Author: Erin

I write - all the time - mostly random thoughts on that which makes me happy every day of my life.
Words in Sentences

“from the help” @ study, saint louis, foggy day

by ErinLeave a Comment on “from the help” @ study, saint louis, foggy day

Parents traditionally delight in their children taking their first steps, demolishing their baby size birthday cakes, dressed up in a costume… a bow… a little baby tux.

As a mother, I know the feeling of delight when I am delighting in my children. I have actively stayed still in present moments to strictly observe whatever they are doing – watching the game they came into on their own, watching their slow waking moments, watching them watching something all on their own.

Matter of fact, this ties into an early intention I set for things like outings to the zoo: let them sit as long as they wish. It doesn’t matter to me how much ground we cover, we can sit in front of the hippos, we can camp out in the birdhouse. Dwell. Delight.

This made for many childhood younger year memories but also, last year, when my 13 year old stepdaughter came to live in St. Louis for 6 weeks in the fall. Prior to the official move, the marriage; David and I let her give it a shot. I took her to the zoo and was mesmerized by how long she could sit, watching… observing. So I, too, sat… watched… observed.

I remember one time I delighted in Ellen; a time so uniquely unconventional for typical delighting that it was formative to my way of parenting. I was sitting on the couch, she was playing on the floor – maybe 2 1/2 or 3 years old. She got up from where she was playing, walked to the end table, grabbed a tissue and wiped her nose.

I cocked my head, squinted and smiled. Did she just get up from playing, aware of a tickle in her nose, know to get a tissue, get one and care for herself? Did she help herself become more comfortable? Surely, she was aware of herself.

Fast forward five years later, she is 7 or 8 and her parents are divorced. I moved out into a small apartment and – though I was experiencing a tremendous amount of relief and freedom in my life – I was naturally processing grief, specifically in relationship to the loss my children took in the break up and the definitions that were shifting for them.

There was one night I went into the bathroom to get ready for bed. It was a peachy-pink tiled bathroom with a big deep tub, stained glass window and warm lighting over a big huge vanity mirror. On the counter was my toothbrush, resting on a fold of toilet paper with toothpaste on it. Next to it was a note, “From the help of Ellen”.

From the help of Ellen.

My heart, to this day, flutters when I think about this – this concept of each of us having a reservoir of help. Bounty of help, reserves of help, to offer ourselves and to offer others in this world; specifically those we are doing life with.

I think about her early demonstration of helping herself with her runny nose. I imagine a tank of help, swirling with awareness, from which she took a small withdrawal and then the experience of being cared for depositing more back in. Likewise, that night, kissing her sleeping soft cheeks – I deposited back into her tank.

I wonder about this concept a lot. That we have help (noun) instead of we help (verb). When we live in a way where giving is the action and the helping, the hoping stop and instead we have help to give, we have hope to give – does this shift the way we feel? Does it impact the way we consider ourselves able?

It’s a foggy grey day today and I have a few things to button up before starting up some work at 1p. I am curious if this thinking feels different to anybody out there. That’s all for now :) namaste…. erin

Words in Sentences

about the towels @ coffee on the couch – saint louis

by Erin1 Comment on about the towels @ coffee on the couch – saint louis

This is going to be one of those posts that I read back in ten years and remember the sweet times of the pandemic, the newness of my marriage, the awareness of the kids and my transition to my fully creative life. It’s long but I want to capture my mind in this moment. :)

In exploring the mysteries of the towels, I also explore myself. My controls, my wiring, my growth and flexibility. This really may sound so incredibly trite but the fact of the matter is, when I go through the morning routine in the house (much like any one person going through any one routine), you begin to notice the things about your self and about others / the world that make the routine different. Like a rat in a maze, you evolve past certain cruxes, you recognize patterns and take advantage of them, etc.

After David and I have at least one cup of coffee together and some early morning conversation – which, if he is lucky, is dusted with the wondrous sharing of my dreams – I eventually get out of bed, get semi dressed for the day at home and I head to the laundry room off the kitchen.

I fold what is in the dryer, stacking it into piles by room on the washer then distribute the laundry accordingly. I live by medium sized loads, laundry by purpose or person and folding as it comes out of the dyer. Growing up in a massive household and years folding for the Gap have set the direction in my laundering.

