cake for breakfast vol. 21

I’m writing this sleepily after an exceptionally sociable past few days. I went to London over the weekend, which was a glorious mix of seeing friends, traipsing around book shops on my own, and sleeping. I got back on Sunday night, and then on Monday night I went out to see a stand up show, which is not usually my thing but a friend invited me and it was so fun to just do something different. It also made for my second post-midnight bedtime in three days, after not having had any (for sociable reasons, at least) for… almost 7 years, I think? So now I am tired, and looking forward to spending some quiet nights at home, but I’m very grateful for the past few days - it’s nice to be at a moment in our family life where it’s possible to do things like this from time to time.

I thought I had taken lots of photos in London but it seems like I mainly just took photos of bookshops and Indian sweet shops?

petits plaisirs

Normally by this time of year our Christmas decorations are well under way, the tree usually arriving on the first full weekend in December, and warm lights are twinkling cosily into the dark evenings. However, due to a certain 20 month old who climbs on everything, pulls things out of sockets, and generally doesn’t like us to have nice things, we will be forgoing a tree and many of our usual decorations this year. The only things that we’ll put up will be things that are categorically out of his reach. (Also, we’re going to Edinburgh for Christmas, and I’m not sure how well a tree would survive a week of our absence.)

It would be wrong to say this is a “plaisir”, because it does make me a bit sad, but I’m also sitting comfortably in the knowledge that this is just a stage. Next year we’ll be able to have all those nice things again, and we’ll enjoy them all the more. Meanwhile, I’m focussing on other things to get us in the festive mood - we have a few Christmassy outings planned, where trees and lights can be admired without being hazardous to our collective safety; I bought a volume of Christmas-themed poems, which the kids have been really enjoying; we’re continuing with our tradition of reading a different Christmas book each evening (I’m never going to be organised enough to do a proper “book Advent calendar”, but I manage to go and pull one randomly out of my “assorted holiday themed books” drawer around 7pm); and our one and only family Christmas cookie recipe starts getting baked on repeat starting on St. Nicholas Day.

I’m not even doing an Advent wreath this year, unless I have a sudden change of heart.

There is a pleasure and peace in knowing your limits, and staying within them. Also, it will be really nice to not have to take everything down again in a few weeks.

thoughts

Talking of limits, I decided that, for now, I’m going to abandon my efforts to go swimming weekly. In my last cake for breakfast post, I wrote about how much I was enjoying doing some gentle, occasional exercise. And I was enjoying it, but I was beginning to feel quite overwhelmed with all the things I was trying to do on my three child-free days, so something had to give. I really didn’t want that thing to be swimming, but when it came down to it, it was the most dispensable thing on my list (I’m maintaining the pilates, though).

Hopefully I’ll get back to it - maybe when the weather is getting warmer again and I don’t have to worry about getting hypothermia whilst walking home with damp hair. But I’m also trying to see this as a lesson in stepping away from the results-oriented approach towards leisure that is so easy to slip into. My initial instinct upon deciding to abandon swimming was “well, the times that I did go are wasted now!” It’s so hard to let go of the idea that hobbies and leisure activities are all about improvement - exercising longer and harder, reading more, playing better, etc etc. Of course there is nothing wrong with setting goals if it serves you, but it is at least as good to do things you enjoy just because you enjoy them. So no, the times that I went swimming are not wasted, because I enjoyed it, and will get back to it when I have time to enjoy it again.

la vie en france

Have you heard of La Vendée Globe? I had not until my daughter did a unit on it in class, and now I’m fascinated. It’s a solo, non-stop, unassisted yacht race around the world, which has taken place every four years since 1992, and leaves from Les Sables-d’Olonne in the west of France. It’s considered a kind of intense, extreme sporting event on a par with climbing Everest, although arguably requiring more skill and endurance.

It is a big deal in France, and although it is an international race with participants from around the world, France is definitely overrepresented. Every winner has been French. Around 500,000 people arrive at the village where the race departs to see off the 40 participants (including, this year, our paediatrician, who promised to take photos to show my daughter next time she’s sick!). This year’s race includes the youngest ever participant, Violette Dorange, who was 23 at the time of departure. Both of my older kids are obsessed with her, and we track her progress almost daily using this interactive map.

I could barely be less enthusiastic about sport, but it has been really fun to get sucked into the excitement with my kids, particularly in a year with a young woman setting a record. Some participants always drop out en route, but the ones who finish take 2-3 months, so we’ll be keeping up with it for another couple of months yet. It’s also been nice for me to learn about this source of French pride which I would have known nothing about if it wasn’t for my daughter’s elementary school studies.

what’s cooking

I never used to be a soup person, but I’ve finally realised that I love brothy soups, just not the creamy/smooth varieties. In the name of cost/nutrition/efficiency, I decided to make soup at least once per week this autumn/winter, and I’ve found a few recipes I really love. My favourites are:

• Lemony white bean soup with turkey and greens - I used frozen spinach for the greens, even though it’s less textured than their proposals, and a commenter suggested that it would be easy to make vegetarian by switching out the turkey for mushrooms, which I think would work well. It came together really quickly and was really tasty. I’m making it again tomorrow.

• Tomato-ginger chicken and rice soup - my daughter declared this soup to be better than candy. Next time I make it, I will add more spice at the beginning, but it was really good and would make perfect healthy comfort food for a sick person. I used chicken I had already shredded in the slow cooker and added it 5 mins before the end, instead of cooking the chicken in the soup, which worked really well.

If you have any brothy soup recipes you love, do share!

things i thought were good

• I think the whole internet has already heard Lila Rose’s interview with Kendra Tierney, but if you haven’t listened to it yet then please do! I had already watched Kendra’s talk from the Fiat conference and wasn’t so wild about that one, but I thought she spoke really beautifully, wisely, and gently to Lila Rose.

• On very similar themes, I have been savouring Father Jacques Philippe’s book Interior Freedom. I really believe Fr. Jaques Philippe is the eminent spiritual writer of our time, and pretty much everything he writes is worth reading, but this one picks up themes that Kendra’s interview addresses, in particular accepting God’s will for our lives and finding peace when life turns out in ways we would not have chosen.

• On a completely different note, I really enjoyed this long piece, Whatever Happened to the Lady Jaguars? by John Branch for NYT. It catches up with a group of young women the author had written about 12 years ago, who had been sentenced to a court-run day school in Tennessee where they are trained to play competitive basketball as an alternative to juvenile detention. Branch traces their stories from then until the present. Although there is a lot of brokenness, system failures, and cycles of poverty and disadvantage, there is so much tenacity displayed by these women with the odds stacked terribly against them. Although none of them have “made it” by any usual measure, most of them have reached a place that they are happy with and proud of, and are hopeful for their futures. It was equal parts heartbreaking and hopeful, and the kind of journalism that I love to read.

Happy Advent and Christmastide friends - the next time I write one of these it will be 2025! Gaaaaaah!