Springtime update

Dear friends,

So much to catch you up on! I remember reading recently, "when you feel like you have 'too much' remember to be thankful you have SO much." Sometimes I am overwhelmed by all there is to do or be or plan or cook or clean... but, while I am trying to learn to prioritize and let go of the lesser things, I am simultaneously thanking God that I have SO MUCH in my life.

Caleb is wrapping up his year in preschool. Part of me wants to plan fun, creative, educational things for the summer. And a second part of me laughs at the first part and says Give it a rest, woman, and enjoy the break! They only get like 2 months off for summer nowadays anyway. I think I will just appreciate those two months for what they are, and look forward to not having to drive him twice a week, or lug the carseat in and out and in and out, or finding Shares or doing homework or packing snack. I think this summer, more than any, both mommy and Caleb are ready for a break.

Little baby Ben is 6 months old now and quite a handful. I won't even attempt to fill you in on him right now. But you'll be seeing him here more often, for sure. :)

Right now, I am very excited about the garden! I have lots and lots of things to share so I plan to post quite a bit the next few days just trying to catch up with myself. HaHA! Be prepared! ;)

So, about two months ago, I took this photo of my seed babies in the sun and thought about sharing it with you.

 

But before I had a chance to do that, a week later I took this photo of my pea plants shooting up and thought I might post it also:

 

A couple weeks later, I still hadn't blogged yet and didn't have time to because my peas were begging to be transplanted and I needed to have a trellis built to support them. Keep in mind, I have to do all these projects in about 15 minute increments, since that's about how long the baby will afford me at a time. He *really* prefers to be held all day. :P

 

 

 

And so it went on and on. There are so many photos I was gonna share of our progress, but now here we are at pretty much the end of the winter garden and I'm just getting here... oh well!!

 

Maybe you remember when I began this garden a couple of months ago, I had a very scientific mindset. I was going to take meticulous notes for my future reference. I was going to practice crop rotation and moon gardening and learn how to start my seeds indoors and do fun experiments to see which plants grew better and...and...and... how often things do not go as planned!

At this point, I've lost track of when I transplanted this or that. I have carrots in three different places, including intermingled with my lettuces (a mistake, I know!), I started some seeds much too early and I'm thinking some of them are going to be very late,  the irrigation system I was hoping would be set in place for less than $40 ended up costing about twice that and took me nearly two weeks to complete in itself (post on that in the future, I'm sure!). I'm starting to think my neighbors view on gardening might be much more healthy. She says Why can't we just throw seeds on the ground and see what grows? She has been an inspiration to me not to STRESS too much about it, not to over analyze, like a can do sometimes. But work with the earth and just see what happens.

So at this point, I think I will just give you a little tour of the garden as it is now. Maybe with a few older pics mixed in just for fun. Hang in there! ;)
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This is the same bed you just saw, but a few days later, with some more seed babies transplanted into it: lettuces, broccoli and onions. Also, carrots, onions and garlic were directly sowed.

 

 

This is actually a photo of the brush pile we made when we cut a couple trees down. But to the side there, you can see the thrifty way I covered my babies to help protect them from bugs. Not a 100% seal, of course, but it seemed to be effective against most things that fly. I kept it on for a good month or so - only taking it off when the plants started outgrowing it. It let in sunlight and the irrigation was underneath it, so it worked out well.

Do you know what I used? It's wedding tulle! It was like $2 a yard on sale, so it was much cheaper than agribon and seemed to work fine for my purposes.

 

 

 

 Happy broccoli under tulle:

 

 

Same bed two weeks later!  

 

 

 

And this is that same bed just this morning! 

Notice the pea plants in the background, climbing the trellis.

The Big Thing in front is my broccoli. Right now it is all leaves and no fruit, so I think I must've accidentally bought some kind of "flamboyant" species.
 

 This is the other side of the same bed today - Carrots, onions, spinach (which is going to seed) and one kale plant to the left there that I received as a gift. :-) More on that later.

 

 

Here is a picture I took of my son's "Giant Pumpkin" he got at the seed swap.

I took this about a week ago - it's already twice this size.

 

We decided to put strawberries in the tops of the cinder block bed walls. We'll see how it goes. They were neglected for a little while and I lost a couple of them, but I'm trying to nurse them back to health.  

