Category Archives: Food

Spoiled

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It occurred to me yesterday, as I was baking muffins at 6:30 in the morning, that my children are exceedingly spoiled. I might go so far as to say that my husband is, as well. Of course, anyone who knows me would think that is probably a rich statement, coming from such a princess, but just because I am incredibly spoiled doesn’t preclude my family being so as well.

There is a difference, I think, in being spoiled and being a spoiled brat, and I will say that the latter is not the case. And, as one of my students said to me as I mentioned that my dog has become much more spoiled with age, that is on me. It’s true! It’s my fault. I don’t really think the kids are spoiled in terms of material things, not really, but they certainly are in terms of food. Hence, muffins at 6:30 in the morning, so that the kids will be able to have a delicious homemade snack when they get home from school.

Delicious homemade snacks and fresh fruit are my two must-have-at-all-time-items, which certainly explains why all my free time is spent grocery shopping and preparing food. I was just telling a friend that I have two refrigerators and one refrigerator-sized freezer, and all of those appliances are chock-full of food all the time. Doesn’t food go bad though? she asked, and no. Nothing goes bad in our house, ever, with the exception of the odd mini-cucumber. This is because we never go out to eat, and I make all our meals, and most things, from scratch.

Side note: whenever I say I make something from scratch, I think of my beloved late Grandma Fern, who used to say about cakes allegedly made from scratch, Scratch your ass and reach for the mix? Oh, Grandma. I was a little skeptical about Hedy’s spice cake at the church potluck too.

Anyway, I do make most things from scratch – no ass-scratching involved – and so now my family is so accustomed to homemade things that store-bought or restaurant items “taste weird.” This includes but is not limited to: ice cream, muffins, loaves, cookies, cakes, brownies, pasta sauce, and, strangely, hummus. It is a problem of my own making but sometimes I’d just like to buy a container of hummus from Costco without everyone wondering what’s wrong with this hummus, it tastes weird. 

ICE CREAM, you guys. A few years ago my husband bought me an ice cream maker, after we were at a dinner party at which the hostess served her own homemade ice cream. One thing led to another and now I have no fewer than three flavours of homemade ice cream in the freezer at any given time. And I don’t even eat ice cream! But I digress.

I am not one to talk, though, as I recently discovered my own “it tastes weird” scenario and that is store-bought cilantro. A few years ago, as a Valentine’s gift, my husband bought me my own indoor grow lights so I can grow HERBS NOT THAT KIND OF HERBS ACTUAL FOOD HERBS. I almost exclusively grow cilantro because a) it’s easy to grow and b) no one else in my house will eat cilantro, and I hated how quickly a bunch would go bad in my refrigerator. The only thing I will accept going bad is the single mini-cucumber every two weeks. So, for the past few years I’ve grown my own cilantro, loving how I can just easily harvest the exact amount I need when I need it.

Over the summer, though, we were out of town and so I took a cilantro-planting break. I didn’t feel I’d be around enough to give my little plants love, and also I am deathly afraid of fire and wouldn’t want to leave the grow lights on lest a cilantro plant weave its way into the fluorescent lights, dry out, and suddenly burst into flames, eventually leaving the house to be a smoking hole in the ground while we were off on vacation.

My two greatest fears in life are, in this order, my husband and/or children being diagnosed with a terminal illness, and fire. I cannot even contemplate having little scented candles in the house, I will never run the dryer if I’m going to step out of the house for even five minutes, and I look nervously at the allegedly harmless little tea lights that are lit in the yoga studio. What if someone knocks it over, and the whole studio goes up in flames? I think, extremely irrationally, given that the tea light would most likely just extinguish itself before such a scenario would ever happen. I even was anxious during Christmas Eve candlelight services, although that fear I think has much more basis. I mean, some of those little kids holding actual flames? What if one of them set my hair on fire? I would think, as a teenager. Given the fact that it was the eighties, and I went through a bottle of Salon Selectives a week, this was a pretty rational fear.

When I was a kid my maternal grandparents had a lamp that rotated, and when it was lit, it looked like a forest fire. A forest fire! God help me. No wonder I’m so crazy. I was obsessed with looking at the forest fire lamp, which probably explains a lot.

Anyway! Enough about fire. Back to the cilantro story. When we returned from vacation, I replanted some seeds, but in the interim, as I waited for them to sprout their little green deliciousness, I needed my favourite stir-fry garnish and so purchased a bunch from the local Co-Op.

