Happy Valentine's Day!

Well, my house doesn't quite look like Hallmark threw up in it, which disappoints me.  ;o)  Ellie and Mikey appreciated my hard work.

I took toys they already had and put special Valentine's Day clothes on them

 

I put up a heart curtain while Ellie was sleeping

\

It was a hit

"My own placemat!"

(Never mind that she does, in fact, have her own placemat with "Ellie" on it)

He couldn't wait to put on that headband!

New Toy: Round Loom

I am a sucker for looms.  Ever since I was little, making hundreds of nylon-loop potholders, I have loved looms.  I'm not very good with looms, but I don't have much chance to use them.  Still, when I find a cheap one, I can't pass it up.  I used a 50% off coupon to acquire this bad boy for $3.50.

So far I've just used the included directions for baby doll hats.  I've made two.  I love them.  The closure on the first one is messy, and the closure on the second one is open, but the hats serve their purpose.

Ellie's Treasure Box

Thanks to my mom and Caillou, Ellie is obsessed with collecting treasures.  Note: Treasures typically include rocks (big surprise...that's a genetic mandate), leaves, pine cones, pine needles, sticks, mulch and garbage.  Yes, garbage.  We do our best to sift through these things and retain only those that can be cleaned or came from a familiar source.  Still, we don't exactly want these things on the kitchen counter or the floor, which is where they inevitably end up.  I've thought of creating a display box, but I don't think Ellie's quite up to leaving her things on display.

I decided she needed a treasure box.  I was envisioning some sort of lunch box, and JoAnn had a few cute ones that just needed some stickers.  I wanted to let Ellie pick, though, and she chose a wooden treasure chest.  I didn't even tell her that's what it was called.  She grabbed it and held it tight.  So...the next step was paint.  Ellie chose Indian Turquoise, which matches her room perfectly.  This kid has an eye for color; this isn't the first time she's chosen a color in the palette of her room.  We set out to find a wood piece to attach, but they were all too large.  I was going to put her name on it, but they were out of "L."  I decided to check out the buttons.  Ellie picked some rhinestones, again in the colors of her room.  I also found some felt butterfly stickers that matched, so I grabbed them.

Ellie helped me paint, peeled the butterfly stickers and applied glue to the rhinestones.  She also insisted we put some rhinestones on the back.  Admittedly, I did not paint the bottom, mostly because I didn't want turquoise paint chipping off everywhere.  I'm happy with the results, and Ellie is thrilled.

Fecund Friday: Barrette Holder

I've wanted to make a ribbon barrette holder for Ellie's room for ages, but I kept forgetting to pick up the supplies.  (I'd walk into JoAnn, buy a bagful of stuff, get home and then realize I didn't pick up a single thing I went in for.  I did this for months.)  I finally remembered this week when Mike came downstairs with a handful of barrettes and asked where they go.

I wanted to get a prepainted wood piece or a plaque from which I would hang ribbon.  None of the prepainted items were big enough or appropriate for Ellie's room (sailboats and frogs...not so much).  The plaques just didn't feel right, either, because I didn't want to spend much time on the painting, and they all had a lot of width for their height.  I did come up with many cute ideas for the plaques, though, like attaching one of the precut words, such as "dream," or one of the prepainted butterflies.  I also thought of putting her name or a wooden "E," but I'd like to use this holder for girls we may have in the future.

As I was exploring the possibilities of the plaque, I stumbled across the idea of using a large wooden "E" instead of the plaque, but the dimensions just weren't right; it could only hold three ribbons.  Plus, I'd only be able to use it for Ellie.  Then I saw the letter "I."  Only this was a sans serif "I," so it was just a bar with beveled edges.  Perfect!

I picked up some pink paint for $1 (Valentine's Day sale!), some half-inch white ribbon on clearance for $0.50, and - score! - two pretty pink butterflies I found for $0.50 each while looking for the ribbon.  Counting the paintbrush and tacky glue I had to buy because I didn't have any, I spent $6.  If I'd had my regular craft stash, I'd have only spent $3.  I did look for rhinestones or buttons to put on the bar, but nothing stuck out.  It probably would've been too much.  I'll take it as a compliment that my husband thought the finished product was a decoration I made for her room.

Don't want to put a nail in the wall?  Use a 3M Command hook like I did!

