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2020 Vision (I know, I know, but I had to)

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Happy New Year! As I write this, I’m still in my pajamas with a big cup of coffee; I’ve been spending the last (almost) two weeks sleeping late, reading, and watching movies. It’s been a very chill kind of holiday break and while I’m not EXACTLY feeling ready to get back to work and routine, well. There’s no stopping time.

Speaking of which, I came across this article, which I suggest you go and read in its entirety if you really want your mind blown, but here is a screenshot of the part that made me set down my coffee cup and stare off into the distance:

THE WONDER YEARS, YOU GUYS. I remember watching that with my friend Elise (HI ELISE) and we would talk about those long-ago hippie days. Long ago like, for example, when Bey burst on the scene or when we all got a Facebook account and poked each other.

Well! Let’s look forward to the new year. I did finally take down the decorations on the 31st, and most of all the outdoor ones are down as well (it’s a long process). The house is clean but seems awfully bare. A bit depressing but it cannot be Christmas all year, can it? January is the time for reflections, renewal, and resolutions. I know many of you balk at the ideas, but don’t get me wrong: I think we are all wonderful just the way we are. However, given the chance for self-improvement, I am going to take it.

I was talking to my younger son about resolutions, and he said “But my resolutions are never done! Because I just always want to keep on improving.” Which, yes. Exactly.

Being Mindful, Being Present

This has been an ongoing resolution for years, and I think it probably will be forever. I mean, none of us suddenly achieve samadhi. Life is a journey and mindfulness is also a journey. I want to really work on being present for everyone in my life, and taking the time to just mindfully enjoy the moment. Here I am, walking the dog, enjoying the blue sky and my fuzzy baby. Here I am, in the Costco lineup, looking at what other people have in their carts. Here I am, folding laundry…okay, it will be easier in some circumstances than others. But I will channel my inner Mary Oliver: “Instructions for living a life. Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.”

I read somewhere – where was it? – that in conversation, people don’t really LISTEN, they are too busy thinking about what they themselves are going to say next. I want to really focus on listening.

Mindful Shopping

Ever since Kondo-ing my house long ago, and my one-year shopping challenge, I have been pretty good about really thinking about things I bring into the house, whether they be clothes, food, or toiletries. This is an ongoing thing, because it can be easy to overbuy things that are really not needed. In thirty days leading up to Boxing Day, I recorded my outfits and I only re-wore one sweater. ONE. And then I received a few sweaters for Christmas…what I’m saying is I maybe don’t need to buy any new sweaters for a while. I keep several lists of things needed to run a household – food, mostly, but also important things like soap, toothpaste, cleaning supplies, etc. – because otherwise I tend to stock up way too much. I think that mindfully buying things that are needed/ badly wanted, rather than randomly shopping, is a good way to live, both from an ecological point of view, and an economic one. However…

Buy A Damn Bra Already

When did I do my shopping challenge? Hold please. Yes, 2017-18, that was when I made the decision to not buy clothes for a year, and I had said the exception was a new bra. Spoiler alert: I did not buy a bra. So back in 2017, my bras were already ill-fitting due to my much-deflated decolletage, so who knows how old my bras actually are? I have been wearing the wrong size bra for many years now. JUST BUY A BRA, NICOLE.

In my semi-defense, most of the time I wear yoga tanks under my clothes, for teaching, and so I don’t wear an actual bra that often but MY GOD HOW HARD IS IT TO GO TO VICTORIA’S SECRET AND JUST BUY A BRA. I don’t have a hard-to-fit size, I have a Victoria’s Secret in the mall that is a five minute drive away, I COULD DO THIS.

THIS. This is my main, non-vague resolution for 2020. Go to the mall. Get fitted for a bra. Buy a bra that fits in a few different colours. GO ME.

Read More, Phone Less

This has been a goal for a few years now, and I’m happy to say that in 2019 I read 133 books. This might be a bit on the high side given that I was alone for ten days while the guys were in Alaska, and mostly I read during that time. However, I’d like to read over 100 in 2020. I instituted a rule for myself that on days that I was very busy with classes – 2 or 3 days a week – I would not look at social media, not once. It turned out to be great for my mental health, particularly with two elections in 2019. I am going to institute that rule again. Let me tell you, the longer I was off twitter the less I wanted to look at it.

Sing Us A Song You’re The Piano (Wo)Man

I have been playing the piano for over 34 years, and I love it – but I don’t play often enough. I usually force myself to sit down once a week to play for fifteen minutes, and that is just not enough. I’d like to extend that time, and learn how to play Evil Woman.

Favourite Things

I am going to continue to write this blog once a week, and do Favourite Things once a month.

