Hey Fringe

tea. books. beauty. geekery.

7 Currents | Quickie Edition

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7 Currents

Playing

Mostly WoW this week and a little big on animal crossing. Nothing amazing to report on either front. I think I want to level my Lock soon but she is very low and it sounds like woooooork. I am at that stage in my WoW playing right now.

Reading

I found the weirdest diet book I had ever seen on Amazon and I totally purchased it. It is called the The Mount Athos Diet: The Mediterranean Plan to Lose Weight, Feel Younger and Live Longer. I have always been fascinated with what people eat and after my stint in Catholic school I needed this book. It’s actually really interesting. The gist is the week is broken up into fasting days, moderation days and a movable feast day. During the three fasting days you cut out all booze, animal products and oil as well as having essentially one meal and 2 snacks throughout the day. The moderation are all Mediterranean Diet days but you can have wine. Feast Days are essentially cheat days – eat whatever. Interesting but concept but I have a hard time with cheat days and do better with a cheat meal.

The book blurb from Amazon:

For centuries, the monks of Mount Athos have enjoyed long lives, healthy bodies, and calm minds thanks to their unique diet and lifestyle. Now you too can discover the secrets of good nutrition from this ancient community in a remarkable new diet book. With this plan, you’ll follow the intermittent diet that keeps the monks slim, youthful, and largely free from disease. The diet is made up of three easy-to-follow patterns throughout the week: three fasting days full of delicious fruits and vegetables from nature’s larder; three moderation days to enjoy the best of the Mediterranean, including olive oil, fish, and even red wine; and one feast day to completely indulge in whichever foods you like. With a simple diet plan, recipes, menu planners, and tips on how to adapt the diet, plus guidance on exercise, meditation, and emotional wellbeing, this book promises to transform your body and mind to help you lose weight, feel fitter, and live longer. Recipes include dual measurements.

Making

I’ve been working on my as of right now unreleased necklace line that revolves around tea. You can read more about it here.

Cooking

Kale chips – mountains of kale chips! I usually just turn on the broiler and come back in 2 minutes – this way takes longer but I am going to try it out tonight to see if we like it more.

Wanting

A nap or to not have stayed up so late last night! I am so tired today!

Drinking

Twinings Buttermint Tea

Ahh man this stuff! I had it shipped form London – WORTH IT. It tastes like those delicious melt-away mints only it’s a tea. It’s amazing and I love it! One of my favorite teas I have ever had!

Tarot Card
The Hermit from The Wild Unknown Tarot

The Hermit from The Wild Unknown Tarot

I am super feeling The Hermit. I need to recharge my batteries and dig deep by myself.

Listening

Loads of electro swing to keep me awake! Move those hips!

Want to do your own 7 Currents? Just use the hashtag #7currents so we can find each other!

Link Party! | New Year Edition!

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Link Party!

Everyone always has big plans for the New Year and one thing I wanted to focus on this year was organization. I found this great printable for a ‘Don’t Break The Chain’ 2015 Calendar – I have 2 of these taped on my wall by my desk! So what is don’t break the chain?

Something else that I have been using daily has been my Bullet Journal. This has really been my saving grace – part epic To Do, part Notes and part Journal. I am really loving it. Here are a couple of pages:

Bullet Journal LegendThis what my personal key is so that way I stay consistent throughout it. At a quick glance I can see what is going on during any part of the day.

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This is my Monthly section for January complete with monthly overview and the start of my important things list for the month. I have been using this for work and home at the same time and I love it – no other system has ever worked so well to keep my To Dos and random weird notes from becoming unmanageable. Here is the official Bullet Journal video for the overview of the system.

Also Tumblr is the best place around for images of people’s bullet journals – check it out!

Something that is just a small tweak that has been really beneficial for me was to change my Chrome tab screen. I switched to a tab screen called Momentum.

