More knitting endorphins.

I said I would show what I'm making with the beautiful MANOS del URUGUAY Cotton Stria yarn. If you're interested keep reading, if you "could care less," go stalk somebody on Facebook.

Again, keep in mind this color is not a great representation. I tried to change what looked like baby blue to the real color, a bright, happy, summer-day turquoise. Now it looks like something psychedelic from the '60s. No hallucinogens needed.


This is a new stitch for me--it's an elongated, airy stitch created by doing multiple yarn-overs between regular stitches.

This photo at least shows the texture and color variation in the yarn. I'm using the stitch pattern from a free Berroco online pattern for a wider scarf ("Fascinate")  to make myself a narrower one. I'm hoping to have plenty of yarn to make a cute little tam out of the same type of open stitch. We shall see.

Cast on loosely the number of stitches you want for width--mine's about 30 stitches on size 10 straight needles, making it about 7 inches wide. My yarn is heavier than the one used in the pattern and has more texture, but it's still a great look.

The stitch pattern goes like this:

Row 1: (Right Side) Knit.
Row 2: Knit.
Row 3: Knit 1, Yarn-over twice, Knit 1, yarn-over twice, keep repeating till you hit the end of your row, ending with the knit 1.
Row 4: Knit 1, drop the yarn overs, knit 1, drop the yarn overs, and repeat, again ending with the knit 1.
(that was the interesting new bit for me--took me a few repeats to get the hang of it without dropping things I did not intend to drop.)

Repeat these 4 rows till you have the scarf long enough for the look you want. The Berroco pattern calls for 66 inches. It all depends on how long you want the scarf to look on you (or whoever) and if you like it doubled and the ends stuck through, or just hanging with a half knot.

Once you get the hang of the whole yarn-over and dropping business, it's a relaxing and simple pattern to knit while watching a movie. I'd just hold off on the buttered popcorn. Icks up the yarn.


Skimmer's Recap: Yup, I'm a wild thing--just tried a new knitting stitch. Feeling a little mavericky.

Knitting endorphins.

endorphins

n.

Any of a group of peptide hormones that bind to opiate receptors and are found mainly in the brain. Endorphins reduce the sensation of pain and affect emotions.

(from Answers.com)

I've never been one to get an endorphin rush from running/biking/mountain climbing/skydiving--mainly because I lack the drive  to get out of the starting gate, let alone the endurance to reach that awesome endorphin high I've read about. And yet, according to the definition above, I've been an endorphin junky from the start. Since childhood, I've found creating, thinking about creating, collecting ideas for creating, all create me a happy place. That's a place with positively affected emotions that over-rule mental, emotional, or physical pain, without the nasty side effects of an opiate.  And knitting is only one of the forms of creating I enjoy.


Perhaps I should market a bumper sticker that says, "I Knit for Endorphins." It could catch on.


One of my favorite things about searching the WorldWideInterWeb is seeing this sort of thing pop up:

Find Endorphins Huge savings on Endorphins: Browse a large selection  & grab a bargain!  www.best-price.com/Endorphins

In all honesty, I would love to "browse a large selection of endorphins and grab a bargain" but you and i both know, best-price.com does not carry them. So why tease me?


Anyway, back to knitting and endorphins, I bought some beautiful yarn when I was in Alabama,

at the store below, "In the Making." Great name, eh? The yarn is really a bright, beachy turquoise, but apparently there are limits to my iPhone's photo capabilities.

And once inside the store,

the sight alone of bins full of yarn starts the endorphins rolling for me. 


The particular yarn I purchased has a great story as well--

for beyond its cool name and tag, there's a great back-story to the yarn. The company is MANOS del URUGUAY, which means Hands of Uruguay. It's a "non-profit organization that assembles over 400 artisans in cooperatives scattered throughout the countryside of Uruguay. The aim of the organization is to bring economic and social opportunities to rural women." The yarn is hand dyed in large kettles, creating the striated effect.


I think life is hard if my economic status says I need to cut back on my lattes, and here's a company making an amazing product that is helping women even have an economic status.


