Shuffle Time!



(Gratutious shot of a train in the snow, taken from our back porch in December.)

I'm going to try to better organize my blogs. I know, about time, right? But it's easier said than done.

Tryl's Meanderings is going to stay pretty much the same. You'll get random thoughts that I get the energy to write about, updates on family things (because I actually have family who reads this), craft and food tutorials or recipes, and random collections of links I find intersting. And I'm going to try to publish something every week - which means I might manage to have it happen every other week. I'm certainly going to try. So, that's the easy part.

Oak and Olive is going to become home of my writing alter-ego. I think. This will make it pagan/earth-centered information as well as a writing site. I'm hoping that means I publish more there as to never publishing something on either Oak and Olive or Laurel Reufner's Lair. I'm going to try to have an article on Lupercalia up soon.

And Bridgette's Scrapbook should be seeing some action once again as I start sharing our adventures with you all. My NaNo attempt this past November was to go back to the beginnings of our group and start writing. The site may also become a discussion destination for our group as we think over our characters and settings over the years and try to restore some continuity. I'll label those posts clearly, so if regular readers want to jump over them, they easily can.

As for Ghost Girl's site, I'm not sure. I need to sit down with my daughter and have a chat. I think it could be an intersting visit if she'd only write for it. (Well, that answers that. It doesn't load anymore.)

So, off to get to work. I hope to have a tutorial up by next Tuesday on how I made a cute Valentine's wreath for our front door. It's a Dollar Store craft, which I love to do for my door decor.

And see? This was a whine free post! I'm almost back to normal after being sick at the beginning of the month. I even called my mom to talk last night! My voice is still recovering, but it's so much better now.

Oops!

Boy do I sound cranky in those last couple of posts. I'd like to chalk it up to 1. hunger and 2. feeling crappy. And I need to clarify that it isn't entirely my relatives' fault that we wound up with so much junk here at home after Christmas. The eldest and a friend of her's were having a party that Friday with about 10 friends invited. Bless her heart, but the Drama Queen jumped at every excuse to add the the food stash for the party.

I still can't quite figure out why, with so many of us either dieting or with diabetes - or both, we make so much sweet stuff every year. We must just love to bake!

Stupid Celery Fast

Well, THAT lasted a long time. Apparently I was getting sick by Thursday night and on Friday I woke up with a full-blown case of whatever crud the girls had been fighting. The eldest had been down with it since a couple of days after Christmas - it really hit her hard. Fortunately, I don't have it that bad and hope not to. However, it kibbituzed the fast. No way I'm suffering both of those at once. I'll let you know when I restart. *sigh*

New Year, New Diet

How was everyone's winter holidays? Our's were nice, getting to spend time with family and being silly. As happens often lately, I was once again overwhelmed by my family's generosity, although I know it's part of how they show their love. And for the last time, I brought home far too many sweets and related leftovers because "no one else would/should eat them and we have friends over every week." Seriously guys, what I brought home this year, while appreciated, was ridiculous. Not even the girls will eat that many cookies. (They were tasty, though...)

And those tasty cookies have led to the new diet mentioned in the title. *sigh* My blood sugars have grown higher and more erratic over the last few months. They desperately need to be brought under better control, but I've let some really bad habits creep in. Back when I was first diagnosed with diabetes, I started cutting back on - or cutting out altogether - lots of foods that I shouldn't eat anymore, but this time it was just too overwhelming. I've been zonked by allergies - and the higher sugars - and a little depressed and wanted my comfort food, dang it!

So, on my birthday last month I agreed to try this crazy sounding diet that my doctor had been talking to me about over the last few months. A doctor at O'bleness had been using it to good affect (effect?) with his diabetic patients. So much so that my doctor, Dr. J., eventually just asked him to send her the info. It was taking a month or more of her patients to get in to see him and get on the program. Many participants had cut back on the diabetes medication as well as high blood pressure and cholestoral medicines. All good things, right?

Ah, but what makes the diet crazy sounding? Well, for the first three days you fast, with essentially a clear liquid diet and three - THREE - stalks of celery a day. When I told her I'd do it, we decided that I could eat as much celery as I want. I like the stuff, and well, it's celery. The stuff is pretty much water with a little fiber tossed in. After the fast you start backing eating solid foods following a very specific meal plan for the next four weeks. It reintroduces carbs starting at just 15 grams the first week and works up to 60 grams by the fourth.

It was the four week meal plan that had me hesitanting and I'm still not sure of how I'll do with it, but I'm going to give it my best go. There's actually a lot of food at each meal. As far as I'm concerned, I rarely eat that much a breakfast.

I started today. So far, I'm not sick of celery....yet. However I was so hungry by dinner time and celery wasn't cutting it. It just made me hungrier. Then I noticed I could have sugar-free jello. Hey, I don't like jello, but it would taste different, right? I ate 5 snack cups. I'm now cheating a wee bit with a mug full of beef bouillon. I need something with a meat taste to it. Sorry.