People. I thought I had actually bought the wrong herb. It tasted…weird. Is this parsley? Or what? I thought, then looked at the little labeled twist tie. No. It’s cilantro. It tasted weird and off and I thought it must be the bunch. I threw it out – breaking my own rules – and bought another bunch at Superstore. I looked carefully – yes, it definitely is cilantro – and when I got it home it was the same thing. I have spoiled MYSELF for regular cilantro. After growing my own I cannot go back to conventionally grown cilantro. I can’t. I won’t. No wonder my kids look askance at bakery goods and regular ice cream. IT ALL TASTES WEIRD.

Nicole’s Favourite Things: The Thankful Edition (sort of)

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Yesterday I learned that it was National CB Radio Day – 10/4! That was a cheering discovery, and if I was a trucker in the 1970s, my handle would be Red Pepper.

Speaking of which, it’s funny; the song Personal Jesus by Depeche Mode, a song I listened to and enjoyed back in 1990 or so, has come on the radio every single time I have gotten into the car in the past week. Every single time. Is it enjoying a resurgence in popularity? I am sure I haven’t really heard it much at all since the early nineties, yet, here we are. Did all the radio stations suddenly collaborate to pull it out of obscurity? A few years ago I witnessed a similar phenomenon with I Just Came Back To Say Goodbye, which is a terrible song to have going in a loop in one’s head. It’s even worse than Your own. Personal. Jesus. Someone to hear your prayers. Someone who cares. over and over.

I have felt like I needed my own personal Jesus in the past few days, mostly because of this:

That was my backyard first thing Tuesday morning, and then about six hours later it looked like this:

I stopped measuring after we hit twelve inches, because I only have a foot-long ruler, and I didn’t think the measuring tape would work.

I’m not going to complain about the weather, I’m not going to complain about the weather, we can’t control the weather, we can only control our own reaction to the weather…I kept up with this mantra over and over, even while I wondered why I live in actual frozen hell. Complaining about the weather is very boring, not to mention depressing, and weather talk in general is only interesting to those directly affected, and so while I’m sure you would all be fascinated by my dog walk that featured snow-laden branches completely giving way and dumping snow all over me not once, not twice, but five times in a thirty-minute walk, and how I actually calculated the calories burned by shoveling snow that felt like it was 100 pounds per square foot, I will abstain. Sort of.

It’s almost Thanksgiving! This is as early as it can possibly be, and I really do want to take the time to be mindful and thankful, even while I am completely depressed about the fact that I live on Planet Hoth and all of my frozen plants are covered in snow and probably will be for the next nine months. That was not being mindful and thankful, Nicole.

Positive thoughts! Positive thoughts! Let’s segue into Nicole’s Favourite Things, shall we! I missed September, so will smoothly combine it with Thanksgiving which is, in my humble opinion, kind of a lame holiday. I dislike pie in general; pumpkin pie is particularly abhorrent to me. Even when I did eat meat, I never liked turkey dinner; as a plant-based person, it is now, how shall I put this, very un-fun. But it’s not all about the food, is it? Well, it kind of is. I do like the thought of being thankful for things, which is something we should do every day, and Thanksgiving gives us a good reason to remember all those things for which we are thankful. So, here we go!

Nicole’s Favourite Things, the Thanksgiving Edition

Leaves

I’m sure glad I took this photo last week, because those same shrubs are now sagging under the weight of the snow. Sorry! I can’t seem to stop complaining. But they are pretty, aren’t they?

Boy, those leaves are going to be a bitch to rake up. Moving on! Positive thoughts!

Apples

I know all of you people are all about the Honeycrisp, but for me, there is only one kind of apple, and that is the McIntosh. Have I mentioned this already? Yes, I have. Many times. But Macs are so good, they are the perfect texture and the perfect tartness and the perfect taste. My older son was begging, literally BEGGING me to make an apple pie, and although I consider it to be an abomination, and a grievous waste of the perfect fruit, I bought a few extra apples specifically to make pie.

I am not gifted in the “making baked goods look pretty” department, so this is as good as it gets, in terms of pie crust. I read the shortening box, and one suggestion was to roll out the crust between two pieces of waxed paper and WHY HAVEN’T I BEEN DOING THIS SINCE THE BEGINNING? What a game changer. I highly recommend it; it makes it so much easier to roll and to transfer into the pie plate, and it is so much less messy than cleaning up flour that gets scattered everywhere since the dough keeps sticking to everything.

By the way, do you like my apron? My parents brought it back for me from their recent trip to Scotland. My youngest niece calls aprons “cooker capes” and forever that is how I will think of them.

