Awesome New Year!

Happy New Year - It's gonna be awesome!

While in the Smokey Mountains, I found it just awesome to be walking alone and hearing only the sound of the rushing water below. Such a special treat for my ears.

Hello my friends,

I am hoping that as I close out my year, that you are closing out your year out in a very peaceful and happy way. I am still very much on crutches, and still very much not walking.

However, that has left me time to indulge in one of my greatest addictions that I am going to pass along to you. But before I get to that, I want to share with you my word for the new year.

Every year I like to focus on a word or theme, if you will. And for 2013, my word is "wisdom," as I can never have enough, and many times, I think, I just lack it all together. Proverbs is filled with scripture on wisdom and it isn't hard to find guidance from the best teacher in that area. Matthew 7:7-8 says: "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. ⁸ For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened."

And that leads to me to my addiction, which has led me to much wisdom that I would like to pass on to you...

There is a website that I go to almost daily, usually every morning and once at night, called TED Ideas Worth Spreading. 

Click HERE to go to website

On TED's "about page" here is partially what it says:

TED is a nonprofit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. It started out (in 1984) as a conference bringing together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment, Design. Since then its scope has become ever broader. Along with two annual conferences -- the TED Conference in Long Beach and Palm Springs each spring, and the TEDGlobal conference in Edinburgh UK each summer -- TED includes the award-winning TED Talks video site, the Open Translation Project and TED Conversations, the inspiring TED Fellows and TEDx programs, and the annual TED Prize.

In short, in my uneducated lingo, it's a lot of very neat stuff said by tons of very neat people, in very small formats, that after watching even just one talk, you walk away feeing a bit wiser.

When you click on the site, (which can be read by IPhone too!) this is how I navigate every single time, but of course, you do what you want. I ALWAYS just click on the top of the page, the left, that says "Talks" and a whole new world opens up to you. Then when the next page opens I always go to the left of the page and I always check "all events" and "all lengths" and then below, my favorite category is "inspiring" and "courageous," however, all the categories are spectacular. Not a single talk is over 18 minutes, and some as short as 3 minutes!

I wanted to give you a treat for the New Year. I have so many, many favorite TED talks, it was so very hard to choose for you. But below is something I think you will enjoy very much. Click on the first talk below and then read what I say about it after it:

Click HERE for the first talk

I came across this talk recently and thought it was something so cool to think about for 2013. I mean, seriously, we have all been there. And when a better time to think of something new, then  the beginning of a new year? So, if you are having a bit of trouble deciding on what new thing you want to do for 30 days, may I suggest this next talk as something new to try? Please watch - it is AWESOME!

Click HERE for the second talk

I found this talk so moving on so many levels, especially now, as I have been pretty much on my back for eight weeks, lots of pain and have lost almost 15 pounds due to meds, no appetite, and very upset stomach - hard to keep food down in the beginning. But then, after watching this talk, I decided to turn it around and think....hey! That's awesome! Fifteen friggin pounds gone! I mean, while I have absolutely no muscle tone whatsoever, and it isn't a "food plan" I would want to go on again, but it is 15 pounds off this fat butt of mine...awesome! :-) Well, I may be stretching the "awesome" part a bit, but you get my drift. 

The point is, there really is something in our daily lives, no matter how wrong our day (or life) may be going at the moment, that we can truly seek to find that awesome moment. Right after I watched this talk, I emailed my good friend, Debbie Dusenberry (of Curious Sofa - check our her fab site) who emailed me the image below. My reply to her was: You're awesome! She had no idea I just watched this video, but at the time, she was offering me some support for an issue I was having and I thought how awesome to have a friend like her in my life.

But back to having an Awesome New Year! I did start to think about some of the really small stuff that really is sorta awesome when you stop and think about it for a moment...here are just a few of my personal daily "awesomes" lately. I didn't realize that in my head, I was really kinda nodding my head up and down and saying "awesome" to myself when:

*Finally being able to sleep on my side for at least 5 minutes

*Taking off an old bandage and not taking any scab off with it so I can put on a fresh bandage (really is a cool thing)

*Taking a hot bath (or any bath really)

*Getting poked only once in the arm for a blood sample (rarely happens)

*Put on my own sock for the first time

*Discovering there IS an Andy Griffith show I haven't seen before (that was truly awesome)

*On a very windy day, and so sick of TV, I just listened to the wind storm all day, wondering what the heck was blowing around in our yard, but not worried - it was awesome to listen to the wind all day long and snooze off and on

So there you have some of my awesome moments lately. Nothing too exciting over here, but if I can find some awesome moments in my currently small world, I have no doubt, that for the next 30 days, in your world too, you can make the choice to find at least one awesome thing a day. 

