Category — Show and Tell

Show and Tell is wasted on elementary schoolers. Join several dozen bloggers weekly to show off an item, tell a story, and get the attention of the class. In other words, this is Show and Tell 2.0. Everyone is welcome to join, even if you have never posted before and just found out about Show and Tell for the first time today. So yank out a photo of the worst bridesmaid’s dress you ever wore and tell us the story; show off the homemade soup you cooked last night; or tell us all about the scarf you made for your first knitting project. Details on how to participate are located at the bottom of this post.

Let’s begin.

First and foremost, welcome to Show and Tell at its brand new place and time. The list will go up every Wednesday evening and will close on Friday night–a big window for adding your own item to the mix. How do you participate? Just think of something to show and tell the class; it’s just an old school, standard, fidget-in-front-of-the-class presentation. You can do it with pictures or simply tell a story. It is not too late to participate unless it’s after Friday night and then…well…it is too late for this week. But save your post for next week because this happens every Wednesday night.

My item? This past Sunday, the women of TOOTPU got together for lunch. Afterwards, we took a picture outside the restaurant, clogging the walkway for all the people trying to get into the nearby mall.

From left to right: Sell Crazy Someplace Else, Me, A Real Life, Hoping for Another Lovebug, B, Our Family Beginnings, Hopeful Mamma, A Little Sweetness, The Happy Hours, Two Hot Mamas, Body Diaries by Lucy, Chez Perky

I’ve always had a bond with Hoping for Another Lovebug that started via email and finally culminated with meeting face-to-face through TOOTPU about two years ago. This weekend, we discovered that we’re actually related. Her husband is first cousins with my first cousin’s husband. Which means that not only did she gain honourary Jewish status by this connection, but we are now family forever. Do you see what starting a blog can do? It can bring you new family members.

My new cousin who is also my old friend–isn’t this like a preteen-girl’s fantasy come true? Her friend turns out to be her cousin? And then we start sharing a pair of jeans and talking about boys and crying because of something we read written about us in a popular girl’s slam book?

Lastly, boobs.

I was signing a copy of my book when Katie mentioned that she had wanted her book signed too, but she had lent it to her MIL. She told me that her husband said that I should sign her boob instead. I have always wanted to sign her lovely lady humps, so I jumped on this idea.
Oh–and I should mention that we’re standing outside the swankiest mall in Virginia.

At this point, I can’t remember how I turned the pen on A Little Sweetness’s lovely mammaries (maaaaaammaries, in the corners of my bra, misty signature scrawled mammaries, of my fellow TOOTPUers).

Fine, so it was less Girls Gone Wild and more a statement about how much I love my girls. I love my TOOTPUers. I feel so lucky to have met a group of women where we can sign our boobs AND celebrate our victories AND commiserate during our disappointments AND become family members AND eat a lot of chocolate.

Oh, and of course I got mine signed too. Like that shit-eating grin? You may need to click on the picture to enlarge to see it.

Josh and I saw UP that evening and as I left the theater, sobbing, Josh said, “I am trying really hard to take you seriously right now, but you’re walking around with a woman’s name across your breast. It’s just hard.”

Saving the rest of my TOOTPU photos for the Roundup on Friday. No more breasts, but some fun photos from the day.

What are you showing today?

Click here or scroll down to the bottom of this post if this is your first time joining along (hint: link to the permalink for the post, not the main url for your blog and use your blog’s name, not your name). The list is open from now until late Tuesday night and a new one is posted every week.

Show and Tell is wasted on elementary schoolers. Join several dozen bloggers weekly to show off an item, tell a story, and get the attention of the class. In other words, this is Show and Tell 2.0. Everyone is welcome to join, even if you have never posted before and just found out about Show and Tell for the first time today. So yank out a photo of the worst bridesmaid’s dress you ever wore and tell us the story; show off the homemade soup you cooked last night; or tell us all about the scarf you made for your first knitting project. Details on how to participate are located at the bottom of this post.

Let’s begin.

First and foremost, a poll. I am considering moving Show and Tell to a different day of the week. Part of it is old school honesty–elementary school simply isn’t held on weekends. Part of it is the craziness of weekends and wanting the time to read posts at a more enjoyable pace rather than shoveling them in my eyes like I would, let’s say, attack a display of chocolate candy. But I do not want to move the day if the core participants like having it on the weekend.

