Slices of Beauty

I came across this blog today. I think through Brit Gal in the USA. She just left a simple comment and I checked out her blog. She had collections of various photos depicting different kinds of beauty. I liked the posts I saw, she seemed to be drawn to very similar things as me as far as seeing beauty went. So I decided to follow her and see what else she came up with. Just some nice pictures to brighten up my day. And then this post came up:

Slices of Beauty...: A Greek Retreat + A Thank You...

There is now a new standard for beauty in houses as far as I'm concerned. A lot of people commented on Greece and wow wouldn't I like to go there. I've been to Greece, it's fine, but this house is beyond. Just the sense of cool, refreshing, calm that emanates from each picture, made my heart ache just a little.

If my Rocket Scientist is ever asking around for something that I might like for my birthday or Christmas or our anniversary, if he built me this house, he would never have to get me anything. ever. again. for as long as I lived. Which would be a really long time in such a peaceful place, let me tell you.

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Check me out! I'm a guest blogger!

A while back I wrote a blog for Beth and she's finally able to take that vacation so there I am on Musings of happy mommy, with my own musings. What fun!

I actually wrote the body of that post several weeks before she asked for submissions and had it just sitting in my written but not edited or posted box. So I edited it sent it to her. It's actually one of my favourite pieces. I think because I came about it so differently. I wasn't sitting down 'to write a post', I just had some thoughts in my head that I wanted to get out so I could possibly use them later. And of course it includes a picture of my Little Man. Always worth a check.

I hope you enjoy my post and be sure to stick around and check out C. Beth when she returns. She's one of the first bloggers that I started following way back when and she's one of the first I check on when I'm going about my daily read.

As for me, I'm off to chase my ever-increasingly energetic 16-month old. He's had a cold the past few days and is starting to feel better and I think is going a bit stir crazy from the lack of acitivity lately. Me too. Off to find a park.

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Brown Bread - It's named after its color

Okay, I have never done this before. I have seen others do it though, so I'm pretty sure it will be okay.

I'm going to share a recipe.

It's nothing ground breaking. Just bread. Brown bread from back when they named it after the color as opposed to the whole wheat content. It might be more appropriate to call it a molasses bread. I got this recipe from my aunt. I think she may have gotten it from Grannie, her mom. It's handwritten so I don't even know if it was once in a book or not. I'm sure my mom will leave a comment correcting me on its origin, all I know is that it is truly yummy bread. A bit dense, cuts like a dream, toasts wonderfully to go with a nice hot cuppa.

In 1 cup of warm water dissolve 1 tsp honey and then add 2 tbsp yeast. Set aside 10 minutes.

Melt: together 1/2 cup of boiling water and 2 tbsp shortening and pour into your mixing bowl

Add: 1/4 cup honey and 1/4 cup molasses

Add: 1/2 cup milk, 1 beaten egg, 1 tsp salt, and yeast mixture. Stir well.

Add: Flour - approx. 6 cups to make a soft, light dough. Turn out and knead for 8 minutes.

Let Rise: in a greased bowl, covered, for 1 hour (150 degree F warmth)

Shape: into 2 loaves, place in a greased pans

Let Rise: 1 hour covered

Bake: at 400 degrees for 10 minutes, then at 375 degrees for 20 minutes.
(cover tops with foil if they get too dark)

*Now, I said it was a bit dense, but I think that's because I had two issues with letting it rise. I don't think it was warm enough, and my mixing bowl wasn't big enough. I was having trouble getting all 6 cups mixed in because of the size of my bowl and then I don't think it really let the dough have enough room to rise. Does anyone have tricks to share with me on a warm enough place to let bread rise? I've heard put it over the burner that the oven vents through, but I have a glass cooktop and no vent.

**Second amendment. I am currently living in the UK and I could not find molasses so I used treacle. I only used about 2/3rds of what was called for thinking that it would be too strong, but I don't' think it was. I would edge toward using the full 1/4 cup next time.

***Third note. This is for UK folk as well. Everyone may know this already, but it was news to me. Shortening is Cookeen in this country.

