Category Archives: Pandemic At The Disco

Friluftsliv Fashion; Forty-Six Weeks In

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Last Monday was Robbie Burns’ Day, and the entire day passed unnoticed by me. It wasn’t until Tuesday that I realized I had missed the day entirely; I usually take a few minutes to watch this video and listen to some Rod Stewart, but this year, alas. Nothing. What kind of partial Scotswoman am I? What’s next, am I going to stop saving tiny useless pieces of soap by attempting to mold them onto the larger bar of soap where they will fall off constantly until my husband, frustrated, throws them out, much to my consternation? Am I going to stop banging the shampoo bottle to get out that last ounce, probably wasting water in the process? Will I stop squeezing out every last millilitre of toothpaste and face primer? Am I going to stop cursing the designers of nail polish for their useless little brushes that preclude using the last quarter of a bottle?

Never.

Some of this could be pandemic-, “what day is it-” related, some could be exam break related, but I am putting some of the blame on my father – not for the nail polish, as far as I know he had nothing to do with that – but for my blowing past Robbie Burns Day. He usually sends me a text, sometimes even with a cryptic “some hae meat and cannae eat” line, but he did not this year. What the heck, Dad? In a pandemic I need all the reminders as to what day it is that I can get.

Saving tiny pieces of soap and other fairly useless frugalities aside, I have been focusing lately not so much on my Scottish heritage, but on the Norwegian part. Specifically, as I have mentioned before, Friluftsliv. As of today I’m on a 302-day movement streak, and I am spending, on average, 90 minutes a day outside. It has not been hard, really, because this January has been, by Calgary standards, mild. We usually have at least a few days, if not weeks, of temperatures in the minus 20s and below, and here we are in FEBRUARY ALREADY and that has not happened. Most days have been around the freezing mark, plus or minus five degrees, but the last week has seen a small blast of winter, and by “small,” I mean in the minus teens. Minus 16 isn’t “my face has actually frozen with exposure to the air” temperatures, but it’s pretty cold nonetheless.

I channeled my Norwegian side, not with a sudden craving for lefse or lutefisck, god, no, never, but with Friluftsliv.

Yes, those are snow pants. Yes, my coat requires its own postal code. Yes, I have a toque underneath my hood, and this entire outfit is meant to obliviate any idea of outdoor fashion. Dress for the weather you have, not the weather you want, people. I am happy to tell you that ninety minutes in this very saucy outfit, and I was as snug and as warm as can be. It made me think of all those hours I spent freezing at the playground, when I could have been wearing snow pants. No wonder kids can spend hours outside in the cold while adults freeze, it is because they are dressed for the weather. Why did I dress my children so well and me…not? Well, no time to spend on regrets, let’s look forward, not back, and meanwhile I will be wearing my snow pants until this cold front has passed.

Hilariously, I’ve been following some new blogs by women who are in their fifties, and they write about fashion and beauty for women of a certain age. For a while I found it aspirational. Now, though, I think I’ve passed right out of “aspirational” and into “we are on different planets.” As I was donning my giant outfit, I thought of their latest “California girl” post wherein they were dressed for the weather in a long sweater, scarf, and cropped pants. What must that be like. At the moment I can’t remember what grass looks like.

Outfit of the Week

Ooh, I love this week’s outfit! It’s a teaching outfit with added layers for the hours I’m NOT teaching. It’s a Monday outfit; Mondays I teach zoom yoga at the community centre – by myself – and that community centre is COLD.

Black tank with grey polka dots, grey long sleeved tee, and, best of all, LEGWARMERS. The legwarmers are essential for that freezing cold space.

Cute, soft black sweater for warmth when not teaching.

Pandemic Reading

The title is a bit misleading but this is a very interesting read on how our society vilifies certain foods and how “professionals” make tons of money on “studies” about our diet. The key takeaway is “There’s a colossal problem with focusing on one macronutrient, and with ‘everything you’ve heard up to now is wrong’ message.” Interesting if you’re into that sort of thing.

The author does talk about how celiac disease was first discovered, and the treatment for it was a diet of bananas and milk. Celiac children immediately thrived from this diet – because it obviously contains no gluten – which sparked a whole movement for bananas. The first of the “superfoods” I suppose. The author believes that people who cut out gluten, without having a medical diagnosis to do so, delegitimize the enormous health issue for people who are actually celiac. I don’t know what I think about that. It’s a very valid point but I think there is also a benefit to more widespread information. I remember when a friend’s mom was diagnosed – she’d suffered her whole life – back in the nineties, when essentially no one had ever really heard of celiac disease. For her, eating out was extremely difficult at that time because no one understood the severity of celiac or how to manage it. Now, we are so much more aware and there are so many different products, so I’m not sure if the gluten-free craze was all bad, as it would ultimately give celiac people options. When I first went plant-based, many years ago, eating out wasn’t always easy. I’ll have a club sandwich but without the cheese and meat, hold the mayo. I’ll have the chicken pasta without the chicken. But now there are vegetarian and vegan options everywhere, thanks to a brief period when such diets were in vogue. The takeaway from the book is to eat how you like, and not to buy into “studies” as the “studies” are not science.

