Did a little revamping and tweaking and I think I like it. My www.GuiltlessCafe.com website has a new look. I hope that this new format will allow me to add more (and maybe motivate me too).
Anyways, check it out, tell me what you think. www.GuiltlessCafe.com
I will talk more about the businesses I am involved in in this blog so, come back now, ya' hear?
Later
Thursday, February 7, 2008
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Election USA Super Tuesday
The National reports, the US campaign is so engaging that a majority of Canadians would trade in their vote in the next Canadian federal election for a chance to cast a ballot in the American race.
We haven't had a majority of Canadians vote on anything for a while.
Interesting...and frightening...
We haven't had a majority of Canadians vote on anything for a while.
Interesting...and frightening...
15 Ways to a Better Life
Well, I don't know if they really work but my life is pretty good thus far. So, here they are:
1. Eat real food, eat more raw foods (nuts, seeds, vegetables, fruit), don’t eat too much, eat more plants. Not that I don’t like a good steak or anything…just eat less of it.
2. Eat fibre. Eat it whenever you can, sneak it in if you have to. You CAN find yummy ways to at fibre. Don’t be afraid.
3. Avoid partially or fully hydrogenated oils. Guess what, they lied to you about margarine. Don’t eat it. Butter really is better – just don’t eat the whole stick. Use cold pressed and unrefined oils (extra virgin olive oil, macadamia nut oil).
4. Omegas. Take some. 3, 6, 9, they are all good, even better when you get them all. Look for good supplements preferably certified organic-cold pressed and unrefined. Eat fish more often.
5. Do not eat fried foods, no really, stop it. Bake your foods instead.
6. White is bad. No I am not racist, I am talking about food. Avoid white foods (white potatoes, refined white flour, white sugar, white pasta etc.).
7. Try to eat unprocessed foods. Shop on the OUTSIDE aisles at your local grocery store. Dangerous high-glycemic foods lurk in the middle aisles. Stay calm and stay away.
8. Eat your beans. They are good for you!
9. Eat smaller meals and eat snacks but choose healthy snacks.
10. Drink water. Just water…don’t add “stuff” to it.
11. Avoid artificial sweeteners. Use natural sweeteners: honey, maple syrup, or stevia. If you really want to use sugar, find raw unprocessed sugars. They actually taste better.
12. Lower your salt intake – hide that saltshaker, well at the very least keep it off the table.
13. Your mom was right about taking your vitamins – find a good one and take it. Do your research. Educate yourself.
14. Walk, cycle, run, LIFT WEIGHTS, do something.
15. Enjoy yourself. Do things you love to do. Spend time with people that make you happy. Avoid the negatives in life. Laugh. Love. Live.
Disclaimer: The above statements have not been evaluated by any governing agencies nor will they ever be evaluated by any governing agencies. Heck, I don’t even care if you evaluate them. I just thought they sounded good when I wrote them.
1. Eat real food, eat more raw foods (nuts, seeds, vegetables, fruit), don’t eat too much, eat more plants. Not that I don’t like a good steak or anything…just eat less of it.
2. Eat fibre. Eat it whenever you can, sneak it in if you have to. You CAN find yummy ways to at fibre. Don’t be afraid.
3. Avoid partially or fully hydrogenated oils. Guess what, they lied to you about margarine. Don’t eat it. Butter really is better – just don’t eat the whole stick. Use cold pressed and unrefined oils (extra virgin olive oil, macadamia nut oil).
4. Omegas. Take some. 3, 6, 9, they are all good, even better when you get them all. Look for good supplements preferably certified organic-cold pressed and unrefined. Eat fish more often.
5. Do not eat fried foods, no really, stop it. Bake your foods instead.
6. White is bad. No I am not racist, I am talking about food. Avoid white foods (white potatoes, refined white flour, white sugar, white pasta etc.).
7. Try to eat unprocessed foods. Shop on the OUTSIDE aisles at your local grocery store. Dangerous high-glycemic foods lurk in the middle aisles. Stay calm and stay away.
8. Eat your beans. They are good for you!
9. Eat smaller meals and eat snacks but choose healthy snacks.
10. Drink water. Just water…don’t add “stuff” to it.
11. Avoid artificial sweeteners. Use natural sweeteners: honey, maple syrup, or stevia. If you really want to use sugar, find raw unprocessed sugars. They actually taste better.
12. Lower your salt intake – hide that saltshaker, well at the very least keep it off the table.
13. Your mom was right about taking your vitamins – find a good one and take it. Do your research. Educate yourself.
14. Walk, cycle, run, LIFT WEIGHTS, do something.
15. Enjoy yourself. Do things you love to do. Spend time with people that make you happy. Avoid the negatives in life. Laugh. Love. Live.
Disclaimer: The above statements have not been evaluated by any governing agencies nor will they ever be evaluated by any governing agencies. Heck, I don’t even care if you evaluate them. I just thought they sounded good when I wrote them.
