El Dia de Los Kickballs (Or Muertos)

This is an historic post, O readers of the Chittum Files: You are about to see the first post with photos taken entirely from my iPhone, not a digital camera of some sort. I'm not posting from the phone - I don't have the patience or attention span to try to type all of this on the miniature keyboard.

El Guapo played the first round of the end-of-season playoffs tonight. True to our Mexican roots, we celebrated El Dia de los Muertos while on the playing field. I knew that was the plan, and I needed to get there earlier if I wanted to get my face painted.

Of course, newspaper is on deadline, and their worknight was tonight. They packed it in at 6:30, I scooted home, quickly changed clothes and headed off to Penn Valley Park.

Let me tell you - most of you probably don't know how far it is from 159th street to downtown. Downtown (at least where we play) is around 25th street. I didn't think I would get there in time for the game, let alone for the pre-game revelry.

But, I made it home, changed, hopped back in the car and got to the game in time for Andrea to get my pre-game ritual taken care of.

My face felt so itchy after she painted. I don't think I really was itchy, but since I knew I couldn't scratch it, or touch it, for fear of smearing, all I could think about was how my skin felt funny and needed to be scratched!

CY and Rita definitely win the prize for complete costumes - check out their bones! Cap'n Dave, one of the instigators of this blessed event, is conspicuously makeup-free over there on the right...He SAYS it's because he had to ref the game right before and it went over. Maybe he just wussed out on the makeup?

Nah, I doubt it.

That's me, getting made up by Andrea. I shot that Hail Mary style with the phone while she did the work.

Checking out everyone's handiwork. That's Kristin back there on the left, working on Andrea's face. Wait til you see how it turned out. It's freaking great.

Bag of bones.

There's Kristin's handiwork. Check out all of the shading in those flowers. Not bad for a job completed in the dark, in the dugout.

What do you think about the iPhone photos? I might be able to eke 4x6 prints out of them for my scrapbook. Those'll be a little pixelated, but I think they look pretty damn good on here, considering they were shot after sundown, only lit by baseball field lights. I'll be interested to see what else I can do with the phone, photo wise.

Oh yeah, we crushed the other team, good ol' Swunts and Swalls. So, I think we play twice next week. I went 1 for 2, with a single and a run scored.

The Big 6-0

Happy Birthday, Dad!

Today is Dad's 60th birthday. If it was a Saturday, he'd be celebrating by hitting the links, but I'm guessing he has to work today.

The photo above is from our trip to K-State for the Louisiana-Lafayette game. We rode up with Mom and Dad, and on the way, we stopped in Maple Hill at a dive called Puffy's Steak and Ice House. He'd heard from the guys he works with that Puffy's sold chicken livers, and that's what he wanted.

Yes, the plate of chicken livers was as big as it looks in the photo. He didn't eat the whole thing then. We boxed some up and took them home. Adam and I each tried a piece, but decided we can probably end our chicken liver experience there.

Happy Birthday, Dad. I love you!

Wii Fit - Fun with Balance Boards

Since the weather has gotten colder, and we had Friday off from school, Betsy and Mitzi came over and we played Wii, just like it was a good ol' snow day. If you have a Wii, you need to get the Wii Fit, we love it!


Here's Betsy, demonstrating perfect ski jump form. She got the highest score on her first try on the game!

Mitzi tried a few games as well. My favorite games are the hula hoop, the yoga poses and strength training, and I like the aerobics too.

I'm not sure how much REAL exercise it is, but at least we're up moving around while playing, not sitting on our duffs!

Baking Goodness - Can we have S'more?

If you are looking for a great brownie recipe, try these S'mores Brownies, from Food Network. The batch we made last week were much more photogenic, but I ran out of large marshmallows so I had to improvis with the regular size marshmallows. They taste the same, though, so you could probably use either one.

Underneath all of that marshmallow is a fudge brownie (made from scratch) on top of a graham cracker crust. These are great warm, with a glass of milk to wash it down.

We have to be careful, though, because our broiler is quite small, so once we add the marshmallows, we have to watch them very closely. It only takes about 20 seconds for them to get the nice brown roasted coating.

