More milestones :-)

No photos, but I'm quite excited by a few recent developments.

As of Tuesday of last week, I'm playing the violin again :-)  I'd been doing physio exercises to strengthen my back so I'll be strong enough to play it, and I decided the time had come.  I wasn't sure what to expect, but it went reasonably well.  Since then I've done at least 10 minutes practise every weekday, working away at Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring.  It's going well and I've ordered some more sheet music from the library to be going on with :-)

Also, on Friday and Sunday I rode my bike to places I needed to get to, as opposed to just riding it for exercise.  On Friday I rode to the GP for a blood pressure check (it's been a bit high and they want to check it weekly for the next wee while to keep an eye on it) and on Sunday I rode to church.  Both are about 1.5km from home (if that), so it wasn't a huge ride, but neat to be using a bike for transport again :-)

When I started seeing the physio earlier this year, he wanted to know what my goals were in seeing him.  Eventually I came up with being able to:

• go tramping;
• use my bike for transport;
• play the violin.

I'm not at the level I hope to get to with any of those, but I'm delighted to see I'm starting to do all three :-)

Citrus leaves

I've recently learned something super-cool: all citrus leaves are edible!

I've long known that kaffir lime leaves are edible (and widely used in Thai cuisine), but I'd assumed there was something special about them.  But no!  The essential oils that are present in the zest of citrus fruit are also in the leaves, so grapefruit leaves taste like grapefruit, lemon leaves like lemon etc.

You don't generally eat them as such: you infuse the flavour then discard the leaf, just like with bay leaves.  So you can pour boiling water over the leaves and drink them as tea; simmer in stews, curries or milky puddings; wrap meat in them before baking (apparently salmon wrapped in lemon leaves is super-yum) or even put a layer of leaves in the bottom of the pan when you're baking a cake and let the flavour infuse up through the batter.

I'm sick

I've got some kind of cold/flu thing and have mostly been in bed since Friday last week (that's 8 days now).  I keep on thinking I'm getting better (and yesterday even walked a circuit of our street with Martin) but then I don't.  I have a yucky, gunky cough and runny nose, my head is fuzzy and I just want to sleep.

Martin probably caught the same thing, but he only had one and a half days off work earlier this week.

Maybe periods of illness like this will also be part of my new normal?  I can think of a number of occasions in the distant pre-CFS past where I had 1-2 weeks in bed with a virus or tummy bug.  Now that I'm out in public more again (and now that my immune system is no longer in the hyperactive state CFS likely put it in) maybe that will be how it is again.

Holiday in Whangarei

On Easter Monday, Martin and I jumped on the bus and headed up to Whangarei to visit his parents for the week :-)

Happenings

There's been a lot going on lately!

Two and half weeks ago, our street celebrated Neighbours Day:

Ruby hanging out with Jan and Matylda and their baby, Camellia

Vegan marshmallow Easter eggs

I've nailed a new Easter egg recipe.  After ludicrously extensive experimentation, I bring you: vegan marshmallow Easter eggs!  Read on to learn why, or click here to jump through to the recipe.

This is part of an ongoing quest to love our neighbours as ourselves.  Working conditions in the cocoa industry are terrible and child labour is common.  We want to love our neighbours in far-off cocoa-growing regions by ensuring they have what they need to flourish: a living wage, safe working conditions and, if they're kids, the opportunity to go to school.  But we also want to love our nearby neighbours by showing them hospitality.  For our vegan neighbours at Easter, that means hand-making vegan Easter eggs using fairly traded chocolate, as vegan fairly traded Easter eggs are otherwise very hard to come by.

Fairly traded Easter eggs 2019

Did you know that at least 20% of the Easter eggs on sale in New Zealand this Easter will be made with cocoa grown by kids who are kept out of school to work?  Kids who commonly work 12 hour days and are frequently beaten.  Who would want to support that?

Fortunately, you don't have to!  Below are some ways you can get your Easter treats whilst helping your neighbours to flourish :-) - the list can also be downloaded as a pdf here.

• Fairtrade certified
• UTZ-certified
• Egg-like options
• Cocoa-free
• Ones to watch out for
• Make your own!