I've been busy preparing for our annual pumpkin carving party and producing the prerequisite cookies. Sunday we baked our ginger breads and on Tuesday we iced 200+ of them by hand (note to self: decorating a pumpkin cookie is much faster than decorating a gingerbread skeleton). Last night was spent on the "witches fingers" shortbread cookies.

Magda loves helping in the kitchen and thoroughly enjoy spending time baking with her. Some of my fondest childhood memories are of time spent in the kitchen with my mom, so I'm more than happy to pass it on. And she's become quite helpful and had a good time decorating gingerbreads with K., and it's easy to forget that she's just four.

So last night she was helping me prepare the dough, cutting up the butter, putting other ingredients in the mixing bowl and adjusting the mixer speed (and, of course, "checking" to make sure stuff tasted OK).

For our party I double the cookie recipes and I wanted some diversity. So while Magda was at the Kitchen Aid watching the butter getting beaten, I turned around to get the unsweetened cocoa from the pantry (I'm a firm believer that there are few, if any, recipes that can't be improved with some chocolate flavor). A few seconds later I heard Magda yelling for help.

When I turned around, I saw her standing on her step stool, yelling and looking down at Rose who was vigorously licking her feet. It took me a second to realize that she wasn't just "looking down" but rather that she was forced in that position because her hair had gotten caught by the mixer and she was trying desperately to stay away from the machine.

I jumped to it and managed to stop the beater with my hand and then turn the mixer off. There was too much hair wound around the shaft to take the beater off and I shortly considered scissors before figuring out that I could simply wind the beater back by hand and free Magda that way.

So with lots of tears and butter in her hair, Mada was finally freed from the infernal machine. Jennifer had the pleasant task of trying to get all the butter out of her tender hair in the bath tub, but it all eventually worked out.

I stayed in the kitchen and finished the cookie dough, with my heart racing from all the adrenalin, though I think I managed to appear fairly calm throughout the whole ordeal (IMO, nothing freaks a kid out more than a freaked out parent).

The cookies turned out great--the brown cookies tasting better than the white ones. But if you happen to come across a hair while eating a witch's finger cookie, you'll know which little witch it came from...

Sure, the polls are pointing towards a big blowout, but I’m still just “cautiously optimistic”. You just simply never know with American politics.

I have watched all four debates and, until the very last one, they were all a bit ho-hum. And even the last one didn’t get all that exciting. Nothing really new was being said, but I suppose many people don’t follow the campaigns as obsessively so maybe for others it didn’t feel as much a rehash. I was pleased with O’s bearings—this is how I want a president to be, informed, composed and in charge.

But in parallel to the civil debates, the campaigns were starting to get down and gritty—and the McCain campaign seems to be descending into a desperate mud onslaught. The Ayers thing didn’t work out for them, so now it’s calling Obama a Socialist (I’m sure Marxist, Communist and baby-eater are soon to follow).

I must say, though, that I am getting very excited about the prospect of President Obama—considering that Bush has pretty much checked out during the current financial crisis, maybe he’ll let him take over before January 20?

I’ve had some interesting experiences this week with Obama related propaganda. Meredith and Michael O had an extra Obama/Biden yard sign and were kind enough to let me have it (they seem to be a rare commodity). When I was in the process of sticking it into our front yard’s limestone, I hear this loud honk from behind me, and when I turn around, I see our mail person giving me a big grin a thumbs up. Then this Friday I was wearing my MoveOn.org Obama T-Shirt and an old couple walked past me and the old guy (to his wife’s apparent embarrassment) hollers at me: “Way to go! Go Obama!” Sure, McCain’s going to carry Texas, and this is Austin and all, but both of these incidence put a big grin on my face.

Whenever we get our UT Informal Classes catalogs in the mail, I usually only glance through it before it goes into recycling. But during the summer, I noticed that they offered an Offhand Glassblowing class that sounded intriguing. I always love to watch glassblowing demonstration and this sounded like a lot of fun. Jfer encouraged me to sign up an Meredith O was also interested in taking it, so I registered for it in August.

Last Sunday was our first meeting with Aaron Gross of Austin Art Glass. After a brief safety overview and explanation of the tools (most of which have a suggestive name), we went right to working with glass! During the first couple of classes Aaron did most of the hot work—gathering glass, blowing and reheating in the glory hole (kid you not!) while we did the papering, blocking and jacking at the work bench. All of which was very exciting and ton of fun and every student ended up with a more or less snazzy glass tumbler and glass bowl.

Magda turned four this week—how the time flies! She actually remembered it was her birthday when she woke up and was excited to see a wrapped present on the table. And she was patient enough to wait for me to return from my run before opening it!

Jfer organized a Tea Party for her on Saturday, with a bunch of her Platypus and Caps friends attending as well as Jfer’s family. As usual, she got way too much stuff and, as usual again, a new (peeing!%$!) doll seems to be her favorite.

I didn’t really contribute all that much to the birthday plans. Except that, to my delight, Magda requested blueberry dumplings for her birthday dinner and the Meringue Chocolate Ice Cream cake that I had made for Jfer’s birthday. The dumplings didn’t turn out all that well (note to self—don’t attempt to use frozen blueberries again) but the cake was a hit.