The Herbangardener

Gratitude Sunday * February 19, 2012

Lindsey — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 04:00:57 +0000

~ I’m once again joining Taryn over at Wooly Moss Roots in her Gratitude Sunday tradition. ~

Gratitude Sunday is a time to slow down and remember those thankful moments that graced our week. One reason I love keeping a daily gratitude journal is because it helps keep things in perspective for me. Each Sunday, I open my journal and share some of those moments with you here. If you’d like to join in, just leave a comment!

Gratitude is powerful energy. I love hearing others’ gratitudes!

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- Audio books, so that I can multi-task!

- A really nice Valentine’s day, spent at my parents’ place since F. was out of town. My mom always does such a nice job of making holidays special and different from all the other ordinary days of the year. I love that. She decorated & bought a big balloon, and my dad came home with flowers, pizza, and some incredibly decadent chocolate-covered strawberries!! We played Dean Martin’s Love Songs CD. It was really fun~

- Going to Colorado’s new IKEA with my mom — having lunch at their cafe and then shopping!!! SO FUN! I’ve always gone to IKEA when on vacation in other states, so naturally I felt like I was on a mini vacation that day!

- At IKEA, finding exactly what I’ve been looking for — a small, portable desk/table that I can transport around the apartment according to where the sun is! I LOVE it. It’s a one-person desk, but then it also has a fold-up leaf that slides into place to make it a two-person table! So I can do my art & moneymaking work at it anywhere in the house, but F. and I can also sit at it together! Currently it’s right next to the kitchen window, and I seem to be spending all my time at it right now! I’ve wanted a kitchen table by the window for so long, and I am absolutely loving this thing! The simple things, ya know…

- The beautiful miniature living rose bush that F bought for Valentine’s Day! It has soft peach-colored blossoms; you can see it there on the table. ♥♥♥ That was so sweet. I love having a blooming plant here…

- Getting so many errands accomplished this week! That feels wonderful.

- Getting my garden planned! That’s always a big project that I don’t really enjoy very much. It really helped that I was already at my parents’ house while doing the planning, so that I had access to all my seeds, and I could just walk out the back door and count up how many pots there are to work with. Plus just seeing the raised beds in person helps me envision the plant spacing better. (To read how I go about planning my garden, click here.)

Planning the garden!

- Having my cat take a nap with me, which is an unusual thing for her to do. She kept pressing herself closer and closer into my face that I had to keep moving her fur aside so I could breathe! She is such a little sweet one…

- F. getting home from being out of town and walking through the door, safe and sound!!

- Rearranging our living room… again! It’s even better now than before. I love newly rearranged rooms.

- Chipping away at projects that have been languishing unfinished for a very long time.

- Ideas for new ways to do some things in the garden this year — that breathes some excitement into my plans!

- Cutting up our beloved (but worn) lobster-print bed sheets into strips of fabric that will be used to tie up plants in the garden this year. I love re-purposing things like that partly because it makes my life much simpler since the solution to a problem is right there in front of me and I don’t have to go out and hunt something down at a store. And instead of throwing away our Lobsters, which would be way sad, they get to begin a whole new life by helping me out in my garden.

- Drinking tea, sitting at the sunny kitchen table today, doing a long-overdue project, with soft music playing on the stereo next to me. I think I’ve got a very nice little set-up here now with window-table-sun-stereo! Yay!

- Pu-erh tea with milk! My tummy still isn’t really wanting regular black tea, but pu-erh is the thing I really go for right now — interesting — could it be because it’s fermented and not as harsh? I have no idea. But I do love it.

- Speaking of tea, the eucalyptus that I put into my nettles tea just now… oh it adds such a nice element, and unearths sweet memories of being in Australia and surrounded by the scent and majesty of so many eucalyptus trees in the Blue Mountains. What an incredible & special place that is… I’d go back in an absolute heartbeat.

- Artichokes! I’ve been on an artichoke kick; I’ve eaten four of them in the past couple days. They are so good!

- Reading my Mother Earth News magazine next to the space heater.

- Taking a nap on F’s back. It felt so nice, and kept us both warm.

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What gratitudes have graced your week?

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Minnestrone Soup

Lindsey — Sun, 19 Feb 2012 00:14:28 +0000

Minnestrone - a variation on the recipe below

This soup is delicious. I sometimes alter the recipe depending on what I have on hand, so feel free to play around.

The recipe makes a pretty large pot. Cut the amounts back if you like!!

