Sourdough beignets

It's interesting to look back and see how everything has been pointing me to the Roman Catholic Church. I took Latin in high school and college. I really love the language. I have always wanted to visit Italy. I really enjoy traveling to New Orleans.

One of my family's traditions is making beignets for supper. Most of the time we use refrigerated biscuits. Tonight, I tried a recipe for sourdough beignets. The directions included salt and eggs that weren't in the ingredient list. I added 1 1/2 tsp salt and two eggs. It made for a chewy donut rather than the lighter beignets of Cafe du Monde. It was a crowd pleaser and made twice as much as we could eat. I cut them and began cooking and ended up having to cut some of the later batches in half again because they kept rising.

Don't ask me why this is right side up in my camera roll but then uploads upside down. But it's lots of deliciousness either way you look at it!

Variety is the spice of life!

So, I have learned that I need familiar things like crochet, cooking, bubble baths and such boost serotonin. Exciting, new things and being active boost dopamine which I am lacking. So I need a routine that incorporates lots of variety.

Since August, I have been planning our school days very effectively. I use a notebook and add each subject with page numbers and review questions. We are getting so much work done. The boys did their copy work in cursive today which was way better than I thought they would be at this early in the school year. We'll be through the science book in three weeks and have time to do one or two more science books.

How about I apply that to my daily schedule? My subjects can by God, husband, children, community, cleaning, organizing, decorating and crafting. I can vary the activities often so I am addressing all areas of focus without it getting old. I can plan ahead a focus to help plan ahead so i am not a slave to my impulsiveness and then add what I else I am able to accomplish once I get on a roll.

I think this will help me focus on today instead of what didn't get done yesterday or what will still need to be done tomorrow. I really love the days when I am in the zone and getting lots done. Maybe this idea will help those days become more frequent.

Daily Choices

I have never thought of myself as a very good person.

I am.....

Careless

Impulsive

Irresponsible

I have tried so hard to change who I am. I've tried Flylady and Emily Barnes to help me keep my house clean. I've tried every routine and schedule you can imagine to keep myself consistent. I do well at first and then I get bored or distracted and fail.

I often feel like a child. Why can't a grown woman get it together? I had even considered medication. Since coffee puts me to sleep, I do react to stimulants in the way that ADHD people do. At my worst, I would have mood swings that were similar to bipolar. I talked to my husband about it and decided that I might need medicine in the future but I wasn't ready to be called crazy just yet.

I decided to pick out a dieting book at the library to give me some motivation. I picked Diet Rehab by Dr Mike Dow. It explained how our brains work. The kind of ADHD symptoms that I was having could well be explained with low dopamine that could be boosted by certain foods and activities.

The mood swings were caused by my efforts to "fix" myself. I'd find a new program or a new motivation and be on top of the world for a while. New things are dopamine boosters. Then I would get into the nitty gritty of trying to be consistent with my new program and my dopamine would drop and some days it was a struggle to get out of bed.

It gets worse with age. My biggest addictions are caffeine and peanut butter. Fat and stimulants that boost dopamine. Because I'm getting older and weight comes on more easily, I can't have a Coke and a Reese's as often as I'd like or I'd be 300 lbs.

I'm using these ideas for myself and my son who has been diagnosed with ADHD but has reacted terribly to medication. The best part is that I don't have to add a lot of foreign foods and eliminate our favorites. For the first week which ends today, I add one dopamine boosting activity and one dopamine boosting food per day. I eliminate nothing for the first two weeks.

So I added exercise, dancing, cleaning to upbeat music and new recipes. On the first day, I noticed my son was a little more anxious. That could be low serotonin so I started adding things like cooking, crafts and more laughs and hugs to boost serotonin.

Basically, sugar spikes and crashes our serotonin levels and fats are the pitfall foods of dopamine. So add more complex carbohydrates and protein.

We ate more beans, grits, flax seed and eggs. I have seen some more ways of adding protein like smoothies and high protein pasta.

Starting tomorrow, I'll be adding two activities and two foods each day. I really like that this about daily choices. Our actions, diet and attitudes affect our brain chemistry every day. Every day we have a chance to make better choices that will help us be more focused and less impulsive.

Food for the poor

I received a letter in the mail from Food for the Poor saying that it only took 6 cents to feed a child for one meal. I thought that surely it couldn't be that simple so I looked up some other charities like World Vision and Catholic Relief Services among others. The numbers that I found ranged from 22 to 25 cents per meal. Food for the Poor said that they bought in bulk and it was for a child so 6 cents could be right.