And here is my SECOND veggie bed! We just started planting in this one so I'm very excited (again)
Left to right: zucchini, market cucumbers, and "green fingers" (small cucumbers) These were all just planted last week, so I'm surprised to see how big they are.

 

This is my lone garbanzo bush (another gift) and I am stoked about that little white flower bud you might be able to see in there.

 

We have planted three types of beans. This is a purple pole bean.

 

 

Somehow I ended up with FIFTEEN tomato plants and almost all of them are of a different variety! It will be so neat to see their various fruits (assuming they live that long. haha)

Here are five of them, along with some marigold buddies. The mari's aren't too happy, I might need to get replacements. :(

 

 

 

and these are some of the other tomatoes, begging me to get them in the ground.

 

 

My neighbor had some surplus, so she brought these over for me today:

two watermelon plants and two LUFFA plants!

"Like the kind of luffa you use in the shower?!" you ask. Apparently! She got the seeds here.

 

This is my boogin...

bouga...

bog...

This is my pink plant:  

 

 

I didn't plant these but they are pretty nonetheless, aren't they? :) 

 

 

And I will end this LOOOOOOOONG post on a hopeful note. This is my first sort-of-decent harvest that I just brought in this morning from those pea plants you saw.

There are sugar snap (which were SO good with lunch) and a few regular peas. :)

 

 

 

 

Believe it or not, there is much more to share! Back soon!

 

Yes we CAN!

Just finished my first batch of Strawberry Jam! :)

I went to a canning class about a week ago. It's something I've always wanted to learn but was intimated by. But the class was very hands-on and confidence-building, so I was excited to get home and do it myself. This was my first attempt and I think it went pretty smoothly. I tried to do it without a canning pot or a rack, which was challenging but not impossible.

I started with Strawberry Jam because it seemed like the easiest and most universal recipe. I just used the Ball Recipe here because I figured they have it figured out by now and the recipe is one of the most popular ones on their website. I halved it. And, being warned that most traditional canning recipes are really sweet, I reduced the sugar in the recipe, but it still turned out a little too sweet for my taste. I might try even less next time or try to find an alternative. Besides honey. I kinda can't stand honey. Trust me, I wish I could.

Oh look! Here's a light version made with grape juice. I might try that next time. :)

A cool idea I had that I would recommend (if you are a canner and haven't tried it already) is to use an immersion hand mixer to mash the strawberries after starting them a little with a fork. I was sitting there trying to get a smoother consistency and it was taking forever. So I pulled out the immersion and it worked great! It was already on the stove by then, making the berries softer, so that might have helped too.

Have you ever canned before? If so, what are your favorite things to preserve?

A couple of Fresh Veggie Recipes ^_^

I have been meaning to get on the blog here and share these recipes with you for a few weeks now. Since I finally got here to post the giveaway, I thought I would share these real quickly as well. Both of them are easy to make and delicious, which makes them a winner in our house! And since we have been trying to eat more yummy veggies, they fit right into our new meal plan.

Although we don't usually ever eat them together in the same meal.

If you aren't already, I encourage you to eat organic veggies: they are so much better for you and taste far better in my opinion, too. Buying local is the best, whenever possible. I am learning to incorporate more local veggies when I can. Among other things, it ensures the freshness and supports your neighbor's businesses. :)
First one: Chicken Salad in a Pita!  Since it's the only pita I really make, it's known simply as "pitas" around here. As in, "It's pita night." I have had this recipe in my box since I was a teenager, but didn't make it until about 5 years ago. It is so refreshing! Nice for lunch or light dinner, especially on these warm days we've been having:

1 cup your favorite salad lettuce

1 cup alfalfa sprouts or pea shoots 

1 cup tomatoes, diced

1/2 cup carrots, finely chopped (or shredded)

1/2 cup green bell peppers, chopped

1/4 cup of mayo (or your favorite salad dressing might work nicely)

pita pockets

1 chicken breast, cooked and chopped

As you can see, the most time consuming part of this recipe is all the chopping. If you have a super-duper chopper thingy, it would probably go pretty quickly. But I do it all the old fashioned way, so I try to save time by cooking the chicken while I am chopping all the veggies.

