resolution

i feel guilty.

all the time.

i feel guilty with my

family because i'm not

always available enough/

awake enough/

care-free enough

to be with them

at the drop of a hat.

i feel guilty at work

because i worry that i'm

not the fill-in-the-blank i could

be - because i'm not

tough enough, smart enough,

something enough.

i feel guilty with my friends because

i wish i was better at e-mailing back, texting

back, making regular plans with them, even

though i think about the people who are

important to me all the time and wish that

i was able to show it more with my actions.

and, i feel guilty about this blog.

i started it because i wanted - needed -

a place to be myself, through my

writing, my food and over time,

my pictures. and, it's true,

i did that for a while. but,

blogging, or more specifically,

building a community is not automatic

and i am guilty of growing

discouraged. and then, i moved, which

i've talked about quite a bit before.

i thought i could handle keeping both

going. i thought that even though i moved

an hour and a half away from my job,

and was waking up 2 1/2 hours earlier

than i used to, i would leave work earlier

i'd get home earlier.

but, that doesn't happen.

these past three months are unbelievably

hard to explain - with the exception of a mini

vacation, thanksgiving dinner and, later, a night

celebrating chanukah, i feel as if my life has been,

sleeping and working, with a tiny bit of cooking

and a few hours of glee and modern family

thrown in (we even gave up amazing race this year

for lack of time - if you know us, that's huge).

sometime in there, i realized

i hadn't been logging onto twitter and

that i had stopped reading the blogs

of the people i loved to read.

i have pictures on my camera

from thanksgiving that i haven't yet

downloaded - but will for this post.

i have been kind of striving for

getting by.

and i feel guilty all the time -

that i shouldn't have started this

blog, that i shouldn't try to keep

up the blog anymore,

that maybe i don't have

the level of commitment in me

that a good blog needs.

i worry that at this point,

when i write something, it's been

way too long and no one will care

to or remember, to check.

but, then, things happen.

two blogs that i read, recently

posted their first entry in months.

and, i realized - i don't think anything

less of them for their absence. i was

just excited to see what they wrote.

and, today, when needing a

cupcake recipe, i was so happy to

be able to refer to

my blog,

my diary (albeit a public one),

to find the one i was looking for.

so, it will be hard, but here's

my new year's promise to myself:

no guilt...um, maybe less guilt.

and, to try to love this blog

for what it is: mine,

and hopefully yours a bit, too.

and in that spirit,

i am also going to make an effort

to try to post more often,

but in whatever way works

in the moment - small entries,

story-filled, or like this one,

a compilation of what's been

happening in my life.

--

my mom, sisters and i took a trip to disney world to celebrate my mother's 60th birthday. it was an all-girl trip: two double beds, two sinks that were crowded with makeup and hair dryers and what seemed like 50 different chargers for 50 different electronic things. we played the trip like adults - enjoying a delicious african restaurant one night, very good desserts after a somewhat rough meal on the last night, avoiding characters (for the most part) and using the last day to visit the food and wine festival at epcot.

a couple weeks later, on thanksgiving - i insisted on making two dishes. my family tried to dissuade me - i had worked a significant amount leading up to the holiday, but i hated the idea of showing up with a bottle of wine or store-bought pie. so, i hunkered down on thanksgiving morning with a significant cup of coffee and started chopping six pounds of kale and peeling and slicing pears.

this cooking experience was not without its faults: i accidentally spilled a healthy splash of milk into the onions that i was sweating, the kale almost boiled over about 5 times, the greens were too salty forcing me to rinse them and just when i thought i couldn't mess up anything else, caramel spilled onto the floor, the counter, my socks and the computer cord when i tried to flip the upside down cake. but, it was all delicious (ok, maybe the cake was slightly undercooked) and company was perfect as always.

recipes:

creamed kale with caramelized pearl onions from bobby flay (i doubled this recipe and used significantly less butter when caramelizing the onions): this was a huge hit, but if you reheat, i caution you to do what i didn't do: heat separately on the stovetop and then add the onions just before serving.

pear and cardamom upside down cake from the wednesday chef: i loved the flavor of this cake, but it's true that it didn't bake all the way through, even though the top was golden and it seemed solid. i'm choosing to blame the cake strips that i used to prevent a domed top. think what you will.

thanks to our collective busy schedules, we celebrated chanukah several days after the holiday ended. i decided that i wanted to make the mushroom and pecan pate that i had spotted a month earlier. i was very nervous that my family wouldn't go for a pate, so i made the only decision that made any sense: i made a chicken pate, too. i needn't have worried. they were lovely and a huge hit.

recipes:

tuscan chicken liver pate from food52: delicious and slightly unusual combination of flavors. next time, i would probably eliminate or significantly reduce the cheese, which i felt overwhelmed the the other flavors. i also would process the mixture for shorter amount of time - i think it was just a bit gummy.

porcini and pecan pate from food & wine magazine: this one is a great vegetarian alternative, but slightly flat for my taste. i ended up adding in a bit of olive oil, a little cayenne and extra lemon juice. next time, i think i would caramelize onions and toss them into the food processor before pureeing. i think this was the favorite.

so that was my november and december.

i would like to believe

that i will post again

before the end of the year,

but let's be realistic.

it was only this crazy snowstorm

that gave me the excuse to spend

time writing,

on my couch,

in my pajamas,

with finally, no where

to go, or really no way

to get there.

so, with that, i want

to say, happy new year.

here's to hoping for more

time together in 2011.