Mindful Exercise

Oof, I learned a big lesson about myself in 2019, and that is that specific fitness goals are NOT healthy for me. I love running but I think my own goals for running my first road race caused my big injury. Therefore, I am going to keep my gentle goals in mind: one long run, one short, treadmill only, cross train with spin and elliptical. Someone told me that treadmill running is not “real” running but you know what? What other people consider to be “real” is not my concern. My concern is health and enjoyment.

Also, my yoga practice has changed immensely to include lots of modifications and variations of gentle seated poses, as well as a focus on strength with sun salutations and standing postures.

Make the Plans

Last year my friend Nicole and I (HI NICOLE) resolved to have coffee once a month for the year – and we did it! Although her son thought it wasn’t a real resolution because “we like each other and we like seeing each other” it was a bit of a challenge getting our schedules lined up. A few years ago I changed “I don’t have time for X” to “X is not a priority” to see how that would sit with me, and it turns out saying that my friends are not priorities does NOT sit well with me. My friendships are important and as such they deserve my time and effort. So, my plan is to find the time, set the date, and stop saying we should get together and just do it.

 

I think that’s everything! We shall see at this time next year what’s what. Have you made goals or resolutions this year?

Boyhouse Year In Review 2019

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The cold and dark at this time of year practically demands cozyness during the winter holidays. We’ve all been sleeping late and letting the days unspool slowly, with no real big goals or activities. The first couple of days of winter break, I did nothing except read and watch movies, slowly increasing my activity levels as I felt myself become restored.

Self-reflection and striving for improvement is always a good thing, I think. It’s good to look back on the year and look forward to the new one dawning. This year, Christmas has felt different; for one thing – and this will surprise many of you – I have not yet taken down my tree or decorations. Usually I pounce on it shortly after Christmas, but it still stands there merrily, and I have made no move to change things. Christmas cards are on every surface in the living room, and I have no urge to pack them away and dust those surfaces. Maybe I’m subconsciously trying to slow down time in a Landslide-type way? I don’t know. All I know is I have the strong urge not to rush anything and to be present, which is my goal for this and every year.

My husband booked tickets to see the new Little Women movie Saturday night, and so last week I set aside my library pile to re-read the books. I say “books” because I include Good Wives as a separate book, which I’m sure could be the cause of many really boring arguments. Anyway, I’m glad I re-read them because the new movie is so true to the books; as well it is very cleverly shot and the characters are shown as being far more complex than they are in the usual heart-warming adaptations. It’s a little dark in places, which is quite true to Louisa May Alcott’s life; she had quite a dreadful, impoverished, and difficult life.

Has anyone seen the movie yet? I need to talk about it. Specifically, I need to talk about the juxtaposition of the scene of Meg at Sallie Moffat’s ball and the scene where she and John are discussing finances and her purchase of $50 worth of silk. And every other little thing about the movie.

Near the end of the movie, Amy has a line in which she says that writing about things – specifically, domestic, everyday things – is what makes them important. Is there anything better description for a blog? Here are the things that were important to me this year:

January

I talked about life’s little luxuries, someone told me that I reminded him of Charlene Prickett, and in an eerie bid of foreshadowing, I rescheduled my son’s appointment to get his braces on, which turned out to be very serendipitous. My older son also went winter camping and I wrote about cozy things.

February

I discovered that Johnny Rotten’s name came from his gross dental health and scheduled myself a dental cleaning (also, he’s still alive – who knew?), I started my Eating a Rainbow series in which I discuss my completely rigid meal plan, and my son’s orthodontist turned out to be an actual criminal. It was also the coldest February on record, so I had to search for my inner sunshine.

March

I had more than usual time-change-related-exhaustion, I cleaned my oven, and while traveling to and from Puerto Vallarta, I was seated beside the World’s Worst Airplane Seatmates. Literally. I also made a Seinfeld-themed birthday cake for my Seinfeld-obsessed son.

April

I went into full-on spring cleaning mode, including, weirdly, booking a Pap test, I got a Garmin watch and went into full-on David Sedaris mode, and I celebrated my birthday! I also talked about my trip to Puerto Vallarta and how I finally realized my dream of ziplining.

May

I bought a scrunchie, I took my son to his drum lessons and met his unintentionally-hilarious drum teacher, and I badly injured myself only two days before my first road race. Also, Barkley turned 11!

June

I applied to renew my sons’ passports, and met David, the employee with the most zest for his job and pride in his work that I have ever seen, government or not, I replaced the battery on my Daylight Magnifying Mirror, and my sons decided to give me even more grey hair by racing around in abandoned shopping carts. I also, weirdly enough, volunteered to make mini-cupcakes for the teachers.

July

I had an empty nest for a week, I hiked with the kids and listened to them talk about Li’l Pump, and we got two days of nice weather so I carped the diem. I also went to a concert and got dressed up in my Stampede Wear.