With the laundry put up and what was in the washer switched or started, I make my way through the bathrooms. When David and I combined households, we brought together a lot of towels and I decided to assign each of our three bathrooms (thank God we have three bathrooms) a specific color towel. This allows me a certain level of situational awareness of what bathrooms factored by who needs to shower / who is home should have their towels washed and stocked.

The other life hack I put in place is I stocked each under sink space with some cleaning supplies so that, in the mornings, I can comet the toilet, wipe down the sinks, switches and handles, viral check anything, gather towels, gather trash and restock. Doing this for 5 minutes each morning instead of Saturday morning haul is honestly one of the best ways I have changed the game. It also has allowed me to step into this compelling mystery of the towels.

In the upstairs bathroom, the one for the four teenage females, there is a gold basket on the floor that takes the rolled up thick blue towels. They get a patterned towel over the side of the bathtub and they get the white and light gray washcloths. There is a hand towel ring to the right of the sink, a 4 hook rack on the back of the door, a hook by the shower and a towel rack by the tub.

On a routine basis, like genuine routine (regardless of the number of hooks I have added and put in place for bath towels) a bath towel is put through the hand towel ring along with the hand towel. The gold basket of neatly rolled up towels has one or two strewn in there on top of neatly rolled ones and the washcloths are all catty-wompus.

Are the towels strewn in the gold basket dirty?

Do certain people have certain towel / washcloth preferences?

Why is the bath towel on the hand towel ring when the hooks on the back of the door are empty?

The main floor 2nd bathroom gets the white towels and the mix a match wash cloths. The white bath towels get folded tightly and stocked under the sink, with a stack of washcloths next to them. There is a hand towel ring to the left of the sink. A bath towel hook to the right of the shower. And that’s pretty much it. There is a little narrow wooden shelf on the wall that I made out of the front of a drawer, it is really decorative only outside of if a makeup bag of a guest needs a place to hang out.

A normal day presents to me two mysteries in this bathroom: the hand towel hanging on for dear life (which may be the simplest mystery to solve: an impatient almost 8 year old) and one of the bath towels *on the little narrow wooden shelf*. The hook by the shower may or may not have a one or 5 towels hanging, which really is just about shower surges when multiple showers occur in a day. But it is the bath towel on the shelf that gets me.

I mean – just, why? This will happen even after I set the bathroom up, have a fresh hand towel hanging and after no showers have been taken. It’s a towel, still mostly folded, on the shelf.

The last bathroom is the master bathroom. This towel gets my hair and face towels (smaller, softer towels passed down to me from my Grandmother), the black and grey towels, the black washcloths and the funky colored washcloths. There is a hand towel by the sink, a towel rack on the shower door, a towel rack on the wall, a hook on the wall and a basket on the floor for the washcloths.

Things that are constant: David puts his shower towel over the shower, I put a hair and face towel on the hook on the wall and I put my bath towel on the rack. The towel stock goes under the sink. Once a towel gets a couple of showers, it becomes the floor towel.

The thing about the floor towel is that I don’t actually love the floor towel to stay on the floor in between uses. BUT. Every time I think to myself “David knows his towel is over the shower – that is where he puts his shower towel” – and confidently hang the floor towel on the vacant rack on the shower door to dry and available for re-use (literally every time I have done this), when I go into the bathroom after he has his next shower, the floor towel is still on the rack and his shower towel is on the floor and a new towel is hanging over the shower.

Try as I might, my words “if there is not a towel on the floor, it means I hung it up right here. A towel hanging on this will never be your towel and it will never be mine. It will only ever be a towel that has been on the floor and that you can put on the floor again…” just do not seem to provide the reassurance.

Guys. I know this is a lot about towels. But I find it absolutely fascinating. I am fascinated by my consistency, honestly. But I am also completely fascinated by observing my people. How they work, what they need. From a personal growth perspective, I am fascinated with my complete acceptance and the fact I am not trying to change any of this. I caution on the side of dirty and throw them in the wash. I let the towel on the shelf sit a day or two. I straighten up the bath towel on the hand towel ring. I leave the towel on the floor.

One of the main things I can feel shifting in me is how important it is to allow people their space among the expectations. How the system does work but it works better if there is grace and flexibility. I mean. These things are essential.

