Enjoying the Silence

Yesterday my husband and I enjoyed our first Thai meal out in a very long time - at Rim Nam Thai in Hebden Bridge. We had our two year old daughter along, but even that seemed easy. My son has gone to stay at his grandma's for a record three nights, since he's off school this week. Its the first time he'll be away from us for that long, so we'll see how it goes, but I know last month when he went for a night and a day, it was strangely, but wonderfully silent in the house.

We were able to take our son out to dinner in restaurants when he was my daughter's age, and he did fine (in fact he ate alot more than he does now!), and to his credit he still does pretty well, he's not the same as when he's in school, i.e. he doesn't get up and run about and fidget and make loud noises. He does wind his sister up though, and complain about the food, loudly!

I'm currently reading Multicoloured Mayhem, Parenting the Many Shades of Adolescents and Children with Autism, Asperger Syndrome and AD/HD, by Jacqui Jackson and can't help but feel I've got it easy with only two children, and so far only one exhibiting autistic spectrum tendencies. Nevertheless, its never really easy and I notice now (even though I miss him terribly) how much more relaxed I am, the house is, its like when the electricity goes off, and all the hum ceases for a serene quietness. I've cleaned the bathroom and its still clean a day later!!!

I'm not saying that my daughter is completely quiet, she's taking full advantage of her terrible twos, but she is more relaxed as well, and naturally enjoys the sole attention. I worry that she's learning some of my son's (atypical) behaviour, which is definitely not what I want!!! I also never seem to shout when my son is away. I don't pride myself on shouting, and its one thing I thought I'd never do as a parent, but as many parents with challenging children will know, its not always that simple. There are many times when my son just pushes and pushes and shouts at me and at everyone else, and its really hard for me to take a few deep breathes! And I know that my daughter also sometimes unfairly ends up on the end of the firing line.

So why should it not be peaceful etc. while my son is at school for the day? It just doesn't feel the same for whatever reason, it seems the house is still buzzing when he leaves and if we've had a difficult morning especially. We woke up later than usual this morning, without having to have closed the bedroom door for the night (because usually DS is up at 6 am and banging about on his merry way). I understand the need for respite as many people have written about and I am now very grateful that grandma and grandad have taken the step of having thier grandson over for extended periods of time. He's different when he's there too of course, enjoying the attention that he doesn't have to share with his sister, and playing as many video games and watching as much Sky as he can stuff into each day!

**My camera is broken at the moment, so that photo is courtesy of yorkshirelife.co.uk, the canal outside the marina in Hebden Bridge, where we ate and watched the ducks and canal boats, to my daughter's delight.

The Ultimate Tea Diet

This is what it looks like outside today, on our road.. that's a wall where water tends to stream down, and its completely frozen. We've been in a deep freeze for about what, about a week now? The crokuses and other signs of spring have been frozen in their tracks.

And this down here was the wall in December as you might recognise from a photo Friday shot.. I think it is now colder than usual for this area.

Still though, its not as bad as Chicago wind chill factors. So why is this post title the Ultimate Tea Diet? Well, when its this cold outside what better than to sit inside with a nice hot cup of tea. That's a quintessential English thing to do anyway.
But this is not an English book I'm about to review here, its actually American, written by Mark (Dr. Tea) Ukra, a tea expert from California. Coffee is taking over here, so maybe tea will take over America... well maybe, maybe not. The premise of the book is about using tea as a means of losing weight, but it has other far reaching health benefits.
When we moved back to England from America, both my husband and I were carrying about 15 extra pounds that we didn't need. We drank mainly coffee in America, even my 'very much a tea drinker' husband. Now he's back to tea mainly, and I have recently given up the coffee, though I still enjoy a good cup now and again. In addition to more walking and some dietary changes, like not eating out hardly ever, we both lost those 15 pounds. Then I had my second child and they came back again. Now they are going again. I believe the tea does help, though its not doing my teeth any good. There is a suggestion in the book to rinse your mouth with water after every cup of black tea, to help prevent the staining. I'm incorporating more green and white teas to reduce the chance of staining, but hey, coffee stains as well!

The book is very informative and provides an entertaining history of tea, along with some scientific facts about the benefits of tea over coffee. Coffee for instance, contrary to popular belief, actually slows down your metabolism, traps body fat and raises blood sugars in your body. It has some benefits as well, but on the whole, you'd do better drinking more tea than coffee.