August

We discovered the term “girl’s blouse,”the kids watched The Shining and thought it was a comedy, and I found a moth in my water glass. My husband took the kids to Alaska and I was home alone for TEN DAYS so I hiked a lot with my friend.

September

The kids went back to school – my older one started high school! – I spent far too long wondering if I should grow my hair long, and I wondered what it would be like to be followed by the paparazzi. Also my younger son turned 14 and we hosted many, many teen boys at our house for a barbeque.

October

I re-read The Handmaid’s Tale and realized I am less a Handmaid and more a Wife or Martha, I became low-level outraged about crappy fundraisers (POINSETTIAS, I AM LOOKING AT YOU), and it was Halloween! I also got reading glasses.

November

I got excited about Christmas and continued to be low-level outraged about poinsettias, I got more excited about Christmas, and I – un-Christmaslike – read Helter Skelter. Shudder. The decorations were put up, and are STILL NOT TAKEN DOWN WHO AM I.

December

More outdoor decorations were purchased and displayed, including a Christmas walrus, I broke out the decorative tins, and my son broke my cutting board by crushing candy canes with a rubber mallet.

2019 – that’s a wrap! Happy New Year to all of you. xo

The Ten Year Challenge

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One of the perks of my husband’s job is that we often get invitations to private screenings for popular movies; on Saturday we headed out to see the new Star Wars. Facebook memories had let me know that five years ago we went to The Force Awakens, and is there anything that inspires a person to start singing Landslide in a shaky, sobbing voice than Facebook memories?

A month or so ago I noticed a social media “10 year challenge” in which people posted photos of themselves from 2009 and 2019. I guess this is because a new decade is dawning, but the weirdo in me kept obsessing on 2009. If we are looking at how we have changed over the decade, shouldn’t we start in 2010? Because that was when the decade began. Maybe New Year’s Eve 2009, I could get behind.

Anyway, it’s interesting to see the changes in ourselves over the decade: hairstyles, clothing, and also how we have all learned how to take a good selfie. And use filters. I think that is the biggest change for every single person throughout the decade: we have learned how to use lighting to our advantage

January 2010 versus December 2019

Why stop there? Why not look at photos throughout the decade? And so I give you ME, year-by-year over the past decade.

2010

2010 was the year I went from Book Fair Lady-in-Waiting to full-on Book Fair Lady; it was the year one son finished kindergarten and the other started, and it was the first year we took our kids on a winter vacation. We went to visit my parents in Palm Desert, and the kids were extremely excited that you could get on an airplane in a place filled with snow and ice, and get off an airplane to actual grass and flowers outside. It was also the Olympics, and the start of my children’s obsession with the Vancouver mascots.

My husband and I took a trip to Tofino for his birthday, which is where this photo was taken. We left the kids with my parents for three days, which was the first time I had ever been away from them for more than 24 hours. Side note: I still have – and wear – this little black dress.

2011

In 2011 I made the leap to becoming Chair of the School Council/ Parent Association, and if I had known I would hold that position for four years, I maybe wouldn’t have. We took the kids to Disneyland, and I got my varicose veins stripped.

This photo was taken after my varicose-vein-stripping, when I was able to walk around semi-normally but was still so scarred and bruised that boots and tights were a necessity. I still have those boots and that skirt, but sadly, not the top. I like that top! I wish I still had it.

2012

This was a big year of change in the Boyhouse. We celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary, took a trip to Maui – which we would subsequently visit four more times in the coming years – my husband unexpectedly changed jobs, and we renovated our house.

I also discovered I love umbrella drinks. I still have that tank top but not the skirt or scarf.

2013

I landed a paying (or “paying”) job at Yummy Mummy Club, as the Meatless Mummy. I would go on to write many, many, many vegan and vegetarian recipes for the site over the next four years. It was a fun time in my life, if poorly paid, and I wore a lot of cute aprons.

2014

More aprons, more food, and longer hair. Hundreds of recipes written, more book fairs organized and run, much drama in the School Council/ Parent Association, and a solo trip to Toronto.

2015

I turned 40! This is my favourite photo of all time. It was taken when my husband’s colleague found my husband’s Top Gun flight suit (doesn’t everyone have one?) in our front closet, put it on, and started singing You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling. It was always my dream to be serenaded in that fashion. Dreams do come true, people. Don’t ever forget it.

What with my 40th and my husband’s 50th, 2015 was a big year for travel: we went to Maui, Tofino, and Disney World. I also learned that sadly, a switch goes off when a person turns 40, and so I started implementing cardio workouts into my life in order to fit into my clothes.

2016

I started yoga teacher training, which was a very excellent decision. It was a really big step for me to do something for myself that didn’t include the children. I also started transitioning out of being Book Fair Lady and School Council Chair, as my younger son was in his last year at the elementary school. The posters are five dollars.

