Adieu to Mambo

My beloved chow-chow mix Mambo is unfortunately going to be put to sleep this afternoon. In approximately 1 hour and 50 minutes I will have driven him on his last car ride to our family veterinarian to have him sent off into the nether realm.

This decision is approximately two years in the making. Mambo was a juvenile when we adopted him. He was a mangy stray that was darting from behind trees and bushes and cars at my mother in laws house. We won him over with some food, found him to be very skittish, totally adorable, and I brought him home to the first house that I had bought with my husband. He was my first daughters first dog. We had him neutered and treated for severe intestinal parasites, and we just assumed with some basic dog training, socialization, that he would snap out of his funk.

You tend to block bad things out of your mind and live in denial. This is the guard dog that makes me feel safe in my own home. Hes chow chow and German Shepherd... so hes a big dog with a spotty tongue.. and a strange sense of gentleness, I can pull his tongue out of his mouth and tickle his mouth. I brush his teeth. No hassles... No problems. He sleeps next to my bed. When I go to the bathroom, Mambo goes with. When I go to sleep, Mambo goes to sleep.

I really believe it was the birth of my second daughter almost 3 years ago (April 2012 will be three year) that set him off where I just felt like I didnt trust him. I cant tell you what it was exactly. He did get left outside more (babies, toddler, waving their arms, pulling his ears, all of that spooked him... and especially being inside where doors, windows and linoleum are so scary to him),.. We mostly interacted with him on the deck. Or in the big fenced in back yard where he could have many exit routes. But cage him in inside, and he would get spooked, you could actually see the whites of his eyes.

If I carried the laundry baskets upstairs and changed my silhouette, this would spook him. On Saturday night I came home and I was wearing a green pea coat he hadnt seen and I went to let him in, it was about midnight, and I had the jacket unbuttoned. Its double breasted and it swung open on each side like big bat wings. This freaked him out but I was able to verbally coax him inside.

He has tried to go for (never successfully bitten) a couple children. The more we spoke about it and I reminisced with my six year old, the more names we added on to the list. First there was Logan. Then Travis. Then Garrett. Then Justin... Who happens to be a 30 year old man...Yesterday he attempted to bite a neighbours son, Thomas, on the back... Which started this whole process again. I called my husband almost in tears and said Mambo has to go. We cant have that liability on our hands and heads.  And then wow, today, this memory, about a year ago (cant remember)... My husband said "Mambo scratched him with his teeth by mistake"... It was supposed to be all of my husbands fault for spooking Mambo when he was sleeping....

I mean it just washes over you. The numerous excuses we have made for him because we love him. He has every right to be here, because he has faults should not be reason enough to have him put to his early death. But then the thing that keeps washing over me, I could never forgive myself if he hurt a child. Took out a childs eye. Scared a child (the boy yesterday was fine, he just shrugged it off, it was me who was a blubbering wreck on his mothers doorstep)...

I grew up with Rotties and Chows. My dad trained them. We had one that was a man-eater (bit people who should never have been on our property regularly), but we grew up in South Africa. You needed dogs like that for protection. Most people had big dogs. Boerbulls. Mastiffs. Chinese Racing Pigs (Bull Terriers). Staffordshire Terriers (Like the Amstaff Pit Bull Terriers). But it was more socially acceptable to have them there. You kinda assumed every dog was a flesh eating animal because they probably were. Because you NEED dogs like that there. But here, in our basic little wooden fence neighbourhood (very unlike the 8 foot solid concrete and brick walls we had in South Africa, topped with electric fencing and shards of glass standing upright in a concrete bed)... we only have the need for family dogs.

With more and more social interaction being dictated to by our childrens growing social needs, we have to protect their friends first. So we have decided to take irrevocable steps to make this a child friendly house. Sorry if you dont agree with our decisions. I only hope, that my own children are as safe in your house hold.

So my six year old thinks Mambo is going to be a guard dog on a farm.... And of course... When she broke down... I immediately offered her a replacement puppy... We will get another small one in the spring from the animal shelter. She said "Lilah will be so lonely"... and it just killed me. Cuz our Parsons Terrier will be so lonely.

Bon Voyage Mambo. I hope to see you again one day across the great blue.

Unto dust.

I just keep returning and ruminating on a constant thought. All the things we acquire, require, request, beat ourselves to death to buy, and to pay for, are all seemingly worthless in the grand scheme of things. The most beautiful Steinway concert grand piano turns to a worthless pile of firewood and rodent food (they like to nibble the felt off the dampers and hammers)... And what could have been a melodic instrument of great worth and an incredible sound, becomes an un-played hulking behemoth in a dusty old home somewhere.


It is the season to think of Jesus and to think of the reason why we celebrate Christmas. Yet even the Christians are obsessed with massive Christmas pressies...and what to buy... and what to give. You get caught up in the wanting to give for the sake of giving, because it is expected, and because kids get worked up so much for the event, who would ever want to disappoint a child. But the fact of the matter is it is all worthless.

A Christmas spent within the arms length of your family and the ones you love, meditating on this special Gift from God,  has far much more value, if not more, than the ones spent at the mall, haggling over shoes on sale, beating down the lady next to you, because YOU saw it first.

Take children, the more you give them, the sulkier and surlier they become. Yet the less you give them from a possession viewpoint, and the more you give them of yourself, of your time, of your attention, the more they understand they need SO LITTLE to survive.

I just get overwhelmed with Christmas. Because it seems like shopping-mass....And yes we all deserve a reward. Yes we all deserve to be happy and enjoy happy things with our families. But Jesus should always be at the center. His life should radiate out. And not get covered up by some fancy gift wrap and a sparkly bow.

So how do you guarantee that without being a nazi?

I just find the festivities so EMPTY without Him.

Every painted sky... It was His design.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-iJcn37L6U

Time to say goodbye.

So my friend that I wrote about in August (read Adult lamentations on the loss of a friend) gave me an even more clear and definitive answer on the status and importance of our friendship or lack thereof. She told me today, at approximately  (checks phone) 1:27pm, EST, Wednesday December 7th 2011, okay nix approximately, she told me at exactly 1:27pm today that she would prefer if I no longer called her.

So this shouldn't even be a blog entry. This shouldn't even have happened today. I should have got the memo, loud and clear, I should have listened to the words of wise friends who were looking out for me, I should have heeded advice. But instead I stuck my hand right into the viper pit. And now I am crushed. So absolutely upset that I have a raw and open wound. To think that I was just commenting to my sister about our superior skills at interpreting and deciphering people. I think honestly those superior ESP powers only work if you're not emotionally attached to the other parties in your dilemma.

So I have been pondering about myself. To have consciously sought out this kind of ridicule there has to be something fundamentally wrong with me, correct? Or maybe I am just an idealist. Like the first boy I ever loved accused me of being? Idealist or pig-headed and stubborn. I don't know. Dim witted is also ranking right high in my list of reasons tonight.

But with Ethel (pseudonym for my BFF, er EX BFF...sob)... I just can't get to that place of anger/grief where it sinks in. Its like I reach this plateau of disbelief where I can rationalize away anything that she says or does.
Essentially what happened in our friendship (or lack thereof) was one day I decided to speak frankly and candidly to her about things that I really felt were on my heart. And she rejected it, thought I was attacking her personally, and I felt at that time that I would far rather have her know the truth than to have her love me because I am agreeing with her. For like our whole relationship, I agreed. Then the one time I actually disagreed, it started this big ugly show down that ensues almost a year later.

Yet honestly, she was outspoken, brash, and critical of me for most of our relationship. And although her words hurt, I appreciated them. She is was like the sun shining in my sky. Shes the kind of friend who paints you a birthday card in oil paints, ahead of time so it is perfectly dry on the day you receive it. Or makes her parents a jumbo jet shaped chocolate cake for their return home from an overseas trip. Shes the kind of friend who sends you a post card from every new little town she visits, so you know you're always with her. Shes the kind of friend who is jealous and possessive. Only wants to spend time with you, and you have absolutely no idea why. And for the longest time she carried me and spoke for me, when I was voiceless and spineless.

After high school, we went our separate ways, had a falling out, our lives were so different. Then in 2005, I contacted her again, and she was skeptical, not exactly too welcoming of this intrusion into her life. I didn't realise the depth that I had hurt her from excluding her from my life then. But after a while she was calling me constantly, we spoke almost daily. About everything and anything and everyone. And it was like that old friendship, someone you knew as a girl, now a woman. Some things were still the same. But many things had changed.