DIRECTIONS are pretty straightforward: just toss it all in a bowl and stuff the pitas with the salad. I highly recommend warming the pita pockets, it makes it sooo yummy when the cool salad is stuffed in the nice warm, chewy pita bread. I usually wrap 3 pitas in a towel and put them in the microwave for about 30 seconds. Nom nom!

The chicken definitely adds a lot of flavor, but I would say it is optional because I really feel that this could possibly stand alone as a vegetarian dish. Another option: when I made it for a vegetarian guest one night, I just added a little bit of tofu "chikin" and they said it was most acceptable.

Fun to play with this one. You can add whatever you want, basically. Joel likes a little bit of red onion if we have it around. I added some Persian cucumbers the other night and it added some extra Yum to it. :)

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The second recipe is easy-breezy. I make it at least once a week because we like it so much and never seem to get tired of it. :)

 Charity's Greek Salad:

1 tomato, chopped

2 Persian cucumbers, peeled and chopped (I get the organic Persians from TJ's)

~1/4 cup (or 2 oz.) feta cheese, crumbled

Italian dressing

That's it! You can add more or less cheese to your taste. And over time you can fine-tune the tomato/cucumber ratio as well.  

Enjoy!

Holy Guacamole!

I love avocados. I love guacamole. I love easy recipes. This one is super easy. And delish. So easy, actually, that I have it memorized. :)

Take an avocado. Peel it (of course) and slice it into a bowl.
Smoosh with a fork.
Add:
1.5 Tblsp. of sour cream
1 Tblsp. your favorite salsa
At least 1/8 tsp. of garlic powder - more if you like
dash of salt
dash of pepper
splash of lemon or lime juice

Stir/smoosh some more.
Done!

See - easy! And if you need more, it's easy to multiply in your head: just consider the "add" list as "per avocado."
The neat thing about this one is that the salsa does most of the work. And it will automatically parallel whatever your tastes are. For example, as you may know, I don't like a lot of heat. So my favorite salsa is a mild one. Thus my guacamole will be mild, too! :)

We espcially enjoy this with homemade quesadillas. Or chips. My tortilla chip right now is actually Trader Joe's Multigrain Tortilla Chips. Really yummy and a little better for you, because it's made with flaxseed and organic grains. Mmmm.

Enjoy!

Growing my own

I've always had a romantic notion of being a farmer. I think I've discussed that here before. "Sheeps and chickens and things." Gathering my own eggs. Milking my own cow. Growing my own produce seems especially feasible to me. Unfortunately in the 7 years I've been married (read: moved out of mom's house), we've lived in apartments, so there wasn't any land to work. Well, technically we did live in a house with some acreage... for about three months. It was in the mountains and we lived there during the winter. Not only was it freezing, but the entire lot was covered in redwoods. Very peaceful, quite beautiful. But not conducive to growing anything really.

Anyhoo.

Our current place is no different. We have a nice second story balcony patio, but it's about 6' x 6'. And Joel's manly barbeque takes up about a third of that. My point here is that while the obvious alternative to having land is to create a patio garden with pots, there is not even much room for that. My other sad secret is that while I love the idea of growing things... I'm actually not very good at it. :} I usually end up either loving the plant to death by watering it too much, or on the other end of the spectrum, I forget it exists and it dies of starvation. I also rarely take time to get to know them very well. I ignore instructions like how much sun it should get. Well, if I have a shady patio, there's not much I can do about it anyway. All this adds up to a few failed attempts at patio gardening, in which the plants usually die after reaching about 3" high. Then I give up and throw them out and get frustrated and decide it's "just not for me," that I must have a black thumb and I leave my empty pots in storage for a few more years until I get the courage to try again.

Enter Fred.

He's my new tomato plant. I was walking out of CVS one day and... something about the way his leaves beckoned me and his cheerful yellow flowers smiled 'hello,' I just had to take him home. The fact that he was only 2.99 might have helped, too. ;) What I especially love about Fred is that I adopted him at a mature age. All my other patio gardens I've tried to start from seed. But Fred has taken root, and grown to a substantial height, so I was hoping this head start would help him through the life of hard knocks he was sure to encounter in his relationship with me. :) But I'm really trying to treat him a little better than his predecessors.

So far things are going well. My son takes joy in helping me water him daily. I placed Fred in the sunniest spot I could find, though it's not his ideal, I'm sure. I even took a daring dash out into a hail storm a few nights ago to save him from certain death.

