"My resolutions this year are..."

Weeks 4 - 9: 23 January - 4 March 2012

Wow! What a busy few weeks it has been! Luckily my recent fun and adventures have given me plenty to blog about! Hmmm…where should I begin?

Let’s start with baking! Always fun. Just after I posted my last blog I decided to make something I’ve never attempted before: iced fingers (a sweet bread dough shaped into batons with a layer of icing on top). There is an ever-increasingly popular TV show in the UK called “The Great British Bake Off” and every week the contestants have to undertake a “technical challenge”. This typically involves being presented with a very basic (in the sense that it is deliberately lacking in detail) recipe and having to make a batch of baked goods to that recipe (using their own technical knowledge to supplement) which should all come out of the oven more or less identical. One week, the contestants were set the task of making iced fingers, which happen to be my better-and-infinitely-wittier-half’s favourite. Ever since that show (actually, before it had even ended) he had asked me to make some for him, so being the lovely person that I am, I did! The end result was far from uniform (let’s go with rustic), but they tasted amazing! A photo of my favourite, with icing dripping deliciously down the sides, will follow…

A few weeks after that, I was invited to my better-and-infinitely-wittier-half’s-sister-in-law-to-be’s hen party. Loving any excuse to make celebratory cupcakes, I decided to make some hen party themed ones to take along. My brother’s girlfriend had bought me a kit to make pina colada cupcakes for my birthday so I thought that they would be perfect. However as this would only make 12 cakes, and there were nearer to 30 hens, I decided to supplement these with some strawberry daiquiri cupcakes, courtesy of my “Hummingbird Bakery” cook book. The recipe involved heating a mixture of rum and sugar until it reduced by half, then pouring this over chopped strawberries and leaving for 40 minutes. The liquid was then drained off, a few chopped strawberries were placed in the bottom of each cupcake case, the batter was poured over the top and the cupcakes were left to bake in the oven.

When I bake cupcakes during the week, I like to bake the cakes one evening and decorate them the next so I don’t feel too pushed for time. As I was clearing up, I noticed the drained off rum/sugar/strawberry mixture sitting on the side, so decided to have a wee taste of it (for quality control purposes you will appreciate!). Mmmm…tasty…maybe a bit more…go on then, another drop! Before I knew it, the mixture was no more and I went about the rest of the cleaning in a tipsy, sugary high.

The next evening, however, I learnt a very important lesson: always, always, always read the recipe all the way through before you start to follow it, and definitely before you eat the leftover ingredients! As I started to prepare the strawberry daiquiri frosting, I was instructed to add the residue rum/sugar/strawberry mixture that I had drained the night before! Oh no! Luckily we have a plentiful supply of rum in our house, and there were extra strawberries in the fridge, so I quickly whipped up some more (being careful not to drink any of it!) and 40 minutes later I was back on track!

The pina colada cupcakes were less technically challenging, being supplied with cupcake and frosting mixes in the kit and so only having to add a couple of ingredients to bind them. The frosting was a little runnier than I would have liked (even after adding almost a full box of icing sugar to it in an attempt to make it thicker!) so I was disappointed that I would be unable to pipe it prettily onto the cupcakes. However this is when I learnt my second important lesson: no matter how you think the frosting may look on top of your cupcakes, adding edible glitter will always, always, always make them look twenty times better at least! After spreading the frosting on top of mine, adding a little “L” plate to decorate and sprinkling glitter on top, I was relieved to see that they looked absolutely amazing! Pictures to follow…

Last time I blogged, I was just starting to read Elizabeth Gilbert’s “Eat Pray Love”. Shortly after this, we had a long weekend in Marrakesh and the three and a half hour flight there and back gave me ample opportunity to finish this. The way that I have described the book to my friends is that it is much more spiritual than I thought it would be, particularly the chapters describing her time in India. This is no bad thing, but the thoughts and experiences Elizabeth was having seemed so incredibly personal that I felt almost like I was intruding. Having said that, she had several “realisations” during her year that made complete sense to me and which I feel like I can apply to my own life. For example, being a natural worrier I was particularly taken by the following, “I’ve started being vigilant about watching my thoughts all day, and monitoring them. I repeat this vow about 700 times a day: ‘I will not harbor unhealthy thoughts anymore’. Every time a diminishing thought arises, I repeat the vow…And now - let the word go out across the seven seas - there are much, much stricter laws on the books about who may enter this harbor…If you can abide by these new laws, my dear thoughts, then you are welcome in my mind - otherwise I shall turn you all back toward the sea from whence you came”.

