Celery Leaves

My dad was raised by a single mother who grew up during the Depression.  From this experience, he learned the importance of hard work and to not waste anything.  Dad would save anything and everything and repurpose it.  Plastic soda bottles with their bottoms cut off became mini greenhouses over pots containing cuttings that were rooting.  He had an unending supply of rubber bands collected from years of morning newspapers.  We won't talk of the many collections that were safely stored in butter tubs.  I did not inherit this practice from my dad.  I am a purger, a minimalist, an if I can't use it right now, don't save it kind of person...except for books.  I guess its a good thing that books can't be stored in butter tubs!

And food...I can't stand wasting food.

This is the first year that we have grown celery in our garden.  It has done quite well.  Over the weekend we harvested four bunches.  Yes, that's a lot of celery, but for me celery is like potato chips - a vehicle for dips of various kinds and, of course, nobody can eat just one.  Peanut butter, hummus, cheese, even the occasional Ranch dip are all fair game as companions for celery.  We cut and stored the stalks so they can be quickly and easily grabbed for snacks or meals.  Did you know that peanut butter and celery is indeed a meal?  When all was said and done, we were left with a huge pile of leafy greens from the tops of the stalks.  Most of the time these have already been removed from the celery when you buy it at the grocery store so you don't have to worry about them.  This big pile of beautiful greens sitting on the counter caused my don't waste food gene to kick in.  The problem is that I had no idea what to do with celery leaves other than make soup or toss them in salads.

Enter Google.

SEARCH: what to do with celery leaves

This search yielded quite a few articles.  Soups and stews, salads, homemade celery salt...the usual and expected suggestions were all mentioned.  The one thing that I had not thought about was celery leaf pesto.  I like pesto.  Celery leaves have a somewhat sharp taste unlike the sweet flavor of the basil used in traditional pesto, but it was worth a try.  I read several recipes, all very similar to one another and to basil pesto except for the celery leaves.  I ultimately chose the recipe I used because it called for the largest amount of celery leaves of the recipes that I found and it did not use parsley.

This is the recipe that I settled on, though I substituted pine nuts for the walnuts.

As is often the case with dips and sauces, the celery leaf pesto will probably be best once it sits for a day and the flavors have a chance to meld.  Though even at this point, it tastes better than it looks.  Lol!  Celery leaf pesto can be used as a dip, sandwich spread, over pasta, or in any way that you would use basil pesto.  Other than a few licks from the spatula as I was cleaning up, I haven't tried this yet "in context."  I'm giving it its time to "age."  I'll give you a full report once I have explored all of the possibilities.

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IN OTHER BLOG NEWS:

Pastries, Pies, and Tarts on Sifted Together

Blueper B and The Turtle Creek Chorale on Blueper B's Blueprints

Feeling Blue in June

In the eleven years or so that I have been blogging, I have written this same post countless times...the one about having gone missing for months and now being back.  They always come with a promise to do better.  And countless times I have failed, but I keep coming back and trying again.  Before writing this tonight, I have given some serious thought to why I keep falling short with regular posts lately.

It is easy to blame a busy schedule and too little time.  I know that's an excuse, not a valid reason.  And not even a good excuse.  I find the time to write my weekly contribution to Sifted Together, the blog I co-author.  I write a monthly devotion that is distributed by our church.  I helped Blueper B write a post on his blog every day during the month of May.  I have faithfully taken a photo a day for four and a half years.  Yes.  Time is at a premium some days, but I manage to accomplish all those tasks to which I have a commitment.  Apparently I have not made a serious commitment to regularly writing and posting here despite knowing deep within that that is something that I want to do.

Admitting to a lack of a commitment, I was still in search of a reason, a reason that I am able to keep so many other commitments but not this one.  Here's what I am exploring.  I think that perhaps social media, Facebook and, too some extent, Instagram, might be the issue.  I post my daily photos to both, usually with a bit of verbiage that places the photo into the context of the day.  My day is usually what I write about here.  Once I have posted my photo, I feel like I have said what I have to say and to write a blog post is redundant even though what I write here is usually a more developed version of my daily musings.  I don't know that this revelation about my relationship with social media is the real reason for my inconsistent blogging.  If it's not, at least I have a point from which to depart on  my quest for the real reason.