Then. Like magic. The other day, we walked out and found this!

It's a TOMATO!! I was so excited to see fruit on my patio garden for the first time in 7 years. My son and I continue to water and check for developments. I've even noticed a couple of other buds falling and fruits coming along. I'm trying not to get ahead of myself just yet, but I'll confess that visions of greek salads and tomato sandwiches have been dancing in my head.

Maybe I should go out there and talk to him a little bit. That might help.

 

Easter eggs

I know, I know. Easter is so last month.

I was going through my camera card, cleaning some things out and found these, I took to share with you. We were out of town the week before Easter, so we did our eggs a little late. It was my son's first year dying eggs, which is fun. It was actually my first year dying eggs too!  :) Don't ask. Long story...

Here are some samples. We made about ten, but we ate the rest before I could shoot them. Teehee.

Even the garbage is pretty: 

I hope everyone had a relaxing Easter and that you got to spend it with family...

Lemon Meringue Pie

So, I know it seems like all fun and games when I start taunting you with meringue pies, but in reality, I've been hard at work trying to fine-tune this recipe. THREE pies later, I think I've found some success.

The pie I've been making for many years was Grandma's Lemon Meringue from allrecipes.com. But it was kind of a hit or miss sometimes, mainly speaking of the meringue part, which as we all know can be very temperamental and quite a test of skill. I decided to try to work on my meringue technique, and see if I couldn't improve on the recipe a bit. I took alot from this article about how to make the perfect meringue, and encourage you to check it out if you are looking for some pointers.

Here's photos of the third pie, so you can follow along if you like, especially since meringue pies can be kind of complex. But I think it turned out pretty well. (And here's a printer-friendly version).

Lemon Meringue Pie

1 (9 inch) pie crust - fully cooked. (I suggest Pillsbury ready-made from the freezer section)

Filling ingredients:
1 cup sugar
2 Tbsp. flour
3 Tbsp. cornstarch
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 cup water
juice from 2 lemons or 8 Tbsp. lemon juice (add some zest too, if you're into that kind of thing) 
2 Tbsp. butter
4 egg yolks

Meringue ingredients:
4 egg whites
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 tsp cream of tartar

All items used to mix egg whites into meringue must be very clean and very dry. A large glass bowl is suggested.

First thing: separate the eggs while they are still cool (put whites into your large glass bowl and yolks into any medium bowl), then let the whites sit out for about 20-30 minutes while you gather the rest of the ingredients, allowing the whites to reach room temperature.

Filling prep:
In a medium saucepan (not on the stove yet), whisk together 1 cup sugar, flour, cornstarch and salt.
Stir in water and lemon juice - very gradually to avoid lumps. Set aside.

Meringue:
In a large glass bowl, beat eggs whites with mixer on medium-high until soft peaks form.

Add the cream of tarter, and then the 1/2 cup of sugar very gradually (about a Tbsp. at a time) while you continue beating. Beat on medium-high to high until stiff peaks form. It'll be nice and glossy.

 

Filling:

Bring your sugar/lemon juice mixture to the stove and cook over medium-high heat, stirring frequently until it comes to a boil.

Stir in butter.

Ok, so we're gonna do a little "dance" here. And of course, I didn't get any photos of it. I was too busy "watching my steps." har har. But it's a do-si-do between the sugar mixture and the yolks, as follows:
Lower heat to keep it from burning while you temper the egg yolks as follows. Gradually whisk about 1/2 cup of the hot sugar mixture into the bowl of egg yolks. Now, turn around and whisk this egg yolk mixture back into the remaining sugar. (This keeps the eggs from cooking into scrambled eggs).

Return to heat and bring to a boil, stirring constantly. Mixture will be thick.
Pour filling into pie crust.

At this point you may want to pre-heat your oven to 325 degrees.

Put it together:
Give the meringue a few seconds of beating, just to freshen it up a bit. While the filling is still hot in the crust, drop globs of meringue onto the pie. Spread it around the edges first, then fill in the center, to avoid displacing any of the filling. There should be tall mounds of meringue.

Spread around the top of the pie and scrape it down to the very edge of the crust, "sealing" in the filling to prevent bubbling over or the meringue from shrinking.

You may want to add fun little peaks in the top of the meringue, which will toast nicely.

Bake in a preheated oven for about 25 minutes or until golden brown.

