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RT @Brixtonite: RT @JaneAitchison No amount of classes can compensate a parent or their kid for having no job or struggling on poverty wages < this!
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Wow – I can’t believe today is the last day of #NaBloPoMo. When I started I never really believed that I would actually do it but as the days passed it seemed more and more like an act of defiance against my lazy self. And what a month it’s been! I gave up on finding work till the new year, I quit my job in Canada severing my safety net forever, I baked, laughed and contemplated love. I came to terms with not being enough (and always being more than enough), went on my first date in eight years and, most importantly, I found my voice and my creative spirit. The personal change in me is incredible – I’m so grateful, so enthused and I feel so incredibly creative. I can’t say I’ll keep posting every single day but I will definitely be posting far more than every couple of months. Reconnecting with you, my readers, has been yet another unexpected joy. I feel as if the shackles have been removed, the veil lifted and I think we’re in for a fabulous ride! Thanks so much for being here to hold my hand! Xoxo November 26 2011Christmas Market on the Southbank
Sorry about the blurry image that girl of mine never stays still for more than 2 seconds. Fleece lined heart rain coat – Florence & Fred, Tesco Navy stripe bow top – Next, £7 Red skinny cords – Carters, sale $3 Strawberry trainers, Converse, ebay, £6 I have a date tomorrow night. My first “first date” in over eight years. I’m not really sure what I’m feeling. Nervous. Excited. Unsure. I kind’ve just want to get it over with if you know what I mean – like ripping off a bandaid. It is a very weird thing to be dating and have a child (he does as well) – I know that we’ll probably talk about our kids (especially if we don’t have much else in common) but I don’t want Maisie to meet any date (potential or otherwise) until things get serious but right now serious is the last thing on my mind. I suppose, like most things in life it will be easier when I’m there and I’ll just have to see what happens. I just feels like such a foreign place to be – somewhere I couldn’t ever have imagined I be earliere this year. Anyone have any advice? Any single parents have tips on dating someone with a kid when you have a kid? This is a whole new frontier. I am SO excited that Christmas is less than a month away. I adore Christmas. From decorations to gift wrap to baking and everything in between Christmas is a wee reminder of how much magic still remains in the world. Not one to ever let the opportunity to throw a party pass, this year is no different. With a bit more of a spring in my step I’ve decided to throw a grown up Christmas party. And not just any grown up party… a MADMEN themed grown up party. I received the final invites today and they are exactly what I had hoped for (I love it when a plan comes together!) and I’m so excited to share them with you!
xoxo * About a month ago it was suggested that I try cutting dairy out of Maisie’s diet as a possible solution to a long term bowel issue. It was around the same time I realised that I was having a bad reaction to wheat again (I had a wheat intolerance pre-pregnancy but it went into remission when I became pregnant). To say that I was scared is an understatement. Maisie survived probably the last 18 months on cheese and cheesy pasta and there is nothing easier than a quick sandwich when you’re out and about. I honestly didn’t know how I was going to do it. Especially when it comes to cake. I mean the few, actually tasty biscuits and cakes available are really expensive. After a wee search I found numerous recommendations for the Cake Angels cookbook. I took my first crack at a recipe from the book today, Sticky Gingerbread. Oh. My God. It was soooooooooooooo good and the people I served it to had NO idea it was wheat and dairy free. In fact I will say, hand on heart, it is the best gingerbread I have ever tried. If you know anyone with a wheat, gluten or dairy allergy you MUST tell them about this cookbook, in fact you’ve just found them an excellent Christmas present. Here’s the Cake Angels’ Sticky Gingerbread recipe: 175g (6oz) black treacle (use molasses in N.A) 175g (6oz) golden syrup 175g (6oz) dark brown muscovado sugar 175g (6oz) dairy-free spread (I use Pure Sunflower spread) 350g (12oz) wheat & gluten free plain flour (I LOVE Dove Farms flours) 2 tsp Xanthan gum 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda (baking soda for my Canadian & American friends) 1 tbsp ground ginger 1 tsp mixed spice (I used 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/4 tsp cloves, 1/4 tsp nutmeg) 150ml (5fl oz) soya/rice/almond milk (I used goats milk) 1 large egg, beaten 75g (2 3/4 oz) glacé ginger (I used crystallized stem ginger & cut it up – sooooooo yummy!)
*There is no photo for this post because we ate it before I had time to charge the camera! Do you ever sort of forget what you look like. What you REALLY look like? Not what you wished you looked like, or what you think you see when you look in the mirror or even what you wish you didn’t see when you accidentally catch your reflection? Some days I swear the person I think I am doesn’t even exist any more. So tonight I took a picture. I don’t know if its the real me but it is the me right now, and right now, this is what I look like.
I’ve been thinking about love a lot lately. I don’t think you can separate from your husband and not think about it (well I think if you separate you SHOULD think about it). People ask me all the time if I still love Husbando. My answer is always the same: “Yes I do. But is that enough?” I don’t do relationship baggage. I don’t get it and I won’t carry it. Yes I’ve been hurt before (ummm hello I walked in on my first husband in bed with one of our friends. I’ll let you digest that last line for a minute before I move on. Oh that? It’s a story for another day but I promise it’s a good’un.) Anyway, back to the baggage, or lack there of. I don’t think hurt has to equal baggage and, now this is just in my experience, but baggage usually has a good ole heap of guilt in it. Guilt or an inability to let go. Carrying baggage is the mental equivalent of handcuffing yourself to the person in question – even though its all over, even now it’s living in the ether, you’re still giving that person power and residency in your life. Why? After a series of ridiculous and confidence annihilating relationships in my early 20′s I swore that I was better than this. Why was I spending my nights pining for someone who had clearly moved on and didn’t give a shit about me? Why was I willing to change myself, my thoughts, my opinions just so someone would like me more? Why did I think I was worth so little that I would fall into the arms (and bed) of pretty much anyone who would glance, even albeit briefly, in my direction. It took a pretty horrific experience for me to find my strength but once I did I was unstoppable. I was in a relationship because I WANTED to be there and not because I wanted someone to want me to want to be there. I won’t say they were all on my terms because that’s not a relationship but some of them were, some of them I was more into them than they were into me and others were mutually elusive. Owning the direction of my love life was the first truth in burning the baggage but the second one is even greater. To quote Bonnie Raitt “I can’t make you love me if you don’t”. You can’t make someone love you any more than you can make them want to be with you or walk on water. I have fought like hell for relationships in the past to work but ONLY when I was sure that the other person loved me (and I loved them) and we needed to learn how to fix us. Which brings us back to my current scenario. Over the past several months I’ve been called brave and strong but also accused of not caring enough about my relationship or told that it seemed really easy for me to walk away (ummm what?) The truth of the matter is that I can’t make husbando-the-separated (HTS) want to be in a relationship with me. I can’t make him happy, I can’t fulfil him, I can’t make everything ok – that’s not my job. And let’s be honest a huge part of my job now is teaching Maisie how to do those things for herself. There may come a time when HTS and I look into each other’s eyes and realise that we love each other AND we want to do the crapload of work that it would take for us to get back together. Or, while we’re both figuring things out on our own one, or both of us, may find our new life more to our liking. We’re not fortune tellers, we’re human beings – simple, complicated, unsure, fragile human beings with a great capacity for great love and great strength. Husbando and I created an beautiful, incredibly spirited, wonderful daughter together – we are going to be in each other’s lives until we die. Our daughter is proof of the love that we once had and that? Right now that’s enough. Come back tomorrow for more because I’ve committed to blogging every day in November
This week I’m thinking about
Come back tomorrow for more because I’ve committed to blogging every day in November
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