Jenyfer Matthews

Spring break is over and the children are going back to school tomorrow. I’m going to bask in the glow of last week for a little while longer however and share some pictures of our quick trip to Chicago.

How much luckier can a girl get – not only do we have a week off, but I just happen to have a couple of friends from way back who own a condo in Chicago. I would have gone to see them in any event and been happy at their place in Ohio, but I surely wasn’t going to turn down a suggestion to go and spend a few days in Chicago since they offered.

(Click any image to enlarge)

Here is the view from their condo – notice Soldier Field to the right:

And now to the left. Is that amazing or what?

I could not have dreamed up a better location for taking the children to see some of the big attractions – the Shedd Aquarium, the Field Museum, and the planetarium were right across the street!

We didn’t arrive in Chicago until mid-afternoon and since the weather was clear we decided to seize the opportunity and go up to see the view from a tall building. We choose the Hancock Building.

It isn’t the highest building in the world, or even in Chicago, but going up 94 floors in 40 seconds was impressive enough for me. I occasionally have nightmares about speeding elevators so though the ride was smooth enough, it was still a little freaky for me!

It has never been my particular goal to live in a giant city, but even I was impressed with the view.

After we’d seen the view from every angle available, we strolled down Michigan Avenue and window shopped for a few blocks. That worked up our appetites nicely for some Chicago-style pizza. Y-U-M. Why does anyone eat any other kind of pizza?

It is a good thing we went up to see the view when we did because the next day, our only full day in Chicago, looked like this:

The fog and drizzle didn’t slow us down though – we just spent the day inside at the Shedd Aquarium instead.

It’s just as well that I don’t live at the condo full time or I’d never get anything done for looking out at the view all the time. It was even pretty at night.

Stay tuned for part 2 of Chicago on Wednesday: A sunny day and The Bean.

Whenever I think of Easter, I think of dyed eggs, Easter baskets filled with plastic grass, chocolate bunnies and eggs, and a big dinner – preferably featuring baked ham. My family was not particularly religious when I was growing up, but there were a few constants at certain holidays and candy featured heavily at Easter.

Easter is in fact celebrated all around the world, and the differences in traditions from place to place can be both very interesting and somewhat puzzling.

From an article in the Huffington Post:

Bermuda: Bermudians celebrate Good Friday by flying home-made kites, eating codfish cakes, and eating hot cross buns.

Europe: In parts of Northwestern Europe large bonfires, called Easter Fires, are lit on Easter Sunday and Monday. While there are various explanations for the origin of the Easter Fires, the most common Saxon tale is that Easter is a time when spring becomes victorious over winter and the fires were to chase the darkness of winter away.

Sweden: In the days leading up to Easter Sunday, children dress up as Easter witches, wearing old and discarded clothes. Traveling from home to home in their neighborhoods, the children trade paintings and drawings for sweets.

I know many Christian holidays have pagan roots, but dressing up like witches at Easter? It’s a bit better than Sweden’s other tradition which is to have the boys beat the girls with switches in the early morning – but at least the girls get to have their turn in the evening!

I found another great site called Easter Bunny’s.net. They have information on a long list of countries, a few of which I have included below:

Egypt: Lent in the Coptic Church of Egypt lasts for 55 days, which includes a preliminary week of modified fasting. No meat, fish, eggs or milk are supposed to be eaten during Lent. This fasting is extended as Lent goes on so that by Holy Week people are observing a stricter fast, in which they eat mainly vegetables and beans.

During Holy Week, people go to church every day. There are services leading up to the main Easter service on Saturday night, which lasts until 3-4 a.m. on Easter morning. Bells are rung to proclaim Christ’s resurrection, and there is a procession with the newly lit candles.

Easter Sunday is spent visiting friends and relatives, and there is a special Easter dinner in the afternoon. Easter Monday is a public holiday because of an ancient spring festival (called Sham al Nassim) which is celebrated on this day. People spend the day outdoors in parks or gardens and exchange colored eggs.

Mexico: In many communities, they may enact a full Passion Play from the Last Supper, the Betrayal, the Judgment, the Procession of the 12 Stations of the Cross, the Crucifixion and last but not least the Resurrection. In some communities, flagellation and/or real crucifixion might also be included. The enactments are often spectacularly staged, costumed and acted, with participants preparing for their roles for nearly the full year leading up to Semana Santa.