2017

This was the year I started teaching a lot, and I also quit my job at Yummy Mummy Club. Both kids were in junior high, and I really embraced the teaching life. I also abruptly stopped volunteering for the school due to massive volunteer burnout. I started running, my older son took a week-long trip to Quebec, and we went to Mexico instead of Maui.

2018

I discovered life with two teenagers is busy and fun, and mostly consists of food acquisition and preparation. I also continued to teach a lot, including new classes for seniors, which I love. We visited Mexico again, and also took a wonderful road trip from Jasper to Vancouver, and discovered that the kids really prefer trips in “nature” than trips to a city.

2019

Here we are at the end of the decade!

Definitely more lines in my face, and my roots show up three weeks after colouring. Life is good, my friends. What will the new decade bring? xo

We Will Assimilate You

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It feels like, in this stage of life, that every single week we think next week things will slow down over and over until we drop dead from exhaustion, but I am optimistic that this week, THIS VERY WEEK, things will indeed slow down.

Well, maybe. At the very least, it is the last week of school – and for me, work – before a few weeks off, and those weeks off will be very welcome and – hopefully – slow. I have big plans to watch movies and read books, to drink coffee with almond Bailey’s in it, and to recruit my husband in to coming with me to help with what grocery shopping will need to be done. I am strong, invincible woman, but grocery shopping – particularly in the winter, particularly when shopping for people who WILL NOT STOP EATING – is physically exhausting.

I go weekly to Superstore, and bi-weekly to Costco, and because Wednesday is my designated Errand Day, those two chores happen on the same day every two weeks. Last Wednesday it started to snow, huge fluffy thick flakes, and I had to really brace myself for the Epic Grocery Day. If you’ve ever pushed a giant cart full to the brim with groceries through a snowy, unplowed parking lot, not once but twice in a two-hour span, you will understand how physically depleted I was by the time I pulled into my garage. In retrospect, I probably shouldn’t have gone for a 6.5 km run BEFORE doing that, but how was I to know it would start snowing immediately before heading out for Epic Grocery Day? I am not a meteorologist.

Pushing the cart aside, the biggest problem with grocery shopping during the day is that no one is home to help unload the car and put things away; it took a solid 50 minutes of non-stop work to do this. Who needs to go to the gym when you can just provide food for teenage boys?

Oh, the life of a domestic goddess. Last Friday I was having coffee with my friend Janet (HI JANET) when I noticed that the clasp of my beloved Christmas bracelet had come undone, and my little Christmas tree was missing. I checked my clothes, the coffee shop, the car…and then came to the sad conclusion that it was gone forever, probably lost in the snow. I taught my class and sadly came home; I washed the dishes in the sink and when I took the dish gloves off there was a little clunk on the floor – my Christmas tree! Of course! I had washed the dishes immediately before leaving the house, because apparently washing dishes is a huge part of my life, and the clasp must have come undone then. I was so thankful that the little tree didn’t go down the drain, or that more charms didn’t fall off the bracelet.

Luckily the clasp didn’t come undone when I was out mailing a card. You know the scene from When Harry Met Sally, when Sally is mailing a pile of letters and checks the chute after every single one? That’s me to a tee, and my husband always laughs at me. “It’s on a slant, of course the letter is going to go down into the box.” Well. WELL. I will tell you that the following events vindicated me forever. When I went to mail the card, I opened the chute to see at least six envelopes sitting there. Someone didn’t check! The mailbox was very full, which was preventing the envelopes from going down into the mailbox, and so I did my best to force them down, hoping I wasn’t crushing important things like photos or anything. It was crammed full, and so my entire arm was in the mailbox, trying to coax the envelopes down. I hoped no one was watching me, thinking I was committing mail fraud or theft. I briefly remembered the scene in The Simpsons where Homer gets his arm stuck in the pop machine, and there is discussion of amputation, when it is revealed that the reason his arm is stuck is because he will not let go of the can of pop. What if my arm gets stuck in this mailbox. Will I have to be rescued. If so, will the fire department arrive. If so, is it worth getting my arm stuck.

Speaking of pop machines, when I was at Costco for my Epic Grocery Day, I noticed that the pop machines were all equipped with credit card readers. Does no one carry change anymore? What an age we live in.

It was another weekend of treat-making to wrap up the season. I am now DONE. I think. There was a party at the studio and so I made cupcakes:

Because it was a yoga party, I wanted the cupcakes to be vegan. In the past I’ve used coconut oil to make vegan frosting, but it is not exactly ideal. For one thing, it either seizes or melts, and there is always a residual coconut taste, unless I use refined coconut oil, in which the taste is too bland. So, I bought a hippie vegan butter (or, “butter”) and I will tell you: I had my doubts. For one thing, after I had left it on the counter, as I would with regular butter, it was so soft that I had to scrape it out of its wrapping. It also tasted a lot like I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter. But I am here to tell you that it was the absolute best for frosting. I didn’t have to add any “milk,” it whipped up into perfect creaminess, and it set up nicely. It was much easier to work with than real butter, and much better tasting than coconut oil frosting, I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter taste aside. I used the remainder of the decimated candy canes to make it festive.