****Final mention. The yeast I use calls for it to be mixed with salt at the very beginning. But since the recipe added salt later, I left it out of the initial yeast mix and it turned out very well. I think it would have been too salty if I'd added what the yeast jar had called for.

I have tried a few bread recipes now and they just keep getting better. This one in particular was lovely to me because it tasted like my childhood. I was very pleased that my Little Man enjoys it as well. He had a slice or two as a snack, no butter, no jam, just the bread and he gobbled it up.

Let me know if you try this. I'd love to know how it turns out for you.

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Ovulating? Me?

Why yes, thank you. I am. Ovulating. On my own. Without drugs. We've thrown around the line, "the best treatment for PCOS is a succesful pregnancy", but now there's actual hormonal proof. Yippee!

That being said, we are still testing everyone a second time to confirm that everyone's works are working.

That was the good news. The bad news is that if things are not working in 6 months or so, IUI's are not covered by NHS. And they don't do Clomid. They do FSH injections. And IVF. Which I don't qualify for for another year and some. That sucks.

We could do the IUI on our own, but it would cost 1400 GBP. That also sucks.

So for now, we are celebrating the fact that it seems I have suddenly gained the ability to ovulate. Thank God!

And now for the sex! Sorry, was that TMI? We're all adults, right? We know how this works.

So, wish us luck!!

With the ovulating, of course.

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National Health

So we have an appointment with our local fertility clinic this afternoon. I find myself quite nervous. I knew I was getting anxious, but as today has worn on, I have become positively beside myself. I've managed to keep myself busy, I got up early and made crepes for breakfast, I've baked some truly delicious honey/molasses bread, and I've just about finished all the laundry I was behind on. I've also finished a unit of my online course and started the next one. And Asher has been nursed, napped, fed, cleaned, and kept happy. I need to be anxious more often. It makes me ridiculously productive.

On the other hand, I'd prefer to go without the stomach ache, slight light-headedness, and general shaky feeling. Sounds bad, I know. But it's all physical. I haven't been running stuff around in my head, I have apparently been suppressing any and all thoughts about it and it's just making me feel like crap. Part of the nervousness is the prospect of starting all this again; the meds, the testing, the not-so-comfy IUI, and the very real prospect of being pregnant again in the next couple months (we didn't have the horrible experience that some have had, I ovulated on the first round of clomid and we got pregnant on our first IUI so I'm kind of expecting it to go just as well the second time round).

The hitch, and I think this is what's really got my knickers in a twist, is that it's not like the US system where we had great insurance and a really great doctor that I had picked out myself. The clinic we're going to is at the hospital instead of a nice cosy office. I'm likely going to have a male doctor, not my first choice for sure. And the real kicker...they can say no. I'm not sure of the rules or waiting lists for these procedures. I know the rules for IVF are really quite strict. If we needed IVF I wouldn't qualify right now. I'm a little freaked. I'm trying not to be. Obviously. I never get this much work done. I'm sure all my worries will come to naught, but of course until I know for sure I'm having a bit of a moment.

Oh, yeah. And if they want to start Clomid, I have to wean Asher first. Yeah. I might actually be ready (although I feel guilty that I am), but I know that Asher for sure is not. Okay, for real now I think I may throw up sometime before this appointment actually takes place. Hopefully it's not as we're checking in. On someone's shoes. That would suck.

I'll let you know how it goes.

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Renewal

A month ago, I disappeared. I was trying to figure out a way of getting to my best friend's wedding back in Canada. I couldn't post about it because of course she reads these posts. And really nothing else was on my mind. So I hemmed and I hawed and Jeff and I went back and forth over pros and cons and logistics and practicalities and it really boiled down to relationship. How much are relationships worth? I've come to the conclusion that they're just about the only thing worth anything. Relationships with family, friends, spouses, children, parents, people on your street, in your church, at work, in your community, on the bus. Relationships are really the core of life. They are why we do most of what we do. How we view ourselves in relation to other people determines how we carry out our daily activites. Sorry. I didn't mean to get so philosophical. Just one of those things you start to get a broader scope of when you actually sit down and start writing. Back to my story.