And she had been unwell and had some struggles. And I grew weary and exhausted from constantly worrying about her and for her. Something tragic and major happened in September 2010 right after her 30th birthday, which preempted my sudden change in feelings, because I felt like I was going to lose her, into a casket, six feet under, with gerber daisies planted on top. The problem was, this wasn't the first time I had feared for her life. I was constantly in fear for her life. She was a shadow of who I expected her to be. And I wanted to fight (even fight her) to make her realise this.

So I did what I thought was best. I meddled in the works, as only a 'best friend' can know how. I did it from a self righteous view point, that "I knew best because I knew her best". But honestly that was my only protection from my feelings of dread and from knowing I could have sacrificed her trust in me, for her. I just always believed that she would somehow see, that I did this FOR her, not TO her.

Fast forward almost an entire spin on the earths axis. We are back into winter, as frigid as when I last had any interaction with her. Her entire life is different now, I believe. I don't really know. I can only surmise. As her first child, a son, was born yesterday. So I called her yesterday to congratulate her and to make sure she was okay. And I think that gave me hope or blind stupidity or the emotional fuel to dial her number again today. And today she ended it. So that is where it is.

I can't have regrets for what I have done.  I have done them. In my heart of hearts, I 100% believe I have done the right thing. I have said before my message was great, but the delivery sucked. But you can't fault me on trying. You can't fault me on intentions. You can't fault me on putting my neck on the line.

I told her yesterday that I loved her. I told her that twice on the phone. Whether she hears it and listens is her own problem.

And like I said in August, I have to try to move on. As nonsensical as it is to me, for what she means to me in my heart of hearts, I have to let her go because she wants it. Not because I want it for one second.

Celebrations

Normally my birthday is an event that smacks me in the face with this overwhelming sense that I am worthless, have nothing, havn't accomplished anything, am the laughing stock of the educated world (the fools don't count, I already know I could easily be top of the class at the McDonalds training academy)... and whilst everyone in my family clamors around me, bestowing me with gifts from the fruits of their back breaking and life threatening labour, I just feel totally inept, incapable of truly being the person that everyone thinks that I am. And so I normally tend to succumb to morose, selfish, childish sentiments of hopelessness and momentary despair.

Even though the mercurial basis of my depression is wavering, the depths of my anguish is normally overwhelming and I would often (privately, as to not cause too much discomfort to the people who love me) rock myself to sleep in a pool of tears, searching for an answer and a reason for being.

But it is my birthday in approximately 45 minutes Eastern Standard Time... Its actually already my birthday if you want to go off the time in the place where I was born, Johannesburg... And instead I am sitting here, too wired up to sleep, feeling a bit like a spoiled bloody fat buddha that has had her cake AND eaten it... (actually it was pumpkin gooey cake as today is also Thanksgiving...)....

So what things have changed since last years birthday and this one? Well firstly, last year I turned 30. It was hard to say goodbye to my twenties. They were the best of times, they were the worst of times, they were the times I felt the most awful things, and the times I felt the most pleasant things. And it seems too soon for them to be over.

But mainly the inner peace, and the satisfaction that I now have, comes from the Prince of Peace. I know I carry on like an old harpy, but I have to give thanks where it is due, and I honestly am so grateful Lord for all that you have given me.

I never planned on becoming the Happy Clappy, Holy Roller... But last night I was driving along by myself, on this totally dark stretch of road that had a couple bends in it, and I was thinking how driving really is just an act of Faith. You follow those cats eyes and the white line around these black bends, having Faith that you will arrive at your chosen destination. And I smiled to myself, because I think I finally (finally) finally get ...(I am a slow learner)... the entire Christianity thing, because I have experienced it (am experiencing it) for myself. And now I wonder why I fought it so hard. Why if I can drive by faith, can I not live by faith? I mean its easier for people to go 60 miles per hour down the road in the pitch black in a tin can, than it is to close your eyes and say hey Father, are you really there for me?

Honestly, what do you actually have to lose?

But the main thing is, I have never felt such clarity in who I am. And I didn't get it at The University of the Witwatersrand, Western Governors University, Unisa or Georgia Perimeter College (all tertiary institutions I have attended in the last 10 years... ). It didn't come from some pseudo science psychobabble book or professor know it all... who proclaimed some incredible profound thing for my life. It came from this little voice inside of me that asked me to just think about the notion of Gods' Grace.

And it has forced me to question, and ruminate, and dissolve, and gnaw at all the things I thought I knew or the things I wanted to know, or the things I took for granted, until I willingly found myself in a church service a year and three months ago, and I cried, these tears of wet hot steaming joy because after 17 years of wandering, and wondering... I was home.

So for my birthday I would like to outline and define my purpose:

My purpose is to serve and worship Jesus Christ in everything that I do, with all of my talents, with all of my being, with the words from my mouth, in my actions, in my reactions, and with my life. My purpose is to raise my children in a house where the name of Jesus is praised and where satan is put under our feet. My purpose is to glorify God with my life. I gave all of me to him. I know I sound like a brainwashed  lunatic, but I cant even articulate or elucidate the place where this has put me mentally.

So for my birthday, and in Thanksgiving, I want to say thank you to our almighty God, for raising me up, restoring me, making me whole, for placing specific people in my life, and for taking others away,  causing my cup to run over, and for placing me right here, exactly where He wants me to be... Although if I could just suggest Father God, next time you want to put me somewhere, could you put me closer to the beach?

Plans for my plans?

My new plan is not to plan. Er...? So is that in itself a plan? How do you just ad lib. How do you launch yourself out of bed in the morning and say that's it world! Here I am! Take me as I am!I am yours! Send me on my way to unique fun novel experiences, beyond my wildest dreams, because I don't have any preconceived notions, therefore I would never be disappointed or feel unfulfilled by the days events passed. 

How do you get to be THAT person without being the irresponsible hippie who comes over to borrow a razor for a possible job interview at traveling circus... oh no wait... oops... that was supposed to be yesterday... oh well catch the next opportunity on the flip side...?

How do you get to be loose and relaxed and at peace with where you are, who you are with, where you are not, who you are NOT with, and happy with whatever you are doing and happy with whatever you're not doing? 

I was speaking to my brother about plans and how I was just going to stop making such specific plans. I mean sure have general plans for your life. You know, don't be a degenerate, don't be a moron, do get an education etc (maybe those are more values and mores than plans... core values, cornerstones of our beings, pillars of our personalities?) but when it comes down to the minutia, to let them be, to let them come as they will, because I mean the stats are like 90% of what you plan or prepare for never happens anyways. So much time spent in exercises in futility and mind numbing agony...

And true happiness is found in those perfect blissful surreal ethereal fleeting rare seconds and minutes (maybe hours) where a zillion other factors, infinitely out of your control, collide and form a beautiful tapestry of splendor that momentarily becomes more than everything you ever dreamed of, but mostly everything you didn't dream of, because the experience exceeds everything you could have ever conceptualized, ie it was mind blowing.... 

 And the feeling passes.... and you feel bleh in your bereftness, ineptitude, mourning and agony in the reality that you didn't accomplish what you set out to achieve in the first place so you're an epic failure....and the loss of hope and despair engulfs you...


And then you speak to your maternal Auntie from South Africa today... and she speaks about those plans and how she thinks all that self help crappola is a disservice to our self esteems actually.... and its so perfectly karmic (the planets aligned or something), because it fits into what you were thinking, what you were saying, the whole spiel about gratitude, happiness, feeling good about this exact moment in the present tense, about realizing there are also cow patties in the green pastures down yonder that you have been so lustfully coveting,  all of that comes from stopping all of the comparisons, stopping all of the pipe dreams, and just reveling in who you are, where you are, and knowing that today and for this moment, and for the next, you are enough and you have enough. We should all be truly grateful for where we are. And not always keep on wishing it away.

Frijoles negros anyone?

My husband is American, through and through. He is a California native to a California native mother, and then he became an Arkansas transplant. What do California and Arkansas have in common? An absolute love for Mexican food. 

I always love it when people ask me what food I ate as a child. I grew up with very few take-away choices available to me. We had KFC which was a once every six months ordeal as it was normally reserved for when my mother was ill or her arms and legs had been amputated and she couldn't cook. Normally she cooked every night. Even if dinner was simple, my mother cooked it from basic ingredients. She never fed us out of a can or out of a box. 