Pears

As much as I love apples, I love pears a teensy bit more. Their season is so short that our whole family ends up bingeing on pears for the few weeks that they are really good. I have been buying them in six-pound bags; the first one contained pears of all the same greenness, so they all ripened at exactly the same time. We were a family of pear bingers for a few days; the next bag I bought had a few that were almost-ripe, so things have smoothed out around here, pear-eating-wise.

Inhale Smoothies, Exhale Love

After my one-year shopping challenge finished, I wasn’t actually going to buy much of anything; I really do have a lot of clothes. But I saw this tank and I could not resist:

It’s like it was made for me! I do both of those things! I had to have it and it makes me happy every time I wear it.

This Sweater

One of the nice things – I guess? – about living on Planet Hoth is that I have a number of gorgeous, warm sweaters. This one I bought right after my shopping challenge ended – it was on clearance for TWELVE DOLLARS, PEOPLE. I love the way it looks! But it is NOT the most practical item, as the sleeves droop into everything while cooking or washing dishes or doing any of those household tasks that seem to take up a large percentage of my life.

Barkley is wondering what is UP with those sleeves.

Happy Thanksgiving, my friends. I hope you have many things to be thankful for this weekend. xo

Let them eat really pretty cake

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In case you were waiting on the edge of your seat, yes, I did survive the seven-hour-ten-teen-boys birthday party on Saturday. More than that, it was probably the lowest-maintenance and most-enjoyable birthday party ever given in my house. Literally all I did was provide food; the boys entertained themselves very easily. What they did I do not know exactly; there was some trampolining, there was some extremely loud noise-making, there was a LOT of eating. At one point it was so quiet I was a bit concerned, but when I peeked downstairs they were all busily playing a card game, which was very unexpected. The sole downside was that all the adults who came to pick up, and I myself, were kept up way past our bedtimes, and we all looked like zombies at 11 pm.

However, a great time was had by all and the cake I had made turned out really nicely:

The birthday boy decorated it with Rolos just in case there wasn’t enough sugar in the caramel frosting and drizzle.

I recently purchased new, somewhat pricey, 9 inch round cake pans to replace the lowest-cost-possible-off-brand 8 inch ones I bought about twenty years ago. The latter are shallow little things that would result in very strange looking layer cakes. Twenty years of strange-looking layer cakes, people, and let me tell you, these new pans are amazing! I am reminded yet again that one gets what one pays for, particularly when it comes to kitchenware. Saturday morning I took the pans out of the oven and marvelled at the absolutely perfect layers. I forced everyone to come into the kitchen and admire them. Why didn’t I buy these pans before? I asked rhetorically, to which all three guys answered in unison, Because you’re cheap!

Well. Cheap is a harsh word; I’ve always been loathe to replace something that is Working Perfectly Well, even though Working Perfectly Well does not equal Working Optimally, as we all know. May I remind you of the life-changing effects of finally, after many, many years, obtaining a really good garlic press, vegetable peeler, and spatula? After Kondo-ing the house and my life I have been especially cognizant about bringing excess Stuff into the house. We don’t need more STUFF! I will say sternly to anyone who will listen. I think of this as virtuous but as you can see, it can also be construed as a character flaw that can only end in sub-optimal food preparation and results.

The econometrician in me desperately wants to do a cost-benefit analysis of this phenomenon, including the economic term “utility.”

This week has been busy with yoga teaching and grocery shopping, my dual loves. I am not even saying that ironically, I love yoga teaching and, in a very different way, I love grocery shopping. Mostly. I was at Costco and was shocked, absolutely shocked, at the state of the parking lot. I know what you’re thinking! Nicole, we have really heard enough about errant Costco carts and how people who don’t return them are the Worst People In The World. Well, surprise! I wasn’t going to talk about carts, although yes, those people are the Worst People In The World and I fervently wish Bad Costco Karma on them all; Bad Costco Karma consisting mostly of Long Lineups, Blocked Aisles, and The Discontinuation Of That One Product You Came To Costco For.

Moving on, it wasn’t the cart situation that shocked me yesterday; for one thing, I’m becoming deadened to it, for another, there were many errant carts but the situation wasn’t as bad as it often is. No, what was shocking was the multiple lineups of cars trying to access the gas station. Apparently the gas station is going through some refurbishment, although I am unclear as to what this entails. Perhaps there are fewer pumps available? I don’t know, all I know is that there were bumper-to-bumper lineups in all possible directions, all ending at the gas station. I am not exaggerating when I say there must have been fifty cars lined up to get gas. It looked like a photograph from the gasoline shortages of the 1970s, but with fewer Oldsmobiles.

