Monday, March 28, 2011

50 Things That Make Me Feel Normal

Carrying on the tradition of stealing ideas from other people, I give you this. Thanks to Patti at Still Breathing and her awesome writing for the inspiration, and with whom I cannot hope to keep up.

I should start by saying that the "normal" I define here is largely subjective and basically means I feel alright with myself and not like a huge blight on society when I'm in this "normal" state.  Not to be confused with what other people think of as normal - way too dull.  Make sense? Didn't think so.

HarrisLakeCoffee

1. Loving coffee

2. Walking/hiking out in nature

3. Having little birds eat out of my hand when on said walks

4. Breathing deeply in the woods and smelling the “greenness” of it all.

5. Hugging my kids

6. Being best friends with my soulmate husband guy

7. Chocolate

8. Smiling too much

9. Laughing, sometimes inappropriately and to myself

10. Talking to myself

11. Trying to help, even when there is nothing I can do

12. Being ridiculously optimistic

13. Listening

14. Volunteering my time

15. Medication to make me balanced

16. Accepting that I need this medication to be 100% myself and being alright with that.

17. Listening to all kinds of music.

18. Singing loudly in the car on a solo drive.

19. The first few hours of time to myself on a Monday when everyone has gone back to school and work

20. Getting lost in a good book.

21. Getting lost in a mediocre episode of “Amazing Race”

22. Getting lost on a drive but finding my way with my old fashioned map book.

23. Laughing with my mother on the phone about life

24. Being with my sister no matter what our moods are. We are close.

25. Being thankful.

26. That feeling I get when I’ve pushed myself to go to the gym and had a good workout.

27. Friends who take you how you are.

28. Friends who bring out the best in you.

29. Appreciating friends for who they are and how their differences make our lives rich.

30. Exploring city neighbourhoods and finding hidden gems in them

31. A really good sleep

32. A really good warm shower

33. Losing track of time on the weekends.

34. Playing with my cat

35. Watching a sappy chick-flick, happy ending and all

36. Appreciating silence

37. Baking something and eating it hot from the oven.

38. Accepting that these extra pounds are not coming off if I continue to do 32 and being somewhat OK with that.

39. Not stepping on the scale

40. Pretending to be confident.

41. Playing games with my kids.

42. Being done with playing games with the kids after 20 minutes and having enough of my Monopoly fill for the month.

43. Being a superhero to my kids

44. Taking pride in my children’s accomplishments – both typical and atypical ones.

45. Travelling and dreaming about travelling

46. Trying something new.

47. Taking comfort in old favourites

48. Making time to be creative and appreciating creativity in others

49. Writing for my own pleasure.

50. Gaining wisdom

Friday, March 18, 2011

KYKM–The March 2011 Edition

Yay! Shannon saves my blog-blocked day with her somewhat regular edition of Knowing You Knowing Me.  Do join in with comments or with official play and linky so that I know that someone reads this thing from time to time.  (My inner narcissist seems to be clambering for attention again.)

1. Do you consider yourself a foodie?

Well, not a big foodie but I really do like to eat good food.  That would be why my middle is expanding and I can’t say no to fresh baked goods or stuff with chocolate in it.  I am getting more particular though.  I’ll take dark chocolate over milk chocolate prefer to dine on meals that take longer than 10 minutes to make.  Does that count?  And I am taking my very first real cooking course in a month at Urban Element – both exciting and terrifying.  But they serve wine so I’m sure it will all work out.

2. Are you a spender or a saver?
Hmmm.  I’m not sure as I am not good at either.  Probably more of a spender but my guilt keeps me from spending oodles of money on myself.  I can buy tons of useless things for the kids, no problem.  I think I need to work on that.  Luckily my DH does a good job with the saving and anything requiring responsibility.  Otherwise my procrastinator ways would get me in deep doo-doo.

3. What was the last movie you saw?
Watched “Becoming Jane” last night with my mom.  ‘Twas rather P&P-ish – no surprise.  However, a lovely diversion and the sort of movie I don’t mind watching with my mom when she’s been visiting for several days and I have run out of sensible conversation.

4. What is the closest book to you?
Does the Cub Handbook count?  Being mom-of-the-year, I am working on making Owen earn another badge.  It is a lot of work for me having him in Cubs!  Reading Left Neglected for a book club which is the book on my bedside table, a little further away.

5. Do you celebrate St. Patrick's Day?

Sort of.  We aren’t Irish but it is tons of fun to wear green, drink a brew and sing Irish shanties.  We have somehow started a tradition of having the kids do a treasure hunt throughout the house and find clues to a “ pot of gold” – a black bag filled with chocolate coins and other dollar store crap.  Fun to watch the enthusiasm.  We ate green stuff (mostly veggies) last night and I bought little St. Paddy’s day cupcakes to amuse them. 

How about you?  What would you answer to these questions?  Do comment below.

Saturday, March 12, 2011

Chillin', Mickey Style

It's in the air. I can feel it somewhere around the corner. Spring! I am SO ready for it to arrive. And things are looking up, generally. DH will be home in less than a week. It is March break and there is no school to stress about. No one is sick or having a migraine or anything right now. And the upside to buckets of rain lately is that I see bare pavement and blades of grass under the snow forts outside. I am .... happy.

The big mood lifter was that happy commercial mouse. We scored FREE tickets to "Disney on Ice" for today. (This is thanks to the Sens Foundation who are tremendously supportive to community groups. Yet another reason to love our NHL team, rock bottom or not.) Not just any tickets - box suite tickets - complete with our own bathroom for goodness sake. I was as happy as the kids. Something about sinking into fantasy, childhood stuff that has nothing to do with the day to day.






Here are the kids and a friend in the sweet suite. I could get used to this.



Happy March break y'all!

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Feeling twisted

I seem to have forgotten how to write. No worries mate, I'll just tell you about a cooking experiment - twisty home made soft pretzels.
Steve is away for a too long business trip and I am craving comfort. Having lost a few pounds in my attempt at a health kick, I feel the need to put them back on immediately with comforting carbs. I haven't attempted pretzels before but I was strangely up for the challenge. Then serendipitously, Allison came by and bravely helped with the procedure. It's much more fun with company.
Got the recipe here and tweaked it a bit because I just can't follow instructions. Call me a rebel.
I included some whole wheat flour to make it "healthy" and baked it longer than they said. Here's what came out:


Not too shabby and they tasted pretty yummy. Laura helped with some of the shapes and then made up some kind of mystery dough with flour, water and cinnamon. Half the joy was in the making and it made a dreary day much more tolerable. I'm going to pull out the ole bread machine more often. It makes the house smell delicious!