I don't ever remember going to Chinese or Japanese restaurants as a young child. I remember them in my teen years. I do remember oil soaked samoosas from the Oriental Plaza in Fordsburg with my mom and sister. As an adult I had money to buy real Indian food at the Royal Bombay restaurant in Bedfordview. We got our first McDonalds in South Africa when I was about 16. So I only got to appreciate the happiness of a Happy Meal when I was a teen and early adult. 

So you have to expect that my palate, although perhaps varied in certain aspects, was totally devoid of the South American flavours and tastes, that so influenced my husbands gastronomic love affairs. 

A couple years ago if you had asked me what my favourite food was I would have easily replied "Lamb loin chops, small fatty medallions, on a pile of mashed potatoes, petit pois and gravy"... today I am not so sure. I am very confused. More confused than ever. 

It is as I transition between the two cultures that I don't know what to keep and what to give up. My accent is destroyed. I made corn bread muffins and they were instant, they came in a BOX. I let my kids dress up for halloween and don't bat an eye lid. I know which 'holidays' you send goody bags out to the rest of the class, and which 'holidays' you just ignore now. I mostly speak Americanese and I can translate for other foreigners. 


And now I think that one of my favourite foods would have to be shrimp and steak fajitas with fresh cilantro. I love the soapy spicy flavour, the freshness of the green stalks, so different from boring parsley. But I have to say I love sundried tomato pesto laden pasta as well. So I have certainly increased the scope and range of what I eat and what I feel is normal. 

So did I ever eat a taco before I came to America? Let me tell you that actually I did. My mom went through these spits and spurts where she found her cooking and recipes very boring, so she would always come home with something new from the grocery store. One day she came home with these German sprinkle things that you put on sandwiches. Lol. So weird and random but I remember it, because the only thing I can think is she was thinking of us, because SHE would never eat something like that. Lol. I think it was next to the Nutella or something. he he he. 

And I think I was about 20 years old, and my mom came home with this "dinner kit" thing. I mean we had never seen a "dinner kit". Later on when my mom went overseas to work, my dad (who could burn water) used to buy the Woolworths cook in sauces and every weekend my brother would be subjected so some type of one pot curry that my dad cooked and was so pleased with. (lying on the floor giggling now).... I guess you had to be there to fully appreciate the humour. Dear God if my sister even thinks of it I am sure a bit of tea would dribble out of her nose. And my dad would hang his head a bit shocked that we would laugh so much. But my dad always had this endearing quality of making mundane things so exciting. So I am always always appreciative of that. But I will have to write down the Bully Beef story one day for you to read....

Okay back to this kit. It was in a yellow box. And it came with these hard taco's... and goop in a sachet and other spice... and now that I am here, I am certain this was an Old El Paso Taco Kit. Because its in a yellow box. And it was REALLY quite expensive. So my mom cooked it. We all tried to eat it. But really it was lost on us. We couldnt palate the cumin and the weirdness of the taco shells. We all thought what in the world is this Mexican food crap? 

But fast forward to 2011, the year that I have been in America for 6 years, and I have to tell you Old El Paso really is not what authentic Mexican food tastes like. 

Authentic Mexican food is actually very simple, nutritious food, cooked by peasants in large batches, to feed hoards of people. And if you deconstruct the meals into simpler states, Mexican food is almost the same recipe, the same elements, just the presentation or the construction of the meal denotes its 'name'. Like a taco and a burrito are very very similar. Just a taco has a smaller tortilla and a brurrito has a larger tortilla, but their contents could be exactly the same. Just like in Indian food, the preparation of the spice gives it a whole different name. Like fennel seeds whole versus crushed fennel, vs finely powdered fennel etc, vs fennel chopped... you get the picture... confusing unless you have an inside person who has the scoop.

I have to say it has taken me six years for me to be comfortable with, to appreciate, and now the next step, ENJOY and DESIRE Mexican food. Like all I could think about on Sunday was a taco salad from El Campesino in Dawsonville Georgia. And I mean I honestly think a Taco Salad is an American creation out of Mexican ingredients, to appeal for those weight watching people, who like to hide their queso blanco (melted white cheese) under a bed of ice berg lettuce.... 

There are still a couple things I am weirded out by. Like corn tortillas, made from masa (maize)... Reminds me too much of putu pap. In fact the bag of dry masa is exactly the same as iwisa pap. Then I really like enchiladas verdes but I don't like the corn tortillas. So if I make them with flour then the husband complains that its not authentic. But then I use my disclaimer, I am a British/Irish African cooking Mexican food in Dawsonville Georgia USA, what the heck do I know? 

Lol. But I do know I love Frijoles Negros and El Campesino doesnt make Black Beans (who would eat refried beans except a baby or a starving Haitian). 

So I made some in my crock pot. Our meal cost about $4 and I have left overs! 

Recipe:
1 bag of black beans (washed and soaked)
1 onion chopped
1 teaspoon cumin (ground coriander)
Ham hock (I didnt use this, they were too hairy and nasty looking so I put in four pieces of "Salt Pork" which is like bacon)

Put the soaked beans in your crock pot. Cover with water, add about 2inches of extra water. Throw in the onions and cumin. Let it boil on low all day. It will become thick and like a paste so add more water if you want it more viscous. 

How to serve: Serve in a bowl with salt and pepper, a dollop of sour cream, a scattering of spring onions, and some hot sauce. 


I also cheated again with the corn bread (I give up on my corn bread seriously). You get these little Jif packets of cornbread mix for 40c and you need 2 packets to make 12 muffins. Grease a cupcake pan (dont use the cupcake cups because it stops the cornbread from going golden brown and crusty on the outside). Mix the Jif (so simple a four year old can do it) and when theyre done, put blobs of butter on top of the muffins so it melts through. 


Tada healthy vegetarian low cholesterol, highly nutritional dinner for $4.00 and my Californian /Arkansan husband was silent because he was busy spooning his beans into his mouth. He said it was wonderful.


My British mom turned her oval nostrils up into the air, and even declined a cornbread muffin. Lol..... 


ps I have cornbread muffins with my PG Tips tea so take that you scone eaters :)

Christmas cake, and what to bake?

It is that time of year again when I start thinking about Christmas cake. For the past six years I have been obsessed with the heavy fruit cakes (and Christmas puddings) that my mom always made in September. She would wrap them up in layers and layers of tinfoil and keep them in a sturdy Tupperware. Every so often she would open up the container and douse them liberally in brandy, then re-wrap them in tinfoil with such care, akin to the way you swaddle a newborn. 

In December the Christmas cakes would make their debut along with tons of marzipan and Royal Icing and we would spend all day sticking our fingers into bowls, or trying to steal pieces of the marzipan, or arguing about who gets to put which special cake ornament where. It was a very special time for us, so much so that I have attempted to recreate it here at home. The only major issues with this whole endeavor lead to the expense of the cake, and the few people who would actually eat it. 

I personally am incapable (as is my mom) of having Christmas cake in the house in my freezer. I know logically it can keep for years. You have to understand that in my thinking, Christmas cake with a thick wedge (the thicker the marzipan the happier I am) of marzipan clinging for dear life onto the apricot jam smeared side of a dark heavy brandy laced fruit cake is the perfect 100% complete meal for breakfast, lunch, dinner as well as any tea times... or midnight snacks. A single piece of the cake, about the length of your index finger, and about an inch thick, has at least 400 calories. So I DON'T want to make a cake like that, not until we have a full house again for Christmas. Or I will be forced to eat it whilst entirely sedentary in the recliner, covered in a blanket, in the dark basement, all by myself... 

Which lead me to thinking about other alternatives for our Christmas cake. My mom recently came back from London with a bevy of miniature fondant snowmen and 'silver balls' which you can not get here in the USA because the FDA has decided that silver food coloring is harmful. The FDA has already stolen Biltong from me, as well as Royal Icing is considered dangerous because of the salmonella threat. So the FDA really can go and jump. I think they should go and target some of the strange Asian foods and leave my cake and dried meat alone. Back to the silver balls, they look amazing on cupcakes. 

So I first thought that carrot cupcakes would be fun. But then my mom reminded me what about Red Velvet Cake, which we both don't eat because of all of the red dye you have to use in the recipes... so I went on a little research binge on the history of the Red Velvet Cake. It was supposed to (many different theories) be first served at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York in the 1920's. It is a light chocolate, moist cake, coloured with beetroot! In the South, Red Velvet Cake is a big favourite, just like sweet tea. 

So I just think this looks like so much fun, and it looks delicious, so I  wanted to share this from SophistiMoms Blog.  She did all the hard work and experimentation for us.