Why would anyone spend thirty minutes of pure aggravation, idling their cars and eating up the very energy that one seeks at a gas station? Well, according to a lady I chatted with in the parking lot, the price of gasoline was a solid ten cents lower than anywhere else in the city. Ten cents is a pretty good savings, but when we do the math, it works out to – on average, assuming that everyone’s tank is about the same as mine – a $5 or $6 difference. Now, I am a frugal person, although you might not be able to tell from my extensive Lululemon wardrobe. I regularly price compare and calculate per-unit costs of household goods, I shop at different stores for different deals and I am absolutely obsessed with collecting and redeeming PC Optimum points. I KEEP SUB-OPTIMAL CAKE PANS FOR TWENTY YEARS BECAUSE I DO NOT WANT TO SPEND $20 TO REPLACE THEM. I tell you this: there is no way that I would undergo such an endeavour to save $5 or $6. Hey, I’m not judging! Maybe it’s worthwhile to the fifty cars idling away, blocking the parking lot exits. But, as I nosily peered at the people in the cars, they all looked as agitated and irritated as one might imagine.

Speaking of cars, I was driving to the yoga studio behind a car with a vanity license plate. The plate read “NIX TOY” which I took to mean, Nick’s Toy. Now, when you think of a car that would be construed as a Toy, what do you imagine? I think of a hot-looking sporty convertible or perhaps a refurbished muscle car. Something shiny and fast, in a sexy colour like red. What I don’t generally picture is a white four-door Buick sedan, which this car was.

Well, I will withhold judgement on that one. Maybe the owner went from a minivan like mine to a sedan, which might seem Toy-Like in comparison. Who is to say, really. At the moment I feel like my new cake pans have effectively changed my life for the better; perhaps a sedan revolutionized Nick’s life too.

It’s Apple Season! And Snowman Season!

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Ah, fall. The season of colourful leaves, crisp air, apples, and this:

Snow!

Well, to look on the bright side, it’s just a dusting.

I feel like the world is divided into two kinds of people: those who love and embrace summer with all their hearts and souls, and those who do not. People in the latter category, please enjoy your season for the next 8-9 months, and meanwhile, I will be busy putting on legwarmers, scarves, and other layers for eternity. It seems like a very unfair distribution, but what can you do? Complain to the management? Because I don’t feel God will suddenly decide to make Calgary a climate of beauty, just because I complain.

I might complain just a little though, as tomorrow a certain young man is turning thirteen, and there will be a total of ten teen boys in my house for SEVEN HOURS. Why or how this was arranged I do not know, but I was counting on a few hours of let’s go play war with Nerf guns at the playground and so the forecast is, shall we say, disappointing. I am sure none of the parents will judge me for indulging in a glass of wine or two whilst the Festivities Are In Full Swing. My non-drinking husband will be there in case someone loses an eye to a Nerf bullet or, more likely, falls into a sugar coma from the requested Chocolate Layer Cake With Caramel Frosting And Rolos On Top. I think I fell into a sugar coma just writing that. To counterbalance, I have a lot of vegetables to make a veggie plate, to go along with the pizza, star-shaped frosted sugar cookies, and three giant “family-sized” bags of chips. If there’s one thing I know about teen boys, it’s that they are a hungry people.

Now that I have two of them, if anyone needs me, I’ll be grocery shopping. Again.

The happy news about grocery shopping – and about fall in general – is that it is officially Apple Season! Apples are, in my humble opinion, the very best thing about fall, followed closely by pretty leaves and the return of thick black sweaters and tall black boots. I am pretty particular about the type of apples I eat; I am strongly Team Macintosh. We are all, as I tell my children and yoga students constantly, different, and I’m sure that many of you will disagree, but I firmly stand by my opinion that Macs are the Superior Apple. They are the perfect flavour and texture, and I essentially binge eat Macintosh apples the second they hit the produce aisle until they are no longer available. I also like the Scottish name; it is as if the Macs and I are namaste-ing each other in a Scottish way. The Scottish way to namaste is probably Aye Lassie It’s A Broad Bricht Moonlit Nicht Tonich or something similar.

Again, we are all different and the world is a rich tapestry and variety is the spice of life, but when I get excited about Apple Season and someone becomes similarly excited about apple pie, my response is this:

I will not judge you, you lovers of apple pie and apple sauce and apple crisps and other mushy abominations, but I will never understand you. This is the same way I feel when I hear of people making jams and muffins with fresh fruit and berries. Such things are so precious to me that I would never do anything but eat them raw. Muffins and jams, in this house, will always be made with frozen fruit, and I stand by that decision, at least while I live in this godforsaken snowy hellhole.

