My Hours of Rest and Relaxation

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I have long believed that to be healthy we need to balance the yin and yang in our lives, and if we do not get enough yin – rest, recovery, rejuvenation – then our bodies force us to, in the form of illness or injury. And indeed, any time I look back on my life and remember times when I was completely taken out by a virus or, in one spectacularly debilitating case in 2019, injury, I absolutely know that the time preceding that was one of stress and exhaustion.

Sometimes that can’t be helped, of course. I had two babies in less than eighteen months and the second one was colicky, and the ensuing sleeplessness and generalized exhaustion was beyond my control. However, there are many times in my life when I had sleeplessness and generalized exhaustion and it WAS in my control; I am a high-energy person and I have a tendency to Do More, Push Through, Just Keep Swimming, etcetera. If I don’t balance that level of activity and energy expenditure with adequate rest, disaster ensues. It’s a lesson I’ve had to relearn many times.

And so these days I am very tender with myself, I take care of myself like I would a small child. I make sure I am nourishing myself on every level: I ensure that I’m getting the proper sleep, that I’m resting emotionally and mentally, that I have adequate nutrition and hydration, and that I am spending time with people who fill up my soul.

Recently a number of friends mentioned that they feel a deep sense of guilt when relaxing, that they feel taking time to read or do other quiet solo activities feels “lazy,” and, although this wasn’t said outright, intimated that they really need to be productive to feel valued. I have been thinking about that a lot lately, particularly since reading The Relaxed Woman, which is affirming, transformative, and inspirational, and everyone should read it. I am going to become a Relaxed Woman evangelist, is what I’m saying.

But something really resonated with me, both with these conversations with my friends and also by reading The Relaxed Woman, and that is this feeling that in order to rest, we need to earn it, we do not deserve rest on its own.

I read Bridget Jones’s Diary when it came out in paperback, circa 1997, and at the time I found it hilariously funny and deeply relatable. There is a part where Bridget is talking with her friend Tom about her daily intake of calories.

“A thousand?” said Tom, incredulously. “But I thought you needed two thousand just to survive.”

I looked at him nonplussed. I realized that I have spend so many years being on a diet that the idea that you might actually need calories to survive has been completely wiped out of my consciousness. Have reached point where believe nutritional ideal is to eat nothing at all, and that the only reason people eat is because they are so greedy they cannot stop themselves from breaking out and ruining their diets.

So funny, back in 1997! So relatable! Look at us disgusting people, greedily eating food! I want to travel back in time and hug myself. This is especially relevant at this time of year, when eating regimes and body ideals abound: we don’t need to earn food. We deserve to eat just by existing on this planet, and similarly, we deserve to rest. We have value in who we are, not what we can do, not in how productive we are or how how much we can squeeze into a day, particularly for the benefit of other people.

Instead of asking, “Have I worked hard enough to deserve to rest?,” I’ve started asking, “Have I rested enough to do my most loving and meaningful work?” – The Relaxed Woman

I love January; I love the fresh-start energy of the month. I love having a fresh new planner and notebook, and plans on how to fill them. Today is where your book begins, the rest is still unwritten. But there is a balance between productivity and rest, and resting is not lazy. Giving our bodies, minds, and souls respite is not lazy. Taking time for ourselves in whatever ways we need is not selfish. We wouldn’t drive a car for every moment of the day and then be angry when it ran out of gas. We would just fill it with gas.

I think we have all internalized this ideal of Superwoman, that we can do everything at all times: we can parent perfectly and work hard and keep a spotless house and be thin and fit and gorgeous and whip up three perfect meals a day and it all looks Instagram-worthy at every moment. This Superwoman ideal, says the author of The Relaxed Woman, harms women by perpetuating the myth that women really don’t need to rest or to take time for themselves; they can do everything for everyone and put themselves last, always, and happily. It is anti-feminist, and so damaging to celebrate this idea that we can just work ourselves into the ground and be lauded for it, like modern day martyrs.

This poster, along with one depicting a fish and a bicycle, were on my office wall when I was in grad school, and although both concepts were over two decades old at the time, I still felt they were relevant, and mostly are still relevant to this day.

We have normalized the idea that a woman’s work is never done and I feel that in 2026, we should stop that. This is the month where we are all enthusiastically setting goals, and I do think that’s great. We can aim to improve areas of our lives while still taking time for ourselves without guilt, without shame, without feeling lazy or unworthy. Our work can be done. We can rest, in whatever way “resting” means.

My goals are, as every year, evergreen and unchanging, along with being extremely nebulous and difficult to quantify: ideas like being present and practicing patience, living life with arms wide open and go placidly amidst the noise and haste and remember what peace there may be in silence. Daily I subscribe to my REM Y REM practice, which stands for Reading, Exercise, Meditation, Yoga, and REM sleep; without those restful things I cannot be my best self and I cannot show up in the way that I want to.

In this month of goals and intentions and fresh starts, my wish is that we all know we are deserving of rest without having to “earn” it first, that we can aim for the stars AND take tender care of ourselves, that feelings of guilt and shame over resting and relaxing can dissipate, and that we become the person that our younger selves needed.

Weekly Reading

Radical Acceptance. Speaking of meditation! What a perfect choice for the first book of 2026! To be honest, I have been very slowly reading this book for the past several months, and just happened to finish it today. The lessons in Radical Acceptance are beautiful and loving; basically, for all you yogis and meditators out there, it’s about practicing loving kindness towards ourselves and others, and gives very practical advice on how to do that, using many very relatable examples. The author is not preachy, but instead – as you might expect – loving and kind in her writing. One great takeaway is the RAIN approach toward negative emotions: Recognize, Accept, Investigate, and Nourish. This really spoke to me and has helped me through some emotionally turbulent times. 

