I was going through old drafts on my blog, looking for Turkey stuff when I found this. I think I was originally going to do a post about our flight/trip to Oman, but it got lost in all the chaos of landing in country and finding our way around.
I forgot how quiet those lemons kept her — I wonder if I need to pack some for our trip to Jordan in a few weeks?
I’ve been trying to hold off on posting the Turkey photos until I feel like I’ve adequately captured the feeling of being there, but I’ve realized that’s an impossible task so I’m just plunging in. When we last left off, we were leaving Ankara and had stopped at the salt lake on our way to the Anatolia region of Turkey. This is where we stayed in Cappadocia: Esbelli Evi Cave Hotel.
The unique thing about the Anatolia region of Turkey is a type of rock that is filled with caves that were formed by a volcanic eruption a long time ago. And the stone in this area is soft and perfect for carving out cave dwellings, which is how people lived here for years. Recently, some enterprising people have taken abandoned cave dwellings, renovated them and turned them into boutique hotels.
On the grounds are stone steps that go up and down and pathways that wind around to all the different rooms.
Looking down on the front door to our Family Suite. There is a garden with fruit trees growing on the roof.
At the bottom of the stairs — the passage to the left leads to the living room (to the right are the bedrooms).
Flowers, fruit trees, climbing vines, plenty of space — I could have called this place home permanently.
And the view of the hillside from our backyard — plenty of caves to explore right outside our back gate!
Nighty-night! Don’t let the cave animals bite!
“You take the good, you take the bad, you take them both and there you have: The Facts of Life. The Facts of Life.” That song is stuck in my head right now (unfortunately taking up valuable brain space) because I often have “funny” stories about Carter related to school — not wanting to read or take tests, his homework frustrations, his non-love of academics, but today I have a fabulous Carter school story.
Two days ago Carter came home and said that his class was hosting an assembly and his teacher had picked him and another boy from his class for speaking parts. I was sure I misunderstood him because a child who just two months ago refused to read out loud if his brothers were in the room wouldn’t possibly be willing to read out loud in front of the entire 4th grade. “Not the 4th grade mom. The whole elementary school!” Say what now?
Sure enough. Today I got to go watch the child I feared would never read, read into a microphone to about 500 people.
The purpose of the assembly was to remind everyone to take care of the toys and playground equipment during recess. Since the 4th grade was hosting the assembly they brainstormed and came up with the points that they thought should be brought up during the assembly: take turns, use the slide properly, always bring a water bottle and hat, wait for the recess monitor before getting toys out of the bins, be careful on the swings, etc.
Then a staff member filmed them while they demonstrated these points on the playground, interviewed each other, etc. The format of the assembly was a news broadcast and Carter and his friend were to be the news anchormen who would introduce the video.
right before going onstage
the main event
Carter on the big screen (he said being in the video was the most embarrassing part).
He did a great job and I’m so proud of him. I was also really happy that he invited me to watch him perform. It felt like I was watching a miracle in action . . .
Lucy came back from India bearing gifts, including this shirt that her daughter picked out for me. I love it, even if I’m not exactly sure what it means.
The recipe calls for 3/4 cup of butter. Hmm, the butter here comes in 500 gram blocks. What is 3/4 of a cup? Isn’t that a stick and a 1/2? How am I supposed to figure out how much butter to add?
eyeball big block of butter. cut off estimated amount. add to mixer with 1 cup sugar. turn on mixer.
Woah! as sugar goes flying over the edges of the bowl. The super slow speed here is way faster here than at home. Sweep up sugar. Add molasses. I only need 1/4 cup, that’s about one glug from the jar, right? Better add a second glug to make up for the lost sugar.
Add one egg. Add dry ingredients to wet. I know you’re supposed to mix all the dry ingredients together first, but that dirties up an extra bowl and take an extra step so I just stop the mixer and add all the dry ingredients on top of the wet before turning it on again.
Add 2 cups of flour, 2 teaspoons of baking soda, 1/2 teaspoon of ginger. At home I always add a full teaspoon because I like them extra gingery, but I don’t have any powdered ginger in the house. I do have plenty of fresh ginger. I bet that will work. Get out microplane and ginger root. Grate into bowl. I wonder how much ginger I should add? Taste dough. Try not to freak out about possible salmonella exposure. Needs more ginger.
Add 1/2 teaspoon salt and 1/2 tsp ground cloves. Look through cupboards. I guess I don’t have any ground cloves in the house. Nutmeg is one of those Thanksgiving-y spices. I’ll add that instead. Grate part of a nutmeg over the mixing bowl. Hope it’s the right amount of the wrong ingredient.
Add 1 teaspoon cinnamon. Cinnamon is easy because I never have to measure it. You can never have too much cinnamon. Turn on mixer. Dodge flying flour. Hope you added enough at the beginning to make up for the loss.
Hmm. The dough looks wetter and less brown than last time. Is that because I was out of white sugar last time and subbed brown? Or because I actually added the full amount of butter instead of cutting it in half like I usually do? Oh well, no turning back now.
Roll balls of dough in sugar. Bake at 375 degrees for 8-10 minutes. My oven here measures the temperature in Celcius. 220 is high so 180 should be close enough, right? Put in oven. Forget what time you started baking them. Hover in front of the oven until they are browned and the tops start cracking.