In my lifetime I can remember the following: low-calorie, low-cholesterol, low-fat, high-protein, low-carb, no-carb, gluten-free, low-sugar, no-sugar, high fat. What’s next? I agree with the author, eat for joy and pleasure and personal health, whatever diet brings you those things.

This was the most creative and original book I’ve read! I loved it! If you had infinite chances to live your life, would you get it all perfect? How can decisions change your destiny? It’s like a choose your own adventure book on steroids. A must-read, especially if you have interest in World War Two.

This empowering and enlightening book resonated so strongly with me; at times I literally gasped and had to stare off into the distance for a while. I wish I’d read this when I was a younger woman. I think this is an important read, for all women but especially those of my generation who were brought up to have it all, but without thoughts to the cost.

Barkley and I wish you a wonderful first week of February, friends! xo

Nicole’s Favourite Things: The Covid Hair, Don’t Care Edition

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This is me in January 2020:

And this is me January 2021:

So apparently the key to growing out your hair is to STOP CUTTING YOUR HAIR. I’ll be here all week if anyone else is looking for brilliant pieces of advice.

I did like the fluffy, bouncy part of having shorter hair, but honestly that length was such a pain when it came to putting it up in a bun. You may be asking yourself if “putting it up in a bun” is a necessary thing to do, and the answer is yes.

Back in the pre-Covid world, when I would teach a yoga class, I would briefly demonstrate a posture and then I would walk around the room, weaving myself between mats, observing my students carefully, giving verbal cues and feedback and, depending on the particular student, gentle physical adjustments. Imagine! Walking close to a person, talking without a mask, TOUCHING another person. It’s like that happened in another dimension in time.

Obviously that is not possible now; zoom yoga is very different. For one thing, teaching online means that I need to DO the actual practice WITH the students, which took some getting used to. Talking while going through sun salutations or holding postures when my head is below my heart, like downward dog, wasn’t easy at the start, and the last thing I need is hair in my eyes and face while trying to talk and hold postures. What this means is that my hair is in a bun most days.

There are literally hundreds of “how-to” videos to put hair in a bun, and it seems like all of them work really well for someone with longer and/ or thicker hair than I have. Perhaps in January 2022 I will be able to work with them.

I want to share with you how I put my shoulder-length, somehow-still-layered-even-though-I’ve-been-trying-to-grow-it-out-for-over-two-years-now hair in a bun, and some of my favourite hair products that can be bought in the grocery or drugstore, no extra stop necessary. It’s the…

Nicole’s Favourite Things: The Covid Hair, Don’t Care Edition

Biotin Supplements

A…while back (possibly two years ago, time has lost all meaning) someone recommended Hair, Skin, and Nails biotin supplements, and I have been using them daily ever since. I will tell you this, my hair has grown faster, it falls out and breaks much less, and it feels thicker. There are many different brands, but this is the one I use as it is available in inexpensive big jars at Costco.

Bonus shot of my nut butters. It’s getting nutty around here.

Garnier Colour

The downside of taking biotin and having rapid hair growth is, of course, the root situation.

This is me two and a half weeks post-colour! Well, one cannot complain about roots when one is taking biotin for rapid hair growth. Also, yes, that IS a scrunchy in my bun, what of it.

Since the pandemic, I have had my hair professionally coloured only once, and you know what, I actually like it better when I do it myself. It’s not just the massive economic savings, it’s also the time saving. A professional colour takes an entire afternoon, and I have to carefully schedule my weeks around it. Now I can just colour when I get tired of seeing my roots, and from the time I open the bottle to the time I get in the shower to rinse the colour out, it takes about 40 minutes. 40 minutes! I can actually colour my hair before anyone else gets out of bed in the morning.

I have been buying Garnier, but that is just because when the pandemic started that was the box I found that most matched my colour. I’m sure any other brand would be just fine too.

Pantene and Cake

I used to be a stickler for fancy hairsprays that were exclusively available from the salon, but you know, I’ve been using drugstore brands for a while and they are just fine. I really like Pantene’s heat primer for pre-blow drying, and the texturizing hairspray for holding things in place but not being sticky or crunchy. The Cake product is new to me, but I bought it in Superstore, so I assume it is widely available. I spritz it in my hair before curling and it works great – with a caveat that it is very, very scented. If you are sensitive to scents (scentsitive?) I would give it a pass. It smells exactly like a lemon cake, but chemical.

I should add that post-styling the Cake spray makes my hair smell very faintly of lemon and vanilla; it’s quite pleasant if you can get past the initial blast.

The Bun Methodology: The Truncated Ponytail

This is one way I put my hair up into a bun; it takes a total of five minutes.

Here I am with unwashed, dry hair. I wash my hair every 2-3 days, and I find it’s much easier to put up when it’s not freshly washed. I mean, I DO put it up when it’s freshly washed, but it takes slightly more time.

Pull it up into a high ponytail, but on the last loop of the elastic, don’t pull the ends through. You can see my ends sticking out here.

Tighten the ponytail and pull it a little higher onto the crown of the head; the ends are still tucked under.

Take bobby pins and start pinning the rounded edges of the ponytail down to make a ballerina bun shape. Pull some of the rounded edges to the front. Pin all the way around as much as needed – I usually use around six pins for this, and I use a hand mirror to see what it looks like from the side and back. Sometimes – as in the car shot above – I put a scrunchy around it but only when I’m feeling fancy.