For the time being, I will continue to post my photos on Facebook and Instagram, but I am going to refrain from writing any commentary to go along with them and save that for here.  We'll see what happens.

So here is today's photo...

...taken at a local park at the blue hour, that magical time of day right after sunset (or right before sunrise) when the minimal light bathes the subject in a veil of blue thanks to the residual indirect sunlight that is below the horizon.  This image is intentionally unfocused.  Art mirrors life.  At the moment, I am feeling a bit unfocused and like my world has been colored blue.  Beginning again here is a first step to regaining some clarity, particularly with my creative life.

Today, right here in writing, I am making a commitment to post something here every day throughout the month of June.  If I can do it for Blueper B. I can do it for me!

All In A Decade

Today is my 55th birthday.

Exactly ten years ago, on a whim, I decided to start writing a blog.  At that point I had no idea why and was fairly sure that no one really wanted to read what I was writing.  But, I did it.  The title perfectly summed up what I wrote about, all the things that happened in my day.  I was faithful to the process for quite awhile.  And then I became unfaithful.  And then faithful again.  And then unfaithful.  It was like the the plucking of the flower petals...he loves me, he loves me not, faithful to blog posting, not faithful to blog posting...and there I ran out of petals.  Realizing that this was the tenth anniversary of beginning All In A Day and that I have done a terrible job keeping up makes me sad.  So much has happened in my life during these ten years, some of it I have written about and lots of other parts I have not.  Here is the condesnsed version.

• I have lost both of my parents.  My mom died three days after my first post in 2006 and my dad in 2014.
• Both of my girls have graduated from high school and college.  
• I have gotten divorced and remarried.  A new flower with enough petals to end with "He loves me." 
• I've moved about fifty miles away from where I lived for 25 years, from the country to the city.
• I've lost a few friends and made a whole lot more.
• I succumbed to Facebook.
• I've reconnected with friends from high school and college.
• I've lost some weight.  Gained some weight.  Lost some weight.  Gained some weight.  I need another petal on this one too!
• I've traveled to many U.S. cities that I have never before visited.
• I've been to Europe three times - once to Italy and twice to England.
• I've had some stitches, just a few and it was the fig's fault for not being still, not my mediocre knife skills!
• My hair has gone from really short to really long.
• I have discovered my love of photography.
• I broke my leg.  It was a sacrifice I made for my art.  I NEEDED to be in THAT spot.  They shouldn't have put that big drop off there, especially when it was dark when I needed to be there.
• I have gained two dogs and a cat and lost three cats.
• I have read lots of books, but not as many as I would like.
• I have written lots of haiku but not as many as I would like.
• I have knitted lots of things but I still have lots of "unknitted" yarn.
• I have become part of NOAH (National Organization for Albinism and Hypopigmentation) and now have lots of cool pale pals.
• I still don't like mushrooms, olives, peas, or fish.  I've tried.  I really have!   It hasn't worked.
• I have become part of the online community Capture Your 365 and have taken at least one photo every single day for the last four years.
• I have learned to drink coffee, lots of coffee.
• I am writing two other blogs: Pixels, Plates, and LOLs with Tracey, a new friend, and Blueper B's Blueprints with Weber and our furry blue and orange monster, Blueper B.
• I have had lots of thoughts that have not made it to written words.
• I have learned to relax.
• I have learned to love myself.
• I have learned how to be happy, really happy...not just on the outside, but on the inside too.
• I have remembered how much I love to write.

As I reflect on 2016 and look forward to my desires for 2017, reviving my relationship with my blog is at the top of the list.  I miss it.  I want it.  I need it.  It doesn't matter to me one way or the other if other people read it.  If you do and some of my words speak to you, make you think, make you feel, make you act, that's great.  But if not, that's OK too.  I will have written for me.  I will have acknowledged in words what is in my head and on my heart.  THAT is what I want.  THAT is what I need.  THAT is what I miss.

A stray petal...be faithful to blogging...has been found!

This is the best birthday gift!

Beginning on January 1, I will also post my daily photos along with my musings of the day.

