Things I've Neglected to Mention

- My mom's been sick. Last week, she reacted badly to her antibiotic and passed out (i.e., hit the floor) in a grocery store. While she is perfectly healthy and fine now, and suffered no ill effects from the fall or the resulting medical tests (thank God!), she's still recuperating. She hasn't been over in three weeks, whereas usually she comes over twice a week. And I miss her!

- We were without a kitchen counter/sink/dishwasher last week, and, will be again for two to three days early next week. But, we're getting a new kitchen counter, sink and dishwasher! No more bright white Formica. No more grime from 1971 (don't ask). Yippee, and also, what an expensive hassle!

- My seven-year-old son Ben will not go to bed. He sneaks down to the dining room, starting random conversations with Brian or me, snatching treasures to steal back upstairs, sprinting the perimeter of the first floor should we try to, ahem, hasten his return to bed. He's also taken to yodeling in the upstairs hallway, which is SO HELPFUL while his 6- and 2-year-old siblings try to FALL ASLEEP. He also, since January, fights homework. We were doing so well, and now: chaos.

- It's Lent. I haven't given anything up. I'm doing morning readings, pondering a Palm Sunday craft for my 1st grade CCD class, and waiting on the Easter feast: pierogis, kielbasa, horseradish, Chrusciki. I was shocked to learn that I am not, in fact, Polish. These traditions resulted from the some Polish neighbors when I was a kid, I think. Luckily, my sister-in-law is Polish, and Brian's grandparents are Polish and Lithuanian. So the dream lives on.

What are you all doing for Lent, if anything? Do you have any Easter food traditions beyond eggs, ham, chocolate, and jelly beans?