1. It’s raining. But it’s April so everything is as it should be.

2. My mom and dad stopped by this morning. They are buying ten acres two miles from our house and came down (up, whatever) to get the survey done. In the rain.

3. A friend and her three wee ones paid us a visit.

The four-week-old baby was the hit of the show. My oldest son laid on the sofa, the babe asleep on his chest, and would’ve stayed there the whole time if I’d-a let him. But I was hungering for my baby fix so I up and booted him from the room.

4. Another friend and her granddaughter are coming to visit this afternoon. I need to rid the house of 273 flies before they get here.

5. The kids and I are doing a little skit at church this evening. The Baby Nickel has a dual role: first a servant boy and then a rooster. I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

6. Rhubarb’s up.

This is my standard rhubarb dessert. It’s a perfect way to star the tart stalks. Half of the crumbs make up a crunchy bottom crust and the other half makes a crunchy topping, thus the name Rhubarb Crunch. It could not be more appropriately named.

This last time I used half sour cherries and half rhubarb—it made for a right pretty (and delicious) crunch.

Rhubarb Crunch

3/4 cup flour
1 cup oats, either rolled or quick
1 cup brown sugar
½ cup butter
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ cup sugar
2 tablespoons cornstarch
½ cup water (or fruit juice)
½ teaspoon vanilla
4 cups diced rhubarb

Combine the flour, oats, brown sugar, and cinnamon in a bowl. Rub in the butter with your fingers to make crumbs. Press half of the crumbs in the bottom of a greased 9 x 9 glass pan. Reserve the remaining crumbs for the topping.

In a small kettle, stir together the sugar and cornstarch. Add the water (or fruit juice) and vanilla. Bring it to a boil, stirring steadily, till thick and smooth. Remove the kettle from the heat and add the rhubarb, stirring to coat. Pour the saucy fruit on the crust and top the fruit with the remaining crumbs. Bake the crunch at 350 degrees for 35 to 40 minutes, or until the juices are bubbly and the crumbs—both top and bottom—are golden brown.

Serve warm, with milk or vanilla ice cream.

This same time, years previous: bacon-wrapped jalapenos, honey-baked chicken

This week I’ve been stomp-my-feet-and-cry frustrated about the state of my house.

I get that houses are to be lived in. I understand that the influx of five, six, or, like yesterday, nine people is going to require a fairly high level of upkeep. I know that the dirty floors, the tossed jackets, the spilled books are all signs that things are happening and that I’m surrounded by the people I love.

If I were the Pollyanna type, I would sing songs of thanksgiving whenever I’d spy a dirty dish: thanksgiving for the dish that held the food, thanksgiving for the food that fed the body, and thanksgiving for the body that ate it. Rapturously clutching the dirty dish to my bosom, I’d twirl around the room, luxuriating in the realization that, because of this dirty dish, I might possibly be the richest person in the world! But then I’d twirl-step on a tea towel that some love-of-my-heart child tossed on the floor, my foot would screech to a halt while my body would keep going, and I’d crash to the floor with a thud. Then I’d lay there, thanking my lucky stars (that are suddenly—whoa! look at that!—visible) that I even had a floor upon which I could break my fall.

That’s what I’d do if I was Pollyanna.

But I’m not Pollyanna. In fact, my mood is such that if Pollyanna walked across my path, I’d probably sock her a good one.

Or else hand her a toilet bowl brush and tell her to get to.

All day long I maintain. I assess the status of my home, create a list of chores, and then oversee the kids doing the chores.

That sounds a lot easier than it really is. Here’s how it actually breaks down.

I see a dirty bathroom sink. I tell a child to clean it. I check the “cleaned” bathroom sink and determine that my child needs to learn how to wield a rag. I call the child back in and teach a lesson in Basic Sink Cleaning 101.

Or, I have a child wash the dishes. Later, I empty the drainer. I find dried egg on a fork, grease on the bottom of a bowl, starchy gunk on the outside of the oatmeal pot. I set aside the soiled dishes, call the child into the house, and have the child wash them again.

By themselves, those two examples don’t sound all that bad. In fact, you’re probably thinking way to go, Mama, being consistent and patient and all that jazz, right? (Note: nobody said anything about being patient.) But! Multiply those scenarios times four (‘cause I have four kids, get it?) and set it on auto-repeat for hours on end and you can see why I’m a little worn down.

The other day I walked into the bathroom and saw that my freshly washed window (I’ve been trying to wash a few windows every day—it’s my gradual approach to spring cleaning) was completely smeared.

As I studied those smears, my chest constricted. My head ached—nay, my very bones ached. I exhaled and all the hope and perseverance whooshed right out of my body. Eyes smarting, I pondered my options. I could:

1. Wash the window myself.
2. Assign a child to wash the window.
3. Cry.
4. Scream.
5. Shut the blind.
6. Complain to my husband.
7. Do nothing.

I chose Option Number Six.

My husband was in the kitchen. I wasted no time in sharing what was on my heart. “I can hardly stand it!” I wailed. “There are messes everywhere! I hate all the stuff in my house! I want more bookshelves! The girls’ room is a mess! Nobody puts their clothes away! We don’t even have a broom so we can sweep the porch! There are no steps to the attic! The flies are driving me nuts! You worked late on Monday! The potatoes didn’t come up! There’s a mouse in the stove again! I want a new camera lens! I only have one pair of blue socks! The sofa has a hole in it!”

