Nature girl vs. the Doughnut blinders

I can't help it...I love doughnuts.

I will completely, willingly, make myself sick, wheat belly and all, for a fresh apple fritter - I blame my father. I have great memories of stopping at our local doughnut shop in Dana Point and each of us getting our favorite doughnuts before heading off to the boat, or whatever else we were up to that day. Sometimes they would have just finished a new batch and the apples would still be so hot they could burn the roof of your mouth...but it was worth it!

Lately I have had this unreal, single minded attention to doughnuts.  No idea why, I shouldn't be eating a lot of sweet treats but sometimes they just call to you! Or mock you from the store front, or laugh at you in the isles of Target...jerks.

Today, I finally caved and went researcher crazy to find some good gluten free recipes to try...I may be eating doughnuts and popcorn for dinner tonight, but we'll cross that bridge later.  I found two recipes that look very promising, one for Apple Fritters and one for a sour cream Old-Fashioned...yummy.

Now I'm not crazy enough to try both of them tonight, though I want to, the cost of the oil alone would be prohibitive. However, you best believe that I will be uploading pictures of hopefully delicious doughnuts in about two and a half hours!

I just have to figure out how to go grocery shopping, walk the dogs, make the doughnuts and eat the doughnuts without burning my fingers and mouth from impatience...well, maybe it will be worth it!

...Nature girl

Training Day

Training Day, it's not just an action flick, it WAS my weekend plan.

I am not usually the one who is up to doing corporate training days. But I guess it's different when you are your own corporation, because somehow I was really excited about the day long training I signed up for this Saturday. So imagine my let down when I opened my e-mail today and saw that the event was cancelled.

It was like the let down from Christmas, no glow, just the bummer that it can't still be a party the next day (unless you're Brittish, then you get boxing day).

Ever since we made this big move to Hawaii, I have felt a lack of drive for my business out here.  Probably because I am lonely and missing home, but moving on.  I was super excited to go and hang out with other Arbonne Consultants and fill up on targeted training. But since that summit was cancelled, I now have two options. Be bummed and further put off, or be stoked that if there wasn't a big enough enrollment, that means I have more than enough room to grow!

The tough part about network marketing is not the sales, it's the courage quotient. With a great product (or products) like Arbonne it's easy because the product "sells" itself! Building this business, for me, is much more about education, options, healthy alternatives, and relationships. But that is where the hitch in my giddy-up comes from in HI. I have to find a way to meet people/tell people what I love to do, not just what my JOB is! This in person summit, I feel, was going to help equip me to get over my fears.

Now in all fairness, the training didn't disappear, it just relocated - to the phone. I am still amped to get going, now three days early, and I happen to have an event planned for that same day, so I will definitely be busy! I guess I just don't like to be bored...it saps my energy.

Not having this in-person training go through just showed me how passionate I am about succeeding in Arbonne. And how excited I am for this.  Besides the amount of freedom that being my own boss will eventually provide for me, it will also let me stay home, play with my baby (when he arrives) and educate people (and myself...I miss you school)!!

So I have decided to move forward. In conversations with my gal-pals today, I encouraged both of them not to be passive observers in their lives, but to continue growing, be involved, and make healthy decisions for themselves and their lives. That was when I realized that this HI holding pattern I have been in isn't really helping me. Though it isn't "hurting" me, it definitely isn't pushing me toward my goals, and I want to achieve my goals.

...Nature girl

Nature girl and Father's Day

So for anyone not living in the USA, yesterday was Father's Day. I'm not sure what the international observances are for a manufactured holiday, but if you celebrated, good on you.

I love my Dad, but it seems like Father's Day can sometimes overlook all the other men that influence us as we grow.

The glut of amazing men that I have had the privilege to meet, and have in my life, is continually astonishing to me. My Dad was the first father figure, and I'm biased because I think he's the best, but he wasn't the last by a long shot. Between my uncles, grandfather, friend's parents, authority figures, teachers, and friends I have found a whole and complete picture of Fatherhood, and it is NOTHING like the cards you get at the drug store.

For my hubby (who is facing down imminent fatherhood with a strange mixture of terror, confidence, and anticipation) I think his definition will be different, but I think when he reads this he may see at least a little commonality, and hopefully some reassurance.

Yesterday, my sister posted the following meme on Facebook (from Fathers in the Field) with the tag line of,

"And between mine [father] and my grandfather and my uncles my standards are just a bit high."