Try them, you'll love these!

Knitting Mania

It's been entirely too long since I've posted anything about knitting projects, so you'll get to see a bunch of items I'm working on right now. Since the weather has finally turned colder, I'm thinking more about knitting than I had been the last few months.

We got the knitting club at school up and running, so at least once a week, I'm guaranteed a solid hour of knitting time, along with the students and teacher who joined the club.

We didn't meet this week because of parent teacher conferences, and next week is newspaper deadline, so unfortunately, we're on a two-week hiatus.

I've been working on these fingerless mitts for the last few meetings.

It's a pattern from the book "One Skein" by Leigh Radford. I'm using some of the vintage yarn my Uncle picked up for me last year.


The pattern is easy-peasy, and it uses drop stitches to widen the mitt around your knuckles (the widest part of your hand). It's all knit in garter stitch (knit every row), and then you sew it together longways. Emma from knitting club did the sewing for me at our last meeting. I was so happy with the way the knitting turned out, I didn't want to ruin it by doing sloppy seaming.

She did an awesome job.


There's the mate for it, up on top of that skein of yarn. These would make good gifts, I think, because they're fairly easy to knit. The only bad thing is that you use sport weight yarn and tiny needles, so it takes time. I'll be using this pair myself, though, since it's usually about 55 degrees in our computer lab at school. Seriously - the kids call it the "Cooler" or "The Meat Locker."

The great thing about fingerless mitts is that you can wear them and still type easily or write, or do what you need to do.


This red yarn is also from the bunch that Mark picked up last year. I started this as a project to donate to the Red Scarf Project. It's an initiative that donates red scarves to warm the necks of college bound foster kids. They accept donations until Dec. 15, so if you can knit, get to it!

Scarves can be any shade of red, and unisex is best.


I haven't worked on this project since this summer, but I really like the way it looks, so I wanted to photograph it anyway. The square is a piece for a knitted purse. It's from the book "Hip Knits" from Better Homes and Gardens. You knit eight of these pieces, then put it together, almost like a little knitted quilt.

Look for the finished version of that sometime next year...


And, last but not least, I whipped up this furry pink confection for Adam. Yes, that's right, I said for Adam!

Next Thursday at his school, the teachers get to dress up for breast cancer awareness, and he asked for a pink boa. I knit it with two yarns on size 17 needles, so it only took two nights of knitting during TV watching to finish. Those are the best projects - quick ones!


So, that's the crafty update. Lots of knitting going on, but not a whole lot of finishing at this point. Hopefully, that will change soon.

Happy Anniversary to us!

Five years, baby!

Guys need Etsy love, too

In honor of Betsy's and my surprise Etsy sales last week, I tasked Adam with poking around on Etsy to find things guys would like. Like Betsy said, we've both been a little short on the Etsy side lately, what with school and day-to-day life getting in the way.

I haven't done a post about Etsy since I don't know when, so I thought I'd post a few items for your consideration.

Though Etsy started out as a place to buy and sell handmade goods, there are now lots of vintage sellers on the site as well. Adam seemed to pick out a few vintage items, in addition to handmade.

If you've seen him lately, you'll know that he's been carrying a "wallet" that consists of either a rubber band or a bulldog clip. So, imagine my surprise when he chose this as a favorite.

It's from seller vintageJones, and one of the keywords is "Hippie" so you had to know Adam would want it.

To go along with the vintage hippie wallet, he also found this little number. It's from seller EasyStreetVintage

It's a size 40, and still has the Vanderbilt label inside.

He also chose this next item from seller BrykinWear. I'm pretty sure he favorited it since the listing feature a cute baby.

So, if you know any hardcore toddlers, maybe you ought to order this little leather wrist cuff for them!

Last but not least, in honor of my awesome half-marathon finish last week, here's his last favorite. It's from seller nateduval. Let's hope Adam doesn't think I look like a gorilla while I'm running.


If you're looking in my shop for the man in your life, you might check out the pocket golf towels.

These golf towels have Velcro closure pockets, for storing tees, golf gloves, ball markers, you name it. It's the perfect holiday gift for the golfer in your life.