Moral Disorder. Of course I had to reread Moral Disorder after reading Margaret Atwood’s memoir! This is the most auto-fiction of all her collections, and it is one of my favourites. I love this glimpse of her life through interconnected stories, both from third and first person points of view.

After two solid weeks of intense and intentional rest – extra sleep, extra reading, lots of puzzles – I feel refreshed and ready to get back into my regular routine. Hello January! I hope you all are similarly rejuvenated and have taken – and are taking – adequate rest. xo

Holiday Roundup and Reading 2025

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Happy New Year, friends! The tree is down and the various decorations are back in their bins for another year, the house is clean, and I’m slowly and gently nudging myself back into my regular routine. I have had, as mentioned, a restful few weeks filled with restorative yoga, long dog walks, reading, and putting together puzzles.

I have also been cooking.

In my recent Ask Me Anything, Coco (HI COCO) asked what is the division of labour in your household, with your husband, and I will say that since he retired it is quite equitable. Prior to his retirement, the house, and the health and welfare of the inhabitants were strictly My Department, with the exception of Home Repairs, which were in his jurisdiction. In general, I was the Department of Health, Welfare, and Education. These days the kids are grown and my husband has the time to do all sorts of domestic duties, but there is one thing that remains the same: I am the Department of Nutrition. I do all the grocery shopping and I do all the meal planning, without exception I make dinner every day and I ensure that there are ingredients for lunch and breakfasts, which are fend-for-yourself affairs around here, and have been for many, many years. In turn, my husband and whichever son happens to be around clean the kitchen after dinner. It is a system that works well for us, as I truly enjoy cooking and I also like wielding the power of being the Person in Charge of the Meal Plan.

But during the holidays, when there are so many Special Meals, I wish I had a break from this food dictatorship of my own making.

It’s my own fault: my husband can cook and is more than willing to help, but as I am person who cooks with zero recipes and just flings things together, it’s hard to delegate. Sprinkle in some cumin. I don’t know how much. I also think that it’s impossible to get delegate the mental heavy lifting of figuring out what we are going to eat for a week and then procuring all the ingredients for them. I just want someone to magically make me exactly what I want without asking me what that is, and for that person to time travel backward to get the required groceries. Is that too much to ask? And listen, I know. I know that takeout exists and restaurants exist and we certainly COULD utilize those modern innovations, but they still require effort and I want it to be effortless.

Along with a chauffeur, Mike Vrabel, and an array of buskers who follow me around knowing exactly what songs I want to hear at the exact right time, I also want someone to read my mind and procure exactly what I want to eat every day – but only during the holidays, when it feels like meals have to be More Special Than Usual. The rest of the time I can, and want to, manage that on my own.

Our equitable division of labour does not extend to travel planning. Coco also asked how do you plan your travels, and this is what I do: absolutely nothing. Well, that’s not true. I will say, for example, I’ve always wanted to go to Morocco, and then, magically, I go to Morocco! I don’t know if this is how my family feels when dinner is always ready and delicious at the same time every night, but it’s kind of magical to have a husband who researches, plans, and then executes all our trips. I’m sure he occasionally wearies of the load – heavy is the head who wears the Travel or Meal Planning Crown – but in general he enjoys it and is good at it.

For my money, a good partnership has a nice balance of a Person Who Wants To Be A Dictator Of A Certain Thing, and a Person Who Goes With The Flow. For my husband, it’s oh, it’s stir-fry night, great! and for me, it’s where are we going again? You sent me the itinerary? Did I look at it? Two people cannot be both 100% in charge of dinner, and two people cannot be 100% in charge of travel planning. Alternately, two people cannot be so laissez-faire about either of those things, or neither of them would happen.

Speaking of which, my husband and I watched a movie on Netflix called Lonely Planet, which takes place in a writers’ retreat IN MOROCCO. Not only was the movie visually stunning, but we were in most of the places. We were there! We were right there! we kept saying to each other over and over. It is also a romance between Laura Dern and Liam Hemsworth and believe you me, I was here for it. HOO BOY. Sexytimes! There was a lot about writing processes, and the challenges faced, and I really cannot recommend it enough.

Laura and Liam were exactly here!
And here!
AND HERE! OMG!!!

Holiday Reading

In 2025, I read 153 books and 91% of those were written by women. The two male authors that I read this last week of December bumped that percentage down, but as is my wont, the male authors are gay and/ or British.

Calypso. In the leadup to Christmas, I had finished all my library books and wanted something light to read, on the heels of Wave, which was the opposite of light. I decided to reread an old favourite; this is my absolute number one Sedaris collection, and I love it so much. I will say that, after reading Happy Go Lucky, I found much of it poignant and sad. If you know, you know.

What Matters in Jane Austen. This deep dive into the work of Jane Austen is RIGHT up my alley! This is NOT meant for the person who read Pride and Prejudice once and liked it. This is for the Super Fan – like me! It really gets into the weeds – what card games the characters play, what characters never talk, what incomes reflect – and I am here for it. It’s extremely detailed and I loved it! 

Book of Lives: A Memoir of Sorts. I have been a Margaret Atwood fan for decades, and I have been nosily curious about her life for almost as long, gleaning what I could from her many wonderful novels and short stories. I particularly pored over Cat’s Eye, The Edible Woman, Bluebeard’s Egg, and Moral Disorder as providing clues about her fascinating life – indeed, she has lived many lives, as the title suggests, and as we all do. I will say that particularly after Moral Disorder, I wondered what drew her to Graeme Gibson, and her memoir provides some insight to that, although he seemed to me to be a man with a lot of baggage and difficulties. Red flags abound in every way! However, the heart wants what it wants, even if Amy March and I both disagree with the sentiment that you can’t choose who you fall in love with. In any case, it was so interesting to read about Atwood and Gibson working with others to really put CanLit in the spotlight; they did so much for Canadian literature and the publishing industry. Atwood’s early life, a source of much fascination for me, is described in detail, as are her various writing processes for her various books. I was so happy to read how she wrote my beloved favourites, and in particular, my number-one favourite of all time, The Blind Assassin. Friends, this work of art was panned by the New York Times, proof that reviewers often get it terribly wrong. In any case, Atwood is a NATIONAL TREASURE and this memoir is everything I could have ever hoped for, and more.