Spritz with a little hairspray, and that’s it!

The Bun Methodology: The Ponytail Twist

This method is one I just started using recently; I think you need a bit more length to pull it off without it looking like a strange little topknot.

This is me with actual freshly washed hair; it’s a good hair day but also a teaching day, so up you go, hair.

Pull it up in a very high ponytail, channel your inner Valley Girl.

Twist the ponytail once only, and then wrap the twisted ponytail around the base of the ponytail. Secure with a second hair elastic. Make weird faces whilst doing this.

Once it’s secured, start pulling it out of the topknot a bit to add fullness, and secure the bun shape with bobby pins.

If I feel like getting fancy, I pull a few tendrils out around my face, spritz the whole thing with hairspray, and voila! A bun.

There you have it: Nicole’s Covid Hair. Easy, inexpensive, and the great thing about putting my hair in a bun is that it always looks like I put effort into my hair, even if a) I didn’t wash it and b) the “effort” is only a few minutes out of my day.

So tell me…how has your hair changed with the pandemic? Have you grown it out, have you changed the way you wear it, have you tried new things? Tell me everything. xo

Brought To You By The Letter I; Forty-Five Weeks In

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One of the most wonderful things about the world is that we are all so different; the world is a rich tapestry; as my grandma used to say, it takes all kinds of people to make a world. And yet, in many ways we are all the SAME; we all want to live our best lives, to be the best versions of ourselves, and to experience joy, happiness, and health. But it’s our differences, I think, that are so interesting.

For example, there are people who, when they open a box of Girl Guide sandwich cookies, prefer the vanilla to the chocolate. When I say prefer, I mean they actually eat all the vanilla cookies before eating the chocolate ones, if they eat the chocolate at all. I know! And there are some people who prefer the sandwich cookies – either kind – to the mint chocolate wafer ones. I cannot pretend to understand such people, but I respect their choices. I mean, if we are sharing a box of Girl Guide cookies, I am more than happy if you choose the vanilla and leave me the chocolate.

I once knew a woman who had incredibly strong opinions on every small thing you can imagine, and those opinions – generally negative, she was and probably still is a wretchedly unhappy person – manifested in judgement of other people. Women over age 21 with long hair were pathetically trying to recapture their youth, anyone who grooved to Billie Jean was a pedophile by association, thong underwear was for prostitutes and anyone who wore such items was suspect, kale was for people who were pretentious and snobbish, as no one could ever possibly really like it. You can imagine her opinion of me. She even thought labradoodles in general, and my dog in particular, were stupid. Barkley! Say what you will about my underwear, but Barkley Boy is off limits.

I haven’t spoken with her – obviously – for many years, but whenever I feel a nugget of judgement about someone or something manifest itself in my brain, I remind me that I do not want to be that person and I try to see things from that person’s point of view. It mostly works. Plus, have you ever noticed that when you secretly judge something or someone, it ALWAYS comes back to bite you? Never say “I would NEVER do X” because inevitably it will happen. It’s like someone I know who smugly told me, many years ago when I was going through the agonies of potty training with my son, that her daughter was fully potty trained, day and night, by 18 months and all I had to do was put my son in underwear and it would happen. It was superior parenting that made the difference and I, frankly, was not doing my job properly. Then her second child refused to use the potty and was still having accidents at age 5. That’s karma at work. I mean, I think that kid must be a teen by now so I’m sure he’s gotten over that hurdle but still. I try to keep an open mind and consider there might be mitigating circumstances that affect every one of us in different ways.

On that note, I have started a “Strength for Runners” online program; I am on a hiatus from running at the moment, and I really miss it. I am just not a Winter Runner; I don’t like running in below-zero temperatures, I am a very early morning person and I do not want to run in the dark even if it wasn’t below zero, and I am really, really scared of slipping on the ice and snow. Even when the gym reopens I am not sure when I will feel ready to face it, and in the meantime, I have no access to a treadmill. I do have an elliptical trainer and a Peloton bike, so I can keep my cardio strength up, but I thought I should try this strength training so that when I do get back to running, I don’t injure my knees or my old-lady hips.

I know many of you love strength training, like my friend Twyla (HI TWYLA) but I…do not. I love cardio; I love being sweaty and that heart-pounding, lung-aching feeling of a good workout. But strength training? No. However, this program is ten minutes per session and I can make myself do anything for ten minutes, including listening to a detailed conversation about the WWE Royal Rumble and how it is a real highlight of January, not to mention the year.

The first ten minute session was incredibly underwhelming, OR SO I THOUGHT. This is ridiculous, I thought as I lunged and “curtsied” and planked my way through ten minutes. This is doing NOTHING. I can’t feel a thing. It’s completely ineffective. Who would ever find this helpful? I silently judged the whole program and everything in it until the next morning when I got out of bed and discovered that my butt was on fire.

Judgement! It literally bit me in the butt.

Consider me humbled. Suffice it to say that I haven’t missed a session yet. Who knows, maybe I’ll end up with buns of steel, like one of those videos from the nineties. At the very least, I’m hoping to start running again and be injury-free.

Outfit of the Week

This week’s OOTW is – appropriately enough – workout wear! Normally only my lucky family sees me makeup-free, in workout clothes, but I love this outfit so much I wanted to share it with you. First, I have had those pants for at least ten years and they still look great. The woman mentioned above also thought that lululemon is overpriced garbage, but the longevity of their clothes can really not be beat.

