Bob was my first real love…

Bob was my first real love.

I was a late comer to love and loving, having grown up in an emotionally abusive family, as well as having been victim to both incest and rape at a young age. I escaped out into the world on my own at age 13 and was fortunate enough to make it through those early rough years. One of my saving graces was an all summer girl’s camp in Ontario.

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The Unfolding Richness of the Unexpecteds: Reflecting on our time in England Part 2

We left off our last blog post with the realization that one reflective writing session was not nearly enough to recognize the fullness of our time in the British Isles. As Judy has often said since, it felt like we had at least five quite different adventures – just one of which was our 160 Kilometer walk along the Cotswolds Way, though this was what drew us to the journey in the first place. After our first post, Nicky also explored our photos and crafted a visual entry of our awareness of the various surfaces we were walking on. We are now ready to return to some of the other significant encounters (inner and outer) that we had.

Walking Surfaces of the Cotswolds…

Mindfulness means paying attention to where your feet land… 🙂

The Unfolding of a Long Walking Journey (Mostly) in the Cotswolds: Reconnections, Rememberings, and Unexpected New Learnings (Part One)

Hail in the Cotswolds in May!

As per usual, though our Cotswold walk is long over, we’re still processing our experiences and likely will be for months, perhaps even years, after the fact. We’ve come to recognize that there are the immediate experiences and learnings in life (and on long walks!) and then there are those that emerge over time. Some of the things we expected to encounter on our 160 km walk (and did) were the different human cultures and different plants, birds, and other animals, as well as some history, ecology and geology. When being outside all day it was also inevitable that we came into contact with the prevailing British weather patterns – from the tops of our heads to the soles of our feet! While we expected rain, and there was quite a bit in the beginning, we did not expect the several hailstorms that blew through. Though other walkers were seeking shelter and unhappy, we were dressed so as to be warm and dry regardless and revelled in the beauty of these storms. We really do love trips that are filled to the brim with the unexpected!

New Website & Online Class!

Hi Everyone! We just wanted to let you know that we have a new website (and obviously a very cool logo)! If you’re interested in continuing to follow our food adventures, come visit us at RAWareness. Not to worry, we’ll still be right here for our more personal blog entries about Tiny and other life adventures.

We also wanted to let you all know that through RAWareness we will be putting some of our face-to-face raw food workshops online! Now that is guaranteed to be an adventure :). Our first one, Fermented Nut Cheeze, is up and running. Learn to make delicious and nutritious dairy alternatives that will rock your world! And, once registered, you have access to the course site for life so not only can you take the class at your own pace and in your own time, you can also go back to the step-by-step videos and recipes as often as you want or need to. And don’t worry, it’s a fully supported online environment so I’ll always be close by to answer any questions you may have.

So come take a looksie at our  new website and our course site. And please, pass on the course info to anyone you know who might be interested. The class would also make a wonderful gift :).

 

Nicky and Judy’s Summer 2017 Health Food Store Peregrinations

One of the things we really love to do when we travel is visit as many food coops and great health food stores as we can. Some are old favorites we always return to in places we used to live or routes we regularly traveled, and others are new discoveries. We don’t even have to buy anything! Just wandering the aisles feels like we’ve come home. We know folks we encounter there are part of our tribe, so to speak. And there is so much bounty and beauty and so many healthy vibrations from the food and the people. It is also really amazing to us how abundant these stores are. They range from the mega Whole Foods to a proliferation of sweet independent stores in town after town after town throughout New England and are a find for us in the big cities in New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Quebec, and Ontario.

Taking our Nut Cheeze on the Road!

Cashew Cheeze

Macadamia Pepper Cheeze

wrapped up and ready to go!

We’re spending the month of August travelling (we left Tiny at home in Cape Breton!), visiting friends and Judy’s siblings as well as exploring new and deeply familiar places. Our adventures began in Canada and have taken us from Nova Scotia to New Brunswick, Quebec, and Ontario. We then turned to the south, entering the Green Mountains and following some of the major rivers through Vermont and into Western Massachusetts, then heading towards the coast in Boston and Cape Cod. We are now back in some of our stomping grounds in coastal Maine (“the way life should be”), and by the end of the month we will have meandered our way back to our loved home and neighbors in Ross Ferry, NS.

We had a number of fairly eclectic goals for this trip

Ginger, Haskap, Chocolate Chip Muffins (Vegan & Gluten Free)

Ingredients

• ½ cup oil (I used Avocado oil, but coconut or canola would also work!)
• 1 cup (or a little less) agave or other liquid sweetener
• 1 ½ cups unsweetened apple sauce
• 1 ¼ tablespoon ground ginger
• 3 cups gluten free flour (see mix below)
• ¾ tsp xantham gum
• 1 ½ tsp baking soda
• ½ tsp sea salt
• ¾ cup haskap berries
• ¼ cup chocolate chips (or in my case, some chopped up raw chocolate!)

Preheat oven to 350F. Grease and flour a 12 hole muffin pan.

Mix together oil and agave. Add applesauce and ginger, and mix again.

In a separate large bowl, combine flour, xantham gum, baking soda, and sea salt.

Add wet ingredients to dry and combine well. Fold in haskap berries and chocolate chips.

Fill muffin containers to the rim with batter.

Bake  on middle oven rack for 40 minutes, or until golden brown. Rotate after 20 minutes.

Cool in muffin containers for 5 minutes before removing. Cool another 30 minutes on rack before eating!

*Gluten free flour mix:

• 4 cups brown rice flour
• 1 1/3 cups potato starch
• 2/3 cup tapioca flour

Recipe adapted from Gingerbread Muffins in The Allergen-Free baker’s Handbook, by Cybele Pascal.

Encountering the Self through Writing Spiritual Memoir

Judy is offering her Spiritual Autobiography course online! Yahoo!

Dates: September 10 — October 8, 2017

Description:

While most writing workshops tell us to write about what we know, it turns out that in spiritual memoir, or autobiography, we can find ourselves writing ourselves into unfamiliar territory, with the writing process itself becoming a path towards greater and more profound understanding. In our time together, we will work collectively and individually to begin to uncover what is sacred in our lives, following the thread of how and when it became so. Elizabeth Andrew’s words can encourage us along this path, in acknowledging that, “The effort of translating experience into story seems to satisfy a spiritual need” (Writing the Sacred Journey, p. 5).

In this supportive online environment we’ll engage in both writing and reading spiritual autobiography. By writing, sharing, and at times rewriting, our own short pieces we’ll learn to follow the words themselves to take us to our core. Reading and discussing published essays with the lens of spiritual memoir, will allow us to explore other ways of writing autobiography, demonstrating what might be effective and moving. Or not! Reading in this way can be a key to writing and to personal unfolding.

First and foremost, this four week-long workshop is about becoming courageous and taking those first steps into the mystery of the self – one that we simultaneously know well but also fear to encounter.

Staying Awake to Who I Am

Cool mint patties

The raw chocolate journey

Rolling truffles

Ganache tarts

It’s interesting how the cliché that life is not a destination but a journey resonates with deeper meaning for us from time to time. When one chooses to step off of a well-trodden path (and we have chosen to step off many!) there are turning points when the whole pattern we are ostensibly crafting seems to shift into a totally different focus. In a recent period of reflection we became aware of how making a living and making a life are very different goals, and we are totally into the latter and only hoping to accomplish the former.

I recently dipped my toes back into the world of raw chocolate in a public arena after quite a bit of down time since my decision not to become an online raw chocolate entrepreneur.