This morning, my weekly newsletter was a bit later than I had intended as I apparently needed an extra long walkabout in my nearby parks.
My life is such that during the spring and summer, I do not get as much time outside as other folk might, and the fall brings me renewed freedom to get out and enjoy the parks and pathways near my home.
I live in the heart of the city, maybe the right ventricle for folks who consider centre town to be the “heart – I’ll give them the left ventricle. The Byward Market/ Lowertown area is full of character and a mix of old and new housing, families that have lived here for generations, gardens that are overrun with weeds and gardens that are tended with love and artistic beauty. And parks. and the Rideau River, as well as the connection to the Ottawa River, where water cascades over a small waterfall.
I grew up in a small town and I find this area of Ottawa to replicate that experience. There is a comfort in living here. I know many of our long-time neighbours, and we see many transitory folks as they come through for the school year, and if they are “trouble”, they don’t stay for long. “Trouble” is defined as requiring phone calls to 911 – otherwise, they might party bit here and there, but in general, keep to themselves.
Back to the greenspaces – What blessings they are. We have our own park less than 2 blocks away, and it connects to 3 other parks with either fairly clear pathways or a little bit of “city walking” over a coupe of bridges. The sound of leaves rustling, while the sunlight is glistening on the water, that kind of thing just refreshes the soul.
And I know there are many other areas in Ottawa that have similar blessings, so thank you, City of Ottawa/ NCC – keep our greenspaces alive for us, as they are a much needed balm for the stress and wackiness of life.
Category Archives: Personal time
Analogies from a counsellor…#personaltime
Many people I know, myself included, are engaged in a journey of trying to improve our mental health. Anxiety has become a more prominent adventure in my world over the past 3 years or so, with side benefits of panic attacks, moments of lethargy and awareness of aging and hormonal changes and realizations that I write run-on sentences.
Thankfully, after the 3rd annual physical where I asked my doctor about how to deal with these feelings of anxiety that were manifesting into physical reactions < heart pounding, every molecule in my body tingling, and other experiences> she finally stopped telling me to “Go for a run.” and let me know that the clinic I belong to offers a limited number of free counselling sessions.
“Would talking about it help?”
Uh, yes… that’s why I keep talking about it with you when I come in here..
“Did you know we offer free counselling?”
NO, you never told me that.
” Would you like me to set that up?’
YEESSS … <*FFS!*, my brain emits loudly into the silence >
So. The poor counsellor.
She’s a very quiet woman, who is trying to figure out how to get me to understand what I am doing to myself and why I have to stop.
I’m going to the sessions because I want help, so I am trying to help her figure this shit out so that she can give me some guidance.
And this week she tried 3 analogies, of which the first one was totally blown out of the water by my programming.
“If you had an employee, would you make them work straight through without taking a break?”
Well.. that depends. If we are on a deadline for a client and have to get the work done, yes. I might get them pizza, but I’ve been there and worked 24 hours x multiple days a few times over the years. You do what you have to to meet the deadline and get things done.
She looks at me.
Sigh.
“Okay, then maybe you need to look at this like a marathon… You cannot keep running at full pace the whole time and expect to finish. Maybe the reward is to finish…”
A light went on, I added, in my head, ah, ok – without collapsing and vomiting…
Please note: I’ve never run more than a block or two, so I do not actually know from personal experience how hard a marathon is, but I can live vicariously through others and have seen the good and bad results of folks running marathons. Those who finish after pacing themselves, pushing when they need to, but keeping 
themselves hydrated and taking care as they go, those folks may still collapse at the end, but the results seem much more positive than the ones lying in pain on the side of the course having pushed too hard.
” And maybe, think about stoplights. when things are green, you can good to keep going. When things turn yellow, you need to consider slowing down. and if you don’t slow down enough, if you run through those red lights, there’s a chance you’ll get hurt.” < I’m paraphrasing, but this is pretty much what I got from her.>
Okay – I can work with that too. Slowing down before I run a red light and crash, that kind of makes sense…
And reading…and researching… and keeping it together when I have to, and stepping back and retreating before I crash – that’s in the works.
One of the books she suggested I get, has a section that talks about how much downtime we all should be taking:
1 hour per day
1 day per week
1 week every 3 months
and there might be more, but my brain stopped at 1 week every 3 months – who can afford to do that? With bills to pay and client deadlines to meet, how can anyone take that much time off??