I wish the photos could show the reality of the color, texture, and marble-like shading.  The yarn is a Peruvian cotton of wonderful softness. It came in a hank, typical of the nicer (translate: "spendier") yarns. When initially untwisted from the hank it looks like that first picture above, a big loop of loveliness. (And in a new experience, these hanks were tied with the devil's own knot--likely offered to me by God in the interest of teaching me that I may need patience, even in my happy place.)


For actually knitting, an evenly wound ball is much better to pull from and less tangly, so you use one of these:

a yarn swift,
and one of these:

a ball winder, to make these,

lovely cakes of yarn, with the yarn pulling from the inside all neatly and efficiently.


In case you don't know what swifts and winders are, here's a quick explanation. The swift (which looks, I realize, like a badly designed umbrella) serves as the hands to hold the opened hank of yarn so it doesn't tangle--while the winder turns and rolls the yarn into the adorable (yet sadly inedible) cake. The  "real" type of yarn store (one that is all about the fibers and doesn't really offer non-fiber related products and has a cool fiber-related name) usually has the swift and ball winder on hand so they can do it for you if you don't have the equipment at home. Me? I love gadgets. My winder is a simple hand crank while the ones at yarn stores usually use power. Mine was cheaper, and surely cranking by hand must burn off a calorie or two as well?


Next time I'll show you what I'm making with this reminiscent-of-a-summer-day yarn, just in case you're interested.


But getting back to the endorphins, I think I can use knitting--all parts of it from the yarn store to the finished product--as natural pain relief and more balanced emotions. Shouldn't that make it payable by my insurance? Hmm... I need to check into that.


Where do you "browse" for endorphins? What's your endorphin-high of choice? And let's keep it legal, and not too embarrassing, okay? ;-D




Skimmer's Recap: i browse for MY endorphins at the yarn store!

Adventures in gluten-free baking.

I have a friend who also loves to write, and we like to get together for tea (she has gorgeous china.) She also has celiac disease. She's not one to adventure into the land of alternate flours and fussy baking while I love to, especially so we can share a treat with our tea. And if you are experimenting, nobody blames you if it doesn't turn out perfectly, right?

Personally, I had no idea how many foods and condiments had wheat in them. Like soy sauce! Silly me, I always assumed it was made of soy. And my family disagrees with any attempt I make to use a Lesser Noodle than one made from wheat flour since the alternatives have a Funny Texture.

My friend has seen the extent to which wheat rules the Western world, as she can't even eat at some restaurants like Texas Roadhouse (to which I always want to add the word "massacre") because everything has something wheat about it, even the marinades. So bringing pleasure to a friend with a sweet tooth? Right up my alley!

Know anyone with a gluten issue? Here is my more than acceptable recipe for:

GLUTEN FREE SHORTBREAD FINGERS

ingredients:

1 Cup Sweet Sorghum Gluten-free flour

1/4 Cup White Rice flour

4 Tablespoons Agave Sweetener 

1/2 Cup room temperature, softened butter

the how-to:

MIX all ingredients until fluffy

PAT dough into 5 inch x 8 inch rectangle on rice-floured counter 

     (if the dough is too sticky, sprinkle rice flour on top of the dough to pat)

CUT into 12 fingers. I like to use my pizza cutter, and usually I feel the need

     to poke a design into the cookies with a fork. Makes me feel all bake-y.

See? Pizza cutted. And fork poked. And very irregularly shaped.

BAKE at 325 F for 20 minutes. I'm assuming you know to put the unbaked

     cookies onto a baking pan first.

COOL on pan before removing, since these cookies are very tender and 

     fragile (like me) before cooled.

Remove gently, eat, enjoy.

tasty variation:

Substitute 1/2 Cup almond flour for 1/2 Cup of the sorghum. Nice, nutty taste.

Didn't I almost sound like I knew what I was doing? So redemptive in my cooking world.

Skimmer's Recap: Seriously? It has what, like 4 ingredients?

More on "More"

Picking up from my last blog post about reading magazines, I had read one article in my copy of More that didn't entirely cause guilt. It was about a woman who had feared cooking, and had never really even tried cooking. But she decided to learn, and even with fear and trembling became a good cook. I have pretty much resigned myself to the fact that, much like the models in the magazine ads, I will never be that person.