Friday, February 1, 2008
The Italian Mother
I am Italian. My parents are first generation Italian-Canadian immigrants. They are proud to be Canadian but they are also proud to be Italian, proud of the heritage, proud of their family, and ultimately proud of their homeland, the motherland. They should be proud, period.
I also married an Italian man. Along with my Italian husband came a large Italian family. Lucky, hey? Actually, I am. Growing up, there were five of us, my parents, myself, and two brothers. My parents left everything back home in the “old country”, including the relatives. I admire them for leaving everything to take a risk such as that just for our future, their children’s future (despite the dang cold weather we have here, really dad, what were you thinking? You lived in the Mediterranean?!).
Along with this sacrifice came the lack of big family dinners, lots of aunts and uncles, more cousins than you can count, and of course, a Nonna (grandmother). Nonna is the hierarchy of the Italian family. Oh, I know you have heard the Italian man is the head of the household, the king of the castle, the Godfather, blah, blah, blah. Try to tell Nonna that. In reality, as I quickly learned through the courting years with my husband, the Nonna is the supreme leader of any Italian household.
Funny though that the typical North American woman has always felt that only here in the free country will a woman be considered an equal to a man or perhaps even superior. Not so, in an Italian family, the woman is the ruler. Outwardly, you would not think so and it would never be publicly displayed because, really, what would the neighbours think? But, if Pappa made the wrong decision while at an outing together you would be sure that Mamma would be pulling his ear when they got home and telling him how things will be and the next day Mamma would get her way of course, all the while convincing everyone that it was Pappa’s idea. The only one that can change Mamma’s mind is Nonna. If Nonna said it was so, then so it was, no one questioned, and no one went against her wishes. Her importance in my husband’s family was so vital that upon her passing the togetherness and closeness was never the same. Perhaps, it had now been handed down to the Nonnas next in line (our generation’s mothers) that now each family had its own tightness. Or perhaps the family just got too big and family get-togethers became too difficult, whatever it was it was never the same without Nonna.
Having seen this first hand at many a family gathering with my husband’s family, I began to question and observe what was really happening in our house. Was Dad really in charge as I had thought all these years? I would watch and I would listen. My mother always seemed as thought she respected my father’s words and decisions with such high regard and to this day I don’t doubt at all that she did but somehow I could see she really did have and still has something else. She has meaning and conviction. She believes in the family, the strength of its closeness, the importance of its love. Perhaps there was so much more to her words, “Your father thinks…”.
The Italian woman holds her head up high. She walks with honour. Her husband also walks with his head high and with honour for he has a strong wife, and she tells him “Stand up straight and be proud!” And he listens.
I also married an Italian man. Along with my Italian husband came a large Italian family. Lucky, hey? Actually, I am. Growing up, there were five of us, my parents, myself, and two brothers. My parents left everything back home in the “old country”, including the relatives. I admire them for leaving everything to take a risk such as that just for our future, their children’s future (despite the dang cold weather we have here, really dad, what were you thinking? You lived in the Mediterranean?!).
Along with this sacrifice came the lack of big family dinners, lots of aunts and uncles, more cousins than you can count, and of course, a Nonna (grandmother). Nonna is the hierarchy of the Italian family. Oh, I know you have heard the Italian man is the head of the household, the king of the castle, the Godfather, blah, blah, blah. Try to tell Nonna that. In reality, as I quickly learned through the courting years with my husband, the Nonna is the supreme leader of any Italian household.
Funny though that the typical North American woman has always felt that only here in the free country will a woman be considered an equal to a man or perhaps even superior. Not so, in an Italian family, the woman is the ruler. Outwardly, you would not think so and it would never be publicly displayed because, really, what would the neighbours think? But, if Pappa made the wrong decision while at an outing together you would be sure that Mamma would be pulling his ear when they got home and telling him how things will be and the next day Mamma would get her way of course, all the while convincing everyone that it was Pappa’s idea. The only one that can change Mamma’s mind is Nonna. If Nonna said it was so, then so it was, no one questioned, and no one went against her wishes. Her importance in my husband’s family was so vital that upon her passing the togetherness and closeness was never the same. Perhaps, it had now been handed down to the Nonnas next in line (our generation’s mothers) that now each family had its own tightness. Or perhaps the family just got too big and family get-togethers became too difficult, whatever it was it was never the same without Nonna.
Having seen this first hand at many a family gathering with my husband’s family, I began to question and observe what was really happening in our house. Was Dad really in charge as I had thought all these years? I would watch and I would listen. My mother always seemed as thought she respected my father’s words and decisions with such high regard and to this day I don’t doubt at all that she did but somehow I could see she really did have and still has something else. She has meaning and conviction. She believes in the family, the strength of its closeness, the importance of its love. Perhaps there was so much more to her words, “Your father thinks…”.
