Welcome to another edition of What-I-Made Wednesday.
This project was just silly fun. It took about a day, or would have if I’d had toothpicks on hand with which to finish it. The little basket is crocheted, and the knitting on the toothpicks is, well, knit. The little balls of yarn are from my scrap pile. The penny is just for scale. The book in the background is my dayplanner just sitting on my desk!
I think this shall come to live on my desk at work.
There are more details if you follow the R below.
The butter on the muffin
I’m eating these muffins this week. I think they’re the best muffins I’ve ever made, and they were largely improvised. Yay!
I’m a struggling baker, and I’ve come a long way in the last two years – For reference, if you have a chance, check out my post about the Cakesplosion of April 2010!
This recipe makes 6 large muffins. Time and temperature are based on approximately 450 feet above sea level. I have no idea what the calorie value is, but I can say with some certainty it’ll be less than the ones they have at McD’s.
Dry Ingredients
1 cup flour
1 cup quick/instant oats (or 2 packets)
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp ea cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground clove (the spices could also be substituted with generic Pumpkin Pie spice)
3 tsp baking soda
1 cup walnuts or raisins (I don’t like raisins in my muffins. Your mileage may vary).
Wet Ingredients
1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup oil (I used canola)
3/4 cup milk (I used 2%)
1.5ish cups shredded carrot (I used one whole unreasonably large carrot)
Other
6 large muffin liners
1/4 cup brown sugar for topping
Preheat oven to 400 degrees Farenheit (205 Celcius, but like crochet and knitting, I don’t bake in Canadian and have always used Farenheit and Imperial measurements. I’m not sure, since outside right now it’s -5 Celcius, and I have no idea what that means to my friends below the border.)
Dump the dry ingredients together in a bowl. Grate your carrot. Beat your egg. Add oil and milk and carrot to egg and stir. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients. Fill your muffin cups. Sprinkle brown sugar overtop. Bake for 25-30 minutes (mine took 27 minutes).
Before
If I make this again, I might slightly reduce the ginger. It’s spicy.
I also used two packets of instant oatmeal for my quick oats, which already had sugar. If you use plain oats you may (or may not, if you don’t have a sweet tooth!) want to add a little more sugar to the recipe.
After
I recently received my Week 5 package, which naturally means: It’s time to post about week two!
The Weird
I have had a few spiritual experiences in my life that are beyond strange, or would be to an onlooker. I don’t tend to talk about them. For some things, you just had to be there. In some cases, it’s just better that you weren’t.
I have learned the hard way to choose very carefully those to whom you divulge your most secret moments. Once, a positive reaction shocked me, and once, a negative reaction coloured the amount I was (am) willing to share that part of myself with the same person in the future, which is unfortunate.
The updated Altar
The altar presently has three items on it: A candle, an incense burner, and a small granite vessel of water. I have not tried swapping out the items yet to see how the experience changes, because I have not been meditating often enough to become used to the initial energy.
Simplicity
My path in 30(ish) words
Right now, I am seeking, feeling out, testing waters. I seem to be somewhere in the aether right now, or lost in the woods, knowing where I’m going but not sure how to get there.
Things I just don’t get
I’ve had a lot of trouble with this question, which is, what is something that speaks to others that simply doesn’t speak to you? I’ve been pondering the question for a while now. Literally weeks, I suppose. The conclusion I’ve come to is this: Nothing. I’ve had an interest in not only theology and religious practice but the Whys of them pretty much all my life. Although it can take me time to understand why something would be spiritually rewarding to an individual, I try, and I can generally, eventually, learn to see it from their perspective.
…sort of. I went to church yesterday.
Now, now. Don’t get excited. I went to a Unitarian Universalist service at the local chapter, which happens to be within walking distance of my house. It’s been a long time since I’ve been to a UU service, at least on a Sunday. I’ve been to many events held or sponsored by the church, but the last actual service I was at must have been the summer of 2007.
I remember that sermon – really it was more of a guest speaker; it was a bit off-the-wall for my taste. I remain undecided on the issue of zombie seeds and their impact on world hunger, and while I have an open mind, I am wary of conspiracy theories. (The Googles found me This article from the Ottawa Citizen, which would have been current at the time.)
Nonetheless, the service I went to yesterday was lovely; it was on the theme of courage in honour of International Women’s Day (which is Thursday the 8th), and contrasted the media version of “courage” with the courage of a 3rd world woman carrying water on her head. Stories were told about those women who struggled to establish Unitarianism in Canada in the 1800s, as well.
