You make the rocking world go round-get on your bike and ride!

That's right. I am now riding my bike to work. Not everyday mind you- just the days that Shawn doesn't work because if I have to take kiddo to the dayhome then drive home THEN ride my bike, it is a logistical nightmare. However, on days when I can just go straight to work, the true value of living where we do is revealed. I am a quick 15 minute ride to the new office we have recently moved to. Not only that but it is a 15 minute ride through Mill Creek Ravine, which is like my little piece of heaven on earth in this big huge city that is home for my little family. It is full of birds, saskatoon bushes, and a ravine that slowly winds it's way to the North Saskatchewan. And I love it. We take our dogs there offleash and pulling the dogsled, I have ran countless kms in it, we walk with the kiddo in it- it feels like our little secret beneath the hustle and bustle. And now my bike takes me to work in it.

The last couple weeks I've been able to go an average of 1-3 times. This week I only had Wednesday and Thursday so this morning when I woke up and saw the freezing rain I was unsure. I had tackled cold before, even a light snow- but this seemed like a force to be reckoned with. But when I looked at the layer of ice the freezing rain had left on my windshield that only a true northerner knows I knew biking was my better option. I had forgotten to take my Canadian Tire plush, gel, comfy seat cover off last night so of course it was frozen- and even in my new lululemon gaiter-on-the-bottom pants my girly bits froze for the first minute or so, but once I stopped and scraped off all the ice, all was good. It might be the legendary biker's "callous" that has now formed- which makes my behind numb to the bike seat and therefore numb to ice as well but who knows. That callous deserves it's own blog entry really but I'll get to that later.

I did note at some point that I should probably get myself some sort of drybag for my work clothes, phone and wallet that I carry in my backpack, but I'm hoping on getting some panniers in the near future so a plastic bag can do for now. I also might need to wear my ski goggles as the sleet and rain kinda hurt my eyes at very few intervals, but enough that protection wouldn't be a bad thing. I also need to get myself some sort of biking shoes/boots. My sneakers won't cut it anymore because they are "breathable" which translates to "gets soaking wet and cold" in the winter on a bike. So I'm going to be the height of fashion out there folks. Look out for me on the runways next year in France...

Anyway, I got to bring my bike in the office, and there's rumor going around that perhaps a permanent bike shelter will be provided for us super keener crazies- nope I'm not the only one. On a good day there are 5 of us that ride! Not too shabby eh?

So once it stopped freezing rain- it started snowing. 10-12cm in fact. Now this poses a whole new challenge for the winter biker. Especially since I don't have studded tires. In fact 3 other commuters this evening passed me on their bikes - all commented that I need studded tires. So I'm off to MEC this weekend before they sell out. It was a lot of walking and slipping around in the snow- as much as Edmonton tries- they don't really ever clear the trails for people so I know this is going to be an issue for me all winter.

So now on to my rant- and this is something I can do because it is my blog and it is just my opinion- nothing more, nothing less. If you don't agree with me, that's fine, I don't want to be preachy, let's have a discussion- but here is my opinion take it or leave it. I'm not saying EVERYONE has to ride their bike or take the bus or x-country ski or walk to work or even ice skate like in Ottawa- but I have the feeling it would be a much nicer place if more people did. I know that there are constraints, I myself have them with dropping my son off at our dayhome (don't get me started on how work sponsored childcare would benefit everyone and society as a whole). However, I have gone YEARS without doing it and to be fair I've only been doing it for a couple weeks but man alive does it make me a happier person. I get up in the morning and know I don't have to deal with the stress of traffic. I am quite happy knowing I will get a boost of exercise and get my heart pumping on my route to work. I know I will probably hear some chickadees and house sparrows. I know I am saving money by the litre. I know I am not spouting out pollution (except my own self righteous bullshit- ha). I know I am going to have FUN on my way to work. What a novel idea. What a crazy mixed up world we live in where people move an hour drive away from work and commute daily an hour back and forth for a cheaper, bigger house in the suburbs. Maybe it's my time spent in Europe when I've seen how it is possible for people to ride their bikes to public transportation and not even own a car... I know this is unrealistic for most northern Albertans with our weather- but if me, a chubby 30-something year old mom can do it the odd time- I don't really see why most people couldn't... and here's where I get all judgey judgey---- Except for the fact that our city has a suburb disease. I had the chance to drive out the other night to the suburbs to pick something up and I was SHOCKED at how far south our city has stretched it's dead cement fingers into our aspen parkland and valuable farmland. An area south of Ellerslie, where I used to trap and track deer for university has literally been paved over and covered in exact replica giant houses with shoddy workmanship and yards the size of my bedroom that all look the same and have ridiculous names like Riverview Heights (the river is a good 40km away) and Forest Villa (the forest was tore down to put the homes there), Hawks Ridge (Sorry what? do you really think hawks live here anymore), Lakeview (are you kidding me? Road runoff does not a lake make), The Orchards (REALLY? Is someone taking the piss? Seriously?)... The biggest pet peeve advertisement I have ever seen was a new home community that literally advertised deer in your backyard. Sigh. Urban sprawl is a disease and it's gross and Edmonton has it BAD. As one of the largest cities space-wise in Canada I really think we could do better.

