The Mindful Palate

I've moved...on the internet anyway.  I am putting my cooking and food preservation efforts into my new business "The Mindful Palate" where you will find information about upcoming classes and service as well as community events.  Thanks for visiting!

Transitions

Hanging them up after a crusty 15 years?  Not exactly.

It's a new week, nearly summer break, and the vegetable garden is in.  Change and growth are in the air!  Aside from the weekly and seasonal shifts, the LeForts are facing much change these days.  My husband is moving forward in his marketing career and taking on more responsibility in the workplace.  Our daughter will finish another year of public Montessori school and be a K-5 (going to school all day next year!)  And I've completed just short of seven years as the pastry chef at a local restaurant and boutique hotel, "retiring" from 15+ years in the restaurant world.  All of us are ready for the next great adventure.

I've been thinking critically about my next chapter for many months and with the aforementioned family changes there seemed like no better time than now to make the leap.  Change is never easy and often a bit scary, but in terms of my transition it's also very exciting.  I hope to continue shaping--even more than I've been in the last few years--the quality of life I want for myself and my family.  The stars are aligned and I'm ready to get started.

The first question I get is "what are you going to do now?" To be honest, it won't be incredibly different.  Many friends and colleagues and former co-workers have no idea that I've been teaching cooking and food preservation classes for the past decade or more (I guess that's why I need to spend more time on marketing!)  I'm continuing down that road, but expanding my offerings at different venues in metro-Milwaukee.  I'm also going to add more private preserving clients to my freelance gigs.  I'm hoping that you'll be able to find my preserves for sale in a local restaurant or two soon.

The second question I get is "how does it feel" or "does it feel weird?" [not to be in my restaurant job anymore].  I really won't know that answer until tomorrow morning when I don't have to wake up at 4  or 5 AM to "go make the donuts" for the first time in seven years. I purposely greatly decreased my hours at this job once I became a mother, but it'll still feel strange not to drive down the lakefront two mornings a week, watch the sunrise, go through my six-step morning opening routine in the kitchen (stove, hood, dishwasher, floor mats, silverware soak bucket, panini machine/toaster), push through afternoon exhaustion, then get to bed early the nights before a shift.  At least part of that time will, of course, be shifted into disciplining myself to promote my classes and events and working to prepare for them all.  But I'm also hoping to enjoy more personal time, gardening, and time creating new meals and edibles to keep my family healthy.

The thought of having time to breathe a bit and enjoy summer break with my daughter is very exciting.  But the thought of feeling listless brings some anxiety.  I've always thrived when busy; I'm kept on task when I have deadlines; I feel purpose in life when I have a job to do.  With my new "you get out of it what you put into it" setup I am anticipating some emotional ups and downs.

But I'm also looking forward to increased flexibility--to spend more time with my extended family, my child, my husband, my friends--and the potential for professional growth via travel and continuing education.  And I'm hoping to READ more!  I make it sound like I'm retiring.  (Ha!  If only!)  I'm merely shifting gears to work towards quality of life goals.  I'm constantly reminded that life's too short.  This change will be many trade-offs, but if I don't give this a try now, then when?

I hope I see many of you this summer, whether at one of my classes, at a concert in the park, at the farmers' market, or around the neighborhood.

Peace to you all and enjoy the remains of spring and the school year.

Spring Cleaning and Voluntary Simplicity

All a girl needs is a puddle

A couple weeks ago my daughter and I were watching my childhood 8 mm films that have been converted to DVD.  I was hoping to show her the footage of my sister 30+ years ago playing the very same violin on which my daughter now plays.  I cried through those clips as well as many others of our fairly simple life in the 70s and 80s: homemade matching holiday outfits, ice skating on the neighborhood pond, Christmas gifts my parents bought at rummage sales, washing doll clothes in the summer and hanging them on a kid-height line, backyard birthday parties w/ character cakes made by my dad, saving/reusing the wrapping paper from gifts, homemade haircuts, and family bicycle rides.  It occurred to me that even though times and kids are very different in 2014 my daughter is also enjoying many of these simple pleasures.

The last 12 months have been an experiment of sorts.  An experiment in how much we can comfortably handle in terms of scheduling, workload, extracurriculars, and personal possessions.  Between the busy-ness of last summer--freelance work, travel, other work, day camps, and the constant family activity during this difficult, long, dark winter I've come to a crossroads.

Not knowing how much time my independent consulting work was going to take in its first six-month season, I had a rude awakening as I watched my overambitious garden lie neglected and overgrown for a good part of last summer and fall.  But I enjoyed getting paid well to do something I love (preserve local food) so I renewed my informal contract for this year.  Therefore, the garden plans have to be simplified.

We're also in the process of simplifying our daily and weekly extracurriculars list.  Of course, the summer has plenty of camps scheduled here and there; since I work mostly freelance, I have to find creative ways to get work done while my daught's on break.  But we're also allowing plenty of blocks of free, unscheduled time.  We've tried to pare down to whatever activities and events are most worth our time, energy, and money and leave the rest open for play (especially outdoors!)

We've also learned just how many material possessions we can live without.  Apparently I'd been hanging on to a ton of "stuff" that I hadn't used or cared about in months and years.  I've had great motivation to pare down and stop organizing, dusting, caring for, and storing things I really don't need.  (Thanks to this gentleman for the encouragement!)  Every time I get a postcard in the mail for a charity truck in our area I schedule a pickup and move at least 5-7 bags/boxes out the door.  Tomorrow is round two of family spring cleaning and I'm hoping to come up w/ at least 3 more boxes to donate (after the 12 boxes that just left a couple weeks ago.)  It feels incredible to live with less!

I'm determined to continue paring down and make my professional life more efficient, streamline my garden plans and (for now) zone in on the homesteading activities that are most important to us instead of trying to "do it all" and either feel overwhelmed or turn into "one hit wonders"-- schedule less, remember that some of the most exciting activities happen during unstructured play time, and move even more possessions out of this small house.

It's so cleansing!  Here are a couple of the quotes that have motivated me lately:

"A man is rich in proportion to the number of things which he can afford to let alone."

I found this one particularly relative--

"Simple living is not about abandoning luxury, but discovering it in new places. [These masters] of simplicity are not just telling us to be more frugal, but suggesting that we expand the spaces in our lives where satisfaction does not depend on money. Imagine drawing a picture of all those things that make your life fulfilling, purposeful, and pleasurable.  It might include friendships, family relationships, being in love, the best parts of your job, visiting museums, political activism, crafting, playing sports, volunteering, and people watching." --From YES! Magazine Dec. 2013  

Also occupying my time this winter is a new plan for cooking and food preservation classes--including a new web design.  Please stay tuned!  And thanks for following.

Happy Valentine's Day

Sharing the love this week with homemade Valentine's for school and a big icy public heART.

I love helping V make Valentine's for her class.  They're never perfect, but
so beautiful just the same.

Had just enough watercolor paper left for these bookmarks

I was recently included in a group of Art Moms from V's school.  They've been making this brutal winter a little more fun by adding public ice artwork to random places in the neighborhood.  For Valentine's Day we all worked hard for a couple of weeks freezing juice, Kool-Aid, what-have-you to make this mosaic-looking heart.  Spread the love!

Getting the ice blocks there by whatever means possible--
even sleds!

After walking off the shape we all got to work walking carefully around the
perimeter only and strategically dropping the colored cubes.

Ice mosaic! 

Our group is called "Popsicle" and here is our tag for this project. 

Spreading the love!

Our fearless leader (and local artist) at center.

We all contributed different shades of red and pink

Brightening everyone's day as they approach the on ramp at Oklahoma and 794.