All Natural Red Velvet Cake
2 large beets (enough for 1 1/2 cups puree)
1/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 tablespoon vinegar
2 sticks (16 tablespoons) unsalted butter, softened, but not quite room temperature
1 8 ounce package of cream cheese, softened slightly
2 1/3 cups sugar
4 eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
4 tablespoons natural (not dark or dutch processed) cocoa powder
cream cheese frosting (recipe follows)
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees (165 degrees celsius). Place beets in a small baking dish and add a 1/2 cup of water. Cover with parchment paper and foil, and roast until quite tender, about 60-90 minutes. Allow to cool completely.
2. Butter 3 8 inch cake pans. Cut out parchment paper circles and place in the bottoms of the pans. Butter the parchment paper and dust with flour. Set aside. Peel the beets and cut into large chunks. Place in a food processor (or a very good blender) with the lemon juice, and pulse until smooth and pureed. Stir in the vinegar.
3. In a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter and cream cheese. Pour in sugar and mix until smooth. Add in eggs, one at a time, mixing well until each is incorporated. Mix in vanilla.
4. While ingredients are mixing, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, and cocoa powder in a separate bowl. Slowly add flour mixture to the wet ingredients. Measure out 1 1/2 cups of the beet puree mixture, and fold into the cake batter. Divide the batter evenly between the cake pans. Tap pans on the counter to remove any air bubbles.
5. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-35 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cakes comes out clean. Invert cakes onto cooling racks, and allow to cool completely. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate or freeze until ready to frost.
cream cheese frosting
2 packages cream cheese, at room temperature
2 sticks (16 tablespoons) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 pound (4 cups) confectioner’s (powdered) sugar
2-3 tablespoons heavy cream
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 teaspoon pure almond extract
Combine all ingredients in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Switch to the whisk attachment, and mix until smooth and slightly fluffy.

From http://www.sophistimom.com/red-velvet-cake-all-natural-no-red-dye/

"Toddlers in Tiara's" : their mamas and their dramas...

We watch Toddlers in Tiara's on TLC with great relish. Firstly its not the kind of show you stay up to watch. You record it and on a lazy day, you grab your kiddos (my six year old loves to watch it with me) and make a bowl of popcorn and just enjoy this little glimpse into other peoples realities. 

I don't think the moms are necessarily 'bad moms'... because there are far worse mothers out there. I felt awful when I saw a mom force an 18 month old (with barely any hair) to wear a hair piece, and when they put the bobby clips in it hurt the baby (the older step sister winced when the baby got hurt, but the mother didn't).... I do see the GOOD and I do see having a very driven daughter needing a way to channel her energy... I just don't think it would work in our house hold. 

Last night there was an 11 year old girl Sydney who was just gorgeous and brilliant. She was "facially gifted" (real term from the show)... but they showed a clip of her doing her competition style cheering and this kid was amazing. So I can see her leading her mom a bit and giving her mom something to be excited about. 

Just who are these people? How do they pay for this stuff? I mean they have boxes and boxes of $1500 frilly bedazzled dresses... fake hair, fake teeth, fake tans, kids get waxed and manicures, pedicures, professional make up artists... I mean this is way more than simply playing fancy dress. This is fancy dress on steroids. 

As a South African, growing up with immense poverty right in front of you all of the time, I find excess to be perverted and disgusting. I know that necessarily my view is not the 'norm'. But in my life, for me, less is more. Everything that I buy has an intrinsic and extrinsic value attached to it. Is this item useful. Can it be used many times by many different people? Who can I give it to when I am done with it? 

I dress my kids well, they both have their 'own things' and their 'special' things, but they're not overly provided with things that amuse them, or things that are pretty, or things that are perfect. My kids play with the garden hose. The broom. Plastic chairs in the garden. Rocks. Lizards. We try to teach them that what counts is on the inside. Its how kind you are, not when you have to be. How useful you are to society. How brave you are in the face of adversity. How sincere you can be when you could choose to be controversial or argumentative. How the only things you need in life are inside of your heart, and can never be taken from you. 


So some of the things the parents say on Toddlers in Tiara's are just so weird to me. The lessons taught (and oh the kids believe every word the parents say) don't apply to the real world. Like how is pouting and pointing to your cheeks whilst wearing "Weston Wear" supposed to help you make friends, or to find a career, or to make you feel comfortable in your own skin without the glitz, hair spray, and fake eyelashes? 


I mean don't get me wrong. Girls do need a sort of finishing school and guidance from their moms and families on how to dress, what works, what doesnt work,  which make up and skin care products to use etc, but to dress a four year old up and to tell her shes only worthy because shes beautiful is so terrible to me. 


The outside world is so shallow. Your mom especially and your family are supposed to be your sanctum of sanctums. You're supposed to be able to be who you are supposed to be, without pageant coaching, within the safety of your home. 


So in my house, we applaud inner beauty, good decisions, thinking things through. We applaud Christ like qualities. I truly think that is what counts. And not how many trophies and crowns you can stick on your kids bedroom wall. 

The sum of my family is this: That they love the Lord. Nothing else matters.

Fronds of optimism.

I have had such a strange and busy week. I think its soccer being added into my schedule, the lack of swimming and sunlight, new stupid stress (I lost my car keys), making tiramisu for 50 people and taking photos at a wedding this Saturday that is also weighing heavily on my mind. 

Essentially I have a darling husband and adorable childers that love me. And everything else is just superfluous noise trying to distract me from my happiness. 

I stayed up with my neighbours daughter making the tiramisu. I use the Williams-Sonoma recipe and I made my own Genoise sponge cake instead of buying lady fingers from Publix. I needed 96 servings of lady fingers... Publix would never carry that amount. In fact the selection of lady fingers has been appalling. 

Generally, we South Africans, prefer to make tiramisu with a boudoir biscuit base. Bakers Biscuits from South Africa has apparently stopped making them.... (three years ago!!) so no wonder I couldn't find them here. The boudoir biscuit will be sadly missed. It was the favourite 'baby' teething biscuit. Long and dry like a finger, ie lady fingers being used as a substitute. 

I have fond memories of my brother, now 22, sitting in his high chair and gumming on a boudoir biscuit. He also then painted the wall next to him with the goooey brown boudoir concrete paste he created with his saliva and biscuit... he he he... was so funny... I thought my own Felicia would be able to have boudoir biscuits when she teethed... but the only thing we found were Baby Mum Mums which in fact turned out to be a product of China. So they got turfed into the trash ASAP. 

Because I quadrupled the recipe, the egg yolks came up higher in the double boiler than I imagined they would. And my tiramisu seems a bit wobbly this morning even though it was refridgerated over night. I have over $100 in the 96 servings of tiramisu. It tastes amazing (I have a heavy hand with the liqueur).... so wobbly it shall be. 

This morning I went and bought some white sugar roses to decorate the top of the tiramisu.... and white ribbon for the wedding pressie... its in a purple box... thought white ribbon would be classic. I really would love to have made the white sugar roses, but I would need fondant, fondant tools, and oh a marble top work space, and not the crammed linoleum and compressed particle board laminate that I have in my kitchen... :) 


Tonight is Mitzi's soccer photo shoot... got to wash her hair after school and blow dry it and jazz it up with some red ribbons.... The photos will be at 6h20pm... so just adorable I am sure... UNLESS it rains. There's just something amazing and magic with the air this time of year, especially at dusk and dawn. Its almost tangible... sort of a magic magnetic quality. I know other people feel it too. Its like our little plateau of a town becomes an easel for the displaying of the most beautiful colours and bedazzling light shows when the sun cracks through the dawn, or when it fades into the sky at night. 
 

Downgrading dysphoria.

Some weeks I just feel so squashed between two heavy plates of dysphoria. I feel almost like the plates will leave indelible marks on me. Like maybe they have been tooled with iniquity and ineptitude. And I feel almost like the discomfort and disease is a learning time, a time to be reformed and reworked into something better, and more beautiful, akin to the butterfly struggling with her chrysalis. 

But I feel like my expected growth or gain is immature and the dysphoria returns, perpetually lurking in the shadows of my otherwise carefree and happy life. 

My baby brother has recently gone off on a three year mission to Germany and then Afghanistan. His job is high risk, high output, but high yield, high gain. He is doing what he wants. How many of us actually get to do that. The attainments of ones dreams and goals are so few and seldom that when it happens we congratulate the person, and then stand in awe of them. How did they get their ducks in a row and know that A +B =C? 


