Sick

You know you are sick when the bed is an ocean. When you hear the house downstairs-Kids high voices, Aaron's lower and then you just fall back asleep and wake up two hours later and you still haven't said good morning to the kids.

Me and the bed have been close buddies for 2 days. I lay in bed so much I got sore lying in bed. Yesterday I was freezing cold under all the blankets. Today I had the brilliant thought I should go to the doctor tommorow. I was too sick yesterday to think about that.

Food is gorgeous when you have been sick and haven't eaten. It is also shocking. I have a painful sore throat. So yesterday I had hot tea. In the middle of the night I had some water and it tasted like ice my throat was so hot. And today I had an apple and I put ALL my attention to that apple.

It tasted so sweet. And I could feel it popping in my throat, and covering it with juice. I only ate half and was done. I'm still not hungry.  Far far out of it. Sick is a different kind of life.

Diving into the depths of your soul

Some of my passwords are the name of my childhood white donkey that died last year.
Threads of your soul wind around you. Ocean metaphors are apt, depths can release unexpected items that may retain qualities of treasure or be nearly destroyed by the forces of time.


Your soul talks to you. It is hard to listen, and if you do- you realize how often you want to do things that you don't do. Once I had a dream that I was in a huge sunlit room, that was dark like a room made of real oak. Like a picture from old times of rooms that are no longer built.  The light shifted down in huge  beams, illuminated by the dust. Like how you see sunlight in woods when there is smoke. 


On my kitchen window I have a small metal buddha that I bought when I was 10 from an Indian shop keeper in Wooster, Ohio who rubbed his hands together when he sold things.  Once I burned wax on my fingers and dripped it on the buddha. Then the buddha lived in a special corner of the barn at the old house we lived in near killbuck, Ohio.

Right now I am not sure if I live in the best place for me to breathe.  But I like it here.

so... fat with complacency, or do it- changes.

Red curtains. December. Supposedly there will be a blizzard tommorow.

Another way to say that is 12- 20 inches of snow and heavy winds.  A blizzard sounds better.
Humans are special because we can really love so many things. we can really love in so many ways. But, we don't do it enough.  And waste our greatest gift.  Net it. Put it out. If it were a fire. Other things take precedence.

Verbs for love are burning, falling. Not treeing. Growing.  Being. The roots that uphold everything. The self that stretches so long it can topple.  Uproot.

down root.  grow like a carrot.

Yam is cheese

The love:   A shout out. To my 5 or so readers add yr comments to this one!!!  I seek more of your own personal food substitutions that made you go " ah... equal. or   "better'  or  " ah, new and just right".   I wish I could get 50 replies to this post!

The explanation: Since I became vegetarian again and am allergic to milk I like to substitute non-dairy things for the "milk element" in recipes, and like to find vegetable combos that are very succulent or hearty or give a meaty satisfying feeling in some recipes.  I am a big lover of simple veggies.  Olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic are one set of veggie friends. Miso, soy sauce, mirin,  and vinegar and oil are another veggie friend set for instant sauces etc.   But.. and...! so..! in this  post I want yr more hearty veggie dishes or substitutions that delight you.  Being satisfied without milk is probably the hardest for me.  The list is just a few meal staples that are just as good with their new ingredients.

The list: (underneath context will come, but of course!!)

Yam is cheese
Coconut oil is ham.
Coconut oil is butter.
Yam is brown sugar.
Lentil loaf is lasagna.
Pancakes are vegetables.
Avacado is cheese.





Yam is cheese.... on pizza.  Grating yam on home made veggie pizza one day just because it was orange  ;) After baking I discovered that it is an awesome succulent replacement. And there was no real yam flavour, just a faintly sweet mellowness.  I do not think it would be as satisfying if you did not baby it a bit. so spread yr dough, sprinkle with olive oil, put on yam, drizzle more olive oil. Put on toppings. one swirl of olive oil and fave spices. (for me oregano / pepper flakes on top).  Also, for the kids I put a little cheese along with yam.  So they still get a cheese pizza but much less cheese.  ANd, grated/ fine cut olives mixed with yam as yr non cheese topping is very good too.

Coconut oil is ham.... in split pea soup. Very good.  It is not the salty rich lumps, but a more kid friendly sweet oil/ fat flavour.  Just a slight add on to the boring split pea flavor.  I made it with salt and pepper and added cut up baked or steamed carrot. so you get brilliant orange rectangles in yr yummy green soup.

Yam is brown sugar ... grated on curries like thai curries that call for curry paste coconut milk and brown sugar.  Make the curry as per yr style. Letting the spices or paste release flavor a bit then adding veggies.  and when simmer time comes grate yam over top and let it steam on top and in the end stir it in.  I am sure dried minced yam,  or a million other ways just as a garnish would also add that sweetness.

Lentil loaf is lasagna.  My mom made lasagna like this : 1 layer meat, 1 layer spinach and cheese, one layer ricotta, top  layer cheese and sauce and spices parmesan on top. So naturally that is how my lasagna template is layed out..  So instead of the meat layer I put in left over french lentil lentil loaf ( from a recipe with just mainly 6 eggs, spices and lentils very rich and good.  Not a very veggie or oatmeal full lentil loaf).  so it looks like meat in appearance and is kind of dense, and goes well with tomato sauce..  and I use cheese in this recipe for the rest of the fam. and w/ mine use goat cheese with the spinach to stick it together on that layer. 