When I get up in the morning, it’s COLD in the house. I spend a bit of time reading, writing, and drinking coffee and so I need a little layer before I start exercising. I love this crop sweater; it makes me feel very Flashdance. I would never wear it for its intended midriff-baring purpose, but I like it as a layer.

When I do my yoga practice, it’s still pretty chilly in the house so I like to have a t-shirt on over my yoga tank. I bought this tee in 2013 for the Blissdom blogging conference, and you can see it here with a photo of my dear, dear friends Hannah and Allison (HI HANNAH HI ALLISON).

By the time I do my cardio I strip down to my tank top. This red tank is probably nine or ten years old; my friend Sharyl has – and still wears – the exact same one (HI SHARYL).

By the by, I have to share with you my workout playlist from earlier this week:

I think we all can agree Spotify shuffle just does not work. I have hundreds of songs on multiple playlists, and I always hear the same dozen or so over and over. My older son showed me how to arrange the songs alphabetically, which is a very fun way to listen to music. Note: it does NOT work for Christmas music, unless you want to hear eight different versions of Baby, It’s Cold Outside one after the other. Anyway, this playlist is brought to you by the letter I, with special appearances from Johnny Come Home and Jump. Incidentally, I think “Brought To You By The Letter I” would be a great name for a personal blog.

Thoughts and prayers for my family, who have to hear me singing loudly with my earbuds in. JOHNNY. WE’RE SORRY. WON’T YOU COME ON HOME. The only thing worse is when I listen to the Hamilton soundtrack.

Pandemic Reading

Bear with me for a moment when I say that this was a really good book and also the premise is a 16-year-old girl who runs away to live “off the grid” with her high school English teacher. I know. I know. Things, as you may imagine, go disastrously, because what kind of man runs away to live off the grid with a 16-year-old girl? But there is a very excellent story in here and also a theme about sisters and family. It’s set in 1969, with a backdrop of hippies, the Vietnam war, and the Manson murders.

I really like Malcolm Gladwell – this isn’t my FAVOURITE of his, but it’s very good. He is always so smart and nuanced, and this book about assumptions and strangers is excellent with, as always, a very very VERY wide range of examples.

Three generations of women, one wedding dress…but the current bride doesn’t want to wear it! Oh no! This is what I’d call a Hallmark Movie Book: light, silly, full of twists and turns and emotions. A nice winter weekend read.

Happy last week of January, everyone! Stay warm and cozy! xo

Johnny, You’re A Cream Puff; Forty-Four Weeks In

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Last week, after a month – or was it six weeks? There was the winter break in there somewhere – of at-home learning, the boys were back to actual, honest-to-god, in-person school. Only for four days though; Thursday – THURSDAY – was a day off for “virtual grade nine tours.” My neighbour, whose three daughters went to the same high school years ago, quite reasonably asked why, if the tours were virtual, did it matter if the kids were in school or not. An excellent question and one that I myself had wondered about. My sons told me that it was because the teachers were busy with this virtual tour, and if you want a weird feeling week, give the kids a Thursday off and then full classes on Friday.

This week they have finals, and their finals are on alternating days, and only in the mornings, and then for a couple of days last week we were told that they have to go to class in the afternoons, but now those afternoon classes are optional tutorials only but not all classes and not all days, and I have honestly no idea what’s going on. I am actually looking forward to the last week of January, when the diploma exams take place and neither of them need to be anywhere. I never thought I would look forward to having a week of the kids uselessly at home in January, but here we are. At least they will be available to bring in the groceries.

Also this week personal services – hair salons, etc. – are reopening for one-on-one appointments, and after the backlog clears a bit I am hoping the boys go in to get their hair cut. Neither of them have been since late September, and things are getting a bit desperate around here. We have full-on mullets happening. My younger son, whose hair is quite wavy, is faring better than his brother, whose hair is perfectly straight and falls right into his face. He has taken to wearing a bandana on his forehead to keep the hair out of his eyes and he looks exactly like Johnny from The Karate Kid, but brunette and with glasses.

Speaking of glasses, my younger son came home from school on Wednesday without his, explaining that he caught a dodge ball in the face and the glasses broke. One thing I’ve learned about parenting teenage boys is that sometimes questions are best to remain unasked.

Anyway, he cannot be without his glasses, particularly going into finals, and although my son suggested that he could just tape the frame back together, or maybe use Gorilla Glue, I phoned our optometrist and spoke with the loveliest woman who found the exact same frames, and then told me to come by and she would pop the lenses into the new frames. We close at five, but are open tomorrow at nine, she said, as I looked at the clock. 4:21. I barely let her finish her sentence before hanging up the phone, zipping out of the house, almost getting stuck in the huge piles of rutted snow in the back alley, making it to the office at 4:36 LIKE A BOSS.

It felt a bit like some kind of illicit drug deal, as the door was locked, and the very lovely assistant opened it a crack. “Nicole?” she asked, and then quickly re-locked the door once I was inside. We were both masked but I handed her the glasses with my arm stretched out as far as possible to put enough distance between ourselves to be, as they say, safe. The whole thing took about five minutes but I was riding on adrenaline for a while, and ended up going to bed even earlier than normal.