Papua New Guinea: On Easter Sunday a church service is held, and at this service there is the Easter Tree. At the front of the church is a small tree or if they are unable to have a tree several branches are tied together, on which sticks of tobacco and packets of cigarettes are hung. After the service, these are distributed amongst the congregation. The people then return to their homes for a feast of leftovers usually from the Friday feast.

Chocolate bunnies and baked hams are pretty tame and rate a big fat ZERO on the self-sacrifice scale next to fasting and crucifixion reenactments. (I don’t know what is up with the cigarette trees.) To each his own I suppose.

My children were very concerned how the Easter Bunny was going to find them this year since we are not at home. I told them it wasn’t going to be a problem. I’ve always just said that the Easter Bunny was magical, like Santa, which was always a good enough explanation. Last weekend they saw the movie Hop and now they really like the idea of a big egg shaped vehicle pulled by a flock of fluffy yellow chicks. Um…Okay…

However you choose to spend your Easter holiday (or not) I hope you have a pleasant day. I’ll probably spend mine biting my tongue about how much candy the kids are eating!

I’ve always liked making things. I can remember making pot holders and latch hook rugs before I discovered needlework. The first time I did any cross stitch was in fourth grade when we did a Mother’s Day project in art class. I loved it so much I designed a complementary pattern for Father’s Day. Soon after I started spending my allowance at the local craft shop on cross stitch fabric and embroidery floss and graph paper.

I used to make little pictures for friends and relatives as gifts. I made a baby gift in 1985 for the friend I am visiting for spring break and though I had forgotten all about it, she still has it.

It’s a bit plain, but it isn’t so bad considering that I am sure I made up the design on my own when I was 14 years old!

It’s spring break this week but I don’t have any pictures of white sandy beaches to share. I could take a picture of the rising river flooding the woods behind my friend’s house but it’s kind of gray and blah looking. I’ve been having a wonderful time visiting and chatting and generally just hanging around and stuffing my face! We go to Chicago tomorrow morning – I’ll have more interesting photos and experiences to share them.

Instead I’ll share this video. It is truly amazing in its combination of simplicity and complexity – I can’t imagine figuring out how to construct the musical wooden track!

I wonder how many takes they did when filming this video?

It’s Spring Break this week and I’m traveling again – this time staying with a friend in northern Ohio, with a side trip to Chicago later this week. I remember now why most people go to Florida or the Caribbean if they have the option – it’s damp, cold, and gray where I am and apparently it even snowed a little in Chicago! I intend to have fun anyway – expect pictures next week even if it is gray and drippy!

Today I’m blog traveling too – come and visit me over at Terry Place. Leave a comment for me and you could win a paperback copy of my book Separation Anxiety.

Come on, you know you want to!

This was too funny not to share:

I am glad that my children haven’t taken this conversation so far – as yet!

The sun came out for a while this weekend, not that I was able to enjoy it. The potent cream I’m currently using on my face for sun damage makes my skin red and scaly and more sensitive to sun. I either have to lurk in the shadows until the end of the month or buy a big hat.

I wouldn’t mind buying a hat. I like hats. Being better about wearing a hat in the future might mean that I won’t have to go through this skin sloughing exercise again later. I have a great straw hat that I’ve had for years – of course it is back in Egypt with so many of my other things. Somehow I didn’t think I was going to need it when we evacuated our home back in February.

There are tons of different hats to choose from out there, none of which are going to look very nice with my skin right now. Maybe if the hat is flamboyant enough, perhaps it will draw so much attention to itself that no one will notice my face. (How is that for optimism??)

Wouldn’t this on make a splash at the grocery store?

This one is certainly bright and cheerful, though it might have people questioning my sanity.

I think this one might be my best bet for now:

If I wear it back to front and cut a couple of eye holes in it, I’d be all set!

I think that the movie theater is going to be getting a lot of business from me until my skin clears up, but I’m sure my children won’t be complaining about that.