The cooking with tea section is enlightening with recipes for including tea in food, making tea rubs, and adding brewed tea into stocks and marinades or making things like a tea fruit smoothie. The weight loss can be attributed to tea's main ingredients that help with metabolism, Caffeine (though not as much as coffee, so less damaging), L-Theanine which comes from the Camellia Sinensis tea plant, and ECGC which is in all tea and is a chemical compound known for its antioxidant properties. It has to be real tea though, green, black or white, but not herbal or Rooibos as these do not contain the same compounds.

As an American, I like the tip on making tea ice cubes out of your favourite tea, so when you want Iced Tea, you get a full flavour tea instead of watered down teas when the cubes melt (pg.254). Though I can't even think about that right now!! There's alot to be gained from this book, even if you are not necessarily looking to lose weight. Its about a lifestyle, and making lifestyle changes to last rather than just to lose unwanted pounds. I tried the Quick and Easy Broccoli Tea Soup which was tasty, and enhanced by the Oolong Tea. You can find more info on the website http://ultimateteadiet.com/

In Britain, buy The Ultimate Tea Diet by Mark Ukra published by HarperCollins, 2008 here. In America, you can buy it from Amazon.com and most leading bookstores.

Sumptuous Summer Reads

I am still stiff in the neck, arms, and back from my hopped-up-on- caffeine day yesterday.. I had a fantastic driving lesson, drove from Halifax -back home, which is about 3 miles or so, and I didn't stall or panic the instructor! I am learning manual for those who don't know this already, and although I've been a driver for 25 years, I never learned manual before. I am really happy about it, and feeling so much more natural and confident than I did about 7 years ago when I tried to learn.

I also had a job interview yesterday, first in I don't know how many years, and it was nerve wracking. I don't think I got the job, but I'm not too worried as my gut was really saying to me that I dont want to leave my daughter just yet.. not full time anyway. So chalk it up to experience. Today has been much more relaxing and I've been discovering my summer reading list.

Granted, I'll be lucky if I get through all of these, and then there's Harry Potter as well. I'm still making my way through the Chamber of Secrets with my son, who is just now (6 and 3/4 years old) discovering the wonder of Hogwarts. In between his reading, I seem to have picked somewhat of a world war II era theme, with Suite Francaise, The Gift of Rain (just before WWII I think) and The Book Thief.

Being Jewish in WW II time resonates deeply with me, and since I believe in reincarnation, I feel that it resonates because I have lived it. Still, I have much to learn and thus seek out information wherever I can. Not all of these reads are related to that of course, and I also favour women's stories such as A Thousand Splendid Suns which tells the story of a woman's life under Taliban rule in Afghanistan. The 1920's is also an era that I really relate to and that is also on my list, this time in England at The House at Riverton. I also can't forget my lovely city of Chicago and will be reading Sin in the Second City by Karen Abbot, just as soon as it is available here.

The hopeful summer reading list then:

A Thousand Splendid Suns by Kaled Hosseini

Sin in the Second City by Karen Abbot

The Gift of Rain by Tan Twan Eng

Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

The House at Riverton by Kate Morton

Secrets

What a nice little secret (maybe not anymore) I have discovered, or should I say a perk of being a writer?? The HarperCollins mailing list for book reviews has just supplied me with two brand new books for FREE. I now need to work my way through them in order to review them. The Good Kids, Bad Habits one has a rather lengthy test to take for all ages of children, to see how healthy their eating habits are. Half way through the test and we are doing well.. but being vegetarian and health conscious, I wasn't too surprised. I think this book is aimed at getting people more interested in raising healthy and happy kids, but it seems that there's a whole lot of people out there who are unlikely to even look at it.. considering that they don't think or know they have bad habits. I've probably already mentioned the dearth of tv shows here about overweight people, horribly misbehaved kids, people who drink too much, etc.. it seems either the general public has no control over the programming, or this is what we crave.

Very frequently (well most of the time) on one of the programmes, You are what you eat, the participants don't eat ANY vegetables. Many don't even know what broccoli looks like. So their children are growing up not knowing as well. I don't know, but seems to me that even if you don't eat these things, you should at least recognise them in the store.So perhaps this book may help, although it is American.

Anyway, onto other secrets.. the law of attraction, cosmic ordering has delivered a car to us--at last!! Last month I was thinking of it and had the feeling (which I shared with my husband) that the car would come from someone we knew, so we should stay alert. And yesterday, in casual conversation, my husband's cousin mentioned a car he just bought, but is not really using and do we want to buy it? So not only have we been presented with a suitable car, but it is also available to us on a payment plan (with no interest of course!).

This video link was emailed to me from the publisher of The Mother magazine. The film was made with the intention of having one million people view it, and remember who they truly are. Its a little bit of positivity.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMMt5xg9YXU . Enjoy.