Tag easter

The Jelly Bean Distraction

Angel Ackerman Leave a comment

Anyone who has ever been in my inner circle knows that I have a jelly bean problem. They are my favorite candy. Come Easter, I shove them in my face like some sort of crazed monster and eventually I forget they exist until Easter again.

In college, for spring semester final exams, I would walk to the Woolworth on Main Street and Bethlehem and buy all the jelly beans at 75% off and stow them in my desk drawer. While the other kids drank coffee to study, I ate jelly beans until my stomach ached.

This year, I did not buy jelly beans… until today. Three full days after Easter I found myself in the Dollar Tree where I could now buy jelly beans for 67 cents a bag. And one of the brands/flavors was Kool-Aid. Now, I turned 10 in 1985. I know the Kool-Aid Man well. I’d say intimately but that’s kind of creepy.

So, in part, this blog post is a review of Kool-Aid jelly beans. The bag is smaller than the others but the jelly beans are larger and a strange size.

The flavors are grape, tropical punch, cherry, kiwi strawberry and orange. They are tasty. The texture is thicker and crunchier on the initial layer than a lot of jelly beans. They don’t remind me of Kool-Aid but the do remind me of artificial fruit flavors. And I like them.

The Sweet Tart Jelly Beans, on the other hand, do remind me of the namesake candy and come in the traditional jelly bean size and texture.

The generic jelly beans are very sweet and bold and crunchy, but some are too chewy. They remind me of the basic lifesaver pack flavor wise. In taste and texture, they do not stand out.

Road trip to Washington DC

Angel Ackerman Leave a comment

So, while my daughter was on Spring Break, I experienced something I hadn’t experienced in a long time.

A paid holiday.

A long weekend.

We spent Easter in Washington, DC, with my traveling companion, M. and his Indian housemates.

Washington, DC, is approximately 3.5 hours from my house by car. I say approximately because traffic can fluctuate.

We left at 8ish Friday morning, stopping at our local Target for band-aids, nail polish remover and bagels. We always run into people we know and give lots of hugs so we didn’t get going until 9.

We stopped around 11:30 in York, Pa., to use the gym. We certainly are getting our money’s worth from our Planet Fitness membership.

And then… after a hearty upper body workout and slaying the crunches… there was a Five Guys outside.

We had the man who waited on us cracking up.

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We arrived in DC at 3.

We hung around the house and had some amazing paneer for dinner. Then we went to Harris Teeter for groceries. This jelly bean addict was offended to see that they only carried Brach’s or Starburst jelly beans. No Just Born?!?!

In the morning, I took our Indian host to the gym in Silver Springs.

In the afternoon, we visited the Frederick Douglass house. That Victorian home is in tact. His books. His desk. His ice box. His dumbbells. His chair. His trunks. His rug beater.

Took my breath away.

Then we went to National Harbor. To the Peep store. Where, even though I am from the Lehigh Valley where Just Born makes my jelly beans and Peeps, I purchased a big batch of candy.

And fed my Indian host his first Peep.

See that here:

https://youtu.be/TgBQ2T4j_Nw

The Easter basket parenting win

Angel Ackerman 1 Comment

My daughter will turn 12 in June. We have a lot of tween meltdowns. We have difficulty communicating sometimes. 

This morning I stepped outside to write in my journal. I’ve been working a lot of extra hours, making my part-time retail job a full-time one.

So I needed some peace and sun.

My daughter approached me one paragraph later. She wore her mopey face. I asked what was wrong.

For the sake of brevity, I will skip the pleading and cajoling that went into getting her to reveal her complaint.

My friend Gayle had said to her that her mother always said you didn’t buy something until you had the money for it.

“I have a savings account,” she says, “and it has a lot of money in it, but I can’t touch it.”

I explain to her she can touch it, but that money is for big purchases: summer camp, someday when she wants a car or needs a security deposit for her first apartment.

I also ask, “what are you pining for?”

“Well, it’s stupid,” she says, “but I told you months ago that I wanted a new doll and you said you would consider it and you haven’t said anything.”

Months is an exaggeration, for the record. The doll in question is a $10 Draculaura Monster High Doll.

Now I know I bought her that doll and a Frankie Stein doll as the focus of her Easter basket. But she’s in full drama and feeling dejected.

I go in the house and get the shoe box containing her goodies. I haven’t wrapped them or retrieved her literal basket. I hand her the box.

“Should you chose to open that, it’s the contents of your Easter basket. There will be nothing for Sunday. It’s your call.”

She opened it.

 She found the dolls.

  
So I told her, “You need to have faith in us, we are listening. We just don’t always do what you want when you want it.”