Caring for our elderly grandparents :)

It is very hard watching our family members get older and watching their bodies and minds slowly degenerate. As I watch this stage of my grandmothers life, it humbles me that I even still have her in my life to ask questions and get advice. But that privilege has been exhausted as her dimentia sets in. In the last five years, she went from being a healthy weight with her own beating heart, to now weighing 75-80 lbs and needing a pacemaker to keep her love muscle pumping properly. She forgets who we are sometimes and gets disoriented very easily. As I see her need assistance in everything from getting up in the morning, to going to the bathroom, I feel the weight of guilt heavy on my heart. I wish there was something more I could do for her! I wish I could take her out of her home and have her with me but that would be impossible as I have to work and get to school and do the things in my life that keep me afloat. My grandmother, my moms mom, is only 86, and in very bad shape. She has given up on her physical therapy because she just has no energy and is always tired. I brought her a piece of homemade apple pie the other day and she didn't really know who I was, which is really hard. I love her and pray that she gets to go Home and be with her husband, my papa someday soon. Her quality of life has deteriorated so much that I doubt she has felt joy in a long time, even when we take her for walks and out to lunch. She mostly is worried about her next bathroom visit or simply getting the sandwich to her mouth. I take care of myself so as to never end up this helpless. She smoked cigarettes for 40 years and ate terrible while never working out. I am an avid health foodie, Zumba instructor, dance instructor and future nurse. Thankfully I have the information today that can guide me in the right direction to lead a healthy life. I treat my stress with exercise or a night with the girls and I definitely don't smoke or drink in excess. I'm thankful for my blessings, even my cute restaurant job. I am thankful for all the people I have met in my life and for my family and for my grandmother who I am fortunate to still have. I am going to see her today to turn this very awkward morning around.. between my double shift at the jobby :) I will appreciate every customer as I always do, who is not dissecting me from start to finish. Thankfully I have my team on my side, including the owner and management, and I will bring all the elderly customers an extra special smile today :D because they deserve it! In honor of my grandma, thanks for reading!

Eating out. Customer service. Tipping your server.

I have thoughts about this unruly place we all know as restaurants. Eating out is something we all have done over a hundred dozens times in our lives. Even children master the art of eating out by the time they are in grade school. Well, for the most part. There is an entire behavior that people assume the moment they step inside a restaurant. Thy are either 'customer' or 'customer service personnel'. They are either the salesmen or the paying patron. The demanding or the providing. The hungry lunch hour breaker or the milli-tasking sweaty server. You see, the very first thing I noticed about working in a restaurant, is that you obviously need to understand the flow of the 'turn': greeting table, drinks/ apps, get orders, bring check, and all the million tiny little things in between, but mostly, I noticed that people act friggin ridiculous when they go out to eat! I get it, they are paying customers, they're hungry, which mostly just means cranky, they might be on their lunch break, there are kids screaming and being impatient... but stop being ridiculous and look around you. Just Look around. How full is the restaurant? And how many tables does your server have? And how many people are working? The chances of you having a nice time and getting everything you wanted how you wanted it, are much much better if you act polite and like a decent person. If you have limited time to eat and you go to a slammed busy restaurant to eat, GO SOMEWHERE ELSE!! I could not stress that more. If the place is not slammed, feel free, but there is something called order. And the order in which people come in and sit down is the same order by which their food is made. That is just how it goes, there is no way around this because people get upset when other tables come after them, eat, and leave before them... There is order, no exceptions! Lunch breakers get rediculous about needing to order because they are on their break but I just dont care. Go eat at a fat food place then... Or pack a lunch! The person taking your order is not the person you should be rude to when it comes eating out! This person, trust me, wants you to have exactly what you want. Their job is that. As simple as it seems, your server does not want anything to go wrong, take long, taste bad or dissatisfy you at all by any means. Servers' jobs require that they are accommodating, sincere, knowledgeable, witty and tolerant. They are tried for these characteristics every shift they work. Something is bound to go wrong sooner or later and it is the servers job to seek out a solution to that problem, without letting the customer leave unhappy. This is very important because, umm, they work for TIPS! An acronym that once meant: To Insure Proper Service. If you are rude to your server, you should technically tip more because all you wanted was food or drink (frugal things really), and all your server did was provide that for you, and all you did was be rude and tip bad which ultimately makes you kind of a shit person. Honesty. If you have kids and leave a huge mess and tip low, it does not make it better to say "oh I'm so sorry about the mess" on your way out. You are leaving more work for the staff to clean. They want to reseat the table and by tipping low, you are giving the person who is cleaning up after your kids, less money because a percentage of server's tips go straight to the staff that assists them. If you are part of a large party and there is gratuity added to your bill. Look at the percentage! Most of the time, gratuity is approximately 18% which is still not the standard by which the server usually aims to get. Most servers want 20% tips because they consider their service worth that much. Service that is blatantly bad, slow, rude, deserves less but servers who are trying their best and do an honest good job do deserve 20%! Do not hold it against your server if they can't sit around and shoot the shit with you. They are busy and needing to get onto the next task. After all, this way, you too get the items you are ultimately there to have. If you go out just to socialize with the wait staff, get a life! Servers have to deal with stuck up, pompous, cranky, cheap, rude A holes all the time. The nicest thing you could do for your server, just as a simple act of kindness, is to be polite to them, and finally, tip 20%. They are under-appreciated. They have to tip out their staff too so by short-changing them, you are short-changing everyone in the establishment: chefs, hosts, kitchen staff, everyone. What is $2.00 to you if it's the difference between an 18% or a 20% tip? It means everything to your server! If your bill was $30, leave $6. If it was $35, leave $7. If it was $40, leave $8... You see the pattern? $50, leave $10! It really makes a difference and you are remembered next time. Next time, your server may just anticipate your needs and have things made exactly how you like them because last time you came in, you were nice and left a twenty percent tip! Gist, be nice and leave proper tips! It's just food and drink so don't get your panties in a bunch, if you don't like it don't go back, and don't blame your server for things out of their control by leaving crappy tips because they tip out the same percentage to their staff.. so ultimately you are screwing over everyone who had a part in your meal, not just the server that you decided to hate.
It really irks me when I go above and beyond to be sweet and accommodating to people with outrageous requests, only to be treated terrible and left a shit tip. What else could I have done? Is there any way to please this person? If I know you and brought you something on the house and you left a 18% tip, you most likely will not get that treatment again! If I am kind enough to treat you to dessert for your bday even if it's not your real bday and u left a shot tip, sit n spin! I hook you up, you hook me up! Otherwise stay home and cook!