Momentum - Chrome Extension

So here is why I really love it – amazing new image daily, the time huge, the Today part is the main thing you want to complete in the day, the bottom corner has a cheeky to do list feature AND it has local weather in the corner. ADDED BONUS: In addition to the beautiful photography that changes daily at the very bottom there is a motivating quote that also changes daily. Seriously I LOVE this. I use it at home and at work! Totally give it a try!

Healthy & Tasty Meals Made Easy by Jules Clancy

Something else I am focusing on for the New Year are easy, quick and healthy meals – I know that it is something that everyone struggles with. I purchased a fantastic eBook from my favorite Aussie cook! I cannot say enough great things about this book! The recipes have 5 variants for each recipe – so they can all be made vegetarian or pescetarian [sometimes even both easily which is great for our mixed house)! They are also all wheat free which is fantastic for my intolerance. They are all about 5 ingredients and take about 10 – 15 minutes to make. Let me say that again – the recipes are all about 5 ingredients and take 10 – 15 minutes to make. I have many of her eBooks (like more than 10!) and they are all worth the money. They are simple recipes made with real food really fast!

I am actually adapting a recipe from this for dinner here tonight:

Mushrooms with Split Peas
Recipe adapted from Healthy & Tasty Meals Made Easy by Jules Clancy recipe “Mushrooms with Lentils”
Serves 2

3-4 Tablespoons Butter
2 Containers Mushrooms, chopped [they were on sale 4 containers for $5!]
1.5 Cups Cooked Split Peas [they are being cooked in the slowcooker because I am that lazy – they were also on sale]
1-2 Tablespoons Tomato Paste
2-3 Tablespoons Dill [what needs to get used up in the fridge!]

  1. Heat butter in a big pan over a medium heat. Add mushrooms and stir ever few minutes until they are browned and tender. It should take ~10 minutes.
  2. Add cooked split peas and tomato paste and warm everything up.
  3. Taste then add the dill, taste again and season. Serve with a little extra dill on top

As you can see the recipe above takes about 15 minutes to make. I am already making the split peas for the next week as an easy side so I don’t even count it as time for this recipe. If you want to make it quicker used canned lentils like the original recipe or canned beans. SUPER EASY. Also this would be killer with a poached egg on top. As you can se nothing weird, recipes are easily adaptable to what you have on hand and are real food. Her recipes are heaven!

2015 Fortuna Phials Snapshot

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Fortuna Phials by Catherine Harris

Fortuna Phials has been open for a year now but it did have a long rest this Autumn. It’s been really exciting having the shop and I do really enjoy the Etsy shop experience. I just sort of dove in last January and I can say now after a year I hope I always have a little shop open. It is the best place for me to really to anything creative. It is a ton of work – even more work than I imagined but it is so rewarding. Every patron I have spoken with has been so kind and understanding about the vision I have for Fortuna Phials.

New lines for 2015

I am adding a new line of Tea necklaces to the shop in early 2015! They will be capsule style necklaces that are filled with tea and have either bronze tea cups or cute ceramic cups or teapots attached! These are adorable and I love the way they look each time. I think that people who are tea freaks like myself would love to wear something like this.

I am also planning on doing a few seasonal and holiday style necklaces. These will be limited edition creations that encapsulate the seasons like Spring flowers or Autumn leaves or holidays like lovely Valentines Day or spooky Halloween! These ones will be so fun and full of whimsy to create.

I also have a few other ideas I’d like to test out this year in small batches like metal hand stamping, initial necklaces and a mythology based necklace line.

International Shipping

I have been going back and forth on this one for a while. I have sent out 5 orders via international mail and 2 orders never made it to their patrons. I feel this is a terrible ratio. I don’t feel like I was shipping to crazy places – the UK and Luxembourg – and each time I send internationally I verify with the Post Office that I filled everything out correctly to help ensure delivery. I also supply the custom code for them to check on, but even doing these steps I have had almost half of my international orders not reach people. This is very discouraging and makes me feel like I may take off international shipping if this trend continues in 2015.

Here is to a fantastic and productive 2015!

Reposted from my shop’s blog.

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