Supplies:
6" (Wide) Wood plaque, bar or figure
Tacky glue or whatever you have on hand that can hold some weight when dry
Acrylic paint
Paintbrush or sponge
Half-inch ribbon
Lighter, depending on your ribbon
Lightweight ornaments or clips for decoration, if desired

1. Paint the wood piece as necessary, allow to dry completely
2. Cut two (2) 8-inch pieces of ribbon and five (5) 16-inch pieces of ribbon
3. Use the lighter to lightly melt all the ends of the ribbon, as necessary, to prevent fraying
4. Knot the 8-inch pieces together at one end
5. Spread the unknotted ends and glue to either end of the back side of the wood piece, allow to dry completely
6. Using a ruler or gridded cutting mat, lay out your 16-inch pieces of ribbon, figuring out the appropriate spacing
7. Carefully glue one end of each piece of ribbon to the wood piece, allow to dry completely
8. Attach your decorative items and you're done!  Ready for barrettes!

(I sewed the butterflies onto the ribbons.)

It may be my dharma, but sometimes I'd rather be Greg.

This is a post about menstruation (periods).  I do not go into the biology or specifics of it, but if the mere mention of it offends your delicate sensibilities, do not read on.

I recently had a miniphany (that would be mini epiphany, if such a word existed) about my "womanly duty," as my mom called it when I was thirteen and mortified that the subject even came up.  This miniphany has its roots in a number of sources, the top two of which include the novel Confessions of a Jane Austin Addict and the television sitcom Dharma & Greg.  In the former, the main character, who is a 21st-century woman trapped in a 19th-century-woman's life (and body), muses that perhaps her monthly visit was so short and sweet because she was bedridden for the duration.  In the latter, Dharma and her mother are crunchy, earthy women who ceremoniously celebrate every season in a woman's life.

Feeling the onset of my suffering, I set out to find some tools that might help me cope.  (Since I can't turn into a man for a week out of every month, I have to accept my fate.)  As I read, the two sources kept playing in my head.  I started to think that if I just changed the way I viewed my monthly visitor, I might enjoy its company, or at least let it sleep in the guest room instead of on the couch.  I read an article that briefly mentioned the biology of the visit, and it made me think of childbirth.  I internally pontificated about using birthing coping mechanisms to ease the suffering.  Then I thought about the best advice I've ever received about labor and childbirth: listen to your body; do what it tells you.

What does my body really tell me during these days?  Does it tell me to run around getting stuff done?  Does it tell me to stand at the sink for an hour washing dishes by hand?  Does it tell me to eat a large pizza?  No.  It tells me to rest, drink liquids and relax.  Now, life likes to get in the way of that, but is that an excuse to completely ignore my body?  No!  Can I lay in bed all day?  No, but I can still alter my usual activities to include more sitting.  I can use the dishwasher.  I can definitely work in some meditation or deep breathing or maybe a few yoga poses.  And nothing sounds better than relaxing with a hot cup of tea after the kids go to bed.

I recently watched a rerun of Dharma & Greg in which Abby, Dharma's mom, thought she was entering menopause.  At the same time, Dharma & Greg were trying to get pregnant, and Abby helped Dharma by giving her a fertility totem and fertility smoothies for both her and Greg.  Dharma & Greg were in charge of Abby's crone ceremony (but then Abby found out she was pregnant).  While I was watching, I thought of another episode in which Dharma and Abby were part of a rebirthing ceremony in honor of Dharma's birthday.  The celebration was as much about Abby as it was about Dharma.

I know a lot of women celebrate a girl becoming a woman.  Obviously we celebrate a woman becoming a mother.  In some circles, various aspects of the fertility cycle are celebrated, like for women trying to conceive or for surrogates.  We celebrate every aspect of a woman's ability to bear children, but we begrudge the monthly symbol of just that.  What if we celebrated our womanly duty as our honor?  What if we fulfilled the needs of our bodies during this time, the way we would lavish gifts on a loved one on their birthday?  This season in our lives is ripe with our dharma, our purpose in life: childbearing.  Whether or not we are actively participating in this purpose, by our choice or not, it is the very nature of being a woman.