Ok. Time to put the blue towels in the dryer. :)

Words in Sentences

Butternut Squash Soup @ Tuesday Mornings in My Office – Webster, MO

by ErinLeave a Comment on Butternut Squash Soup @ Tuesday Mornings in My Office – Webster, MO

I took Tuesday mornings off through Thanksgiving to give myself a little buffer and a mild taste of freedom. I have all sorts of interesting things to write about these days… There is this towel mystery going on in my house (a real page turner) and I continue on my journey of transforming little random pieces of resentment that pop up into compassion. That actually is really an interesting bit.

We are working on a new allowance plan to roll out to the kids that will focus less on them being helpful and more on them being human. Ya know, with screen time goals and bonuses for how they spend their leisure time.

But, for now, I want to share with you a little recipe I put together yesterday. I didn’t take any pictures so you’ll have to use your imagination.

I really love how the soup turned out and it is pretty great for your immune system per my expert nutritional analysis. I am especially thinking about this because a couple of my readers have little babies and this is totally something I would imagine they would absolutely love cool or warm or even in a little frozen treat if they are teething.

Here you go:

Ingredients: Butternut Squash, Carrots, Apples, Celery, Onion, Yellow Curry Spice, Garlic, Cinnamon, Nutmeg, Ginger or Ginger Tea, Chicken Boullion, Honey, Coconut Milk, Simply Nutritious Mega Antioxidant Juice or Lime Juice and Peaches, Pumpkin Seeds.

  1. Half a butternut squash and put it in the oven to roast. I had it at 375 maybe for 40 minutes. I also used a well seasonsed cast iron skillet. Do the whole bit where you scoop the seeds and prick with a fork over the skin that should be facing up when the halves are laid down.
  2. Peel and roughly cut up 4 or 5 carrots, roughly cut up 4 apples (honeycrips, medium -ish), cut up 2 or 3 celery stalks, cut up a medium or large yellow onion. Put all that in one giant bowl and toss with some oil, 1 T yellow curry spice, 1 T minced garlic, 1 tsp Cinnamon, 1/4 tsp nutmeg. I happened to be fortunate enough to have left over oil from when my oldest daughter made donut holes over the weekend so I used that to toss it but anything works. Roast the fruits and veggies until they are smelling good and a little brown.
  3. In a large pot, put 4 cups of water, 2 ginger tea bags (or some minced ginger – I was out so I used ginger tea and just taped the tea bags to the outside so they would not slip) and a little chicken boullion (optional) and 1 T of honey and bring that to a boil then turn off the heat. This should smell like something you want to drink / soothing / comforting. Take the tea bags out.
  4. When the squash is done, pull that out and spoon the squash out and add to your ginger chicken broth. Use an immersion blender to get that going first.
  5. Add 1 cup of Simply Nutritious Mega Antioxidant juice. It’s apples, carrots, peach and lime – I suppose in theory you could always add peaches to your fruit roast and some lime juice.
  6. Put all your roasted fruits and veggies in and use the immersion blender to get it smooth.
  7. Add yellow curry, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg , more juice to taste. I drank about two glasses of this from a wine glass while I was cooking. This soup is truly a labor of love and this antioxidant juice is a little treat while you are giving.
  8. Add a can of coconut milk and blend
  9. Garnish with pumpkin seeds

David and I are doing a little bit of reclaiming our health this fall. There are so many different ways we are considering changing things up in our life. I have been finding a lot of joy in my morning routine and eager to spend some energy on some writing and yoga stuff I have on my mind.

I am also starting to think through our ofrenda and how I want to celebrate Dia De Los Muertos (Day of the Dead) coming up. We have lost some really lovely people in our lives, whose energy and vibrations are still very much a force in our day to day. I am thinking of putting a little emphasis on the celebration of them this year.

Plus we have Maddox’s 8th birthday hot on Halloween’s heels. The kids start phasing back into in person learning this fall which I am hopeful is not only healthy and safe but also gives them a little taste of normalcy and community.

Okay – time for the weekly BYOD (Buy your own drink / donut) Dunkin run. If only there were a way to make me feel better about the single use plastics…. maybe containers for water for painting the ofrenda…..

:)