I’m generally exhausted on Wednesdays anyway since that is Designated Grocery Day. Since the most recent lockdown, grocery stores are only allowed 15% of fire code capacity, and while last spring I was perfectly willing to line up outside, January – even this lovely mild January – is a different story. My new Wednesday Routine is to get up even earlier than normal to do my yoga practice and cardio workout, shower, clean the bathroom and breakfast, all before leaving the house at 7:45 to get to Superstore just as it opens. My husband has suggested that some, if not all, of those things could be easily done AFTER shopping but no. NO. I need to feel like I have some kind of control over my day and so I’d rather sleep 20 minutes less than move any part of my usual morning to a different part of the day. Plus, after grocery shopping I like to have some Recovery Time, where I drink a relaxing cup of herbal tea and stare into space for a while.

Outfit of the Week

This week’s OOTW is a Tuesday Outfit; on Tuesdays I teach zoom seniors’ yoga, and for that demographic I like to have a tee over my usual yoga tank and pants. This is one of my favourite combinations: the tee is loose and flowy but short enough to show the grey tank, and the cardigan I wear for the t-1 hour that I am not teaching is made of the softest wool you can even imagine. IT IS SO SOFT, YOU GUYS.

Pandemic Reading

I had a couple of days after finishing my library stack before others started coming in, so I grabbed a couple of books from my own shelves.

“Are you reading something by that guy again?” my husband asked me as I shook with laughter in my reading chair. Oh, marriage. He was referring, of course, to David Sedaris, who is probably the funniest and wittiest writer of all time. His essays make me cry with laughter and then, break my heart, as when he discusses his mother’s inoperable cancer or his own sexuality. As I was reading this, it occurred to me how far we have come as a society, as he wrote about teachers – TEACHERS – relentlessly mocking homosexuals in the classroom, and his own self-loathing.

Even in my youth in the 80s I can remember those attitudes, and I am happy that my children’s generation is so much more open and accepting. Obviously there is always room for improvement and change, but we have come a long way.

Speaking of the 80s! Judy Blume for adults is exactly what you’d expect – very readable, quite smutty, and really fun. I liked this book about friendship and first loves, although I suspect I would have liked it more had I read it 25 years ago when I was closer in age and experience to the protagonists, rather than the parents.

This really fell flat with me. A satirical book about the so-called wellness industry, it attempts an underlying theme of body positivity and acceptance, but really, it just feels sort of “off.” Meh, a semi-decent weekend read I guess.

We completed the puzzle yesterday so now we can get on with our lives. I hope you all have a good week; I’m sending positive thoughts out to all of you in the States for a peaceful one. xo

Shiny Happy Oven; Forty-Three Weeks In

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I know that it has been a crazy week but I have a very important update:

Let us all admire my gleaming, shiny oven!

Cleaning the oven led to one of those If You Give A Mouse A Cookie cleaning scenarios: I soaked the racks in the downstairs bathtub, which led to the scrubbing of said bathtub, which somehow led to the mopping of the downstairs tile, and then, since I had the mop and bucket out anyway, washing the floor of the back entry. Then, for no reason at all, I decided to move all the living room furniture to sweep under it, and, in conclusion, I am very happy my teaching schedule is picking up this week.

Every time I clean my oven I think, that wasn’t so bad, if I did it more often it would be so easy and then I make a resolution to clean it quarterly or at least every four months. Inevitably, years pass, and this same scenario repeats itself. I do have a self-clean function, but I do not use it. I used it once, naively, during the winter and I a) spent the entire time terrified that the oven would catch on fire and burn the house down, and b) the house smelled terrible for days. Never again! I vowed to use only elbow grease and some kind of crazy fume-free spray from that time forward.

Note: my mother-in-law got a new oven and it has a steam-clean function; the oven itself heats up to about 250 degrees with a pan of water inside, and it somehow cleans perfectly. I want that for my next oven, which, hopefully, is years away. My mom told me yesterday that the average age of appliances before they die is seven years, and we bought this oven in 2012, so hopefully I didn’t just jinx myself.

Another note about my mother-in-law: she still has the chest freezer from when she got married in 1962 AND IT STILL WORKS. I mean, it probably sucks up vast amounts of energy resources but IT STILL WORKS. I find that remarkable.

One more note about my mother-in-law: as all of us canners know, it is impossible to buy lids right now. They are…just not available. Who knows when they will be? The last time I saw my mother-in-law, who is an avid canner, she told me that she had recently learned that lids can be reused. As long as they are not damaged in any way, they will still seal. When I expressed extreme skepticism about this, she took me to her pantry and showed me rows of preserves and tomatoes, all with perfectly sealed lids. “Wow,” I said, “I’ve thrown out a lot of lids.” She looked at me and said “I’ve been canning for sixty years, imagine how much money I’ve spent on lids that I’ve thrown in the garbage.” We both silently stared at her jars, contemplating this.

After that visit, I made jam with old lids and voila:

Perfectly sealed! I admit I was a bit worried but I thought that a) jam is a pretty low-risk item, and if they didn’t seal I would just refrigerate them, and b) I like to live dangerously.

As my friend Tora (HI TORA) said back in April, if we can take away one positive from this pandemic, it’s that we are learning new things and saving money.