Yet hope springs eternal for me in the cooking department. I am always certain I will be able to cook like my grandmother did, never measuring but turning out perfect baked goods and casseroles. More certain for me is the failure waiting at the end of the baking. Again I decided to take a stab at it. Seeing a recipe online that intrigued me, Cornmeal crepes with sausage and egg filling, I decided to try it on for size.

I measured carefully--well, kind of carefully, one of my biggest problems--and made the crepe batter to chill ahead. Since my dear hubby is suffering through a year of the midnight shift and sleeping till around 3 pm, I'm trying to think of meals that appeal to the fresh-out-of-bed person as well as the ready-for-dinner person. And the tiny picture online of the finished recipe looked good. And who doesn't like a good crepe, even perchance a cornmeal one?

After all, aren't crepes just little disks of deliciousness?

Mine? Disk? Maybe amoeba, or paisley run amuck.

Some simply defied description at all...though the second one reminds me of a brain.

They were also every imaginable shade. Kinda like trying to pick a yellow for painting the walls.











The online photo of the recipe was taken from more of a distance. I, however, can't back up far enough for the distance mine require to look good.

But my guys assured me they were very tasty when filled with sausage and eggs and cheese, so I guess I can count it as a Taste Success. Presentation? Fail.












Skimmer's Recap: Possibly my hidden culinary talents are simply buried too deeply to mine.

Is it just me? or: The importance of picking encouragingly titled magazines.

Seriously, I don't know when guilt first got its hold on me, but I do remember feeling guilty as early as kindergarten. The incident? I mixed up the names of two of my fellow five-year-olds.

The reason I bring this up is because I can't even read a magazine without becoming guilt-ridden. I was having a lovely Saturday coffee and magazine morning, reading the July-August copy of More magazine with Kyra Sedgewick, the lovely star of television's The Closer on the cover. 


I'm a pretty polite reader. I start at the first page of a magazine and work my way through to the last page. (I was raised to be polite and not leave anyone out.) I smile to myself as I read something amusing or just interesting: "Japan, where the country's second-largest airline, ALL NIPPON AIRWAYS, announced it would offer designated women-only toilets on its flights." I smile, remembering my last flight where I used the restroom right after one of the pilots, distressed to find he'd left the nasty, heavily used toilet seat up.  


I skim the list of summer reading suggestions, even skimming the full page ad for shoes adjacent. 


The book list makes me talk to myself: Now why are you not writing something? You love to write, you should try to get something published. You spent all that money going to Mount Hermon's Writers Conference, and still you are not writing. What is wrong with you? The shoe ad for Sketcher's Shape-Ups merely causes me to mock, it's gonna take a lot more than a shoe to shape YOU up! 


I look at the page of "must-have" handbags. Again, my Guilt-Voice interrupts. Why do you have all that stuff to make handbags to sell on Etsy and still haven't done it?


I see an ad for feminine protection telling me "What you're wearing is so last year." This at least is a choice I can feel no guilt about, I tell myself, thanks to that handy emergency hysterectomy back when I still wanted to have more kids. Then I notice the "protection" is for bladder leakage. Crap--I really  should be doing those Kegels...


Why do I do this to myself? The article on "This is what 55 looks like," picturing a low-jean wearing lean woman my age(ish) causes me to berate myself for being overweight; the article on women who after 40 started second (and of course incredibly successful) careers farming olives, or organic meats and vegetables, or sheep to sell the fleeces, only serves to make me question my own lack of risk taking and dream following. Even the name of the magazine screams at me: "MORE" i should do more!


For this reason I think I shall avoid magazines named things like "SHAPE" and "SELF." Waaay too much to feel guilty about there.


Skimmer's Recap: When predisposed to feeling guilty about your life, your looks, your health, look for magazines with names like "GOOD ENOUGH."

Alabama bounty.

I've always been a West Coast girl. I grew up in Portland, Oregon, went to school in McMinnville, Oregon, and now live in the San Francisco Bay Area of California.

There was one brief stint spent in Vail, Colorado while working as a housekeeper in a hotel. Did I learn to ski? Not so much. The idea of downhill skiing terrified me, so I took a lesson in cross-country skiing. The teacher said, "Wow, I've never had a student fall down so much." Um, thank you? It was much harder and wetter than walking, which I did in abundance, rarely falling down. Thus ended my relationship with skis and poles.

