The Smugness of Organisation

I don't know about you, but I'm generally a pretty organised person.  Being organised keeps me from panic, so it is often also the antidote to my husband's spontaneous nature.  So this week I'm feeling very smug and self-satisfied about my level of organisation.

Over last weekend I made some banana and chocolate chip muffins.  The recipe is from one of my sisters-in-law but I'm not completely thrilled with it.  It's too sweet...and not just for my non-sugar-eating tastebuds.  Even Miss Sunshine said they were too sweet.  So I'm going to reduce the sugar and golden syrup and replace some of it with honey next time.  I think that'll work well.  They were in the freezer, until Miss Mischief took the last one for school this morning.  Sorry - no photo forthcoming on that front.

The photo above, however, is evidence of the other terribly organised things I've managed.  I made real chicken stock overnight on Saturday in the crockpot.  Some was used on Sunday, and another meal through the week.  The remainder has been frozen, as you can see.  Some in ice cube trays and some in larger blocks.  They'll all go into the labelled bag.  Every time I open it up to get some out I just know I'm going to feel good about that one!

The pale disc beside those blocks is pastry.  I love Maggie Beer's sour cream pastry for both sweet and savoury dishes.  It is just perfect and light and easily and quickly made in the food processor.  A couple of moments of wizzing in there and it's all done.  Given it requires 125ml of sour cream and the container has 250ml I tend to make a double batch and use all the sour cream.    Next time I need pastry I am but a footstep away from pulling it out of the freezer.

And finally, I am feeling relieved and excited that my final exam for the year is over and I have a blissful three or four weeks before I begin summer school.  I feel like it went OK.  Time will tell!  I have done my two exams at a school down in the suburbs with a couple of other fellow students.  It is always so very good to catch up with them and have a real-life, face-to-face chat.  It is far more relaxing to drive a half hour to the edge of the suburbs than to drive through traffic into the city!

Now...a four day weekend with no responsibilities to attend to other than relaxing!

....next month!

You know what?  Summer arrives next month.  All the warm days must have made my brain go into overdrive.

I'm still looking forward to a completed exam and a lovely long weekend.  Who wouldn't?

And Summer Arrives

I just realised that it is summer tomorrow!  We've had a couple of very summer-like days.  Temperatures into the 30's (86F+) but it will rain and cool down again tomorrow.  I think the most perfect beginning to summer must surely be mine this year.  A full six-day 'weekend'!  Along with my normal day off, I've had to take Friday off to do an exam and then Our School closes for Monday, before Melbourne Cup Day.

The days are looking bright indeed given that I've had confirmation that my first choice of school to undertake placement have agreed to let me go there next year.  I am very excited about the experience.

Autumn's final fling concludes with the strange advancement of Australians taking on the American celebration of halloween.  I put a sign on our front door this afternoon after being taken unawares by trick-or-treat characters.  We don't celebrate halloween.  There are a number of reasons, which I suspect would appear offensive to those for whom this is a part of their way of life.  Nevertheless, it's a personal choice and we are all very wary of the idea.  My sign was as friendly and direct as I could make it.  It reads:

Greetings
Our family does not celebrate halloween and thanks you for not disturbing us.
Enjoy your evening.

At last count I've escaped the opening of the front door to explain we don't do halloween about five times.  There will probably be more now that the dinner hour is over.  A few years back they were still going long after my then young children were sound asleep. 

So...a lot of study and then the blissful release of a completed exam before enjoying some very much longed-for time to just relax.  A wonderful beginning to summer.  I have a strange hankering for fish and chips at the beach.

Healing Food for the Sick

This week I've been craving things that I need for improved health.  Fresh air, for example, and fresh fruit.  I finally managed to have that longed-for pot of Chicken & Dumplings on Thursday evening.  A good homemade chicken soup is bolstering when your under the weather.

The other thing I've craved is salad-type foods.  The salad below was my lunch yesterday.  I'd bought a bag of avocados from Aldi a week or two ago and they are finally soft enough to eat.  So fancy salad leaves, cucumber, avocado and prawns.  Nothing more difficult than that.

 

Prawns are one of those things I tend to keep in the freezer.  My local Safeway has a 1kg bag for $16-18.  Now that might seem expensive, but if you're only using a handful at a time they really do go a long way.  I defrost them in the microwave and then toss them into a pan and they're cooked in the blink of an eye.  I did these ones cooked in some melted butter with a pinch here and there of dried thyme, cayenne pepper, cinnamon and lime juice. 

The other thing I have enjoyed while I've been unwell is hot water with a slice of lemon in it.  I just can't handle the idea of tea and the extra mucous caused by the milk.  So hot water it is, and the lemon has been very refreshing.