Part of my New Year’s Mindfulness Resolution is to shop more mindfully, something that absolutely went out the window in 2020 as we all lost our minds in the grocery stores. I think my husband will leave me and my mother will disown me if I attempt another one year shopping challenge but this year, I am going to really try to be mindful about my clothes. I mean, you guys. I have so many clothes. I really do. My closet is literally bursting, but particularly with yoga clothes, sweaters, and boots. Those three items are ALWAYS the items I am attracted to when shopping and I really (probably) (maybe) don’t need more. This year I am going to really try to be mindful when shopping and, when tempted, before hitting “purchase” (because who is actually shopping in person these days, or ever?) I am going to “shop my closet.”

This is not to say that I won’t buy new things, because let’s face it, we all need some source of joy. But maybe, just MAYBE, I don’t need another pair of knee-high black boots. Maybe.

On that note, I introduce…

Outfit of the Week

I will not bore you all with an Outfit of the DAY, who has time for that, but I am going to choose my favourite outfit each week. I love clothes, and I think it’s important – even in a pandemic – to find joy in getting dressed every day, even if that day only involves working on that 1000-piece puzzle my mom gave me for Christmas. That puzzle, incidentally, has taken over our lives. It is our new master. We sit down to look for Just One Piece and then, hours later, look up from The Puzzle, bleary-eyed and completely disoriented.

This is a Friday outfit; underneath that super-cozy sweater is a yoga tank and long-sleeved tee, as I teach on Fridays. Yoga leggings are so comfortable but not quite warm enough on their own for January, so I have also added legwarmers, like the 80s girl I am.

Barkley approves.

Pandemic Reading

Do you want to read about a 54 year old unemployed copy editor who goes to Cuba and instantly falls in love with a 31 year old Cuban woman? Do you want to read about a 54 year old man getting drunk on rum and having sex with his 20 something colleague in the ladies room at a bar? Do you want to hear this self-described unattractive man speak disparagingly about those women’s appearances, including the term “puppy fat” and details about moles and moustaches? Then this is the book for you. There was a small interesting twist but not much of one. I eye rolled through much of this book. Pass.

Oh, this was good! A complex and wonderful book about women and choices, consequences and fresh starts. A woman in Jaipur, who left an abusive marriage at 17, is enjoying a life of renown as a henna artist and herbal healer. Things get complicated when her husband shows up with a sister she didn’t know she had! Includes a few recipes, a history of the caste system, and even a glossary of terms. Highly recommend, unless you’re a person who doesn’t believe that women have autonomy over their own bodies and should have the ability to make choices for themselves.

My friend Julie (HI JULIE) told me about this book; it’s a really incredible book about finding meaning in life, written by a man who survived four different concentration camps and all manner of horrible tortures. Choosing our own response and attitude to the situation we find ourselves in is the last of the freedoms, it is something that can never be taken away. Amazing book.

I ran my library stack right down to zero because my husband has been urging me to read this book for quite some time. It is a very incredible story of survival, but I am not an adventure story type of person, so I cannot say I enjoyed it. The whole time I was reading it, my Mom Voice kept popping up in my head: What are you DOING? GET DOWN FROM THERE RIGHT NOW. Which is, of course, the point of the book.

The boys are back to in-class school this week; fingers crossed all goes well. Have a beautiful week, everyone! xo

Goals and Gratitude; Forty-Two Weeks In

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Happy New Year! New Year’s is a funny thing; yes, we said goodbye to 2020, but the world did not change because the calendar did. I mean, we are still in a global pandemic and will be for a while yet. Nothing really changes on January 1, no matter how glad we are to kick the old year to the curb.

And yet. I love New Year’s; I love the feeling of everything fresh and new even if it isn’t actually fresh and new. January 1 I took down the tree and decorations, and I deep-cleaned the house, and I actually feel like my HOUSE is fresh and new. This happens every year; the house feels so much more spacious. It’s like I have a brand-new house, I think, every year at this time, and if history is any indication, this feeling will last until about the end of this week. Possibly less since Everyone Is Home All The Time.

I asked the family if they were setting any resolutions for New Year’s, and my younger son scoffed at me and said “I set my goals throughout the year, not just in JANUARY, MOM.” Well, I guess I do this too; if I want to make a change I implement it immediately, it is silly to wait until an arbitrary date. All the same, I do like to set intentions and goals for the year to come at this time of the year. I looked back on last year’s goals and I think I did a good job fulfilling them, with the notable exception of mindful shopping – hello panic buying, but I’m trying to do better – and buying a new bra. I need to make up my mind to the fact that my ill-fitting bra and I are going to be together for a while. I cannot imagine going to a lingerie store and trying on a whole bunch of bras, let alone have someone get up in my grill and measure me. Maybe in 2022.

2021 Goals

Mindfulness

This has been on my list for years and it’s something to keep working towards. It’s a journey, what can I say. Being present in the moment is not always easy, but I’m working on it: paying attention, being astonished, and telling everyone about it, as per Mary Oliver. I’m also STILL working on listening more, rather than Zoning Out, but honestly, that has been a bit tough in a year where, as I say, Everyone Is Home All The Time. Well, these goals are for looking forward, not back, Fresh Start, etc.