Cool completely before serving. May take about 7-8 hours at room temp. or you can cool for about an hour at room temp, then about 4 hours in the fridge.

Of all the complexities and details in making a meringue pie, probably the trickiest and hardest part for me? Waiting for it to cool! :)

This pie came out of the oven at 1:30,
at which point I put it very politely on the stove top and tried to stay busy.
This photo is to document that 1 hour later, it was still in one piece, and I hadn't mauled it yet:

This one was taken at 3:30. I bet it's cool enough, right?
I touched the bottom, and it was still very warm. Drat!

So I put it in the fridge for another 3 hours. Outta sight/outta mind might work better for me here.

...oops. What's this? ;)

Three infinite hours later:

Mmmmm.... Don't mind if I do! (shown with a homemade latte)

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By the way, you may substitute Splenda Granulated for white sugar to create a sugar free version that also has about half the calories. Be aware that, while the taste is still delicious, the height of the pie will be effected. As far as I calculated: One slice (1/8 pie) = 273 calories. One slice of sugar free = 141 calories

So there you have it. There's nothing quite like the sense of accomplishment you get in a successful meringue. Or maybe it's just the pie that's making me feel so good inside. :)

Great recipe for the upcoming warm months - very refreshing.

Enjoy!

A different iced tea

Well, spring has sprung! The warm air these past few days has once again called forth the blossoms from their winter dorms. The bees are buzzing. The birds singing. It sounds cliche, I know. But it's true!

The weather in Chico is usually pretty extreme. In the 7 years I've lived here, we've rarely had a true springtime. It goes straight from 45 degrees one day to 80 and upwards to 100 almost overnight. Usually a night in March, I think. But this week has been nice and mild. Real spring weather - what a treat for us. :)

Here's a funky pic I took with my phone in Bidwell Park during a moment of rapture:

So, to celebrate this glorious weather, I thought I'd make some iced tea. Seems festive. Seems simple. I don't usually drink alot of iced tea, but I think I'll try to more often. It's a nice alternative to the soda pop I grew up on and that I'm trying not to drink anymore. It's also a nice alternative to city water, which has been tasting kind of gross lately, even after filtering.

So - iced tea. Just buy some at the store right? Well... I tried a couple different lipton things. They were OK. But they have this funny aftertaste I can't quite describe. It's almost a fishy something. I wouldn't normally be so picky about things like this. But I wanted to find something really yummy that I wouldn't mind drinking every day. So I continued looking. Maybe I don't like iced tea, I thought. There are alot of flavored drinks on the market, and most of them look tea-ish. But in the whole aisle of tea-ish things, they each and every one had either loads of sugar (which isn't much better than soda, now - is it?) or aspartame. I was surprised not one of them used splenda or anything. How does anything with aspartame even sell these days? But I digress.

Here I was, in a bit of a culinary bind. So I consulted the Contessa. In her book, she suggests a Zinger recipe she says is very good. After spending a week looking for Red Zinger (which is not Raspberry Zinger, by the way) and finally finding it at one of the natural food stores, I rushed home in anticipation. Watched while it brewed. Barely waited for it to chill.

Aaaaand ...it was ok. I don't like apple juice very much. And this recipe calls for apple juice as a natural sweetener. I tried substituting water and just adding a bit of splenda to sweeten. That was actually pretty good, I thought. But I let Joel try it and he said it tasted like old lady. Or potpourri. After considering the ingredients of the Zinger teas, I said - you're probably tasting the rosehips. He agreed that must be it. He didn't like it. Thanks alot Joel - now all I taste is potpourri.

Well, I thought I'd give it a bit more thought. Eventually, it occurred to me that the lipton tea I thought tasted fishy wasn't just TEA, in any pure form, but a real flavor of tea (black pekoe), and maybe I just don't like black tea. And maybe I'm just not very fond of Zingers. But might I try any other flavor of tea over ice and make my own flavor of iced tea? (You may be just starting to realize now how truly awkward tea and I are around each other). But you know, all these hot teas are kept on very different shelves from the "Iced Tea!" in the grocery stores, so it took awhile for me to put it together. Haha. 

My favorite hot tea has been Earl Grey. So I steeped some grey in only half a cup of hot water, then filled the other half with cold water. Ice. Sweetener. It was perfect. Just what I was looking for. Refreshing. Nothing fishy.