I vote we celebrate our monthly gift as a gift.  Instead of dreading it and stocking up on ibuprofen, let's meditate on the wonders of the human body.  Let's listen to our bodies and give them what they need.  Let's give ourselves a little ceremony for the arrival of our visitor, something that reminds us how special we are, how special God made us.  Buy some special tea and a pretty mug to drink it out of.  Learn a few new yoga poses and practice them daily.  Treat yourself to some aromatherapy candles and a fluffy robe.  Take a meditative stroll somewhere, even if it's just five minutes after the kids are asleep.

This time doesn't have to be a burden.  It's part of life.  It's part of being a woman.  It's a gift.

Time for Tea

I love tea.  I have always loved tea.  I was the only seven-year-old I knew who ordered iced tea at dinner.  I felt like I was special.  I felt then, as I do now, connected to other tea drinkers.  Let's face it:

Tea brings people together.

My taste in tea has changed over the years.  I used to love LOVE love Nestea instant tea.  I went through it by the jarful.  When I stayed home sick as a tween, all my mom needed to do was make up the pull-out and leave the remote and the Nestea on the end table, and I was set for the day.

As the years went on, I discovered the wonders of green tea, said wonders being that it existed.  Working in the mall, I fell in love with the Blackberry Jasmine green tea at the various Asian restaurants in the food court.  I'm not a flavored tea person, but if it's not sweet, I can appreciate it.  This leads me to a tea-drinking quirk of mine.  While I do enjoy a rich, full-bodied tea, hot or cold, I prefer my tea weak, more like tea-flavored water.  (I better not see any comments about how tea is, in fact, tea-flavored water.)  My loved ones have joked about misplaced drinks, saying that if it looks like pee, it must be my tea.  Now there's a visual for you.

My wonderful husband, who normally does not indulge my addictions, introduced me to Jasmine Pearls.  These are full green tea leaves rolled into balls with jasmine.  They bloom when you add hot water.  The jasmine flavor is flowery, but it's so subtle and soft that it's not too much.  A lot of people who do not like flowery teas like jasmine.  I like to add a little lavender to my Jasmine Pearls.  Sometimes I mix them with white tea.  Sometimes I mix my white tea with lavender.  Tea is fun.  If you want to discover new flavors of tea, the best way is to find a bulk loose-leaf section and grab a few pinches of each flavor that interests you, not in one bag, of course.

I must interject here with some tea-care instructions.  Be sure to store your tea in a cool, dry, dark place...metal canisters are great for this.  Do not display your tea on the counter in a clear-glass canister or jar!  Not only does light degrade the tea quality and flavor, it decreases the amount of antioxidants.

I also feel the need to throw in some brewing tips here.  Remember: you can always add water to tea that is too strong, so be sure not to use too little!  Alton Brown gives his guidelines here.  (Note: He likes both tea and coffee very strong.)  He also tells you proper brewing temperatures and times.  To paraphrase Mr. Brown's comments in his tea episode, when your kettle whistles...  For black tea, bring the tea to the kettle (it brews hottest).  For green tea, bring the kettle to the tea (so it cools just a touch).  For white tea, remove the kettle from the heat for a couple of minutes before pouring (white tea is delicate).

I enjoy drinking my tea in another nifty and thoughtful gift from my hubby, my Libre Tea glass.  I can brew my tea on the go, I don't have to change containers, and I don't need an infusion ball because the filter's built in!  The glass is insulated, so I don't burn my hand, and my tea stays hot.  Hubby actually got me two: a glass one and a plastic one.  The plastic one still has glass on the inside, but it's not as fragile as the all-glass one.  Those of you who know me can guess that's the one I use.

I recently had a new tea experience.  The yummy Japanese restaurant Le Hana near the base of the Portland Aerial Tram serves a wonderful green tea, nutty and smokey.  I asked the hostess/server about it, and she said the brand was Miyako.  Unwilling to wait for an Internet order and knowing I've seen this type of tea, green tea with toasted brown rice, from other brands in the past, I looked for the tea in the bulk loose-leaf section of New Seasons Market (thank you for your vast selection of bulk loose-leaf tea!).  I found it made by The Republic of Tea.  Yay!  Yum!  Introducing the Tea of Inquiry.  [Ooohhh...Aaahhh...]

Don't be surprised or disturbed if your preschooler points out the "bugs" in your tea.

The excitement is building!

I wish I could have gotten a better picture of the beautiful swirling motion of the leaves as I poured in the water.  Maybe next time.

For some strange reason, the tea separates into two groups: floats and sinks.