Oh! But I wasn’t going to complain! Perhaps I shall just go eat an apple and finish frosting all the cookies, and dream about warmer climates instead. Have a wonderful weekend, everyone! Please spare a thought for me tomorrow night. xo

One Thousand

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Can I Get A Witness

I can hardly believe this, but this is – get ready for it – my ONE THOUSANDTH POST. One thousand posts. Can I get a medal or something for this? Very few people old-school blog anymore, but I am glad to have this diary of my life over the past – get ready for it – DECADE. Of course, I could have just kept a regular diary, but what would have been the fun in that? It’s nice to have a witness to this everyday life. Can I get a witness?

The Winner, In A Landslide

As I’ve mentioned before, I often think of the Soundtrack of My Life; it occurred to me the other day that there are songs that are inextricably associated with other people, in my mind. For example, my friend Hannah (HI HANNAH) is linked forever and always with Some Kind of Wonderful, and so now that I have asked if I could get a witness, I will be a) singing that all day, and b) thinking of her. For fun I asked Facebook friends what song reminded them of ME and it was a very interesting experiment. A friend who knew me way back in elementary school mentioned Corey Hart (HI MELISSA), a friend from high school reminded me that we always sang Hello City when we were together in chemistry class (HI TRACY), a friend from university mentioned Total Eclipse of the Heart, the Old School version (HI ALICE), and there was a nice mix of interesting music from friends made in the past decade (HI EVERYBODY). The most common song, however, was Landslide, which is both unsurprising and apt, given this time of year.

This Is Me In Grade Nine

My BFF, who I met in grade nine, (HI TARA) said what reminded her of me was Light My Fire, stemming from that period in which I was obsessed – OBSESSED – with The Doors, and also wearing all-black-all-the-time. Well, my interest in listening to The Doors has certainly diminished to zero, but my all-black fashion statement largely remains.

This is me in grade nine, baby. Yes, my love of black and also excessive jewelry has remained, nearly thirty years after the fact.

Speaking of which, I have had This Is Me In Grade Nine stuck in my head for days – DAYS – because the start of school has ushered in a new era: my oldest is, indeed, in grade nine. I am assuming the same will be true next year at this time as my youngest will be there as well. Usually I have Back To School, Back To School, To Prove To My Dad That I’m No Fool from Billy Madison stuck in my head for days; this is preferable. I got a red leather tie and a pair of rugger pants, I put them on and I went to the high school dance.

This is further proof that my brain is needlessly filled with song lyrics and if I could just channel that brain power I could probably work for NASA.

Dogpression

Barkley knows what packed backpacks in the kitchen means, and he does not like it. Now that we are four days in, he has come to weary acceptance, so long as he can come along for school drop-off.

Winter Games

I have been using the silent house and also the free time before my new registered classes start next week to get a few menial, tedious, and annoying jobs done. These include but are not limited to calling the cable company to order a new remote, necessitating me looking up serial numbers and account numbers and clearing up last name confusion, registering myself and my husband to vote in the upcoming provincial election so as to not have to wait for an enumerator, and calling a certain government agency to ensure an issue that was not caused by anyone in this household but instead someone who we actually paid for their services and still makes me irritated to think about it has been cleared up. (Spoiler: it hasn’t!). Yesterday I was on hold for what seemed like an eternity, only to be redirected a few times before getting the correct person for the job, who ended up completely unable to help anyway. The interesting part of this story, at least to me, was that while I was on hold, the theme from the Calgary 88 Olympics was played. Two things: a) that really took me back in time, and b) is it just me or does that seem like a strange choice of music? The rest of the music was pretty neutral elevator-Kenny G-type music, and then wham! Bah bah bah bah bah bah bah bah bah BAH BAH!

It’s Just Like New Year

September feels like a much milder form of January, doesn’t it? Everyone with their fresh starts and getting back to the gym and making crazy school lunches with bento boxes? I personally have a couple of resolutions for September and on, and one of them is to not use my phone when the boys get home after school. I instituted a “no screens” rule for myself and the boys, although it has since been amended to “no screens until homework, physical exercise, and something creative has been done.” For me, though, it’s no phone at all, unless someone texts or emails me. It’s really helping me be more present, which is an ongoing goal of mine, and also allows me more time to read and play the piano. In fact, it’s given me so much more time that I feel a twinge of shame about my (former) phone habits.

