An Instagram friend, lexysauve, shared that
“These oatmeal scones are perfect. And I will forever be doubling my scone recipes for #saveastepcooking which @leilamarielawler taught me about! The second batch of unbaked dough freezer perfectly on a piece of parchment lined plate, then you simply wrap the parchment over the round and pop it in a labeled plastic bag for the freezer! You need to lengthen your cook time.
I appreciate the tip on freezing, because I'm always unsure about whether this sort of dough will really freeze properly (though I often freeze baked scones and find they reheat perfectly).
So of course I had to ask her for the recipe — the idea of toasting the oats really appealed to me — and try them myself! Deirdre says they are indeed “perfect”!
You can find the recipe for Toasted Oatmeal Scones here at Creations by Kara. I did everything as she said!
My notes:
- Really cool the oats completely or they will melt your butter, defeating the point of the scone, which is the flaky, buttery texture.
- I like to divide my dough in half or even fourths and then form the scones by cutting each disk into sixths (it's not hard once you get the hang of first cutting in half and then each half into thirds) — I just like mine a bit more bite-sized. So my batch here yielded 12 scones.
- I used “raw sugar,” i.e. large crystal sugar, to sprinkle on top for a nice texture.
- Next time I will double!
Enjoy!
bits & pieces
I want to offer a few articles that pertain to Covid, but hopefully not in a contentious way. I know our readers always read before commenting and I trust this excellent habit will continue!
- From Msgr. Pope: Coronavirus Stalks in the Darkness, But Do Not Be Afraid
- The burden of proof is on those who impose burdens — from Edward Feser, professor of philosophy and defender of common sense: “Everyone should make an extra effort at showing humility during this crisis, but especially those who are imposing enormous costs on others, where reasonable people can disagree about the necessity and efficacy of those costs.”
Widespread daycare has really drained our common sense about babies. We take all sorts of things for granted that don't hold up to scrutiny or even what we know to be right, because no one can just say that it's not good for babies to be away from their mothers.
But I have to say that I reached a new level of shock upon reading the tweet of a working mom who mentioned that her very young baby used to get sick with a fever once every two weeks at his full-time daycare, but since Covid, the daycare workers have been wearing masks, and baby hasn't gotten sick at all!
Presumably they have also been washing their hands, which I think matters far more to contain the spread of disease. But what makes me physically sick myself is the thought of a baby spending all day every day with “caregivers” who are wearing masks!
If you do a search on the importance to their well being of infants (and children, and adults) seeing the human face, you can only find evidence for the proposition. No one holds that it doesn't matter or isn't harmful to deprive human beings of this sort of interaction.
We can't let fear of disease — remote fear in the case of young people under the age of about 26 — wipe away the basic human need to see faces.
“Around eight to 12 months of age, infants learn that they can use information from other people’s faces – especially their mom’s – to help them figure out what to do in new situations.
“For example, when infants who are first learning to crawl and walk are presented with a possibly dangerous slope, they look to their mothers’ facial expressions for cues.”
And a few on politics more broadly:
- The Cato Institute did a poll: 62% of Americans Say They Have Political Views They’re Afraid to Share
- Two reviews/critiques of books on race that are best sellers and ubiquitous amongst students (due to propagandizing institutional efforts): The Dehumanizing Condescension of White Fragility (White Fragility) and Ibram X. Kendi, Prophet of Anti-racism (How to Be an Antiracist). Our country has struggled from the beginning with racism. We have to think well on what the right approach is, lest we harm the very bonds that we are trying to heal.
- A cautionary tale for today’s ‘woke’ movement, a review of the movie Mr Jones, about “Walter Duranty, who as the Pulitzer Prize-winning foreign correspondent for the New York Times led the cover-up of the 1932-3 famine in Ukraine, [and for whom] mass starvation was a career opportunity.”
