Celebrating A Feast In A Time Of Fasting

This Sunday's lunch: Sourdough pancakes, bacon, and mixed berries with orange juice.

Sunday, February 22, 2015

For most of my life, my birthday has fallen during Lent.  Only once in a great while is my birthday before Lent.  This year is no different.  Here we are in the first full week of Lent, and my birthday will fall exactly one week after Ash Wednesday.  When I was a kid, it wasn't really a big deal, my Presbyterian family wasn't overly concerned with Lent.  (We did sometimes have parties on Sunday afternoons because then my Catholic friends could come.) Since becoming an Episcopalian, I have not really changed how I celebrate my birthday, but I have come to appreciate the small pleasures of celebration a bit more.  Sundays are always feast days, even during Lent.  So, having a nice brunch after church is not a problem.  Birthdays are also an exception, I believe, at least for me.  To have a special meal, a cake perhaps, is a nice way to mark the occasion without being too loud about it.  

Lent is after all more about spiritual discipline than physical discipline.  Denying oneself certain foods or certain activities only has value if it does something to sharpen your spiritual awareness.  Does it make me more conscious of the needs of others? Does it help me to be kinder and more tolerant? Can I brighten someone's life with the time/money I save by abstaining from my favorite things?  

For me, being able to share the joy of the company of friends and family, and acknowledging their importance in my life is the important part of any celebration, especially a celebration of another year of life.  

So, as this Sunday runs down, I am getting ready to finish the last of the laundry, and get ready for sleep.  Then, tomorrow, weather permitting, I will get some of my usual Monday things done.  Don't think I'm going to make it out to the commissary, but I can go Tuesday. Maybe.

Monday, February 23, 2015

  Two days before my birthday, and we have snow.  So, instead of being able to do the grocery shopping or to go to my voice lesson, I spent today being lazy, finishing a little laundry, reading, doing 90 minutes on the elliptical, and I will get voice practice and a grocery list completed before I sleep tonight, so I can possibly go to the base to shop tomorrow.  

Today's mail brought more birthday greetings, and my email a nice photo collage of "some of my favorites" from a fellow Perlgirl.  

The only thing that feels like Lent around here today is the weather.  It is cold and snowy,and while it looks pretty, it makes driving anywhere, or even a walk to the mailbox, a dangerous proposition.  Mostly because of the sleet under the snow.  (Not very good traction  for the unwary or those who hurry too much.)
I am thinking that this year, instead of being so focused on my birthday, perhaps it is a good excuse to give to others.  I shall have to come up with sneaky ways to do little things to brighten the day for someone else.  That would be good as a Lenten practice, and it would feel good to help others, too.  Won't be telling you about it in any detail, because that just spoils it. 

Some housework was also done today, so that for once I feel like I'm keeping up with it.  My "Christmas Cactus" is still blooming.  The while one just finished, and the red one is blooming again.  Three whole blooms, but it's better than last year!

Matt is busy making "cauliflower crack" ,  the roasted cauliflower that all of us were eating as an appetizer as soon as it came out of the oven on Saturday.  Ooh!  That stuff is SO good, and it's fairly low-cal, too.  I'll be back after I enjoy some!

It was delicious!  Matthew spoils me something awful.  Now I'm going to make some real, all-butter, honest to gosh Scottish Shortbread for our dessert.  May even dip it in chocolate.  Because:  Birthday Week!  (But yes, it is still Lent, and I should restrain myself from too many indulgences...)

There is also the matter of a grocery list to be planned and written, and the coupons to be found.  Voice practice needs to happen too, so I can see what all I can do when I haven't had allergy meds for almost a week.
Well, the voice practice didn't happen.  It's too late now, and I have to get to bed.  Got the shortbread made, though.  Here's hoping for clear enough roads to drive on tomorrow.

Tuesday, February 24, 2015

The trip to the commissary was not too bad.  Got all my shopping done, roads were not bad at all, talked to my Mom on the phone and got my short elliptical stint in before I ventured out.  (Made sure roads had time to clear, and people who had to work were already there before I left home.)
Matt and I ate dinner at the Saltgrass Steakhouse, and then stopped at our favorite liquor store, Moore Liquor, for some chocolate stout to make my birthday cake with.  Went to the larger Crest store on 27th and Penn for some other stuff.  So, now, at 8:30 pm, I get to make my own birthday cake.
Oh, and my FitBit One is going bonkers on me.  Showing yesterday's numbers PLUS today's for my daily totals.  Hope it calms down by tonight.  I'm leaving it on its charger for now.

Am about halfway through the Chocolate Stout Cake preparation.  Waiting on the stout/butter/cocoa mixture to cool so it won't pre-cook the eggs and curdle the sour cream when I add it to them. 

Here's the recipe for the Chocolate Stout Cake

It's a King Arthur Flour recipe.  Should be good.  I'll let you know tomorrow after choir practice.  The mixture of the stout and melted butter and dark cocoa smells divine. 

This is the stout and melted butter getting ready for the cocoa

Here's my beginning set up for the cake...

The cake is in the oven now.  I'm going to go hit  the elliptical trainer for a little while and then check on it when the timer goes off.  I'm going to be cruel and leave this post here.  I will post more about the cake tomorrow.

We'll see if I succeed in celebrating a feast while still remembering that it is, in fact, Lent, a season of self-denial and spiritual quest.

Christmas Eve Ruminations

I'm awake!  Got a late start because I finally go to sleep after 2 when the pie finally got cool enough to go into the refrigerator. 
I've gotta make a list of what I need to get done.
Gotta make a list for Matt who is going out to get last minute stuff.
Little patters of squirrel feet on my roof make me smile in the middle of everything.  I'll go out and refill the feeders.  Merry Christmas, Squirrely Whirly, and birdies.

Almost 4 pm.  Chores done, presents wrapped, still some cooking to do.  We'll eat our first feast this evening, then nibble tomorrow, and on Friday, have the Feast of the Festive Leftovers with our good friends.  (There may be a few things made fresh for the "leftovers" feast.  All depends on how things go...)

Joys of the day:  A dog joyfully playing ball with his human as I passed by on my walk.  The neighbor dogs who stop barking and wag their tails as soon as I say hi and tell them how pretty and what good doggies they are.

Dinner eaten and almost all cleaned up. Soup was excellent, beef was good, beans need a little work... but they'll be OK before the Feast of the Festive Leftovers!

A tweet out of the blue yesterday really made my day!  Nice to be remembered, and a very nice thing so close to Christmas.  Still smiling.

Time now to recoup a little before getting ready and heading for church.  This late service makes for a long day for us, but we'd be up late anyway...

The service seemed  longer than usual, and boy, did we sing a LOT of carols!  Only three anthems, but LOTS of carols!  And they let us have lit candles in the loft for the end of "Silent Night".  They're either brave or crazy. 

Sermon was called "The Light Must Change Us".  About how now that the Light of the World has come to us, we should live more like we've seen that light.  Share that light by our deeds, not by preaching and trying to convert people, but by touching people's lives and hearts the way Jesus did.  It was a good sermon. 
And so, to bed.  A long day, since I stayed up so late last night. It is almost as late now.  Christmas Eve is always a bit this way.  Now that I've had some of each kind of pie (both came out well, yay!)  and some hot chocolate, time to wash up and clean my teeth and head for zzzzzzz.

The light of love does change us. It lightens and warms all those upon whom it shines.  May the Light of  Love shine in our hearts and into the lives of those we encounter, may we all be changed for the better, made more loving, by that light. 
Peace to you, and Merry Christmas!!