I baked 115 gingerbread men on Thursday for Friday decorating with the boys, and it went exactly as expected.

Sometimes it’s better not to ask questions, you know?

A hammer and sickle. Note the cookie is broken, “just like Communism.” Symbolism in gingerbread decorating.

This is “Okay Boomer” cookie, which the boys say to each other, and also to me. “I’m not a Boomer!” I’ll say, to which they respond “Okay Boomer.”

Well, I think we can all read what that one says.

Self explanatory.

My army of gingerbread men. I would like everyone to note that a) mine are the only ones that actually get eaten, as no one can stand eating as much artificial icing as the boys put on their cookies, and b) I am a machine. Of the 115 cookies, the vast majority are exactly like this. We will assimilate you.

Here’s to a – maybe? – slower, quieter week. Only one week until Christmas Eve! May your days be merry and bright, friends, and cookie-filled too. xo

He just doesn’t know his own strength

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The past few days have seen me unusually irritated and agitated about things that would not normally irritate or agitate me. I’ve been having feelings of being completely overwhelmed, and no amount of list-making has assuaged those feelings. Is it this time of year? Have I over-extended myself? Am I having a breakdown? All of those questions and more were answered when my phone buzzed with a notification that it is Almost That Time Of The Month Again! Oh! Well. I’m glad my phone knows what’s what.

Honestly, I feel like everything would be at a normal level of busyness, but for all the little things that keep popping up. Call vet to refill Barkley’s eye drops. Figure out when I can get the boys in for their dental checkups at the new, non-pediatric-but-still-convenient dentist. Take Barkley to the groomer. Reschedule last week’s wax appointment. Make an appointment with our (very hot, I’m serious, this guy is a looker) plumber to come and look at our thermostat, since the furnace is coming on but not always to the right temperature.

This last one almost broke me. Who wants to find a free afternoon to wait at home for someone to come and look at the thermostat? Well, as I said, at least he’s nice to look at, and besides, I can get a start on my gingerbread men.

My email just popped up with an article entitled Why You’re Eating The Wrong Cinnamon and I am NOT clicking on that.

Even without the furnace/ dog/ dental scheduling, the last week has been a whirlwind of activity and treat-making and teaching and just generally scurrying around. I’ve been packaging up treats for my students and playing tetris with my downstairs fridge:

Me: it will be fine once I roast the cauliflower, there will be room in the fridge.

Oops.

I spent much of Sunday making gingersnaps:

More decorative tins!

I had left the candy canes for my younger son to crush, in order for me to make peppermint bark. I wanted to have the candy cane crushing completed by Monday, so I could package them up in little bags for a different group of students. My son got out the rubber mallet and the cutting board, and asked me just how crushed I wanted them to be. Chunks? Little pieces? Decimate them! I said to him in my Fun Mom voice.

One thing you should know about my younger son is that he Follows Directions. Remember in Game of Thrones when Sam cures Jorah of greyscale, and when asked about it he said that he read the instructions in some ancient manuscript and then followed those instructions? If only more people could be like that. It is my regret that Sam was not Ruler of the Seven Kingdoms, because with that attitude, he should have been. Anyway, that is my son to a tee. He is the king of step-by-step directions, and you never have to tell him something twice. I probably should have kept this in mind when I told him I wanted the candy canes decimated.

He presented me with three bags of candy cane POWDER. Quite honestly that works really well in bark, as there are fewer tooth-chipping hunks of peppermint candy. There are a few small chunks in there too, as I had also said “a few small pieces would be nice.” As you can see:

But mostly, it’s powder.

In addition to decimating the candy canes, he also decimated my cutting board. It cracked into thirds. I can’t be mad about it, though, because he was just following directions. He is much less remorseful about the loss of my cutting board than he is impressed with his own sheer brute strength. Well, he does work out a lot, and YET I feel that perhaps a little less vigor would have yielded similar, but non-cutting-board-destroying results. I agreed with him that, Hulk-like, he just doesn’t know his own strength, while duct-taping together the cutting board for use next year. No sense breaking another cutting board next Christmas.

I went to Canadian Tire to buy a new one, and for those of you who are not Canadian, CT is one of our big national brands. Not only does it sell tires and other automobile-related things, but it also has a garden centre, household items, paint, kitchenware, and sporting goods, as well as all things Christmas-related. It is one of those stores that I love – because it frequently has incredibly good sales – and also hate, because the store itself is often a disorganized jumble. I ended up with a cutting board that was on sale for half-price, which I didn’t know until I went to pay, and if I HAD known, I probably would have bought two. Not that I’m complaining.

