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Manicotti is tricky.  I screwed up first when the noodles fell apart while boiling (solution: take them out while still undercooked and let them finish up in the oven stage)  and then again while filling them with the cheese mixture (solution: squeeze out filling from a freezer bag with a small corner cut off). But they were tasty in the end, if not pretty-looking.

I have presents! A simple board book for the youngest,  Max Has a Fish for the next,  Goth Girl and the Ghost of  a Mouse for the next, and Un Lun Dun for the eldest.   Slightly worried that Un Lun Dun might be a bit intense,  but I wanted to give her a book that I'd genuinely enjoyed for myself and not just "here's an age-appropriate-labeled book object from another grownup". 

(I do chafe at the age restrictions on books sometimes, though I am good and obey them because after all I'm not the parent.  When I was a kid I read every single thing I could get my hands on.  Sometimes that turned out to be a really bad idea,  especially with no one to talk to about what I read, but mostly they stretched my brain all different ways and lit the fires of my soul for life.   But the kids I know now don't just have more protection, they have a million more options for entertainment.  They don't want to work as hard at reading - and there's no reason they should have to.  They'll grow up with their own beloved stories. )

Anime night this week:

• Started BBK/BNK,  which looks like an interestingly different take on the giant robots genre
• Love, Chuunibiyo and Other Delusions  Cute, but not especially my jam. 
• Non Non Byori  Same.