Minnestrone Soup

1/4 cup olive oil

1 large onion, chopped

1 large carrot, cut into 1/2″ dice

2 ribs celery, cut into 1/2″ slices

3 cloves garlic, finely chopped

2 small zucchini, cut into 1/2″ dice

1/2 lb potatoes, cut into 1/2″ dice

4 cups shredded green cabbage

4 – 6 cups chopped kale or swiss chard (1/4 – 1/2 lb)

28 oz canned chopped tomatoes with their juice (or feel free to use fresh tomatoes!)

2 to 3 tsp salt-free Italian herb seasoning

4 1/2 cups vegetable broth (but homemade grassfed beef bone broth is delicious too!)

1 1/2 cups cooked Great Northern beans (or 1 15-oz can, drained)

Salt/pepper to taste

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*It helps to have everything chopped and ready before starting*

In a very large pot, heat the olive oil and add the onion. Cook, stirring, until softened.

Add carrots, celery, and garlic. Cook, stirring for 4 minutes.

Add the zucchini and potatoes. Cook, stirring, for another 4 minutes.

Add cabbage and kale (or chard) and cook till cabbage is wilted.

Add the tomatoes with their juice, the veggie broth, and the Italian seasoning.

Simmer, covered, for one hour.

In a blender or food processor, puree half the beans with some liquid from the soup. Stir the puree along with the remaining beans into the soup.

Simmer, uncovered, for 15 minutes. Salt + pepper to taste.

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Happy Valentine’s Day!

Lindsey — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 08:01:35 +0000

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Classic Gingerbread

Lindsey — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 21:58:53 +0000

Here’s a recipe that I love. It’s for gingerbread, which is so warming and comforting when it’s chilly and gray outside. Serve it with tea or coffee, and a dollop of freshly whipped cream if you like, or just a simple powdered sugar heart, for Valentine’s Day — or any day!

The secret ingredient is dark, stout beer; don’t leave it out! Just as wine gives depth to sauces, the caramel-like flavor of dark beer adds the depth needed to make this cake really awesome!

Classic Gingerbread

3/4 cup dark, stout beer (such as Guinness or something fairly similar)

1/2 tsp baking soda

2/3 cup molasses

3/4 cup sucanat or brown sugar, slightly rounded

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour, plus extra to dust pan

2 1/2 Tbsp dried ground ginger (yes, tablespoons!)

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp finely ground pepper

2 eggs

1/3 cup coconut oil, melted

***

Preheat oven to 350°. Grease and flour an 8″x12″ pan (or an 8″x8″ if you like).

In a medium saucepan, bring the stout beer to a boil, and simmer for several minutes to allow the alcohol to dissipate. Do be present in the room while the beer is on the heat, since it can (will!) rise and spill over the sides of the pan very quickly! Remove beer from the heat and stir in the baking soda. When the foaming subsides, stir in the molasses and sucanat/brown sugar, and stir till dissolved. It will likely still be quite foamy; that’s OK.

In a separate bowl, mix together all of your dry ingredients.

Pour the beer mixture into a large bowl and whisk in the eggs and oil.

Then whisk the dry ingredients into the beer in three parts — after each addition, stirring vigorously until batter is totally smooth.

Pour the batter into your pan and tap against the counter a few times to dislodge any large air bubbles.

Bake on the center rack until a toothpick stuck into the center comes out clean, about 35 minutes (slightly longer if you use an 8″x8″ pan).

Cool the cake, slice, decorate, and enjoy!

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Gratitude Sunday * February 12, 2012

Lindsey — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 19:12:00 +0000

~ I’m once again joining Taryn over at Wooly Moss Roots in her Gratitude Sunday tradition. ~

Gratitude is powerful energy. I love hearing others’ gratitudes!

***

- A restful weekend after a hectic week.

- Working on my felted wool mittens on Monday and enjoying that day so much; it was cloudy outside and cozy inside, and while I worked I listened to some old stuff I haven’t heard in many years including Experiments in Truth by Ram Dass. Those tapes really helped me while I was grieving Sonja’s death, but it’s thought-provoking listening during any challenging situation, really. It felt good to hear them again.

- Having my favorite documentary, Alone in the Wilderness, appear on PBS! What a treat!

- Homemade sourdough flapjacks, re-heated in the toaster till the outside is just a little bit crispy, with a bit of pasture butter and lots of homemade wild grape jam!

- Finally moving the stereo to a new location near the kitchen where it’s getting so much more use. What a pleasure to have Billy Holiday playing softly, with the lights down low, while I prepare black beans and flapjack batter to soak overnight.

- A heavenly massage.

- Napping on my parents’ couch after my massage, with my cat sleeping on my chest.