What I'm thinking about while analyzing my choices in coasts and my obvious lack of skiing ability is that I've spent most of my time with plentiful fruits and berries and vegetables. Amazing berries growing wild in the empty lot next door when I was a child (I also tried picking berries for money with a friend, but again, HARD and way too early.) And the nuts? We had two walnut trees growing in our yard that provided so many nuts that my mother became quite creative in their use. I've only been able to face walnuts again in the past 10 years.

California also is an amazing land of plenty, fruit, nut, berry and vegetable-wise. I can casually plant a squash in my flower garden and enjoy fresh squash for months, heck, I've even had volunteer tomatoes grow from the compost I made before I learned not to put anything that might grow from a seed in the mix.  Every street I go down has lemon trees.

But I've always been able to recognize the vegetables.

Aren't these the prettiest things? New to me!

In Alabama we had the pleasure of watching one of my hubby's cousins in action. And I see why I have my own personal energy crisis, since she had her energy, my energy, and possibly the energy of everyone living in a 5 mile radius. She's one of those people I can only sit back and view in awe: in retirement she heads up the local Chamber of Commerce, runs the local farmers market, takes tennis lessons, and in her down time she does HAND SMOCKING on dresses for her granddaughter. And that's only stuff I know about! And in retirement. I've not done that many things total in my life.

Hubby with his cousins, while he semi-patiently waits for me to be

done taking photos with his iPhone since my battery was dead.

It drove him a little crazy, but it's a mighty short trip anyway.

But the bounty of 'Bama! Oh--they have beautiful fruits and vegetables, things I've never seen in person. We went to the farmers market the Monday we were there, and I of course went crazy taking pictures. It was just so colorful, and the actual farmers themselves are the ones selling the produce, and that doesn't happen at home.

Sells honey from his farm, among other things. And only looks

mildly irritated that I'm making him pose. ;-)

Yum. Beautiful produce, and he didn't seem to mind

the crazy lady from California asking him to pose. :-)

Those are the actual farmers themselves--in fact, the market is held in the afternoon just so the farmers can bring their produce. And an extra added bonus? In this lovely small town, people didn't act like I was an escaped mental patient when I talked to strangers!

More produce loveliness:

More new-to-me vegies!

We bought that Ambrosia canteloupe--and that big melon

that looks black? Actually very dark green, and is a Sugarbaby 
(if i remember right) watermelon!

And oh, sweet summer fruit--don't you just want to dive into that

basket of peaches? Juicy wonderfulness...

Skimmer's Recap: OH. YUM. Alabama.

Colors and patterns.

Flying out of the Birmingham airport in Alabama, the sight of miles and miles and miles of green amazed me. Having grown up in Portland, Oregon, land of liquid sunshine and all things green, my spirit is always lifted by the sight of green growing things.

A swath was cut through the miles of lush, green trees--but what was it? From where I sat, far above, it looked for all the world like a casual path cut by a lawnmower through the green. On closer squinting, (these eyes aren't what they used to be,) I could see cars were traveling along a swath of highway.

Coming into Denver looked less like plush grass carpet and more like a crazy quilt, beautiful in a different way. Both places have an expansiveness not seen in the Bay Area where houses touch houses touch other buildings touch--you get the idea.

On the leg from Denver to Oakland, CA, I was part of a real-time demonstration of that whole Mars/Venus difference between men and women. The young man next to me (and mind you, "young" means pretty much anything under 50 to me now) asked the flight attendant if he could purchase two glasses of wine at once. She said, "Oh! I don't know if we can do that--let me go ask someone."

After she left I turned to him and said, "Well, you look like you could handle it."

He said, "Yes, I would think so! I weigh two twenty!"

Who but a man would announce that so proudly to a complete stranger?

Our time in Alabama with family was relaxing and fun and we laughed a lot and I got to go to a great yarn store, "In the Making," with my hubby's cousin. And why yes, of course I got a photo of the store.

All those bins of colorful yarns give me a tickle of excitement along with an injection of "I'm in my happy place." Life is good when I'm in a yarn store. A different sort of expansiveness and pattern that makes me smile. 

Of fibromyalgia and vanity.

