Hey everyone! Here is my second self-reflection!
1.) What is something you did for your body?
In my first self-reflection, I talked about how I exercised every day for my body in order to continue living a healthy life – even in quarantine. Now, I’ve kind of did a 180, but let me explain why. I started to notice that because I’ve been able to sleep in so much, I’ve been sleeping through breakfast every day. So, when I wake up, I eat lunch with my family and by the time dinner rolls around, I’m really not very hungry. Therefore, I either eat really little or not at all. I definitely was not eating enough to fuel my body – especially because I was exercising every day. Now, I’m making sure to eat three meals a day by waking up a little earlier than usual and I’ve cut my exercising to 3-5 days a week instead of seven. I feel my strength coming back and my body thanking me for it!
2.) What is something you did for your mind?
I recently started painting as an activity for my mind. My mom used to be really into painting quite a few years ago, so we have all the supplies but it was never really my thing. So, with some of the free time I have now, I decided to give it a go. For a while now, I’ve had this strange image of a blue pomegranate with a red background, so that’s what I decided to paint. It was incredibly relaxing and it sort of transported me into my own world for a little while which was really nice. I’m also planning to paint something for Mother’s Day coming up! Painting was a very relaxing activity that allowed me to destress and focus on one thing instead of the current situation of the world around us. I highly recommend!
3.) What is something you did for your happiness?
I have been continuing baking (my scone count is up to 120 – 15 batches!!). For the scones, I’ve branched out from only maple pecan and I made my own recipes: lemon blueberry, chocolate pecan, PB&J, and more! My parents really enjoy trying out each batch and I really enjoy making them. I also made vanilla strawberry cookies as we had some berries that were about to go bad, and I am thoroughly impressed as they turned out really well! Lastly, we had a little bit of yeast, so I decided to bake a loaf of bread from scratch, something I’ve never done before. The loaf turned out really well, but we are not only in a pandemic, but we are also in the midst of a yeast shortage. So, I don’t think I’ll be baking any more bread any time soon…Nevertheless, baking gives me a lot of happiness and it’s something I truly enjoy doing. I can’t wait to experiment with new recipes!
4.) What is something you did for someone else?
In the last post, I talked about how I dropped off baked goods for my aunt and uncles. Their reactions really showed me how much a simple action can impact others, especially in times like these. So, I decided to do the same thing for my friends. I spent the whole morning baking in order to have the freshest scones, divided each batch up into containers, and wrote each person a little personal note. Nobody knew I was coming and their reactions when they opened the door was priceless! That was the first time I’d seen my friends (or anyone my age, for that matter) in over a month. So, even though we were 6+ feet apart, it was great to see each other. They all texted me afterwards saying how much it meant to them and how much they loved the scones which meant the absolute world to me.
Thanks for reading! I hope you guys enjoyed my second reflection. Feel free to leave me any questions or comments!
Hey Heeva!
Wow! You’ve definitely been keeping busy!
I found your reflection super engaging to read, partly because a lot of the stuff you are doing, I am doing too! I did a little painting project of my own a week ago for my Capstone, and my mom, sisters and I have been doing TONS of baking.
For the first time in forever, we made traditional Italian Easter Bread in celebration of Easter at the beginning of April. In addition, we’ve also been making homemade buns for lots of our dinners. Last night we had pulled pork sandwiches with warm, fresh buns! This was really new for me and my family, because we almost NEVER make our own bread. Funny enough, we even own a bread machine lol. But I think because we are always so busy throughout the school year, we never found the time or patience to do it. It’s interesting to see how the pandemic has us doing things we would normally not have time for if we were living our regular lives.
Before the pandemic, did you bake much yourself? Or only once in a while? Are you finding that having extra time at home is encouraging you to bake more?
I also connected with how you mentioned that we are living in the midst of a yeast shortage! I found this super funny because a family member of mine recently shared something on her instagram story for a bread recipe that uses beer instead of yeast since there is yeast in beer! I thought this was really interesting, and I connected it to how you mentioned you are going to stop making bread now due to the yeast shortage so I just thought I’d mention it! 🙂
Overall, awesome job! Glad to hear you are keeping busy and finding ways to help others and yourself!
-Madison Ciulla