Pancakes are vegetables.  I have become so into making these pancakes, the batter has a a good  amount of garbonzo flour added, extra eggs. Then they get green onions, summer squash,  corn, carrots or yam, cabbage, zuchinni basically any vegetable that is not too strong  or any vegetable that is sweet. About 3 kinds of vegetables  is about the max.  The goal of course is not just chucking in vegetables in dishes,  it is in making delicious food.  so, the mix has to work and the family has to like it. Sometimes the kids get honey on top, or vanilla sugar sprinkled on. But in general these are just eaten as is, or with yogurt  and applesauce.

Avacado is cheese.  Hummus is good on sandwiches as a cheese substitute, but I found I get bored some. Which I hate, since I love hummus and do not ever want to just ho hum eat it !  But avacado always just keeps on with its goodness, I used to just really "need" cheese ( mozzarella type goat cheese is expensive!)  on burritoes and wanted it on beans often too but avacodo and green onion, or hot sauce or lemon  or all of those make it just as good as cheese for me.

my wee list is done. Even tho I know more combos that work super well, these are less Asian-y and more just kind of kid friendly.      Give me yours!!

A changing Marie

Today we had a playdate and 3 girls came over.  We have a bouncy teeter totter that goes around and around as well as up and down. There was a lot of teetor totter action. 5 kids five years old and under in one living room is noisy.  Marie stayed there most of the whole time playing,  I did notice she took some breaks going out to the porch and started painting.  But, when she did one of her friends followed and they painted quietly together.

I remember last year at busy playdates she would just vanish,  and if it was at someone else's house I would go find her upstairs in the kid's room or over in the kitchen looking at fridge art or somewhere like that.

As she gets better at handling noise and lots of kids I've noticed she has become a noisier kid herself.  The super sweet quiet blondy is gone.  No more. But I like the new, often rude, always silly and very often loud Marie because I know its how she should be acting.

Tonight she was announcing she was a princess witch.  In their game Junie was an innocent bystander who would see the bad witch and go EEK and jump in surprise then Marie would squirt yucky stuff at her from her witch's wand.

This merging of princess and witch is new..  the persona tonight was supposed to be beautiful, fast and bad. !

  She was racing through the house with a balloon tied to the end of a ribbon tied to her wand.  Something about Marie even when she is naughty or pretending to be bad there is such a sweet core. When she does bad things she usually breaks down with emotion over the results and reasons why she was doing the wrong thing surface.



poem from yesterday dinner:

Mint song
minty minty I love some minty
cook it right inside my special pot

Dollhouse Dollhouse
"hi" said a big doll in the dollhouse moving all about

I love you
I know you
You are my friend Tuba.
Numa, Numa how do you dooba.

thanks to a friend who posted this on her blog

I think I have read this poem before. I admire the friend who posted it who is going through great personal pain and journeying.  I, who am not, was inspired also by this poem. The truth of it. the childish wisdom and old wisdom of it. and it made me thing of my mom as well. As in she would like this poem. (so to my dear darling main reader ;)  Let's read, shall we?)

THE WAY IT IS

There’s a thread you follow. It goes among
things that change. But it doesn’t change.
People wonder about what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the thread.
But it is hard for others to see.
While you hold it you can’t get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; and you suffer and get old.
Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding.
You don’t ever let go of the thread.

—William Stafford

Thankfullness

more on the same topic. I think this will be the thread that ties up this year for me.  I think it needs to be a daily practice and integral part of my life.  I have been a whiner way too long. You know internally... and in funny ways just to gripe and vent.  But I want to just not even feel frustration.  I want to have a whole different head guiding me.  Working harder, feeling thankfulness for what I have, for that work itself even feels like the earth shifting underneath me and rock rising up that I need.

I have a lot going on, and I need to be doing a lot but I also need grace to ease my busyness and stress and fears as I keep on trying to keep up my classes and preparation for teaching- all the tests I have to register for and the stuff I have to get ready for adviser interviews before student teaching.  All these things should be simple, but they are not.  I have lack of good calendar skills and lack of memory once things are filed leading to clutter.  So I kind of flit around wasting my time but always busy. My family just way takes over, I used to balance the two but I just joyfully chuck work now to go be with the kids and do little random things.

So, I need to remind myself. Hey, its a blessing I am at this point. It's great that I have this mass of paperwork and different interviews and requirements that need to get met in December and November.  These are important steps. I am not special, there is no way I can duck them. So shoulder it with grace.

I am seriously going to try to look at everything I can in the light of thankfullness.  I want a massive change. I like who I am but its like I'm running windows 97....

children of the table

 

Of the many toys we have ...The big cardboard blocks and their table won.  Marie built a precarious throne behind the table.  I let her ascend her throne. ( the table was dragged over for foot support).  June wanted to be as high as her sister and by herself created a second throne. Once ensconced a willing mom brought them toys. An afternoon of gobbling plastic food and making ornate queenly demands commenced. However, just like many a cautionary tale for children begins- after a while their height bored them and they desired to be higher and then even higher.  Close to the ceiling they perched. Clinging to one of my hands each.  No pictures taken because I dared not move.  After while as my hands grew tired I tried to cajole them down.  But it was just too great to be on a homemade narrow tippy chair where you could touch the ceiling.  And, I totally understood.  

However.......

All good things must end, I scarily pulled them down ( toppling their throne on purpose as I took them down so they would think twice before doing it without me again. just a little precautionary sneakiness....)

In awe they stared the blocks scattered all over.  Then Marie rushed over to rebuild it.   she built it tall over her head ( but not as tall since I didn't help) and then carefully placed her doll Angelina on the throne. Where she stayed for  a day or so. Queen of the living room.