Big Box Stores? Why do we need those? People don't need to drive in between stores- build malls- they take up less space and people walk more then. I've tried walking from store to store in South Edmonton Common. It's suicidal.

Sherwood Park. What is the point of that place really? It's a bedroom community for people who work in Edmonton but want to drive further to get to work? There's no actual businesses there except to sell cheap plastic things to people who live there. Sigh.

St. Albert- same thing but for really rich people who don't want to live next door to someone who might make less than $100,000 a year. Someone once wrote into the St. Albert Gazette commenting on how the people raising their kids there were doing them a disservice by not exposing them to all income brackets of people as well as people who might not be white (next time you're there take a look around) or don't even get me started on THIS awful kerfuffle: http://www.stalbertgazette.com/article/20100403/SAG0904/304039974/-1/SAG09/higher-earning-families-part-of-st-alberts-appeals .... holy shit... read the comments to really get a sense of racism. Or don't and you'll be a better person for it.

I know I have been called a dirtyhippycommiegranolamunchingsocialist. However. I think that the city and it's people can do better. I really, really, really do. Build up not out. Develop inner city schools that are already here and desperately need renovations. Stop building schools in the suburbs. Maybe everyone could take a step back and realize they don't need a giant house in the middle of butt fuck nowhere where they can't even walk to the grocery store. Public transit? No wonder nobody takes it, and it's useless. How could it possibly serve a city the size of New York with less than an eighth of the population. It's impossible. Jesus rollerblading Christ people. Stop the spread of urban sprawl. Stop the demolishing of trees, farmland, irreplaceable wetlands, and wildlife habitat. Did you know that if an animal isn't protected by species at risk rules its home is 100% going to be demolished to build yours. When you could move into a perfectly nice house close to your work, send your kids to a wonderful school in the city, and maybe, just maybe get to ride your bike to work some days in the snow and have a giggle while doing it.

End rant.

Dirty Hippy Brownies!!

So. I slacked for a little while... I'm going to go with around 3 weeks. I had a project at work due and an immense amount of work and very little timeline- welcome to consulting- that found me at the office till 1am on weeknights and bringing kiddo, laptop, and movies in on a Sunday. But now that that's over I can get back to focusing on my life. Ha.

Today I sat down and was perusing the lululemon website after a 30 min cold run in the ravine- and saw some pants I want to eventually fit in... But I got sad because I love desserts and unless I can enjoy food I just can't diet so I might end up a 1-tonne mom. So i was googling healthy recipes that looked really good- and I remembered I had Michael Pollan's book Food Rules somewhere (bear with me this timeline ends up at brownies haha). So I dug into that and it inspired me to see how creative I could get on improving food... One of the rules Italians and French people follow are ENJOY your food- and what's more enjoyable than a brownie? Nothing my friends. Nothing.

So I just took a brownie recipe from the internets and I made it my way-

1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup organic cocoa powder
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 cup coconut sugar*
1/4 cup ground flax
2 tbsp wheat germ
1/4 cup hemp hearts
3 egg whites
1/2 cup pureed mixture of prunes and spinach**
1/2 cup canned pumpkin
1/3 cup almond milk
2 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup strong brewed coffee
1/2 cup chopped unsalted almonds to sprinkle on top

*it's supposed to be unrefined so it contains all it's minerals still and it has a really low glycemic index so your blood sugar doesn't freak out.
**4 dried prunes, tbsp of water, and 1 & 1/2 cup fresh spinach in a blender

Mix the dry stuff except the sugar.
In a separate bowl mix the wet stuff and sugar.
Add together mixing as little as possible to blend.
Sprinkle with chopped almonds
Butter or Pam 8x8 pan and bake at 350 for 40 min.

It was perfect. The hemp hearts helped with the nuttiness and the prunes and pumpkin kept them moist. Not exactly your mom's brownies and not too sweet or dense but chocolatey enough to make everyone happy, especially my insatiable sweet tooth and I could let H have a sizable piece and not have visions of him being a 1 tonne teenager. We all loved them! Bingo!! Score one for dirty hippy brownies! I guess the next logical step is to move us all unto a commune.

Here's hoping the salesgirls don't laugh me out of the store...