I’m trying to incorporate mindfulness into all aspects of my life, including – as I mentioned above – shopping, god help me I do not need to buy any more flour for a while. I am also – and this is a carryover from last year – reading more and scrolling less. I read 147 books last year; part of that was being locked down with the pandemic, but a bigger part of it was deleting certain apps from my phone and stopping myself from wasting time mindlessly scrolling.

On that note, the constant news cycle and the barrage of terrible things does not do me any favours; I’m finding that limiting myself to the bare minimum is much better for my mental and emotional state. Going forward, I’m going to continue to do that. If there is Really Important Information, I’m sure I will find out eventually; there is no need read everything about it and end up in a Doom Spiral.

Embracing Aging

This probably deserves a post on its own, but I’m not ready for that right now. Just to summarize, last August, I decided to stop weighing myself, and the impact that decision had on me and my mental state cannot be overstated.

Here I am, 45 years old, and my body is changing. My face is changing. I am not getting younger, people. If 2020 taught us anything it is that life is short and uncertain and unpredictable but I am, as one of my seniors puts it, on the right side of the grass. And as such I don’t want to waste time being dissatisfied with the way I look. I’ve wasted enough time. Going forward, I am not going to do that anymore.

As we go through life our looks change, that is a fact. Imagine how bizarre it would be to see a ninety-year-old woman with the face of a twenty-year-old. Just as we don’t go instantly to 90 from 20, so things change and evolve over the years.

In any case, I am embracing myself. I smile a lot and I wrinkle my forehead a lot and I raise my eyebrows a lot and you can tell by looking at my face. I am fit and strong, true, but my stomach is softening and my waistline is widening. My hairline is completely grey and my neck is deserving of a Nora Ephron essay. All of this is part of Life’s Journey. I refuse to waste time mired in unhappiness because of some arbitrary idea of conventional beauty and because we live in a culture where youth is held up as the gold standard.

We are all beautiful just as we are. Every one of us is a goddess, and I will not hear anything otherwise.

Practicing Gratitude

I have so much to be grateful for, particularly my health and that of my family. I am grateful for that every day, and every day I will reflect on and practice gratitude.

There is much I am grateful for, that came out of 2020. My husband is still gainfully employed and able to financially support our family, I am still working as a yoga teacher, albeit mostly remotely, my kids have adapted to this new, pandemic way of life with grace and acceptance.

Other things I am grateful for:

The little space between the table and the kitchen wall that serves as my home practice studio in the early hours. I never thought I would have a home yoga practice, but it has been surprisingly wonderful.

My home gym, especially the Peloton. I am so thankful that I have had the ability to exercise throughout this past year. I never thought I would be a person riding away in a spin class by myself, but then again, I never thought I would be in a global pandemic that shut down all spin classes and yoga studios and that devastated whole industries, including travel and airline. Never say never, is something I’ve learned, and also never say things like we’ve hit rock bottom or it can’t possibly get worse.

The availability of, and my ability to purchase and prepare healthy, nourishing, delicious food. I am so grateful produce is still available to me, along with all my other favourite foods.

Warm clothes and the concept of Friluftsliv! I have gone on a long walk every single day of this pandemic; January is typically our coldest month, although it’s starting off pretty mild, and so I am gathering my warmest layers.

Wine! I’m really glad there wasn’t a wine shortage. God bless all you Dry January people, but I do love my weekend tipples.

Pandemic Reading

Another thing I am grateful for is the library. Of the 147 books I read last year, the majority were from the library; if I tried to buy all of them I would be broke or, at the least, swimming in books. On that note:

This wasn’t mind-blowing, but it was an enjoyable book about a marriage in trouble, friendships, and the dangers of assuming that someone else is living a perfect life. It’s interesting, in our Instagram-Facebook-highlight-reel world, that we often assume that Everything Is Perfect for someone else, but lo, that is a dangerous assumption.

I LOVED THIS SO MUCH. This was an absolutely perfect holiday read, all about an Old Hollywood actress. I have loved everything that I’ve read by Emma Straub so far, but this is my favourite.

This was the last book I read in 2020 – I finished it New Year’s Eve – and it was very strange and unsettling, apt for a strange and unsettling year. The dialogue was witty. The premise was upsetting. I didn’t love it. I didn’t hate it.

Now THIS. This I loved. This book was incredible. Absolutely incredible. On the surface it’s about a woman and her part-time nanny, but really it’s so much more: class structure and wealth, secrets, lies, friendship, marriage, bad choices, power, and the proliferation of chain and online shopping at the expense of the little guy. After I finished I put every one of her books on my to-read list. So well done, excellent story and characters. Not sure, though, why on the front cover it is touted as “laugh out loud funny” – maybe they were talking about a different book? It is, indeed, wise and captivating but I don’t think I laughed at all, let alone out loud. Oh, but it is so good – I highly recommend it.

Now I’m off to start the week – the boys are back to online school this week and my husband is back to work, I have a couple of classes to teach and the goal to clean the oven. We shall see if this goal is achieved. Have a great week, friends, may unicorn sightings be in your future.

Boyhouse Year In Review 2020

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WELL! I don’t think any of us could have possibly predicted the year that we just had, in any capacity. I would like to think that we will never take things for granted again: our health, our ability to travel, our friendships and family, but human nature being what it is, there will come a day when we probably will.