“What do you want me to do about it?” he asked, his voice level, his eyes laughing.

“I want you to get up at 5:30 tomorrow morning and clean the house!” I sniffed. “Clean everything.”

When I came downstairs the next morning, the house looked right sharp. Granted, it looked that way for only a few hours, but with that little boost I was able to make it through till the end of the day when I start yelling about how I can’t STAND the mess and how I can’t DO this anymore.

Hopefully I’ll feel better next week. ‘Cause the messes sure ain’t going anywhere.

I can not keep it from you any longer: it is time I tell you what I did with those six egg yolks I had leftover after making the mint wedding cake.

Really, I had no plan for them … at first. I plopped them in a little plastic container and slipped them onto the top shelf of the fridge. Later, when I opened the fridge later Somethingorother, I spied them, paused in my mad dash, focused my full attention on yolks and applied all my mental energy to the task of coming up with a use for those six golden orbs. I actually felt the heavy clanking wheels in my brain heave forward. ICE CREAM flitted across my mind, the wheels ground to a halt, I grabbed the Somethingorother, and moved on.

In the intervening hours between when I decided on the ice cream and when I made the ice cream, I pulled my David Lebovitz ice cream book—it bristles with sticky notes—off the shelf and rifled its pages.

I didn’t have to look for long; the very first sticky-noted page caught my eye.

I like chocolate ice cream well enough, but I’ve never made a chocolate ice cream that I was proud of. David’s chocolate ice cream looked fair enough. Perhaps a little more convoluted than some of the more straightforward recipes I’ve tried, what with both powdered and bar chocolate and a bunch of egg yolks, but a bit o’ convolution is good when you’re searching for a better than average recipe. (Now that I’m looking at the recipe again, I see that it calls for only five yolks. This confuses me. Did I unwittingly add six? Or did I do something with the other yolk that I can not, for the life of me, now remember? Hmmm, it’s a mystery.)

Making this ice cream made for some crazy-fun times. The textures and tastes thrilled me to the tips of my toes. My heart raced, my adrenaline pumped, and I giggled and laughed, cackled and crowed. I even cornered my children and made them eat samples. (For once, they didn’t argue with me.)

After boiling the cream with the cocoa powder and pumping it full with chopped chocolate, I peered into the saucepan full of thick chocolate sauce and saw it for what it was: a heck of a lot of ganache. I think it was at this point that I started smiling. Clearly, I was heading down the right track.

The warm ice cream base was out-of-this-world good. Creamy and smooth, it slipped down my throat with alarming ease. Or I would’ve been alarmed if I hadn’t been in the midst of one of the most fabulous chocolate-induced stupors of my life. The ice cream base was exactly what I imagine the chocolate river in Willy Wonka’s factory to taste like. I had planned to kick up the chocolate factor with a generous handful of cacao nibs, but it was at this point that I decided that there was no way I was pebbling its sexy sleekness with anything nibbly.

In fact, while I was standing there, methodically dipping and tasting, it occurred to me that this is what hot chocolate should taste like. Forget that milky, sugary drink that passes for hot chocolate—real hot chocolate should be made of cream, thickened with egg yolks, and served in shot glasses. Can I get an amen?

Once chilled, the mixture set up into the consistency of a thin pudding. I forced myself to do a bunch of taste testings so I could be sure my “thin pudding” description was accurate. It was.

And then I churned the ice cream. (Or, I should say, my super-duper Mother’s Day gift from last year, this splendiforous ice cream maker, churned my ice cream.) Straight from the machine, the ice cream was Class-A Soft Serve. (No pics, night had fallen thunk.) And after a sleep in the freezer it was Class-A Hand Dipped (set it out for 10 minutes to soften a little prior to scooping).

Funny story: one night after my stand-at-the-counter-and-eat-straight-from-the-ice cream-container session, I put the ice cream away. Or so I thought. The next morning I found a container of chocolate pudding sitting all pretty-like on the top shelf of the fridge. I shrieked wildly, put it in the freezer, and several hours later it was ice cream again. Moral of the story: this ice cream has endurance.

Chocolate Ice Cream
Adapted from The Perfect Scoop by David Lebovitz

2 cups heavy cream
3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
5 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
1 cup milk
3/4 cup sugar
pinch of salt
5 large egg yolks
½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Put one cup of cream and the cocoa powder in a pan and bring it to a boil, whisking steadily. Remove from the heat and add the semisweet chocolate and stir till smooth. Stir in the remaining cream. Pour the mixture into a large bowl.

Wash out the pan and measure in the milk, sugar, and salt. Heat it till warm but not boiling. In the meantime, but the egg yolks in another bowl. When the milk is hot, use it to temper the yolks. Pour the tempered yolks back into the pan and heat the mixture, stirring constantly, until it has thickened a little. Pour the custard through a strainer into the bowl of chocolate. Add the vanilla. Thoroughly chill the mixture (it will get quite thick) before churning.

Yield: a generous quart

This same time, years previous: baked spaghetti, chocolate mayonnaise cake, a dirt pile (lately, it’s been turned into a cave)