I got paid today. And after I pay all my normal boring bills, I am heading straight to Lululemon to buy myself some workout worthy clothes. I am tired of Shawn's old tshirts and ratty old pants. I ran stairs last weekend on Sunday with a friend of mine who I used to do stairs with pre-leg break quite regularly. It was tough and I wasn't nearly as fast as I used to be. But I did it. And it was fun and totally worth it. However, I couldn't walk for this whole week. My calves were so tight that I couldn't get up or down the stairs without desperately gripping the bar and sort of doing an old lady shimmy to the side down them. And forget what torture it was when Huxley needed me to "I carwwy you momma" (he's got it backwards but I know what he means) down the stairs. Ugh. I actually made plans every time I went up and down for throwing him over my head so he would land on me when I fell. You see I have fallen down stairs before. About 8 months after I broke my leg, I decided to run some stairs in Medicine Hat and my ankle actually just gave out halfway down. I went flying and had huge scrapes on my tummy and face from hitting the stairs on the way down and landing in a huge pile of red dirt. So I have a bit of a fear of stairs and so Sunday was a good accomplishment for me. However, it hurt so bad I couldn't even get off of the couch to get the remote so I kept watching Honey Boo Boo run all week and I've noticed I didn't mind... Well F that. I clearly need a kick in the ever increasingly baggy pants. So I am going to pick myself up a couple fall/winter running shirts, some pants with reflective strips, and maybe an ear band to get me motivated and out the door again. Barring the door doesn't accidentally open while H is running in circles picking his nose and I'm trying to stuff myself into the sausage casings and traumatize every tight svelte 20something girl in there into spontaneously committing suicide while looking at their inevitable future staring them in the face while I scream "I USED TO BE JUST LIKE YOU".....

Fingers crossed!!!

People in real life have started to notice I'm losing weight. Today, my dayhome lady, asked me if I'd been losing weight. I was so happy. My pants are so lose right now I don't even half to undo the buttons or zipper to take them off. YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!

I also need some more running music for my ipod. Anyone got any good song recommendations????

I am a runner.

I really don't know what to write. I could be funny and talk about how I sweated like a pack mule, heave myself forward rather than actually "run", and all the training and blood, sweat, and tears I had to go through to get to this place. I had all these visions and inspirational wisdom, and thoughts of what I would write- but to be honest I want to keep it honest and simple... I ran ten kilometres on Saturday the 21 for the Doctors Without Borders. And it was easier than I thought it was going to be. Yay training. I didn't turn around at the tempting 5km halfway mark because I knew Shawn and kiddo were going to be somewhere along the way and because I stopped caring what place I was in or if everyone else except me looked all of a sudden like Jillian Michaels. I kept running because I could. The beautiful repetition of one foot in front of the other, going forward no matter what. Slowly but surely. I ran because I could run. I ran and I thought. I thought about my family. My mother -how much she enjoys kiddo. My brother and his epic pilgrimage across an entire country and his bravery and willingness to just throw himself into something and finish it no matter what (family resemblance maybe?).  I thought a lot about my Dad- about how proud he'd be of me. The race was right near the U of A and I remember driving around there many times when my brother was at baseball practice, and me and my Dad talking about me going there. About how I never even applied to another university- and how proud he was of me. I thought about what he had to go through and how what I was doing seemed trivial and silly and not painful compared to cancer. In fact it put it all into a much better light for me- could it be that running was joyful and a celebration of the fact that I am alive? I hope every day he knows how much I loved him. 

When kiddo and Shawn met me at the 5km mark I ran up and saw H giving me a HUGE grin that he does so well and it made me so happy to have him see his momma practicing what she preaches. If anything I can exercise to be an example for him. Shawn pushed the stroller for about one kilometre with me and then they tailed off- with H saying "good run mama" and waving at me and blowing kisses. If anything will make a momma cry that will...

My time isn't something I even care about. I could post it but it wasn't about that for me. I only race against myself. I finished just as they were giving out the prizes, needless to say I wasn't a contender for a prize. But my prize was seeing my two boys waiting for me at the end frantically waving and trying to take a picture. I finished and felt good. And my family was there cheering me on, as a runner. A little piece of heaven that was.

Meatballs

I have been mulling this one over for a little while now. How to make the perfect meatball. And I think I have done it- with props to Laura, who in her own right should have her own cooking show. I took a pound of extra lean hamburger (from TK ranch- organic, outside cows), almost an equal amount of shredded zucchini, one free range chicken egg, a whole bunch of ground flax, wheat germ, the keg steak spice, shredded onion, and enough garlic to seriously disfigure both Edward and Bella. They are baking right now in the oven... Kiddo will let me know in approximately 8 minutes how they turn out... until then- here are some photos I took with my iPhone.

 

Home Again, Home Again- jiggity jig.