- Updated to add another review of the movie — the Mr Jones of the title is Gareth Jones, a Welshman who went to Ukraine to see for himself what had happened. “Walter Duranty led the ferocious, Soviet-prodded attack on Jones’s credibility. He also bullied most other Moscow-based Western journalists—to their enduring disgrace—into doing the same, lest they lose their visas. Jones, however, had a spine. He did not back off. He continued writing and speaking about the famine in Ukraine with lasting effect, until his death under suspicious circumstances two years later.”
Dept. of Misc:
- From Leila Miller, important words to clarify what loving your erring son or daughter really means: The biggest mistake of modern Catholic parenting.
- Did you see the evocative photo of the priest heading towards a major pile-up to offer last rites? Steve Skojec writes a moving reflection on “just doing his job.” We all have a job to do — let's do it and not be afraid.
- To share with a friend who just isn't sure about homeschooling: Kristina Hernandez: Homeschooling during coronavirus – here's why my kids will be with me this fall
from the archives
- Now, more than ever, you need our wedding advice — that venue is closed and you're looking at a small social-distanced event with disgruntled and frightened relatives. Deirdre's here to sort out your priorities! {pretty, happy, real weddings}
- My most basic parenting advice: Act, Don't React
liturgical year
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Whitney says
We just had our first child earlier this month. He was rushed off to NICU and stayed there for 7 days. I do not know if this was typical of because of covid, but we had to wear masks whenever we wanted to see him. We also could only see him 4 hours a day (which was indeed due to covid), and that’s on top of the typical NICU things like having to scrub in.
It broke my heart knowing that my son didn’t know what his mother and father’s faces looked like. I couldn’t tell the difference between the masked nurses, so how could he possibly tell the difference between us and the nurses? During the latter days of his stay, we would quickly take our mask off to sneak him a kiss when the nurses weren’t looking.
I understand it’s different — NICU is a very different risk population than daycare. Even a little cold could have taken one of those premies (and our baby was term — just sick). But it hurt.
Kate says
My last baby was in NICU after birth for 4 days. Because I insisted on nursing him, I was allowed to sit in the NICU. I spent most of my time there except when I left to eat or use the restroom and during the nurses’ shift change. I was only required to wash thoroughly up to me elbows every time I came in. No mask. When the nurse was telling another nurse about everything the babies in the room needed and she came to my son, she pointed to me and said, “She does everything. Just check the monitors periodically.” It broke my heart to see how rarely other parents came in, Some babies never had anyone pick them up. I think many parents were intimidated and frightened by the clinical atmosphere.
Annie says
I’m so sorry that your NICU experience was handled so poorly. I can’t imagine. One of my twins born this December (flu and RSV season!) was in the NICU for 10 days after the other twin and I were discharged, and all of us were able to room in at the hospital until he was eventually discharged. There were definitely some cumbersome restrictions and I’ve heard of some even crazier/more nonsensical rules given COVID. (If you could be there for 4 hours, what difference would it make germ-wise if you stayed longer??) I wonder what the people making some of these rules could be thinking.
Kate says
My sister is a Montessori teacher and she refuses to teach under the new restrictions. Not because she is frightened of Covid, but because she she cannot teach her students well if they cannot see her full face. And how do you even do Montessori remotely?!
One of my daughters worked in a daycare pre-covid for a few months and she was sick often during that time. Another daughter teaches kindergarten and was sick often until she started aggressively boosting her immune system. Young children have awful hygiene and are very handsy with each other and their teachers (whom they often regard as a second mother). The main problem is parents sending sick kids out when they should be at home recuperating. I know a school principal who had to send out a special notice to parents last year during flu season: “Please do not send your child to school if he/she has vomitted within the last 24 hours.” And these were families where most of the mothers were at home and could care for a sick child. They were worried about the kids “falling behind” in class. And schools have drastically cut the amount of time children are outdoors. Does no one have common sense anymore?
