Hodgepodge of Five

1. For a long time I've been doing pretty well with the diet suggested to me by my D.O. (Doctor of Osteopathy). This diet, among other things, consists of no white processed flour, no sugar, and no caffeine. However, tonight, as I was shopping at dinner time, and hungry, I bought a package of Ghirardelli Dark Chocolate with mint filling. Let that be a reminder, never go shopping by yourself when you're hungry. It doesn't end up well. However, I should get back on track with my new food processor and blender (yay!) and my plan to make blueberry muffins from scratch with wheat flour (we'll see how that turns out).

2. Have you ever had a mood you just can't describe accurately? I had one of those moods, and then had it play out in front of me. So here's the story that describes the mood: I was out watching my nephew play in the front yard when a school bus pulled onto our street. It was big, and it made a lot of noise, and he's only 20 months. When he saw the bus come toward us, he turned toward me, his eyes big and worried, and ran up the sidewalk, grabbing my leg for security as the bus drove up. I have felt like that recently. Life looms at you and makes some scary noises, and I wish I was small enough that I could hide behind the leg of someone who would make it all alright. (Granted, I know that I can turn to God, but he never promises to make it all alright, just that He'll be there no matter what.) Sometimes I wish all of my hurts could be fixed with a hug and a kiss, like the problems of my sweet baby nephew.

3. Speaking of children, I'm in search of a Children's book. All this semester in school we studied the DISC personality model (Dominant, Influencing, Steady, and Cautious) it just recently hit me that one of my favorite books as a child was based off of that model to help kids figure out their personality. The book is The Treasure Tree: Helping Kids Understand Their Personality. I remember a little about the book, which follows the four animals - Lion, Otter, Golden Retriever, and Beaver - on their adventure to find the key to the treasure tree. It turns out that the key is made up of four small keys, and each of the animals needs to find one. Conveniently, each key is achieved by using the best of each personality, and then the keys are put together, teaching kids that the personality types worked together. I remember as a child knowing my favorite animal, and then realizing just in the past week that it corresponded to the personality style I have now.

4. Since realizing that, I've also decided to start collecting other Children's books that I someday want in my children's library, like:
Brown Bear, Brown Bear,
The Giving Tree,
Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day,
Dr. Seuss Books,
The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and
Goodnight Moon.

These books are particularly dear to me, because reading was my favorite thing as a child. These were some of my favorites. What was your favorite thing to do as a child? Has any of that nostalgia come back yet?

5. Also, I think I'm going to start trying to make my own jewelery (not really complicated things), along with my lofty goals of cooking, crocheting, knitting, taking and editing photos, and making things from magazines. Someday, I think it'd be really cool to make a quilt too. So maybe I'll do that. Or maybe I won't. Time will tell. God and school and life come first, but I'm pretty sure if I didn't zone in front of the TV I could get a lot done. TV is still okay, but it's those hours where I don't even really care about what's on, but still watch. Those are the problem times that I think I can be more productive with.

So there's your hodgepodge. Random stuff that's going on in my head and in my life.