Goodness, I meant for this just to be a brief roundup of the books I read over the holidays, and look what happened. I guess when I take a break, a lot of thoughts pile up for the old blog. I hope you have a wonderful weekend, friends, and I’ll be talking all things rest and relaxation on Monday. xo

Boyhouse Year In Review 2025

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Hi friends! Happy New Year’s Eve! I hope you have all been having a lovely holiday season. I have, as I alluded to before, been getting a lot of rest, restoring myself to start the New Year refreshed.

2025 was a year marked by a lot of difficult, and frankly, terrifying things in the world, and for me personally there was also loss and sadness. But there were many happy things too: travel, time with friends, seeing my children flourish. My intention every year is to be present and grounded, to find joy in both the ordinary and extraordinary, and I did that. Things weren’t always perfect, but they were really good, and it feels strange to say that after a year that started with threats of our country’s annexation. I guess it’s okay to find joy where we can, to make the world a better place just by shining our little lights as much as possible. What I’m saying is that I know, I know that 2025 was hard, and I am sending hugs and Care Bear Stares, and trying to shine my little light in your direction, friends.

Here’s what happened for me in 2025.

January

I talked about books and having adult children, I had some dental work done, I issued everyone a very gentle yoga challenge which I should have followed up on, but never did, I answered a lot of questions about marriage and also talked about fibre, the postal strike was over and I started to receive things in the mail, I talked about mourning my old body and clothes, and I discussed all the things I love about January.

February

I talked about things that are confusing, the weather turned cold and I listened to a podcast about weird erotica, I discussed the concept of “reseating the theatre,” and I went to Mexico and entered into my tankini era.

March

If you’re looking for a vacation/ beach read, here is a good list, I was grumpy, it was five years from the start of the pandemic and I had five habits I kept from that time, I shared my meal planning techniques, we celebrated our anniversary and a couple of birthdays on the exact same day, I embraced not being in style, and we had a frog in our house.

April

Music is always in my head, and sometimes it leads to wildly varied thoughts; everything from travel to paint night to bumper stickers. I made everyone uncomfortable by asking them to tell me something beautiful about themselves, and the comment section of this post is wonderful. I turned fifty, and I talked about all my favourite things throughout my fifty years. I also had a big party and planted my garden, but not at the same time.

May

I had five cakes over my birthday month, I talked about radical acceptance and unconditional friendliness, except with regards to weirdos on Facebook, all the cool kids were doing A Day In The Life, so I did too, I started the 100-Day Project – spoiler alert! I did not finish it, Homegrown Salad Season started, I discussed ducks, dialects, and Daddy Cool, and I talked about life-changing things such as BCAAs and eyebrow mascara.

June

I wrote a series of posts in June about NOURISHMENT, which was really fun. I talked about nourishing the brain through mental exercises, nourishing the body through glorious food and joyful movement, nourishing the soul through nature, nourishing everything through sleep, and nourishing my relationships. The Favourite Things were, of course, Nourishing! I think I need to write more series in 2026.

July

I had some gardening wins and some podcast woes, I had some strange downward trajectories involving both Peloton and birds, I actually spent a week time-tracking, and it was just as boring as I thought it would be, I toured through my bookshelves and introduced my eclectic book organization system, and I said bye-bye to July with a few Favourite Things.

August

While my husband and son were away, I played…with my friend Birchie, who visited all the way from the American Midwest! (HI BIRCHIE) Then she left, and I was alone with my Greek salads and British period dramas. AND THEN the guys came home to a vast array of homegrown vegetables, I talked about enjoying the things I have, including seventy-seven tee shirts, I reread the transformative Your Body Your Best Friend and mused on how we can be our own best friends, and my Favourite Things were in memory of my beloved yoga students.

September

I was drowning in tomatoes and talking to people in the grocery store, I talked about what I would do in the (improbable) case that I attain billionaire status, I pulled the figurative Ferrari out of the garage, it was the great Judy Blume reread, I talked about AI girlfriends and also updated everyone on my garden, and I talked about fall-themed Favourite Things such as grapes, new shoes, and also a killer hair product.

October

I went to Morocco, I showed you the travel essentials for going to Morocco, I talked about the wonderful and not-so-wonderful people I met in Morocco, and I shared my Favourite Things from Morocco. There was a theme!

November

It was the start of Tiny Secret Festive Season, I shared my enormous library haul and my travel reading list, my coffee maker malfunctioned, leading to panic, I was faced with some very minor mysteries, following in the footsteps of its friend, the coffee maker, my stand mixer malfunctioned, and I fought the November gloom with some Favourite Things!

December

I talked about holiday music and Advent calendars, I got to tour the back room of a Canada Post outlet, I shared five-star books, music, and podcasts, and also confessed that I have turned into my own dad, I relayed that my husband and my own love languages are both Acts of Service, I toured around my holiday decorations, the theme of which is Nostalgic Festive Chaos, and my Favourite Things were warm and yummy-smelling.

Thank you for being here on this journey with me. I wish you all health and happiness in 2026; may the year treat us all with kindness and gentleness. xo

Nostalgic Festive Chaos

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I love looking around other people’s houses, and I love seeing all the little touches that make a house a home: photos and artwork, knickknacks and book stacks, colour and materials and furniture. I particularly love it during the holiday season when I think homes reflect the personalities of the inhabitants. My personal theme for holiday decor is Nostalgic Festive Chaos. Nothing need match, and indeed, it’s preferred if it doesn’t!

