Coconut macaroons, Book sale treasures, and Core exercises

Fall is creeping ever so slowly into North Georgia. The days are going by in a blur- cross-country meets and fall festivals abound- and I'm not being particularly adventurous in the kitchen. 

For a teacher potluck, I signed up to bring in a gluten free dessert. I had a bag of unsweetened coconut flakes in the pantry so I thought I would make coconut macaroons, based on this recipe. I've made cardamom and saffron macaroons before; they are a lovely, chewy dessert for anyone who loves coconut.

This time I mixed together 4 cups coconut flakes and 1 can sweetened condensed milk in a large bowl, then added some salt and vanilla for flavor. I whipped 2 large egg whites to stiff peaks and folded them in. Then I used a 1/8 cup measure to dollop the sticky mixture onto 2 parchment-lined sheets and baked them at 325F for about 20 minutes. I got 22 golden macaroons and dipped the bottoms in melted dark chocolate. My "artful" chocolate drizzle was a bit of a flop but the macaroons are tasty.

This was the first fall-like dinner of 2024. Lemon pasta from TJ's (an impulse purchase) sautéed with spinach and sage and tossed with roasted butternut squash. 

One Sunday evening I was fresh out of ideas for dinner and made some French toast for the kids. We had plenty of leftovers for school morning breakfasts. 

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Media round-up

• TV: I started watching a random Netflix recommendation that I had never heard of, a sitcom called Still Game. It turned out to be a cult Scottish comedy series and I am enjoying it. The show centers around the lives and misadventures of a group of pensioners, complete with thick accents and salty language. What I love best is the depiction of male friendship, although my favorite character is the nosy and lovable neighbor lady Isa Drennan.  
• Family TV: We started watching the latest installment of the Great British Baking Show. The first episode amazed me. The contestants are taking it to the next level- making an overly fussy bake during the technical round without a recipe (!!) and making hyper-realistic cakes for their show-stoppers. Although I must say I cannot stand all the fondant that goes into realistic cakes.
• Books: Short stories used to be my favorite thing to read, as I wrote in this post some years ago. I recently read a really great collection of short stories, Pastoralia by George Saunders. The first three stories are fantastic, each conjuring up a weird and dystopian but uncomfortably believable America. The story titled Sea Oak in particular, about a male stripper and his dysfunctional family, about the struggle to get out of poverty, is the most absurd yet amazing, darkly funny story I've read in a long time. 
• Music: I listen almost exclusively to music from the 90s (when I listen to music at all) but thanks to readio I discovered some more recent pop music to add to my playlist, from a band called almost monday- three songs I like are cool enough, live forever, broken people. I'm entering a new century, y'all.
• Highlight: I spent a blissful hour rummaging through endless tables of donated books at the biannual library book sale where you get to fill a bag for 10 bucks. Here's a picture of my haul. The meditation book, Wherever You Go, There You Are by Jon Kabat-Zinn made it to my bedside table immediately and I'm enjoying reading a couple of passages before bed. The book without a title (gold rectangle on the cover) is The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco. The Color Harmonies is for my dad who loves sketching and painting. The Calvin and Hobbes is for my son. When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead is for my daughter, a middle-grade novel that I've read and loved before. I was very pleased with the number of science books I found this time.

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In my last post, I talked about the seven major muscle groups and mentioned sample exercises for six of the groups. In today's moment of fitness, we focus on the last group, the core. When people think of the core, they tend to think of the "abs" or abdominal muscles, the coveted "six pack" defined muscles for some fitness enthusiasts of the beach body variety. In reality, vanity is the least of the concerns when it comes to the core. This muscle group is literally the primary stabilizer of our body and involved in all movement on and off the beach. 

Consisting of much more than the abs alone, the core is a substantial cylinder of muscle tissue that wraps around our trunk. 

• The base of the cylinder consists of the pelvic floor muscles
• The top of the cylinder consists of the diaphragm, a key muscle involved in breathing
• The sides of the cylinder are the internal and external abdominal obliques, involved in twisting and turning motions 
• The superficial muscles of the core are the "six pack" abs ones- the rectus abdominis in front of the abdomen
• The deep core muscle is the transverse abdominis which wraps around the trunk
• The erector spinae are deep muscles connected to the spine, involved in stability

A weak core leads to many issues, including poor posture, a tendency to lose balance, and the big one, back pain. I have had first-hand experience with back pain, an episode that is seared into my memory because it happened at a particularly inopportune time, when my son was a toddler and my spouse was out of town for a week-long work trip. I remember being in spasms of pain whenever I bent down, and bending down was essential and frequent while caring for a toddler single-handedly. It was a helpless feeling and a wake up call. Back pain is debilitating and can severely impact daily life- everything from the must-dos to the fun times. 

The good news is that core exercises are easy to learn and can be done anywhere, with no equipment needed. You can do them right on the floor, on an exercise mat, or a rug/carpet. A 10-15 minute core exercise routine done 2-3 times a week is a great start towards building a strong core with many protective benefits. 

Here are some of my favorite core exercises. Search for exercise names on the internet to find images and videos. Try some out and tell me your favorites in the comments.

• Dynamic core exercises (dynamic= you move during the exercise)
• Cat cow stretch
• Bird dog
• Dead bug
• Leg raises
• Russian twist
• Mountain climbers

• Static core exercises (static= you hold the pose for some amount of time, say, 30-45 seconds)
• Plank
• Side plank
• Bear hold
• Boat pose