And Here It Is June...

So what have I learned lately?

My desire to do is greater than my ability to do.

My intention, once school was out was to write more.  I have done that...just not here, which was not the plan.  I thought that I could keep up here, with my regular Pixels, Plates, and LOLs posts, and writing every day for Blueper B...oh, and a photo a day for him and for me.  Then there was stuff like preparing meals, and laundry, and a little (very little) vacuuming and dusting.

Let's just say that during the month of May, I learned the limits my mental capacity.

Weber and I bought our friend Blueper B when we were in Delaware during my dad's illness.

I guess you could say that he was a silly diversion from all of the sadness and seriousness that was going on. He travels and he tells the story of his adventures in words, sometimes mixed up words, and pictures on his own blog.  I vowed that during the month of May I would help him write a post every day.  I fulfilled that promise, but at the expense of writing here.  Looking back, I am really okay with that.  Weber and I had fun with Blueper B's everyday posts.  If I am to be totally honest, I was a bit sad when I helped him write his last post of his Month of Me yesterday.

If you are interested, here is Blueper B's blog.

He will continue to write regularly, but regularly will not be every day.

Now that I know that I can only write so much, and three regular blogs is too much, my writing attention for June will be back here in my own voice.  I suppose if I were a little more disciplined I could manage all three, but I'm not right now.  Maybe I will get there.

The biggest thing happening in my world this month is that Weber is retiring after twenty-five years of teaching.

As of right now, his plan is to be a house husband.  I am perfectly okay with that as I am not retiring.  It will be a bit of a role reversal for both of us as he has worked for the last forty plus years and although I have worked, I have also been the one primarily responsible for household chores for all of my adult life.  I suspect that I can get used to getting up to my breakfast being made and coming home to my clean laundry.  The furry kids are looking forward to having him home all day too.

It's funny...once people hear that he is retiring, the first thing they ask is if we are going to travel.  We are traveling quite a bit this summer, but that has nothing to do with his retirement; it is just the way things worked out.  We won't be taking any long trips during the school year since I'm still teaching; however, I don't teach on Fridays so we will have the ability to take some long weekend trips.  And, my semester breaks are longer than his were so much of January is time that we will have off together.

It is a new chapter to which we are both looking forward.  He just needs to get through the next two days, through the last last day of school!

It's Been Too Long!

It hurts my heart to admit that I have not written a single post here this year.  I have been writing, just not here.  One of the places where I do write almost daily is in my Morning Pages Journal.  This is a discipline that I have had for many years, one that fuels me creatively, intellectually, and spiritually.  Though this writing is not fit for public consumption, it is was inspires me to write in other places.  Over the last bit, I have found myself scrawling over and over how much I miss blogging regularly.  It is not that I think I have something to say that others want or need to read, it is more a discipline that helps me to document my life, a somewhat selfish act.

The other night I went back and read several of my posts from my early days of blogging.  I was so grateful for those words.  They gave power to such small and seemingly insignificant moments in my life, but moments that I wanted to remember nonetheless.  Moments that now are so much more important than I ever believed that they would be.   I am sad that there are now big chunks of time to which I did not dedicate even a few words.  There is nothing that I can do about that now, but I can try to pick up where I am and begin again.  Start where I am.  I need to write regularly.  I want to write regularly.  I will write regularly.

In the midst of being a bit hard on myself,  I do have to remember that although I have been absent here, I have been active creatively in other places.  I have continued to take a photo a day.  2016 is year four.  Here is a video of the 121 daily photos that I have taken so far this year.  The video creator crops the photos square though many of them were not originally square, so they look a bit strange.

I have also continued to write a food and photography blog, Pixels, Plates, and LOLs, with my friend Tracey Gehring.  This is a super fun venture, but it does take a fair amount of time each week.  Here is the link to some great recipes and food photos.  Currently we are documenting our joint weight loss adventure.

And, Weber and I continue to help our furry friend. Blueper B, with his blog.  Again, we have not been as diligent there as we would like, however, we are making a commitment to keep that space current as well.  If you are interested in the adventures of Blueper B, you can read his blog here, or follow him on Facebook.