My tree in particular is a historical record of our family. We add at least one ornament every year, something that speaks in some way to the year that has passed. When the kids were younger, my parents would give each of them an ornament that would also reflect their interests that year, which means we have everything on our tree from Lightning McQueen and Thomas the Tank Engine to Roman Reigns as a snowman, the latter of which careful readers might be able to discern in the photo above.

Every ornament has a story; sometimes the stories are simply that I took my preschoolers on an outing to Walmart and we ended up with stuffed decorative snowmen, and sometimes the stories are more involved and emotional.

The Santa in the middle came from Rome, the white and red ball in the very bottom right-hand corner came from Tofino the year of the Vancouver Olympics, and the ball beside the snowman came from my best friend Jen (HI JEN).

This year’s new ornaments came from a ceramics factory tour in Fes: the goat and the hand of Fatima. My friend Sandi (HI SANDI) brought me that snowman with a Scottish cow from her trip to Scotland; she has the same one, so when I look at the ornament I feel extra connected to her. My sweet friend Michelle (HI MICHELLE) sent me the handmade gnome, my friend Sharyl’s husband (HI SHARYL) carved the little snowman in the bottom left corner, and the Clue ornament came from my parents, after many, many games of Clue with the boys at their house one summer. Each of the four snow globes has a family member’s name on it, and the narwhal was our ornament from 2020, because I could not bear to have anything on the tree that reminded me of masks or Covid or isolation. A narwhal seemed much the better choice! Bye Buddy! Hope you find your dad!

One of the most marvellous things about having children is that their personalities are all their own. One of my sons dutifully hangs all his childhood craft ornaments, most notably the kindergarten photo of him in a Santa hat mounted on a CD and surrounded by glitter, but he puts them on the very back of the tree, unperceived by anyone. The other son insists on having his preschool angel in the most visible spot on the tree. Every year we laugh at it, because the face. The face is like something out of a horror movie. This year it’s next to our Barkley ornament, and close to Bob Ross, even if it is as unartistic as can be. I love how different my boys are in this respect. It’s like the New Year’s that they came home from the same party: one of them was the designated driver, who made sure everyone got home safely, and the other one was missing his shirt.

Twenty-five years ago, my husband and I were visiting his parents and I gathered these gigantic pine cones from this very property, so it feels very full-circle to have them on the table in this house. I have displayed them in this bowl for twenty-five Christmases now.

I have had this Nativity scene for even longer; I bought the figures in Mexico in 1997, and every year setting up the creche is an event. The gnome in the background was given to me by my friend Sammi (HI SAMMI) on the first Christmas we lived here, and behind the creche is a bowl of rocks and driftwood from a long-ago trip to Vancouver Island, which is displayed year round, and to which I add some ornaments from my husband’s childhood. I have to be careful though, because ornaments from the 60s are VERY fragile. I have, sadly, shattered a few accidentally.

In my last office Christmas party before resigning, the executive assistant to the CEO had made – by hand – one of these felt snowmen for every one of the 150 people at the party. The work that went into that astounds me, but then, I am unable to even sew on a button, as evidenced by the missing buttons on these fellows. Buttonless or not, I display them every year in honour of my former career and for the tireless woman who always went above and beyond in every way. The vase and candlesticks were wedding gifts from my husband’s company, and I like to fill the former with ornaments that are missing hooks or are otherwise unsuitable for the tree.

I had many worries when we moved into this house two years ago, and one of the most consuming worries was where are we going to hang the stockings. I definitely had better things to worry about than not having a mantel, however, I will say that I am pleased with this stocking placement. The low-key Advent calendar was bought on one of those I must get out of the house with preschoolers trip to Walmart, to ceremoniously count down to Christmas.

Last, but definitely not least in this tour of Nostalgic Festive Chaos is this pair of candles that I purchased from London Drugs in 1999 for our new apartment. The snowman has a bite taken out of his hat, courtesy of my then-teething older son, when he was eight months old.

Speaking of bites and chaos, this weekend was our Annual Gingerbread Decorating.

Weekly Reading

HOLD ONTO YOUR HATS. This week’s list is CHAOS.

Wild Dark Shore. Wow, what an ending! There are so many twists in this book and I didn’t see ANY of them coming! My friend Suzanne (HI SUZANNE), who loved this book enormously, warned me nervously that it is “dystopian-adjacent” and it IS. It is just teetering on the edge of dystopian which, of course, is something I avoid at all costs. Why, though? Suzanne asked me what it is about dystopian novels that are a big NOPE for me, and I really had to think about it. What is it? I think it’s the despair and the futuristic feel. I also think that climate-change dystopian novels – of which this is one – give me anticipatory anxiety. The thought that this COULD happen is really, really scary for me and I’d rather not read about it. HOWEVER. Like she said – and I agree – this is more dystopian-ADJACENT, and if the story was not so compelling and the writing so beautiful, I probably would have abandoned it. The story itself, and the message of a family fighting for each other, and the hope that goes into just living when the world around you is being destroyed, was a message that I really liked. The twists and turns were also so well done! So while this is a book that is upsetting in idea – people taking care of a seed bank off the coast of Antarctica, seeds that are being saved for the end of the world as we know it – the story itself was both beautiful and thrilling.

The Face on the Milk Carton. Another one from my friend Suzanne (HI SUZANNE, again) who had read this with her daughter. What happens when a girl recognizes her younger self as a “missing child” on the side of a milk carton? Was she kidnapped? Memories start to surface for her and she seeks the truth. This is a YA book and I would say it’s for slightly older tweens, as there is a surprising (for me) amount of sex talk between the 15 year old protagonist and her boyfriend. Actually her boyfriend is a bit of a sex pest, which feels accurate. I remember this phenomenon from being a 15 year old girl myself in 1990, when this was published.