I disintegrate it. Is it maturity, adult awareness and decision processes, is it drive, ambition, knowledge, opportunity, fate, grace, all of the above? Is it simply leaning backwards into the breeze, like a kite on the beach, and surrendering to the will of the wind. 


I often spend a huge amount of time plotting and creating and researching my five year and ten year plans, ruminating, pondering, obsessing, cow chewing the cud through four stomachs, over and over again, plans that never happen for whatever reason. Then I am bereft. I feel a loss for what was not. So then I tell myself next time to be more relaxed, laid back, colloquial, less rigid and confined, and I skip along essentially aimlessly and find myself watching a lot of late night TV, incapable of reading a book or being able to fall into the arms of sleep. 


I sound like I don't have much going on in my life. But the opposite is true. I make about 45% of the money in the house hold. I have two daughters that I do 99% of the caring for. I drive them to school, to sports, to the library, to parties, to friends, I dress them up, photograph them, read to them, make birthday cakes, love them, revel in them, dote on them, adore them, do all these ancillary functions for them that benefit them, all the supportive motherly functions, etc... for them. 


So I am thrust always into activity for them. But then in the stillness in me, I feel like I am living someone elses life. That I didnt chose this for me? But maybe it was chosen for me? 


My question is, how do you get to the part where you stop chasing pipe dreams, and just learn to purely exist in the here and now. Because my here and now is absolutely perfect. Just why do I always feel like I could have done something more, or I could have been smarter, or I could have made better decisions. How do I let all of that go, and just be okay with me?
 

Adult lamentations on the loss of a friendship.

I really have been putting off writing this post for many moons now. I just think I didn't want to confront it because it forced me to think about how even though I will be turning 31 in a couple of months, that I don't have any superior or advanced ways to interpret the loss of a friendship other than it stings the same way it did as when I was a child.


The rejection is akin to a banishment. In some ways I actually think its quite befitting because I just don't think I could fully empathize with the other people also forced into the wilderness. And now I find myself here, and the only way I can make sense of it, is to reach out to the other people here in the darkness and ask them to afford me some strength. And they help me not to become bitter, but to try to wait patiently and optimistically, for the day that the sun will come out from behind the curtain of darkness.


In the grand scheme of things, the loss of this friendship doesn't impact my life in any major physical way. The earth still spins on its axis and the stars gleam like bedazzling fireworks in the velvet blanketed sky. I go to work. I come home. I laugh with the children and my husband. This year we have gone on two mini vacations. We have seen the end of winter, welcomed a beautiful spring, endured a mindlessly hot summer, and now recently progressed into a tranquil fall, and the entire time her absence was palpable.

But it was such a selfish missing or longing. It doesn't affect anyone around me. And I have to just keep myself in check and the logical side of me has to instruct the fragile and weeping side and say you know this is only one sided, she doesn't miss you or even feel the need to admit that she could have been wrong too. We both were wrong.

I have gone so far as to write her a sad soliloquy, proclaiming that I miss her, as Romeo pined for his Rosaline. Her response was a vacuous silence. A deafening zero. What could be more clear than that? How could I live in the hope that I am mistaken, that perhaps she hasnt checked that email account, maybe shes got a new email account (I know I did, I deleted the one she made for me, was too painful to keep, kept going back in and reading our conversations and I was going crazy)? Maybe that was then, and she would feel different now?

I had so many things pent up that when I started talking, I couldnt shut up. And maybe I said more than I needed to, maybe I wasnt as tactful as I should have been, but I dont think I lied or made things up. I thought we could have weathered the storm. I thought that the air would have been cleared, cards on the table, each of us bend down to mend the wall between us. But instead there is nothing.

Not even the hint of an apology or any remorse. Not even perhaps a thought that perhaps I had no idea how to handle the situation, that this was out of the frame of ordinary, bordering on psychological torment. And yes I lost my cool.

So I am just trying mentally, emotionally, to let go. I know there are wonderful things happening in her life, special things, exciting firsts, and the hand she holds over is is information and interaction. For as long as I am bound in this mental state, shes still winning.


So I just have to move on. The loss of her is worse than the death of a friend. Knowing someone is alive and well and wants absolutely nothing to do with you is just totally cruel. It means that everything was just a farce.

The Young and the Restless...

My kids are young, and I am restless. I cant help but be annoyed by the monotony of the daily grind. The umming and the ahhing, the to-ing and the fro-ing, the packing, the stacking, the laundering, the folding, the buying, the chopping, the cooking, the slogging, the directing, the inspecting, the telling and the re-telling, the hashing, the trashing, the spending, and the lending, the leading, the receding, the weeding, and the deceiving, if you go to school and do you work, you will have a happy life, your life will be full. You wont stay up at night and question why everything is the way it is. You will sleep as blissfully as a child without a care in the world, and the world will be your oyster. You wont have doubts, regrets that ebb and swirl, all the musta's and the shoulda woulda coulda's wont nip at your toes, you will be head strong, and confidant, you will know without any hint of doubt, that youre doing what you should be doing... so different from mommy, who has a headache now, come and read your reading book to me, and for heavens sake get off the dining room table and stop swinging the pendulum light back and forth (true story).

You will have relentless energy, your relationships will flow with synergy, you and your chosen mate will live together in true harmony, essentially there is nothing but bliss in matrimony. There will be no socks on the floor, no underwear stuck underneath the bathroom door, no odd spots in the sink, no odd blobs in the toilet that make you think, that maybe perhaps you were meant to be more than the person in charge of cleaning hairs out of the shower, that maybe your life was supposed to be more, than worrying about double bagging garbage, that maybe the endless wiping of noses, the choosing of clotheses, the pairing of shoeses has left you feeling empty and useless.

Dont get me wrong, I am grateful, more than I appear in this little song, for the blessings I have right under my feet, but when it comes to my needs and wants, theyve packed up and hit the street.

I have everything that everybody always said that I could need and want. The three/two, a house on the cul de sac, a pool for the summer months, and warm shelter for the colder weather, nestled in with birds of a feather, other mommies who wave from their porches,  who appear so unlike you. At home in their jammies, in their fleecy robes making muffins, smiling at their children, gleefully mopping floors and attacking their chores.

I just feel bound by my duties and ever more entranced with my obsession, of finding something that mentally fulfills me, that enhances my profession. I love to earn money, I love to prove my worth, I easily balance bank accounts and export packages around the earth, I love to take care of my family, and provide for them. Just I feel so dissatisfied and I hate this feeling again.

I dont want to wish anyone away, or to grow them up faster. I welcome every childish moment, and every family disaster. I just wish I could make a selfish decision, serving no one but myself, without feeling like I abandoned the puppies that I whelped!

Excerpt from a letter to a friend... sums up my life pretty well...

My brother graduates from flight school on Thursday. So tomorrow I am packing the kids up in the car, saying my prayers that all seven of my animals are alive when I return, and leaving The Husband behind to go and take photos of the ceremony. The girls have little black and white dresses that I am so excited to put them in. I too have a black dress. After the graduation ceremony there is a little ball. So we will see what the Army drums up for us. I imagine American ball means polystyrene plates and plastic forks. We will be in Alabama for two nights then I am going to Panama City Beach alone with the kids. I have to take them to dig in the sand at the beach.

Its just bad timing because Eldest Daughter has JUST started first grade at her new school. We had to move her from the private school to a public school. Actually the move was bitter sweet. The private school was so tiny she had such a small pool of friends to choose from. Shes a lot like me, anxious, a bit over weight, bites all her nails off. Shy. Struggled to make friends. So she finally made one BFF and then we ripped them apart when school ended. Then for the summer she went to a day camp for 9 weeks. They went on three field trips a week, to zoos, museums, parks, etc... On Fridays they had a cultural soiree and ate ethnic foods and they had water slides... so they had a lovely time but she was taken from the bosom of her very small school and thrust into a group with new friends. Then after 9 weeks of that, we let her have four days at home with us, took her to the orthodontist, etc, and we went to a water park (Youngest Daughter is so scared of everything- she hated it but Eldest Daughter loved all the rides).... and then she was sent to school with a whole new group of friends in a whole new building. But there are only 22 in her class. The teacher says its the largest group she has seen. There are three grade one classes... and the school is adorable. I put a lot of photos of it online but I am sure you were busy sewing hopscotch (Beautiful job btw)..... so she has a larger pool of friends to select from and since shes played some sports in the county, shes met a couple of friends she already knew from her sports team, like the coaches daughter is in her grade...

