching Riley experience the early phase of discovery of choice reminds me that I can change my mind, that trying something again can make a difference. And that you can miss out on some good things if you quit trying too quickly.

Kid foods

/ Sheila / 2 Comments

Kid stuff for dinner

Stephanie was taking care of a friend’s kids recently, and for dinner they had fish sticks and mac and cheese from the blue box. You know, the classic Kraft mac and cheese, food of kids everywhere (and secret weakness of some adults I know). Made me think about some of my kids’ favorite foods. Let’s see…when they were little, they used to eat:

  • Sloppy joes and tater tots
  • Spaghetti
  • chicken fingers
  • the classic grilled cheese
  • Fairy Cake (recipe here)
  • Animal crackers
  • Goldfish
  • Gummy bears
  • String cheese
  • Applesauce
  • Rice Crispy treats (homemade, the only way to go)
  • Oatmeal
  • Kid pizza (mostly cheese)
  • Fruit leather
  • Ketchup (a food group to my daughter)
  • Milk (needed a cow in the back yard for my two milk-a-holics)
  • Potato soup
  • Pop-tarts
  • Hot pockets (Alex loved these. I was probably a terrible mom for buying them for him, but looks like he survived that abuse)
  • Pizza Rolls (see above confession)
  • Beef stew
  • Orange sherbet push ups
  • Chocolate chip cookies, the original recipe from the chocolate chip bag
  • Tiny green peas
  • carrots (see, they did eat some good stuff!)
  • Bacon and eggs
  • Waffles and pancakes
  • Strawberries
  • Breakfast cereals (shall be nameless here…what can I say, they wore me down)
  • French fries
  • Chicken noodle soup

The above items were some of their regular and favorite foods. They ate other things too, some of it healthy. I’m usually in the camp of “all things in moderation,” so while I’ve tried to make good choices at the grocery, I’m not fanatical about avoiding sugar or fat. I’m happy to say that they did not grow up on a diet of fast food. That’s one gift we gave to them, mostly by accident of where we bought a house: too far from fast food restaurants to be even remotely desirable for a dinner option. 

Well, maybe that list isn’t so bad. You’re only a kid once you know. And that old blue box mac and cheese…it isn’t gourmet, but it is tasty, especially if you’re a little kid who’s just learned how to open the pantry door and point. And what do you think that kid wanted for breakfast? That’s right! Kraft Mac and cheese. Long live kids! They like what they like, and they don’t get hung up on time of day to eat the right kind of food. 

Mothering

/ Sheila / 2 Comments

My favorite quotes about the privilege of motherhood:

“Making the decision to have a child – its momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” Elizabeth Stone

“There’s no way to be a perfect mother and a million ways to be a good one.” Jill Churchill

To mothers everywhere: enjoy your special day on Sunday. And keep up the good work. It’s a hard battle to bring up children; maybe it always has been. But worth it. Oh, so worth it.

I’m an empty-nester now. In addition to living with me, my heart lives in Arizona, and in Tennessee. If you are a mother, where does your heart live?


What are you feeding yourself?

/ Sheila / 3 Comments
A slice of home-made bread pudding.

Comfort food

Had a hard day today. So I fed myself on a few important things:

  • loving support of some key family members
  • read some uplifting words
  • laughed at a joke
  • had a beautiful dessert of bread pudding, caramel sauce, and cinnamon ice cream
  • snuggled up with a warm blankie and hot tea
  • worked on developing a new blog idea
  • promised myself tomorrow would be better because I’m worth it                                                                                                                          What are you feeding yourself today?

Oatmeal for breakfast; or, I have to lower my cholesterol

/ Sheila / 2 Comments

High cholesterol treatment

Was there really any doubt? About five years ago when I last had my cholesterol checked, my number was good…don’t remember the exact number, but it was good. And the most recent reading? A disappointing 251, in the “high” category, although the HDL (good cholesterol) number is excellent.  The cream-in-my-coffee habit has caught up with me. I’m expecting the lipid police at my door any moment.

