Now that my canning kettle has been found I'm becoming anxious to get to work on something. The pineapple jam is a possibility and I continue to work on the recipe. This time of year is tricky, though. Not much of anything is in season and although I've never thought of such a comparison before, I wonder if what I'm feeling isn't akin to what avid gardners feel when everything is cold and gray and those first seed catalogs arrive in the mail. I've got a kettle, I've got jars (Lord, have I got jars), I've got pectin and vinegar and everything else I need but what I don't really have is something with which to actually use it all. I'd better work out that pineapple recipe quickly because the last time I felt this antsy I got pregnant and I don't even want to flirt with such a thing again. No, much better to work on the hobbies I think.

I observed the other day that moms about and around where I am now living are fancy. Much fancier than in, say, Charlottesville. There, most of the moms were of the jeans and sweater variety and my usual workaday wardrobe blended just fine. Here (and "here" is more or less the Main Line of suburbs west of Philadelphia), dropping off at art class or playing with the train table at the local bookstore requires high-heeled boots or pointy toed shoes, lots of jewelry, a blow-out, full make-up, and goodness knows what labels lurking beneath the cashmere. The moms I've met have been friendly enough and no one seems to have looked twice at my usuals but I swear I haven't felt this much peer pressure since middle school. Today I dressed to deliver the Boy Wonder to his art lesson, changing out of my jeans and into a pair of black crepe pants, pumps and a boiled wool jacket. The other day before leaving the house on an errand with the whole family, I changed into a long black skirt, periwinkle stretch tee and a new black knit jacket with rounded collar. Brainiac watched me walk down the stairs and said, "Wow, honey, you look really nice." Since I can count on one hand the number of times he's paid me this particular compliment (he's not an ogre, he just usually says other nice things) I realized that maybe I had let things go just a bit far in the casualness department. And, I felt really, really good in these outfits - comfortable and decidedly unslovenly.

So, fancy. Or, rather, fancier than I've been for the last, oh, forever. I may not have much in the way of jewelry and blow-outs, but I guess it won't kill me to spiffy up a bit.