So theres something about being a part of a community, kids networking, etc. When we drove outside of the county to go to school (I had the 80 mile commute) she was far removed from the social networking in the community. So now when we go to fairs, or where ever, it will be within her school and friend group. I know you cant be too obsessed with friends... BUT I mean a good friend can make or break your child. So you want to foster what is important to them. The older she gets, the more she leads me. And the more she rejects us....

So on Friday I dropped her off at school for her first day in first grade with her new teacher. I walked her in with Youngest Daughter (Youngest Daughter was already tearing name badges off tables, trying to sharpen someone elses pencil)... and Eldest Daughter wouldnt hold my hand or walk near me. She said she was holding her bag. So I just took the cue and exited stage right....Then she has this new thing, she wont go anywhere with anyone except me. She says it makes her nervous. I told her shes got to trust her gut instinct and she now uses this as her new get of jail card. You know i was trying to tell her about dangerous situations, feeling scared etc, listen to your intuition....

So Brother was here a couple of weeks ago. He wanted to take her to the mall nearby for some Rainbow Sorbet. They made it almost onto the main road. He had to turn his beautiful shiny black single man no kids to pay for Audi around and bring her back. He said "its okay Eldest Daughter we can go next time"... then my father in law has a gorgeous fully restored 1983 Porsche 911 and he wanted to take her for a ride. He went to get her car seat. She freaked out and said no shes not going with him. No amount of cajoling could get her to go. Then Husband got a $500 gift card from his mom for his birthday last week. So he was just beaming. He said COME Eldest Daughter lets go blow some money!!!! And she point blank refused. 

Husband got so upset with her. He even told her he wasnt buying her a present. I mean HE acted like the child. Then this Sunday, Husband wanted to take Eldest Daughter to his friends house. Friend is a single dad and his daughter is the same age as Eldest Daughter. 

So she said no Dad, I dont want to go with you. So Husband took this as the BIGGEST rejection. It was almost akin to a girlfriend rejecting him. He blew up like puffer fish and was like "I cant believe you wont go with me, Im your dad, I want to spend time with you, you always used to go places with me, this is BULL SH*T..." I mean the level of his explosion and the venom was totally uncalled for. So then I told him to back off of 'my daughter'.... so then he said youre probably going to reward her for not going with me by taking her to the pool or buying her a toy.

And you know (I know you know) that we're not the favourites because of the toys we buy. Daddy is the fun one. Daddy is the cool guy (who bought a kinect so they can dance around the living room in a group and pop virtual bubbles)... Mommy is the brush your teeth lady, wipe your face, get your butt back in there and use more toilet paper, disgusting, scrub your nails, dont bite your nails, why am I tripping over your shoes, how many times have I told you it is bed time, get out of bed one more time and I will.... YES this is dinner there are starving kids all over the world. I swear to God  you put your dinner in the trash and I will just explode. DO NOT FEED IT TO THE DOG. Leave your sister alone. Stop smacking her. Stop biting your sister. Okay the two of you, time out..... !!!!!!!

I speak well of him to them. I say Daddy loves you .....  he really DOES love you. Dont bother your dad, hes having a nap. But oh yes come and bother me. Thanks, elbow in the boob. I cant wait until you get boobs and then I am going to get a pointy stick the width of your elbow and poke you in the boob.... :)

So we're not cool. But we're consistently there. We're the roll our eyes but go and get a glass of milk at any time of night, fold the laundry until 9pm most nights (Not lying- swimming every day, I do a ton of laundry, I always think cuz its a communal pool that they have germs all over the towels from touching the chairs)... I think my kids know theyre my priority. And thats why they want to be with me. Eldest Daughter said shes scared of her dad and shes worried he wont be able to take care of her like I can. So is she being sincere, or is this little con artist just totally pulling a fast one on me? Ironically I am more scary than her dad. He doesnt blow up often. I spit venom at least once a day. I am often referred to in the same sentence as flying monkeys. 

So I told him he had to apologise. I told him the bigger man would apologise. Can you believe that someone would want to have a full on argument with a six year old to the point where he wont apologise. He acted exactly the way she told me he would. He would get angry and be scary. So I just told him it is not my fault if they dont have a relationship with him. I know I work daily on mine. I mean I am getting ready for my kids to dislike me. Eldest Daughter already told me I was an ugly old granny last night. I remember calling my moms varicose veins her "corduroy pants". I mean kids are cruel. You just dont think your kids are going to reject you or break your heart. I told him hes got to be there for me for when she rejects me. You can raise them up in your own house, but you dont own them.

So I dont know what type of mom I will be. That is still a work in progress. My dad says I am too liberal. But he suffocated us and we rebelled so bad. You dont want to line them up for  being teenage drunks or alcoholics. But I mean in reality theyre going to do things and wear things we dont like, just like our parents didnt like our stuff, just like our moms' parents didnt like their things... My mom says her parents hated the Stones, Elvis and the Beatles!!! Just like I have to pretend not to like Rihanna. Its not that I dont like Rihanna. Its that its inappropriate. And "inappropriate" is a whole other echelon that I am not willing to confront just yet, not without doing a lot more research....

Life without books.

I am totally panic-stricken at the thought of a life without books. I mean what will I give as presents for Birthdays/Christmas/Holidays/Weddings? I mean books are my fail safe. They're my favourite gift to give. You scrawl a meaningful message on the inside of the cover, you hang onto every nuance and hidden message in the prose and hope that the recipient finds them as enticing and delectable as you do, and your kids lay sprawled on the floor, touching the pages, totally immersed into the fantasy. 

How do you remove that and give them a little glowing pod/pad/nano/tablet that connects to the internet. How do you replicate the feeling of the pages underneath the fingers. How do you recharge your glowing reading instrument when there is a power failure. How do you give your dog eared copy of a favourite story from 1986 to your friend to read when its all stored on a little inanimate cold hard piece of plastic and perhaps chrome? 

Frightfully more is the thought of why I am so against change. I understand less trees used etc (in theory) less damage to the earth. But surely all the little glowing LED's or circuits, etc contain lead or mercury or some poison that will fill up the landfills just as quick as paper books would? Maybe newer textbooks will be available faster to the schools etc.

But honestly, coming from South Africa, where internet connectivity and electricity are fantastical ideas from the future, a dream for most, only a given for the elite in cities earning lots of money, paper books can not be made redundant just yet? Surely they are still treasures, not has beens? 


Im so confused and I am so bereft. I remember pouring over silly novels with friends. I think of the dictionary I used in school, given to my dad by my mom when he went to college in 1977. I see her neat perfect block shaped letters, and the xxx's she put at the bottom, kisses that remained stored in the little time capsule between the covers. 


I remember intimate moments, spent between the sheets, my favourite book and I, hours on end, reading, pouring over the characters and the plot, and immersing myself in a forever fantasy type state. I dont see myself being as open or relaxed with a cold hard piece of plastic. 


Maybe we dont read anymore. Maybe our stories are made from one liners, captured from twitter, facebook, some random status update, a chapter given in byte-sized installments... 


One of the first basics of parenting that I attach myself to is to provide books for your children to read, so they can delve into the crevices in their minds, escape here, form alternate realities, the proverbial vicarious experience, but no where do parenting books say thou shalt provide internet connectivity so thy child can download a book to read on a plastic tablet. 


It just confuses me. I know its irrational. I hear echoes from movies, "You cant stop progress"... but is this progress really? Or is this an emerging market that I have the right to refuse?

Instructions on how to run your house.

^{10 [b]}A wife of noble character who can find?
   She is worth far more than rubies.
¹¹ Her husband has full confidence in her
   and lacks nothing of value.
¹² She brings him good, not harm,
   all the days of her life.
¹³ She selects wool and flax
   and works with eager hands.
¹⁴ She is like the merchant ships,
   bringing her food from afar.
¹⁵ She gets up while it is still night;
   she provides food for her family
   and portions for her female servants.
¹⁶ She considers a field and buys it;
   out of her earnings she plants a vineyard.
¹⁷ She sets about her work vigorously;
   her arms are strong for her tasks.
¹⁸ She sees that her trading is profitable,
   and her lamp does not go out at night.
¹⁹ In her hand she holds the distaff
   and grasps the spindle with her fingers.
²⁰ She opens her arms to the poor
   and extends her hands to the needy.
²¹ When it snows, she has no fear for her household;
   for all of them are clothed in scarlet.
²² She makes coverings for her bed;
   she is clothed in fine linen and purple.
²³ Her husband is respected at the city gate,
   where he takes his seat among the elders of the land.
²⁴ She makes linen garments and sells them,
   and supplies the merchants with sashes.
²⁵ She is clothed with strength and dignity;
   she can laugh at the days to come.
²⁶ She speaks with wisdom,
   and faithful instruction is on her tongue.
²⁷ She watches over the affairs of her household
   and does not eat the bread of idleness.
²⁸ Her children arise and call her blessed;
   her husband also, and he praises her:
²⁹ “Many women do noble things,
   but you surpass them all.”
³⁰ Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting;
   but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.
³¹ Honor her for all that her hands have done,
   and let her works bring her praise at the city gate. 