Wave. When I read about this book on my friend Julie’s blog (HI JULIE) I thought it was a novel about a woman who, along with her parents, husband, and two small children, was caught in the tsunami in Sri Lanka 2004. She was the only survivor. I was surprised, then, when I picked it up to see it is not a novel but a MEMOIR. And it is very raw, as you can well imagine, the descriptions of actually being swept away and then dealing with the sudden death of all her family members. Eventually the woman goes on to heal, but it is obviously very painful in every way. A remarkable story and one that is devastating. 

The Relaxed Woman. I have not felt this way about a book since I read Your Body, Your Best Friend in August 2020. I wondered if this woman and I actually share a brain and, interestingly enough, she is also an Ashtanga yogi and meditation practitioner. Maybe we are long-lost sisters! This incredibly affirming, uplifting, inspirational, and also very smart and well-researched book examines the guilt and shame that we as women are conditioned to feel when we require rest and restoration. It examines the very damaging ideal of “Superwoman,” the woman who can do it all and push through everything in order to be as efficient and productive as possible. It shows that not only is the Superwoman mindset terribly damaging to our personal physical, mental, and emotional health – not to mention our relationships and actual quality of work – but it is also damaging to feminism and women as a whole. When we refuse to take the rest our bodies, minds, and souls need, we are perpetuating this myth that we need to “earn” rest, just like we need to “earn” calories. It’s just wrong. We don’t need to EARN anything, we deserve it just by being humans on this earth. And in fact, we need it. Our bodies need it, our souls need it, our minds need it. This shows how constant “busyness” damages our physical health – including metabolism – and our minds, with brain fog and cognitive decline. The book blends neuroscience and psychology to show – without victim blaming that can often rear its head in these types of books, I’m looking at you, Dr Mate – how to journey towards becoming a Relaxed Woman. There are very practical and gentle suggestions in this book, and if I was a billionaire, I would buy one for every woman on this earth. I am not, sadly, and so I will just buy my own copy and tell everyone about it. I put sticky notes in for reference but then realized the entire book is a sticky note. I have so much more to say about this, but will write a blog post about it – but not until January, because I am RESTING.

Yes, I am resting – I am taking a holiday break and will be back for my annual roundup on New Year’s Eve. Until then, friends, take care of yourselves and I hope you all have a beautiful holiday season. xo

Nicole’s Favourite Things: The “It Was Warm and Smelled of Yummy Things” Edition

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At this time of year when my kids were small, we would read many holiday-themed books, and the favourite of all of ours was The Littlest Christmas Tree, about a tiny tree who despairs of ever becoming a Christmas tree because of his diminutive size.

Eventually the tree is taken by the tree lot man, who is actually a squirrel. “They walked for what seemed like forever, and then suddenly stopped. The man carried the Littlest Tree inside, where it was warm and smelled of yummy things. The Littlest Tree looked around and thought Oh, this must be a home.“

I would pause at that point because the three of us would all be teary-eyed and emotional. This must be a home. I think about that all the time, and to this day both of my sons remind me of it.

One of my goals in life has been to have a home that feels like a home, warm and smelling of yummy things, and I think I have achieved that. My sons told me that our house WAS famous for its smell of baking and general plethora of baked goods, back in the day when it would be swarmed by boys. This is MUCH better than one friend, whose house apparently smelled like garbage, and another, whose house smelled like feet. Well, that latter one had three boys in athletics, so there’s really no getting around that.

Anyway, I do think this is the season for warmth and yummy things, and on that note:

Nicole’s Favourite Things: The “It Was Warm and Smelled of Yummy Things” Edition

It’s Mint Chocolate Season, Motherfuckers

Am I just going to say It’s X Season, Motherfuckers for every single Favourites Thing post going forward? I make no promises but it feels like a pattern. Every fall – or, technically, late summer – the Pumpkin Spice People get all excited, and I am happy for them, but I am not of them. I merely think yes, yes, my pretties, wait until November 1st, when it is MY time to shine. Oh, how I love mint chocolate. I love it in all iterations. I love making mint squares and peppermint bark – both, I should say, are vegan, if that’s something you look for in your holiday treats – I love eating peppermint Lindt and York patties and After Eights and even Chipits mint chips straight out of the bag, in a minty emergency. In my recent Ask Me Anything, San (HI SAN) asked what my favourite ice cream flavour is and, sadly, ice cream is no longer part of my life. Well, non-dairy ice cream is, but I have yet to find my favourite flavour in non-dairy form, namely mint chocolate chip.

No matter. Frozen minty treats are just as good!

Typically, I drink my coffee black. When you drink in excess of fifty cups a week, black is definitely the way to go. However, on weekends I like what I call, when talking to Rex, a little treat-treat, and then I pull out the peppermint mocha non-dairy creamer.

Isn’t that mug adorable? My niece picked it out for me, saying Aunty Nicole loves mugs AND gnomes, we have to get it! It’s true! I DO love both of those things!

Wine Time

Speaking of gnomes, my dear friends Jen and Dom (HI JEN HI DOM) gave me these VERY fancy wine glasses for my birthday. Wine, gnomes, Christmas? ALL OF MY FAVOURITES ROLLED INTO ONE.

It reminded me somewhat of a little friend of my son’s who, for her sixth birthday, declared the party theme to be ROYAL CHRISTMAS TEA PARTY!!! My friend, her mother, thought that was a lot of specificity for a sixth birthday party and yet, the Royal Christmas Tea Party went off without a hitch. For me, my weekly wine time is now Christmas Gnome Wine Party!