What I have not craved is sugary foods, beyond vitamin C laden fruits like oranges and blueberries.  In the past my throat has always felt far worse when I've eaten sweet foods so this time I was not even tempted.

All of this along with lots of sleep interspersed with some quality time with Nigella and I'm almost as good as new.  I think when you believe you can safely walk away from the tissue box without being terribly anxious you're just about there.

A Plodding Kind of Pace

I'm meant to be studying for an exam at the end of the next week, but I'm all stuffed up and my brain is too foggy.  I've been coming home from school and keeling over.  Today I slept between getting home and taking Mr Busy to church.  Yesterday I just sat and grunted at anyone who looked at me....and napped on and off most of the evening.

Yesterday's exhaustion was also, in part, due to an excursion to the Melbourne Aquarium.  My Year 1 student demonstrated his scientific prowess as he named almost all the different sharks they had there.  He met a few new types as well that weren't in his shark book - very exciting for the shark obsessed!

I have come up with a new food dilemma.  If you aim to only eat what makes you feel good, what happens when cooking what would make you feel good (old fashioned, homemade chicken soup) is well beyond your physical capabilities?  Fish and chips was all I could muster.  It was only us girls who needed dinner and no one was going to make me some soup.  It didn't make me feel good - I knew it wouldn't.  There should be somewhere you can get chicken soup when you're not well enough to make it!

Tomorrow, barring a miraculous recover, I am planning to stay home to study and nap alternately.  I would love to go and enjoy the Year 12's final day but I don't think I could gather the necessary energy to do so.

A New Relationship with Food

Photo credit: vitality4life.com

 

I think many of us have a somewhat unhelpful relationship with food in some way or another.  We have strange food rules and guilt over eating something we think we shouldn't.  Or like me, food that tastes delicious but will end up making you feel less than well.

My last download from Kindle's Top 100 Free list was "Why Quantum Physcicists Don't Get Fat" by Gregory Kuhn.  It's not a very long book and it contains its fair share of Oprah-style psycho-fluff over which I swished rather quickly.  But there were two little gems to be gleaned that I think will change the relationships we have with food.

The first of these nuggets was to only eat what makes you feel good.  Now I know that sugar does not make me feel good.  Nor does wheat.  And as I stood in my kitchen the other morning considering what I might have for breakfast I wondered "what would make me feel good?".  Whilst my favourite breakfast is raspberry jam on toast, at some point that would make me feel quite uncomfortable.  So I chose thinly sliced tomato on rye toast that had been lashed with real butter and sprinkled with ground salt and pepper.  It made me feel really good.  It's a question I ask each morning now.  This morning it was poached eggs on the afore described butter-lashed rye toast.

The second nugget was to reconsider the stories you tell yourself about food (and exercise).  The author suggests that you begin thinking carefully about rewording your stories so that they are positive....a bit of a "fake it til you make it" kind of approach.  He tells the story of his journey to loving fruit.  He didn't begin that way, but he began by eating one piece of fruit a day and telling himself that while he didn't enjoy it now he would eat it because he knew it was a healthy practice to engage in.  He went on to tell himself that perhaps tomorrow he would enjoy it better.  Eventually - about three months later - he was able to genuinely enjoy eating fruit.  I think that beats "I hate fruit, I'm only doing it because I know I should".  The positive story brings with it hope and a willingness to change.

 

It's a rather interesting take on how to think about food.  I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Gracious Simplicity

Photo credit: nigella.com

I spent much of the day on Thursday with a very special lady and her gorgeously perfect little boy. At one point I suggested that days at home with a happy little person was perhaps a calmer, more sane way to spend a day than my current busyness.  And it was.  It did me a great deal of good, not the least of which was because of a few hours with a precious friend.  

For lunch we enjoyed a quickly thrown-together Thai Chicken Noodle Soup.  It was absolutely delicious and something I think my family will enjoy - I will definitely be serving it to them!  The quick throw-together was by no means because of a lack of desire to put in some effort.  It was simply a beautiful meal that was quick and effortless, and which was permeated with the love with which a good friend cooks.

Unfortunately 3pm arrived all too soon and I had to leave to pick up my own children - a definite change of pace after a six month old!  I came home with the Nigella Feasts DVD.  Which means two things:

1. A few hours of viewing enjoyment - and I have the book so I will transfer some of that enjoyment to meal-time inspiration.
2. I'll need to see my friend again soon to return her DVD.  Not that I need an excuse!  But certainly it'll not be so many weeks next time!  

 Now....for some exam preparation.  I gave myself a few days of down time and now it's time to be a little bit serious to finish off the semester.

 

Thank you, A.  I had the most wonderful, serene day in the midst of all that happens here.  It was a pure joy and blessing to spend some time with you.