Before my CT trip, I put gas in the car and, due to my inability to see out the back window, washed it. There was no snow in the forecast, I swear, I checked my weather app twice, but not 30 minutes after washing the car, the snow started to fall and continued for the entire day. Did I curse the city? Possibly. The entire day, I kept looking at my weather app, which said “cloudy” but at no time did it call for snow, even when the snow was coming down. My Monday afternoon students, after I related this story, thought that perhaps the rest of the city was completely dry and that a snow cloud was just following me around, like a character in Winnie the Pooh. The long and short of it is that I had a clean car for about 30 minutes, and now I can’t see out the back window again.

Well, it’s only two weeks until Christmas, but my dear, dear, dear friend and neighbour (HI TARYN) surprised me with this beautiful gift:

Isn’t it gorgeous? I love it so much.

I hope you are all having a wonderful week; it can be stressful this time of year (THE FURNACE) but hopefully you are experiencing some joys and beauty of the season. xo

It’s Decorative Tin Season!

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On Thursday I came home to THREE messages on my old-school landline answering machine. I have an actual, physical answering machine, you guys. Anyway. This is not a story about how I am barreling into the next decade with not only a landline and answering machine, but also an iPhone 5s that does not hold a charge and cannot be physically powered off because the power button is broken, but I don’t want to start over again with all the apps and passwords and so I hold onto it like a security blanket. This is a story about suddenly having a free afternoon.

Usually when I get messages on my answering machine it’s an automated call saying that this is the credit card company calling and I’m heading straight to jail, or similar. But on Thursday, one of the messages was from the new day spa down the street, where I had an appointment for a wax. “Had” being the operative word, since the panicked voice on the machine was telling me that the wax had to be rescheduled, and that this was the only number that they had for me, and please call them back. All of which I found strange, as I never give out my home number, only my cell, and I know for SURE that when I filled out the strange waiver you get with a new esthetician that I put my cell down for my contact. I mean, how DID they get my home number? Well, it doesn’t matter. I called and it was indeed, mysteriously, the spa, and not some scam in which people call and leave messages saying that their appointments had been cancelled. Can you imagine if that WAS a scam? It would be the strangest scam ever.

Anyway, apparently my esthetician “put her back out” and so was unable to wax my bikini line. Let’s not think too much about how that happened or the strain my bikini line might give a person. The point is, I had a free afternoon.

That never happens! I literally stood there for a solid minute, staring at my old-school landline answering machine, thinking about the hours that stretched ahead of me. What to do first? I tackled my least-liked Christmas job, which is gift wrapping. I hate gift wrapping. I am terrible at gift wrapping. I somehow lack the spatial skills that are required to cut an appropriate amount of paper for the size of the gift and then I also lack the coordination to fold and wrap without it looking like a jumble. My hair seems to fall out from the stress of it all, as there is almost always strands of my hair stuck in the tape. But in any case, it is mostly done now. After that, I tackled some of my Christmas goody jobs and took a very long dog walk.

As well as being the Season of Light, it is also the Season for Decorative Tins. Over the years, I have amassed many, many festive tins and I feel the need to fill them, always. What is sadder than an empty decorative tin, I ask you? Well, you might answer, many things. Moving on! Let’s fill those tins up!

Back in the day when I worked in natural gas options trading, we would sometimes get a really big market position that we would want to eventually reverse. My boss was famous for saying “Let’s chip away at it” because a giant options position? It’s not always possible to reverse it all at once. Small steps. And so it is with life, when faced with a big task, the best thing to do is chip away at it, a little at a time. This is my philosophy when it comes to Christmas treats. If I think about all the things I want to do, it’s overwhelming. So, chipping away.

How To Make The Maximum Amount Of Delicious Treats In Minimal Time

Sugar Cookies and Gingerbread

I have talked about this before, how the key to Holiday Happiness is making cookie dough ahead of time, and then rolling and baking when the mood strikes. Who knows, maybe you’re a person who likes being in the kitchen for fourteen straight hours? But I am not. My recipe for sugar cookies is here, and my recipe for gingerbread is here. Each dough takes ten minutes to make, maybe 15 if you find your flour canister is empty and you have to bring up a bag from the pantry. Make the dough. Freeze the dough. A couple days before you need the dough stick it in the fridge to thaw. I timed myself and it took less than thirty minutes to roll, cut out, and bake five dozen cookies. If you’re a pipe-and-flood person, then you might want to factor that into your time, but I am of the “spread some buttercream on the cookie and then put sprinkles on it” team. Or, in the case of gingerbread, I just stick some M&Ms on with those little tubes you can buy at the grocery, AND I get my kids to decorate, which is only for the people who can really let it go. I mean:

Those were from last year. Stay tuned for this year’s creation!