tster says
Once you reach school age, if you do not send your kids in, your child can be listed as truant if they miss too many days of school and you don’t have a doctor’s note, and there’s a lot of pressure on public school parents to send their kids in because of the income it generates. For instance, my son had a full-time nurse, and whereas it was not any inconvenience to *me to have him stay home if he was not feeling 100%, our nurse said he liked to have as much notice as possible for any absence because he would not get paid on the days our son did not show. I often felt guilty if I kept my son home if he said he didn’t “feel good” when he had no fever or other technically disqualifying sign of illness. There are a million little things like that where the incentives are against common sense in our society and which mean ill people are often out infecting others. This is less the case with COVID-19 as it seems the majority of spread is from presymptomatic or asymptomatic people (also true for flu, by the way), but there are often subtle signs that something is off (feeling a little worn down, or tired, or a tiny little tickle in the throat) and we have been taught as a society not only to ignore those things, but that it is our duty to go out and “earn a living” or “be productive” when in fact that means we are sickening others and preventing them from earning a living or helping provide for their families.
Emily says
Yes, that tweet made me feel that way as well. The kids I know that go to daycare are almost always sick with constant infections, but somehow *that* was OK?
I’ve also noticed how badly we fail in the basic hygiene department–hand washing, and “covering your cough”, things that have been told to us for a long time! Wash your hands, folks! As my dad says, “common sense is not so common”…..
Re: parents in hospitals. I spent many years (until recently) being admitted to a children’s hospital. It’s not rare to find nurses rocking babies and spending time with the littlest because their parents are gone. Yes, some of them have to work, but it’s really heartbreaking to see how many children almost *never* see their parents when they’re in the hospital. I’ll never forget seeing a nurse in the hallway, rocking an adorable little baby, because her parents never came to visit.
Marta says
Great selection this week- I had stumbled on that Atlantic piece earlier and loved the common sense logic of his critique.
I also love those studies on child development with the astounding findings that, “breast milk is very good for babies!” and “children need to be embraced x number of times a day” and “babies thrive when they see human faces!” The mask issue is a real concern: my 7 month old belly-laughs when I have to wear mine and persistently pulls it off my face!
Victoria says
Yes! My baby thinks my mask is hilarious too and makes a game out of trying to get it off my face at Mass!
Dixie says
I’m glad to see more folks opting out and homeschooling. I do worry that state-level regulation may increase as the numbers of homeschoolers go up. Hopefully this will not hold up in the courts.
Kasey says
Hearing that a baby was sick every other week with a fever is heartbreaking to me. That poor thing. Where I find common sense lacking is that this is (or it was pre-COVID) considered normal for babies and young kids in daycare. I get that little kids get sick, and they are building their immunity, but a baby with a fever every other week is not ok. (And this is not to say I am for or against mask wearing. I promised myself months ago, I would not get into that debate online. I’m just pointing out the fevers.)
BridgetAnn says
Yes, good point Kasey. “Building immune systems” does not necessitate nor equal frequent illness, especially fevers.
And, kids *can* be taught good hygiene. It requires vigilance and patience, like anything else instilled in young children, but it can be done! My kids know that “washing your hands” requires more than an instantaneous run-in with soap & water.
Terri says
Thank you, as always, for the informative links.
Yes, seeing faces is a basic human need. My father had a stroke recently and I spent two nights in the ICU with him. Every time a nurse would come in wearing a mask he would become agitated–some times terrified. Having had a stroke, he already was struggling to understand what was said to him, and the masks further impeded his understanding. Recognizing this, most of the nurses would remove their masks if I asked them to do so. At a recent follow-up visit with his neurologist, the neurologist said he has noticed that the masks make a difference in his communications with his non-stroke patients as well. Apparently delivering the news to someone that they have Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s doesn’t go over the same when his face is covered.
Leila says
Terri, that is an important observation. I would add that it’s not acceptable for normal touch in the hospital to be covered with rubber gloves. Cleaning the patient’s bodily fluids? Sure. Touching a newborn in the ICU? No. What is accomplished? If there’s something on the nurse’s hand that is going to harm the child, then it will be there on the glove. Surely there’s nothing on the baby’s body that will harm the nurse — she can wash her hands afterwards. Nurses should wash their hands and then touch the baby. I was repelled when a NICU nurse was “stroking” my granddaughter’s cheek with a gloved finger. I understand her intention but I did not want her doing that because it did not feel the way she thinks it felt to the baby.