Looking at the world news headlines this morning, maybe my decision about whether or not to go back to Egypt in the fall isn’t as difficult as I thought. Protests were planned again in Egypt today against the military regime for “not being more transparent in their decision making processes” and because they had not prosecuted Mubarak for all of his various transgressions. I’m surprised it took this long frankly – the military regime is the same old beast with a different face (or no face depending on how you look at it). Between Egypt, Syria, Libya, Bahrain, and Yemen it may be better to just give up any thoughts of going back to that region, even for a short time.

Thinking about all of that was fairly depressing so after I dropped my kids at school, my friend and I went to a local diner for a greasy breakfast and then on to an antique mall. I love going to both thrift stores and antique malls – you just never know what you are going to find.

Earlier in the week I found a soft-as-butter black leather jacket with enough metal zipper details to make my inner biker chick very happy. Best part? It was only $5.99 and it fits me perfectly.

Today I was all about kitchenware – particularly mixing bowls and utensils. Since I don’t currently have a kitchen to furnish I resisted all the beautiful retro mixing bowls I saw. I did however find one treasure.

My mother had one of these measuring cups when I was a child. It’s great – filled to the top it is one cup, and the lid has a one tablespoon measure.

I can quite clearly remember my mother using it when she made gravy. She’d put flour and water in it and shake it up before pouring it into the meat drippings. I don’t tend to make gravy myself, but it cost little enough that I couldn’t resist buying it.

After we left the antique mall, we stopped by Jungle Jim’s. How can I describe it? It’s like Trader Joe’s but much, much, much bigger. It’s a spectacular place to just wander. We wandered through the liquor section, looking for sales. I couldn’t resist getting this bottle of wine, based purely on the label alone.

There would definitely be upsides to staying in the US…

In spite of my rather downcast attitude these last few weeks and not having much more motivation or energy than the creature at the left, I took advantage of the beautiful weather we had on Sunday and made a day of it with my children at the Cincinnati Zoo. Life and motherly duty go on after all.

(It actually wasn’t that much of a sacrifice once I got going)


Aren’t the tulips beautiful? In spite of the fact that they were not poppies, I almost expected the good witch Glinda from the Wizard of Oz to appear somewhere nearby. I’ve always wanted a pair of ruby slippers, and wouldn’t they come in handy right about now…

I haven’t seen quite so many flowers around town just yet and have never seen what I assume is a pussy willow in bloom growing in nature – I’ve only ever seen the dried twigs with their fuzzy buds in flower arrangements.

I am really hoping that all these flowers blooming mean that the worst of the cold winter weather is past us for the season.

The cat exhibits were closed because of renovation and the giraffes are on a maternity leave so we didn’t see some of the more “standard” zoo animals. We did see some “new” animals though. There were three manatees on exhibit, for instance, and I had never seen such tiny penguins before.

The leaf floating in the water on the left gives you an idea of just how small this cutie was!

You can always learn something new wandering around a zoo, reading all the informational notices that are posted all over. After reading about Komodo Dragons and how they hunt, my daughter announced to me that we could never go to Indonesia! Somehow I don’t think that is an immediate concern!

This notice was posted inside the door in the bathroom stall. Thank goodness I’m not a coffee drinker because I think this particular factoid is bordering on too much information!

I’ve had a small discoloration on my cheek that I’ve been watching for the last few months. It seemed to me that it’s gotten somewhat more pronounced over time and I was planning to see a dermatologist in Egypt before all the upheaval. I saw one here today instead.

I’d love to be able to say that I had overreacted, but no. The doctor took one look at my face and also a patch of my chest – with her naked eye – and told me I needed to have a rather aggressive sounding treatment that involved basically peeling off all the damaged skin. One cream she suggested was actually a radioactive chemotherapy cream.

When I was younger, if there was sunscreen around no one I knew had heard of it. My mother actually liked it when I got sunburned because she liked to peel skin (gross, huh?) No one really gave any thought to sun except to go out and sun bathe. Tanned skin is healthy, right?

Being the mother of two red headed children living in the Middle East, land of never ending sun, I have always been very protective of their skin. They each have a UV protection sun swim suit that provides 98% protection. I get them from a company in Australia called StingRay. The suits aren’t super cheap, but StingRay do free shipping to the whole world and when you weigh the cost of the suit against long term skin health, I think they are totally worth it.

As for me, all I can say is that if the universe only gives you as many problems / challenges as you can handle then I must be stronger than I think…