What does that mean? Six cents won't buy anything in the US. But how quickly could a little savings add up to help the poor.

1 soda = at least a dollar or 4 to 16 meals for the poor

1 fast food meal = about $7 or take leftovers for lunch and provide 28 to 116 meals

1 restaurant meal for a family of 4 = $50 or eat at home or with coupons for $10 and provide 160 to over 650 meals

Doesn't that just blow your mind? It's so easy to think living frugally just doesn't add up quickly enough. But it depends on where you put your money to work. I really like the three charities that I've mentioned because they provide more than just rice and beans. There are seeds, animals, water pumps, education and more that help people to provide better for their own families.

What other ways can we save in our daily lives that can add up quickly to help the poor?

Eat less meat

Drink more water

Eliminate the coffee maker

Get rid of makeup (I've done this. My skin feels so much better clean and moisturized instead of made up)

Mend clothes or buy from thrift stores instead of buying new

Use shopping bags instead of trash bags

Combine trips to save gas

and many, many more

What kind of impact will your blessings make on the world?

Pantry challenge

I was on the Daniel fast for two weeks instead of the forty days that I had planned. I ran out of beans and other things that made the fast work so I'll finish up the forty days when I get to Alabama. Right now I am challenging myself more to eat as much as possible from the pantry and freezer.

We have a few blueberries left so blueberry muffins will be for breakfast a couple times a week. We have oatmeal so we'll have that for breakfast every other day. We have veggies that we'll eat for lunch. We'll have chocolate pecan cookies with the pecans we have left.  We have so many breakfast options that we may do breakfast for supper as well.

I've really enjoyed the process of creativity to make what we have work. I've also noticed feeling more content. I appreciate what we have that helps me create something delicious. I want to continue this.

When we get moved, I want to shop sales and stock up when I can so that I am shopping for the pantry and not just for what I want to cook for the week. As I cook more and more with what we have, I'll get better and better at making it work. Practice makes perfect.

Kitchen mistakes make for interesting results

We have really been cleaning out the kitchen. We made vegetarian chili with adzuki beans and a small amount of red lentils last night. Breakfast and lunch are still pretty easy but supper is requiring some major creativity. It makes me anxious to see the shelves emptying. I know I need to only buy what I need to use up what is left in the cabinets but I have to fight the urge to buy a buggy load. A full pantry and freezer makes me feel secure. But being creative and finding ways to make do make me feel satisfied and more content. I made a big batch of muffin mix to make 12 batches of muffins using the recipe from The Gluten Free Gourmet Bakes Bread. I made one batch with blueberries. I wanted a streusel topping but I softened the butter too much and it was more like a paste. The baby was crying so I just spooned the brown sugar/cinnamon/butter mix and watched it sink into the muffin batter. Well the brown sugar mix pushed the blueberries to the bottom. Removing the paper and putting it upside down made it like a muffin topped with a blueberry/brown sugar jam. Super delicious!

To Do list: Visit my brother

On my to do list when we get moved to Alabama is to find directions to my oldest brother's grave. I don't guess that I've been there since his funeral so long ago. He was 8 yrs older than me. He's still the coolest guy I've ever met.

I still remember the day we got the news that he had died in a car accident. I had never seen nor would I ever see again that grief on my father's face. And regret. Even as a young child, I could see that he wished that he had been there more for his child that he would never see again this side of Heaven.

I remember the funeral. I wasn't sure what to do. When my great Uncle Red came by to shake my hand, I wrapped my arms around his neck and held on for dear life. I remember only four figures from that day. Davy in his casket as the music of Friends are Friends Forever by Michael W. Smith played. Sean, our brother between Davy and me, whose face showed that the closest person on this planet to him had been taken away. Me wishing that I knew what I had missed out in knowing him since we didn't get to see each other very often. And Uncle Red, someone to hug me and let me know that this day wouldn't last forever.

At his burial, I remember his mother telling our father that Davy was a good boy. I'm sure he was. I've always felt that he was our rock. And we're all a bit shaky without him. It doesn't make sense for a talented young man to be taken from this world when the world is better for him being here. Just one of those things we can't see from our viewpoint.

David Greely Fulgham - Gone but not forgotten.