I encourage you - if you're looking for a new refreshment this summer - er, I mean spring - why not try your favorite hot tea over ice? :)

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The Contessa's Tea

Recipe can be found here.

My Iced Tea Epiphany

To brew any tea as iced, be sure to reduce the amount of water you usually use for hot tea, since it will dilute over ice. I would say for each bag of tea, steep in 4 oz. hot water for 5-10 minutes, then remove the bag and add 4oz. cold water. Sweeten if desired.

 

One cup at a time - keeps it fresh.

Cheers!

Soft peaks...

So, we're in the middle of a hundred-year-storm out here in California. That might be an exaggeration. It's been raining off and on (mostly on) for about 2 weeks, which is relatively unusual. Some trees in Lower Bidwell Park and around Chico got blown over about a week ago. You know it's a big storm when the trees blow over. And of course, being the sensible person I am, I thought what better to do in this inclement weather than to make some meringue? :)

Lemon Meringue Pie was mentioned last week and ever since then both Joel and I have been dreaming about it. So I pulled out my old recipe and my trusty whisk attachment and got to work. The pie turned out pretty good. It tasted delicious, actually, but I think the consistency was a little off. That may or may not have to do with the weather... and the fact that I have a huge problem waiting 5 whole hours for the filling to set. Teehee.

I got one of those 2-fer deals on the pie crust, so I'm gonna try the recipe again next week and I'll see if I can perfect it a bit. Then, I'll share it here, for anyone who wants it. Right now, I'm just being a tease:

Since I had the eggs out and it was still raining, I made macaroons while I was at it. :)

Funny story about macaroons and me: I've never had a macaroon other than my own. So I don't know how they compare to the mainstream macaroon. My suspicion is that mine are much more meringuey (yes) than most. Because you can really see the coconut in the photos of other people's macaroons. My coconut is sorta hidden in a poofy cloud of sweet vanilla-almond. Not that I mind. Mmmmm... I'm just curious how they compare. Maybe I'll buy one at a local patisserie and see if I can figure out how to make mine a little more so.

In the meantime, who's gonna help me eat all these sweets?! I'm gonna have to speed walk for like a month to burn all this off.

Oh wait. It's raining.

A taste of Ireland

On a recent trip to the Emerald Isle, we were touring the Ring of Kerry and stopped in a sweet little coastal village for lunch. In a quaint cafe, the toasty warm fire was a welcome relief from the cold winter winds outside, and the Carrot Parsnip soup and coffee I enjoyed was also quite a comfort. I reached a point in the meal where I was actually quite full, but the soup was soooo tasty, I had trouble stopping. Which was unusual for me. For the rest of the trip meals, if I saw carrot parsnip or any other veggie type soup, I opted for that and was never disappointed.

On my return home, one of the first things I did was look for a similar recipe online and was surprised at how few carrot parsnip soup recipes there were. Maybe it's specific to the country. I know I had never heard of it before. Anyway, I found basically two versions, the main difference being that one is made with butter and one with half and half instead. I am sharing the former with you, since it was my favorite. I reworked it a little bit, and now it is very close to the soup I had in Ireland, but not exactly the same. So I plan on perfecting it over the next few months and if I find any improvements I will post them here. :)

Smooth, very "earthy" in the taste of the root vegetables, but the parsnips give it a nice sweetness. Every time I taste it, I am transported back to Cahersiveen and a toasty warm cafe.

Carrot Parsnip Soup
4 Tblsp butter  5 Tblsp butter
1/2 small-medium onion 1 cup chopped onion
~1/2 large baker potato
4 medium carrots
1 medium parsnip 1 large or 2 meduim parsnips
~ 28 oz. of chicken broth (i used reduced sodium)
salt and pepper to taste

Peel and chop potato, carrots, and parsnip. Chop onion.
Melt butter in saucepan, add onions and potatoes and stir until they are coated with butter.
Cover with lid and sweat ingredients over low heat for 5 minutes.
Add carrots, parsnip, and sweat for another 5 minutes.
Add the stock. Bring to boil, then lower heat and simmer until veggies are soft. Like falling apart soft.
Liquefy with a blender, hand blender or food processor.
Add salt and pepper to taste. May garnish with parsley.

Enjoy!