The hardest part is avoiding all of the temptations! It's impossible in this house not to see or think about them. I'll think, "Oh, I'll just grab a nibble of that or a bit of this." And then I'll remember I'm fasting and have to make the conscious decision not to grab the nibble or bite. It's honestly been exhausting, but I'm almost through Day 1. Now, to just remember in my morning grogginess not to eath anything...

2 DAYS!!!

We've only TWO DAYS left until the beginning of National Novel Writing month and I have no idea what I'm writing. Now, some folks enjoy the feeling of writing by the seat of their pants. Sadly, I'm not one of them. I need a rough road map of where I want to go and key points I want to visit along the way. I haven't got that yet and it's starting to bug me a bit.

I like to use the month of November to push my boundaries. Test myself and see what I'm made of. My first year, it was simply to write 50,000 words of fiction that didn't completely stink. To take a plot idea and run with it. The next year I settled on a middle/young adult work that my kids could read. Two years ago it was erotica/romance. Just how far could I get myself to go with a sex scene? (And yes, I really did suprise myself with that one!) Last year I tried to tackle a sequel to the young adult story, but didn't get very far. Actually, few of us got very far that year. I'm not sure what happened to the others, but I know what happened in my case. Or at least I think I do. I hadn't finished editing the first book and it seemed silly to go on to the next. That and I got sick half-way through.

All of which brings us to this year. What the heck am I going to write? I thought I'd tackle a non-fiction mythology book. It's something I've been thinking about for a good while now. But then I got this sliver of an idea for a true vampire tale, which is something I've also been thinking would be fun to write. And by true vampire, I mean the revenant vampires of folklore. Something truly horrific as opposed to what Hollywood and lit. have been tossing our way. (THAT was my first novel.) However I didn't have much to go on, until last week that is. One the way back from taking a friend home from our meet n'greet, it started to plot itself in my head. Great, right? Except it stopped and I haven't had the chance to think more on it...So, WHAT am I going to begin writing in a few days? I still have no idea, but something tells me it'll be neither of the above, because that seems to be how it's going this year.

*sigh*

NaNo 2012

Ohmygersh! Only 

 

 more days until 2012's National Novel Writing Month kicks off! Are you ready?

 

 

S'more Birthday Cakes

So, the Monkey Girl turned 13 a week and a half ago. Yep, we've TWO teenage girls in the house now. For her party, she wanted a s'more theme - you know, those melted marshmellow, chocolaty goodness treats. Where she gets her ideas, I don't know, but it was fun. Mr. Incredible made a giant s'more for the pinata. But those pics will have to wait for another post, since my camera batteries died and my sister took pics on her camera instead. I need to get her SD card downloaded to my computer.

Instead, I want to share the cakes we made with you. This is the first time MG's wanted sometime homemade instead of one ordered from the store. Of course, stumbling across these cupcakes from Martha Stewart probably helped with the decision making process. (Yes, I love Martha.)

 

I thought they were so cute and was really, really happy when MG wanted them for her party's cakes. Of course, that then means I had to MAKE them. Checking out the recipe through me for a loop. It uses what germ! What they heck? I've never seen a recipe like this, but it looked healthier than your regular cake. I just wasn't sure how it would taste. So guess what cake Mr. I got for his birthday the weekend before? Sometimes he can be a really great sport. So is our gaming gang, thank goodness. And they were rewared wonderfully. Drama Queen said the cake tasted like snickerdoodles in a pie. I suspect they were going for the graham cracker crust effect and hoped I'd like it better once we got the chocolate sauce and marshmellows on. (I did!)

 

Since we needed A LOT of cakes, I made regular sized and mini-upcakes the day before. They didn't go together quite like Martha's, but that's okay. We used her recipes and the pic as inspiration and made our own thing. Take a look:

 

 

 

Cute, right? Saturday morning, MG and I sat down to assemble them and quickly realized that putting them together like the originals just wouldn't work. The mini cupcakes were too big, so we stacked the minis on the big cupcakes and then added the big marshmellows. After we'd filled one of the cake plates with finished cupcakes, MG decided to add the mini marshmellows around the sides so we got to use them as well. I've got to tell you, sitting at the table putting those together with MG was my best memory of the day. We weren't in a hurry and got to have some fun with it. It was great. She kept looking for ways get the chocolate sauce all over her fingers so she could lick them clean. Yeah, it was that good.

 

If you want the recipe, just click on the image of Martha's mini cakes above and it'll take it to her webpage. I'd post the recipe where, but I honestly didn't change anything in it and so don't feel right copying it verbatim. I'm going to try making it again in a couple of weeks for gaming night, only I think I'll just make it as a regular cake, slather on the chocolate sauce, and toss on some mini marshmellows. One of DQ's friends, who has joined our gaming group, keeps requesting them.

 

For the display, we used my old cake plates and arranged them on our new-to-us teak cabinet in the dining room. They looked lovely and we could sit the rest of the food around them. However, it didn't look nearly as lovely in photographs, so here's a shot of them sitting on the deep freeze, which is our main workspace in the kitchen right now. (New counter/cabinets should be in in the next week or two!)

I love how Pinterest lets me post ideas so I can attempt them later. It was nice to be able to go through web pages and blog posts finding ideas for her party and then have them all nicely organized, with pictures, in one spot to go back over them together.