The amazing gift of fathers cannot be understated. They are the guides, teachers, confidence builders, challenge issuers, and the prison guard that EVERY child needs.  It took me years (and I'm still trying to hear it) to understand what I was being taught by these men. It wasn't just how to tie boat knots (I still don't do it well), sand a rail, work a math problem, find the root of a problem, give a foot rub, kick a soccer ball, or play chess.

Little by little, I was learning that frustration doesn't get rid of the problem, patience does. Finding satisfaction in little things done well is just as important as satisfaction in big things done. Getting the RIGHT answer doesn't always give you the BEST answer. That sometimes what you see on the surface is not the real deal. I learned that tenderness isn't always a hug or a kiss, sometimes it's willingness to put your hands on tired, achy feet...even when you are tired and achy. I learned that what you put in to life is what you get out of it, good and bad. And that a long view of life gives you the best picture of the road ahead.

These men have taught me how to live a life I can be proud of and they did it, sometimes, by sheer force of will, and the examples that they were given. In a million different ways, on  thousands of different days, I have been taught how to expect to be valued, and treated; as well as how to treat others. What is expected of me as a person, and as a woman. I was taught to be ethical, proud, confident, loving, forgiving (but not a push over), smart, adventurous, and flexible.

Many of these lessons overlapped with things my Mothers taught me in different ways; but my Fathers have taught against odds like frowned upon discipline, contrary attitudes, tears, tantrums, and sometimes school systems. My Fathers have been firm, loving, gentle and bullish. They have been athletic, bookish, practical and whimsical.

But ALL of them...especially mine...have been exactly what I need!

So thank God for dads, however many you have, because without them life would be far less.

...Nature girl

Nature girl vs. messy trees

In California there are the Jacaranda trees...in Hawaii there are the Shower trees.

See, on the list of things that I miss about California, I wouldn't necessarily say that the annual shedding of the jacaranda trees is high up on that list.  Don't get me wrong, I love jacarandas. Their vibrant purple blossoms are one of the few ways that I truly enjoy the color purple, and they remind me of home (which is helpful right now).

 

And while I do miss the color explosion, I didn't really miss the mess...I can't because it here too! I have found that Hawaii has it's own version of the jacaranda, it's called the shower tree (very aptly named)...or rainbow shower tree depending on the variety.

This tree starts blooming around May, and starts really shedding blossoms as the island cruises toward summer.  The cool part (and irritating part), is that it seems to be an unending process. A long blooming season allows a continual shower of blooms until the winter rolls around and the trees start dropping foliage as well as flowers.

The little dropped flowers of both trees, while beautiful and delicate, are amazingly messy! I walked out to the car today only to find blossoms halfway up the windshield and the parking space had a clean spot where the ground was sheltered by the car.

As silly as it is, I love it.

Somehow it is reassuring that I can find little things everywhere that remind me of where I started, where I come from, even when I am geographically far. It gives me a whole new appreciation and respect for those friends of mine who long ago moved from their countries or states of birth.  It seems the human mind has an incredible gift to find home wherever we land.

...Nature girl

Today is a good news day

I don't watch the news. It's depressing, lacks substance, and I don't have cable...so I can't. What I do, is read the news. 

The search bar on my browser yields a plethora of news outlets to choose from. Sites vary from the NY Times, BBC, Reuters, CNN and pretty much anything else I can get my hands on. Today was a good day for the US news outlets. Usually overwhelmed by socialites and sensationalism, today the top story was about five soldiers killed in a friendly fire incident in Afganistan (the Fox story is a little jumbled, but if you want a clearer version...try this one.)

While it is a sad story, and not one I was glad to read by a long shot, I was glad to see it in a headline. We are so inundated by the inane and meaningless in the news that I think it is sometimes very easy to forget about the important, and frankly high risk things that also affect us and people we may know.

I also went to BBC.com today to check up on the Russia-Ukraine situation to see if there has been any new news since Ukraine elected their new President, a business tycoon and a man with several political forays already on his résumé, Mr. Petro Poroshenko. I'm glad to see him proposing realistic solutions to the still escalating conflict in the eastern regions. With the pro-Russian Vostok Batallion gaining ground in the region with their volunteers from Russian conflict areas, higher training and weaponry, things could get very messy, very quickly.

Though it seems that there is nothing but "bad" news in the news, it reassures me to keep in touch with the world. It reminds me that my "earth shattering" problems are nothing more than mosquitos, irritating and painful to me, but inconsequential to anyone else. So keep that in mind peeps, don't lose your perspective.

... Nature girl