Let the words fall out

I'm tired.  I really need to plan better, since late evening is not my best writing time.  But I can't stand the thought of having a month where I only posted once, so here I am. 

Watching:  Doctor Who--we're happy to finally be into the second half of the current season.  Also Dancing with the Stars, which is one of my girls' favorite programs.  They both have their favorite professional dancers, and they root for the celebrities paired with their favorites.  

Reading:  A lot of online stuff, mainly about yoga.  Since I haven't been posting much, I haven't written about how I started doing yoga through an online 30-day class.  I'm really enjoying it, and it's helping me both physically and mentally.

Listening:  This awesome song that was brought to my attention by one of my courage classmates.  

Making:  I've been in the kitchen quite a bit, even though not many of my creations have made it onto the blog.  I really need to make more time for bread baking.  I put it off, thinking it will take more time than I want to spend, but when I finally do it, I'm so glad that I did.  That's true of a lot of things in my life...  I've also made some fun cakes for birthdays at work, including the one at the end of this post.  Vanilla cake, fresh strawberry filling, cream cheese frosting.  It was a huge hit.  Too bad I can't sell that one.

Feeling:  This morning as I was driving to work, I realized that I was feeling happier and less stressed than I have in quite a while.  The first quarter of the year is often a difficult time for me, but it seemed particularly challenging this year, plus it spilled over into most of April.  But things feel like they're improving.  The yoga is helping.  And while I don't have a daily focus on doing brave things, the habit has been created from the courses I've taken, and I worry less about what might happen or what people might think about what I do.

Planning:  This is the exciting and somewhat scary one.  It took a while to work a lot of things out, but I've finally gotten started on my own baking business.  The people I currently work with have been treated to my baked goods for the better part of a year, and I knew they would be excited to find out that I can sell things to them now.  I filled my first order yesterday, and immediately had inquiries about a couple more.  There are things I still need to figure out, but I have to start somewhere, right?

Currently...

I'm still trying to get back in a blogging mood, so I thought I'd borrow something from my friend Anandi.  Back at the beginning of last week, she posted a list of things currently going on in her life.  The idea originally comes from Kristin, who decided to do this as a series on her blog this year.  I figured it would be worth a try, to give me prompts to write about.  So here goes...

Watching:  HOCKEY!!!  I'm so happy that hockey is finally back.  We really need to make plans to attend another live Texas Stars game, too.  We got a bit of "divorce hockey" today.  My husband's Flyers played my Sabres.  I need to get more familiar with the players again--I kind of wish I was playing fantasy hockey this year, since that forces me to pay more attention.

Reading:  Assorted things, including the new cookbooks I got for Christmas.  Today it was the one pictured up top, Cook Illustrated's The Science of Good Cooking.  Many of the recipes are familiar from the other CI volumes that I own as well as the website.  One of the things that I love most about CI is their explanation of their testing methods and the science behind the recipes they come up with, so this book is right up my alley.

Listening:  Another Christmas gift, Maroon 5's Overexposed.  Yes, it's been out for months, but I didn't buy it because I've been trying to leave stuff on my wish-list for J to buy. =)  He said he would have gotten it for me sooner but he had to order the non-explicit version since he knew the girls would want to listen to it in the car with me.

Making:  Lots of stuff, the past couple of days!  Which is a refreshing change, since I've been feeling kind of stuck with baking as well as blogging lately.  Today's dessert was chocolate mousse, again pictured up top.  I also made an impulse buy at Central Market this morning and picked up a carton of blood orange juice.  I've already made David Lebovitz's orange caramel sauce with it, and will have to see what else I can use it in.  I've also mixed up the starter to make these Asiago Bagels from KAF tomorrow.

Feeling:  Pretty good.  The main thing that I'm focused on right now is the Cultivating Courage course that started last week.  When I took it back in October, it was every day for 30 days, including weekends, and I liked the continuity of that.  This time, it appears to be just Monday through Friday.  I was initially disappointed by that, but having a break from new activities over the weekend allowed me to catch up on reading what others in the class have been up to.  And I can still do new brave moves on my own if I want.