The chapters based in Italy have also re-awoken my longing to return to Rome and eat delicious food all day long…

Following this, I needed to pick another book from the BBC’s List. I decided on “Moby Dick”…not entirely sure why…but whilst this was on order from Amazon we were having a further weekend away, this time in London, and I needed something to read on the train. On our way to the train station I popped into a bookshop and purchased the very short but wonderful “Animal Farm”. I absolutely loved it: such a simple concept but the way it was extrapolated out was so, so smart. I don’t want to insult the author’s memory by attempting to critically analyse it (there is plenty of scope in that book to do so, particularly considering the era it was written in), but I would love to read what those with more literary acclaim have to say.

My next book was a present from my better and infinitely wittier’s half’s Mum. It is called “The Camera Never Lies” and is the first novel written by Tess Daly, co-presenter of Strictly Come Dancing (it was the dancing link that was the reason for the present). If you had to categorise it, it would fall in the genre of “chick lit” and was a wonderfully entertaining piece of escapism…I actually felt disappointed that it ended as I had so much fun dipping in and out of it.

“Moby Dick” has now arrived and is a much bigger book than I was expecting…I’m not sure what I’ll make of it, but I will no doubt let you know!

With all these weekends away, my “physical” activities fell temporarily to the way-side. My first lesson back at ballet was an absolute killer, but I was pleased to note that I could still run 10km in more or less my average time. Now that I’m around for the next few weekends, and that the days are starting to get longer, I can now work on building up my distance in preparation for a (as yet unidentifed) half marathon.

When I returned to ballet, I learnt from a classmate that the English National Ballet runs open “taster” classes! How amazing is that?! A chance to have a ballet lesson with a top ballet company amongst professional ballerinas! This is subject to a long waiting list, which I wasted no time in putting myself on I might add, but I am sure that it will certainly be worth the wait.

Finally, I have a stripy knitted scarf in progress. I can now cast on, knit and incorporate a new colour in…just in time for spring!

Even though I’ve had a few weeks away, I’m pleased that I’ve been able to keep my resolutions going so much during and inbetween my adventures. This has resulted in a very lengthy blog, but it has been fun to write and now you’re fully up to date!

Weeks 2-3: 8 - 22 January 2012

I am once again writing my blog with aching legs.  No, I’m not still dragging myself puffing and panting around my 5km route - surprisingly, I graduated to 10km last weekend with ease - hurray!  However yesterday marked my return to the world of ballet and if anybody dare to think that that is something for “soft girls” then I would challenge them to give it a go!  I like to think of myself as being relatively fit, but it would appear that despite running regularly over the last year, several of my leg muscles have been left somewhat redundant…Not anymore though: wakey wakey legs! 

Despite the pain, I had a lot of fun yesterday and it was nice to be in a room full of women who, like me, want to reawaken the ballerina inside them.  I know my chances of ever dancing professionally are well and truly behind me (in fact, I’d be close to retirement now if that had ever been an option!), but for an hour a week it’s fun to make believe!

So, having woken this morning struggling to walk, I thought a 10km run might loosen things up for me…I was wrong!  I’m really pleased that I’ve managed to increase my distance though and think that once I’ve got a busy February out of the way I will start to increase my distance further and start racing again.  The post-running reward of a bacon, egg and cheese bagel can do wonders for my motivation!

Yesterday I also finished reading ”The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy”.  As I said in my previous blog, it’s like nothing I’ve ever read before and one of the reasons I enjoyed it so much is down to the fact that I would never in a million years have dreamt up anything like it: I love things that challenge or develop my way of thinking.  It also made me remember with fondness the first time my better and infinitely wittier other half visited my flat (number 42) and observed that it was the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything… 

Having ticked off another book on the BBC’s List of 100 to Read Before You Die, I’m going “off piste” for my next book-worming adventure and will be turning the pages of Elizabeth Gilbert’s “Eat, Pray, Love” shortly…

Finally, this last week was my birthday week which gave me the perfect excuse to bake delicious treats for my office!  I made prettily decorated vanilla cupcakes with vanilla or chocolate icing and an apple, cinnamon and walnut cake.  Thankfully they tasted as good as they looked..!  Pictures to follow…

Week 1: 1 - 7 January 2012

So how have I progressed my resolutions this week?  Hmmm, well it’s fair to say that I haven’t exactly set the world alight just yet…more like taken a ‘softly, softly’ approach…yes, that’s it!  Softly, softly…

I am, however, writing this post reclined on my sofa, recovering from my earlier 5km run.  Not a personal best by any means, especially when only three months ago I could run over four times that distance - it’s frightening how quickly one’s fitness can plummet!  I refuse to feel disheartened by today’s performance though - I’ve run 13.1 miles before and I will do it again.  Softly, softly does it… 

This week I have also bought a brand spanking new pair of ballet slippers and sourced a couple of adult ballet classes in my town, so that by this time next week I should be in a position to report on my first day back at the barre - exciting!  I felt a little giddy when I was being fitted for my slippers and am very much looking forward to getting started again next week.  As I was buying my slippers, I felt a little pang of jealousy towards the girl who was being fitted for her pointe shoes.  I’ve never danced en pointe but would love to try one day…maybe I should just buy a pair and totter around the house in them?!  

