Saturday's Email of the Week: A Smorgasbord

I have to say that it was a bit of a slow week for interesting emails. A gazillion recipes, lots of comment stream on Linked In, a few cutesy emails, but nothing that made me roll on the ground laughing or inhale sharply at the shock of it. Oh well, they can't all be banner weeks I guess. Perhaps I will just present you with a smorgasbord of images and snippets from my week via my life-line to the outer world - email. I hope you have a fabulous Saturday!

So on Thursday the kids and I went for dinner, then hit Canadian Tire to pick up a new inner tube for T's bike. We wandered around and as we were in the exercise-type aisles, I also picked up a step-counter.  The kids were gung-ho to buy some hand weights as well, but I managed to convince them out of them.

Why a step counter, you ask? Well, I have to admit that I fear all of this writing stuff might be a bit of a detriment to my waistline. I missed my weekly yoga class and didn't feel like I managed to squeeze in quite enough activity to make up for it. All the surfing I do just doesn't amount to quite enough calories burned I suspect.

So on Friday I strapped on the step counter, left my laptop behind and hit my gardens for a little fresh air and slugging of mulch. My shoulders got a mite rosy from my exertions, but my mood was elevated. By the time the kids came home I had burned off 150 calories, according to my new toy! While the girls ran naked through the sprinkler (first time this year!), I lovingly planted a few new specimens that we picked up from the garden centre on the way home. Yes, I love my gardens!

The forecast now calls for rain for the near future, so I stayed late into the evening to feel the grass between my toes. A discovery that our rhubarb was coming ready was cause to celebrate, so a bundle was picked. I think that perhaps tomorrow I can make use of one of those recipes that came in last week;

Aunt Norma's Rhubarb Muffins

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/4 cups brown sugar
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup buttermilk
• 1 1/2 cups diced rhubarb
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
• 1 tablespoon melted butter
• 1/3 cup white sugar
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease two 12 cup muffin pans or line with paper cups.
2. In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. In a separate bowl, beat the brown sugar, oil, egg, vanilla and buttermilk with an electric mixer until smooth. Pour in the dry ingredients and mix by hand just until blended. Stir in the rhubarb and walnuts. Spoon the batter into the prepared cups, filling almost to the top. In a small bowl, stir together the melted butter, white sugar and cinnamon; sprinkle about 1 teaspoon of this mixture on top of each muffin.
3. Bake in the preheated oven until the tops of the muffins spring back when lightly pressed, about 25 minutes. Cool in the pans for at least 10 minutes before removing.

I will let you know how they turn out! 

For now I will leave you with a cute little poem that resonated with me from the week. I am sure I have read it before, and probably you have too, but it made me smile to re-read. Maybe I will vacuum and work on that sticky floor tomorrow after the muffins go into the oven...

MOTHERS

Real Mothers don't eat quiche;

They don't have time to make it.

Real Mothers know that their kitchen utensils

Are probably in the sandbox.

Real Mothers often have sticky floors,

Filthy ovens and happy kids.

Real Mothers know that dried play dough

Doesn't come out of carpets.

Real Mothers don't want to know what

The vacuum just sucked up...

Real Mothers sometimes ask 'Why me?'

And get their answer when a little

Voice says, 'Because I love you best.'

I Remember...

Memories:

 *Splashing in huge puddles at the side of the road as we walked home from school in spring/summer. We would yell to the passing cars to "speed up" and "splash us! splash us!" laughing madly every time we got soaked to the skin. Truly a dirty little experience and dirty little memory, but a smile drifts in...

*The smell of fresh bread baking in Grandma's kitchen was enough to make any soul salivate, with little hands and faces plastered to the oven door to watch the golden goodness rise to its full glory. Any leftover dough (and Grandma always made sure there was a little left over for her googly-eyed Grandkids) was transformed into fried treats sprinkled with sugar. We thought we had died and gone to heaven...

*Staring up into my Mother's spent face as she explained that my Father had died. Our vigil was over. This was my time to say goodbye, before life moved on. Standing at the side of the bed I stared. My five year-old brain did not have the words to say a thing. I stared and stared. Life moved on...

*Sitting in the back of a speeding big rig in nowhere Namibia wondering what had possessed me to think that hitch-hiking was okay, and safe, and a good idea? Screaming to my guardian angels to please, please, PLEASE help me out of this one. "One day I would grow up and realize that I wasn't indestructible and if I could just get this little favour and end up outside of this truck in one piece mentally and physically, I would Learn!" One scary lesson to learn from those said angels. Thank you

*Having wave after wave of the worst pain I had ever experienced slam into me. Looking up into my husband's eyes knowing that just his presence alone was enough for me to keep going. Wanting release, but not wanting to give up for me and for the baby inside of me. The blessed bundle ratcheting my pelvis into a position it felt appropriate regardless of my physiology. Knowing that I could do it, despite everything my body tried to connive me into. And doing it. Breathing with wide-open eyes as the miracle of life was bestowed upon me. A shared moment of love with this man. This man that I had walked with, talked with and now created with. We made life eternal in the form of a tiny human girl. My touch with perfection and the pristine pool of pure love.

