We book a babysitter and finally go out for that milestone birthday – fish and chips and a cocktail at a spot in our old neighborhood that, it turns out, is full of young families on a Friday night. We (I) ogle other people’s babies while missing ours, then take a walk past our old garden plot and our old apartment. I miss the life that we had there, and the golden light of early evening. We don’t often see that light these days.

The big kid takes swimming lessons at the University pool. It’s well organized chaos, and I’m grateful that he’s hanging on someone else for a change.

I mark seven years on the job with a coconut donut. This is the longest I have worked anywhere.

We plan to visit my ancient grandmother for Easter, then change those plans at the last minute. Instead, we stay home, dye Easter eggs, and make a disastrous batch of matzo ball soup on a rainy weekend.

We find outrageously cheap flights to Belgium, a trip we were certain we couldn’t afford this year. Instead, we will spend 3 weeks there in the late fall, our flights entirely covered by travel points, with our housing nearly free as well. It’s all happening!

The baby still hasn’t figured out crawling; instead, he hops on his butt like a frog. It’s surprisingly effective.

A bike trailer shows up on a neighborhood listserv for cheap, so at the end of my intentional spending Lent, I make an impulse buy. The same day, a strap on my bike helmet breaks. This is how it goes – one spontaneous purchase results in others, necessary or no. That was weeks ago, but weekend weather and plans have yet to allow us to go for a ride.

The big kid wins a prize at an Easter egg hunt – a basket full of candy on top of the candy he collected in the hunt. I hate feeling like the food police, but this candy is just awful, and I’m grateful that we already had a wonderful box of treats at home from the Zurenborg Paashaas, as it means the big kid is absolutely fine with sharing.

I present at a conference that is pretty far outside my wheelhouse. The opening plenaries are engaging and challenging, and I feel grateful to be there. There will be no conference travel for me this year – or perhaps next – and while that’s fine, it’s also a little sad.

Mom comes in for a quick visit, arriving after work on a beautiful Friday night and leaving in an incoming snowstorm Saturday morning. Will this winter ever end? We just do the normal things – dinner at our favorite Thai place in the neighborhood, breakfast errands at the grocery store – but decide to scramble the routine a bit in order to try to win free pie for a year. The first 50 in line win – we are #53-57 due to folks cutting in line. Ah well, we still had pie.

There’s that saying about not crying over spilled milk – I have the most epic spill of my pumping career, but thankfully, I realllllly needed to pump, so I am more concerned about the carpet underneath the spill than the spill itself.

A few weeks after we made a list of all of the things that we want in a new place – a place pops up on the University marketplace site that checks all the boxes. It is as good in person as it seemed in the ad, so we throw caution to the wind and put in an application despite having 6 months left on our lease.

And so the rest of April is consumed with housing worries – will we get the place? Can we afford the place if we get it? Our application is approved – now, can we find a subletter? Will one of the many people who comes through to see our apartment decide to take it? Again, can we afford it? One thing after another, which will likely continue until we are settled in with a subletter secured.

But! In a month or so, we will move to the northwest corner of our neighborhood into a condo rented from an owner. We will have a dishwasher and laundry in unit. We will have windows that look out into trees. We will have central AC. It will be stressful until we get there, but we will get there.

April Reading

• Is Prison Necessary? Ruth Wilson Gilmore Might Change Your Mind – NYTimes – this is a long but important read.
• is everything an MLM – Anne Helen Petersen — the sharpest, most painfully accurate take I’ve read on why graduate school is a scam
• Everybody Loves Samin Nosrat – Bon Appetit — including me!
• Diet Culture May be Influencing Your Wellness Practice – Bon Appetit
• How to Embrace Gentle Nutrition – Alyssa Rumsey Nutrition
• Women Did Everything Right. Then Work Got ‘Greedy’ – NYTimes
• Opinion | The Data All Guilt-Ridden Parents Need – NYTimes – Emily Oster is a godsend, and I can’t wait to read her new book, Cribsheet
• How Did Ice Cream Get So Expensive – Eater
• Children of Blood and Bone – Tomi Adeyemi

April Eating

• From the NYTimes:
  • Tofu escabeche, both the regular and the provençal preparations – I’m way into this as long as I remember to start it before work.
  • Moroccan baked fish with potatoes, peppers, and olives – I’m trying to get more comfortable with preparing fish. This was a great place to start.
  • Warm kale, coconut, and tomato salad – a literal mountain of kale. The baby ate the bits and pieces but couldn’t have the dressing.
  • Ottolenghi’s pasta and zucchini salad – We tend to lean hard on the puttanescas over here and rarely branch out to other pastas. This was so good and I can’t wait to make it with summer produce.
  • Andean bean stew with winter squash and quinoa – Because it was still winter in mid-April.
  • Wild rice and mushroom casserole – Warm, comforting, but very beige and with an absolutely absurd amount of bread crumbs. Next time I’ll omit the crumbs and double the mushrooms.
  • Tofu ‘chorizo’ for tacos – Big eh. I’ll buy soyrizo or make sofritas next time.
• So much cod en papillote
• Vegan matzo ball soup – hahahahahaha this was an epic disaster.
• Cauliflower “meatballs” with tomato sauce and bread – I’ll tone down the Italian herbs next time, but otherwise a weekend winner.
• Honey roasted endive and carrots – Recipe called for parsnips, but we had carrots, which worked just as well. This one’s a keeper.
• Cannellini aglio e olio – Fancy beans on toast are always a hit in our house