Baby steps… get it?

One of the weirdest things I have dealt with in my adult life… the mom bod. I say weirdest, not worst because if I’m being honest, I fucking love my body. (Sorry grandma if you’re reading this) but it’s true. I am 110% digging these sweet, colour-changing, shape-shifting marks on my hips and legs. I have an x-shaped one on my one leg, it’s like a nature tattoo. My hips are wider and every time I look at them, I am reminded of the life I created with someone I love. My sleeves may be tight, but my arms are strong from holding, comforting, raising my son so far.

All of this touching body positivity aside, I do need to exercise more. As I proudly told my doctor about my walking routine, he gently informed me that I would be on the right track… if I were 40. Fair. Walking isn’t exactly vigorous activity.

I started to rack my brain. How can I exercise while watching Riley full time and being on a budget? Fitness classes and gym membership are a little pricey and I’m not much of a runner. I figured I’d give yoga a try. Regain some balance, ground my intentions each day, improve my flexability, muscle strength and endurance. Cool, but I’ve never been a fan of yoga.

Well, guess what! I don’t know what I’m doing now that I wasn’t doing then, but I am really enjoying myself. It makes me feel energized and relaxed and strong!! I do wish that I could be a fly on the wall and see myself attempting some of these poses. I am not in my best shape.

Like I said, baby steps!

Blogs are hard

I’ve always wished that I was somebody who could just talk. Talk and have people listen. Talk and not trip over my words, stuttering over questions. Talk and be interesting. The same thing is with writing. I have always loved literature from Edgar Allen Poe to J.K. Rowlings to the Pelee Island Grapevine (The local newspaper of the island we frequent), but never had much of a knack for writing.

It would be so convenient to be able to put my pen to the paper and have a story flow out of me or take my cell phone out, open up Word Press and have a spectacularly amazing blog. That’s not really how life works for 99% of the population. If you aren’t a literary prodigy, odds are you may be proof reading and scrapping many silly excerpts and articles.

That’s why I say blogging is hard. I don’t have time to brainstorm, draft, edit, tweak, preview and post so I consider my blog to be more in the category of word vomit.

Why am i telling you this out of the blue? Because I love to write, but for the life of me can’t figure out what I’d like to write about. The best part of this blog post is that as soon as I got it out and typed, my brain FLOODED with ideas. I could have just deleted this all and wrote about a focused topic, but I want to share my random thoughts and how I process life.

You know? Happy Sunday!

Daily Riley!

Guess who?! Not Riley… Riley’s daddy! Not a spitting image at ALL!

It’s like we 3D printed 5 month old daddy and stuck my eyes on.

Brittany breakdown

I’ve always been someone who loved my hair until one day, I didn’t. It started when I was pregnant and hair was just falling out like crazy…until I started to take prenatal vitamins. Then none of my hair would fall out and I was left with a thick, heavy mane.

I got so sick of breaking hair ties, my ponytail giving me a headache and to top it all off, a newborn with a thing for grabbing hair. So I was fed up and chopped it to my shoulders. Contrary to my expectations, my hair was STILL thick and heavy and Riley still tried to forcefully remove it at every opportunity. Now, I couldn’t put it in a fun bun! Why? Because I just ended up with a mullet bun and 5 months later, it’s still not grown back out.

Constant. Hair. On. My. Neck. I am on the verge of a breakdown, Brittany Spears style. My hair is falling out, my baby hairs are out of control, and Riley actually seeks and destroys my hair. If there is hair nearby, his clammy little drool fists will find it.

The only thing keeping this wretched mass of frustration fuel on my head is the fact that summer is almost over and I do NOT bud well with cold ears.

If someone (anyone?) Out there has any tricks for someone who hates hair but would look ghastly without it, I am all ears. (Warm ears for now)

Daily Riley!

I have a feeling that this little trooper will cut a tooth soon. It feels like he’s 6 weeks old again, waking up every hour all night. I bought him an amber teething necklace to see if it would help, but his dad isn’t comfortable with having it on at bedtime. I agree, but they are made with a clasp that will unfasten if pulled on at all…

Anywho, look at that face!!

Daily Riley!

We are BACK and we come back with a tale of true love. A boy and his… feet? Yes, that’s right, love at first sight IS real!

Since the last Daily Riley, he has learned to:

• Roll onto his tummy
• Get stuck on his tummy
• Yell
• Giggle
• Hold toys and bring them to his mouth
• Wriggle in a circle on his tummy
• Push up onto his hands
• Sit up with help
• Jump in his Jolly Jumper

Oh yea, and bite his toes.

Oh, happy day

I’m afraid I don’t have much to say today. Mr. Man here is teething again. Mama hasn’t had more than 3-4 hours of choppy sleep for a week, but by the looks of this snuggler, I might just get a nap.

