Love Your Body - How to Make the Best Superfood Smoothie - Delicious...

Hi Beautiful,
To get your Monday off to a good start, I thought I'd quickly share this delicious thing that has become a regular part of my days lately...

This year I re-committed to the oh-so-important practice of treating my body with love and respect and nourishing myself lovingly too.

I'm a sensualist and love all things delicious, but I can go a little too far down the butter-bacon-bread-cream&wine path sometimes... I still love to go there but I'm working towards "occasional fun indulgence" for that experience.

My daily self-care includes lots of fresh organic fruits and veggies, salmon, soy, quinoa, free range organic chicken and local eggs, then more veggies and maybe a glass of red wine. It works so well for me in terms of vitality and general well-being. I struggle with mood and have experienced episodic major depression, so using every avenue to keep my mood elevated is a really important part of my overall healthcare. Food can be our best medicine.

So anyway, I've been experimenting with smoothies, and have come up with one that I really love, and it packs a punch too. I blend:

• one small organic banana
• a handful of organic strawberries (or raspberrries or balckberries, whatever is fresh in season)
• a handful of frozen organic blueberries (we're growing our own this year!)
• about 1 T Kefir (a bazillion more probiotics than yogurt)
• about 1/2 C yogurt (I use plain organic nonfat)
• 1T almond butter
• 1 t black sesame seeds (amazing antioxidant)
• 1 t oatbran (yay soluble fiber)
• 1 t raw cocoa nibs (or powder if you don't like little crunchies in your smoothie)
• a little chunk of organic lemon including skin
• a little chunk of organic fresh ginger including skin

Blend it up. It's SOO good. I recently also tried it with Maca which is supposed to be a lovely hormone balancer (we like those) but eeeww, it did not taste good. Nonetheless, you can experiment with adding other superfoods. I bet goji berries would be good.

Happy Monday,

stone soup

   When I was a child, I loved the story  "Stone  Soup."  I'm still not sure why, but I found it very exciting, the idea of creating something from nothing; or maybe it was the idea that we really do have everything we need, if we have the courage to begin to create.

Anyway, I still love making soup. There is something so comforting and wholesome about the activity, especially on a day like today: wet, cold, drab, and threatening snow.

One of the facts of island life is that we don't have access in the sense most people have become accustomed to. I can't order in a pizza or Thai food on lazy nights (frozen pizza from the General Store doesn't really cut it, although it is a last resort...) Also, I only grocery shop every 10 days or so. We don't have a big grocery store here, just the General Store for essentials like milk and bread (and frozen pizza.)

So on the days at the end of my grocery cycle (like today),  I'm often in a "stone soup" kind of situation. And it's fun, I enjoy it. I've always loved the great cuisines that developed from so called "peasant" food: the Italian and  Indian cuisines, for instance, are great examples of how simplicity, necessity, devotion, taste, and love brought forth miracles from the simple ingredients of farmyard, kitchen garden, and countryside.

Today I am making an Italian minestre, a hearty soup with what I have on hand, requiring improvisation and a bit of scrounging. I can smell it cooking as I write, and in a moment I will venture out into the muddy, dormant garden to see if my rosemary, oregano, and thyme plants will give me a few tired but pungent winter leaves.

At dinner we'll drink cheap but good red wine from handmade clay cups, tear pieces from an island-made baguette, and enjoy steaming bowls of this simple, soulful soup.

reverb10 - party

Hi Beautiful,
This is an inspiring on-line project I've decided to jump in to! "Reverb 10 is an annual event and online initiative to reflect on your year and manifest what’s next. Use the end of your year as an opportunity to reflect on what's happened, and to send out reverberations for the year ahead." Every day in December there is a new prompt for writing and reflection. 

December 9 – Party Prompt: Party. What social gathering rocked your socks off in 2010? Describe the people, music, food, drink, clothes, shenanigans. 

As you may know by now, I live in a small, relatively isolated  island community. We have no pubs, cinemas, nightclubs. We have one really great restaurant, but they serve dinner only once a week (once every two weeks in Winter.) What we do have is a community of lively, creative souls who have become expert at creating our own entertainment. Parties tend to be pretty great around here. It was hard to pick just one highlight of 2010, so I'll tell you about the last party I went to - it was pretty wonderful.

