Back from Holiday

Hello!!!  I'm back in England after our long, wonderful holiday in the States with our families and friends.  Thanksgiving at home was good.  Christmas was good.  We miss everyone already, but we're glad to be back.

I've had jet lag to the extreme since we got home, which explains why I'm wide awake at midnight when we have to get up at 5am.  Hooray.  On the bright side, all of this time spent not sleeping has opened up some serious craft time, and I have just about finished a piece of wall art (or shelf art, depending on your decorating needs) that I am SUPER proud of.  All I have left to do is secure all of the pages together and put a wall hanger on the back.  Here it is...

Altered Book Sculpture.  "Reader's Digest: A Garden for all Seasons"

So what do you think???  The dishevelled environment in this picture really helps the book shine, doesn't it?  How awesome am I that I have not changed out of my PJ's today?  Very.  I even opened the door to accept a parcel today... in my PJ's... without a bra.  Jet lag is seriously winning here.  Thankfully, it only lasts around a week & a half, so we're on our way back to a normal schedule.  :-)

Etsy has a calculator that is supposed to tell you how much to charge for your handmade items.  I spent 20 hours working on this (so far), and it told me to charge... $700.  I laughed.  Am I not giving myself enough credit?  Or am I being realistic to think that this is an outrageous amount to charge a person for a book I carved pages out of?  Don't get me wrong.  It's beautiful.  I'm incredibly proud of the work I put into the entire piece, especially the detail on all of the flowers.  But $700???  I'm taking a poll among my friends and plan to sell it for whatever the average price is of all of their answers.  I'll keep you updated.

In addition to listing these creations on Etsy, I am very seriously considering joining the Bury St Edmunds Art Society.  They have an art fair every summer and an online gallery where members can display and sell their art.  It would also be a good way to meet more people and become more involved in the community that is my new home, which is important to me.  Community service is my jam.

Any other artists out there?  How do you decide on a price for your work?  Am I the only person who didn't put on real clothes today??  Until next time!

We Hosted 22 Adults, 5 Kids, and a Dog for Thanksgiving

It.  Was.  SO FUN!

My husband took Bruce for a long walk after breakfast in an attempt to deplete some of his bounce and energy.  It worked pretty well, but we still gave him a Benadryl to keep him calm and make him a little less nervous since he hasn't spent a lot of time around large groups of people.  We're actually not sure if he's ever spent time around kids, but he did really well with them and even let our friends toddler use him as a pillow when they both got tired of walking around everybody's legs.

We started cooking (and drinking, let's be honest) around 9:30am, and people started showing up around noon.  Turkey was done ahead of schedule at 2:30pm because everything cooks faster in this tiny oven.  We had plenty of food and in fact have a ton of leftovers.  We went through most of a 14 lb turkey, an 8 lb ham, stuffing, macaroni and cheese, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, gravy, pecan praline sweet potatoes, prosciutto-wrapped asparagus, 5 packages of Hawaiian rolls, crescent rolls, lumpia, a couple of meat and cheese plates with crackers, olives, chips and dip, puff pastry with cranberry and brie, a pumpkin pie, an apple pie, a red velvet cake, a crockpot of mulled wine, and about 3 trash bags full of beer bottles.  I'm sure I'm forgetting something.  We had so much food.  Our kitchen looked like Heaven.

We actually didn't run out of beer and only ran out of mulled wine an hour before everybody started making their exits.  Most importantly, we didn't run out of things to laugh about.  We kept Spades and Cards Against Humanity going throughout the day, and the last 9 of us closed down the night with a super competitive (and hilarious) game of Cranium.  I think our British friends were just entertained watching us celebrate our weird, American holiday.  It was fun to see the roles reversed because usually I'm the one asking what different food is and trying to figure out why we're celebrating.  Ha!

There were only two dog-related issues.  Our neighbor is allergic to dogs, which means Bruce, of course, chose him as a favorite person to rub up against.  And when those same neighbors knocked to come in, our friend opened the door, and Bruce shot out into the front yard where our sweet, little neighbor kid Charlie was waiting to come in - and he's deathly afraid of dogs.  By the time I got outside 2 seconds later, he was down the block hiding and crying hysterically.  We felt TERRIBLE.  Thankfully, they are great people and held onto their sense of humor during it all.  Well, everyone but Charlie, but who can blame him?  Bruce is almost as tall as he is!

At the end of the night, we were bummed to discover that someone had dried their hands a little too vigorously and pulled our towel holder off the bathroom wall, so add that to the list of considerations - something WILL get broken.  No sweat, though.  It's an easy fix to putty it back onto the wall, and if that's the worst thing that happened, I'm comfortable calling our first Thanksgiving a great success!  We made new friends, laughed again at all of the fun things we've done with our old friends, complimented our dog on being such a good boy, and finally locked the door around 10:00pm with a satisfied sigh.  We went to bed with full bellies and happy memories.  Can't wait to do it all again next year.

VFW Veterans Day and Remembrance Day 10k

Running is hard.

Okay, fine, running isn't hard.  In fact, if you listen to a friend I made in Haiti, nothing in life is hard.  But athletic activity in general isn't something that I am naturally good at.

My husband and I trained for almost two months for the VFW Veterans Day and Remembrance Day 10k run in Mildenhall.  Then we adjusted our training a little bit.  Then we trained a little more until we finally felt as ready as could be expected to run Six. Freaking. Miles.  And you know what...

WE FINISHED IN 66 MINUTES!