The Italian woman holds her head up high. She walks with honour. Her husband also walks with his head high and with honour for he has a strong wife, and she tells him “Stand up straight and be proud!” And he listens.
Listen Up!
I multitask..doesn't every mother...but because of this, I think I may have a really short attention span. You see, I finished writing that sentence and then I stopped. What was I going to write after that? I am never really sure so then I make something else up and hope that I will remember what I was really going to say before everyone stops listening to me and walks away. It doesn’t always work.
In my family, if you stop to take a breath someone else starts talking and if you are like me you won’t remember what you wanted to say when they finally give you a chance to speak. I have three older children and a self-employed husband. They always have so much more to talk about than me it seems. Or maybe it is just that as a mother I have assumed the role of listener over the years.
I work from home, handling the administrative side of the business my husband and I have built up over the last 15 or so years. I have worked out of the home as well when the children were school aged but we have always had our business to run so I was never working full time away from the home. This has allowed me the privilege, although I sometimes may have questioned that description, to be here for everyone. I am here when someone needs a ride, when someone needs some food, or when someone needs an ear. Mostly, I am here, and they have all learned to count on that. Unfortunately, on the flip side, it seems to have taken away my ability to be anything but The Listener. I work alone all day and speak on the phone very rarely. When I do, I am listening to customers. When my family comes home, I am listening to them.
Here is how it typically plays out: Imagine a table at dinner, the food is home cooked and the house has been cleaned, the family sits around talking about their respective days. They all seem to be talking to me. Or maybe I just feel that way and I have the desire to listen to everyone talking. I try to listen to one, then the other, then another, now the first is clamoring for my attention again, “I didn’t finish”, throw in a parent or an in-law or two, they demand respect, oh dear, oh no, who was I listening to in the first place? I think you get the picture. See I maybe really do have a short attention span.
How do I treat this developed affliction? How do I get others to listen to me? Wait, I sound pathetic. When I attend a party or a get together at a friends’ home, they listen, they even tell me I am entertaining sometimes. I do get invited again so this is a good sign, right? Well then, what is the problem? Why is it that at home I am The Listener? I am fun, I am intelligent, I have things to say. Really.
Now my children will read this and end up saying “But sometimes you don’t listen. Sometimes you just LOOK like you are listening”.
Err, umm, yes, I do that too.
Remember I work from home and many a days I have been busy doing my work and the school bus arrives, the kids let themselves in, sit down in the empty chair near my desk that awaits there arrival and proceed to tell me about their day. I tried really hard to listen all those times but I really needed to finish what I was doing so I could make you all some supper!
Talk to me, then but wait for your sister to finish her story first.
In my family, if you stop to take a breath someone else starts talking and if you are like me you won’t remember what you wanted to say when they finally give you a chance to speak. I have three older children and a self-employed husband. They always have so much more to talk about than me it seems. Or maybe it is just that as a mother I have assumed the role of listener over the years.
I work from home, handling the administrative side of the business my husband and I have built up over the last 15 or so years. I have worked out of the home as well when the children were school aged but we have always had our business to run so I was never working full time away from the home. This has allowed me the privilege, although I sometimes may have questioned that description, to be here for everyone. I am here when someone needs a ride, when someone needs some food, or when someone needs an ear. Mostly, I am here, and they have all learned to count on that. Unfortunately, on the flip side, it seems to have taken away my ability to be anything but The Listener. I work alone all day and speak on the phone very rarely. When I do, I am listening to customers. When my family comes home, I am listening to them.
Here is how it typically plays out: Imagine a table at dinner, the food is home cooked and the house has been cleaned, the family sits around talking about their respective days. They all seem to be talking to me. Or maybe I just feel that way and I have the desire to listen to everyone talking. I try to listen to one, then the other, then another, now the first is clamoring for my attention again, “I didn’t finish”, throw in a parent or an in-law or two, they demand respect, oh dear, oh no, who was I listening to in the first place? I think you get the picture. See I maybe really do have a short attention span.
How do I treat this developed affliction? How do I get others to listen to me? Wait, I sound pathetic. When I attend a party or a get together at a friends’ home, they listen, they even tell me I am entertaining sometimes. I do get invited again so this is a good sign, right? Well then, what is the problem? Why is it that at home I am The Listener? I am fun, I am intelligent, I have things to say. Really.
Now my children will read this and end up saying “But sometimes you don’t listen. Sometimes you just LOOK like you are listening”.
Err, umm, yes, I do that too.
Remember I work from home and many a days I have been busy doing my work and the school bus arrives, the kids let themselves in, sit down in the empty chair near my desk that awaits there arrival and proceed to tell me about their day. I tried really hard to listen all those times but I really needed to finish what I was doing so I could make you all some supper!
Talk to me, then but wait for your sister to finish her story first.
My first BLOG
Well, here we are.
I have joined the millions of "bloggers" out there. Now if only I could think of something clever to write...
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