The Full Moon Supper Club was founded this year. A group of 10 or so couples meet monthly to eat and drink, hosting rotates. The November supper club was exquisite. We travelled to our sister island Hornby, to the vineyard home of Suzie and Steve. A beautiful fresh snow was falling as we made our way up the bamboo lined path to the door. You know that special feeling of standing on a doorstep in the dark, smelling fresh snow, and then suddenly being drawn in to the warmth, light, conviviality, hugs, and delicious smells of a friend's festive home? Ahhh. Timber rafters, earth coloured walls adorned with beautiful land and oceanscapes by  local painters, smells of something roasting, woodsmoke, hints of perfume. Soon there is a glass of very good red wine in my hands, and I'm drawn in to circles of conversation. A long table, beautifully dressed, and the food! Wild mushroom crostini, with chantarelles picked that day in the woods. Beef carpaccio, tuna tartare. Then the main course, the best lambchops (I was craving more for a week afterwards) gorgeously plated. Excellent wines. Creme brulee. The perfect dinner party.

what are you grateful for?

Today is Thanksgiving in the United States, so Happy Thanksgiving to all of you who are there... you may not know that here in Canada we celebrate Thanksgiving in mid-October. Above are a few highlights from our celebration last month. In our house, we usually have an unconventional day, but one that always includes feasting and family. This year, my sweetie and I were on our own for the first time in our empty nest, and we decided to have a simple and romantic Thanksgiving. We had a long walk on the beach and watched the blustery, changing October sky. We gathered oysters as the tide came in, took them home in a bucket, and prepared them simply with garlic, butter, fresh herbs (from my garden), and breadcrumbs, just a few minutes under the broiler. We popped a bottle of champagne and gave thanks for love and simplicity, for our beautiful island and for the bounty of the sea.

Wishing you a day of love, gratitude, and abundance, whatever shape that takes for you. Remember, it's not always a big family and a turkey. There are so many ways to celebrate the bounty and beauty of life, and so much to be grateful for. I would love to hear about your day of gratitude. What and how do you celebrate? What are you grateful for this year?

august break #2

saturday market
beet greens with shaved reggiano
summer food looks good in my blossom bowls.


My next "7 Keys to an Artful Life e-Course" begins October 10th!
Start your autumn season with 7 weeks of creativity, life-balance, self-care, and fun. Read about it here.

island+summer+weekend

Fresh caught halibut+local organic greens and edible flowers, two morning ocean swims and an evening swim, three forest walks, lilies blooming, meeting friends at the bistro, a long nap.

What pleasures and treasures did your weekend hold?

My next "7 Keys to an Artful Life e-Course" begins October 10th!
Start your autumn season with 7 weeks of creativity, life-balance, self-care, and fun. Read about it here.

ayurveda & maintaining balance in seasonal change

Staying connected to the rhythms and cycles of the natural world is very important to me. We suffer from too much separateness in our world as it is now; at worst, immersion in the modern world can create an almost complete estrangement from the true rhythms of nature. I believe this amounts to an estrangement from our bodies, our creativity, each other, and our deepest selves. When we work, live, and travel in comfortably controlled environments, communicate and receive information about the world through electronic devices, we need to remember to connect with the real, tangible, and powerful forces of our actual natural environment. If we can maintain that organic connection, then all the shiny tools and comforts of our created world can be enjoyed and understood, in the greater context of nature. Perhaps maintaining this connection can help us to create new technologies and comforts which work in harmony with nature.