If you're looking for gifts for anyone in your life, not just Crafty Craftersons, Etsy is a good place to start. Especially in today's horrid economy, you should feel great supporting artists trying to make a buck.

Hate to tell you this, but you can't have it both ways.

An open letter to Sarah Palin and the Repubs:

Had some downtime during Parent/Teacher Conferences last night, so I was reading the New York Times and came across a couple of articles about Sarah Palin and her fancy-schmancy new wardrobe.

I just want to know, Sarah:

Are you "just a Hockey mom"?
Is your husband "Joe Six Pack"?
Are you really "just like typical Americans"?

I'm pretty sure I'm in your target audience, since I am Midwestern, middle class, etc. I mean, you can't get much more "American" than Middle America, so you don't have to worry about us being Anti-American, right?

But, I'm scratching my head, trying to figure out the last time I spent $150,000 on new work clothes. Oh, wait, that's right - NEVER. My work clothes come from Wal-Mart, Target and Kohl's, and Old Navy. I think that's what truly represents your everyday American who is on a budget.

So, which one is it? Would you rather be like all of us, as the Republican Party has been trumpeting for the last two months, or are you now a true member of the Washington elite? Option 2 doesn't sound too "Mavericky" to me. How 'bout just buying yourself a silkscreened T-shirt with "The New McCarthyism" emblazoned across it? Maybe that'll help you root out those nasty people who have done nothing wrong but disagree with you. Last time I checked, we are allowed to do that in this country, based on the First Amendment (and any of my high school freshmen could educate you on that). So, really, if you think they should be silenced and removed from government, maybe you're being Anti-American...

P.S. What will you do with all those clothes when you're done? Good luck paying income tax on all of it - they are gifts, after all.

Long Day's Journey

I should be getting ready for school right now, but I'm doing my morning routine of shower, breakfast, TV, check the blogs and e-mail, then finish getting ready.

Last night was the first night of conference, and we have another round tonight. They're only from 4-7 p.m., which doesn't seem like much, but by the end of the day, I'm ready to get the heck out of Dodge. I wasn't busy for the first hour or so, then I had a steady stream, but never a line. Some poor teachers had lines that looked like the good ol' pre-internet days when we used to have stand in line for concert tickets.

I still haven't figured out how conferences that are supposed to be limited to seven minutes a piece can generate lines that are 30 families long. It's crazy.

Conferences are usually pretty fun for me. I don't get a lot of takers, since I'm "just" an elective teacher, but the parents who do come are fun to catch up with and talk to. It's the editors' parents, the three-year staffers' parents, the ones who mostly just want to say Hi and see how I'm doing, as well as how their student is doing.

It certainly helps that I am blessed with great kids, because that cuts down on the amount of conference night drama. AND, of course, the parents who I really NEED to conference with are not the ones who show up. I think that's a pretty typical situation.

The payoff for two night of conferences is a day off tomorrow. I'm looking forward to that. I've got work to do for my masters class, and we're hoping to get the touch up painting done since we have a day off. We'll see how that goes.

•••

I've been reading "The Secret" for a while now, and I will eventually post about it, but I have made a "vision board" for what I want to accomplish. The first thing on the vision board is financial gains from the blog. I have a set number, but I'm keeping it to myself to see how close I can come...

Help prove "The Secret" works, by clicking on and checking out some of my Google ads. You can also use the Google search bar at the bottom of my page...We'll see how well it works.

And I ran, I ran so far away - Kansas City Half-Marathon

Dark and early Saturday morning, Mitzi, Stacey and I headed down to Crown Center for the Waddell and Reed KC Half-Marathon. It was about 42 degrees when we left the house, so we were all layered up.

The race started at 7, and it was still dark and pretty darn cold. As soon as the sun came up, it warmed up a tiny bit, but was still chilly.

Stacey was the first of us to cross the finish line, at around 2 hours and 10 minutes.

Adam and the kids waited near the finish line to see us as we came around the last corner. There was quite a crowd.