All in all, it was just really lovely. But the thing that is still sticking with me today was the comment from the lovely lady who mentioned that when she was younger, the feminist theory was to feel the fear, and do it anyway. I think, for anyone, that’s still a really important lesson.
I think I shall go back again.
There are always stops and starts when one begins a new chapter, and I’ve always found this to be true. The problem lies in remembering to start again once something has caused you to stop.
Not stop. Pause.
I hit a wall this week. Well, that’s not true. I hit it last week. I was bubbling along nicely, but the thing is this. When one starts to meditate, one starts to Listen. That’s (at least in this context) sort of the point. Listen to that Voice that you’ve been ignoring. Knock, knock. The Universe wants your attention.
I’ve been ignoring it. I know I’ve been ignoring it. La La La. Fingers in ears, stomping my feet like a child. Only, I’m not sure I was this badly behaved when I was a child.
I ignore it because I know there are things I simply do not want to know. I stopped, just as the door was opening last time. I stopped doing readings. I stopped studying. I stopped reaching out to the Divine. Some of this was restorative and necessary because I didn’t know where I was going anymore, and I now have a better idea. But some of it was not good because I have been merrily ignoring the elephant in the room.
So, I stopped, some time ago, and forgot to start again. La la la.
I can see the Path again now, but I am not quite ready to take the necessary step(s) to get there. Because in order to get to that place, there is more work I need to do in my life, in my head, in my Self. Some of that work has to do with decluttering. Some of it has to do with Just Doing It.
No one wants to do housekeeping on their life. It’s uncomfortable. And scary. As I get older I find I am not as fearless as I once was; I have built up comfortable walls in my life that are as limiting as they are soothing.
So, I have not meditated this week despite it being the main focus of the Nomad course. I have not meditated because I need to sort out what I have Heard already before I can take some more. I have not pulled out my cards because although my hand itch terribly for them, I am not certain I am ready to face what they will tell me.
Even as I type that I feel like it might be time.
Welcome to another edition of What-I-Made Wednesday.
Today I’d like to show you a scarf I made using a stitch pattern I found in a knitting magazine. The stitch was for a sweater, but I’m kind of glad I didn’t attempt that. It was already fairly complex.
The yarn was the much-lauded Fleece Artist sock yarn – I believe I may have recieved it as a gift in a swap I did in 2006 or 2007, but I honestly don’t recall. It’s been a long time since I’ve done one.
This project spanned more than 4 years, as it was a carry-around for me and shortly before finishing was lost into a friend’s moving boxes! But lo, I got it back, and finished it:
There are more pictures and details if you follow the R below.
Today I’d like to share with you some of the prayer beads I have made.
A few years ago, I became extremely intrigued by the idea of rosaries and prayer beads. For many years I have enjoyed micro-macramé, and attempted to see if I could use it to make prayer beads. I didn’t like the effect and switched to simple knotted silk.
Hematite and red glass on green silk. 9 sets of 9 beads plus the focal four.
I later decided that I preferred using eye pins instead. Most of them were given as gifts over the years. I still have a few that haven’t found homes yet, waiting neatly in their packages. Here’s a gallery of the ones to date. They aren’t all works of art, but I was really quite pleased with most of them.
Lately I feel like maybe making some more.
I made a deal with myself that I couldn’t open module 3 until I at least finish the journal questions from module 1. Module 2 needs to be done as well, but I don’t think I can hold out that long. This course is just too interesting so far. I want to eat it all up!
This may seem a little stream-of-consiousness or disjointed.
Spiritual history
Looking back over my spiritual history, I think I’ve mostly had a positive experience. I think I am fortunate in this. I was reflecting recently in a conversation with my mother that I don’t have a lot of the hurts and injustices many do when healing from their experiences with the Church, although at the same time this is also a challenge for me. I have nothing to rise up against. Spiritual rebellion was challenging for me as a teenager. I think going Pentecostal for a while was probably more rebellious than the going Pagan afterward.
I did find while I was at Church that there were things I didn’t agree with, but in the end I think it has to be admitted that my problems were with the people themselves. I remember encountering some people who were vehement creationists, which I found, well, shocking and baffling. I remember on one retreat someone being shocked that I was raised on AC/DC because they had been taught that this was an acronym for “AntiChrist/Death to Christ!” and I didn’t have the heart to tell them it’s an electrical current. It’s easy for some people to see demons anywhere. Maintaining my open mind became more important after that.