And yes, my hubby and I take 3 weeks in August every year, so I guess that’s almost the same, but we schedule for it for months, making sure our clients know and our work is up to date and done as needed. And yet, the thought of scheduling in a week off every 3 months through the rest of the year, that’s a hard one.
So, I picked the 1 day off a week as my goal. I call it my “Zero-People Day”. For me, that means: no clients, no social engagements, internet only if I “feel” like it, but no business replies, fun/ creative/silly stuff only. And I try to take time with the family that day, but big commitments are off the table.
And I felt guilty.
and I felt like it was wrong. Wait…what?
Why do I not deserve a day off? What’s that about? Ah, well, this is why I’m getting help. So I started to look forward to my zeropeopleday with growing personal permission to do what I needed to do that day, for me. Yes, work was still there and waiting, but it will always be there, so I just needed to manage my time when I was in work mode to allow myself that break and reduce those negative feelings.
And then the universe chose to test me – as it always does…
For 3 weeks I had to give up my Zero People Day to work. Crisis deadlines and this being my busy season, all call into play extenuating circumstances and there it went. I still had a day off here and there, but those days off were filled with social commitments and other pre-booked events that were fun, but I still had to be “on”.
I reclaimed it on Thursday July 2nd and was amazed at how I had returned to feeling guilty and awkward and undeserving again – after only 3 weeks of being in crisis mode!
WTF.
So… obviously, I have some issues.
We all do, I’m not the only one, and on a scale, if I was comparing my problems to others I know, my problems are pretty low. I am relatively healthy physically, and have many good people around me that are very supportive – and I try to avoid burdening folks with this stuff, but I thought it was time to talk about it a little bit – maybe the stuff I’ve been told will help others.
Other things my counsellor has suggested:
http://selfcompassion.org – treating ourselves as we would treat a friend < uh, that one did not resonate as well for me as it could have>
http://www.mindfulselfcompassion.org/meditations_downloads.php – this one I am still working through the downloads…
So, there it is. I’m still having days where I need to step back and take time to cocoon < yesterday after work was one of those>. And I know there are more changes ahead as I approach/ enter into a new age of my physical development as a woman. But I’ve been angry for years so I’m not sure how different some aspects of it will be… we’ll see.
Anyway – back to your regularly scheduled programming now:
Vegan meringues
Father’s Day 2015.
A brief moment in conversation has the Sis-in-law erupting into a raving review of chickpea whipped cream.
Seriously raving. lunatic even…sorry JKL, I think your eyes were glowing slightly…
But today, I am making a slow cooker casserole and using a can of mixed beans – see photos – and decided to give it a try.
The first place I checked out was via Pinterest and Chocolatecoveredkatie.com as a starting point.
Again a bit of raving there too… but ya know…foodies… 🙂
She had made a reference to people baking the mixture into meringues, so I thought, “Hey, that sounds good.”…hmm…talking to myself…yeah…
I had to check on baking time and temperature, so I checked out Alittleinsanity.com as it seemed like a good way of maintaining continuity.
And yes, lovely vegan meringues pictured there are super inspiring. I don’t have silpat mats for my cookie sheets and I cannot be bothered to set up the piping bag and decorative tubes I do have, so spooning it onto paper bag cookies sheet liners works for me.
So… the concept:
Drain the liquid from your can of beans into your mixing bowl and start mixing on high and whip/ beat until you get stiff peaks like you would with egg whites.
This stiffness comes after about 10 minutes.
Add sweetener to taste. I started with about 2 tablespoons of brown sugar and added another tablespoon of honey for the white ones.
I then added 2 tablespoons of cocoa and 1/2 tsp vanilla for the brown ones. They are still baking, I am afraid to look – but I will and will add that photo later.
At this point, you can stop and just use this whipped frothy wackiness as a topping for whatever you want. Strawberries, cake, your spoon, your fave person – whatever…
Or you can dollop them out and bake them to make crunchy little bits of yum.
Yeah… the insanity is pervasive.
Freakin’ canned chick pea juice has a use!