As I approach the final two weeks of this semester, I know that I am biting off a big chunk here with a public promise to recommit myself to regular posting.  Even with the impending busy-ness of final exams, it feels good to write just this little bit here.  I am doing what I need to do.

Until tomorrow...

Jumping Back In!

The calendar says that fall will be here in two days, but for my creative self, it is spring that is dawning after a five month dormant season here.   Unlike the plants and animals who know that they need fall and winter to rest and rejuvenate, I was unaware that my spirit was longing for that time.  I have been doing other creative things, including other types of writing, but in the past few weeks, I have been hit hard with the realization that I truly miss this forum, my blog.  Yes, I have missed deeply the writing, but perhaps more importantly, I have felt strongly the absence of the daily thoughts, reflection, and wondering that were the spark for my my daily posts.

Several things have happened that, taken together, have spurred me on to begin again here.  First, people who were faithful readers have asked why I stopped posting and where I had gone.  They were even kind enough to say that the missed my offerings.  I am flattered, though honestly  I never thought anyone would really read what I write here; I started blogging as a personal discipline, as a means of accountability to no one but myself.  If others find a reason to smile, or cry, or experience a little piece of joy, or find a bit of insight in my musings, I consider those are an added bonus.

For many years, I have been a faithful follower of Julia Cameron and her daily discipline of writing morning pages.  It is through this practice, that I rediscovered my need to reinstitute writing regular blog posts.  Since going back to school a few weeks ago, I have also added to this morning routine a poem in haiku form.  I say in haiku form because in the traditional Japanese haiku, this seventeen syllable form contains a kigo,  a seasonal word drawn from a defined list of words.  The poems that I have written usually contain no such word, but do follow the 5-7-5 syllabic structure of the lines as well as the use of a “ exiting word.”

Here are a couple of these poems:

Uninvited thoughts
Coming and going freely.
Through my mind, they dance.   - KEB 9/14/15

Thoughts of things undone
Fester, surface, call to me.
Your attention, please!        - KEB 9/16/15

Imagination.
Tool of possibility
Or disappointment?   - KEB 9/21/15

As I reflected on my own words, I sensed a theme, one that was calling me to pay attention and to take action, a strong yearning to write….here   And so I begin again.  Even after all this time away, this is a comfortable place for me.  Writing this post is kind of like a much anticipated homecoming.

Oh, and today's Capture Your 365 photo prompt is "jumping."  Yes, the prompt was intended in the literal sense, but most often, I am not a literal person, so this post is my idea of jumping today.  Now to figure out how to photograph this.

One of the reasons that I have neglected my blog is because I have been writing in other places, new places.  That is not an excuse; it is simply to say that I have not done a very good job at time management and prioritizing.  I will continue to write in those other places as well as here.  And sometimes, it may be necessary for me to “kill two birds with one stone” and share the same material in two places.  

One of those new writing adventures is another blog that I am writing with a dear photography friend.  As is evidenced by its title, our focus is on friendship, photography and food.  If you are interested, it is here:

www.pixelsplatesandlols.blogspot.com

Also, Weber and I help our blue and orange furry monster, Blueper B, write about his adventures on his blog as well:

www.blueperbblueprints.blogspot.com

Neither of these other forums takes the place of the kind of posts that I have written here in the past and intend to share again, but those other endeavors do take time and energy, commodities which seem severely lacking in my world some days!

If you are still here and reading what I have written, thank you.  I am grateful for your presence on this journey.  As I did previously, I will continue to share my photographs and my daily thoughts.  I don’t promise that they will be worthy of your time and attention, but I do promise that I will do my best to share with honesty, integrity, and a little humor.

Thank you for stopping by!

249/365-2 Off Prompt

"I've Got Friends...and Mail!"

Today's prompt was supposed to be September's self portrait.  Because of our schedule, that wasn't going to happen.  We had a fantastic day at the theater and then going out for dinner to celebrate a friend's birthday.  When we got home, we discovered that Blueper B had received a package from a friend.  

You can read all about Blueper B's exciting day on his blog:

He also has a Facebook page if you'd like to keep up with the adventures of a furry blue and orange monster.