“But why had he always felt so strongly the magnetic pull of home, why had he thought so much about it and remembered it with such blazing accuracy, if it did not matter, and if this little town, and the immortal hills around it, was not the only home he had on earth? He did not know. All that he knew was that the years flow by like water, and that one day men come home again.” Thomas Wolfe from "You Can't Go Home Again"


It's funny how you can have these people in your life. Ones that you have known since you weren't even able to tie your shoes. People that hold your history in their hearts and you theirs. People that grew up with you. I grew up in a town with a population of ~800 people, 850 if you count livestock in town limits. We had train tracks and open prairie in our backyard. The kind of place where the elderly sit outside in their lawn chairs and offer you candy as you walk by and nobody blinks an eye. The kind of place where a mom can throw the kids outside, lock the door and drink red wine and watch soaps clean her house uninterrupted knowing her kids are safe. The kind of place where tadpole hunting and riding your bike on gravel roads is a daily experience in the summer. The kind of place where you form friendships where you might only see people a few times every couple of years as you grow old, but when you do- you ease right back into that comfortable place where you can talk about anything, laugh uncontrollably, all put your arms around one another and sing as loud as you can to music from your youth... A community.

Since my parents moved away it hasn't been easy for me to get home much. But when I do, it is home. Every inch of that town holds a memory for me and I feel so lucky and so blessed to have grown up in my town. I went into my parent's old store and chatted with the new owners. It was like nothing had changed. I could still see my Dad standing there behind the counter. I'm adult enough to say I cried. In the store. It was a lot for me- but it was worth it.

I spent sometime outside on Saturday night staring up at the stars- because I forgot what it was like to see them so clearly you can almost feel them.  I laid in bed in the trailer one night and could hear the sandhill cranes flying high up ahead migrating south. I ran out of town from the campground to the old airport and back (4km wahoo) on a gravel road that smelled like clover and I could hear cows mooing and see the cowbirds flying around.

I feel upset sometimes that my son won't have the same experiences I had. He won't understand directions like "turn left when you get to the red barn, and right at so and so's house". He won't grow up in school with all the same people, know all their families, and have the same bond I do with these incredible people. He won't learn how to drive on a gravel road- the smells, the crunchy noise, and the feel of the rocks under the wheels. He won't have that feeling of knowing them since he was 5 and then seeing their 5 year old children- and be able to pick whose is whose out of a crowd... He won't have these people. These incredible, special, down to earth, smart, amazing people- That I don't see enough of and was so blessed to grow up with.

In other news: my eating was crap, I ate way too much cheese, and whiskey, beers, and baileys blew my diet right out of the water... I remember rationalizing the cookie I was eating as I drank my 27865th beer that I would eventually just throw it up anyway.. ha. Didn't happen. I did run 4km and golf, so that should count.... but I wasn't this weekend. I was just too busy.

I'm terrible at titles. And I ramble in this one.

So my eating hasn't been good this week. It started with a birthday party chips and squares, then a baby shower cupcake, then two beers at the Glass Tiger/Roxette (with four girls i went to grade school with and have known since I was 6 years old- we sang our hearts out- holla!!!) then Chinese food, arghlespla!!! I went for a 40 min run today with Andrea and let me tell you that first 20 was SO SLUGGY! I can definitely tell when my diet has been disgusting... But the last 20 minutes were much better after I'd gotten all the crap burnt off and taken a pee in the bushes. In the ravine. Crawling with dogs and people. While Andrea stood watch. In the middle of the city. Of almost a million people. What can I say? I'm a small town girl at heart.

Also I gained a pound back. Booooo :( well that's a lesson to me for sure!

My brother went to Europe yesterday with his partner for a whole
month. He is hiking across the entire country of Spain from The French border to Santiago. The St. James walk. It's a pilgrimage of over 1000 km and he is going to do this epic journey for a week with E then she is leaving and he is continuing on by himself the last 3 weeks. Walking about 35-40 km a day I think that works out to. I'm so incredibly proud of him! He has been training for weeks running on his treadmill, walking around Cooking Lake loops of 32km- and he went to mec and got himself all sorted for gear, boots, sleeping bag, light hiking clothes. I'm so jealous I would bleed green if I got a paper cut (now that i said that i better not get one - why is paper such a vindictive, passive aggressive bit€h?). So we discussed me coming on a trip next time. Mt. Kilimanjaro? Why not. Maybe when Huxley is a teenager we can take him too! Agh! I get so excited about all the things I want to show him! I hope he shares my interest in adventures!!! If he starts dressing goth and baying at the moon though ... Well I'll still love him and probably take him to Romania then :)

Here is some photos- my brother and kiddo, bro and E the night before the trip, and my beautiful friend E at the Roxette/Glass Tiger concert!