Unable as yet to embrace my gray hair, I continue to put myself through the annoying process of home hair color. In hopes of a quick and easy solution, I purchased a different brand than usual. The name, "Perfect 10," was compelling. I mean, 10 minutes away from at least my hair being a perfect 10?

I've often had friends available to do the deed for me while I sit, slipping into a hair-coma. Whether someone is cutting, styling, or even brushing my hair, I get so relaxed I could end up bald and not even care. Never mind that it's much simpler for someone with a view of the top and back of my head to paint my roots.

I launched into the usual scenario--pull out the instructions, put on the plastic gloves, line up the bottles and tubes to be used in proper combination. And all with the promise of only 10 minutes needed to cover those stubborn grays.

10 minutes to do the job, yet an hour later I was still trying to scrub the color from my skin and the area around my eyebrows that now looked like Groucho Marx. I was trying to bleach the color from the sink, the countertop...giving myself seriously raw patches on my face from the scrubbing... *sigh*

Then on to blow-drying my hair, then straightening my hair, because if I do those things it will last for days without doing more than passing a brush through it.

But how does fibromyalgia enter into this picture, you ask? Well, all that holding my arms over my head against the better judgement of my weary muscles leaves me very tired and achy--which can lead to a certain level of personal crabbiness.


Skimmer's Recap: Fibromyalgia and vanity make poor partners.
:-)

Travels in Alabama

At the moment I am sitting in a lovely, clean house, everything in order and tastefully decorated. Mine? Heck no! I must be visiting!

Hubby and I have been staying with one of his Alabama cousins and her husband and cat. The husband is very gracious. The cat, not so much. I have mixed feelings about cats whose front paws have been declawed, but it's been a positive situation for me. I don't think Shelby the cat likes me all that well. She's beautiful, a rescue kitty that was dumped on the other cousin's property as a baby, possibly by someone sensing the animal-friendly vibe of the acreage.

"Acreage"--there's a word we don't hear much in the San Francisco Bay Area. In our spot called home our houses are on small dots of property surrounded by privacy fences. Seems the closer people live to each other, the more closely guarded any bit of personal space is. We can see into a neighbor's open bathroom window 15 feet away, but we have fences so we can sit on our little chairs in our little back yards and listen to every word of every conversation taking place in the 3 back yards surrounding ours. Here in the area of Alabama the cousins live in, one yard just rolls into the next and into the next, broken only by houses and landscaping.

Of course, here in Alabama, I don't honestly know if they sit outside in the summer like we do in California. Each time I've stepped out of a store or car I've been surprised again by my immediate immersion into a moist heat sauna.

The downside to this friendly family picture we're enjoying is that the cousins' father is being treated for pancreatic cancer. As you can imagine, the whole family is having a tough time.

The upside is watching the interactions of this family. Every person pitches in. They're a unified group, helping out in whatever thing needs helping. It's a good thing to see. :-)

Skimmer's Recap: Alabama. Heat bad, family good.

My Monday fibromyalgic thoughts after a busy but fun weekend.

(cartoon here showing a big thought bubble choked with 

random phrases overrunning the edges of the bubble-- 

couldn't find one, so you'll have to use your imagination.)

i get tired of living up here in my head

today it's quite noisy and my focus is bad

i hear my brain chattering:

 "should i go work outside? 

no, i should clean the kitchen--

no wait, shop for groceries--

why's that so dusty?

no, i should be. . ."

forget it.

think i'll go take a nap.

Knitting: New "Cool Tool"

I've mentioned in the past (interruptions: Come out and play!) my love of Cool Tools. Yes, I LOVE gadgets.

My newest LARGE Cool Tool is the Silver Reed LK 150 knitting machine.

Men and (other) women may love talking about 0 to 60 in however many seconds, or horse power under the hood, but me? I'm thrilled by words like "tension" and "150 needles" and "row counter."

To many others these may be words of a foreign nature, and tension merely states the feeling after work each day, or needles just remind you of your last trip to the doctor's. But to me? Ahhhhh....sweet drippings of nectar into my mouth.

I understand it may look like nothing much to you, but let me tell you about it! If you have ever used a sewing machine or done any hand knitting or crocheting, you will understand "tension." Without correct tension being held the stitches will be all wonky and uneven, but with tension? A whole new world of precise, beautifully matched stitches one after the other after the other.