2020 was disastrous in so many ways, but I think that looking back on it, we can see massive change and growth, and, looking forward, glimmers of hope. I know that going through this year has made me re-evaluate many things, and I have realized that many things I felt I could never live without, I have.

So let us look back on the year that was absolutely unlike any year we have experienced, but that will surely be talked about and written about for decades to come.

Boyhouse Year In Review 2020

January

I was stressed out about juggling doctor, dentist, and orthodontist appointments for the boys – remember juggling things? – it was insanely cold and I went for a mall walk like an elderly person, and I got weirdly stressed out about getting a gel pedicure. I also – sob – complained about exam break and my son being home from school IMAGINE YOUR KIDS BEING HOME FROM SCHOOL FOR THREE WEEKS JUST IMAGINE LOLOLOLOLSOB.

January 2020 Nicole was such an innocent, and also I did not go for that gel pedicure.

February

I overheard a man at Walmart asking for extra-small condoms, I went to Math Night at the high school and was comparatively a hippie, I went to Costco on a Sunday afternoon for the first and last time and also baked a heart-shaped cake for dinner with friends, and I wore a different outfit every day in February.

All the outfits were pretty similar though.

March

I talked about how insidious jealousy is, although I freely admitted to being insanely jealous of my friends’ hair, I noticed people buying a LOT of toilet paper at Costco (cue ominous music), I really did try to fulfil my New Year’s Resolution of buying a bra but failed, we cancelled our trip to Mexico and I bought a lot of groceries, my son turned 16 and we had our first Pandemic Birthday, and I accidentally hoarded taco shells.

Everything shut down, including the yoga studio, and so I also started my home yoga practice. This was a huge change because nearly every day for thirteen years I went to the studio to practice in the early morning hours. School was also cancelled “indefinitely.”

April

In what can only be described as the Worst Timing Ever, my coffee maker started leaking, grocery shopping became a harrowing, soul-sucking quest and I started wearing a mask, my sons stopped shaving, I got my very first cloth mask and declared it to be the New Lipstick, I coloured my own hair for the first time in decades, and I cleaned and reorganized the hideous laundry area.

I also had a pandemic birthday and my friends brought me a gift while wearing dinosaur costumes and playing Danger Zone.

May

Some things started to open up, notably the orthodontist, which meant that I did NOT have to use toenail clippers to cut my son’s brace wires, we had a Pandemic Mother’s Day and I stressed out about baking powder, we visited my parents for the first time in months, I aired my grievances, big and small, and I was really on edge about grocery carts.

I also talked about pandemic beauty products.

June

Amid lots of worries, we celebrated Barkley’s birthday, we started to catch up on appointments as medical and dental offices opened, I gave myself a bikini wax and I learned some things are best left to the professionals, the renos were finished on our vacation home and so we went there for a little break and I thoroughly enjoyed the newly-flushing toilet, and I reminisced about Hammerman.

I also shared my hair styling tips, follow me for more great beauty advice.

July

I talked about the role of luck in life, I had lots of adventures, including one in which I learned how outhouses in the backcountry get emptied, I GOT A PELOTON AND IT HAS BEEN LIFE-CHANGING (and also practiced gratitude), and I talked about leaning in and out, yin and yang.

I also talked about sweat! Again, follow me for more fascinating and glamourous topics.

August

I finally watched Hamilton and also bleached my hands accidentally, someone called the cops on my son and his band, I realized after months of wearing shorts that the boys had vastly outgrown all their pants, we were on a vacation of sorts and I prepared for the boys to actually go back to actual physical school.

I also talked about my beloved herb garden.

September

The boys went back to school (!!!!!!), my son turned 15 and had a socially distanced birthday party, I marked six months since I had my hair cut and professionally coloured, I had the Lido Shuffle stuck in my head and I actually did get my hair cut and coloured.

Also, Barkley shared my passion for fall fruits.

October

My son finally (FINALLY OMG FINALLY) shaved off his pandemic moustache and I got excused from jury duty, we enjoyed incredible fall colours and for the first time ever I got to eat something at Thanksgiving dinner (that I made myself, but still), I had an adventure at Costco, and I talked about Mom Jeans and Dressy Sweatpants.

November

My husband declared himself the winner in the Halloween decoration war, it was the return of the Tiny Secret Festive Season and I finished my Christmas shopping, I had a small breakdown in the grocery store, I talked about Friluftsliv, and we got put on a mini-lockdown.

I also had fun – and THANK YOU ALL FOR WEIGHING IN – discussing Divisive Issues! That was probably my favourite post to write, and my favourite comment section of 2020.

December

Everything was fine, I got festively crazy, the mini-lockdown turned into a major lockdown which we are still in today, and we got a whole lot of snow.

I also talked about being a Linus’ blanket to someone else’s Charlie Brown Christmas tree.

As we wrap up 2020, I’m looking back at my goals for the year (I still didn’t buy a new bra) and looking forward to setting goals for a fresh new year. I learned a lot about myself this year, I grew as a person, so many things changed, there was much sadness and despair but also much happiness, beauty, gratitude, and time with my little family. (SO MUCH TIME WITH MY LITTLE FAMILY).

Thank you so much for coming along with me on my adventures during this strange year; I wish you so much joy and love for the New Year. Here’s to 2021! xoxoxo