It's not such a daunting task, staying connected. Just pay attention - to the weather, to the moon, to the voice of your body, to the seasons. Get out there sometimes, and just be in the weather. Staying connected to the seasons has been a powerful practice for me since I left the ease and warmth of California for the intensity of the temperate rain forest of coastal B.C.. I love the times of seasonal change for the feelings of excitement and renewal they bring into my life. Like all times of change, however, the seasonal changes can bring a little vulnerability, and a challenge to stay in balance. Ayurveda, the traditional East Indian wellness practice, offers tools for staying in balance through the seasonal changes, and for keeping our bodies in balance with the larger rhythms. The transition into Fall is often a bit challenging for me, so I thought I'd look into how Ayurveda could help. Here's what I learned:

According to Ayurveda, September is the beginning of the Vata season, which lasts til around Winter Solstice. Vata energy is one of the three Doshas, or universal energies. Vata has the qualities of movement, activity, light, coolness, dryness, agitation. It is related to the element of Air. We are prone to imbalances of Vata during this season of late summer and early fall. Vata imbalances can manifest as:

• an over-active, agitated mind
• sleep disturbances
• low immunity
• achy joints
• dry skin
  
• loss of focus
  
• chills
• digestive problems
• worry and anxiety

Right? I've been suffering from all of these things in the last couple of weeks! So what helps? Here are some suggestions I found for restoring balance during Vata season:

• Stay hydrated by drinking lots of water or warming herbal teas.
  
• Keep to a regular, and gentle, schedule, especially with sleep. Go to bed early, and rise early.
• Practice restorative yoga or another gentle physical practice - stay active without overdoing.
• Stay warm! Practice gently warming yoga poses like backbends and extensions.
• Eat warming cooked seasonal food like squash, brown rice, and nourishing soups.
• Take immunity enhancing herbal supplements.
• Avoid too much travel, too much work, staying up too late.

These all sound like healthy, appealing suggestions, and I might even be able to integrate a few of them into my Fall routine. But the suggestion I liked the best was:

• practice self-massage every morning with warm, scented oils (sesame oil is traditional.)

That sounds like a wonderful, self-nurturing practice, and well worth making time for. So if we do a few of these things, focus on slowing down, staying warm, and nourishing ourselves with seasonally appropriate foods and activities, (common sense, right?) then we can expect to experience the best of the Vata season, which is:

• healthy energy
• clarity of mind
• awakened senses
• renewed sense of purpose
• positive momentum

Ayurveda is a sophisticated and complex ancient science. I found a good lay person's introduction here, if you are interested in learning more.

muffin recipe with illustrations

It's a sparkly almost-fall day and I definitely have the urge to bake things and make soup. Savoury scones and potato leek soup are on the menu, but right now my sweetheart is making muffins with zucchini from the farmer's market. Like most of us, I have a notebook where I keep recipes; it's actually a spiral bound sketchbook, and when the mood strikes I do little watercolour illustrations for the recipe I'm recording. It's not a 'precious' book - some recipes are just jotted down, or torn out of magazines and stuck in, but the occasional illustrated ones make it a fun and beautiful journal - including the drips and spots and watermarks on the pages!

An Artful Gift for You:


Here is my basic muffin recipe - it's all-purpose, reliable, and super versatile. I know it's too small to read! if you click here, or on the image, a nice big printable page will open, and you can print this out and add it to your own recipe journal. It's easy to veganize too, just replace the eggs with egg substitute, and the dairy with soy or rice milk or soy yogurt. Enjoy!

summer on the island

ripe berries
long twilights
barnacle scrapes on my toes
yard full of blousy dandelions
smell of warm cedar & salt water
purple starfish
wet dogs
freshest salads ever
swimming in the evening tide
afternoon naps with the smell of lilies

huevos rancheros

We've been indulging in lots of amazing, fresh, beautiful local food. Sunday breakfast was Huevos Rancheros. I used freshly made local organic corn tortillas, melted a little organic cheddar on them, topped with organic white beans, tomatoes from the farm down the road, eggs from next door, a sprinkle of fresh green onion and cilantro, then salsa verde and some sour cream. Soooo good.

10 things to do on a summer saturday

1. go for a walk in a meadow at dawn









2. take a yoga class at your favourite studio











3. have a really long bath













4. smell the roses










5. spend time in nature with a friend











6. attend the local farmer's market, chat with people, and buy something nice for dinner.










7. light a scented candle and do some reading & journaling.










8. have an adventure in or on the water.














9. tend your garden.