In the summer, I attended a seminar at the offices of Marie Claire UK in London entitled, “How To Get Published”.  They had a panel of four women (an author, a publisher, an agent and the deputy editor of Marie Claire), one of which was Lindsey Kelk (the author).  I remember her advise that if you want to be a good writer, you should read around genres, and this has influenced my first literary selection of 2012: The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy.  There may be gasps of surprise at the fact that I have got to the age of 26 without reading this iconic book, but science fiction wasn’t really my genre of choice growing up and this has left a bit of a gaping hole in my literary knowledge.  A couple of chapters in, however, and it’s fair to say that I haven’t read anything like it before.  That is very much a good thing, though, and I think I’m going to be pleasantly surprised by stepping out of my comfort zone. 

Other than that, I have looked at one or two knitting kits (too advanced) and salivated over my baking books (too calorific for the first week of January!) but that’s pretty much it in terms of my resolutions.  The good intentions are still plentiful, but remember that it’s only the first week of the year and there are still another 51 to go…Softly, softly!

My resolutions this year are…

So what have I resolved to do in 2012? Well, as my better and infinitely wittier other half pointed out, my chosen goals somewhat resemble the challenges faced by the contestants of the 1990’s game show ‘The Crystal Maze’. That is, I have a ‘physical’, ‘skill’, ‘mental’ and ‘mystery’ (albeit through no actual intention to categorise them in this way, or indeed at all). As such, my resolutions this year are:

Physical

To run a half marathon in under two hours; and to reignite my love of dancing. Ok, I know that’s two, but it actually turns out that after avoiding physical activity like the plague during my teenage years, as a twenty-something I actually quite enjoy it. I started running about 18 months ago after signing up for a local 10km race and the rest, as they say, is history. In October 2011 I ran my first half marathon in two hours and six minutes and now want to break the two hour barrier. It seems to be accepted that to run 13.1 miles in two and a half hours is about the average, and to run it in under two hours is what everybody hopes to one day attain. I’m therefore in a bit of a no-man’s land at the moment and hope to step up my training enough this year to shave that extra 6 minutes off my time.

Dancing, in particular ballet, was my earliest form of exercise and from the age of about three I would dance more or less weekly for the next eight years. My love of dancing always stayed with me, suspended in the background, and I have recently tried out a couple of local classes in a bid to reawaken the dancer in me. For one reason or another, these attempts haven’t worked out in the long term so I’m hoping that it will be third time lucky in 2012!

Skill

To be able to knit (yes, knit!) properly; and to continue to expand my baking “repertoire”. Again, I know I’ve picked two things here, and I also know that this may be perceived as me following the recent popular trend of 1950’s style frugality. However, knitting has always felt like one of those home-maker skills I should know how to perform (not in a subservient house-wife sort of way I should make clear!) and baking is a skill I developed pretty much from scratch during 2011 and am wholly unwilling to leave by the way-side in 2012! Now, I’m not planning to knit a jumper or bake a cake every week or anything, but if I can successfully knit something and accompany that with some delicious, never-before-baked-by-me goodies by 2013, I will call that a success.

Mental

To read more classic or critically acclaimed books. Now, I have always considered myself, and been labelled as, a bit of a bookworm. However, when the BBC recently published their list of 100 Books To Read Before You Die, I was ashamed to note that I had only read 21 of them. So this year I have decided to bump up my number to at least 30 and will make every other book I read one from that list. I have chosen to alternate the titles as I don’t want my entire year’s reading to be dictated by that list, and one of the beauties of literature is that new modern day “classics” are constantly being born, so I don’t want to miss out on that.

Mystery

As the name suggests, this one is to remain a mystery to all but me and a couple of my nearest and dearest…it’s always fun to have a little secret!

So there you go! They may not be the most exciting and daring resolutions ever, but in my own quirky world they are goals that are enjoyable and personal to me and about which I will have fun writing. And why the blog? Well, I would hope that by committing myself to writing regular updates all year I will, firstly, stick to my resolutions; and, secondly, have a good excuse to write creatively again. Who knows, once the creative juices start flowing, maybe that book that has been 26 years in the making will finally find itself written!