January Reflections: Food

Food: Describe the best meal you had in 2010. What role does food play in your house? Share a recipe.

This prompt could keep me going for post after post after post.  Last year, I even did an “Alex in the Kitchen” calendar for the grandparents for Christmas.  I love food.  I love cooking.  I put up with the mess and insanity love getting Alex in the kitchen.

So, food plays a big role in our house.  Food equates to hospitality and creativity in my opinion.  It can become the foundation for welcoming people in and taking care of their most basic needs.  Food and cooking can be messy and can go very very wrong, but I am still convinced it’s worth the effort and insanity.

I think food should be fun.  I grew up in a household with a high school Home Ec teacher for a mom.  Food was always central for us, but it was much more calculated, measured and specific.  I began to realize the difference between my approach and my mom’s.  Even though I’m incredibly type A, I began to find that being a little less calculated, and cooking to taste and creativity can be really freeing.  My mom’s job was to teach high schoolers (she even had a class filled with only 12th grade boys!  Holy, holy Moses.).  The whole point was to give her students a recipe and have them create a product with as much precision as possible.  Baking is much more about chemistry.  I began to realize that cooking can have a whole different approach.  I’m trying to instill in Alex, and hopefully in Drew eventually, that food can and should be exciting.

Case in point….today’s breakfast.  It’s not a complicated recipe whatsoever.  Just an attempt to make eating and breakfast fun.  Alex is obsessed with purple and so I decided to use our neon food coloring to *spice* things up a bit.  I mixed up some Trader Joes Buttermilk Pancake Mix {(from SCRATCH, folks!!)} and then put in the food coloring.  Pretty intense cooking here in the Gough household.

Next, I dished it up and called in the *troops* to eat and enjoy.

So, enjoy some HOMEMADE breakfast.  Add a bit of whimsy….and be sure you make it into the clean plate club!

Recipe for Rainbow Pancakes:

1 3/4 cup pancake mix

1 cup water

1 egg

Neon food coloring

Combine the pancake mix, water and egg.  Add LOTS of food coloring.  Pour onto a hot skillet.  Cook.  Dish up.  Eat and enjoy!

This post is part of the January Reflections 2011 writing project.

Perfection…a recipe for Disappointment

Anyone remember this game from Milton Bradley?   Amazon.com writes a great description, “Even adults will be challenged by attempting to fit all 25 pieces into place before the 60-second alarm sounds. These complex geometric shapes need to be matched with the appropriate hole before the whole tray pops up and sends them flying in an explosion of yellow plastic.”

Alex has been really eager to play games with us.  Unfortunately, most of our collection works great for adults.  His typical response when going through the game closet?  ”This is ANOTHER boring game for adults, huh?”  I guess I’ve used that phrase a few too many times to get him away from taking out each and every part, piece, buzzer, card, “golf” pencil, game board, domino, bingo sheet, and poker chip.

When he pulled out Perfection this morning, the teacher in me realized (cue:  thought bubble)….”HEY!  SHAPE RECOGNITION OPPORTUNITY!  HAND / EYE COORDINATION PRACTICE!”  And so his new obsession began.  Considering Alex’s patience threshold, I was surprised how he never seemed to give up when pieces weren’t fitting.  He kept trying and reassessing.

When he realized that he just wasn’t going to be able to do it all in sixty seconds, he didn’t throw himself down on the floor and start having Tantrum Takes on 2011.  He just turned off the buzzer and completed the task without the time limit.  THEN…..he set the buzzer.  And waited 60 seconds….

And then enjoyed the pieces all flying (although our game doesn’t quite have the original ferver of the aforementioned “flying in an explosion of yellow plastic” description).  Alex’s look here doesn’t seem fully convinced that the {*POP*} was all that life-changing.

 

Wikipedia states that “Perfection is, broadly, a state of completeness and flawlessness.”  The article also shared that Aristotle (that cute dude above) had a 3 part definition of perfection:

1. which is complete — which contains all the requisite parts;

2. which is so good that nothing of the kind could be better;

3. which has attained its purpose

 

When I read it in THOSE terms, I have to laugh at myself, Ms. Perfectionist.  Ms. Type A.  Ms. J (not just due to my maiden name, but due to my Myers Briggs personality type).  I constantly seek perfection.  I am hard on myself when I let people down, don’t finish the to do list, leave dishes in the sink before going to bed, yell at the kids rather than keeping my cool.  And yet, I’m a bit stunned to read those definitions of perfection.  Why in the world would I think I can be complete or flawless??  That nothing could be better?  Or that I’ve attained my purpose??

I guess Jesus knew this would be a sticking point with us.  And then folks who followed him and later carried on what he’d begun, knew it would be hard.  No doubt, they knew it because THEY WERE STRUGGLING WITH IT THEMSELVES.

Matthew shares a time when Jesus delved into this topic a bit in Chapter 5, the Beatitudes.    This teaching is hard.  You might remember part of it?

When Jesus^* saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; and after he sat down, his disciples came to him. ²Then he began to speak, and taught them, saying:

3 ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

4 ‘Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

5 ‘Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

6 ‘Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

7 ‘Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.

