News Trend Four Important Truths About Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome|Actual

To optimize my bedroom for sleeping, I keep the decor simple with a focus on comfort. And yes, that includes a bowl of fresh water in the corner for my favorite redhead.

Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome is not sulit tidur.

Insomniacs toss and turn through restless nights filled with sporadic and shallow sleep. No matter how hard they try, insomniacs rarely get a good night's sleep.

But for us Delayed Sleep Phasers, it's only when we force ourselves to go to bed before we are sleepy that we struggle to fall asleep. When we can go to bed and get up according to our own inner clocks, we doze off quickly, sleep well, and wake up refreshed.

I often find dried leaves and tiny bits of twig among my white blankets, but this is the price I pay for Gracie's five a.M. Breakfast run under my husband's supervision.

Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome is not the same thing as being a "night owl."

True night owls stay up late even when their inner clock tells them they should be going to bed. As a general rule, night owls forfeit sleep for fun and pay the price the next day when they are sleep-starved during their normal work hours.

We Delayed Sleep Phasers use the late night and early morning hours to accomplish meaningful tasks. By making good use of our most creative and productive hours, we get done at night what other people do during the day.

I may spend hours looking at gorgeously styled nightstands online, but mine is strictly edited down to basics. And yes, I do consider a miniature brass owl and a pink potted plant to be essential to a good night slash morning's sleep.

Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome  cannot be "fixed" or cured.

The internet is full to the brim with tips on how to be an early riser. With time, determination, and a huge amount of sticktoitiveness, Delayed Sleep Phasers can indeed force themselves to operate on a more conventional sleep schedule.

I should know. I've been doing that for all my life.

But here's the truth. We can manipulate our sleep habits but we can never reset our internal sleep clocks. They are biologically determined by our DNA and therefore completely impervious to change.

In addition to our internal sleep clocks, our bodies' various systems function according to their own internal clocks, all linked together and mutually dependent. When we disobey our bodies' sleep demands, we throw the entire networked system out of alignment, and trouble quickly ensues.

Depression,

obesity,

and diabetes

are at the top of the list.

Sleeping at the wrong time will literally make you sick, and Delayed Sleep Phasers who try to "fix" their biological sleep cycles put their health in serious jeopardy.

The art on my bedroom walls came from inside my head, and helps me relax and wind down.

Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome sleepers face judgment and shame, especially in American culture.

Early risers are valued as virtuous and good.

Those who sleep in are considered lazy.

There's no arguing with that perceived truth. Other cultures embrace more fluid sleep schedules, especially those in the tropics, but in the United States, we have long equated earliness with goodness and lateness with contempt.

All through my life, I've struggled with this shame. Mostly, I've tried to hide my late sleeping hours by clearing my throat extra carefully before taking those 9 a.M. Phone calls, or scrambling to throw on sweats and splash water on my face when the doorbell rings unexpectedly.

The few times that I have tried to explain my sleeping habits to family or friends, raised eyebrows and clucked tongues have quickly shut me down. Very few people have ever understood.

* * * * *

But I'm done with feeling shame and judgment. I'm ready to fight the good fight, people, and I will keep explaining till the world understands what Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome is all about.

News Trend Reading About The Desert|Actual

Cactus Country: The American Wilderness by Edward Abbey

Hear the gravel crunch under your boots as you walk along the dusty trail.

Stop for a moment.

Slip your pack off your back and set it at your feet; feel the wind cool against your shirt, damp with sweat.

Take a long pull from your canteen. Even though it is tepid at best, taste the water soothing your parched throat as you drink, careful not to spill even a drop.

L ook up at the ancient saguaro standing tall against the cloudless blue sky.

Breathe deep, filling your nose and lungs with the hot, dry and fragrant air of the Sonoran Desert.

What's this? You have neither the opportunity nor, to be perfectly honest, the inclination to go on a desert trek? Well then, sit down with this book because, while reading the lively text and enjoying the splendid and thoroughly 70s-esque photography, you will be transported.

* * * * *

We pulled into the rest area, a typical oasis of green along the busy interstate. My two younger daughters - who were maybe six and three years old  at the time - hopped from the car and raced up to the restrooms as the rest of us were still piling out of the van. Suddenly the wind was violently whipping around me, staggering my steps. Each breath inflated my lungs with almost unbearably hot, dry air, as though I was breathing fire. The sun pounded ferociously on my head with an intensity that made me weak. I felt myself dehydrating on the spot.