When in doubt, add more sprinkles.

Truffles

I have been making these truffles for YEARS, and I always kind of dread making them, as it’s super hard to dig out the hardened chocolate and make it into balls. But this year I had an epiphany, probably from seeing one of those candy making videos on Facebook. So here’s what you do: melt chopped chocolate together with coconut milk (the full-fat, canned kind) in a 4-to-1 ratio. Add some vanilla extract, or some peppermint extract, or some orange or almond extract. Whatever floats your festive boat, people! Put it in the fridge for 45 minutes or so, just to cool it slightly. It will be like thick pudding. THEN use an ice cream scoop to put little blobs on wax-paper-lined cookie sheets.

Stick it back in the fridge for another 45 minutes or so and THEN you can squish them and roll them into little balls.

THEN put them in the freezer and forget about them for a while. Days, even. I used to just roll them in cocoa powder, but NOT ANYMORE. I have stepped up the game for something that takes barely any time. When you have 15 minutes, melt say one cup of chocolate chips with a tablespoon of (REFINED) coconut oil. Then grab your frozen truffles, drop them one by one in the melted chocolate, put them back on the same messy wax-paper-lined cookie sheet, and stick it back in the freezer. It takes very little time to set, at which point you can package them up for gifties or put them IN A DECORATIVE TIN.

Don’t you wish you were in my seniors’ class? And YOU get a box of truffles, and YOU get a box of truffles…

The rest go into my tins in the freezer.

My giant container of tins that are patiently waiting to be filled.

I also made peanut butter truffles this year, which was super easy. Melt together 2 cups of peanut butter and 1/4 cup (REFINED) coconut oil. Stir in a teaspoon or two of vanilla (just pour, it will be fine) and 2 cups icing sugar. Follow the same procedure as above with making them into balls, and rolling them in chocolate coating. EASY PEASY PEANUT BUTTER SQUEEZY.

Peppermint Bark

Literally anyone – ANYONE – can make chocolate bark, and it makes the best gift. You need almost no kitchen skills and certainly no fancy fine motor skills. The only person who I could think of who couldn’t make this is my dad, who has ZERO kitchen skills (sorry, Dad, but it’s true. Don’t make this. I’ll make it for you.) Peppermint is my favourite for this time of year, but you people who dislike mint, well, you can put dried fruit and nuts in instead. I have an actual recipe for this, but honestly, you don’t need it. I mean, click on it if you like, but I don’t get paid anymore for that so who cares? Basically, take chopped chocolate or chocolate chips, any quantity. One cup? Six cups? Who cares! Just put it in a saucepan, put it on low heat, and stir until it’s melted. Or microwave it. Whatever. Melt the chocolate, then stir crushed candy canes – or fruit and nuts, whatever – into it. Spread it on a parchment-paper-lined cookie sheet, stick it in the freezer, after about 30 minutes take it out and break it into pieces. THAT IS IT END OF STORY.

The thing that is the most tedious part of this “recipe,” as it were, is to unwrap all the candy canes. That is a bitch of a job and, circling back to my original point, is one that I did last Thursday afternoon. It took a solid half-hour to unwrap all the candy canes, what with all the little pieces of plastic getting stuck to my hands and sweater. I put them in ziploc bags (I know, I hate the plastic too, but it’s only at this time of year) and then I assign my younger son the job to crush the candy canes. Believe me when I say he takes this SERIOUSLY. He uses a rubber mallet and pulverizes those minty sons of bitches.

Festively awaiting annihilation.

Gingersnaps

I saved the best for last! My grandma’s gingersnap recipe is here, and I can tell you that you will not be disappointed! Unless you don’t like ginger, in which case, why would you make these? You wouldn’t. But they are the best cookies, easy to make, and the dough should be chilled so you could theoretically freeze it and thaw when needed. Usually I make it early in the day and refrigerate, then roll into balls. I don’t find these that labour intensive, though, since there’s no rolling or decorating.

Before this gets any longer, I will close. After all, it’s time for my spin class! Which MIGHT be a good idea, given all these treats! Here’s to singing and spinning, my friends. Happy treat-making. xo

And why WOULDN’T we have a Christmas walrus?

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I was having a bit of a Monday-ish Monday; my older son needed to be at school for his sports med volunteering at 6:30 in the morning, so I had an abbreviated yoga practice and rushed home. We zipped over to the school, and half an hour later I got a text from him saying that it had been cancelled. This is the second time sports med volunteering had been cancelled with zero notice; the time it was cancelled after school was one thing, but this felt especially offensive. Then, my younger son realized with some dismay that his magazine rack that he had built for Industrial Arts and had brought home to stain on the weekend was still slightly damp; transporting a large, slightly-damp magazine rack to school without getting wood stain on everything was a bit of a feat. All of this before 7:30 on a Monday morning.