Prov 31

Loving alien seeks home planet?

I do not agree with the mainstream school when it comes to immigration. I do believe that certain types of individuals should not be allowed to immigrate or should be barred from places based off of their past behaviour... but I do believe that the majority of people are GOOD and they should be allowed to move freely from place to place. We are humans. We are not cattle. 

Nor are we extraterrestrial. That is why I find the term 'alien' to be so derogatory. Yes of course, the literal translation is 'a foreigner' but the modern associations of the word all lean towards something from M. Night Shyamalans latest summer thriller, corn fields, crop circles, eerie bleep bloop noises, and large eyed grey things coming to beam you up in the middle of the night and perform God only knows what on your unconscious body.... 

Yet this term 'alien' I believe is used exactly for that purpose, for the distance it places between us. Yet I have to tell you that I am no different from the Zimbabwean who runs through the Kruger park at night on the way to South Africa, nor from the droves of South Americans who slip their way into the United States at night.

The thing that KILLS me is there are few people who are actually from the countries they are in. The rest are immigrants who then spend a lot of time talking about the us and the them, and the us try to keep the them out of here. 

What a stupid way to spend your life, in fear of other people. Surely there have to be far more profitable ways to spend your time? 

From a logistical and fiscal point of view, I do believe that everyone who enters a country should be registered, and accounted for and given an identity number and if social services are required, then taxes need to be paid. Then immigrations witch hunt would be focused on people who do not follow registration rules in a humane way, because currently the immigration rules ARE NOT HUMANE. 


A very small percentage of people actually qualify to live in America. The immigration process is so restrictive. Yet may I point out please, there were no white men or black men originally here in America, those brown people youre trying to keep out, they were here first!! Their ancestors moved freely up through Mexico into the States long before there was a toll booth and border patrol and helicopters swooping down like pterodactyls in the night....

I think you should rather reprimand people for being lazy, and not for the countries of their birth. How about deporting people for stupidity or for their inability to contribute positively to the rest of humanity? Those are things you CAN control. Where you are born, and to whom you can not control.

I think the immigration rules were a great idea in theory. But their application has failed because of one element. The Human Element. You can not tear families apart because they dont have the $5000 plus per person to apply for permanent residence and then citizenship.

I believe the borders should be opened up. Its going to happen sooner or later anyways. I dont see it as divisions of resources available. I dont see it as a bad thing. I see it as an increase in manpower, an increase in taxes paid (if people are registered), and an increase in the legal population, because theyre not going home you know. They go home, and some lazy ass white girl is going to have to start cleaning toilets at McDonalds.America cant cope without our illegal helpers. So how about we help them?

Nationality?

I went to a charming little baby shower this weekend. It was a traditional female only event full of silly little baby games and a smorgasbord of delectable little nibbles. I sat across from a very well kept lady, around my age, although I would say she was far sophisticated in her attire and mannerisms (to the point that she was rigid and a lark) I kept feeling how I could very easily choose to emulate her, with all her stiffness and confines but more and more I am choosing to be colloquial and more free in my presentation. 

I keep wondering if this is a part of my American transformation. Or if this is just honestly who I am supposed to be? My entire early years were spent with constant emulation (emulation is the highest form of praise, so those that I emulated, I only adored you)...to the point that I felt like an empty hollow shell. I could be whom ever you wanted me to be. Yet I had no idea of my 'true self'. My median core value was wistfulness and longing, a haunting longing to be someone else, and never myself. 

Yet my elder years (closer to 30 and to 31) have been on the constant hunt for my 'true self'... yet 'true identity' is also always open to interpretation.

I find that my speech is more varied. I have adopted into my patter the American humour that surrounds me. Yet I have a hard time relinquishing the vowels from my words. I also refuse to say Boo-eeee for buoy. But I am not feint or weak hearted at the thought of floating down a river or hanging out at the lake. Practically any puddle will do. 

And as much as I am adverse to them, I understand the need for paper plates. Never polystyrene (they do not degrade) but paper. 

I think the most major change is instead of seeing the differences, I now see the similarities. I see the humour. I see layers and layers of mirth in common situations. I see the collective force of humanity. 

But honestly, getting back to our rigid aforementioned lady above, I really think I identify most with the rednecks. There are a couple things that really sit well with me when it comes to the redneck identity. 
 * Relaxed and laid back
 * Come as you are, no dress code
*All are welcome, open door policy
* I will treat you like youre part of my family, your kids are my kids, vice versa
* I am going to feed you and fall over myself to keep your cup full
* No airs and graces, what you see is what you get
* Fun loving and outdoorsy. Horses, quad bikes, pools, lakes, rivers, BBQ, sun, mosquitoes and laughter.

The tail wagging the dog.

I never set out to become who I am today. Mostly it has been a circumstance that has dictated the forging or adoption of new behaviours or models that become the routines and structures of our every day life. Of course having children in the house lean absolutely everything towards them. I am surrounded by 8x10 photos of their beautiful little faces, a constant reminder of who I am and what I am supposed to accomplish here. 

First and foremost, this is a childrens household. Whilst I may have a forked tongue and suffer from a bit of verbal diarrhea (f-bombs) I blame that on being sagittarius and a monkey and needing to make people laugh. I know that can be accomplished without such colourful language, but sometimes its just funny. I have told my six year old not to repeat the f word etc in front of her teacher, friends, etc... but shes well aware of it. I dont think in this day and age that its anything too shocking. I mean its all over the media. But is it boorish and common, yes. So yup not my proudest thing... rather a work in progress. 

It just occurred to me this weekend (I am a slow learner) that I have a very different style of parenting than other people. I am a bit loud naturally. So I often raise my voice. When I am aware of it, I may take my nagging and moaning and turn it into a joke to soften the blow, or a sing song, laugh along... meanwhile I am deadly serious, pick up that stuffed pony or I am going to throw it into the nearest dumpster because I am so darn tired of falling over it and listening to my own voice saying PICK UP YOUR TOYS!!!!!! 

So my girls know I am like Grandpa (always blame the patriarch) who has a quick fiery fuse, and like mom, we're kind of like cherry bombs, big bang, some smoke, but not a lot of damage. At least for the most part, on a certain basic level, you know where you stand with me. I dont hold grudges for eternity. I am quick to forget, but yes I do have a temper. 

I also do most of the discipline as poor Daddio is away working his 60 hour weeks... and is exhausted when he comes home :( Quite a burden and why I felt it necessary to quench my nagging suspicions that I am a slave driver parent, who pushes my kids too far. 

So dear Dr. Phil provided this lovely quiz http://www.drphil.com/assets/a/a0170fbd26b6c36fa62c08ef9bf049b3.pdf which enlightened me to the fact that I am not an awful parent, just a go getter parent, the authoritarian- equalitarian parent.... 

I spend an awful amount of time obsessing about my children and pondering, and ruminating on their welfare and development... So I am the pushy parent, we have chores, things everyone must do to make the house function. My kids are great kids. But even the two year old puts her diapers in the trash, her clothes in the wash, and gets in trouble for inappropriate behaviour. Whining and whinging are punished with banishment into ones bedroom. The old adage of seen but not heard is alive and well in our house. If you are being a fool you will definitely not be given an audience. If you are being a delight, we will smile at you, put you on a pedestal and clap with enthusiasm. 

Just I look around and I feel like I am the only one exhausting myself with the explanations, the education, the installation of mores and certitudes. When I discipline my kids in public (could be a smack for a dangerous problem, like trying to undo ones buckle and open the door before the car is turned off)...(or could be time out at the pool because of too much screaming)... I am met with these inquiring eyes... Like let them be kids. Dont push too much. Dont corral them too much. Dont define them too much. Dont choose for them too much. I dont choose for them on all things. As they get older I do take their feelings and wants and needs into consideration. Am I at fault for making my kids go getters. Am I at fault for telling them everything they cant do (like running with knives) and am I at fault for encouraging them and telling them everything they can do (like swimming and actually getting wet instead of being perched on the top of several floaties?)... 