I hadn't found my awesome moment today yet, as it hasn't been a good day for me - that is until just a moment ago. There is some noise outside, some beating of loud bass, in the far distance that is jusssttt barely enough of a strong beat to drive me nuts and I can't concentrate at all - or sleep. So just now,  my barber husband brings me one of the best gifts he ever gave me some time ago: Bose noise blocking earphones! They are perfect for airplanes, or in the case, some bass playing outside. And as I put them on and clicked the "noise blocking" button, and pure silence, I breathed an "awesome" sigh of relief! 

Now, if you have just FOUR minutes to spare, I PROMISE you, that this TED Talk will not disappoint, and it will be a talk that you will remember, pass on, and use as lesson even to your little ones...I have watched this one over and over again...please watch it...I just had to share it...

Click HERE to see fabulous talk

Now is this a guy you would want as a friend or what? He has it all...a giving heart, humble, brave, and willing to pass his wisdom on to those of us who wish to be more like him - and the best part of it is? He has no idea that we want to be like him...he thinks he is "just sharing" what he learned.

And I think that is where we find wisdom most of the time. We have to seek it, and as our heavenly Father promises, we will find it. And once we gain some wisdom, we have a responsibility to share what we learn. And the only wise thing I can really share with you at the end of this year is that there are so many wise and experienced people out there from which we may learn. And how awesome is it that TED Talks makes it only a click of a button to have access to all that wisdom and insight?

May 2013 be awesome for you and may you find wisdom from wherever you seek to find it.

From my house to your house,

Elizabeth

Love is the Reason for the Season

M e r r y C h r i s t m a s !

"Come, follow me," Jesus said, "and I will make you fishers of men." Mark 1:17

I couldn't let this day go by without my visiting with for a moment. I've missed you. And like you, I have been deeply touched by all the tragedies surrounding us lately.

I believe most of us wish to celebrate today as we struggle with the continued tragedies that just seem to plague our small world lately. Unfortunately, tragic events are nothing new to our beautiful globe. We don't get to escape them. We aren't given a free pass.

But we are given free will.

Even those who don't believe are given the gift of free will. 

Today, we celebrate the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ. God's only son. And through Him, those who mourn these recent tragic events, "He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away." Revelation 21:4. (NIV)

I don't pretend to understand the injustice of it all. But I do understand this is a fallen and very broken world. And for that reason, I am all the more grateful to lean on Christ, and trust in faith, that He has all the true and correct answers and it is okay if I don't understand.

Free will is a gift God gives because without it, one can't truly love. No one has the power to force another to truly love. Love is only love when given freely. God loves us so much, He wants us to experience real love, receive His real love, and for you to be able to give real love. God waits patiently, wanting so much to receive your love - hence your free will. He has an open door policy. He will never force His way into your heart, nor will He force you into His, but welcomes you always, and waits.  And we all know that love overcomes evil every single time. Each and every time there is a horrible event... love, compassion, tenderness and help immediately shows up, and evil retreats. 

Every single time. 

"And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love." 1 Corinthians 13:13 (NIV).

To me, Christmas is the day of love. Out of love, God sent His son to show us how to love among many other things. Out of love for us, Jesus died. And out of love, God continues to let us have our free will, even though there is a very small number of us humans (relatively speaking) who choose to use their free will for evil. But look how many of us use our free will to love, encourage, inspire, help, teach, comfort, assist, feed, cloth, care for,....the list is endless. 

I want to thank you for all the lovely messages, visits, and emails you have sent me since my surgery and ER visits - I felt a lot of love from you. And I believe it is your love that will help me heal over these next few months.

And it will be love that will help all those in mourning to heal as well.

Never underestimate the power of love. Where there is love, there is Jesus. 

Love is extremely powerful because it is the one thing that only grows larger and stronger the more you give it away to others.

Merry Christmas, and know that you are very loved.

Love
Elizabeth

I'm Benched

Too much going on and I'm down for the count.

It's been one of those months....

This is not the post I planned on writing at all...and I'm probably not going to sound like my usual self, as I am still all medicated up, and I am sure I will just be blunt, and to the point, and I must beat the blurs, as I will explain in a moment.

I will say that November began abruptly with me in the ER with a very painful kidney stone. And just a week later I had knee surgery (scheduled). All was well with the knee for two days, then back into the ER I went with a very painful blood clot and I was admitted into the hospital for a couple of days to adjust for blood thinners and shots I had to administer myself. Once out of the hospital, I was back in the ER again, this time for stroke symptoms. The whole bit...my left side feeling heavy, shortness of breath, dizzy, weakness, and never mind I have a blood clot in me...but it turned out (thank God) to be an anxiety attack.