The photo below shows some Randy Randoms coming around the corner. Adam tried to get a photo of me, but he had forgotten our camera, so he was using Eugene's, and it shut itself off right as I came around the corner.

That's fine by me, because they'll be professional photos online in a few days, but Adam was pretty upset that the camera pooped out.

There's Stacey coming around the corner. I was 10 minutes behind her. I was shooting for a finish at 2 hours and 30 minutes, but I finished at 2 hours and 20 minutes. I ran with Mitzi until about mile six, and then I went on ahead, to see how I could do. The route was great - scenic, weather was perfect, and I felt good as I kept up a pretty good pace for me.

When I got home, I uploaded my data to Nikeplus.com, and it said that one of my last miles was 8:09. That's really fast for me. Usually, on a long race, I'm somewhere between 10 and 11 minute miles.

Mitzi was 10 minutes behind me, looking strong as she finished. My legs are a little sore today, but not as bad as the day after I ran the full marathon. The worst part of the race was AFTER the finish line. I crossed the line, had to find an open spot to get the chip cut off my shoe, and then came to a dead stop in a giant crowd of runners who were waiting for food. The crowd wasn't moving at all. I had to get out of the mess, so I found an opening in the railing and just walked back up to where Adam and Eugene and the kids were. My belly was saying "I'm hungry" but my legs were saying "If you stand still, we start cramping, so keep moving."

Logistically, the end of the race wasn't set up very well. Too much of a bottleneck. I won't let that spoil the day, though, because the race itself was one of my best running experiences.

So glad I did it.

Early Halloween Fun

Since we had the Jenkins-Lardi clan in town, we decided to go ahead and carve pumpkins for Halloween. It was a nice relaxing activity after a day that started pretty early.


Here are a few photos of our finished products:

That's Eugene's on the left, and Adam's on the right.

We had a couple of stencil and pumpkin-carving tool kits, so it was a little more highbrow than the pumpkin carving days of yore, when we just stuck sharp knives in the pumpkins and hoped for the best.

Mine is on the left (Adam said it looks like it's high), Genevieve's in the middle, and Stacey's is on the right.

He's a little intense, eh?

Josh and Stacey do their thing.

Eug gets ready to work on his. He used a really cool stencil of a skeleton face.

Once we got them all fixed up, we took them outside for a test light - they all looked great. Thankfully, no neighborhood houligans came along long last night and smashed them. They might be moldy before Oct. 31 rolls around, but we'll see.

I'm supposed to be cleaning house, but...

I just wanted to post before I forgot.

Today, the newspaper staff passed out their third issue of this year. It was a 24-pager, and it looks great. Fourth hour, they went out to get papers out of the car, and then spent most of the period stuffing the papers with the ad inserts.

Once they were done stuffing, almost the entire class sat and read the papers and you could have heard a pin drop in that room they were so silent. It gave me goosebumps as I moved around the room futzing around. The staff is wonderful - conscientious, involved, engaged, dependable. I can see real pride of ownership as they go about their business. It's their newspaper, their business enterprise, and they really seem to understand the whole "sink or swim together" philosophy.

I think the paper they put out today is the best one since I started at BV. They just keep getting better and better. I'm glad they're so pumped, because the November issue will be tough - two and half weeks turnaround, instead of our usual month.

•••

Now I've got to pick up the house, before Stacey, Eug and the kids get here. They're in town this weekend since Stacey is running the half as well. Wish us all luck!

How do you say "0 fer" en Español?

Because that's what I was tonight - 0 fer 2. Even with my superfans in attendance, I couldn't get on base!

Here they are: Amy "I'm doing my best to look nonchalant" Laws Meyer, Mitzi "Oh wait, she's taking a picture" Peterson, and Adam "don't bother me while I play with my wife's iPhone" Chittum.

I did, however, kick a pop foul that went over the fence and bounced off of our mariachi jukebox (aka Mike's Jeep). Whoops.

El Guapo's mojo was a little rusty in the beginning - not much offense in the first inning, and the other team scored a couple of runs. We had a little injured reserve issue - the top two in the lineup were both out tonight - a bike accident and a kickball injury from last week kept JB and TY out of the lineup tonight. Little did I know that our manager, Travis "Sparky" Young, would raise us up to victory with his shrewd kickball strategizing and cheering from the dugout.

