I need a reset button for my day

I had a rough morning today, and I’m not quite sure why.  I woke up feeling rested.  I had finished the dishes and cleaned up our family room last night, so the house wasn’t a total wreck.  But for whatever reason, my patience was thin with the boys.  It was a stretch to make it till naptime, but they are sleeping now.

The funny thing is, the first thing that popped into my mind to do about it was not to “rest” in the sense of sitting down, but to make some pizza dough.  I’m starting to get into the idea that you can start something in the morning or the middle of the day when you only have five or ten minutes, and then let nature take its course as you finish off other things the rest of the day.  I have started to fall into this rhythm of making dough in the morning (sometimes with the boys), and then letting it rise in the afternoon while they nap, so that we can bake it in the late afternoon or early evening.  Eli has grown so accustomed to this routine that when I ask him what makes the dough rise (I’m trying to explain the power of yeast or leaven) he says, “It rises when we take our nappies.”

Making dough with yeast can sound daunting to many – it takes time, planning, and there are some failures along the way.  But I like that it requires something of me that goes beyond just opening a can or bag.  I like that it asks me to be patient, to persist when there are kitchen failures, to analyze and research when something has gone wrong, and to rejoice when something turns out really well.  In return for the time and effort I put in, I get a sense of accomplishment and confidence.  And saving money is not a bad benefit, either :).

 

 

A yo-yo a day keeps the crazies away

While I am trying to improve how I do things in my primary sphere of influence, I don’t really have many big goals written down for this year.  I really should, I know, but I still feel like I’m in that zone where “big hairy audacious goals” will only make me feel bad about what little I can accomplish.

On the other hand, it is worth considering that maybe sometimes, if you start out with a little fuzzy assertive goal, it will eventually grow into a big hairy one.

So.

I really want to sew and create things.  But I don’t always have time for a major project.  This led me to start thinking small – really small.  As in a yo-yo a day.

For those of you unfamiliar with yo-yos, they are little discs of fabric that are stitched with a running stitch around the edge, then gathered up into a little pouch.  They were all the rage a long time ago, and they are really cute, plus they fall into the category of “round things that make me happy.”

This is my little fuzzy assertive goal:  to sew one yo-yo a day.  They take about five minutes per yo-yo, so I think it’s doable.  They help me feel a little saner, because there’s something calming about stitching quietly and having something to show for it (which is quite different from the daily grind of boys and repeated cleaning/cooking).

By the end of the year, I should have 365 yo-yo’s.  I’m hoping to string them into a garland for the Christmas tree, and they will serve as a reminder of how little things done daily can add up to something significant.

Good thoughts: Of soil and seed

Once when I was processing through some things with a counselor after working for five years in Uzbekistan, I mentioned that I wasn’t much of a brainy person.  She started to laugh.  “Are you kidding?” she asked, “you have more thoughts running through your head in ten minutes than most people.”

That may or may not be a good thing . . . after all, just because you’re thinking doesn’t mean that you’re thinking good thoughts.  You could be worrying (guilty here) or doubting (guilty again) or a doing a host of other things.

But let’s assume the best and say that you’ve come across a few thoughts this week that made you stop and wonder.  Thoughts that encouraged you, or inspired you, or even compelled you to live differently.  For me, here are a few that caught my eye this week:

From the Prudent Homemaker:

“If you have $1 to spend on a garden, spend 90 cents on dirt and 10 cents on seeds, and your yield will be so much higher!”

How true this is not only in gardening, but in life as well.  A lot of what we become or produce is related to the soil we’ve cultivated for ourselves.  We inherited two garden plots with the house we are renting, and I’ve cleared the soil, but have yet to do the hard, and seemingly unglamorous step of prepping it for future plantings.  I spent quite a bit of time this month organizing and clearing things out in our basement – it too was kind of like a soil preparation, because it cleared the path for seeing what we could do with the space down there.

From Miss Mustard Seed: 

“I had a plan for my life and it changed. . . I want to share it because you may have had a plan for your life and it had to go on a shelf and God may have something for you that is so much better . . .”

I loved this story – you really should click over on the link above and read it yourself.  I resonated with it because I had a plan out of college to go into public policy, and ended up homeschooling five kids for five years instead.  Now I am in a new role as mother and wife in the Midwest – it doesn’t feel as glamorous as the previous one, but this post reminded me that God’s story never ends, and can often spring up out of the most humblest of circumstances.

Upping your game

Last semester there were times when I felt overwhelmed by my life situation.  We had intentionally become a one-car family to save money (as well as the stress of having a second used vehicle that could generate more risk for needing repairs), which left me at home for most of the day with three little, active boys.  Even though we were on a law school budget, we still found ourselves eating out more when I was just too exhausted or busy to cook what I had planned on.  Even though we had our own washer and dryer, the laundry just seemed to pile up in ways it hadn’t before.

And then one day it hit me – life wasn’t going to get any easier.  Well, maybe it would when the boys wouldn’t be so needy one day, but for now, I couldn’t expect Michael’s workload or my boys’ needs to decrease.  So there was only one solution:  I needed to up my game.  I couldn’t give myself a raise, but I could give myself a break by changing how I did things.

A commitment to constant improvement in how you do your job is often one of the secrets to success in business, but keeping house is often overlooked.  We look at housework and keeping the domestic fires stoked a category where just good enough is good enough.  But we rarely (at least I haven’t) sit down and ask, “How can I make this scenario better?”

“Why does that room constantly end up looking like a bomb went off?”

“What would it take for the laundry to get done?  For me to not pull out my hair because the stains aren’t coming out like they used to?”

“How can I change things so that my responsibilities are easier to meet?”

Sometimes stopping and re-evaluating is the key to a smoother day.  For me, I realized that while I loved intricate recipes, this time of my life required more freezer meals, soups, and crock pot meals.  I needed to buy more of our groceries at the beginning of the month because it gave me more meals to chose from when things got hectic unexpectedly.  I realized our laundry detergent didn’t work the same way here that it did in a different state, so I decided to buy the more expensive kind that was worth the increased stain-removal.  I started training myself to sneak downstairs to fold as much laundry as I could while my husband played with the kids after dinner.

I also tried to be kinder to myself.  Instead worrying that my kids were going to grow up feeling neglected and require years of therapy because I couldn’t get to everything, I told myself as I did each task to do as much as I could.  And surprisingly, I often got more done than I had planned.

It’s not about perfection – just improvement.

How are you upping your game?

Carnitas: Our new favorite way to eat pork.

And here’s why:

1.  They don’t cost that much to make – Pork shoulder typically is less expensive than ground beef.  Corn tortillas, crisped up a little with cooking spray in a cast-iron pan, and a sprinkle of feta/cotija cheese, some cilantro sprigs, red onion, and sweet corn and a squirt of lime juice – all of these things are low-budget yet so tasty.

2.  They are beyond easy to make.  Cut up the pork shoulder into 2 inch chunks, toss with the juice of two oranges and limes, 1 tsp. each of cumin, oregano, and salt, and simmer in a dutch oven for several hours until tender.  Then shred the meat and broil it (with some of the fat from the pan) until it’s nice and crispy on the edges.

3.  They make it easier to live on a budget and still feel like you can do take-out without too much effort – I can’t say the same for Indian or Thai food, unfortunately, because I love it and can make it, but it ends up using half the dishes in my kitchen.  This is definitely our new go-to way to make pork, right up there with slow-cooker pulled pork sandwiches.