Only 1255 Pages To Go

I have had A Suitable Boy on hold from the library for some time, thanks to a recommendation from my friend Mary-Lynn (HI MARY-LYNN). Imagine my surprise when I went to the library to pick it up and discovered that it is almost 1500 pages long. Hoo boy. I have been keeping a spreadsheet of all my books read, in an attempt to be more like my bibliophile friend Allison (HI ALLISON), and so far this year I have averaged one book every 3.5 days. This is going to mess me up big-time. To add fuel to the reading fire, two more of my holds came in yesterday, so if anyone needs me, I’ll be over there, reading. I know, I know, it’s the journey, not the destination, but I like my current book-to-day average.

I Love Your Pictures

A few months ago, someone had posted on Facebook about how sick they were of seeing photos of other people’s kids, and no one cared, and just keep those photos to yourselves, you terrible attention whores. I’m paraphrasing, but only slightly. Then a friend told me that someone told HER that seeing back-to-school photos was the worst, and if your kids weren’t in kindergarten, then nobody cares. You terrible attention whores.

I am taking this opportunity – this One Thousandth Post opportunity – to say that I CARE. I love seeing all your photos, of your kids, of your pets, of your fancy drinks, of your houses, of your vacations. I love your selfies, your outfits-of-the-day, your bikini shots, your workout shots, your nature shots, I LOVE IT ALL. I want to see MORE updates about your lives, not less. What else are we on social media for? Outraged political updates? I think we have enough of those. After all, look how well all those political posts pre-US-election turned out.

I mean, I even love seeing photos of what you had for dinner, so long as it’s not already digested. Which brings me to this travesty:

You Know How I Feel About This Emoticon

People, this is a bridge too far. TOO FAR.

Nicole’s Favourite Things: July Is The Best Edition

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It has been another glorious summer week; summers are so short in this city that I feel like I need to soak up every moment outside. Hence, the writing of this at 6:30 am on a Saturday morning. I realized that I started this blog in 2008 which is a decade of having a whole lot to say about not a whole lot. My friend Lynn (HI LYNN) thought that maybe us “old-school mom bloggers” should now morph into “perimenopause bloggers” which, maybe we should. Speaking of EMOTIONS, the other morning I was practicing yoga and a girl rolled out her mat beside me. She had a shirt that said “When It’s Dark Look For Stars” and I got teary-eyed. Getting emotional over a tank top is probably one of those Change of Life things that no one talks about, UNTIL NOW.

And speaking of tank tops, only ten more days until my goddamn shopping challenge is done. Then I shall buy all the emotional tank tops I want. August 1st, lululemon sees a spike in sales like never before, analysts cannot explain it. It all seemed to come out of the Calgary area.

Truthfully though, I was in the mall yesterday to choose a hostess gift, and the tea store is just down from lululemon, and I am not made of stone. I thought I would browse the store and just make a mental shopping list for The Big Day. Reader, there was nothing I wanted to buy. Either the shopping challenge has fundamentally changed me or all the current styles and colours are unappealing, or both. I was gravely disappointed. I felt like Rip van Winkle but with clothes, like the whole world has moved on to crop tops and tucking things in and I just am not prepared for that right now.

Also, why so many things with an exposed back? As I said summer is brief here, and I will enjoy this six weeks of feeling warm but come August, I will be layering up again. I do not want my back exposed; in a similar vein, I also never embraced the cold shoulder look. I am already cold enough, thank you.

This post has taken a turn for the negative; let’s get back to the point which was…

Nicole’s Favourite Things: July Is The Best Edition

Sirius XM Radio

There is a pattern in my marriage, and it goes like this: my husband has an idea of something he wants to buy for me/ our family/ our house, and I resist it with all my might. We do not NEED that, I will say. This conversation, such as it is, will go on for any length of time; weeks to years of back-and-forth. Finally my husband will break down and buy it/ install it and I will end up loving it so much so that I cannot imagine life without it. Repeat, ad infinitum. The single time that I myself had to convince my husband that we needed to buy something was when we purchased the trampoline.

I am a dream to be married to, believe me.

A small list of the items that have been purchased in this way are: Roomba, my stand mixer, my super-fancy dehydrator, the juicer, the Vitamix, my Yamaha piano, the elliptical machine, and Sonos. We have had Sonos, with Sirius XM Radio in the house for years, and my husband also has it in his car for his commute to work. I have steadfastly refused the installation of Sirius in my minivan, although mine is the vehicle that we take on long road trips, meaning that once we lose local radio stations, we end up listening to the same mix CD’s over and over. Some of those mix CD’s were made years ago and there is only so much of Gangnam Style one can listen to on one road trip. Finally my husband put Sirius in my car and people, I cannot ever go back to regular radio. I can listen to 70s soft rock without hearing commercials for Grey Power Insurance or Nurse Next Door or even My Pillow Dot Com. I already bought the damn pillow.