Even with the slow start, we came away with a 6-3 victory. It's the first time we've allowed more than one run in a game.

This seemed to the be the other team's offensive strategy: Bunt. Bunt. Bunt. Bunt. Bunt. Bunt. Kick it as hard as you can. Let the girls do whatever they can.

Yeah, yeah, our team tends to do a little bunting, but every time?! Thus, it was a slow night for us out in the outfield. TJ got a workout behind the plate, though.

I shot a bit of video, but I'm going to save it up and hopefully edit a little piece together at the end of the season. We'll see how it goes.

As promised - here's the wrap from last week's game against Swunts and Swalls (I think I just threw up a little in my mouth as I typed that).

I think Creighton wrote it, but maybe Dave or someone else can correct me.

So, after this week, we're a big 7-0. I'll get you the official wrap up from this week as soon as I see it.

•••

We went to the marathon expo before the game - got our race packets and some shwag. I'm ready - I just hope it's not freezing cold Saturday. A girl can hope.

It's Half-Marathon Week

Saturday morning we're running the half. Sunday Mitzi and I ran 10 miles, and I didn't feel like I was dying at the end. It makes me think back to when I trained for the marathon in 2006.

When we got up around 8 or 9 miles back then, I seriously thought I would die from the running. Not so much anymore. Yes, 10 was hard, and it took us a while, but we did it, and I didn't feel like I was dying at the end. The weather was perfect too. Please - everyone pray that Saturday morning will be sunny and about 65 degrees.

I think on Saturday morning, part of me will feel like I'm missing out by not running the full. I'll want to be with all the "cool" kids who are doing it. (Of course, this feeling will go away around mile 11 when I realize I'm only 2 miles from finishing!).

We're going to check out the Expo and pick up our packets on Thursday night. I'm getting pretty excited - I'm ready to do it.

If I've been a little neglectful of the blog lately, running is a big part of that, and school is really keeping me busy. I'm taking a master's class, in addition to my regular teaching duties. Kat and L visited this weekend. I've got photos to post, but that will have to wait til the end of this week, I'm guessing.

We had our first yearbook worknight of the year tonight. Almost everyone showed up. The only ones who weren't there were the ones who had games tonight. We've got a great crew this year - lots of really good sophomores who I think will become dedicated yearbook nerds by the time they're seniors. And three boys this year instead of one! We've tripled the male enrollment! Yearbook always seems to attract the female crowd more than the males, but newspaper stays fairly even.

We'll be 40 pages ahead by the first deadline - sending all the senior ads in at once. It'll be nice to have that cushion built in.

Ahhhh, how cute, you're trying to use big words...

but I don't think you really know what they mean.

Check out this recap of our kickball game from last week (written by the other team).

From the WAKA newletter last week

Can you be "over prententious"? I think it's "overly pretentious." And, while I am being quite pretentious in this here blog post, that's the LAST word you can use to describe our kickball antics.

A pretentious team would not play mariachi music from the sidelines.

A pretentious team stay completely sober the entire game so that they could make sure the rules are followed to the letter of the law.

A pretentious team would complain about every call even when they're beating the other team by 13 runs.

A pretentious team would leave the sombreros at home so that they could be completely focused on the game at hand.

A pretentious team would make damn sure they got their write-up written in the newsletter.

This is not us. This is not El Guapo.


I think there's already a recap in the works for last night's game, so I'll get it posted when I see it.

We're not pretentious - you're just jealous, since we've kicked ass in every game we've played so far (knock wood).

Even playing a game with a kickball so juiced it felt like kicking a bowling ball provided by the other team, we still scored 13 runs to their 1 or 2 (I can't remember exactly - maybe a team member can clarify). Betcha didn't know a kickball could be juiced, but jeezy petes, it was. It had so much air in it that on one bounce it would fly about another mile.

"Oh, we just bought that today! We didn't air it up!" Yeah, right.