I have been using The Ultimate Sweater Machine by Bond for the past few years with a decent amount of success (pictures of projects at the link above. And any of you who know me can totally accept that I had just that look of happy pride the lady at the top right of the box has. HAHAAHAHA! There were some great moments of frustration.

 

See those cute antennas on the first photo, the Silver Reed? Those are part of the aforementioned Good Tension. Notice the antennas on the Sweater Machine? No? That's because there are none! And yet I managed to make some decent projects on it. So I am pretty much guaranteed success on the new one, right?

I purchased the Silver Reed LK150 at That Yarn Store in nearby Dublin, CA. Lessons are included in the purchase price, so yesterday when I picked it up I had my first lesson. The owner teaches a lot of classes on a variety of levels of machines and in a variety of needle arts. She has taught classes on my first love, the Sweater Machine, and told me I should be very proud if I was able to turn out projects. My first lesson on my new love (no, I am not fickle, I just love them all) was to get me used to the machine set-up and get me over any fear of the machine and the usage of it and the yarn.

I just get all warm inside when I think about it! I even bought a very cool metal case that looks like I'm carrying a rifle--so very American of me to appear to be "carrying." :-)

Skimmer's Recap: Julie got a cool new toy. See Julie smile.

Skimmin' the recap.

Seriously? Two weeks since I last posted anything? Good grief. So much for my thoughts of consistency. Oh well, that's usually how consistency works out for me.

SO--Skimmer's Recap of the past two weeks:

The back garden hummingbird nest has gone from this--

^ to this ! ^

My good friend went from bearer of a large red ball

to the bearer of this beautiful baby boy (how's that for alliteration?) And i got to love on this little lovely! (i just can't stop!)



i had a mini vacation all by myself in the beautiful breezy back garden in Sunday's warm weather--i lounged on the new cushion of my lounge chair, soaked up the sun, and listened to the birds, the windchimes, and the "shoosh"ing sound of the poplar leaves.

Some of the new plants are growing beautifully,

while some of them? Not so much.

But that's just life, right? Some of it is full of joy and amazement,
while parts of life carry only the best of intentions
that didn't work out after all.

Pretty sure my care of this plant is in that last category.
But then the next day comes along and i get to start
fresh again. Plus i can always go buy a new plant. ;-)

Back garden wonders: the hummingbird nest!

Last year in July, Dean finally got the camera he'd been lusting after forever, a Canon EOS Rebel T1i. The first pictures we took were of the hummingbird nest in our backyard poplar tree. At Christmas i actually managed to surprise him with a very cool telephoto lens. The first pictures i've taken with the telephoto lens have been of the mommy hummingbird in this year's nest! i was so happy to find her back again.

On eating large.

 the majestic lion, sleeping off his dinner of fresh gazelle.

Did you know that calorie counters abound on the good ol' www? Do you also know you should not use one when eating at a Texas Roadhouse restaurant?

I, of course, during my current obsession with calories, have the calorie counter from Livestrong.com installed on my iPhone. A good portion of the restaurant's menu pops up in their database. And it scares this current counter. "WHAT??! ONE ROLL HAS HOW MANY CALORIES??" (And this after i had just eaten the second tasty fluff of carbohydrate.)

My husband suggested that perhaps I should not look at the database or my meal would be spoiled. But no, for me it was much more like driving by an accident and you don't want to look but you do anyway--what I believe is called "morbid fascination."

As the food arrived I couldn't help but notice that at home I use platters smaller than their plates. I looked around me at couples and families in the neighboring booths. . .they must eat there a lot. I am no dainty princess of a woman, and yet I felt, well, small.

Surrounded by folks who were leaning protectively over their plates to eat like one of those nature shows where the beautiful gazelle is being torn into bloody bits by a lion, i thought, "Are we being secretly filmed for one of those documentaries called 'Obesity in America'?? Have I been placed in the fat room?"

Heck no, I have no issues around my size or food ...

Oh, side note: I have a friend with celiac disease. She is unable to eat at Texas Roadhouse, because everything has some form of wheat in it! Even the steaks have seasonings containing wheat. Bad news.