There’s also a Yacht Rock station, and the 80s on 8 frequently plays “on this day in 198x” countdowns. When I was driving to pick up the kids from my parents’ place, I was delayed by a big accident, and listening to the top songs of July 1986 made everything better. I had my own little karaoke party with The Greatest Love of All.

Breville Food Processor

I don’t know how long I’ve had my old Cuisinart food processor – since 2011 maybe? Or 2010? I don’t know. All I know is one day I was going to pulse some tomatoes into my guacamole and instead of pulsing the processor just kept going. It wouldn’t turn off until I unplugged it. I still used it like that for a while, plugging it in when I needed to process something, but it felt weird and dangerous. I thought I would just get another Cuisinart but my husband – who used to get Consumer Reports back in the day – had been researching it and thought I might like to try a Breville.

Oh, baby.

It was like all those years I was driving a Ford Focus, and now I have a Maserati.

It processes much better – the Cuisinart always left little chunks where the blade didn’t touch the bottom – and it is also so easy to clean! The Cuisinart had a rubber seal and lots of little crevices that were impossible to keep clean, which felt a little gross. This is my new bae. I’d make out with it if it wouldn’t slice my face to a pulp.

These Old Jeans

Thanks to Facebook memories, this photo popped up in my feed the other day.

It was from exactly ten years ago, and you might be thinking awww, what cute little guys. I am thinking that too, but I’m also thinking, hey, I’m wearing those jeans right now. Yes, these old jeans are at least a decade old – I don’t know when I bought them – and I’m still wearing them. Now that I’m looking at that photo, I realize that I still have and wear those shoes.

My god, August 1 cannot come soon enough. Although, it is a testament to how I buy things that last. No one could say that I’m a “disposable fashion” kind of girl, that’s for sure.

Dog Calendar

My mom gave me a Labradoodle calendar for Christmas, and every month features an absolutely adorable dog. Not as adorable as this one, mind you:

Look at that FACE. WHO’S A GOOD DOGGY. WHO’S THE BEST DOGGY.

But the month of July features this dog:

It puts me in mind of a 1980s glamour shot. It makes me smile every time I see it, which is good because…

Neutrogena Rapid Repair

This photo of me was taken exactly forty years ago:

I love it so much, not just because of my great fashion, but because I so clearly am thinking I will pet this sheep but I will not enjoy it and you cannot make me. My friend Janet (HI JANET) mentioned that I still make this face, which explains a lot regarding my perpetual Bitchy Resting Face. No wonder I have such an epic case of BRF, I have been working on it my whole life.

Several months ago I posted about my favourite Growing Old Gracefully things, and one of those things was Neutrogena Rapid Repair Night Cream. My friend Liv (HI LIV) mentioned that she uses the one that is SPF 30 and meant for day use. Liv has perfect skin so I thought I would try it as well, and people, my skin has never looked better. It is truly amazing. I still, of course, have BRF – no amount of retinol is going to reverse 43 years worth of that face. Nothing, short of massive plastic surgery, is going to do that. But it’s a fantastic cream and I highly recommend it. I also recommend looking at glamour dog shots frequently to keep smiling, keep shining.

That’s also my favourite sunscreen, for the six weeks of high UV index that we get per summer.

So that’s that. What are you loving this July, tell me everything. xo

We’re all going to die

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Every morning when I drive home from my yoga practice, I see a sign that would be a balm for weary travelers. Travelodge: Your Room Is Waiting For You. What a nice slogan! Alas, it is meaningless, since the motel was demolished months ago, and now the sign advertises for an empty lot. It feels like there is some kind of symbolism there but I just cannot seem to make the leap.

Today I heard that the house featured on The Brady Bunch is up for sale in Los Angeles, and also that it is “one of the most photographed homes in America, with 30-50 visitors every day.” I guess we all have different interests, and the world is a rich tapestry, but still, that number surprises me. I am surprised that anyone at all visits it, but I must remind myself not to be close-minded. After all, I am a person who has a strong desire to see the Jungle Room at Graceland, and also the stained-glass peacocks.

Also, I do not think I have seen even one episode of The Brady Bunch.

We have been having such a beautiful summer, with great weather and lots of sunshine. I was writing down the date for one of my class sign-ins, and I had a small crisis when I realized that July was more than half over. The days are long but the years are short is something people say when you are home with little kids, but now it just seems like life moves pretty fast, if you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it. (Thank you Ferris Bueller).

Speaking of life moving fast, I just finished reading this book:

This is a very silly title. We all have 100% chance of death; P=1. WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE.