UPDATE: don’t try baking the mixture once you add cocoa. It totally lost it’s shape and was not salvageable. So just use it as whipped topping if you add flavourings. No pics – too horrible for you to witness…
Getting into the greenery…only a little tho
So I don’t know much about plants. I grew up in a house where eventually we lost the use of the dining room because of the amount of house plants mom had.
My dad had a garden and compost bin out back as well, growing lots of stuff but Swiss chard was the notable plant- he loved it.
So here I am, in my middling years, with enough knowledge to have kept a spider plant alive for a decade or do and a few other indoorsy plants ish.
Bring on the new abode… and the shifting of the universe that emptied out 3 out of 6 units, including the folks who sort of took care of the common areas.
I had already been shovelling the front walk all winter as the “superintendent” never seemed to arise before noon and certainly never picked up the shovel even to do a second round during the day.
We also had brought our own mower from the old place as we did take care of the common areas there.
So here we are again. We’ve taken on the care of the common areas and I’m feeling like progress can happen.
This time, the front already had established flowery beds and the back yard had some basic work done by the previous tenants ( I think I have Kitty to thank for that).
My caveats: I know nothin about plants, except :
- perennials mean plant once and if they live, you are all set.
- ….uh, yeah. That’s all I know. Well, and water them if the rain is not doing it’s job.
Today I was able to get the 2nd gift of greenery donated to my cause of maintaining my sanity as well as creating a nice space.
Gailene got me started a couple of weeks ago- those pics are somewhere and the plants seem to be still alive!
Thanks muchly to everyone who has offered and to Gailene and Andrea who have been able to provide the experimental flora for me to explore this ancient art.
Now I have to go clean my nails!
Sweet soya beans- cooking again!
Today takes me to our monthly gathering of crafty ladies- and sometimes non crafty but simply socializing ladies…and sometimes “lady” is more ironic than accurate for this group…I digress.
soya beans. I have a small amount raining of dried soya beans from a bulk purchase a few years ago- and yes- dried beans are great.
I soaked and cooked up a small batch last week and decided today they would be my contribution to our potluck.
The recipe:
1 cup dry soya beans, soak them and cook them- I used my slow cooker overnight.
1/3 cup molasses
2 tablespoons honey
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp cinnamom
1/4 tsp coriander ( I ran out- add more if you like)
Melt/mix this in a skillet and add the drained beans.
Chop a small apple and toss it in.
Cook over medium heat and stir until the apple melts into the sauce.
Enjoy
When conforming to a dress code is the polite thing to do….
So.
Yeah.
The last time I was “encouraged” to opt into a dress code, it was for a Charity Ping Pong tournament where they asked us to wear “tennis whites”. So I wore this:
Surprisingly, I did not win the costume contest, but since I lost to a couple dressed as Cleopatra and Ceasar who had a lot more skin showing than me, it was ok. And yes, I played Pingpong in this outfit and won almost every game, until I got tired of playing and switched to my left hand for the final game and lost by one point.
🙂
And today, I’ll be attending a friend’s baby shower and the dress code is once again white. Now, white is lovely. I design, make and alter wedding dresses. So yeah, I know white.
But I am messy, I have a dog, and I know I get white clothing dirty very quickly, so I don’t invest in it.
But what I did invest in last year was a pile of men’s XXL white t-shirts for a summer sewing course I taught to young girls and I had some left over. SO this morning, I made this.
They have also suggested that we accessorize with turquoise, purple and brown. I’ll pull out some purple sneakers, and a turquoise necklace, and hope that I don’t spill anything chocolate on my dress.
Have an awesome day!
ReBlog of Another Contentedly childless woman's post…
This pretty much sums it up, my difference is once the kids hit 13, I want to experiment with them! And I am fortunate to have siblings with offspring so there have been a few teens and beyond to test theories upon !
You’ll have to read her entire post – which is long – so ya know, only if you have the time/ care 🙂
Celebration of a fabulous guy – WTL
Hubby’s Birthday fell on a weekend this year so we took one day for us and one day with friends. Here’s the card I created for him:
And here’s the Black Forest Dump Cake:
And here’s the cake on a plate with the freshly whipped cream:
Really, this post is about the cake. Dump cake – who knew?!?