8 ‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

9 ‘Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.

10 ‘Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

11 ‘Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely^* on my account. ¹²Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

13 ‘You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.

14 ‘You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hidden. ¹⁵No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. ¹⁶In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.

My favorite part?  After these 14 verses, he continues on with some more specifics for 30+ more, and ends with this one-two punch…..

‘You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.”

But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,

so that you may be children of your Father in heaven;

for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good,

and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.

For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?

Do not even the tax-collectors do the same?

And if you greet only your brothers and sisters,what more are you doing than others?

Do not even the Gentiles do the same?

Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Did you catch that last verse??  Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. Matthew’s quoting Jesus.  And Jesus is saying be perfect.  And not only “be perfect”….but be as perfect as GOD!?!?  What????  It’s these kinds of verses that seriously lead me to have a perfection complex.

Instead of completing losing it, though, I’m beginning to see a bigger story going on in scripture:  a message that starts to come through in community.  God had a lot of options when deciding how to make his presence  known here on Earth.  And for some reason, unbeknown to me, he chose to use US.  Us?  Me.  You.  Kids.  The checker at Whole Foods.  The postman.  The garbage man.  I’ll speak for myself, but would wager that we could apply it to everyone, though.  We’re not perfect.  As hard as we try to meet those three criteria that Aristotle defined, it’s just not gonna happen.

Maybe that’s a bit of a relief.  But this message is also a challenge to love.  To know that we haven’t (and won’t fully) reach “perfection”, but that we are still called to love.  And not just to love the fun and easy people.   But everyone.  Even our enemies.  Even our kids when they’re driving us crazy and feel like our enemies…

This will be a challenge for 2011.  And for 2012 and beyond, obviously. But rather than being disappointed in myself for the many ways and times I messed up in 2010, or the times I was too afraid to love since I couldn’t do it perfectly, I will seek to try.

 

 

p.s.  This is the second post inspired after joining Corrin at The Glorious Impossible to look back on this past year with a project called January Reflections.

 

Stillness

During the month of January, I’m participating in a writing project allowing for….

A month of reflections.

Contemplating last year.

Planning for the future.

Thanking our Creator.

Improving our writing.

It’s a good discipline for me and will no doubt encourage me to write on some topics I might not approach otherwise.  One of the prompts for this week is on the topic of {STILLNESS}.

Another prompt is on laughter.  And yes, I thought long and hard about combining them into one prompt as stillness seems laughable these days with a busy 3 1/2 year old and an almost 3 month old.

 

Case in point.

 

This morning, after having a half naked boy wake me up and ask for help putting on his Spiderman underwear, the Reverend and I groggily begged him to go and entertain himself in the family room for awhile.  You see, as intense and busy as Alex can be, he slept through the night at 6 weeks and slept in his own room from there on out.  Drew is another story.  He is sleeping in the cradle that has housed many, many babies back to Matt’s generation, right next to my side of the bed.  And these days, he’s waking up to be fed starting at 2am and continuing every 90 minutes until it’s time to just get up and get going with the day.

So, suffice it to say.  We’re a bit tired these days.

Well, Alex did as we asked and went on to entertain himself.  I had my ear plugs in and Matt sleeps like a rock.  So, we didn’t hear him upending all of his toy buckets.  Each and every one of them.  Here’s the start to some of the “creativity”.  And as a sidenote, CLEARLY my child doesn’t have enough toys.  Send more now.  Before he suffers any longer.

The funny thing is, Alex truly had a purpose.  He was creating tables for his restaurant guests (excuse the blurriness….I must have been crying laughing over the clean-up that would eventually ensue and couldn’t keep the camera steady).

We picked up this little restaurant cardboard box gizmo at Cost Plus yesterday.  It was on a deep sale and I figured it could entertain him on a rainy day.  It didn’t last til that “rainy day” since Matt forgot to hide it, but oh, well.

As much as I am “type A to the core” kind of girl, something shone through for a bit and I started trying to see the creativity in the midst of the insanity.  The pile of items that had to be eventually dealt with and put away were actually dumped out there for a good reason (at least in a 3 1/2 year old’s mind….).  He needed TABLES, folks.  For the GUESTS.  I mean, c’mon!!!  Lighten up, MOM.

And, he was even trying to share.  Poor Drew.

Being fed wooden cheese.  Once he’s mobile, he’ll be running for sure.

 

But back to the original prompt….stillness.

Is it possible to have stillness in the whirlwind?  In the hurricane?  In the storm?

I’m hoping to God that the answer is yes, otherwise I’m sunk for the next 18+ years.  In an attempt to claim that stillness, I’m realizing that it requires intentionality.  Matt and I were graciously given the opportunity to go out to dinner last night for our seventh anniversary (shout out to the sweet Debbie Klein!).  We spent an hour sharing about our answers to the questions Tsh Oxenreider posted which I shared about on the 31st.  We had a quiet moment.  An INTENTIONAL moment.  It afforded us the chance to actually get on the same page so that when the storm hit today, I could mentally go back to the stillness and thoughts we’d shared last night and stay somewhat grounded and focused.

