the mingling of food, family, and life
You had been told that this would happen. This ever-increasing independence. The wings starting to flap. You’d read about it in books. You’d been told, many, many times by all the people who came before you but still, for you, you weren’t quite ready. No, you’re still back in preschool when she’d cry and call…Continue Reading
Every night I go to bed hoping it won’t happen. I pull close the blackout shades. Cut the Rooster off of SportsCenter. Do some stretching. Some deep breathing. Slap on my eye mask. Occasionally, put in some ear plugs. All hoping it will help. Every dang morning (if you can call it morning), I am…Continue Reading
You may have noticed that I haven’t been publishing posts here on La Pomme as regularly as I have in the past. I have to be honest that I have been a wee bit overwhelmed lately. Overwhelmed by having three kids in three different schools. Overwhelmed by their activity schedules. Overwhelmed by my own writing…Continue Reading
“Ummm, Mrs. Minns, I don’t think our camp starts until 10:30 am,” my 12-year old’s buddy says to me as I’m minutes away from dropping the two of them off at cooking camp. “Oh no, darlin’, it starts at 10am. I’m sure of it. I have it in my calendar.” It was the first week…Continue Reading
It’s true. We all have our quirks. Our less appealing bits about ourselves. Our strengths and our weaknesses. And nowhere is this magnified more than within the walls of a family. We love each other. We drive each other crazy. Our families have known us for so long, it’s hard to hide our true personality…Continue Reading
My family is nuts for artichokes. Every year I anxiously await the moment that the DeNoble Family Farms table at our Farmers Market is covered with artichokes of all sizes. And every year I enjoy hearing again and again from the head of DeNoble Family Farm how Tillamook, Oregon deserves to be the artichoke…Continue Reading
IMPORTANT MESSAGE: Please read my message after the story especially my gracious email subscribers. She was three years old when she performed in her first dance recital. Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and The Bunny Hop. Her little feet could be heard “tap, tap, tapping” away as she practiced for her big debut. Considering that when…Continue Reading
So, my dear friends, this week has been filled with milestones, celebrations and a few tears on the part of yours truly. One headed to high school, one to middle school and one leaving that sweet, sweet year of Kindergarten and as I’ve said before every first for my littlest one is a monumental last for me.…Continue Reading
Well, friends, it’s Salmon Season and more specifically it’s Copper River Salmon season. I’ve been in conversations where the “hype” surrounding the Copper River Salmon has been debated. Is it just a marketing ploy? Is it worth the cost?I am not a salmon expert although I grew up eating salmon the way other people grew…Continue Reading
I pulled the car to a halt in front of the mailboxes. With half my body out the window, I hoisted the usual haul of catalogs, coupons and bills onto my lap. Methodically, I sifted through the stack on the very, off-chance that there would be something unexpected in the pile.Caught between a Pottery Barn…Continue Reading
It’s 6:00 a.m., the radio is blaring but I’m not budging. Gone are the mornings when I gleefully arose, tiptoed downstairs through the dark house and pedaled my legs around the elliptical for a half hour like a gerbil in a habitrail while watching french films. This particular morning, I barely exert the energy to…Continue Reading
I had known about this trip for months. Five months to be exact. Five months to pack, go to the grocery store, make carpool arrangements, buy Birthday presents. Five months to figure out why the fan on my laptop runs continuously when I use it. But here it was t-minus three days and I had yet…Continue Reading
It snowed last year too: I made a snowman and my brother knocked it down and I knocked my brother down and then we had tea. -Dylan Thomas, Welsh poet”Mom, it’s so embarrassing! Do you know what he does all day at school?”"No, please tell me.”"He skips.”"Well, he’s in kindergarten.”"Well, it’s embarrassing. My WHOLE class…Continue Reading
Yes, it’s true. “I’m a weeper. I weep.”(To borrow a line from one of my favorite movies, The Holiday, which does indeed make me weep.)Just this morning I started weeping while making the kids’ lunches. One may have thought it was because if I have to make one more school lunch I may start weeping…Continue Reading
I sit here in the shadows just out of sight like my mother did before me. There but not there. Still needed but not seen.Watching you with your friends. Linking hands with these friends as you jump unabashedly into the water. Holding handstand competitions.Saddling up to these friends on the chair lift. Laughing and singing…Continue Reading
As we slowly pulled into the lot the first thing I noticed was the police car. It could have been a coincidence. Just a routine drive through the neighborhood most likely but my heart sank a bit as I thought to myself, “Please keep them safe. Please let them be treated kindly.”We climbed the open,…Continue Reading
I remember the moment distinctly. When she noticed. When she asked me about it. Back in the days when I would drive my 5-year-old daughter 30 minutes to attend a 30-minute “ballet” class and then, 30 minutes back home, all with her younger brother in tow. Back when I didn’t make things very easy on…Continue Reading
I have often considered January as my month of reprieve. The month to look inward. To self-reflect. The month where time slows down. A bit.This doesn’t seem to be the case any longer.January is just as high-paced as any other month and it feeds right into February which is missing a few days and that…Continue Reading
There I was in organizing bliss. Well, actually, scratch that. I was hyperventilating and covered in perspiration as I surveyed the boxes of games and puzzles with missing pieces and cried out in desperation, “Someone get me an Old Fashioned!” even though I don’t drink Old Fashioneds but my Granny always used to ask for…Continue Reading
“I feel like a…like a…sh@$ shoveler. I can’t help it and I know I’m like a broken record whining and moaning about this every year at this time. But I do. Every year there’s this grand celebration about gifts and giving but once it’s over and everyone has moved on to the next “big thing”…Continue Reading
On a highway. In the middle of Mt. Hood National Forest. Our car was in park. The engine off. And even though there was a line of cars behind us, as far as I could see, in the same predicament, it was strangely quiet. Dark. The snow gently falling all around us. Those big luscious…Continue Reading
I am so excited to give you all a sneak preview of a project I’ve been working on with my über-talented graphic design sister. We have put together a 2011 La Pomme de Portland Calendar. Each month features one of my food photos, many of them highlighting what is in season for that time of…Continue Reading
Maybe it’s that we’re finally getting into a rhythm two months into the school year. (Has it only been 2 months?) A “Limp-a-long Cassidy” kind of rhythm but a rhythm nonetheless. Maybe it’s that the days are shorter. The kids are in bed earlier. The house is quieter. The rainy season has begun. I don’t…Continue Reading
I had been forewarned about the hairpin turns but what I hadn’t been prepared for was the splendor of the canyon ablaze in reds and golds. The tiniest of the three of us had somehow managed to wedge herself in the “back” as we headed south in the cherry red sports car. The beauty of…Continue Reading
When the kind, sweet people at AM Northwest asked if they could film a cooking segment in my kitchen, my first thought was, “Oh no, now I really am going to have to clean out that pantry.” There’s not much you can’t find in my pantry. I like to keep my kitchen well-stocked with staples.…Continue Reading
Carrie Minns, writer, photographer & mother of three, can be found sipping tea or sipping wine depending on how things are going here in the chicken coop.