Deity
I’m not sure I could come up with just one name to call God if I had to choose it. In my brain it varies between The Gods, The All, Them, Whom, Himself, Herself, God, Goddess, etc. Interestingly, I notice that none of these are names in and of themselves. My definition of the Divine has not changed in many years. I have spent (wasted?) a lot of time searching for a particular Aspect to call my patron or patroness, but I suspect that for me this may be missing the point. I need to remind myself sometimes that the All that is true for me is a dualistic, elemental, multifacted thing, more like Yin and Yang than like a particular face.
Occasionally I have interacted with Aspects, or gods with a small “g”, or particular faces of the Divine as many pagans have. It’s rarely been the same Aspect twice. This is one of the biggest reasons why the Nomad course and path are drawing me in. I have had powerful moments, earth-moving interactions, dreams, conversations, and stunning visualizations with Aspects, but none of them have ever Called me Home the way I’ve always craved. Instead, I find I resonate with different Aspects at different times, and that’s okay.
Sometimes the interaction is not with a specific Aspect of the Divine but with what I would consider the Divine in a more generalized way. The moments of grace, for instance, that I wrote about in my earlier post, would fall under this category. It is more… trancendent, perhaps, although even that doesn’t feel like the correct word.
Altars
As with my previous post on altars it seems to me that I can do with less, much less, despite my love of the accessories of faith. In fact, I can do with nothing at all. I don’t need an altar to connect to the Divine, but I am enjoying the ritualization of it and the altar’s role in the ritual.
Thanks for bearing with me through all that!
I have taken captcha off of commenting for the time being while I figure out what the issue is. Commenting should work fine now. If you are still having trouble, please drop me an email at analae at gmail dot com to let me know – I’d appreciate it!
I’m sort of bouncing all over the place here, but right now I’m going to skip back to one of the Week One exercises, which has been stewing now for about two weeks. The idea is to identify moments of “grace”.
“Grace” can be a loaded word, especially for those with a Christian background. It has helped me to think about it in other terms. For instance, times that I unquestionably felt a Divine presence; times when I feel like the God(s) have interceded in my life; times of great peace and calm, or serenity. To me, when I think about it, yes. Those qualify as moments of what I would comfortably describe as Grace. So that was the first challenge of the exercise. Alrighty then. Moving on.
I would add something to that list. Movie Moments. Have you ever had a moment that just seemed perfectly orchestrated, as if the director of the movie of your life had placed this light here, the marks just so, the soundtrack perfectly queued, and shouted Action! and you find yourself waking up into the most beautiful moment? I like to think the the director is a divine force, so let’s call that force the Director with a capital D.
Most of my Movie Moments have a soundtrack. They most often involve music, although sometimes it is more subtle, like ambient noise or birdsong. For our purposes today let’s go with musical examples.
I can recall once, in highschool, walking down the sidewalk with my headphones on. I am not certain what I was listening to at the time but I suspect it was something by Roxette (<3 Roxette). The day was overcast and cool, and there was a fine mist of rain starting. I remember my mood was fairly grim (I was a teenager; this was not uncommon). Suddenly everything – the mood of the scene complemented by the weather, the freshness, the mist on my face and the soundtrack – just came together for a moment, and time just… stopped.
I recall another time probably a year or two later when a friend I no longer have and a boyfriend long gone and I were sitting in her sister’s room, listening to a particular song (Windy Day, from the Escaflowne soundtrack) and she and I were belting out the phonetically learned lyrics at the top of our lungs while he looked on. It was a gorgeous moment when time stopped. To this day that is the only Japanese song I can sing fully from memory.
I recall taking the train into Toronto at night, and onto my headphones came Across the Universe, which is a Beatles song, but the version from the soundtrack of the movie of the same name, and I recalled the scene in the film when it plays – the main character is on a subway. I watched the lights of Toronto become brighter, speeding through the industrial areas, and felt like I understood the context of the song the director – or Director – was trying to achieve.
Last May, I was on a bus on an overcast morning on my way to get my nails done with a bride and my co-bridesmaids. On my headphones (don’t you love shuffle?) randomly came the opening to U2′s Where The Streets Have No Name, and just then, the sun broke through the clouds. And it was beautiful, and perfect, and not ironic or cynical in any way. It just was, and I knew that no one else on the bus would understand this moment, because they weren’t me, where I was in my life, listening to what I was listening to just at that exact wonderful second.
I can think of several other moments of Grace that fall into the other categories I listed, but those would require pages and pages to define. I am happy with remembering these examples for you all.
Hey gang,
If you’ve tried to leave a comment recently and it hasn’t taken, don’t worry. It’s not you. I’m working on it!