This was our first 10k run, and it went MUCH better than expected - our initial goal was 75 minutes, and we CRUSHED IT.  The people at East Anglia VFW Post 12143 and all of the volunteers and spectators did a great job of providing a safe, fun, and inspiring atmosphere for the race.  It was even greater to see some friends of ours volunteering at the water stops for some personalized shouts of encouragement as we made our way along the route.

It's now 7 hours later, and all of my joints feel like they might have crumbled - but that won't take away from my sense of accomplishment!

I'd love to hear what goal you've reached recently!  Tell me in the comments - let's encourage each other!

Simple Season Decorating with Sincere Spaces

All of my friends are incredibly talented in one way or another.  Some of us can sing.  Some of us create imaginative works of art.  Some of us always win at Scrabble.  Some of us can chug a beer in less than 5 seconds.  Lots of talent in my social circle.

One of my very best and most talented friends is an interior designer, and I am SO excited to have her help in preparing for our out-of-control Thanksgiving dinner.

Her name is Natalie Lytle, and with her business Sincere Spaces, she can help you refine and design any room in your house.  What that leaves you with is a home in which you are surrounded 100% by things you love, efficient spaces you utilize often, and an environment that makes you feel all warm and fuzzy when you walk in the front door.  It's a multi-step process that you can read more about here.  (The sneak peek I got of her portfolio was phenomenal.  The closets.  Oh my gosh.)

This holiday season, she can help all of us look like we've actually got our shit together enough to host Thanksgiving at our house.  (Thank the Lord!)

She and I are working via Skype to create beautiful tablescapes and little, decorative surprises out of the pretty vases and glass mugs that I already have (along with berries and pieces of trees that I stole from around the neighborhood during Bruce's walks this week).  Hey, neighbors, I basically trimmed your hedges for free this week - you're welcome.

This is what I've gathered so far:

(It already looks great, and it's just sitting at the bottom of a sack!  I can't wait to see what she does with all of this!!!!)

If you're interested in adding that little, extra spark of cheer to your Thanksgiving dinner this season, start gathering greenery and give Natalie a shout at sincerespaces@gmail.com!  You guys can work out a time when she can come to your house (if you're nearish to Oklahoma City) or set up a Skype or FaceTime date to experiment with ideas for your own tables.

I can't wait to show you what she does with our house!  I hope I have enough stuff...

Whole30 - Are You Brave Enough to See if You're Wrong?

Maybe I hang with the wrong crowd, but lately I've heard a lot of ridicule aimed at people who are jumping on the "gluten sensitivity" train.  Here's the deal: Gluten sensitivity is a real thing.  Just like dairy sensitivity is a real thing - at its worst it's called lactose intolerance.  Just like diabetes is a real thing.  And Crohn's disease is a real thing.  If you aren't sensitive to any foods, I'm really happy for you, I'ma let you finish, but taking the gluten out of my diet is one of the best things (of all time) I could do for my body.  And yes, I just paraphrased Kanye but only to make you realize that cutting down people who are trying to improve themselves is the equivalent of pulling a Kanye.

Let me ask you a question.  Are you 100% sure that you don't have any food issues?  Because I thought I was one of the lucky ones with no food issues, too.  

Spoiler alert: I'm not one of the lucky ones.  

Aside from an addiction to sugar, I also discovered that gluten or wheat or something in bread-type foods makes me an angry, hateful person with clouded thoughts and a quick temper.  How did I discover that?  By cutting those foods out of my diet for a full 30 days.  

I'm talking about the Whole30.

Photo by whole30.com

What is the Whole30?  In my opinion, it's the best thing you can do for yourself.  Objectively, it is a program of eating (it's "not a diet," but I'm going to call it a diet) that eliminates common problem foods for 30 DAYS and then gradually reintroduces those foods one by one for you to find out exactly which foods cause issues with you.  It's a diet that's not about the scale - though you will lose weight.  It's about your mental health, your emotional health, your physical health, and the control you should have over all aspects of your well-being.

Here are the things you eliminate: 

-Sugar

-Alcohol

-Grains

-Legumes

-Dairy

-Carrageenan, MSG, and Sulfites

-Foods typically made with the eliminated items but substituted with good foods (Don't try to make cookies out of apple sauce, pizza out of cauliflower, etc.)

-Stepping on a scale.  Yep, I'm saying you can't weigh yourself for 30 days.

It sounds terrible.  It is.  But it's also AWESOME.  If this sugar addict (and pizza addict and beer lover) can do it, so can you.  Trust me.

I completed my first and only (so far) Whole30 earlier this year.  After about a week, I felt mentally and physically better than I have in my entire life.  That quick temper that I've always been known for?  It disappeared.  The generalized feelings of melancholy that I've lived with my whole life?  They evaporated.  When something upset me during those 30 days, I quickly recognized what was triggering those negative feelings and responded logically, you know, like they tell you to do in self-help books and magazine articles.  Who was this normal person????  It was me.  The real me.  The me beneath the gluten gloom.

I'm ready to be that person again, but that means I'll have to kick bread-type foods out of my life permanently.  Am I sensitive to gluten?  I don't know.  I'm not currently able to claim more than a mere correlation between glutenous foods and general grumpiness, but that's enough for me to want to drop those foods from my diet.  Will I be able to live a pizza-less life?  I guess we'll find out... after the holidays.  ;-)

Do you want to find out if you could possibly eliminate the parts of your personality that make you cringe?  Try eliminating a few foods from your diet, and see if that helps.

For a TON of free resources and more information on how the Whole30 has literally HEALED people, visit Whole30.com.