Suddenly, the floats group starts to fall.

I know my tea is ready when all the tea is at the bottom.  Neat, huh?

Ahhh...ready to drink.  And the next cup is already brewing!

I love drinking tea.  It relaxes me and makes me happy.  I love sharing tea with my friends and loved ones.  I feel like I'm part of a big family when I connect with other tea drinkers online, in stores, in coffee houses, in tea houses...  We're everywhere!  (That was a little more ominous than I intended.)

What is your favorite tea?  Where do you like to drink your tea?

I love CARROTS!

A friend had this as her facebook status today.  It reminded me that I, too, love carrots!  I love them raw.  I love them steamed with butter and maybe some tarragon.  I love them roasted, maybe with honey and almonds, or maple syrup.  I love them pureed into a curry soup or a cream soup or a ginger soup!  I love carrots tempura, carrot cake, carrot muffins (I put shredded carrots into most of my muffins)...  The list goes on.

For me, winter is an awesome time for cooked carrots.  They contain so many nutrients, including harder-to-come-by copper.  They, and other root vegetables, provide so much comfort and health benefits.

So...

I want your carrot recipes!

Foraging for Scraps

Andrea Tidrow's blog reminded me of a yummy recipe I created with stuff I found in my refrigerator.

I used leftover slow cooker chicken, but rotisserie would be very yummy, even grilled. Shred it. Combine Vegannaise or an oil-blend mayo with a garlic vinaigrette, like Annie's Naturals Roasted Garlic Vinaigrette, to create a yogurt-like texture. Quarter red grapes. Combine chicken, dressing and grapes, roll in a tortilla and enjoy!

I wish I had a picture for you, but I was so excited that I ate it without thinking.  I've made it since, and every time I'm too excited to eat it.  Maybe next time...

Now, be sure to check out Andrea Tidrow's blog for other inspired dishes of desperation.

Thankful Thursday

Tonight I overheard my husband singing "Twinkle Twinkle" to our one-year-old son.

Earlier today, my son informed me that the birdies were saying "dada."

This afternoon, my three-year-old daughter learned, much to her fascination, that bats eat broccoli.

Last night, my son stood up by himself for the longest yet.

Yesterday morning, my daughter discovered that Japanese food is wonderful and eating it is even more wonderful when you use chopsticks.

This week, my son learned to hold up one finger when asked how old he is.

This week, my daughter became obsessed with making paper snowflakes, or "snow flags," as she calls them.

Wordless Wednesday...on Thursday

(I spent so much time redoing my site that I neglected to actually post anything.)

Menu Plan Monday...on Thursday

So I'm a space cadet.  I'm sure you just didn't know what you were going to do without my meal plan this week.

Monday - Leftovers
Tuesday - French Dip Tacos (Leftovers of Slow Cooker French Dip served on fresh flour tortillas, with au jus, of course) with sauteed green beans.  Seriously, buy the raw tortillas in the refrigerator section and cook them yourself.  It's worth it.
Wednesday - Picante Chicken that I didn't make last week served over rice, as always...gotta catch that juice!
Thursday - Dining Out
Friday - Leftover Buffet

Caterpillar Cuddly

Okay, so he's not that cuddly, but he is a plush toy, and the name went with "Butterfly Buddy."

I actually thought through my stuffing process before starting this time.  I also had the sense to attach my colored pieces to a single backer instead of trying to assemble them midair.  Both sides are the same, and other than the slightly fish-like head resulting from after-market eyes, he's slightly reminiscent of Eric Carle.  I had to add eyes to the original design because Ellie was disturbed by the lack of eyes on the dinosaurs.  After seeing them on the caterpillar, she asked me to put them on the butterfly.

Butterfly Buddy

Tonight Ellie brought me the dinosaurs I made her yesterday and asked me to make them into something else, Elmo.  (Now, I feel I should clarify that she was not saying she didn't like the dinosaurs but rather she didn't realize I have more materials from which to make other things.)

Well, I don't have any red felt, so I asked her what else she'd like.  She said, "green Elmo."  I asked for another idea, and she said, "red Elmo."  So Daddy interjected with, "What about a butterfly?"  Ellie: "Yeah!"  Then he felt the need to tack on, "and a caterpillar...The Very Hungry Caterpillar."  Thanks, Daddy.