So: resolutions begin. I’ll add oatmeal to my coffee habit. I can’t give up the cream so I’ll have to find ways to minimize the impact. I suppose I’ll have to increase my exercising too. Hey, I already drink red wine, so I’ve got that going for me. What else? I’m not a big meat eater, so I can’t help myself by giving up something I already don’t do. You followed that, right?

Why is it that I can manage my weight and stay in the same size clothes I’ve worn my whole adult life, and yet this one little test can threaten my love affair with dairy products? I wouldn’t say I’m addicted. But it would be a grim world, mornings at 5:oo am at my house, without the promise of hot coffee diluted with cream until it’s a beautiful khaki color. And don’t even get me started on butter. I don’t eat too much of it these days. I don’t bake a lot, and most of what I bake I give away. I don’t cook a lot in general. But if a recipe calls for butter, that’s what I use. I can’t do margarine or other plastic products passing themselves off as dairy. I’m in the camp of “I’d rather have a small amount of the real thing than a lot of imitation.”

Hmmm….Paula Deen, where are you? And I wonder what your cholesterol number is? I notice you don’t offer full disclosure on your Food Network programs. Think I’ll have to rewrite that old rhyme: “Butter, butter, everywhere, and not a bite to eat.”

Well, as it turns out, I like oatmeal, so that won’t be too difficult to add. I don’t eat it often, but I like it. And I especially like it with brown sugar, a pat of butter, and just a splash of cream. Uh oh….

See you at the gym!

Me, organized?

/ Sheila / 1 Comment
Typical Japanese sushi set, as sold in departm...

Yum!

Just when I think I’m doing so well…I’m a list maker, you know…I find that I have four…four…bags of sushi rice in my pantry! Three of the four had cunningly hidden themselves behind other items so that I’ve obviously thought I was out of this once-a-year use staple. Sometimes I amaze myself. How could I have bought this several times without realizing I was stocking up on something I so rarely need? To be fair to myself, I know I didn’t do this in the past few weeks. No, I’ve been beefing up my rice supply since we moved here two years ago. And it now appears…we don’t eat sushi very often. Who knew?

Then there’s the other end of the spectrum. Last week I went to the grocery twice and both times forgot to buy kitchen trash bags, although I had carefully noted, as a hint to myself…top of my list, big letters…not to leave without buying a replacement box. So, trash bags are on the hit parade again. Maybe the third time’s the charm.

I like to think I’m organized. This is not a subject I discuss with my husband. We don’t see eye to eye on everything.  I acknowledge that I have pockets of dysfunction…witness the pantry find of a small country’s supply of sushi rice. And I admit that I am not a freezer manager. In fact, the best way to permanently hide something from myself is to disguise it as a leftover stored in the freezer for future retrieval. I know that really, this is just a way to make peace with my conscience. My thrifty grandmother would be appalled if I threw out a perfectly good portion of leftovers, so I smartly detour these items through the freezer. Wrap in Saran or stash in a freezer bag, abandon for a few months, and presto! off to the trash with no guilt!  Even my grandmother would throw out freezer burned food. When she discovered it. (She’s not a freezer manager either, and there are legendary stories in my family of the age of some items she discovered in her freezer. But she turns 90 in June, so she’s off the hook for everything at this point.)

My mother-in-law stores cash in her freezer and found quite a stash in the process of cleaning out a few years ago. Turned out she had several thousand dollars tucked away among the frozen veggies. Not me. First of all, I don’t use cash, so it would be unlikely that I would find money stored anywhere in my house. But the idea of finding anything truly useful in my freezer, beyond ice and ice cream, is a novelty.

What to do, what to do? I think of the number of things I juggled this week: work, home, email, blogging, phone calls, friends, errands, chores, the daily grind. I’m sure that somewhere in all of this is a highly functioning person. I actually had a pretty good week and I checked off the majority of my to dos with a feeling of accomplishment and satisfaction. I was on a roll…until this morning. Now I’m thinking of throwing a small sushi party for the residents of Ketchikan. I have some extra rice on hand…won’t even have to go shopping. I’m organized, you know.