And while all of this is to be expected on a pit stop in the Sonoran Desert, I was not prepared for the emotional assault. Danger swept around us on all sides like a pack of hungry wolves, and I fought the urge to gather up  my little ones, who were dancing up the sidewalk ahead of me, and rush them to cover. Instead, I watched them testing themselves against the wild winds that blew their little bodies forcibly this way and that. They laughed as they played, oblivious to nature's menace, while I trembled with a renewed respect for the immense power of the desert.

* * * * *

Read more about what I've been reading:

Reading Afternoons

Reading Mornings

Reading Children's Books

Reading Memories

Reading Recommendations

Reading Inspiration

Reading Insights

Reading At The Pool

Reading About The Desert

Reading On Repeat

Reading Natalie Babbitt

Reading The Truth

Reading Books That Are Blue

* * * * *

Read more about what I've been reading:

Reading Afternoons

Reading Mornings

Reading Children's Books

Reading Memories

Reading Recommendations

Reading Inspiration

Reading Insights

Reading At The Pool

Reading About The Desert

Reading On Repeat

Reading Natalie Babbit

Reading The Truth

Reading Books That Are Blue

Reading Mysteries

Reading About Walking

* * * * *

I've been lucky enough to visit the Sonoran Desert and the magical cacti who live there. Read more about my adventures:

A Two-Day Trip To Tucson In Three Acts

Among The Saguaro

Among The Giants

Heaven

Desert Blooms

Good Advice

Reading About The Desert

News Trend Rice Bowl Sauces: Hoisin Ginger|Actual

Why make just one flavor of rice bowl sauce whenyou stumble upon a recipe for five?

Once I surveyedthis quintet of delicious options, I set upon a plan to try them all.

Another perfect sunny summer evening in my backyard, another delicious rice bowl dinner.

This week, I served up brown rice, roasted radishes and lightly wilted arugula, and a tidy bit of roasted salmon, topped with hoisin ginger sauce.

Hoisin sauce, if you didn't know, is an Asian condiment. I assumed it came from a single source, like the juice of the hoisin berry or some such thing; I didn't know. But after a bit of poking around online, I learned that hoisin sauce is composed of a number of familiar things like peanut butter, honey, rice vinegar and miso paste. You can make it yourself if you so desire.

But I had no foreknowledge of this culinary possibility, so I whipped up my dinner using the basic garden-variety hoisin sauce from my local Asian pasar swalayan, and the taste was phenomenal.

I'd go so far as to say this rice bowl and its superstar sauce was lip-smacking good. And that, my friends, is darn near perfect.

Ingredients & Directions:

Combine 1/2 cup hoisin sauce, 1 teaspoon sesame oil, 1 tablespoon soy sauce, 1 teaspoon fish sauce, 1 1/2 tablespoons chopped fresh ginger, and 2 cloves garlic, then blend till smooth.

from the Kitchn

* * * * *

I've committed to a month of Rice Bowl Mondays, featuring each of the five sauces in the article. Here you go:

Orange Tahini

Spicy Sriracha Peanut

Mediterranean Olive Sauce

Hoisin Ginger

Herbed Goat Cheese

News Trend Macrame Magic|Actual

"We learn the rope of life by untying its knots." -Jean Toomer

"Or tying them, as the case may be." -me

* * * * *

Nothing makes me feel more like a thrownback flower child and wannabe hippie woman than making macrame.

Well. Maybe tie-dying tee shirts. But that's a close call.

So, when my brain was searching around for a graduation gift well suited for some college bound young women in my life, I decided to break out the sticks and string.

Many yards of cord, several YouTube viewings, and a few hundred knots later, this is what I managed to spin.

Straw into gold, people. I'm telling you, it's magic.

And now I'm making one for myself.

I used a basic dowel from Home Depot, a package ofthis cord, andthis tutorial. My DIY hostess showed me how to make some but not all of the knots, so I supplemented with a few additional YouTube knot-tying videos, easily searched by the name of the knot I needed to know.

In the end, the process was about as complicated as tying my shoes.

So if you'd like to get in touch with your inner gold dust woman, send off some boho chic gifts, or even just treat yourself to some mid-summer magic, I highly recommend macrame.