Every time I talked about the week of E's wedding, I kept saying things like, 'when I get back'. Totally by accident. Jeff was already going to Poland that week for a conference, I was facing my first week on my own with Asher with a bit of trepidation and a bit of excitement, honestly, but everytime I thought of the wedding, I just couldn't imagine not being there. Originally, I was supposed to be a bridesmaid. It hurt that I wasn't going to be standing up there with her. So in the end, I went. We bought the ticket Sunday night and Tuesday we all flew out. Jeff dropped Asher and I off at Gatwick and then headed straight to Heathrow for his flight. We survived our first trans-Atlantic flight on our own (whew), and were able to surprise E Wednesday morning at her home. The wedding was on Friday and was absolutely one of the most beautiful, intimate, and unassuming weddings I have ever been to. I actually cried more at this wedding than my own. I am so happy that I was able to make it.

I spent a lot of time on this trip, reminiscing. Maybe that's not quite the right word. Remembering is a better word. I had been having a hard time remembering what life was like before Asher and I was able to spend a lot time reliving the 'good old days'. The days when Jeff and Iwere first dating, when we were engaged, the early months of our marriage. These were good things for me to remember, important things. I had forgotten an awful lot. About myself. I was already starting to realize that. But mostly about Jeff. And about the things we went through.

To clarify: I am not going down the road of 'having a baby ruined our marrage'. I cannot imagine life without Asher. I don't want to. But adding a member of your family does shift things. I think I did not really acknowledge/understand/get how much time it would take to make that shift. I think I thought it was over months ago and this is how we were going to be forever. It wasn't a place I wanted to be. I needed to remember things that were before because there are so many of those things that I want to be sure to preserve as we go forward, things I want to be a part of Asher's life as well as our own. Things I want to keep in this family no matter how big it grows. Remembering is important. Living life on purpose is important. It's often too easy to just let every day happen as it will and too much gets lost if you don't purposefully hold on to them.

So this is me, holding on.

To my style: to who I am in all of my varied and wonderful roles

To my family: and all the history and growth and future that they represent,

To my friends: new and old, and all that we've stuck by each other through, I'm sure there'll be more to come

To Jeff: my husband, my partner (in crime and in parenthood), my love, my rock, my sheltering arms. Here's to never forgetting again, or at least not for long.

To God: Who created the whole concept of relationship in the first place, to have one with me, He's the reason that I love. Keep reminding me.

Without relationship, there can be no change. We are affected by, and in turn affect, those around us. So make sure your effect is a good one.

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Help! I'm in the Great White North without wireless internet!

Just a quick shout out to say, I am still alive but relatively offline. There is internet here, but the room in which it is located is a) roughly the temperature of a meat locker and can only be survived for short periods of time, and b) very much not child-friendly and since I have a small child almost permanently attached to me, it is difficult to sit here for the time required to write an actual post. That, and, let's be honest, I'm more interested in spending my time soaking up family and friends. Not that I don't love you all, but I'll be back soon. Does anyone want to write a guestpost for me some time this week? I'll return the favor as soon as I'm back on English soil. Drop me an email if you're interested. If not, this will just give you more time to read up on all the other blogs you follow. Oh, yes, I haven't read a single blog since I've been here. I don't know if it's liberating or if I'm going through withdrawal. Somewhere in between I'm sure. But I miss you and will catch up(-ish) as soon as I get back my wireless.

PS. Oh, right! you don't actually know where I went. Part of the reason I stopped blogging for a bit was because all I wanted to talk about was my best friend back in Canada and her upcoming wedding and how hard it was to not be there and how much I desperately wanted to buy a ticket, but if I did decide to go, I wanted it to be a surprise. So we went into stealth mode. Turns out we decided that money wasn't a good enough reason to not be there for one of my oldest and dearest friends. So I bought the ticket Sunday night and left on Tuesday and surprised her at her house on Wednesday and made it to the wedding on Friday. Woot!!

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