These two occurrences unsettled me more than they should have; I was already feeling a bit out of sorts with the discovery, late Sunday afternoon, that there was a mouse in my kitchen. If there is anything more insidiously disturbing than finding mouse droppings under the kitchen sink, I do not know what it is. What is with the mice problem lately? Longtime readers will remember the time I basically had a nervous breakdown from the previous kitchen mouse experience. How are all these mice getting in here? Why is this happening? I asked my husband, as if our house is constantly overrun by mice, instead of having one other such incident, back in 2013.

In any case, the problem has been resolved. My husband set a trap and not ten minutes later, as I was chopping up vegetables for Buddha Bowls, I heard it go off. Hellllllllppppppp! I screamed, until the boys came running and, shall we say, disposed of things. Another trap sat there untouched for 48 hours, so I was completely unprepared for the sight that greeted me when I reached in to get dishwasher detergent on Tuesday evening.

I started wordlessly screaming in a loud and high-pitched voice, not unlike someone getting ax-murdered in a horror movie. The kids had no idea what was wrong, but seemed to assume that I was having some kind of medical emergency as my older son grabbed my arm and started to escort me to my room, to force me to lie down. The door of the cupboard was still open, the dog was wandering around, and I had to tell them what was wrong but I found I could not form words at all. Language, what is that? All I could do was scream. “Mom, Mom, it’s okay, why don’t you lie down,” my older son said as I responded with a long AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Finally I managed to say disconnected things like “MOUSE” and “HELP” and “KEEP BARKLEY AWAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY.”

This is a long and roundabout way of saying that I was feeling a bit Fragile and Out Of Sorts, when I had a message from my friend Lyn (HI LYN), to go look on my doorstep. YOU GUYS. Look!

Math AND Christmas? Two of my favourite things! This makes up for everything! Festive Nicole has been reinstated! At least until the next mouse incident, which hopefully will be several years away, if ever.

Things have been pretty festive around here, dead mice and optional classes notwithstanding. People have been walking by and photographing our front yard, which looks like this:

I would like to point out the Christmas walrus, which my older son and husband picked up on a trip to Home Depot. The two of them really cannot be trusted to go shopping by themselves, and although a month ago I might have thought Why would anyone need a Christmas walrus? I now see their point. It’s really cute!

Have you guys heard about Whamageddon? It’s a game played on social media in which you actively avoid hearing the song Last Christmas; if you hear it – say, if you are out shopping – then you are OUT. Sudden death. By Last Christmas. This is a phenomenon I do not understand; why would anyone AVOID hearing Last Christmas? If anything, I actively seek it out. I have even downloaded a playlist curated by my friend Peggy (HI PEGGY) that is solely made up of different versions of Last Christmas. Clearly, this game is not for me.

As a matter of fact, I believe that Last Christmas – not the “OG,” as the kids say, but one of the newer versions – was the first Christmas song I heard this season, when I was at Superstore. I found myself singing along as I pushed my giant cart through the Health and Beauty section, wondering why they moved the cotton balls. I am a person who often finds myself singing audibly in public, and not just in a “The Best Way To Spread Christmas Cheer Is By Singing Loud For All To Hear” kind of way. I do this year-round. It’s my contribution to the world, I guess. I have to stop myself from singing out loud when I am at the gym, though, because I feel like loud singing with headphones on is not actually appreciated by the general public. I do this when I’m on my elliptical at home, but when I’m on the treadmill at the gym I have to content myself with merely lip-synching.

I take a Saturday morning spin class, and I feel I must tell you that it is not like other spin classes you may have attended. I guarantee it. The instructor is probably in his sixties, and the average age of the students in that class exceeds my own by at least two decades. It’s inspiring to see older people sweating along to the very eclectic musical selections by the instructor, but what I am really trying to convey is that this is not a youthful group. I have been to spin where the instructor was about nineteen years old, and there were black lights and strobe lights and the “retro old music” was the descriptor for such dance songs that would have been played in the bar, when I myself was nineteen. THIS IS NOT THAT KIND OF CLASS. Anyway, I was in spin and lip-synching/ singing softly under my breath to Holding Out For A Hero, when an older lady in a Tom Baker Cancer Survivor t-shirt, two bikes down, noticed me. She started singing very loudly along, gesturing to me in the universal sign of “pump up the volume.” It honestly made my whole day, the two of us, singing loudly in spin class, as the rest of the group smiled indulgently. The moral of this story is: don’t be afraid to sing out loud. Shine on, you crazy diamond. xo