Planning:  Cake, cupcakes and the meal for Brianna's birthday on Friday.  She's going to be 10--how is that possible?!  I'm glad that we have the day off tomorrow (me from work and the girls from school).  That will give me some more time to prep things so the end of the week won't be quite so crazy.  For school, she's requested chocolate cupcakes topped with swirled chocolate and vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream.  For the cake at home, she wants chocolate mousse cake.  I made one for Christmas that was chocolate sponge cake layered with chocolate mousse and coated with poured ganache.  She liked it so much that she asked me to make another one.  I wasn't thrilled with the mousse I made last time, so today's dessert was due to me test-driving an different recipe.

Loving:  This great necklace that I ordered from Anandi with my One Little Word for this year.  There's still a post coming with my reasons for picking that word and how I hope it will shape my year.  After last year's focus cake, I want to make another baked good to feature this word.  I'm still trying to decide what to make.

Okay, that's my list for right now.  I'm not sure if this will become a weekly activity or if it will be less often, but I think it will be a good way to help me work through some of my blogger's block. =)

Bringing things into focus

I didn't mean to take a couple weeks between posts, especially since I seemed to be doing so much better with blogging more consistently. =)  I've been struggling with figuring out how to wrap up 2012, as well as with figuring out what to bake and cook lately.  I had some ideas on what to write, but couldn't come up with food pictures to put with it.  It finally occurred to me to just borrow the ones I used at the beginning of the year.  The picture above is one of my favorites from the year, though there have been many that I liked.

My one little word for last year was focus.  I've been reading what I wrote at this time last year, something I didn't really revisit during the year.  And I'm pleasantly surprised at how much progress I've made toward what I wanted to accomplish.  It took most of the year, but I'm finally doing a better job with saying no to things I don't want to do or that aren't important to me.  I'm letting other people do some things, and focusing more on the things that only I can do.  I took a chance and moved to a different location at work, which allows me to work with people who appreciate and support me.  I've also been exploring some personal dreams to see where they may lead.  You don't know if you don't try!

One of the things that I did last year to help bring things into focus was to do some things just for me.  That included participating in some online courses that I really enjoyed and would highly recommend.  I have to thank my friend Anandi for sharing her experiences with Mondo Beyondo, which were intriguing.  Unfortunately, by the time I actually looked into taking the course, there wasn't another one scheduled until September.  But there was something called Dream Lab that started in late June, so I started with that.  With themes of play, rest, and kindness to yourself, it turned out to be a good way to start focusing on myself more.  I don't feel like I did as much with it as I would have liked, so will probably sign up for the course again the next time it's available.

Then in the fall I did get a change to experience Mondo Beyondo.  I read something today that said that "Inspiration is an essential part of the creative process."  That's kind of what Mondo was for me.  It helped me figure out what sort of things I want to do.  Not things that other people want me to do, or that I think I should do.  But things that I want for myself.  It got me started on figuring out how to make my dreams happen.  Heck, it got me started on simply believing that the dreams were okay to have.  But then along came another piece of the puzzle that really got the ball rolling.

While I was taking the Mondo Beyondo course, I found out that Andrea was about to start a brand-new course, called Cultivating Courage.  Unlike the other courses that were 6 or 8 weeks long, this one was just 30 days.  But it was every day, weekends included.  And the premise was simple.  Do one brave thing every single day for 30 days.  Some might seem small, others huge.  But the idea was to build a habit of pushing your boundaries, just a little bit at a time.   It was exactly what I needed in conjunction with Mondo Beyondo, the action to go with the inspiration.  It's amazing how powerful you feel when you do something that you were afraid to and survive, even especially when it's kind of uncomfortable.

There will be more to come, since I'm starting on another round of Cultivating Courage today.  Some of my Mondo Beyondo dreams are coming true, and I want to write more about that as well.  And I also have a new word for 2013 that I'll share very soon.  In the meantime, I'm not going to forget about last year's word, since I'm sure I'll still need some focus for this year.