I let Ellie pick the colors, right down to the floss, and she did a pretty good job.  I, on the other hand, should have gotten off my behind and gotten the pins I was too lazy to get.  Eh...Ellie won't care that he's lopsided.

As for the caterpillar?  Not tonight.  Three hours on a butterfly that should've taken about an hour is enough for one night.

Oh My Oh My Oh DINOSAURS!

My kids LOVE dinosaurs.  I saw a tutorial on a craft blog about some cute MYO fleece dinosaurs.  Well, I don't have any fleece, and I wasn't about to take two children to the craft store.  What I do have is gobs of felt and floss.  So...

I drew up a form of a dinosaur and went to town.  I decided to make a set of two dinosaurs with contrasting embellishments.  Drawing the form wasn't too difficult for me.  (Sketching patterns freehand is the only type of drawing I do halfway decently.  Do not ask me to try to draw something that won't be cut out and traced.)  Cutting the felt proved a little harder because there were some tight corners in my design.  Assembling the dinosaurs was nothing.

The first dinosaur, a sort of stegosaurus, was just two forms and four triangles cut from the scraps.  I pinned the forms together and inserted the triangles about 3/16" in between the forms, pinning each triangle.  Then I sewed all the way around the form except for the belly, for stuffing.  DO NOT DO THIS.  I don't know what I was thinking.  Leave the back open, please please.  Not only did I have a bear of a time stuffing all the tight areas, I had to stuff the legs AS I WAS SEWING THEM.  Plus, I had to go back and reinforce all the sharp corners because I pulled them open while stuffing.  All the sharp corners are around the legs, of course.

The second dinosaur is a brontosaurus with his head down, or that's what I'm telling myself.  He required a bit more work because his embellishments, spots, had to be sewn onto each side individually.  (Then, when you make two right sides, which you will inevitably do if you try to multitask, you have to rip off the spots and reattach them the other way, and it will look nowhere as good as it did the first time.)  Since I hadn't learned of my stuffing error yet, I sewed all the way around except the belly.  DO NOT DO THIS.  That is worth repeating.  Please, please, leave the back open for stuffing.

I could have thrown these dinosaurs together in a couple of hours if I'd paid attention to what I was doing.  They are a great little set to accompany one of my daughter's favorite books, Oh My Oh My Oh DINOSAURS! by Sandra Boynton.

Menu Plan Monday

Meaty Monday - Eh...dining out
Tasty Tuesday - Chicken with Apples and Onions and cheesy broccoli
Wild Card Wednesday - Slow Cooker French Dip and Crock Pot Applesauce
Spaghetti Night - Simple Slow Cooker Picante Chicken with extra veggies (yeah...I know it's not pasta)
Free-For-All Friday - Leftovers, anyone?

Operation: Freezer Cleanout (A.K.A. Lessons in Menu Planning)

We are going on a trip, and our freezer - and pantry, for that matter - is full of things that won't last until we get back.  I kinda forgot about this until this week, so now I'm desperately trying to creatively construct meals - preferably with nutritious element from our culinary collection.

The first day, I cooked a frozen cheese pizza with fresh pepperoni and a pepperoni broccoli stirfry.  I also threw a box of yellow cake and a box of raspberry Jello together to make one of my favorite desserts ever, it was incredibly tasty and just as moist and wonderful as the blue cake I made for my mother-in-law.

Last night we had frozen chicken strips, frozen chicken nuggets, the sad leftovers of a bag of frozen onion rings, frozen tater tots, a box of frozen veggies and a can of baked beans.  Ellie and I had a nutritious meal.  My husband?  Well, he did eat a single onion ring along with his strips and tots.  Onions are veggies, right?  Oh!  I rounded out my meal with Martinelli's sparkling apple-grape juice.  Yum!  I followed the meal with some of the yummy raspberry cake.

For lunch, my mom requested frozen Hebrew National pigs in a blanket, so I reheated some of the baked beans and cooked frozen peas and carrots with butter, shallot salt and garlic pepper.  It was a rather tasty meal.  Of course, I also had a piece of raspberry cake.

Dinner tonight was frozen P.F. Chang's beef with broccoli and frozen spring rolls.  The P.F. Chang's meal is not the cheapest, about the same price as getting it at the restaurant, but it sure is tasty, and we can round out the meal for much cheaper than dining out.  I also baked some frozen tropical fruit with some honey.  I produced a yummy fruit concoction resembling a crisp without the crisp topping.  I'll have to remember this.