I found moments of stillness in 2010:

~on the beach in Manzanita, Oregon

~during our weeklong conference at Montreat Conference Center in North Carolina

~sitting on the couch prior to Drew’s arrival

~nursing a newborn (any other moms use that as an excuse to escape a crazy older sibling?!)

~in the evenings after the boys have gone to bed

~doing dishes, surprisingly

~journaling along Dutch Bill Creek on the last day with our coordinators after summer camp ended

 

 

And as for 2011, the writing prompt asked if we crave stillness for the upcoming year.

Ummm….YES!  Please!

As for the how, well, I guess I will need to be proactive and seek ways to make that happen.  Psalm 107:  23-31 gives me some perspective on this.

²³ Some went out on the sea in ships;
they were merchants on the mighty waters.
²⁴ They saw the works of the LORD,
his wonderful deeds in the deep.
²⁵ For he spoke and stirred up a tempest
that lifted high the waves.
²⁶ They mounted up to the heavens and went down to the depths;
in their peril their courage melted away.
²⁷ They reeled and staggered like drunkards;
they were at their wits’ end.
²⁸ Then they cried out to the LORD in their trouble,
and he brought them out of their distress.
²⁹ He stilled the storm to a whisper;
the waves of the sea were hushed.
³⁰ They were glad when it grew calm,
and he guided them to their desired haven.
³¹ Let them give thanks to the LORD for his unfailing love
and his wonderful deeds for mankind.

In 2011, I will reel and stagger and cry out to God.  I will be at my wits’ end.  But I look forward to the day(s) when I can keep perspective and remember to give thanks for God’s love.  A love that does not fail.

When I’m having trouble remembering that truth and need a reminder to chill out and laugh, I’m grateful for those that bring perspective to the mayhem.

(Amanda, Me & Casey last January….and btw, it’s Casey’s birthday today!!!!!  WOOP WOOP!!!!!!)

My dear friend and amazing photographer, Amanda Silas, shared with me that it often helps to imagine that the insanity that unfolds before you could be seen as a movie.  You can ask yourself questions like, “Hmmm….I wonder why the director chose to do the scene this way?”  or “Clearly the producer must have a deeper purpose by allowing this temper tantrum to erupt and last FOREVER.  In public.  What might the reason be?”  This perspective made me laugh about the whole scenario today with Alex.

So, Amanda’s option, or receiving amazing champagne via Fed Ex in the height of the tantrum, could be helpful….(seriously, this happened to me today.  And no, I still haven’t opened the bottle…yet….).

Or…

claiming that promise in the Psalm that God will indeed still the storm to a whisper.

Amen to that (and pass the wooden swiss cheese, please)!

 

p.s.  The top pic was taken at my parents house in February of 2008 right after a dusting of snow.  Love the blueberry bushes no matter the season!  And the beach shot was taken at sunset in Manzanita, Oregon in 2009, just south of Cannon Beach.

Oops….

Sundays are always a little hairy in the Gough household.  With Matt re-entering the church world again as a pastor, and needing to be at church at or prior to 7:00 AM (yes, you read that right…..SEVEN IN THE MORNING!!!) for the first service, it’s a bit of a marathon.  Seriously makes me appreciate all that single parents must go through.  Oh.  My.

Usually, I plop Alex in front of a video so that I can get a shower in and feed Drew, make breakfast, etc.  Today, I decided I’d try to do it without the video.  It had been a mellow morning (by 2 mos and 3.5 year old standards).

Drew was happy….

I had lit the candles in holders Alex and I made yesterday….

Checked on the journal I’d made to see if the Mod Podge had dried….

(I made the journal in response to the post I wrote yesterday about LIGHT and the new year)

And when all seemed {CALM}, I made a bee-line to the shower.

A little bit later, while making the coffee, I noticed this…..

and then my eyes traveled up to the shelf above and I saw this….

Oh my goodness.  I looked at Alex in horror and with every ounce of calm (which isn’t much), I asked him what happened.  He assured me that he only took *this much*, showing me some “Alex Standard of Measurement” with his fingers.  He was sent to his room.  After some crying and time alone, we talked about this whole thing.

But, woe.  What a reminder.  I thought these were out of reach and hidden.  Guess not.  For you parents out there, let my mistake serve as a reminder for you to be a bit more hypervigilant with medicine and chemicals.  Horrid Mom Scenario Take 28391720.

On a hopefully more UPBEAT note, I’m going to challenge myself in my writing this month by participating in the January 2011 Reflections opportunity that Corrin is starting at The Glorious Impossible.  It is a writing project to encourage bloggers as they look ahead to 2011. My favorite part about January Reflections is its writing prompts–they are great inspiration. Go check out the project!  Tomorrow, as we hit our seventh anniversary, I’m thinking it would make sense to focus on her prompt idea about marriage.  I’ll be ruminating on that and share some profound thoughts tomorrow…ha ha.