In the company of women

/ Sheila / 4 Comments

My friend calls to see if I want to go to dinner…”girls’ night out.” Usually we get together on a week night so we don’t impact weekend family time. We all work, so weekend time is premium, and everyone respects that. And somehow, dinner out on a week night seems like an extra special treat. Nice to know I don’t have to think about what to make for dinner, just about what to order. As much as I love puttering around the kitchen and stirring up my favorite foods, I’m always appreciative of someone else doing the cooking.

There’s no set schedule for these outings. Sometimes we’ve made it a monthly event, but it’s always casual, determined by travel demands and how hectic life is for each of us. There are times when adding anything, even something that should be fun, is just too much. Some weeks are like that. Some months are like that.

We come from diverse backgrounds, this little group. All my adult life, I’ve been fortunate to have girlfriends. For a long time, the primary bond was formed through my children. You know, you meet the moms in your kids’ circle, in the carpool group, through youth group, soccer, etc., etc., etc. In more recent years, post children, and after a couple of relocations, my friendships grow out of work relationships or other ties, but I’m no longer connected through kid activities.

Although we are of similar ages, some of us are in the empty nest phase (me) and others still have kids at home. Our conversation reflects this. I now talk about a grandchild, and celebrating her first birthday. I have a son-in-law, a daughter-in-law. The women who are a bit behind me, either in age or in life cycle, still have school events to plan for, graduations, college. But regardless, we’re close enough in experience that we speak each other’s language.

The little circle of friends I have here comes from all over: Colorado, Arizona, Utah, Mexico, Washington, the mid-West. Alaska casts a wide net, drawing people for many reasons. Most of my friends came here with husbands, but a few came alone and have made a home here, drawn by the adventure, the beauty, the uniqueness of the state.

We talk about the same things that women everywhere speak of: family concerns, work, hobbies, new finds, frustrations, the next trip out (when you live on an island, travel is always a big event and commitment, both in time and money). Husbands. Children. What broke recently and how much it cost to fix it. Sometimes we share from the heart, expose bits of ourselves to the others. Sometimes the evening is all laughter and fun. But always, there is awareness that for a few hours, we are women as well as wives, daughters, mothers, employees. Actually, we are girls, and on a good night, diners at the tables around us smile as they recognize the camaraderie that occurs in the company of women. We giggle, tell our stories, sympathize, encourage, hug, share appetizers and desserts, tell each other we’ll do it again soon. Most nights we leave the restaurant just before the staff closes up, realizing guiltily that it’s late and tomorrow is a work day.

But no matter, that’s part of the charm. When you’re with girlfriends, enjoying “girls’ night out,” you don’t watch the clock or notice the passing time. You’re just celebrating the moment. Here’s hoping you have good women in your life. (And if you happen to be a guy reading this, just change the references from female to male. It’s good for men to bond too, and I hear that sometimes happens.)

Crossover

/ Sheila / 1 Comment

It’s an interesting thing to watch people grow up, especially if the people happen to be your own children. You see them through all the early stages, through the cute baby and childhood years. Then comes the teen era, and while I admit that my two were easy teens, it was still a challenging period in our lives. And now they are in their 20s, 23 and 27.

This summer, we will have our five-year anniversary of being empty-nesters. Hard to believe it could already be that long since we had kids at home every day. Stephanie and Matt will have their 5th anniversary in June, and Alex will end his five-year contract with the Army in August.

Through these years, I’ve seen a lot of changes in them. They were good kids…but they were kids. Now, they have not only taken on adult responsibilities, they have crossed into the adult world in maturity. Not that they’re all done. Oh no, none of us is ever a completely finished human being. That’s part of the magic of humanity. We get to continue the process of re-inventing, of self-discovery, maturing, throughout life. Circumstances change around us and cause us to respond. Or maybe the change is self-generated. But the point is, we have an almost infinite capacity to grow. And that’s a good thing.