*Opening up the newspaper and seeing my face and my name perched beside an article written by my hand. Knowing that I had received my five minutes of fame by reaching out to touch the world with a picture that I could share of me to whomever was willing to read. And knowing that people read, cared and liked what I had to offer, even going so far as a brief TV time slot. Pride and fame are mine...

*Taking my two girls by hand and walking with them into the future. Approaching the building that represents their start of tomorrow, their independence. Breathing smiles into me and my progeny. We have been one. Love binds us together. Trust must let me walk beside them for a distance

    and then wave goodbye...

School starts September.

Change comes eternal for me and you

Never stand in way

Friends via Chocolate Shortbread

   This post may seem familiar to one I did at Christmas, but I have added a twist. Since everyone seemed to be feeling better today, I thought we would do some baking this afternoon. My girls love to bake and don their aprons faster than I can finish this sentence.  Today's baking was baking with a purpose though. 

   Yesterday after swimming lessons, we were supposed to go to our friend's house for dinner. Well, T kiboshed that little plan by painting the van in (you don't really want the details, do you?). Right then. So I bundled a bootless, coatless T back into the van and called our friends to say that we would not be attending dinner as planned. The problem was that I had just received their house key, as last week we had arrived there first. Not wanting to leave us out in the cold, a key was proffered. Bad timing. As it was now nearing 7pm and no dinner had been eaten by anyone, it was decided that dear D would come over to pick up the keys at around 8pm. Once I had T safely tucked into bed, R and I dined on strawberries, cherry tomatoes, crackers, cheese and left-over noodles. Bless his soul, D showed up with some of the home-cooked soup that would have been our dinner. It was delicious, but I am sure would have been better eaten with friends and a bottle of wine.

   So while I thought to entertain the children with baking, I also recalled a promise I had made at Christmas to make some gluten-free shortbread for N. What better way to fill the day than to serve up a little yummy thank you for being such good friends. So here is a post for you today N, for being a good friend and super support. Your gluten-free chocolate shortbread cookies will arrive shortly. Thank you!

Memory Lane via Cookies

     Chocolate chip cookies. Yummy!

   As promised, cookies were baked this morning. My girlies love to bake and it is a sweet moment to share this love with them. My Grandmother fostered this love in me, as she always baked with my sister and I when we were little. I cherish memories of the delectable smells of freshly baked bread, sugar cookies, thimble cookies, jam jams and so much more. If we were patient, it was a treat to be given a beater or spoon to lick the sweet confections off of them. The bowl was the "icing on the cake", if you will. There was never a fear of  becoming ill from the raw eggs in the batter. I have eaten so much raw batter that I do not worry about it, although the baked cookies are more to my taste now. My children's delighted faces that light up with the promise of their own spoon to lick is a beautiful reminder of my youth. I cannot help but smile and send lovely little "thank yous" through the air to dear Grammy that gave me this gift in the first place.

  

   My Grandfather also comes to my heart and mind, as the baking progresses. I have two of my Grandmothers baking sheets that my Grandfather made. While I have a cupboard full of baking sheets, the two Grandpa made are my favourite. The cookies always come off perfectly and the sheets clean up easily. They look brand new and I know that is a sign of quality. They have seen umpteen number of treats and they will see numerous more if my children have anything to say about it.

   My Grandparents were a special part of my childhood that I hold close and cherish more as my days go on. I appreciate their self-sufficiency in a world they literally built from the ground up. They constructed a house blasted from the Rocky Mountains in British Columbia. Grandpa kept chickens and we gathered eggs by the dozen when we visited. The fowls also graced the soup pot when they were done laying, a fact that bothered my childhood sensibilities. 

   Today I let nothing go to waste and boil chicken carcasses into stock with a nod to Grandma again. A raised garden bed filled their kitchen table and larders with veggies. Raspberries, peas, strawberries and beans were thinned out by my sister and my little hands with glee. The canning process that saw their produce saved for winter serving was something I attempted to recreate this Fall. I aspire to get better at it as the years go by. My modern family thinks I am a little goofy for spending so much time at these menial tasks, but my jams are always accepted by all. Should we slow down and appreciate the gifts that are offered us by Mother Earth and memory? I cannot answer for all, but for myself I know the glee glimpsed on my little girls faces when aprons are pulled out tells me yes. Most definitely yes. 

Thank you Grandma. Thank you Grandpa. Merry Christmas.