Added: I probably should have stated this too, but since the vote is somewhat splitting down the center, it’s hard to get a read. Vote for Wednesday/Thursday/Friday if you’re willing to move (even if you like Saturday. I like Saturday too, but it makes it hard to read all the posts on the weekend). Vote for Saturday/Sunday/Monday if you’d be unwilling to move (meaning, you wouldn’t be able to participate anymore). The move is to enable me to hold Show & Tell every week and not have to skip it sometimes if we’re out of town for the weekend or to post it, but not get to read along. But I don’t want to move the date if everyone is really set on the weekend. So if you’ll still participate if it is held on Thursday, please vote for the move. If you plan to stop doing Show & Tell if it is on another day, vote to stay.

So I’ve embedded a poll below and please take a moment to vote on which set of days works best for you. If we vote to move it, we will hold a second Show and Tell this upcoming week on Thursday (I will open the list on Wednesday night, people can participate on Wednesday night/Thursday/or Friday). If we vote to keep it where it is, I’ll see everyone back here next Saturday night (the usual: I post on Saturday night and people can participate on Saturday night/Sunday/or Monday). I’ll post the results this Tuesday as to which day we’ll use.

I need to preface this story by telling you that while I often stray from recipes, if I’m making something from a restaurant cookbook, I will stick to the recipe exactly in order to taste what it would be like in the restaurant. So we’ve tried Bouchon or Les Halles or Morimoto through their cookbooks. I’m sure the dishes are much more incredible when prepared at the restaurant, but this is as close as we’re going to get to some of these places.

On Tuesday morning, I had a meeting that backed-up on Josh’s afternoon meeting. Lindsay came to meet me at the office building when I was finished and asked if I wanted to try Mario Batali’s restaurant, Otto, for lunch. I had not had success with Batali’s recipes when I tried them–and by a lack of success, I mean that the food was inedible and we ended up dumping the meal. But Lindsay promised that the food was good so I was willing to give it a try.

We shared a Margherita (D.O.P.) and a pasta alla Norma. The meal was incredible.

As we left the restaurant, we were musing on whether chefs purposefully make their recipes for shit in the cookbook so that you will still be inclined to get a meal at their restaurant. Because the pasta alla Norma I made from the cookbook was nothing like the meal I had in the restaurant. We laughed about asking chefs this question.

A few blocks later, we are about to cross into Washington Square when I see an explosion of colour beginning with the shoes. Orange crocs, bright socks, hairy legs, blue shorts, two shirts, red ponytail, and sunglasses. It was so surreal and I heard myself saying to him as he passed, “Mr. Batali?”

“Yes,” he responded, and we both started walking backwards.

“We just ate at Otto. The meal was incredible.”

“Thank you!”

And then we both turned back around and I walked into Washington Square Park with Lindsay and baby Fred and he walked down the street with his friend, and Lindsay and I spent the next three minutes saying, “that was so bizarre.”

The end of the story is that now that I could compare the red sauce in my mind, I tried to make it at home on Thursday night and here’s the secret part he left out–blend it. Stick the whole thing in a blender and it’s sort of the same consistency and sort of the same flavour as the sauce at the restaurant. And it also made for a lovely pizza sauce.

What are you showing today?

Click here or scroll down to the bottom of this post if this is your first time joining along (hint: link to the permalink for the post, not the main url for your blog and use your blog’s name, not your name). The list is open from now until late Tuesday night and a new one is posted every week.

Show and Tell is wasted on elementary schoolers. Join several dozen bloggers weekly to show off an item, tell a story, and get the attention of the class. In other words, this is Show and Tell 2.0. Everyone is welcome to join, even if you have never posted before and just found out about Show and Tell for the first time today. So yank out a photo of the worst bridesmaid’s dress you ever wore and tell us the story; show off the homemade soup you cooked last night; or tell us all about the scarf you made for your first knitting project. Details on how to participate are located at the bottom of this post.

Let’s begin.

Well, first and foremost, I changed the icon. I figured a new year of Show and Tell deserved an icon change.

But what I’m really showing and telling today are two purses that my siblings (and by my “siblings,” I mean that my sister chose them and then included my brother and BIL) gave me this week. The amusing part was that I was with my mother and the Wolvog in the mall and I told him that we needed to stop by the store to buy a formal purse for an event I’m going to this week. My mother nervously told me not to do that and after arguing about it for a moment, gave me the box she had been carrying around. Great minds think alike–my siblings bought me two purses that could both go with my black sheath dress. Your thoughts on which one I should use?

Option A: a black clutch with feathers and beads.

Option B: a red, textured purse with sparkle added by beads.

I’m wearing a black sheath dress (with a small black cardigan in case it’s cold), black heels, and pearls. I have a sense of which one would be better for the event, but I’m also collecting opinions since I love both purses equally and both are large enough to hold everything I need that night.

What are you showing today?

Click here or scroll down to the bottom of this post if this is your first time joining along (hint: link to the permalink for the post, not the main url for your blog and use your blog’s name, not your name). The list is open from now until late Tuesday night and a new one is posted every week.

