Cookies and a Veggie Bowl, Community, Scheduling

Last week, I was looking for a small birthday gift for a family friend, and thought of making a batch of cookies- they are consumable (this person is downsizing and doesn't need a single thing), and a good gift for someone with a hefty sweet tooth. I wanted cookies with a snail theme (snails because of an inside joke) and thought of making pinwheel cookies which resemble a snail shell. 

My son and I made them together on the MLK holiday using this recipe. Our chocolate dough was very light (I need a darker cocoa, perhaps) but the recipe was a success. The cookies looked cute and tasted great, soft and rich with two distinct flavors. I've wanted to try making pinwheel cookies for a while; they will be great in my next holiday cookie line-up. 

Another birthday gift I made a few weeks ago to mail out to a family member- cashew shortbread cookies, again cashews were a pun/ inside joke. I used this recipe, and it is lovely. The dough comes together quickly in a food processor. I did need a few additional spoonfuls of milk to pull the dough together. The resulting cookie is barely sweet, but rich and tasty with a hot beverage. It is a good cookie to mail out as long as it packed well; it stays fresh for days. 

A final bake from last week- pumpkin swirl bread from a King Arthur Flour recipe. I found this cute pan for two bucks at a consignment sale last year and am determined to use it a few times before spring arrives! The recipe is great and makes a tasty, plush loaf. It was demolished at a lunch with friends. I used AP flour instead of cake flour. 

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On Friday, come dinner time, I was feeling absolutely uninspired to cook. But we had a lot of veggies in the fridge. This was my fairly-low-effort dinner:

1. Two sheet pans, one with cubed potato and sweet potato, and the other with diced cauliflower, carrot, yellow pepper. Add some salt and pepper and olive oil and roast all the veggies. 
2. Meanwhile, bake some frozen nuggets (I used Quorn nuggets) in the toaster oven. 
3. Make some massaged kale salad. 
4. Mix tahini and lemon juice and hot sauce to make a dressing. 
5. Assemble a bowl and serve- veggies, kale, drizzle of dressing, nuggets.

It was a great meal in the end!

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I'm not a particularly social person but I am community-minded, and one thing that has always made me happy is volunteering for various things. I like to feel useful. Doing big social projects, sitting on nonprofit boards and such is totally beyond me, but I'm a great little worker bee when entrusted with short and specific tasks. With our kids getting older, I have a little more time to volunteer occasionally and this past week brought me three fun opportunities. 

Monday was the MLK holiday and here, we are encouraged to celebrate it as "a day on, not a day off" and participate in some volunteer activity. So I spent a couple of hours in a warehouse of a local literacy advocacy organization packing books that will be distributed to kids to fight against summer slide (learning loss when kids are out of school.) 

All week, while drinking my morning tea, I read and evaluated ten papers for a statewide high school science competition. There are many bright kids out there, y'all. 

Over the weekend, there was a marathon in town and my running buddy K and I decided to volunteer at a water station. We run many races and appreciate the water fairies who keep us hydrated and cheer us on, and here was a chance to be on the other side. NE Georgia has had unusually cold weather and marathon morning was absolutely freezing (teens and 20s F.) The water we were pouring into cups started freezing into lumps of ice! Yikes! I almost lost my toes to frostbite; meanwhile, there were a few people running in shorts. The runners were great, very inspiring as always. 

I also benefited from someone else's volunteer generosity. A local dance instructor announced a free 90-minute contemporary dance class, open to anyone in the community at all experience levels. I signed up and enjoyed it thoroughly. Contemporary dance is a style of dance that combines elements from other genres like jazz, ballet, and modern dance. There is a lot of freedom of movement, fluidity, and improvisation as dancers use their bodies to tell a story or express emotions. I love watching dance performances but have always felt like I don't "get" contemporary dance the way I appreciate ballet or hip-hop or other dance forms. Well, I understand it a whole lot more now, and it was a rich experience that I'm grateful for. 

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Today's moment of fitness is all about the power of scheduling workouts. It is a simple but powerful way to prioritize fitness in a busy life (and not just make it an afterthought) by adding it to your calendar, just like you would add the other important commitments and obligations such as work meetings, teacher conferences, birthday parties and dentist appointments. 

Doing this reduces decision fatigue- you don't have to make the daily decision to exercise and then struggle to fit it in. It is already planned and present on your calendar. As you keep scheduling workouts, you create a routine and help build a habit. Fitness becomes an expected part of the day and you can mentally gear up for it, and prepare for it beforehand, by setting out clothes, etc. 

For me, personally, I live and die by my calendar and scheduling workouts is a must to keep me on track. Through trial and error, I've found that I realistically can only exercise in the mornings before work. Scheduling workouts during lunchtime or after work has absolutely failed for me- so scheduling and adjusting the schedule can help you find what works for real in your life. 

Here's a mini challenge for you- if you don't already have workouts scheduled in your calendar, take a few minutes to do it now. This may be your digital calendar in your email app, or a paper calendar or a whiteboard in your kitchen- whatever you use to run your life. Your workout could be at home or outside, 10 minutes or 60 minutes, every day or once or twice a week- it doesn't matter. Even a 10 minute walk can be penciled into the calendar. 

If you're looking for short workouts that can fit into a busy schedule, here are two good ones from NYT (full access gift articles): a 10 minute full body routine and a 10 minute workout to improve mobility. 

One week from now- One Hot Stove will be 20 years old!