* * * * *

She may have been a few years late for the macrame party,

but this lady knew plenty about spinning things into gold.

* * * * *

More macrame projects to make your dreams come true:

Fulfilled

Sugar, Sugar

A Macrame Home For My Spider Plant Family

Macrame Magic

Perfect Imperfections

Roses And Ivy

News Trend Reading On Repeat|Actual

During the first week of August, this year as always, I can be comfortably certain that:

my black-eyed Susans will burst into bloom,

my grass will need almost constant watering,

and

my battered and beloved copy of Tuck Everlasting will fall into my hands for its annual read.

Tuck is a story that takes place during the first week of August. The prologue opens like this:

The first week of August hangs at the very top of the summer, the top of the live-long year, like the highest seat of a Ferris wheel when it pauses in its turning. The weeks that come before are only a climb from balmy spring, and those that follow a drop to the chill of autumn, but the first week of August is motionless, and hot.

Those sixty-six words describe exactly, precisely, perfectly how I feel about the first week of August, and if Natalie Babbitt had written only them, I would still adore this book.

But she didn't stop there. With luscious prose that drips with sensory images like a ripe peach, Babbitt weaves profound questions about life with magic from a fresh water spring, and creates a sweet, sultry story that comforts my heart like the cooling shade of a forest on a hot summer day.

It is a book written, perhaps, for children. But any adult with even a drop of imagination will relate to ten-year-old Winnie's dog day doldrums, enjoy her roller coaster ride of an adventure, and maybe shed just a tear or two over the beautiful, painful decision she must make.

Heaven forbid that I should ever have to choose my favorite book. But if I was forced to narrow it down to my top ten, or even my top three - I'm quite sure that Tuck Everlasting would make the list.

And every year during the first week of August, I would read it again.

* * * * *

If you'd like to read my 2015 review of this very same book, go here.

Please take note of the black-eyed Susans and thirsty-looking lawn.

* * * * *

Read more about what I've been reading:

Reading Afternoons

Reading Mornings

Reading Children's Books

Reading Memories

Reading Recommendations

Reading Inspiration

Reading Insights

Reading At The Pool

Reading About The Desert

Reading On Repeat

Reading Natalie Babbitt

Reading The Truth

Reading Books That Are Blue

* * * * *

Read more about what I've been reading:

Reading Afternoons

Reading Mornings

Reading Children's Books

Reading Memories

Reading Recommendations

Reading Inspiration

Reading Insights

Reading At The Pool

Reading About The Desert

Reading On Repeat

Reading Natalie Babbit

Reading The Truth

Reading Books That Are Blue

Reading Mysteries

Reading About Walking

News Trend My 2019 Graduation Cards|Actual

Signed, sealed and ready for delivery.

I might be a wee bit late to the party, but my 2019 graduation cards are finally done.

Most of my cards go to my wonderful math students. I love to share in the celebration of their high school graduations, and almost always follow them through their college careers as well.

As much as I love to make homemade graduation cards for them, I must admit that sometimes I fall behind. And I don't necessarily mean a little behind. The sorry truth is that several of this year's recipients actually graduated in 2018 and I hadn't quite gotten round to making their cards until this summer.

Okay as belated greetings go, I'll be the first to admit that this situation is completely out of hand. Worse even than the year I sent Christmas cards out in July. Which is a true story and I have old college roommates who will vouch for me if you have any doubts.

So it's no exaggeration to say that"better late than never" are words I most sincerely live by, and this is a perfect opportunity to do so.

At first glance, the cards appear flat and inanimate, but once the ribbons are untied, they spring to three-dimensional life.

Wandering across my dining room table are a handful of this year's creations.

Though each year's cards are slightly different from other models, at this point, my general technique is tried and true.

Heavy watercolor paper cut to desired size and folded accordion style.

In the past, I've sized the pages to match a dollar bill folded into quarters. This time I folded them to fit a gift card on that standard cardboard hanger that they are mounted on when you buy them.

I've also been known to squeeze longer names into shorter spaces, to keep the total number of pages down, but this year,  I went a little wild and put each letter on a separate page.

I'm dealing with two years of pent-up graduation celebration sublimation here, and things are bound to get a little crazy

"Dear student, you rock."

