Happy St. Patty's Day

Last year for St. Patrick's day, I dumped some green food dye into pancake mix and called it a celebration. This year, I'm making "green spaghetti." The kids greeted this news with enthusiastic cries of "Yuck!" and "That's disgusting!"

Brian told them not to worry. "It's just regular spaghetti with green dye in it."

"No it's not. It involves a pound of spinach."

"Oh. Uh-oh."

Yes, I'm continuing to torture my family with my Vegetarian Times cookbook, and it's been great fun. Except the chickpea cabbage soup I made the other day, which the kids wouldn't touch and resulted in me getting a stomachache of epic proportions, requiring 4 GasX tablets, a shot of Pepto and a cup of ginger tea. I also got on my knees and asked God, "Why don't I own a hot water bottle?" Needless to say, I haven't dipped into the leftovers.

So, enough about my stomach. Tonight we have an ice cream social at John's new preschool. Tomorrow I have my first date with my new girlfriend. Sunday, Ben has a birthday party at the local candlepin bowling alley.

We took the boys bowling last week since they'd never been, and we didn't want Ben to be a complete novice in front of his friends. I can't believe how expensive bowling is! For the kids to bowl for 1/2 hour, it cost $13 ($26 for an hour). We rented three pairs of shoes, the kids bowled for 30 minutes, and Brian and I played two strings. It cost us over $30. Maybe it's because we're broke, but for less than an hour of entertainment, I was not impressed.

Anyway, after eating all the green spaghetti myself tonight, I may get crazy and dump some green food coloring into my beer. Are you celebrating St. Patty's Day?

Coming up: A long-overdue review of The MomsTown Guide to Getting It All. I'm also giving it away to a commenter, but mostly because I didn't like it. Doesn't seem so exciting when I put it that way, does it?