Semantics, yes. But of course, the book isn’t about living eternally, or even Yoda-like, it’s about using nutrition to assist in the staving-off of premature-death-causing diseases. It is a very interesting book and written in a fairly compelling way, and for some of us who have been following plant-based diets for years, it’s a bit like preaching to the choir. I will say this though: the alarmist use of non-statistics is my least favourite part of the book, and that makes up a large part of this book. It’s quite misleading, and I say this even as a person who is plant-based. Statements like studies show that even one serving of egg per week can increase your chance of x disease by 30% are very misleading if you do not tell the reader what the original chance of x disease is. For example, if your current risk of, say, kidney cancer is 2%, and you increase your chance by 30%, then your new risk is 2.6%. Maybe it is the econometrician in me, but that kind of statement makes me crazy. Most people, I am sorry to say, do not have a particularly good understanding of statistics, and this kind of writing does not help. AND I AM SOMEONE WHO AGREES WITH THE WHOLE PREMISE OF THE BOOK.

The premise is decent, and I think that no matter if you eat an egg serving a week or not, we could all stand to increase our intake of fruits and vegetables, plant-based proteins, and flaxseed. My god, the author of this book is obsessed with flaxseed – that, and turmeric – so much so that you might wonder if he was being paid by Big Flaxseed. Or Big Turmeric. Well, I like and consume both of those things, so I guess I’m okay.

We go through a lot of fruit and vegetables in this house. I love vegetables and I have a big appetite for them; I personally can eat an entire head-and-a-half of roasted cauliflower at one sitting, and I do this weekly. I have been known to consume a full head of kale at a time, and once when I was preparing Sunday dinner my husband came into the kitchen and stared at me.

Mr: Nicole, no. NO. This is insane. No one can eat that much asparagus!

Me: Hold my purse.

All of which is to say that I eat a lot of produce personally, and so does the rest of my family. However, even for me reading the recommendations for the “Daily Dozen” was overwhelming. Like, I just don’t think I can fit all those things into my life. How much flaxseed can one person eat?

Well, as I said, it’s a good premise and eating more whole foods, fruits, and veggies are better than eating highly processed things of dubious nutritional value, if you can. It reminded me that I wanted to tell you about my favourite green smoothie, which is a really good way to get more leafy greens into your diet, if that’s something of interest.

Nicole’s Favourite Green Smoothie

I have one of these every single day, except when I am out of town and have no access to a blender. I usually have this at lunch, but I think most people would enjoy it more as a breakfast food. I, however, tend to have very little time for lunch, so this fits the bill. I use eight cups of spinach for this recipe, but I don’t recommend anyone new to green smoothies starting with that. Maybe start with ONE cup, then work your way up.

Someone once said to me, in a very unkind way, that they do not enjoy smoothies because they are not infants and prefer to chew their food. Hey, I like chewing food just fine. However, I usually have 10-15 minutes to eat lunch, and I just don’t think I could eat 8 cups of spinach in that amount of time. Plus, I LIKE this smoothie. I can chew food at the two other meals in a day. My jaw is not atrophying, believe me.

Anyway, here is the recipe!

8 cups baby spinach (this is a lot of spinach! I’m like Popeye. Start small and work your way up, or you will be completely grossed out.)

1 cup almond milk

2 tablespoons almond butter

1 frozen banana

a whole lot of cinnamon

The ingredients! Do NOT give me a hard time about the tetra-pak almond milk. Maybe when I have a lot more time in my life, I will make my own almond milk, but today is not that day. Note the red moose in the background – my older son made that in Industrial Arts class. It poops out gumballs! Although we have no gumballs so this is theoretical.

I’m strong to the finish ’cause I eats me spinach, I’m Popeye the Sailor Man.

Almond butter = food of the gods.

Mmmm. Liquified spinach. So, first blend the spinach with the almond milk and butter. THEN add the banana and cinnamon. Trust me on this. GET THE SPINACH BLENDED FIRST OR ALL WILL BE ASHES. I keep bananas individually frozen for this purpose, and I always break the banana into pieces before freezing. You don’t want to not do this, unless you want a blender tragedy, or even just unblended chunks of banana.

I have no idea how much cinnamon I add. I just shake it on until the top of the liquid is all covered, thickly. I like a lot of cinnamon. Hey, it’s anti-inflammatory!

This may not look appealing to you but it’s making me hungry.

So there you go! Even though every day we are one day nearer to dying, and I am on that slow journey to death just like everyone else, I swear that these green smoothies make me more energetic and healthy. Are you also a green smoothie lover? If you try this, let me know, I’m DYING to know what you think. Dying. Ha! xo