Finally, a Bit More Energy

Today was the first morning I've had a bit of energy, it felt great. I cleaned the toilets and the sinks (finally), washed the sheets and the towels, took the kids to the local health food store, and sorted through the last of the mason jars. All before lunch!

Have I told you about my mason jar stockpile? I got hooked on garage sales primarily because of my first great deal, these mason jars. I got (I kid you not) more than a dozen big boxes of assorted jars for $10. Hundreds of jars. When I usually have to buy a box of a dozen jars for $6, it was an awesome deal. Anyway, we carried these jars around for three moves, all the way down to Calgary. Trevor finally said "enough's enough", so I sorted through them. First of all, I weeded out the big jars (holding 4+ cups) because I don't have a pot big enough to process them anyway. There were more than seventy. Good grief. Then I sorted through the smaller jars, keeping 4 dozen 500mL jars, 1 dozen 375mL jars, and 1 dozen 250mL jars. I still had over 4 dozen assorted smaller jars to give away. As usual, there were several people on Freecycle who wanted them, so the big jars are gone and the small ones are getting picked up tomorrow. This is rather an extreme area for simplifying and winnowing down belongings, most areas haven't been nearly this bad, but it's good to get it done.

The menu plan is going over very well. I thought I'd post a list of my dinner meals, the recipes are all a hit with Trev and I, and the kids like most of them.

Week 1: Spaghetti and meatballs with salad; Cianfotta (Mediterranean vegetable stew) over brown rice; spiced chicken wraps with salad/veggies; Kichiri (Indian lentil curry) with homemade chapati; steaks, baked potatoes and veggies; cockaleekie (chicken and leek) soup, salad and homemade scones; homemade pizza and raw veggies.

Week 2: Pasta with pesto sauce and salad; chili over brown rice; burgers, oven fries and raw veggies; chicken curry over brown rice with salad/veggies; lentil veggie soup with salad and homemade scones; chicken Provencal; grilled fish, baked potatoes and veggies.

A lot of the recipes have easy variations to make it not seem so repetitive. We'll have to see what everyone thinks when we've run through the cycle two or three times.

Getting By, with a Few Big Changes

We're still inching along here - my nausea is slowing down our efforts at change at home, but we're getting there. I've been working my way through some whole foods cookbooks at the library, and have finally gotten around to putting together a new two week menu plan. This one has a lot more variety (Trev says it 'spans the globe') and is healthier too. I've also found a shortcut to grocery shopping, as we're trying out a local organic grocery service that delivers. It does cost a bit more, but for now it seems worth it, especially since we can go 100% organic this way on all of our fresh stuff. We'll try supplementing this weekly delivery of fruit, produce and dairy with a monthly/biweekly trip to Costco for staples.

Trevor is starting the "Body for Life" challenge tomorrow; he's got it all set up, meal plans, workout plans and everything. For those (like me) who haven't heard of it, it's a 12 week challenge you enter, with before and after pics and all that. He's a competitive fellow, and thinks it will help keep him motivated. I'm very proud of him...and I'm sure he'll do well, with all of the planning that went into it.

Sounds like a lot, doesn't it? I guess it is, it just took about 4 times as long to get there as it normally would have! Still, it's good stuff. And in the meantime, if I can keep the family (well) fed, the house (reasonably) clean, and the laundry caught up, I'm trying to be content. I'll be feeling better soon enough - at least that's what I keep telling myself.

Sweetness

I'm having a very tough day today, coping with horrendous nausea. I've been nauseous pretty much for a month now, but today was the worst yet. I'm trying not to complain, mind you, but it's necessary to tell you that so the story makes sense. Trev (sweetie that he is) took the kids out to grab a bite to eat, because I simply could not deal with the idea of food, and he asked me whether he could get me anything. I told him the only thing I could think of was ginger ale...not that it's terribly good for me, but it's my 'comfort food' when I'm feeling sick.