I sometimes hear them complain about work issues, someone not doing their job or doing it poorly. Alex has experienced the loss of a number of friends, casualties of war and life. That’s a growth experience a lot of people don’t have at his age. He spent a year deployed to a combat zone in Iraq, and that shaped him too.

Stephanie, 7th grade math teacher, brave soul that she is, is frequently saddened by the turmoil she witnesses in the lives of her students. And she’s caught between expectations of her as a teacher and the burden of having 30+ kids in class several times a day. And she’s taken on the joy and journey of being mom to Riley, in itself guaranteed to furnish a lifetime of growth opportunities.

I’ve seen them mature in their marriages too. That’s another area no one is ever done with. If you’re married, you’re challenged. Not because of the specific person you’re married to…because you are with another human being. No two are alike, no two are always in sync, and no two are perfect. And young marriages are by definition a work in progress. Actually any marriage is a work in progress.

But what I hear is not the complaints or frustration. I hear two people who understand if you take on a job, you need to step up, do it right (or as best you can). They understand that actions have consequences, that adults do the responsible thing. That applies to relationships and to work. They get that life isn’t always fun, although it often is. They’ve learned to value the income they earn, and understand they are paid because of the effort they put in. We’re not subsidizing their lives or their choices. And that’s a good thing.

And the best part? Rob says we’re just consultants now. That’s our role. Of course we’ll always be their parents. But most of the time we get to be friends with these two great young adults.  Making the transition from parent to friend has been a gradual process; not consciously sought, but so rewarding. This is the part you can’t foresee when children are little: how sweet it is to see them on their on path to becoming, in spite of the parenting mistakes and mis-steps. This is not bragging, you understand. In fact, it’s astonishing to me that two small beings, put into the hands of naive twenty-somethings, are stable young adults. And that’s the real payoff for all the years of work, lost sleep, taxi service, school events, youth group, soccer practice, etc., etc., etc. It’s a good place to be, and I’m honored to have a front row seat from which to witness, cheer, and encourage them on their way.

Really? Seriously?

/ Sheila / 1 Comment

Ok, I know this is judgmental. I can’t help myself here. I saw a commercial for a new series, I think it’s called “Extreme Couponing” or something like that. From the preview scenes, the premise seems to be that some people (women) spend hours and hours clipping coupons, then are able to buy many hundreds of dollars worth of groceries for practically nothing. Now, I don’t know what these people eat. But when I see coupons, it seems like most of them are for items that I don’t eat, don’t need, don’t like, or can’t use. Or, you have to buy three things to get one free, or stand on your head and hold your mouth just so to get the discount….I don’t know….is it just me? Am I a coupon snob? I don’t feel like a snob. I’ve clipped, torn, folded, saved and forgotten many a coupon in my time. For years we subscribed to a daily paper, and the Sunday edition, with it’s booklet of coupons, was always a part of my Sunday afternoon routine. But alas, coupon management is not my strong suit. I’ve been known to carefully store coupons with exciting discounts (the few really great coupons I’ve ever found) until just after they expire….that’s when I find the ones I clipped with such anticipation, snuggled deep inside my purse…just as they become worthless little bits of paper.

I finally gave it up. To me, the whole thing is just a tease. I think I’m going to save money, but somehow it doesn’t work out that way. And here’s another thing I’ve learned. It may seem counter-intuitive, or even sacreligious. But I find that it’s better for me to buy everything for household staples – laundry detergent, toilet paper, cleaning supplies – at the grocery. It costs more to buy these things there, but if I go to one of the big box stores – WalMart or Target, or a Sams or Costco – I always spend more on items that weren’t even on my list. Yes, impulse buying. So I’ve learned, over time, that it’s better to spend a little more at the grocery, and avoid the other stores as much as possible. Not that I have anything against any of these businesses….it’s just simple economics. Or more accurately, it’s Sheila’s economics. And it probably works at this point in my life because I’m not buying for a family any more. But regardless, it’s my system, and I’m sticking to it. And I do not spend hours getting ready for marathon shopping sprees. Maybe I just don’t know what I’m missing. But I’m coupon free, and loving it!