- Interlibrary Loan — one of the best things ever!

- Salt. How salt has escaped a place on all previous Gratitude Sunday posts, I do not know.

- Hot showers for when the body needs warmth immediately!

- Coming home to my Honey. I love love love that

- Being able to ride my bike again to get from place to place, after the big snow storm where I needed to rely on the buses instead. The bike is so much more free and spontaneous. I love getting around by bike, even in winter. To me, it’s the least stressful of all transportation modes!

- Making black bean hummus using my regular hummus recipe with black beans instead of garbanzos + a little extra olive oil. So yummy spread on a piece of lettuce, with tomato slices, black olives, Dijon mustard, salt + pepper, and eaten like a taco!

- My day planner, a gift from my Hubby’s sweet mom — I’ve never had one before, but am loving it! It’s so helpful and I have a feeling it will be a new staple in my life from now on.

- Staying in bed yesterday for as long as my body wanted to (till noon!). Ohhh my that felt good.

- Having moneymaking work, ’cause it means money coming in which is always a very good feeling.

- Cozy warm house when it’s 5° outside, as it was last night.

- Feeling my body heal. Slowly, but surely. Oh hallelujah!!!

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What gratitudes have graced your week?

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TGIF!

Lindsey — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 22:08:42 +0000

What a busy week! I’m so glad it’s Friday. I’m ready to vege out!

This week, amidst many other not-as-fun things like meetings, headaches, bus rides, and blood draws, I finally began my Mitten Project. It deserves those capital letters because it’s turning into quite the time-sucking ordeal (mostly because I have no idea what I’m doing, so am inventing as I go), but the mittens are going to be awesome when I’m done. I’ve worn out my old mittens & am tired of my hands being so cold while I’m outdoors & on my bike, so I decided to make myself some super duper custom-fit 3-layer fleece-lined wool mittens out of a couple of sweaters I felted.

: The first one is nearly complete & fits beautifully!

It’s been quite cold and snowy this week. Even our neighbor squirrels look cold (although plenty well-fed I’d say!).

I got so excited one night this week because I stumbled upon one of my favorite movies/documentaries of all time, “Alone in the Wilderness” about Dick Proenneke. Have you seen it? I love it. I hadn’t seen it in a long time, and after a long and exhausting day it felt like such a gift that it was on our local PBS station. Anyway, many years ago I read his book called “One Man’s Wilderness” and in both the book and documentary he talks about making sourdough flapjacks. I was inspired, then, to go get some of my own sourdough flapjacks going so they could ferment overnight. I cooked them up the next morning, and they made a wonderful snack eaten in the cold wintery air on my walk from the bus stop to Darlene’s house, that wonderful neighbor I talked about in my Gratitude Sunday post.

Darlene is a massage therapist and gave me a wonderful massage as a gift. It was heaven. My body has been so un-fun to reside in for the last couple years, and to have it feel so good for those two hours was so nice. Interestingly, the massage really stirred things up in my still-healing body; I actually felt quite bad and sick for the rest of the day and the day after. Hmm. Well now I know — massages are powerful medicine and they really do get things moving!

Yesterday I made minnestrone soup for lunch; it was awesome! I’ll share my recipe for it soon (Edit: here’s the recipe), but the beauty of it is that you can really deviate from the recipe which is what I did yesterday. That soup was SO good!

And today… is finally Friday! Part of the exhaustion this week was needing to be lots of places and not being able to ride my bike because of the deep snow & icy, rutted roads. Therefore I rely on city buses which introduces some stress into my journey as well as making it much more of an ordeal to get from here to there. It also involves more walking which my poor lil’ body was not really up for this week. But finally, today, I was feeling much more myself with more energy, and could finally ride my bike again as the sidewalks & some of the roads were clear enough. After a major snowstorm, I always have such an appreciation for again being able to transport myself freely and independently via bicycle.

I had another 2-hour meeting today after working hard this week on moneymaking stuff even though I felt like crap & my body was screaming GO TO BED! But today I woke up feeling good, and I liked getting up early and looking nice and going to my meeting and contributing something. At times, I feel like a full time patient, and therefore quite useless. I didn’t feel that way today.

And then it felt great to be home again! After being out and about, I always love coming home to our sweet little apartment… and today when I arrived home at 12:30 the sun was streaming in the kitchen windows, and with our new furniture arrangement it just felt especially good in here.

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I’m looking forward to a quiet, relaxing weekend ahead!

Do you have any fun plans?