Mostly I see them look to me. If I say I love playing tennis and I love hitting the ball, my daughters will say they love playing tennis and they love hitting the ball too. Both of my babies get water up their noses and in their eyes in the pool. I go under the water and get water in my nose, and in my eyes in the pool too! We emerge and I smile at them and say "good girls, you CAN swim like a fishy!" and they smile back to me.

My point is that before they can have an opinion about themselves, they mimic yours. So give them a good base. Give them a positive base. Encourage them. Coax them. Make them be a bit uncomfortable at times. The end result is so worth it.  My six year old rode a horse two week ends ago on a four mile trail all by herself. I cant express how delighted she was, full of SELF satisfaction. Where did she get the idea she could do it from, she got it from her mom and her dad. She got it from us.

Teach your kids to be polite, well mannered, WELL GROOMED FOR HEAVENS SAKE, thankful, to be adventurous, to just try things. To just experience things. 


You only have them for such a short time before they are too set and too scared and too intimidated by everything. You only have today. 


Im not saying my kids will be perfect. But what I love most about them, is that they try. They lock eyes with us for reassurance. We smile at them. And they take the plunge.

Calorie calamity?!

My beautiful eldest daughter has put on about 10lbs in the past year. She is 6. She always used to fit into a size smaller than her age, she always was scrawny and had her little chicken breast ribs sticking through her bathing suit... she could suck her diaphragm up into her sternum and look like a person from a concentration camp. So this new change is nothing wrong, its just something different. 

Before you think I am a weight nazi I have to let you know more about my background. As a 12 year old I wore womens size 16 clothing or XL clothing. Most XL clothing if I am really honest, did not fit, but I would stretch it to make it fit. When I was a child, in the country that I grew up in, 14 was the maximum size on most things. You got 16's if you were exceedingly lucky. Add in braces, glasses, acne...and that I am almost 6 foot tall...musical, artsy, eclectic, eccentric... I am sure many of you now understand that I did not have the happiest time in school. 

I read an article lately about something worse than bullying in school, because to be very honest I was never bullied (by children at least... my 7th grade teacher would be considered in my mind to be a bully but there were extenuating circumstances that I dont have the energy to mention right now)...but what this article said was worse than bullying was the child who was invisible. And that resonated with me to the core of my being. I was an invisible child.

That was a two part puzzle. Partly because I was just the klunky fat kid, the weirdo, but not weird enough to tease outright (and because I was bigger than most kids, I would have and could have whooped some butt)... partly because I felt so rejected that I recoiled into the fibers of my being and used to hide myself amongst layer upon layer of defense and camouflage. I became used to playing  incognito. 

And of course I would never mention it to my overly burdened and loving but innocent parents.... They loved me, more than I could possibly understand at that age, but I always felt worthless. 

I was just speaking to my mom today, I am not a binge eater, or a person who binges and purges. I would just constantly be nibbling. When I was 13 I weighed more than my dad. Made me feel like a worthless bag of fat. So I just kept on munching my way through the void where I would have had a larger group of friends, or sports, or other activities where I had to leave the confines of my bedroom.

I sound like a total nerd, but honestly I have had a lovely fulfilled life. I used to read six books a week because my mom took me to the library only once a week, and I only was allowed six at one time... I went to piano lessons for 12 years...I had my nerdy friends (NERDS RULE)... I had a rip roaring early adult life (once I left high school and realised how little high school really means in the grand scheme of things)... and now at the age of 30 I feel satisfied and pleased with where I am and who I am. I like being me. Sounds cheesy but theres no one else I would rather be. 

The brilliance of my fleeting mind... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0tn2WtgY5H4

Its just an incredible feeling looking at your baby who is no more, slowly transforming by  genetic process into part of who you had been. You want to swoop them up and protect them. In the same place you dont want to impose on them who you were. They are not you. They are not yours. They are your stewards and you are their guardians... They are not you. Yet the resemblance is uncanny. 

You want to protect their innocence. Guard them from hurt, pain, rejection and all of the prickly barbs. You want your darling baby angel to feel beautiful always. You want to wipe away the inadequacies. You want to be more aware than your parents were of rejection or shame. You want to be more in touch, in tune, in control... Yet also let them forge their own individuality and become their true selves. 

So I have decided to back off on the weight issue. To make it a non issue.. an anti-issue. 

My daughter is beautiful and perfect. And just like me, she will find her way. We have the most Perfect Guide. He is the key to wholeness.

Returning to Christ.

It struck me that I have confused all of you. And perhaps I have not fully explained my sudden re-attachment to the Christian walk. As someone who had not been to church in over 17 years, the fact that I went in September 2010 was astonishing to me as well. I am still reeling from the sudden return. I shall recall the events as clearly as I can remember. This is a personal account, not meant to offend anyone okay? :)


I have long deliberated in the two schools of thought that plague me. Do I tell people the edited version of who I am, or do I delve into details that may make them uncomfortable or to think less of me. My dad has always said bury the past. And I desperately have tried to stick to that. Just my natural inclination is to spill all of me in one flurried gush. I dont only wear my heart on my sleeve, I wear my life on my sleeve too.

I am a recovered (past tense) drug addict. I have been 100% clean (not even one relapse) for almost 7 1/2 years. And I get, you hear this always in the news, you watch Intervention, you become desensitized, you see people shooting up on tv whilst you shovel food into your mouth at dinner time with your kids. You say to your kid, hey Junior, dont do that, its baaaad...

But do you have any idea how long almost seven and a half years is in junkie time? And whilst I realize my story or my life is neither novel or a wonder of the modern world, the healing and deliverance I have experienced in my life, IS novel and wonderful to ME. 

I went to a rehab in Johannesburg. It was a scientology based rehab program that I loved because it was NOT christian. Also they taught the antithesis of the 12 step program, which is once an addict NOT always an addict. I dont carry around some calendar, count days, say how hard this is, how much I pine for my old life... The  program was a total rehabilitation progam. You think youre there for drugs or alcohol, wake up, youre there for a full on life intervention. And it was hard and chaotic, but it was brief and temporary, and it opened up the doorway to so many new horizons and avenues beyond which I had ever thought of, because I never saw a future for me.

After the program I was offered a job. What kind of lunatic offers a recently clean junkie a job looking after money? (Genesis 39 v 20-22)... And I of course took the job, I loved the freedom, I loved helping people, being with people who were so positive and powerful and wonderful and I was good at my job and reliable.. and I started dating Kurtis.

And I just started getting these nagging feelings that the only reason that I made it out alive was because of Gods Grace.... and I brushed that off as a stupid fleeting notion.... what an idealistic fairy tale romantic stupid idea was that? I got out alive because I chose to... right? I mean that was the humanistic answer to it right? And things were going well because I was making them go well. You had good things happen to you because you were a good person. Kinda like karma, you pulled it in right?


Then in January 05 I had my daughter Shannon and in March 05 we moved to Atlanta Georgia. Soon we were working and had our own apartment in Sandy Springs. We bought a new car with money that fell like manna from heaven. I was working for the other rehab here but I hated it. I just wanted to get far far away from Drug Addicts in general. I wanted to have another baby and go back to school.

But the nagging suspicion of divine guidance and deliverance never left me. In fact I was plagued by it. All through out my second pregnancy I could not get two words out of my head, "Gods Grace"... they nagged at me, clawed at me, bit into my calm until I was gushing out potential thoughts or reasonings to it to my husband whom of course, did not acknowledge or approve of my new found crazy phase...

Well I thought it was a phase... now almost 2.5 years later I am still shocking people with my 'church phase'... yet I have to say I feel that all I did was come home. Come home from my wild wanderings and wonderings... I feel like I tried to disprove everything that was shoveled into my gullet as a child, but instead all I did was confirm and solidify that I was taught the truth as a child... and that I want my children to be taught the truth as I know it.

There are of course lose ends and many instances I cant fully explain or fully answer, I have to use faith to bridge the crevasses between thoughts and understanding... Questions about sexuality, perceived morality, perceived values, perceived norms, all of those I have to still work out.

I didnt become a Christian because I wanted a high horse to lean down from, to judge other people. I became a Christian because of the God sized vacuum in my soul. Most of you who truly know me know that I am exceedingly accepting of differences because I fully acknowledge that I am so thoroughly flawed and inept. In my ineptitude I wholly see and adore many different forms of beauty and I truly am washed over with boundless waves of gratitude for the colourful palette that I call my Soul Sisters and my Brothers from Another Mother. I love you all.