There were a few small variations I chose to do to Rachel’s recipe – go directly to her site for the fudge sauce recipe and replace the regular sugar with brown sugar.:
BLACK FOREST DUMP CAKE
yield: 12 SERVINGS 20 if you are frugal
prep time: 10 MINUTES
cook time: 1 HOUR
total time: 1 HOUR, 10 MINUTES
prep time: 10 MINUTES
cook time: 1 HOUR
total time: 1 HOUR, 10 MINUTES
This black forest dump cake recipe is full of cherries and chocolate — just like it should be. But it is unbelievably easy to make.
INGREDIENTS:
- two 21 ounce cans of cherry pie filling < I instead used 1 can plus 1 bag of defrosted frozen cherries – worked great! >
- one 16.5 ounce box Devil’s Food Cake Mix, unprepared
- 3/4 cup unsalted butter (1 and 1/2 sticks), melted < I instead sliced it thinly and placed it evenly across the top of the dry cake mix>
- one 12.8 ounce jar of prepared hot fudge, warmed slightly according to directions on jar < I followed her recipe and make it from scratch – super easy! >
DIRECTIONS:
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Spread both cans of cherry pie filling evenly into the bottom of a 9×13 cake pan.
- Top the cherry pie filling with the Devil’s Food Cake Mix (unprepared). Smooth it out slightly to make sure it is even.
- Drizzle melted butter on top of cake mix. Pour hot fudge over as evenly as possible.
- Bake for 1 hour and serve warm topped with ice cream or whipped cream.
Baking and cleaning and being all domestic!
As 2015 is bringing me to examine how I do thing and what changes I need to make
to improve my daily existence, it also is helping me spiral around to previous paths that added benefit to my world.
I love food, baking, cooking and I tend to use recipes as a base for a concept and go from there.
As I am trying to set aside more time for the things I love that are not work related, I really enjoyed taking time yesterday after seeing clients to do some baking.
The ginger apple upside down cake recipe I followed pretty closely, ( Here is the link: http://smittenkitchen.com/blog/2009/11/gingerbread-apple-upside-down-cake/ or you can find it in the posts here: Facebook.com/bellywood ) skipping the honey, used whole wheat flour and yogurt with water instead of buttermilk.
The eggs- pretty simple but I mixed the yokes with mustard, a bit of apple balsamic vinegar and lime oil instead of mayo.
And the Oatmeal butterscotch chocolate chip squares were a total creative journey.
2 cups of oats
1/4 cup margarine
1/2 cup brown sugar
¼ cup molasses
1tsp vanilla
2 eggs
about ½ cup dark chocolate chips
Mix it all up really well and bake for about 25 minutes at 325.
Hoping the ladies enjoy these as much as I enjoyed making them!
The cleaning in the title refers to some clothing swap items leaving home today too – yay!
Celebrating 17 years, a moment between shenanigans…
Yesterday was our wedding anniversary.
17 years ago, on a beautiful February morning, a small group of our friends and family joined us outside to help us celebrate the moment:
And this morning, I’m up early as usual and my hubby sleeps < our system works great for a pair of self employed people>, and I can take a moment to be grateful for his existence.
It is hard to believe it has been 17 years, while at the same time, it has always felt like we’ve know each other forever. We have our ups and downs like everyone.
We have a LOT of respect for each other and that basis in friendship carries us through the moment of WTF?!?
And this little one is our second fur baby, Sprocket.
Boing was our first and she helped shape all of our future decisions about our growth as a family. 3 days into having a dog, and we knew we were going to shelf our ideas of having homeschooled children that would take over the world for us. We would instead stick with a four-legged creature that would infiltrate the hearts and minds of all around us and keep them in her thrall.
And ADOPT- DON’T SHOP of course! Our fave rescue is the Minpinerie, but there are a lot of great places!
We are a couple who values the contribution that parents/breeders make to our world and enjoy borrowing our nieces and nephews when possible . And so long as we can live in our illusion of being the cool but elusive Aunt and Uncle, that works for us. If we cross over into the Strange aunt and uncle, that’s ok too!
And as long as The Next Generation has been replenished with both Vibert and Leroux genes – thanks to our siblings who have taken this on – it’s all good!
So, I could ramble on about how wonderful married life is, and bore you all to tears.
Make choices that work for you – be it a single you or a collective you.
And remember…an’ it harm none, do what thou wilt.
Oh and always try to eat Black forest cake and drink wine to celebrate your anniversary – traditions are important!