Next thing I know, my precious girl comes downstairs clutching her coin purse with a very determined look on her face. She tells me she wants to spend the money she's saved in her piggy bank on ginger ale, to help me feel better. We couldn't talk her out of it, she wanted so badly to help.

Makes me think of Jesus telling the disciples we all need to become as little children to enter the kingdom of heaven. What would life be like if we were all that spontaneously loving and generous?

Anyway, it touched my heart, and I just had to share.

Vindicated

I've read in three different places in the last week about 'pregnancy-induced celiac disease'. Seems it's finally becoming a thing doctors will admit is happening. After going through three doctors who (very kindly) told me I was delusional, it's nice to see that I'm not the only one who has experienced this.

On a much more frivolous note, IKEA now has moose shaped, whole grain organic pasta. Just one more reason to love IKEA. *grin*

Something I've Been Meaning to Say

I have a confession to make. It's been rolling around in the back of my head for weeks and I'm finally getting around to putting it down in words for y'all to read. Here it is:

I hate talking on the phone.

Hate it, not just like 'I hate onions in my scrambled eggs', but to the point that I get the shakes and feel desperately uncomfortable. I would rather clean toilets, change smelly diapers, or do just about anything else I can think of than talk on the phone. Except bungee-jumping - that scares me more. A little more.

It occurs to me that many of my friends and family members may have, in the past or at present, thought that it was just them. That I didn't want to talk to them on the phone, that I was avoiding them. That, worst case, I didn't care. It's not at all true. I've looked at the phone, even thought about calling. Then I quickly come up with something else to do so I can avoid it.

I asked Trevor about it, and he says that I've been that way ever since he got to know me. He says that while I've gotten better at impersonal business calls, I haven't changed much in the way of personal calls. Certainly I've been that way as long as I can remember.

If it were just a matter of hating the initial calling, and then enjoying the conversation, I could get over that, force myself to do it anyway. But it lasts the whole time, and I feel so ridiculously fake trying to sound natural and composed while my hands shake, my voice quavers and I restrain myself from running away. So I don't call. I email, I send cards, I try to find thoughtful gifts, I do whatever else I can, but I don't call. And I can't help but wonder how many people have misinterpreted that.

Now, would this post ever have been written if hormones weren't making me rather emotional? I'm not sure. But I do feel relieved for having written it.

Moose Jaw for New Years

We celebrated Christmas here with my Mom, and then headed down to Moose Jaw on the 30th for a gathering at Trevor's Dad and Carol's home. Joel and Jeannette came down on the 31st, and we had a belated Christmas on New Years Eve. It was great to see them all again, and the kids had fun soaking up all the attention. It all went well until...Trevor came down with the stomach flu at 3am on New Years day. You may remember the last time we got the stomach flu while travelling - it was in Moose Jaw as well. Hmmmm.

Anyhow, poor Trev lay about on New Years Day trying to gather his strength, and then about 6pm we put everything in the van and headed home. We left late because it had been a very long drive down due to road conditions, and we reasoned this way if it took longer it wouldn't bug the kids because they were sleeping. It wasn't a fun drive, lots of blowing snow and poor road conditions, but no one complained, and Trev slept better in his own bed once we got home. We were extra glad that we had driven home that night when the next morning, Adara started getting sick. It caught me last night, so I'm huddled on the couch today while Trev has taken the kidlets on an adventure somewhere. Con seems to be fine so far, I guess we'll see if that lasts or not.

I had one very special positive happen while in Moose Jaw: Trev's Dad mentioned casually that he was looking to get rid of all of his and Sharon's old photo albums. He's not much of a sentimentalist, and he kept a few small albums of pictures that were important to him, but he didn't want the rest. So I grabbed them!! We're going to buy a photo scanner, and I'll scan all of the old pictures in and hopefully someday be able to do them up nicely with notes and dates and stuff. I'm very excited to have this piece of Trevor's history to preserve for our kids and their kids.

Back to lying on the couch for me - going from Trev and Adara's recoveries, I should be feeling much better tomorrow.