Love Makes Little Things Grow

Speaking of gnomes, my friend Joy (HI JOY), who is the actual physical embodiment of her name brought me this:

Isn’t it the cutest? If that wasn’t enough for my off-season growing love, my friend Sandi (HI SANDI) gave me an amaryllis bulb.

Since Noelle, my non-blooming Christmas cactus is not only still non-blooming, but seems to be almost dead, I’m happy to have something new to grow and love.

Does anyone remember the television show Clifford’s Puppy Days, where the theme song was Love Makes Little Things Grow? If you need a little nostalgic festive cry, there’s your link.

Isn’t She Lovely

For those of you following along with the Saga of the Stand Mixer, here is the beauty that now graces my home. Buddy the Elf, what’s your favourite colour? This! This is my favourite colour although not, obviously, for clothing. Wearing robin-egg blue makes me look corpse-adjacent.

When you have an appliance for a long time, you get used to the way that it works, you know all its little quirks and ways, and then when a new appliance comes along, the difference in functionality is vast. This was like trading in a broken down old Dodge Caravan with wood siding for a Porsche 911. I was absolutely astonished at how well this new mixer works, how efficient and quick it mixes everything together perfectly. It has an attachment that has a SPATULA BUILT IN. It scrapes the bowl ALL BY ITSELF. It is a whole new world for me, friends. It made baking my grandma’s gingersnaps a snap.

Let me tell you, this made our house smell like yummy things, because these are the yummiest cookies around.

Scent of a Cookie-Woman

I have long loved Dove products, and when I saw a set of Limited Edition Sugar Cookie-scented products, I was all in. Marketers know what’s what, let me tell you. They know someone like me is shopping for just a regular product, but then the words Limited Edition jump out, and before you know it, I’m exfoliating and shaving with things that smell like…well, not really sugar cookies. I would never sniff this and say sugar cookies, yes. It’s a pleasant, ginger-forward scent which I do not associate with sugar cookies, but, as mentioned above, I do enjoy it.

Outfit of the Month

I was invited to a festive Sunday afternoon open house, which is a very fun kind of gathering that calls for what I think of as Festive Casual Fashion. I had a perfect outfit for it, but before I get to that, let me tell you about the two remarkable things that happened at said party.

First, I was talking to a woman who I had just met, and we were doing the customary small-talk of basic backstories when she interrupted me to say that the math wasn’t adding up. She went on to say that I must be older than she thought, because I had mentioned my sons and their ages, 20 and 21. This woman thought I was thirty-five or thirty-six. Reader, I married her.

Another woman, unknown to both of us, joined in on our conversation and this is where things took a turn. We three were talking about our dogs, all of us being dog people and dog lovers, and this is a very important point. All of us. Dog lovers. Dog owners. When I mentioned Rex the Bernedoodle, the new woman asked if I knew much about the breed, before going on to say that Bernese Mountain dogs are notably short-lived, and the Bernese that she had known had all died not long past their fifth birthday. This was after – AFTER – I had relayed Rex’s age, which is four and a half. She hoped, she said, that this wouldn’t be the case for me. Maybe, she mused aloud, the poodle part would add to the longevity, but who knew, because, as she said before, every Bernese she knew died young.

If you could have seen the look on my face and that on the woman who mistook me for someone much younger. Our faces were the absolute personification of What The Fuck. We both stood, mute, with mouths open, heads tilted to the side, and a slight furrow in our brows.

I think I even made that hand gesture, before excusing myself to get another cookie. Some people are just VERY BAD at conversation, and this woman was clearly such a person. She didn’t even backpedal, she just KEPT GOING. Small dogs live so long! And big ones die early. Especially Bernese.

Anyway. Let’s get to the outfit! These pants are probably the most comfortable pants ever, and that is coming from someone who has spent the entirety of 2025 searching for and wearing comfortable pants. They are from Lululemon, and the turtleneck sweater is one I’ve had for a decade or so. The boots are winter ones, and the pendant was a gift from Sandi, last Christmas (HI SANDI, AGAIN). (I gave her my heart) (the very next day she gave it away but gave me a pendant instead which I love and wear for every occasion that I can).

I hope you are having a week in which you are warm, and surrounded by the smells of yummy things. I personally will be making more yummy things on the weekend, because this week, friends, THIS WEEK. I am a husk of a woman, let’s put it that way. I had multiple administrative things to do before Friesen Press closes for the holiday season, I went to the MALL to buy a new phone, which yay, new phone, but also, the mall the week before Christmas is not for the faint of heart, and speaking of things that are not for the faint of heart, I was at Costco and Superstore. I will only say that in both cases I kept saying to myself put your patience pants on and everyone is a beginner at some point, not everyone is adept at Costco shopping and we are all gathered together in this thing called life, buying groceries. I will say that I got into a very involved and lovely conversation with an employee who was tidying the carts in the parking lot. It started with apples and ended up with Nickelback and Guy Fieri, both of whom the Cart Fellow had met and both of whom we admire. Do not come at me! I am unapologetic in my love for both, and I will hear no dissenters!

Take care of yourselves during this busy time, friends. Don’t forget to treat yourself to some yummy things. Maybe take a trip to Flavourtown! xo

Acts of Service

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While decorating the tree and the interior of the house is firmly a whole-family affair, putting up the outdoor lights and decorations are solely in my husband’s jurisdiction, with some help from one or both of our sons. He was finishing setting them up a few weeks ago, and when I looked out the kitchen window I saw him hanging a large red ball on our heart tree, a miniature tree whose branches grow in a downward swoop. I knew immediately what he was doing and I ran outside, with Rex at my heels. Is that a Charlie Brown Christmas tree? I squealed, and he said that it was.