Skimmer's Recap: Texas Roadhouse--bad for people with grain allergies, bad for dieters. But tasty. Very, very tasty.

Fret Free Friday

My brain has gone blank frequently these days, therefore I am declaring today a Fret Free Friday and putting something up I wrote a couple of years ago. Besides, I like this post!

Apricot Thoughts.

The bible verse that kept me going during my recent Fentanyl withdrawal experiment was the one about the vine and the branch, where Jesus says, "I am the vine and you are the branch. If anyone remains in me and I in them, he will bear much fruit. Without me you can do nothing." (That's a loose-ish paraphrase of John 15:5.) While i was feeling so detached from life i needed to feel attached still to my Creator, so i would repeat it but from my end of it: "You are my vine, i am your branch." It's yet another version of something i've said to God in the past while going through what seemed an impossible situation: "i may not be able to see You right now, but i will not turn my back on You."

You see, i remain aware of His thoughts toward me, and his persistence in loving me even when i don't seem to be able to carry off my end of the deal. Sometimes simply voicing that desire for connection with God has helped me hold on.

Anyway, later in reading a random bible verse i read something written by the apostle Paul to the Christians in Colosse, "Let your roots grow down into Him and draw up nourishment from Him so you will grow in faith, strong and vigorous in the truth you were taught." (Colossians 2:7.) These thoughts meshed for me. i choose to remain attached to the vine that is Jesus, and that is because i will then stay rooted to the source of nourishment, and will stay strong.

Recently i picked apricots from my daughter's tree with the help of her two girls, Haley and Cassidy. A few branches here and there had been broken away at their place of connection to the bigger tree. The only apricots they held were stunted and dried up, inedible. Other branches were heavy with apricots, growing vigorously from their solid connection to the tree, and were ripe and plump and beautifully colored.

Even i get the visual there--remaining strongly rooted to the source of nutrients grows plentiful, enjoyable fruit. The interruptions of life that we may let break us away from the tree causes dryness and immaturity of fruit.

Good stuff.

Skimmer's recap (and no, hubby of mine, i cannot set this blog up to send you only the skimmer section, sorry--): Attached to the tree= healthy growth. Not attached=little growth if any growth at all.

Fibromyalgia and the "D" word: Diet.

Lately I've read some articles that serve to give me firm excuses for my lack of a model body (well, that does depend on model of what.) Such as, hormonal imbalances are common in fibromyalgia, and those generally cause weight gain. (Yup, I've got those.) Many of the medications used to treat fibromyalgia cause weight gain. (Yup, I take those.) Plus there's that whole "seriously I'm this exhausted 24/7 and you want me to do aerobic exercise??" (And yes, I LIVE there.) Excuses? I collect those with the same diligence I use to explore all the chocolates of the world.

Actually, the fibromyalgia comes way after the issues of poundage. I've struggled pretty much since birth with the F word and the D word--you know, Fat and Diet. What'd you think I meant?

My sister and I had a long conversation recently where I laughed about the many many diets I've tried over these 56 years of life: in elementary years I ate a million carrots. As I grew older I simply became more sophisticated about it, instead trying the "don't eat in front of people" diet because I felt like skinny people would be judging me, before I moved on to the ever-popular grapefruit diet of the 70s. (Still can't look one o' them buggers in the eye.) I soon went through the Atkins and McDougall's of the diet world, and let me tell you, pork rinds are not the same as barbecue potato chips, and there is no all-vegetable substitute for cheese! I've eaten tiny portions with tiny utensils, I convinced myself for years that I didn't like chips. I've read Dr. Phil's solutions and those of 25 hundred other people, all guaranteed to be "The One." I've eaten enough lettuce to choke a rabbit and enough seeds to sprout like a Chia Pet.  To which my sister responded, "I've never been on a diet."

I hate her. I mean, I love her but--

Okay, she too is overweight. But she hasn't spent what seems like an eternity wasting her energy and money on all this dieting silliness of mine. Is it just my way of saying, "hey, I'm trying!"? I'm sure that if I was thin, I would obsess about something else--maybe that people teased me about being skinny (sorry, not feelin' you skinny folks out there--it's been my lifelong dream to have someone be able to call me "skinny.")

