Raige Creations

What a race! The Flowers Sea Swim , a very well done event, this year is the 27th year it has been going! I trained a long time for this, since January. All through training, I simply wanted to just be able to swim a full mile without stopping. And at the start, I realized just how hard that would be. But, after months of training, I knew I could swim that far, even if I did stop to get the mouthful of water out of my mouth, or massaged a cramp, or slowed to get a better look at the fish. So the day came, and I wanted to swim it faster than I had in every training session. I was excitedly nervous. The weather was beautiful, even if a bit hot. The ocean was calm and a few clouds gave us some relief from the sun sometimes. Me and my numba! Never so proud to wear J16! Especially after I got my number painted on me! I felt so good, actually, with that number on. It was official now. Now, I just had to stash my stuff - they had a shuttle to take our stuff to the finish line....

from Pinterest via http://paleoaholic.com/ My mind was the one that had the bright idea to try the early morning Cross Fit class. I knew I had to do it, get back to seriously exercising, but I was afraid. I had not been to Cross Fit since the end of May. Two WHOLE MONTHS. Plus, I did very little in the way of any other exercise. I stopped getting up early for run/walks. I hardly walked on the beach. Swim? Nope. Kayak? Once. Eat? Hell yeah! I ate. I ate pizza, fried fish with French fries (yumm), and more pizza, had cookies, pies, ice cream. I even broke down and had a Wendy's burger with French fries (yummm). (I LOVE French fries) Ugh. By yesterday, after polishing off half a pie in 2 days, I was downright feeling fat, disgusted with myself. Now, I DID enjoy everything I ate. I made sure to. I knew all along it would catch up with me. And yesterday it did. I felt like I was rolling down the hallways at work, sloshing around the house. When I sat I felt like Jabb...

If I hadn't made it clear in any of my earlier posts, I think I have hinted at it, planning dinner stresses me out most of the time. I have tried having the kids cook, hubby cook, asking for requests, and  planning days ahead . Ultimately, these things fade away, and I am back to stressing about what to cook at the last minute , order , or suggest for dinner. This morning, having this discussion with my 2 kids who had the luxury of a 2 hour delay of school, we had some fun with weekly dinner plans. Today, being Tuesday and having our oldest son coming home from college who loves anything as long as a tortilla is involved, we decided to have our 'Taco Tuesday' . This is a popular one we have been doing for years now. Celebrating a Previous Taco Tuesday My kids drew this for me. photo: Raige Creations This led to 'Meatloaf Monday ', since that meatloaf was a huge hit the other day, and 'Spaghetti Sunday' , since we have pasta at least once a week...

One Organized Person - this is NOT my list.... There is much talk about 'how to handle' Thanksgiving:   How to deal with extended family , how to cook the bird, how to make the pies, how to make certain side dishes ahead , the secret to carving breast meat , how to set the table , what to wear on Thanksgiving , and there are even playlist suggestions for Thanksgiving music !  Now THIS could be fun to try to do..... Just reading all this stresses me out! Our game plan this year is much simpler. The big thing for me is I took today off, meaning 3 days in a row off for me. Ridiculously huge. So did I choose to spend today running around preparing home made desserts and prep-ahead side dishes?  NO. WAY.  I am sitting with my entire family, hubby and all three kids, enjoying the banter of video game talk, joking about being so hungry but everything to eat involves work (! - like getting a bowl and cereal out is tough...oh yeah, milk too...oh the eff...

Having little time to do much of anything but work, dinners at our house have been a little lacking. If we don't order out, or I don't pick up things from the deli at the grocery store, I revert to 'Get Your Own' night and everyone makes their own dinner. This is hardly the tastiest or healthiest ways to go about having family dinner.  if only it were that easy   I suspect that I am not alone in this dilemma of trying to get dinner on the table the fastest and easiest way. I am one to really value a family dinner time, and insist that we all eat together whenever possible. But since I opened the shop and have been working all open hours myself, with few exceptions, home made dinners eaten as a family are becoming few and far between.  these 2 ingredients make it YUMMY Then my youngest asked for a dinner I haven't cooked in ages. It is a dinner I learned from hubby's family - a staple of Caribbean cooking - Stewed Chicken and Rice and Beans. It taste...

I am so honored! I have actually been saying the word 'Lovely' quite a bit lately, so when I was awarded this 'One Lovely Blog Award' I was thrilled. It was, well, lovely! Thanks to Sunfire , and her quite lovely blog The Dragon's Breath , I have been told I have one lovely blog myself. The rules of the blog include thanking the person who passed it to you, sharing their link and the award image, listing 7 things about yourself, then nominating up to 15 other bloggers who deserve the award. The 7 things about me, that isn't so tough. For starters, -first, I am a proud mother of three wonderful children. -Second, I am happily married to my best friend, and -third, we are about to celebrate our (gasp) 19th anniversary. -Fourth, I just opened my own shop, called Blue Rage of Asheville, where I am happy to share my passions and interested with anyone who comes in. -Fifth thing about me is I am happy to feature locally produced and handmade creations r...