Life in Denim and Flip Flops

View this post on Instagram I was craving sweets so I made homemade nutter butters from @hedygoldsmith’s Baking Out Loud cookbook. Only tweak was using Calico Bean Market’s butterscotch peanut butter. Absolutely fantastic. #baking #notjustbread A post shared by Becky (@msbeckiejean) on Mar 30, 2020 at 5:43pm PDT When my hands are idle, my mind is busy. But when my hands are busy, I can find a way to quiet my mind. Baking and cooking are one of the ways I do that. Now it's one of my signature hobbies and skills, but it wasn't always that way. I know for some people that's seems very weird, but in fact, about ten years ago I blogged about the very short list of recipes in my repertoire. Since then my cookbook collection has more than quadrupled, I eat at home or cook for myself like 6 days a week (even before social distancing), I handmake pasta, I've made my own ice cream, fried donuts from scratch, made my ...

I've never been good with change. I think that's putting it lightly. As anyone who has met me can tell you, I'm a type A control freak with a major worrying streak. I don't like when I can't predict what will happen. I don't like not knowing or having the ability to fix something. So as you might imagine, I'm kind of struggling with all this. I'm grateful now more than ever that I sought out professional help to deal with my generalized anxiety. Eight months ago I got on meds and found a therapist. But even with those tools, it's taken every trick I've learned over the past 20+ years of dealing with anxiety before I even knew to call it that to deal with the world and reality right now. I'm trying to take whatever this is right now one day at a time. I'm not even sure where to start one of the count of days of this. I'm not in quarantine; I'm not entirely working from home; My state isn't sheltering in place. We went fully...

It had been so warm this week. Had, is apparently the key word in that sentence. Today was not so warm, and the wind picked up. My time on the riverwalk this morning was slightly less pleasant than I was hoping for. Windchill was just 32 degrees. Sadly I didn't think to check this out until after  my walk. Oops. Thankfully temps will be a bit warmer tomorrow when I have strawberry shortcake to make. :)

I have spent a large chunk of my evening troubleshooting audio issues for recording and streaming video games over Skype. It has been interesting. And frustrating. But it made me think about the first world problems of it all. I've been in communication with my friend in so many different ways tonight. Texting, tweeting, text via Skype, video chat, audio via Skype, and even screen sharing. At one point I was even using basic sign language over video when he couldn't hear me, while in the opposite situation I was reading his typing while he shared his screen with me before I saw it show up on my end of the chat program. I remember as a kid trying to build or fix things without directions with my dad. We started that way tonight. Then to understanding the basic strategies. And then progressed to text tutorials.  And now we're just trying to recreate exactly what someone has done on YouTube. We haven't found a solution. Despite me on my phone and my laptop simitaneously,...

What is it about April that drives me to start new projects? Or resurrect old ones. I honestly think it has a lot to do with the weather. Anything seems possible when you finally feel like you can be outside for more than a few minutes without a coat or 3 scarves. Maybe that's just me. I'm not an outdoorsy person by any means, but I love  being  outdoors. I can spend hours at a park reading or writing or playing on the swings. (Sidenote: I love swing sets. Like  love  them.) In the winter I go stir crazy being indoors all the time. I want to go on walks or sit at the park and read a book outside. Or write. I don't know that I've ever really considered myself a writer, per se, but I've done a lot of writing in my day. And oddly enough, a good chunk of that writing has taken place outside. This has definitely been aided by the fact I love to write long hand. Don't get me started on all the 8,000 journals and notebooks half (or barely filled) with random musings, o...

Today at church the opening hymn was You Are Mine one of my favorites. I haven't been to church in a while so getting to sing that today was a bit like coming home. I spent a lot of time growing up singing in church choirs or cantoring for service. Certain songs, composers, or arrangements bring me right back to my home church or my choir in Madison. It was just what I needed this morning. If you don't know the song I've posted it (and another of my favorites) below. You Are Mine Deep Within