Kari and Brad Brane says
My friend is a occupational therapist in the NICU and told me that some of the older babies in the PICU have never seen a face without a mask (or face shield, I guess), but still smile at mostly developmentally appropriate times. She said it looks odd, but she was so amazed that despite not seeing a full facial smile, they still can see the eyes smile and imitate the rest.
God has made babies amazing!
Cynthia says
I truly believe that no baby should be in daycare, never mind in daycare during a pandemic. But if they must, then by all means protect them from getting Covid19 by wearing a mask AND a face shield. While an infant MAY contract Covid and have a mild case, he or she will still be able to infect other family members. Even one critically ill parent, grandparent or sibling is too many. Keep your babies home and wear masks and glasses whenever you go out. This is real, deadly and AIRBORNE, so it recirculates in all of our public buildings, libraries, schools, dentist’s and doctor’s offices and daycare facilities included, because most of the modern buildings are sealed . I have had 2 critically ill family members who were inches from death and took months to recover and then they recovered only partially. I am a ( former) Respiratory Therapist with friends still working in ICUs across the country.( I have also worked in NICUs as well, and infection control guidelines make gloves absolutely necessary for the protection of the infants. Better to receive a loving touch from a gloved hand than no touch at all) It is a difficult and frightening line of work right now. Please wear and demand masks and glasses for those who come in contact with all of your babies…. for the care and safety of your family, your community and YOUR healthcare providers. So far ,1800 Healthcare workers worldwide have lost their lives to Covid19….. 798 of those who died were here in the United States Let those numbers sink in. ( go to www. medscape. com and read the In Memoriam list of all of these Healthcare workers who lost their lives caring for the sick and dying…. it is sobering ) Every misstep by politicians and individual citizens puts all of us in danger. Babies will likely catch up on their development later, even if they spend sometime in an environment with masked caregivers. Better to be protected than to end up as orphans because their parents died from this horrible virus. Remember that we truly are in this together,so we should do our best to protect one another.
Leila says
“Even one critically ill parent, grandparent or sibling is too many.”
This is not how one rationally assess risks. It casts everything you say under a cloud of hysteria. The numbers you cite are vanishingly small.
Imagine saying “even one life is not worth getting into the car… ” You’d be FAR more reasonable saying that, and yet, I am willing to wager that you WILL get into your car…
Cynthia says
This is not hysteria it is caution… and sadness over the sheer number of healthcare workers who have died in such a short time. It is IMPOSSIBLE to say how many people might be affected by one daycare worker spreading this virus exponentially. I worked as a Respiratory Therapist and Asthma educator for 18 years before I left the field to raise my children. I use many scientific sources to guide my decisions, because It is a lot of information to wade through. One of those reputable and sane sources is Professor Erin Bromage PhD, a Comparative Immunologist and Professor of Biology at University of Massachusetts Darthmouth. I don’t expect you to print my response, I have no wish to argue with you in your comments section. I have been a reader for many years, and I enjoy your blog very much. I hope that you and your family are able to stay safe and healthy during these uncertain times.
Here are the links if you are interested: https://www.erinbromage.com/post/about-the-author-professor-erin-bromage
https://www.erinbromage.com/post/the-risks-know-them-avoid-them
https://www.erinbromage.com/post/what-s-the-deal-with-masks
Leila says
Well, I am happy that you are a long-time reader and appreciate your kind words! Now I will just say a few things.
The problem with caution, taken beyond what the facts show, is that it can paralyze people and cause them to lose hope. We cannot do anything at all if we live in fear that we may cause “one person’s death” — every day we take so many risks! We would have to cower in a corner. True caution, or as I like to say, prudence, is looking at the risks comparatively and then not being fearful.