Happy Tuesday, from a grateful, sleepy me!

Back to scobin’ around

Since I never updated on how my Kombucha brewing turned out, I decided to start another batch! Especially now that I know what I’m doin a little bit better…

The very first thing I do when starting a new batch is STERILIZE MY JARS. This is SO important when you are working with fermenting as there is very much bacteria present.

To sterilize my jars, I leave them to soak in hot soapy water for a bit (food grade) and then give them a good scrub. I then rinse with hot water and wipe down the inside and outside with vinegar. You can never be TOO vlean, but keep in mind your kombucba will be injested so I’d avoid chemicals.

Make sure your work area is sterile as well.

Next, you want to start boiling some water to brew your tea. I don’t measure exactly, however, 1 gallon of water, 10 teabags, 4 tbsp of sugar is a common recipe. The idea is to brww strong, sweet tea. Some people use green tea, some use black so let’s try a blend this time. I basically just filled up a big pot with water, tossed in 5 orange pekoe bags and 5 green teabags and turned on the burner and walked away. I add the sugar after the burer cools down.

Once it is boiling, wait a few minutes, stirring occasionally and then turn it off and leave it (bags in).

Here is my pot of tea. It smells ah-mazing by the way!

When your sweet tea is cooled (ALL the way) you will want to add your scoby and fill your jar with tea. I leave an inch or 2 on top because a new scoby develops with each brew.

*see my blog post about obtaining a scoby*

Those are my scobys. I have 4, but with the size of my jars, I could use 1 for all three if I cut it. I just use the whole thing!

Lastly, cover your jar TIGHTLY with a tightly woven breathable fabric such as a thin dish towel. I use a dollar store fashion scarf and rubber bands, but it’s your call. If you do not wrap it tightly enough or use a loosely woven fabric, you WILL get fruit flies.

My tea is cooling currently so I don’t have a finished photo, but I will update when he next step comes about. Happy Tuesday y’all!

Daily Riley!

I think it’s time for early teething! Did you know that babies can start teething 1-3 months before they actually cut teeth? I didn’t. Mr. Man is a constant flow of drool lately. His current favourite activities are biting his fists, biting my knuckles, and giving me the teensiest little hickies on my arms as he impatiently awaits his bottle. Poor little guy had a pretty restless night last night and then awake for 6 hours after getting up!

Thankfully, as long as I keep the ants marching and the bononos oted, he is happy!

I have to post a second one of course! I was so inactive because I had a birthday and went to visit some family for the weekend.

Saturday was the first time going out since Riley was born and he got to hang out with nana and papa for the night. I may have had my phone in hand all night, but I somehow resisted calling to check in every hour.

I missed my little sweetie so much, I feel like I’ve hardly put him down since coming home.

Am I the scoby master?

In a previous post I talked about a scoby, what it is, how to obtain one, and why I wanted one. Somewhere in there, I mentioned that I had done it all wrong, but was going to see what happened anyways.

Something happened!!! With immense self control and not going to look at my jars 5 times a day, I finally got through 2 weeks of ignoring it.(as best as I could) And guess what?! There are young scobys in both jars! Even the jar that I thought wouldn’t grow one!(I used ginger Kombucha in it)

The photos unfortunately aren’t the best because my hand isn’t big enough to grip the jars so the photos had to be taken quickly.

My boyfriend is hilariously grossed out by this by the way. It’s great, he won’t even look at them, but he did say that he would test out my brew when it’s all done! I kind of get it. The scoby is not at all appetizing and when I get a tiny floaty piece in my drink, I definitely freak out.

Believe it or not, you can totally eat the scoby. If you wanted to, you could take a bite right out of it. I have read that it has the consistency of squid legs so no thank you. I don’t like that texture deep fried and dipped in whatever you dip squid in and I am not going to like it as a bacteria yeast blob.

So why the heck would anyone want to try to eat their scoby?

Well for one, they multiply everytime you make a batch so you really have nothing to lose if you messed it up when cooking. Mainly, it would be eaten for its health properties. The scoby is made up mainly of cellulose and bacterial yeast and before I lose you with technical terms, I’ll make it short and simple!

The bacteria and yeast of a scoby is what gives the finished kombucha its probiotic properties which will regulate your digestion and bathroom visits.

The cellulose of a scoby is actually an interesting one because it makes up the blob structure of the scoby. It’s an insoluble fibre and if I took anything away from highschool cooking class, I know that that is not the fibre that gives you energy, but is actually a carb… but it’s a good carb. (Yes that is a thing all of you silly dieters!) It cleans out the bowels and the gut and is claimed that enough of this type of fibre will help avoid IBS, heart disease and cancer.

So am I a scoby master? No, I’m still learning. I’m more of a scoby apprentice.