In my recent Ask Me Anything (still open!), Suzanne (HI SUZANNE) asked: How did you know your husband was The One? At this point in time, my husband has been a part of my life for longer than he hasn’t. We were friends for almost two years before we started dating, and by “dating,” I mean “having sex,” since we had spent much time in each other’s company on platonic dates prior to that. How did you go from friends to more than friends? someone asked me, when I related my husband’s apparent 20 month seduction plan. Um, we were supposed to go see The Full Monty but ended up having sex? I guess I saw A Full Monty, if not The Full Monty.

Anyway, by that time, I knew that he was everything I wanted in a man: he was, and is, very smart, logical, and handy, fun to be around and to do things with but also responsible and serious, and, not incidentally, incredibly attractive. I would say that all of those attributes – especially his attractiveness – have only increased with age and time. In addition to that, when it comes to love languages we share the same one, which makes marriage and life a lot easier, and that is Acts of Service.

My husband does many things every day just to make me happy. Sometimes these are big things, like building an entire garden complete with garden boxes from scratch, but sometimes they are smaller things, like taking my car out just to fill it with gas. And sometimes it is putting up Christmas lights and creating a Charlie Brown tree that I can see from my kitchen window.

For the past fifteen years or more, my husband has set the timer for our Christmas lights so that they not only come on in the late afternoon, but also at 4:30 in the morning, so I can look at them when I have my coffee and practice yoga. It’s those kinds of little things that make a happy marriage, I think.

Marriage is an interesting thing; if you’re lucky, it goes on a long time and you can grow and change together while still maintaining the core of who you are as an individual. And it goes through so many stages over the years and decades: there are choppy waters and smooth sailing, there are times when you can’t keep your hands off each other and times when you’re so exhausted by babies and toddlers that you can’t abide more touching. There are times when life is so busy and so stressful that you feel like semi-amiable roommates who fuck once in a while. But then there’s a time when you just feel so fortunate to have found one another, and hopefully that time lasts for most, if not all, of the marriage.

No matter what endeavor I come up with, my husband is supportive. I have only to mention that I want to go somewhere or do something, and by the time I turn around he’s knee-deep in research about how to make it happen. Although, I will say he is less than enthusiastic about my recent world war obsession. How long will this go on? he asked in a tone that can only be described as “despairing,” when I mentioned Blitzkrieg. You’re only on Blitzkrieg? The war has barely started! You’ve been talking about this for weeks! I didn’t have the heart to tell him it’s an ongoing series and they drop new episodes all the time. My son suggested that this was going to be our new reality, and I will be talking about war for the rest of our lives. God, I hope not. I miss the person I used to be back in November, listening to podcasts about skin care, before I became a Military Strategist. At this time of year I should be listening to podcasts about holiday fashion and parties, or the best books of 2025, and instead I just downloaded four hours’ worth of episodes about the assassination of Franz Ferdinand.

Weekly Reading

I had a great week of reading, but I have to mention that I had a DNF this week. It’s been my goal to DNF more when a book is not hitting, so I can spend time with books I love, rather than…not. The book in question was The Egg and I; it had potential but there were three racist slurs within the first two chapters of this supposedly humourous book, and that was just three too many. I know it’s “of its time” but no thanks.

The Road To Tender Hearts. In the Acknowledgements section, the author says of the house she lived in from 2020-2021, “that rental house gave us two gas leaks, two basement floods, a gang of rats who nested in our car and caused $1400 in damage (not covered by insurance because the car “didn’t explode” FU GEICO), black mold on the walls, lead in the water, three trees that the arborist said were going to fall on the house after he came to cut down one, poison ivy that blanketed the yard, a neighbor who stabbed her sister on the day we moved in, and a teenager who crashed his car driving too fast and died at the base of our driveway. When we moved out, I sent the new tenant a message to make sure she filtered her water, and she wrote back: “Did you ever have any paranormal experiences in this house?” “No,” I wrote back. “But that could explain some things.””
Now, if this paragraph made you laugh a horrified coughing laugh like it did for me, then you must read this book immediately. Because while she doesn’t write about a house that’s actively trying to kill her, she does say she wanted to write a book about every single terrible and traumatic thing she could think about…but funny. And did she ever. This book is the weirdest heart-warming delight of a book about all the journeys to death one can have, and I loved it with all of my (tender) heart. 

Wreck. The poem that starts “Your children are not your children” by Kahlil Gibran came to mind a lot while I was reading this book. “You may give them your love, but not your thoughts, For they have their own thoughts.” On the surface this – much anticipated for me, I love Catherine Newman! – book is about a woman grappling with a strange autoimmune diagnosis and her own mortality, while also coming to terms with a fatal accident in her town that is only tangentially connected to her and her family. But to me it was about loving and accepting people even when their lives and choices are different from your own, and what it is like to be a mother of adult children. I will say that my favourite parts of this book were the scenes with the local Buy Nothing group. Did that ever take me back to my Calgary days! “To gift: leftover pizza from my kid’s birthday party. To gift: coconut milk, expired six months ago. To gift: a variety of Sephora samples.” (That last one was me). Thanks again to my friend Lisa (HI LISA) for sending me a SIGNED and personalized copy of this book!

Because of Winn-Dixie. Oddly enough, this book is referenced extensively in Save The Cat! Writes a Novel, and so I decided to pick it up. It’s about a girl who adopts a big dog who subsequently won’t let her out of his sight and also makes her life immeasurably better. Relatable! It’s a very sweet story about letting people into your life, not judging people for their past but for their present actions, and that everyone has sadness within. I wondered why I hadn’t ever read this lovely little book as a child and then realized I was twenty-five when it was published.

