Open-concept kitchen can cost a cook big-time

I find myself wanting to shout at the television these days. Not at the news shows—they do their own shouting—but at the home and garden shows.

These open concept kitchen floor plans are a huge mistake. You see the homeowner running about chattering how wonderful it will be to have friends and family in her new open kitchen while she prepares a meal. What you don’t see is the homeowner running about looking for bandages because she sliced her thumb along with the carrots because friends and family are gathered in the kitchen while she prepares a meal.

Surely, I’m not the only one who can’t talk and cook at the same time. I listen to someone tell a riveting story, lose focus and overdo the paprika. By a half a cup.

I try to be a polite listener, making occasional eye contact while I cook, and shave two knuckles in the cheese grater.

Thankfully, we only have a semi-open kitchen. There are two doors to the kitchen, one of which can be closed completely. The other is a large open doorway, but I can barricade it with a piano bench and two chairs if the need arises.

Since it’s only a matter of time before I injure myself with a carving knife or zester, I’ve dictated that anybody who isn’t actively involved in food prep must stay on the other side of the peninsula. Nobody gets in my Bermuda Triangle (the triangle of workspace between the ‘fridge, stove and sink).

To those of you considering knocking down a wall to open up a kitchen that has been separate from the rest of the house, think twice about the benefits of working in seclusion:

When you have a kitchen that is somewhat set off from the rest of the house, the rest of the house doesn’t smell like garlic. Or stir-fry.

When you have a kitchen set off from the rest of the house, you can still sweetly say to your spouse, “May I have a word with you in the kitchen?” When your kitchen is a major gathering space you have to say, “May I have a word with you in the garage?” Trust me, this raises eyebrows.

When you have privacy in the kitchen, you can lick the spatula, test taste all you want and let the dirty dishes tower in the sink.

When you have privacy in the kitchen, you don’t have to dive below a counter or into a cabinet so the kids don’t see you popping a cookie or a cracker into your mouth.

You can even pretend to knock your head against the counter to relieve frustration and no one will call a family meeting because no one will see you do it.

One final word for those of you still uncertain of the value of a semi-closed kitchen.

Your own stash of chocolate.

Cloudy with a chance of s’mores

There is an underlying assumption that you will have good weather whenever you plan a trip. The good weather assumption is right up there with other ridiculous underlying assumptions, like nobody will get sick, you won’t have car trouble and the kids will get along beautifully.

We planned a weekend trip with 12 family members to enjoy the loveliness of fall at a rented lake house based on the aforementioned assumptions with good weather chief among them.

A month out, the long-range forecast said 65 for the high and 52 for the low. Perfect sweater weather.

Three weeks out, the temperature forecast began warming to the mid-70s. Ditch the sweaters.

Fifteen days out, the forecast on my weather app replaced all the sun icons with clouds and raindrops. Find the rain parkas.

Two days out and there was a 90 percent chance of rain. Seven small children in a house in the woods with nothing but rain. Whose idea was this, anyway?

I ripped open my suitcase, began pulling out clothes and throwing in construction paper, scissors, pipe cleaners, glue sticks and washable markers.

The day before we took off, the forecast changed from a 90 percent chance of rain.

To 100 percent.

I ripped open my suitcase again. If the hair dryer and cosmetics went, I could wedge in a hot glue gun, ball of twine, wood slabs and a wood burner. We were going to have fun even if Grandma’s hair looked scary and she didn’t smell so great.

We arrived at our destination with threatening clouds but no rain.

“To the beach! Run, kids, run!” someone yelled.

Everyone sprinted. Kids jumped in small waves, threw sticks and rocks and got their shoes and pants soaking wet.

Then the rain came. “To the house! Run!” someone yelled.

So it went. “To the beach!” “To the house!” “To the beach!”

During the Saturday afternoon lull in the rain, we sprinted to the beach, lit a fire, roasted marshmallows, squished them between graham crackers with squares of chocolates and gulped down s’mores as the sky turned a threatening steel blue. The wind kicked up, the rain commenced and it was back to the house.

The storm raged, bending trees and whipping branches. The lights in the house began to flicker, the wind lashed and the waves from the lake roared. We all pasted our noses to the windows and agreed it was way better than watching the Weather Channel. We would have stayed with our noses to the windows, but it is hard to eat lasagna standing up.

We played board games, tinkered on musical instruments, sang off-key and slept that night to the sound of rain pelting the house and waves roaring along the shore.

Morning came softly with the moon high in the sky and a swatch of pink low on the horizon. Day broke and, as if on cue, two bald eagles soared overhead. We loaded the cars and pulled away leaving blue skies without a cloud in sight behind.

We don’t always get what we want, but sometimes that is entirely enjoyable, too.