Show and Tell is wasted on elementary schoolers. Join several dozen bloggers weekly to show off an item, tell a story, and get the attention of the class. In other words, this is Show and Tell 2.0. Everyone is welcome to join, even if you have never posted before and just found out about Show and Tell for the first time today. So yank out a photo of the worst bridesmaid’s dress you ever wore and tell us the story; show off the homemade soup you cooked last night; or tell us all about the scarf you made for your first knitting project. Details on how to participate are located at the bottom of this post.

Let’s begin.

Please turn in your homework: It has been a full year since Show and Tell began, therefore, last week, I gave you a little homework. Please enter your favourite post from a past show and tell. Give the permalink url for the old post (not the permalink for the Show & Tell post, unless you are choosing something I showed. Give the link to the post that appeared on the other person’s blog) in the comment section of this post. And then go back through memory lane and revisit some old objects and stories from this year.

This week:

I didn’t take this picture (I got it here), but it is the perfect image to commemorate my Bat Mitzvah anniversary. The big 2-2. Which also happens to be today.

I share my Bat Mitzvah anniversary with Amy, one of my best friends from college. We met in an introductory Hebrew class on the first day of school and have been friends since (in fact, she was a witness at my wedding and signed my marriage contract). We realized that first spring that we shared a Bat Mitzvah anniversary which makes us parsha twins.

Part of this Hebrew class was memorizing these small plays that contained vocabulary words and performing them for the class. She was always my partner and we liked to spice them up. Instead of simply reciting them as everyone else did in the class, we brought props and costumes.

One of the plays had the phrase “l’yad ha’amood” in the dialogue and I couldn’t stop bitching about what a useless vocabulary word “pillar” was. How often in life do you need to use the word “pillar?” And I didn’t need to use it for almost three years. But one day, we were standing near the student union and I was trying to point out the boy I liked and I said, “l’yad ha’amood” because he was, indeed, standing by one of the pillars in that picture and Amy cried, “see! It did come in handy!”

So happy anniversary to Show & Tell as well as to my Bat Mitzvah twin, Amy.

What are you showing today?

Click here or scroll down to the bottom of this post if this is your first time joining along (hint: link to the permalink for the post, not the main url for your blog and use your blog’s name, not your name). The list is open from now until late Tuesday night and a new one is posted every week.

Show and Tell is wasted on elementary schoolers. Join several dozen bloggers weekly to show off an item, tell a story, and get the attention of the class. In other words, this is Show and Tell 2.0. Everyone is welcome to join, even if you have never posted before and just found out about Show and Tell for the first time today. So yank out a photo of the worst bridesmaid’s dress you ever wore and tell us the story; show off the homemade soup you cooked last night; or tell us all about the scarf you made for your first knitting project. Details on how to participate are located at the bottom of this post.

Let’s begin.

Homework: This is the one-year anniversary of the first Show & Tell post. In honour of that milestone, Liv came up with a brilliant idea in which to celebrate the year. Click on that last link (or use the tag list on the left sidebar) and you will be able to peruse all 52 Show & Tell posts. Your homework for this week is to choose one of your favourite past Show & Tells and come to class with it next week. In a comment, you’ll share the permalink to your favourite show and tell post that was entered on the Show & Tell list (in other words, the permalink from the person’s blog, not the permalink for the roundup of all the show & tell posts on this blog).

This week, I am bringing a Smith Island cake.

It’s an 8-layer cake made up of paper-thin yellow cake and slathered in between with a cooked-fudge icing. I learned how to make it last year when we were on Smith Island. I have been in love with this island since I first heard about it from a Washington Post article on the dearth of teachers in island communities. I think about the place daily.

An article I read about the cake a while back spoke about the terroir of the cake–whether it is really a Smith Island cake if it’s not made on Smith Island. Does the space somehow affect the overall product, much in the same way New York tap water is said to enhance the pizza dough and bagels in the city?

Terrior loosely means “sense of place” and it is how something edible can take on the characteristics of the space and if recreated anywhere else simply is missing that unique, indescribable quality that made it remarkable in the first place. It is what makes each glass of wine made from the same type of grape taste differently. And yet, what can you do when you are a three hour drive and a 45 minute boat ride away from the place that has your heart?

Have you ever fallen in love with a place simply by reading about it, before ever seeing it. And if you ever got to see the place, were you still in love after you left?

What are you showing today?

Click here or scroll down to the bottom of this post if this is your first time joining along (hint: link to the permalink for the post, not the main url for your blog and use your blog’s name, not your name). The list is open from now until late Tuesday night and a new one is posted every week.