So back home I go, feeling very grateful. Nothing changes you so quickly, as it does while you lie on the table getting a CT scan, and feeling very weak, and wondering if your life is about to change drastically, and why did is this happening? It is very scary having three ER techs running all around you sticking things on you, reading lab slips, taking blood, doing EKG, and mumbling a lot of stuff and all I know is that I can't hold my cell phone in my left hand without it shaking. I ended up feeling stupid  when I found out it was "only an anxiety attack." But then I realized, "stupid"? why in the world would I want it to be anything but that? The doctor reassured me that with me having a kidney stone, then knee surgery, then a blood clot, and so on, that anxiety attack wasn't surprising. 

Then the two days later I am back in the ER again, yes again, for the most painful event in my life. I was standing near my sofa, and I barely bent over, and many blood vessels, underneath my kneecap burst open and since I was now on blood thinners due to the blood clot, it was one very, very painful mess in the ER for about six hours before I got any medical relief. I would gladly take 20 kidney stones at one time, before I ever go through that again. 

I need a drink...

So I was admitted into the hospital again, this time for six friggin days, and knocked out with meds for three days to control the horrific pain. I finally got home the week of Thanksgiving, and I am currently bedridden. My living room looks like a hospital ward with my wheelchair, potty, crutches, brace, walker, blood thinner shots, tons of meds, bandages...actually, more like a MASH unit. 

I am currently exhausted, and recovering and will begin PT this coming week. I can walk on crutches, and can do it well, but I am supposed to keep my leg up until I get my PT going. It is very surprising to me how tired I get though. This is frustrating as I am a mover, doer, going, and this is a horrible time of the year to not be able to cook, decorate, or shop. I am ready to blast through PT...we'll see :)

I'm going to have to cut this short, as the meds have a side affect of having me see "the blurs" and then double after only a short time of reading or writing, but I am told this will wear off soon. (I hope so...I love to read...but seeing things twice, isn't much fun actually.)

It's funny how life will throw you a real curve ball at times, you know? Just sorta sucks when you aren't wearing a mitt to catch it because boy does it stings when it gets you. This time last year, my posts were so very different. 

But that's okay.

I think the time to really start worrying is when life quits throwing those curve balls at you. Because when that happens, that means you aren't in the game anymore. And being in the game is what life is all about. 

I am just benched for now. Just for now.  :-)

From my house to your house,

Inside and Out of a Little Fried Pie

Hello!

Hoping you all are doing well. Been super swamped, as I am sure you have too. Last post, I showed you a few sneak peeks of the fried pies I made for an upcoming book, Pieography, by Jo Packham, that I am honored to be a part of (just found out to be due out early March 2013, so I will talk about it again). You can read about the book in my last post.

I promised that I would show how I made these little bites of delights and how, last year for Christmas, I wrapped them and set them on  my table for my dinner guests. But these little fried pies are great year round and so easy to make....but I won't be giving out the exact recipe....that you will find in the book!

Well let's get started with the behind the scenes photos...the messy stuff...where the real work is and you can see for yourself just how easy they really are to make....

I used about a 6' little soup bowl...

I use a little frosting tip as a key to my fillings....

Keeping your fork in ice helps the fork to do its job better!

 

Another frosting tip design....another type of filling inside!

Running out of room....piemania...taking over...

 This is just one of my favorite fillings...this one and the coconut one. You can find these with the better jams in the grocery store. They are delicious!

A little key to the designs on the pies...to put in the box.

Little sleeves please!

The little box can be found at The Container store...

 Now, do you think I would show you all of this just before the holidays and then tell you....too bad...the book isn't out until March and no recipe? Well, to be fair to the publisher, I can't give out the recipe...but I CAN suggest that you just use ready-made pie crust and it is still very delicious! (But the book is filled with great recipes!) The little sweet curds are so very tasty and besides...it is the fact that you made them by hand and with love is what counts. 

Just be sure to make a lot. They go quickly and most likely, many will never make it out the door!

I hope you enjoy your fall and holiday preparation in a slow and happy manner and not rushed this year. Take time to enjoy it and know that every year brings new things to be experienced and once the year is gone...we can't go back and do it again.

Do you ever get a dessert that is "too pretty to eat" and you are afraid to stab a fork at this work of art? And when you finally take a stab and then a bite, it isn't nearly as great as it looks? Not the case with the little fried pie. They don't look perfect, but they almost invite you to take a bite. That is what I like about them. They are better on the inside than on the out, which means they never let you down...like a true friend.

from my house to your house,
Elizabeth

If My Life was a Pie...

Hello!