I can at least feel good about my efforts to support the economy--all those books and magazines and cookbooks about diets, and that gym membership I have somewhere--?? If I ever decide to return, I'm going to need to call somebody to remind me where it's located.

Skimmer's Recap: Feeling whiny, and you're here to complain at. What about it?!!

A day late and a dollar short: Mother memories.

I admit it. I am not the best cook in the world--and it's not even that I think I couldn't be a good cook, I would just need to *care* about cooking. Not my favorite.

We used to tease my mother about her cooking, that she would get frostbite from purchasing most of our dinners in the frozen food section of the store. Heck, until I was an adult I didn't know you could make spaghetti without cans or boxes.

But she pulled off some good meals. Her Sunday pot roast with potatoes and carrots? Oh so good. Rich in taste and comfort-food satisfaction. Her pork chops on the other hand? They could have been used as food for the space program, they were so devoid of moisture. Throw one in a baggy and you had a "just add water" meal.

She was creative, and I've followed in those footsteps. Again, and maybe I was just a particularly stupid kid, it didn't occur to me that people bought new couches. I was always fascinated to see the new slipcovers my mother would make for our furniture when she created a new look for the living room.

She loved to write, so do I.

There are similarities between us, something I do think about around Mother's Day. As the years pass, I'm more easily able to see those and not just the emotional unavailability, or the hot temper, or the crazy-making responses to life. I'm becoming more able to put all the hurtful letters she'd sent into their own place in my brain, and the memories of her laughing into another. I'm learning to hold the pleasant days my family spent with her as precious hand-me-downs, while boxing up her anger and accusations into their own separate closet. It's a process.

One I'm working on.

Thoughts on a book: "Thin Places" by Mary DeMuth

Yesterday I woke early, reaching for the next book waiting on my bedside table, "Thin Places" by Mary E. DeMuth. Nearly 4 hours later I put it down--finished. What kept me reading?

The idea of Thin Places is the times in your life where the membrane between earth and God are stretched so thin you can see God more easily. These places in Mary's life were during the more soul-wrenching parts: being abused as a 5 year old, seeing father after father removed from her life, dealing with the sense of loneliness that came from being "in the way."  She explains how these things carry on into adult life, as we all are made up of our old experiences and beliefs.

My own childhood home was a place of chaos, so I'm always curious how others dealt with that. In Mary's story she is quick to show where God made something good out of the darkness of her life, so I was left with a sense of hope, not depression. I am another person who travels the road of actions based on old pain, so I related to much she had to say.

I was immediately caught up in the flow of her words, as her prose has a comfortably poetic phrasing. She is honest, she shares the rawness of life--but there is no self-pity in her recounting of pain, and much can be learned simply from that.

Personally, i loved the book. It was like a 4 hour sit-down over coffee with a good friend.

Fun with calories.

Obsessing over weight again.  i think this cartoon says it all.

When nature disturbs, AKA "Brought to you by the letter 'B'"

Does this look like the face of a killer?

One week ago Barnaby, all 12 pounds of him, joined  us for lunch. We were having pizza and he brought something into the bed next to hubby's chair to eat. Hubby looked down, looked at son, asked "Is that what I think it is?" and stood up.  Son looks down and says, "Yes, I think so."

While being interviewed later by his mother, son said, "I looked down and all I could see was skinny little bird legs." Barnaby had caught a bird for lunch. Apparently if not offered pizza, he will simply BYOB--Bring Your (his) Own Bird. Good to know.

I was disturbed by this event. Our little blue-eyed boy catching a bird? I am not used to him chasing anything larger than a spider or fly, and baby birds are too cute to kill. (I do not share the same opinion of any age of spider, fly, or ant.) Later i realized there was a nest in a bottle-brush bush that overhangs our fence. How did I notice this? When the next baby bird was being chased by our dog Blue.

And again I ask, is this the face of a killer?------->
I think not, he appears innocent enough, but apparently the call of nature is stronger than me screaming "DROP THE BIRD!! DROP THE BIRD!" loud enough for neighbors in a six block radius to hear.

At least he didn't bring his to the lunch table. Or get a chance to snack on its feathery delights.

That was the point where I realized the mama and papa birds were hanging out on the fence top cheeping their baby on--"Come on! You can do it! Fly Freddie, fly! Uh oh."