I attached that gift card-sized pocket onto either the last halaman or the back of the card, depending on whether I needed to spell out either an odd- or even-numbered name, respectively. That's where I tuck an handwritten note of congratulations, and a little stash of cash or gift card.

The covers are made from crayon and watercolor on plain ol' printer paper, wrapped around cardboard rectangles. I did a color-coordinated design on the heavier watercolor paper for the letters, and cut each one by hand.

A true labor of love, almost as great as completing the square or working a chemical mixture dilema.

Rachel has an even number of letters in her name, so her pocket is built onto the back of her card. By contrast, Jon (whose card is toward the back, in blue) has an odd number of letters, so his pocket fits onto the last halaman inside.

I love that my cards feature the graduates' names. Our names speak us into existence, and when other people call us by name, we all get that special warm glow. You know what I mean.

Over the long years of my work with each student, every time I showed up to deliver yet another set of lectures on, oh, maybe trig identities or trinomial division, I made a point to greet them by name. I'm convinced that hearing our names matters because it makes us feel known.

And as you may guess, I am willing to bet the ranch that seeing our names matters too.

Now, for each letter in the person's name, I generated a personality trait or characteristic that suited that person, wrote out the word on a small slip of paper, and attached it to the page underneath the corresponding letter.

Though I love every step in this tried-and-true process, this is my favorite part. Finding just the right words to describe the unique person that I see each one of them to be is a special challenge. I feel honored to reflect back to them who I know them to be, and help them see themselves through my eyes.

I want them to feel known. As known as the Pythagorean Theorem. Or maybe even the quadratic formula. Which are both very well known indeed.

^ Once the book is complete, with a length of ribbon taped to the inside of the back cover, and then both covers glued into place, you can flip through it page by laman, as an ordinary book is read.

Or, as my amazing student demonstrates, you can open it all up at once.Voilà!

* * * * *

Congratulations and best wishes to all my favorite 2019 graduates and special thanks to Rachel for sending me this photo. <3

And remember, if I forgot to send you a card this year, there's always 2020!

* * * * *

To see my 2012 graduation cards and get all the how-to details, check out these posts:

These Cards Are Legendary

Looking Forward

News Trend Rice Bowl Sauces: Herbed Goat Cheese|Actual

Why make just one flavor of rice bowl sauce whenyou stumble upon a recipe for five?

Once I surveyedthis quintet of delicious options, I set upon a plan to try them all.

Ta daaaa! Allow me to present my fifth of five forays into the sweet and savory world of rice bowl sauces!

This one may be the easiest of the lot. Basically, a small package of goat cheese loosens up with some olive oil and water, then dragged through the herb garden, and shazam! Sauce is ready.

^ Yes, it really is that easy. Here are my store-bought ingredients in a bowl, with a handful of freshly clipped herbs from my backyard garden.

^ I gave them the quick chop for which I am famous, at least around my dinner table. I call it a rustic chop - I prefer a plate of food where I can still make out the individual tastes and textures of each component, rather than every item being chopped into homogeneous oblivion.

My husband begs to differ.

^ But I'm the one who wields the knife so we all know how that story ends.

As has been my practice, I served my sauce with the paired rice bowl. In addition to the requisite brown and white rice, this one featured a can of black beans, one diced poblano pepper, a handful of grape tomatoes, and four ears of sweet corn.

Thanks to my dog, Gracie, I had to make do with three and a half ears. Girl loves her veggies. She ate it, cob and all.

Generously seasoned with spicy Mexican flavors, these ingredients did not compliment the tangy herbed goat cheese as I would have liked. My family agreed with me that next time, it might be better with gently seasoned beef or salmon so the punch of the goat cheese is the main flavor event.

We also agreed that when it comes to this herbed goat cheese rice bowl sauce, there definitely will be a next time.

* * * * *

Ingredients & Directions

Combine 4 ounces of softened goat cheese, 1 tablespoon olive oil, and 2 tablespoons water, then blend until smooth. Stir in 1/4 cup of chopped fresh herbs (any combination of chives, parsley, basil, and mint), and season to taste with salt and fresh-ground black pepper.

from the Kitchn

* * * * *

I've committed to a month of Rice Bowl Mondays, featuring each of the five sauces in the article. Here you go:

Orange Tahini

Spicy Sriracha Peanut

Mediterranean Olive Sauce

Hoisin Ginger

Herbed Goat Cheese