Balaboosta & Favorite Poem

Balaboosta (n.)(bah-lah-b00-sta) A Yiddish term meaning the perfect housewife, homemaker, wonderful mother, cook, and gracious hostess. She does it all and does it well. (This is an impossible-goal-to-achieve word!)

I've had a week. A good week. We got back from vacation last Friday and this week was busy. We restarted homeschooling after a long break, we began a new way of eating healthy (no more 'diets' to follow, just healthy foods.) I found the Balaboosta website while looking up recipes today to marinate the Pork Loin. Yes, I was cooking. Let me tell you what happens when you start eating right. You feel better. You feel more awake, less lazy/tired. You feel like you can handle more. At least I have.

This week I cooked almost every night (made other meals too), was more involved with the homeschooling, caught up on some reading, creating art, cleaning & dishes too. I'm involved more. My family may not have noticed, but I did. I noticed a different feeling while cooking, cleaning and during just basic living. I'm happy. Usually I'm so stubborn about not wanting to have to do everything for everyone that I slack off because you know its just going to get messed up after I clean up something right? KWIM?

I think I'm getting the point of my whole 'Live Consciously' challenge for this year. I want to be a better wife, mom, teacher, etc... It's important. There is a certain joy and self satisfaction in putting others first sometimes. I didn't realize how much I had slipped into a me-me or don't-think-about-it phase. This is the year to change some things. How I take care of my family, how I take care of me (hence the new eating.)

I've been tired of us all eating different foods/meals. We had a vegetarian, a lo-fatter, a sometimes lo-carber (that's me) and a self-proclaimed carbetarian (the little one. ha) We never ate the same thing, at the same time, in the same room. I'm planning to change that. The teen and I sat down and planned 1 month of healthy meals that everyone can eat a part of. DH and I are both just eating healthy instead of focusing on some fad diet. The little one is eating more veggies now too.

I'm back to creating things as I said. One of my favorites is for this week's Creative Therapy Catalyst. The prompt should be up today. Go participate! It's a great way to get inspired.

Creative Therapy: 'What is your favorite poem? Why?'

Why:
I love the 'How Do I Love Thee?' poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. I'm not completely sure why. I remember in Jr. High taking a calligraphy class. We had to choose something to write and I chose this poem. It's so beautiful, rolls off the tongue. As you read the words you can see her clutching his letters in her hands, writing with a feather pen and inkwell, telling him how much he means to her. You can feel her love for him, it's complete, it's whole, it's unconditional. I like to think it represents my love for my husband and my daughters. I don't think I could have expressed my love for them any better than Mrs. Browning did.


Techniques: Nothing real special here. All I can say is scraps, scraps, scraps! I keep several bags & a stuffed drawer of scraps and just start pulling pieces out and slowly a combination of colors seem to start going together. Even the stamped pieces were scraps I had saved. I recommend keeping everything, much to my DH's dismay.