It was a big night for me - got moved up in the lineup, went from about 15th (a slight exaggeration) to third. Why, you ask? For my speed, of all things. Adam found this quite funny when I told him that. He kicks my butt every time we have a foot race, but I guess I'm the fastest runner on our team, so I've been moved up to the sacrificial lamb spot on the roster.

If I get on base, it's gravy, because my job is to advance the guys who kicked before me (who are, in fact, lightning fast). The change in strategy seemed to work for us last night. We'll see how it goes the rest of the season.

How do you like them apples?

Mom's friend Ellen brought a sackful of apples over tonight, so I grabbed some and made some apple crisp.

I've been wanting to bake something for a few weeks now, but I hadn't gotten around to it. So, I figured when she walked up with the apples, that must have been some kind of sign. I thumbed through my "Beat This" and "Beat That" cookbooks and found a recipe.

It's called "Very Controversial Apple Crisp." It wasn't at all controversial at first - Adam, Mom and I all agreed that it tasted dee-lish. But, when Mom headed home with Dad's bowlful, she called later and said HE BROKE A TOOTH ON IT!

Oops. Not all my fault, though, she said last time he was at the dentist, he was told he'd need a crown on one of his teeth pretty soon, so I'm hoping that's the one that got chipped tonight. Then I won't feel AS bad.

Now that I've told you all that, you probably want to stay miles away from the recipe, but I promise you - it is worth your time and effort. It is super easy. The worst part was peeling and slicing the apples, but even that only took about 20 minutes. (It could probably be done much faster with the right equipment.)

There's my bowl. See below for the finished product in the loaf pan. Here's the recipe, from "Beat That!" by Ann Hodgman.

4 generous cups tart apples, peeled, cored and sliced
1 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1 tsp ground cinnamon, mixed with 1 teaspoon sugar
1 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
1/8 tsp salt

Vanilla ice cream, if serving warm

Preheat oven to 375. Butter a 9x5 loaf pan.

In a large bowl, toss the apple slices with the lemon juice and cinnamon-sugar.

In a small bowl, blend the brown sugar, flour, butter and salt together, first with a pastry blender or 2 knives, and then with your hands (consider it a nice exfoliating hand treatment!)

Put the apple slices in the loaf pan. Press the topping over them. Bake for 1 hour. You'll have a really dense, chewy candlylike topping (that can break teeth, apparently).

Serve warm with ice cream. Serves four to six.

And it makes your house smell damn good.

I'm hoping the 900 calories Mitzi and I burned while running nine miles today equals out to my serving of Apple Crisp!

The Upright Citizen's Brigade (or, El Guapo rocks WAKA KC)

I've been spending my Thursday nights lately down at Penn Valley Park playing kickball in the World Adult Kickball league. One of the teachers I work with mentioned one time that she plays, and the team is always looking for girl members (ah, the constant lament of any recreational adult sport), so I joined up.

If you're wondering about the Mexican regalia, it's because our team is called El Guapo. We listen to mariachi music during all of our games...It's a theme thing!

Right now, our team is rockin' the league. We're undefeated!

Even though it's a bit of a drive to PVP, I love playing up there. There's a great view of the downtown skyline from our kickball fields. We live out in the burbs, but I still get to play in the city!

Craving something new and different?

Like someone who doesn't know what the hell she's talking about being a heartbeat away from the presidency?

I don't think so.

"Darn right it was the predator lendors."
"Everyday American people, Joe Six Pack, Hockey Moms across the nation."
"Hurtin' like it is."
"A heck of a lot"
"Barack's plan to tax increase..."

Um, how exactly do you tax increase?

It's almost like you could see the mental Rolodex shuffling through the facts behind those trendy glasses. My plan was to add more phrases than that, but I got bored and disgusted so I had to stop.

Evidence that the American media has lowered the bar frighteningly so: People are saying she did well, just because she didn't completely flub it. I'm sorry, but all I could think of while watching was that phrase from "Mean Girls" - word vomit.

Do the Republican strategists really think women will vote the McCain-Palin ticket just because it has boobs?

I hope not.

By the way, the alternate title for this post was: Tina Fey for VP!