I knew we had a lot of food in the freezer, but I really had no idea.

Blue Rose of Birthday

(Okay...I know.  Bad play on words.)

My mother-in-law has a birthday this month, and we celebrated last weekend.  We don't generally do big birthday celebrations for adults, so I wanted to do something to make it special.  My mother-in-law loves blue food, the brighter the better.  I decided I was going to make her a blue cake with blue icing.

I found a recipe for Jello cake online.  I also found a recipe for Kool-Aid glaze, but I didn't really follow it.  If you need a recipe, follow the one with the Jello cake but substitute milk for water.  My wonderful husband went to five stores to find both blue Jello and blue Kool-Aid.  I can't believe it was that hard to find.  In the end, he still had the wrong Kool-Aid, but at least it did turn the glaze blue.  The cake was blue berry flavored (note: not blueberry), and the glaze was blue raspberry lemonade.  It took a ton of powdered sugar to tone down the lemonade tang.

My husband (did I mention he's wonderful?) suggested using a Bundt pan, and I elected to use the rose-shaped pan that my mother-in-law gave me in honor of my middle name: Rose.  The cake cooked up beautifully, and hubby completely drenched it with the glaze.  When cut, it wasn't as blue as I had hoped (and the camera makes it look really yellow green), but you could tell it was supposed to be blue.  The cake was moist and subtle, and the glaze added a slightly crunchy, tangy-sweet contrast.

Oy...just...oy

Ellie never put anything in her mouth, so I was not prepared for this.

(In fact, we've let Ellie play with 3+ toys since she was less than a year old.)

Mikey isn't even allowed to play with many under-three toys.

So when Ellie either dropped or gave him a penny today, I was clueless...until he puked it back up in the presence of the firemen.  Yes, firemen.

He choked.  He couldn't breath for a few seconds.  He continued to labor for breath for a couple minutes.  By the time the fire truck got here, he was calm and only choked when he breathed deeply or sharply, but I knew it wasn't over.  At this point, I had no idea on what he choked; there was nothing in his vicinity except for some dried-out rogue peas he threw on the floor the other day.  I thought he maybe had aspirated some vomit.  Whether he was choking or drowning, I knew I couldn't risk driving him to the hospital myself.

The firemen arrived and set up shop to assess him.  His numbers checked out, and he looked fine.  He was horribly congested, though, to which one firemen asked, "Does he sound congested to you?"  (Um...yes...duh?).  Then he asked if it was normal for him to be so congested.  (Um...no...I already told you that's why I called 911?)  Stupid questions aside, he was a very nice, competent EMT.  (Well, aside from not having a tongue depressor.  Or a light to check his pupils.  These guys were really ill equipped!  Anyway...)  He got a tongue depressor and attempted to wedge it in Mikey's clamped jaw, an action which upset Mikey so much he proceeded to puke, and...hello, penny!  Mystery solved.

Mikey was immediately better.  No more congestion.  No more labored breathing.  He even started to warm up to the EMTs, smiling and waving.  The fireman who appeared to be in charge called a doctor to see if he'd approve us refusing transport, which he did.  I chose to drive us to the ER, now that I was confident Mikey was well, so that I wouldn't have to deal with both kids at the hospital.  (Mike could meet me sooner if he didn't have to go get my car.)

[While I was answering questions for the report, I heard a couple of the guys talking about something at the side of our house, but I didn't think anything of it.  Apparently, they dumped our bucket of water-soaked, used fireworks, no doubt looking for illegal fireworks.  You'd think they'd say something about the search, even though they had probable cause.  They also nosed through my first floor, probably because I acted like I didn't want them in my messy house.  They were nice, though.  They even offered to change my preschooler's nasty diaper.  I just couldn't let them suffer through that, though.]

As expected, at the hospital, they gave Mikey a chest X-ray and checked his oxygen saturation.  Everything was fine.  The Mikey bank, as the PA called him, was empty.  Mikey was even eating crackers and taking a bottle like nothing ever happened.

So...Did I learn anything?  Hmmm...  I did learn one thing:  Flylady is right when she tells you to always be prepared.  You never know when you'll have six firemen and four paramedics in your dining room!