We share toothpaste and kids, but not a suitcase

I used to routinely pack for the husband whenever we went out of town, but a few years back I stopped. I can’t remember the exact circumstances. I suspect it was a combination of time shortage on my part and a preference for waiting until the last minute to pack on his part.

In any case, since we initiated the “Everybody Count Out Your Own Socks Policy,” it has become increasingly apparent that we have very different approaches when it comes to packing.

When we first started packing separately, I wondered what sort of random, haphazard packing method he might use. When I witnessed him packing methodically, carefully and neatly, I wondered if perhaps I was indispensable. And then he tossed in hard cover books, newspapers and heavy dress shoes on top of his neatly folded clothes. So maybe I was still indispensable.

Mathematically, our split packing should have meant going from one suitcase to two. It did not. I take two bags for his every one. I long to be one of those people who “travel light,” packing only three articles of clothing and turning them into 15 different outfits, but it is not in the stars. Or the luggage.

I tend to pack for every conceivable weather condition (heat wave, torrential rain, drought, hail, hard freeze, blizzard), while he packs like an optimist who assumes the weather will be sunny and 72 regardless of the destination or season.

His modus operandi for packing is “Have khakis, will travel.”

Let it also be noted, the man doesn’t do “outfits.” He is of the mindset that everything he has goes with everything else he has. Why argue at this stage of the game?

I’d be concerned if I saw him laying out shirts and pants on the bed, seeing what goes together for hours at a time the way I have been known to do. He appears to put little thought into packing, but always looks put together.

The greatest difference in our packing revolves around shoes, which is currently running at a 4:1 ratio in my favor. What can I say? I have needy feet.

We also differ in that I will start packing days before we leave, while he often packs the morning of, based on the motto: “What’s the big deal?”

It turns out I come with a lot of baggage. Literally. Meanwhile, he has successfully become the minimalist that I always wanted to be. He’s gone from packing one medium suitcase to a carry-on bag, to a business overnight bag that wouldn’t even hold my hair appliances.

We recently returned from a weekend trip and I asked if he had unpacked, as I was going to start laundry.

“I brought in the clothes I took on hangers,” he said. “I just need to unpack a few things I stuffed in my camera bag.”

Is there anything more annoying than someone else’s success?



Lives of trees intertwine with family

It took seven strong men in four big trucks little more than three hours to take down 30 years of history.

Two 80-foot white pines bit the dust. Or the grass in the backyard in this case.

Bark beetles had taken their toll on our once-lovely towering pines. The beetles leave pinholes in the bark and mounds of sawdust at the base of the tree to let you know they’re hard at work. If you’re ever driving along and see a row of pines looking deep fried, extra crisp, or an entire mountainside with trees that look like they have been painted with rust, say hello to the bark beetles. They are dastardly little things.

Personal history and memories often intertwine with trees. There was a stately row of poplars in my first childhood home. I never picture the house without the trees.

Out on the farm, our grandparents always cut a Christmas tree from the fields. It was short and squat, had stiff needles that left scratch marks on your arms and smelled wonderful. That tree was a family tradition.

The pines in our backyard were only 5-feet tall when we moved in. They grew right alongside our kids and in the same manner—silently and quickly, but without the orthodontia and pizza.

Those pines once stretched a hammock between the two of them. They watched over swimming pools, campouts, rounds of hide and seek, snowfalls, one unauthorized bonfire and countless family gatherings.

A huge willow tree once stood in the backyard as well. The kids had a treehouse in it for a long time. Neighbor kids enjoyed it, too. The old willow rotted from the inside out and had to be taken down. The kids are in their 30s now and they’re still mad about the willow.

There’s a sadness to a fallen tree, a hollow thud that echoes death when it hits the ground.

My husband and I were working as newspaper photographers in the Pacific Northwest when Mt. St. Helens exploded. Forests were annihilated. Sprawling stands of evergreens stripped bare and splayed like bristles from a hairbrush on the charred and barren mountainside.

It was jaw-dropping, not unlike the aftermath of hurricanes and tornadoes. The loss of trees somehow compounds the even greater losses of lives and homes.

Trees tend to be symbols of strength and beauty. The death of a tree is a reminder of our own vulnerability.

The trees returned to Mt. St. Helens —and they returned faster than the experts predicted. To all who had witnessed the devastation, the regrowth was invigorating.  Those small seedlings cradled the beauty of new beginnings.

We’ve filled in the empty holes where the pines stood and dug a new hole that waits delivery of a Norway spruce.

One of the grands asked how tall the new tree is.

“Not much taller than I am,” I said.

“Can we decorate it for Christmas?” she asked, eyes twinkling.

New growth and new memories.

Getting a lock on your true friends







Striking out with friends, I moved on to family.