10. take a long walk on a country lane.

nurturing self-care & community: be a locavore

To my mind there's always been a romance to eating locally. I was raised by artists who gardened, so I have marvelous childhood food memories. Digging potatoes at night, reaching into dark loam to unearth that treasure, smooth and yellowy white, mirroring the full moon. Reaching under the downy breast of the hen and bringing out that treasure, still warm, speckled brown. Gathering wild fiddlehead ferns in earliest still-snowy spring, how amazingly delicious they were with lots of butter. Early morning trout fishing with my father, followed by trout-for-lunch; my mother rolled them in flour and fried them in a big cast iron skillet. That's what "eating locally" conjures for me. I'm very excited that this is a philosophy that many people are beginning to embrace; the rewards of local eating are huge, going way beyond the positive social & environmental impact. The rewards include increasing the sensual pleasure in our lives, connecting more deeply with our place and with the cycle of the year, connecting more deeply with our community, both physically and socially. On a subtle level I believe this kind of connection, when nurtured, leads to a deep and ineffable sense of ease and rightness in our lives which so much entertainment and consumption just won't bring.

I am blessed to live in a place which has always boasted a wealth of beautiful food. The original foods of this place are salmon, shellfish, venison, wild greens like nettles, chantarelle mushrooms, also berries, so many berries. We eat all of these things directly from our wild home. For the last century or so, agriculture has become a part of this place, so home food options now include milk, cheese, and eggs, lamb & mutton, grass-fed beef, apples, and vegetables and herbs galore. The eggs I eat come from hens that I can watch from my windows as they happily forage in the grass. I make blackberry smoothies all year from the blackberries I gather in two or three happy sunny September days right on my own property (the photo was taken last September). Clams and oysters are regular summer fare, after a walk on the beach with a bucket and trowel. What are the foods of your place? Do you know what the indigenous foods were? Do they survive? Do you eat locally? How? How does it make you feel? I'd love to hear.

nurturing self-care: celebrate you!!!

Well, my excuse for this post is that today is my birthday! Yay! I love birthdays. The sun is shining after a few days of rain. My daughter and my little pup snuggled in bed with me this morning while the sun streamed through the white curtains, I grabbed my journal & coloured pencils & tarot cards & dear daughter did a reading for me, spreading out the cards on our soft turquoise 9 patch quilt in the filtered sunlight. It was incredibly insightful & helpful *sneak peak below* then my sweetie brought me breakfast in bed including toast with extra butter. THEN all the dogs started barking because bff was standing at the door holding a new rose bush (white/pink blush, double, elegant, old fashioned bourbon type and super fragrant; she knows me!) and as if that all weren't enough my sweetie actually booked a pedicure for me. A seaside spa pedicure. Pedicures and extra butter! Wheee!

I love to feel special on my birthday, and I love to make others feel special on theirs. There is sacredness and mystery in the day we are born - have you ever been in a birthing room? Our birth anniversary is the time to remember that joy is our birthright. It's a funny thing; although my birthdays are almost always really lovely & magical, I am often sad, mad, and depressed for the days leading up to *my* day. All these ugly feelings of un-deserving and self pity come rolling in like stormy surf. Then the day dawns and life is good and I can relax and enjoy. This isn't about aging, I don't really mind about aging. (My grandmother is 95 and she rocks. ) I think it's really all about deserving, and I think many of us struggle with this one. Do I deserve to celebrate my self? Is my life special? Do I deserve to be celebrated for simply being? And the answers should be yes, yes, and a resounding yes. It's really important to take the time to honour ourselves; for our accomplishments, yes! But also just for our being. In Buddhism there is the idea of keeping a primary focus on gratitude for our precious human life. Not a guilt-ridden-not-sure-I-deserve-it kind of gratitude, but a joyful, certain gratitude that rises up in your heart like love. YES! I celebrate my precious human life. How can you celebrate yours today?

a few of our favourite things

Cassy (my daughter) and I were inspired by this post on Kimberly Wilson's blog, and decided to do lists of our own. We had fun comparing notes and researching images. Can you guess which favs are the mother's and which are the daughter's choices in each category (some are both!)??

fav magazines:
.

entertainment we love:


fav way to spend a free hour: (that's a brand new journal on the right)


fav tea:


creatures we adore:


we find comfort here:


best places:


our favourite scents:


fav drinks:



desert island music:




just yum....