With Covid we have to look at the positivity rates in our region and the R1. Although of course sad, the deaths of the healthcare workers from Covid that you mention is statistically insignificant in a world of 7 billion + people and 59 million health care workers. There are other factors that represent higher risk for them. One important one is the environment they work in, as Covid (and a whole host of other viruses) is spread via AC as we are now finding out, and poor ventilation in general is a culprit. Most hospital workers don’t even have a window… and if they do, it probably doesn’t open. This is unacceptable.
We know who is at risk from Covid (the tiny, tiny population) and we can protect them without damaging young people by putting masks on them and subjecting them full time to masked caregivers — something actually quite risky for their well being.
The site you link to is not helpful because the writer is simply explaining a predetermined opinion, not offering scientific evidence. We aren’t concerned so much with the person’s CV as with the data offered. I personally don’t need yet another explanation of how “my mask helps you” but rather, hard data on the risks.
Here is a study done on the efficacy of cloth masks (what people should be looking at, since that is what the orders tell us to wear) : https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/5/4/e006577
Here is another: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2768396
Cynthia says
I am not sure if you are referring to the CDC when you said ” the orders”. Unfortunately I lost faith in the CDC early in the pandemic when they were adamant that masks were useless and recommended bandannas for workers begging for proper protective equipment. I think of their recommendations now as the minimum I should be doing.
I wear cloth masks for a socially distanced walk outside. I’ll only remove it if there are no other people around.
Otherwise if I go to the grocery store I wear a KN95 mask and glasses. If I could not acquire an KN95 then I would wear a surgical mask with a cloth mask over top and glasses. Here is a study about the effectiveness of surgical masks vs N95 mask for the prevention of flu transmission.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2749214 I realize that the study was not specific to Covid, but for the purposes of a trip to the store I am convinced that a surgical mask is much better than cloth alone. I believe that surgical masks have become easier to purchase. There are some Youtube videos that tell you how to tie them to achieve a fit that is closer to an N95. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TTg53aAP8Q I have not personally tried this, but someone else might find it useful.
The way that hospitals generally dealt with patients who had a diagnosis of a disease that was spread by airborne particles was to place them in a negative pressure isolation room. We simply don’t have enough of those rooms in most hospitals to handle the number of patients who need them right now. What needs to be done moving forward is that filtration and UV lights that can kill the virus will need to be installed in ALL of our hospitals and public buildings. And it wouldn’t hurt if we had windows that could be opened and screens were added as well.
I hope that you might find something useful in what I have shared. I look forward to more of your blog posts.
Leila says
No, I’m referring to the orders given by the governors or mayors — to wear cloth masks. Cloth or surgical masks are ineffective or actually harmful — the links I posted above back that statement up with studies.
I think the orders reflect the reality that the population is not going to be wearing N94s nor would that be desirable, as those also have negative effects when worn for a long time.
It’s not at all desirable for children to wear tightly fitting masks or any mask at all. They are not at risk and their risk to others is low. Even if it were not low (as in the case of flu and so on), rational people do not muzzle children to protect themselves! Instead, they practice good hygiene and keep those at risk at a safe distance — IF that is what they (for instance the elderly) want — but often that is NOT what they want. They want to be close to their loved ones and that is a valid choice.
Healthy people need to build their immune systems by being outside without masks so they can get sunshine, fresh air, and oxygen and yes, even be exposed to various germs and viruses. Those at risk can be sheltered. Otherwise, we just should go about our days and not worry — the numbers to watch are the positivity rates and the deaths in your region (keeping in mind that the stats are inflated for reasons I think we are all familiar with).
Christina A says
I haven’t had a chance to read the two links on anti-racism, but I did read Samuel Sey’s review of White Fragility on the Founders’ Ministries blog, which was shared in your Instagram stories. It reminded me of parts of the article discussed at our church’s men’s forum recently, The Strange Persistence of Guilt by Wilfred M. McClay from The Hedgehog Review, Spring 2017: https://hedgehogreview.com/issues/the-post-modern-self/articles/the-strange-persistence-of-guilt
Christina A says
Also, the Canon Calls podcast has a great interview with Samuel Sey about White Fragility: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/canon-calls/id1468028842?i=1000485589998