From Tree to Plate- Apple Pie

Housesitting has it's up's and down's but probably one of the coolest things is being able to make apple pie from scratch! Yesterday I noticed how many ripe and delicious Granny Smith apples there were on the apple tree so I grabbed a ladder and headed up to the west side of that tree to collect pounds of gorgeous green- pink fruits. After hunting and gathering, we sent them through a cleaning assembly line, then cored and peeled them. I then sliced them and tossed them in a little lemon juice, and doused them in a mixture of sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and a little flour. Slipped the sliced, seasoned apples in the fridge to marry the flavors and began my dough before heading off to work for the evening. The dough was a simple mixture of flour, salt, chilled butter and ice cold water until made into a ball. Refrigerated the dough for 4 hours! I then rolled out the dough for the top and bottom crust to our delicious pie!

Easy now, place crust on pie baking dish and press around the bottom and sides, place apple filling in the dish (maneuvering apples to fill every open space to pack the pie with flavor), top the apples with 1/3" slices of butter, place other rolled dough over top of the dish and make slices to the top to create ventilation through the pie (see pictures below). Trim the extra dough from the edges and pinch sides together. Here you can get creative with design or just let it be rustic looking... However you like it! Then bake at 425 degrees for the first 15 minutes and then for the next 40-45 minutes at 350 or until the crust is a nice golden brown.

Vooalha!! A beautiful pie! Enjoy with a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream!

Aleph

Today I am beginning a journey. A spiritual journey with the book Aleph, by Paulo Coelho. Page 1 immediately starts off:
"The world has never been as divided as it is now, what with religious wars, genocide, a lack of respect for the planet, economic crisis, depression, poverty, with everyone wanting instant solutions to at least some of the world's problems or their own. And things only look bleaker as we head into the future.
What am I doing here, trying to make my way in a spiritual tradition whose roots are in the remote past, far from all the challenges of the present moment?"

I left this first page with many thoughts. Mainly though, it's theme... "harsh reality" is something that consumes my thoughts often! Stress. Depression. Awestruck, and not in a good way. I sent my sister a picture of this first page knowing that she will find interest too! I read on and hope that some invocation about how to deal with, solve, cure these obstacles in our lives is ahead. Then page 21 happened:
"...I know that I am in all the people surrounding me, and tht they are in me. Together we write the Book of Life, our every encounter determined by fate and our hands joined in the belief that we can make a difference in this world. Everyone contributes a word, a sentence, an image, but in the end it all makes sense: the happiness of one becomes the joy of all."

Perfection. Thank you Paulo for once again bringing light to a dark place. I am thankful for such words of wisdom which help guide me through tough times! Stay tuned for more exerpts, self dialogue and discussion :)

Dance

I have been a nom stop dancing machine lately! Please don't stop the music! I'm so happy to be reaching others through my love for dance! Teaching dance is like a dream for me. Something I never ever saw coming! It is my therapy. It is my solace in a silly stressful world. It is my escape. My freedom. My art. My expression. My happy place. A blessing. A release. I am a leader now. I teach dance. Granted I can feel my aging body tear and fall apart more than I ever have. As I have just RICE'd (rest ice compress elevate) my right knee. I injured it practicing choreography but more specifically, doing backwards coffee grinders... a move that use to give me awful shin splints when I was a much younger dancer. Not to mention I am already fighting with my right shoulder after it decided to stop functioning correctly. Anyway, my point, I am conditioning my body to do hip hop again which is very strenuous on joints and surrounding muscles! But the sacrifice does not outweigh the gain even a little bit. I will wobble into class any day of the week until I'm old and shriveled... Searching for a way to encourage dancers' freedom to express themselves through this remarkable art form. I'm truly truly blessed to be given these opportunities to develop my own style/ genre of dance and fitness. I can only hope that I bring some joy to every students day. I tell them always that they have to smile, sweat and have fun! Every class! I love it love it love it! I have so much I want to accomplish in my life but this makes me feel like the road I'm on ain't all that bad after all :) thanks for listening!

Peach Butter

http://nourishedkitchen.com/peach-butter-recipe/

peach butter

YIELD: 6 pints (48 Servings)
PREP: 5 minsCOOK: 60 minsREADY IN: 1 hr 5 mins
Peach butter is simple to prepare and wonderfully rich in flavor thanks to the addition of spices like allspice, ginger and cloves.
ingredients
15 pounds peaches (pitted and quartered)
3 tablespoons ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
instructions
Working in batches, toss the peaches in a food processor or blender, and blend until smooth.
Pour peach puree into a heavy-bottomed stock pot, and stir in spices. Simmer uncovered over medium-low heat, stirring frequently, for about 60 minutes or until thickened into a fine paste.
Blend until smooth with an immersion blender, pour into pint-sized mason jars and refrigerate or can using the water bath method.

Photography

All of these pics inspire me in some way.

... Thanks for lookin :)