I hope you are all well, happy, and getting ready for the fall! First, I want to thank my precious guest blogger, my little Lulu, the faux Brit pug, who wrote my last post, as I have been here, there, and everywhere and still have to download photos! Thank you Lulu for doing a wonderful job. Lulu asks me to tell you she loved all your comments, but she didn't know how to reply, but she loved them!  :-)

I have lots to share, but it may be a bit before I can get to my adventure photos as I am on a deadline for a fun project, so in the meantime, I wanted to share with you a wonderful project that is about to come out very soon!

A new book is about to come out that Jo Packham, editor-in-chief of Where Women Cook, called Pieography. Where Pie Meets Biography. 

Pieography

This book can be pre-ordered now on Amazon, just click on the title above for the link. This is a fabulous book that I am honored to be a small part of. Jo asked many creative women (not sure how many, over 30) what kind of pie captures the essence of their life? We were to write a short essay on what kind of pie would capture us best, and then give out our recipe and in some cases, we could photograph our pie. And yes, I photographed my pie.  Jo Packham is a creative author, publisher, editor, artist, writer and much more and you may also know her as the originator of Where Women Create.

I can't tell you what an honor it was to be asked to participate in such a beautiful book. I have no idea of who else in it and I have only seen a couple of photos, but by the cover and the little I have seen, I am very humbled. 

I am going to share with you what kind of pie I felt best captured the essence of my life, but not my recipe! Not for a while....yes, of course...I want you to support Jo's efforts and these women in the book, so hopefully by sharing some photos that weren't used in the book, that will inspire you to pre-order, or at least think about giving it as a gift to that special baker in your life. Honestly, I am not just saying this, but this would be a book that I would love to get as a gift...and think about it...you could bookmark the recipe that you "would just love to try" and the baker in your life would just have to make it for you! 

It would be the gift that keeps on giving....hahaha.

The assignment isn't as easy as it sounds...we got only 300 words, if I remember correctly. What kind of pie? What kind of pie, I wondered. A fruit pie? I am a little fruity? A pecan pie? That is pretty Texan, if you ask me. Or how about at cream pie? I don't think so...I'm not that diplomatic lately...hmmmm. 

After much thought, I realized my life couldn't be expressed in just one pie....nope. I have had way too many adventures, walked (ran actually) on way too many paths, and plan to do so many more things, that my life just couldn't be contained in one big ole pie dish. In fact, I realized, my life couldn't be contained at all...phooey on the baking dish....

So, I decided, that Little Fried Pies...those best captured the essence of my life. They are from the South, as I am. You get a whole pie to yourself, as I throw my whole self into work, fun, friendships and adventures. They are handy...no plate, or fork needed...perfect for on the go, just like my adventures...on the go, go, go. And mostly? The fillings are all different...you just never know what you are going to get...sorta like an adventure with every pie...

Well, after the book comes out, I will share with you my essay. And those of you who know me, or have been reading for me years, you can decide from what you know about me, if Little Fried Pies seem to capture what you know about me or not.

But what about you? What kind of pie do you think would capture the essence of your life? It is kind of fun to think about. What kind of pie would capture a moment, circumstance or situation your experienced in your life? 

I grew up with these little fried pies. My father favored the pecan pies and my mother loved the coconut cream filled. We always had a freezer full of the day-old 10 cent Mrs. Baird's fried pies. Actually, I love frozen fried pies. I love to eat a lot of stuff frozen, actually. I know, weird. But my gal pal, Gretchen, is my frozen buddy...she loves to eat frozen food too!

Something fun to do? Get with a gal pal and decide on what kind of pie you think you would be and why and decide what kind of pie you think your buddy would be and why and then guess what each other's type of pie you chose for yourselves and for each other and why. It is fun!

In the book I give a fab recipe on how to make the dough and give all sorts of ideas for the fillings.

On my next post, I will show you how I boxed them up last Christmas as gifts and show you how I made them as well! Just in time for you to make them maybe this year for your holidays, if you like giving aways treats as gifts.

By then, I should be off my deadline for my current project and have my photos downloaded to share with you my wonderful adventures. Hopefully this post will inspire you to start thinking about some homemade ways to give gifts this year, as money always seems tight, but for some reason, giving homemade goodies is always appreciated. 

I adore homemade gifts, and while you, my readers, are the Queens (and Kings!) of crafting, cooking, and creating...think of all those shoppers in the malls next month or so, rushing around, buying whatever their credit limit will allow...fighting the weather, the crowds, and noise. 

And if you choose to make goodies, you can be warm in your own kitchen, listening to your own music, around your own family, saving money, and creating memories without racking up the credit cards. Just something to consider.

Until then, enjoy the fall weather and know that no matter the gift and no matter its cost; it's the created memories that never wear out.

From my house to your house,

Elizabeth