This is by no means a flex because none of us have control over the weather, but we have been having such a mild December, with drizzly rain and, other than one short-lived day, no snow. Looking at photos of my friends from Alberta, Ontario, Saskatchewan and the Midwestern US, I feel like I’m on an entirely different planet. Although this is my third December living here, I am still not used to rain in December. Maybe I never will get used to it! In any case, every day we are edging closer to the least amount of daylight – just over eight hours now, sunset at 3:56, sunrise at 7:47 – which makes the outdoor lights even more of a gift. Have a beautiful week, friends. xo

Five For Friday: The 2025 Five Star Edition

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  • My New Personality and Identity as a War Buff. Spotify Wrapped was released a few weeks ago, and I looked dispassionately at my top five podcasts, all of which were chatty-style, women-hosted, independent podcasts. It felt like a far-off memory, a whole different world, because over these same past few weeks, I have listened to nothing but the podcast The Rest is History, specifically about the lead-up to and the specifics of World War II. The same Australian man who bonded with me over White Wine In The Sun had recommended it, and, interestingly enough, his wife had recommended Palace Confidential, which I was obsessed with until The Rest is History. I can now listen to nothing else. It’s like my life has been divided into two parts: before the podcast, and after. It has become my entire personality. At this point I have lost count of the number of episodes I have listened to, but I think I am well into thirty hours. In the time Before the Podcast, I would have said that I was pretty well versed in this subject, having received an A in a 300-level German History From 1870 to post-World War II, back in 1995, but I was wrong. I have learned so much. This podcast is incredibly detailed; for example, it took three episodes just to recount the invasion of Poland. I have been robotically reciting facts left and right about the Beer Hall Putsch and the fight for iron ore in Sweden and the 1938 German annexation of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia. I have drawn parallels between the slow build of the Nazi party to other international current events. I have been astonished by the vast number of German spa hotels which serve as a backdrop for the strategic goings-on in the 1930s. I have no other topics of conversation. If I am not listening to the podcast, I am thinking about the podcast. When I finished all twenty episodes of World War II, I started in on World War I. I don’t even recognize myself anymore. I am out of control. Next thing you know I will eschew women’s literary fiction and will start reading nonfiction tomes about military strategy. Maybe The Art of War. I have become A War History Buff. I have turned into my own dad. What’s next? Will I start watching the six o’clock news? Will I take up curling? Will I drive into town every morning to pick up a copy of the Calgary Herald and then get into long and involved conversations with the women who work at Shopper’s Drug Mart? I mean, if we substitute “Shopper’s Drug Mart” and “Calgary Herald” for “any place in which I am interacting with a customer service representative,” then I’m already there. If I start swanning around town wearing Dockers, my transformation will be complete.
  • I’m a Weirdo, What the Hell am I Doing Here? Although I listen to podcasts – or, lately, A Single Podcast – as I go about the more mundane tasks of my life, I also enjoy a lot of music, and this is where Spotify Wrapped becomes most interesting. When it comes to my top song of the year, it’s never what I think it will be. Indeed, this year’s came as a big surprise. What an eclectic mix of songs! Longtime readers may remember that Dog and Butterfly was, once, my top song, and that was astounding enough. Creep! To be sure, I don’t listen to any one song a lot – Creep had a mere 33 listens – because my favourite playlists are all so long. “Nicole Karaoke” and “Nicole Workout,” my two most-listened to playlists, are 19 hours each, and even “Nicole Christmas” is five and a half hours, which is a lot since, as my sons tell me, there are only six songs in various versions. This is obviously not true, I have more than six songs on my Christmas playlist, although it is a fact that I have five versions of Baby, It’s Cold Outside, and an entire playlist curated by my friend Peggy (HI PEGGY) that is six hours of Last Christmas covers.
  • Queens, A King, and Country. When it comes to Top Artists, not one is connected with my Top Songs. Aretha has been my number-one artist for years, and Whitney certainly wasn’t a surprise, but Zac Brown was the dark horse in this race. Truly, things got a bit skewed as my husband insisted on listening to our son’s “Country Bangers” playlist for at least half of a twenty-hour road trip, and “Country Bangers” is, by my estimation, at least 75% Zac Brown. I like Zac Brown just fine, but a number three spot seems excessive.
  • Five Star Books, or the Books That I Can’t Stop Thinking About. I know, it’s madness to discuss five-star books two weeks before the end of the year, but this is my third year in a row of doing this exact post at this exact time of the year, and I don’t want to break the chain. Also, I am sure I’ll be noting five-star books of late December next year, just as I am going to mention my final three five-star reads of 2024: The Wedding People, The Knockout Queen, and Tell Me Everything. For 2025 (so far): Moon Road, Isola, Notes On Your Sudden Disappearance, Girl, Woman, Other, Death By A Thousand Cuts, Animal Instinct, What Are You Going Through, Sky Daddy, Show Don’t Tell, So Late In The Day, Shark Heart, Dream Count, Audition, Maggie; or, A Man and a Woman Walk Into a Bar, The Thing Around Your Neck, The Love Haters, The Correspondent, The Road To Tender Hearts.
  • Five Star Re-Reads, or the Books I Love Beyond Belief. What, I ask, is the point of having shelves full of books if you’re not going to reread them until they literally fall apart in your hands? It’s a great joy of my life. Here are my five-star rereads of 2025: All Along You Were Blooming, The Husband’s Secret, Mansfield Park, Devotions, Hateship Courtship Friendship Loveship Marriage, Standard Deviation, Single Carefree Mellow, Sandwich, Songs At The River’s Edge, The Joy Luck Club.

There were lots of five star experiences in 2025: we had some great travel, the garden was a success, and I turned fifty. Although, according to Spotify, that’s inaccurate.

I mean, honestly, it’s not wrong. Do you have five-star books, playlists, podcasts, music, or anything to share with me? Tell me everything. xo