*****

Gratitude Sunday * February 5, 2012

Lindsey — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 18:51:50 +0000

~ I’m once again joining Taryn over at Wooly Moss Roots in her Gratitude Sunday tradition. ~

Gratitude is powerful energy. I love hearing others’ gratitudes!

***

- Receiving over a foot of snow!

- Accomplishing a few things that had been weighing on me more than I realized, and once I did them I felt so much lighter.

- Watching some Seinfeld episodes. I need to do that more often — they always make me laugh!

- Eating lunch of soup & bread with my mom at their sunny kitchen table one weekday this week. Simple pleasures.

- Bad days ending well.

- Hugging my Honey tightly after we both had a really bad day; how comforting just to hold each other.

- Taking a brisk walk in the deep snow.

- Watching our hilarious neighbor squirrels straining to crawl through the deep, deep snow on the roof outside our kitchen window! CUTE!

- Seeing a couple of inspiring shows this week on TV, especially one about Joan Baez.

- Talking with my neighbor Darlene this week both in person and on the phone. She is such a loving, accepting, forgiving, heartful, enlightening soul. In the majority of our interactions with other people in this world, we are not seen for who we really are, and what we say is not honored. Depending on the situation, this can wound us very deeply. And so to actually, truly, be seen and honored by someone feels like salve to your soul. Darlene is one of those people who sees you and honors you, 100%, no matter what.

- Rearranging our apartment! I love how doing that breathes new energy into a space.

- Bit by bit, slowly getting things more in order around our house.

- Getting some significant things accomplished this week & crossed off the to-do list.

- The way our living room feels like a tropical conservatory today with the warmth and all the green plants and the little table fountain bubbling away, while there was a mountain of snow just outside the window!

*****

What gratitudes have graced your week?

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So Much Snow!

Lindsey — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 20:25:45 +0000

We’ve gotten well over a foot of snow since Thursday night! If you’ve hung around here long, you know how much I love the snow, and especially these big blizzardy storms. What fun! Snowfall is so peaceful, too. As you can see below, we can hardly even see out our living room window anymore. I really like being snowed in!

And I love the indoor time — we’ve been rearranging some things in our apartment and I’m loving the new energy that comes from shifting stuff around. Plus, working diligently on getting rid of more stuff. Among other things, I organized the pantry yesterday and am enjoying it each time I open the door. It feels so good to be getting a handle on our house! It seems like when my illness got really bad in April, time stopped. When you’re so sick you feel like doing absolutely nothing, guess what? Absolutely nothing gets done! Huh. So I’m finally picking up projects that I had started in early April, which then got basically frozen in time. It feels great to be continuing them in earnest once again! And the crap that has piled up in the house in the space of 10 months… it feels so good to finally be addressing it.

I hope you all are having a wonderful and relaxing weekend! Tomorrow we’ll head to my parents’ place for the Super Bowl. It’s all about the food, the commercials, the company, and yeah, we might even watch a little football too…

*****

A Warm Winter Day Walk

Lindsey — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 14:37:22 +0000

Look what I saw yesterday! Snowdrops! Spring is coming. The birds know it, the plants know it!

It was a beautiful, warm day yesterday. Admittedly, I was more in the mood for a snow day so that I could stay in and get indoor things done. This is the season of hibernation and hunkering down, and sometimes I don’t want to feel lured out by the sunshine and warmth. In wintertime, I want winter. Buuuuut…you gotta strike when the iron is hot — so I let myself be lured out anyway, and I enjoyed it so much!

I was craving Ethiopian, my favorite type of ethnic food, so I got take-out and took it to a nice nature spot, took off my shoes, rolled up my sleeves, and ate in the sunshine. Then I took a short, leisurely walk. It felt so good to be outdoors in the warm air.

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Free Shipping at Tropical Traditions (Today only, Monday January 30)!

Lindsey — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:17:32 +0000

Just wanted to alert you that Tropical Traditions, one of my favorite companies, is having a Free Shipping Day today! Free shipping will save about $10-15 off your order, so it’s a good time to stock up, or try them out if you haven’t before. I really love this company’s products, and use them daily. Now through Midnight EST on Monday January 30th, they’re offering free ground-only shipping when you enter coupon code 123001 at checkout.

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You can see a list of all my favorite Tropical Traditions products here.

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And if you’re a new customer and have never bought from them before, you can also get this Virgin Coconut Oil book, with information & recipes, for free (any time, not just today) by entering my User ID, which is 6032410. When you’re going through the checkout process and you’ve added your shipping address and phone number, you will see the question “How did you hear of us?” Just choose “Referred by a friend” and then a new “User ID” field will appear below that where you can enter my User ID. (See screen shot below.)

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