don’t cry. don’t say that.

Posted on March 18, 2014 by jplatt27

I’m a crier. I’ve always been a crier and will always be a crier. I cry in conversations with friends, I cry at commercials. I’ve cried at work, and in yoga class, and in church. This is all pretty normal for me.

So take it from me, when someone is crying, the last thing they want to hear someone say is “don’t cry.” Please don’t say that. It doesn’t do anything for the person crying. When you say that, it cuts off the connection.

When someone is crying, you don’t necessarily have to say anything. When someone is crying, you don’t necessarily have to do anything.

The best thing you can do for a person crying is hold space for their tears.

Tears are sacred. Don’t be scared of them. Let them come. And let yourself be present for the person shedding them, whether that’s you, a loved one, or a stranger.

P.S. A beautiful little short on the power of empathy. Please watch this.

book review: bread and wine

Posted on January 28, 2014 by jplatt27

Bread and Wine: A Love Letter to Life Around the Table with Recipes by Shauna Niequist was one of the most-wanted items on my Christmas list this year.

This book fell in the cozy category on the list and it was exactly that. A book to cuddle up with to be reminded about the joys of life. The tenderness of relationships and family.

This book filled me with hope and connected with my soul in a way that I’ve rarely experienced before.

The truths in this book brought me to tears or made me want to scream “yes!” Passages like:

That’s what shame does though. It whispers to us that everyone is as obsessed with our failings as we are. p. 230

The heart of hospitality is about creating space for someone to feel seen and heard and loved. It’s about declaring your table a safe zone, a place of warmth and nourishment. p.114

Basically, I just really liked this book. Climbing into bed to read a chapter or two or getting cozy on the couch on a weekend day was such a treat. Yep, that’s what this book was to me, a treat.

a new kind of christmas list

Posted on December 15, 2013 by jplatt27

Every year, Mike’s mom asks us for Christmas lists. They’re due before we head back to DC after Thanksgiving weekend. I always struggle with this activity–feeling like it’s forced and I’m listing things that I’m lukewarm about.

I decided to make my Christmas list a little differently this year. I was going to make an intentional Christmas list. And I did. I took great care in making my Christmas list this year. And the whole process of making the list was very enjoyable.

I started by asking how I want to feel in 2014. I came up with three feelings:

cozy, pretty, and abundant

Then I thought of things that would support these feelings.

On my list:

Cozy
tea
throw blanket
Bread & Wine: A Love Letter to Life Around the Table with Recipes by Shauna Niequist (this could also go under abundant)

Pretty
1″ curling iron
sleeveless blouses to go under cardigans
Sephora Favorite Sampler (hoping Santa can find this…I saw it in store but can’t find it online)

Abundant
Kate Spade business card holder
Godiva chocolate bars (the small ones they have at Barnes and Noble)
Vase (fresh flowers always make me feel abunant…and pretty too)
Josie Maran Body Butter

I’m really happy with my list. But also, I think this process was really good for me. I’ve been working a lot on valuing and taking care of myself (more to come on that later) and I think this was a great exercise in learning how it feels to take good care and value yourself.

How do you want to feel in 2014?

What’s on your Christmas list this year?

How would your list change if you first thought about how you want to feel in 2014 and only put things that supported that vision?

thought a day

Posted on February 7, 2013 by jplatt27

Mike got me a thought-a-day journal for Christmas. It’s a five year journal and for 5 years you write one thought a day. When you get back to the beginning, you write year two’s thoughts under year one and so on. Wow, it’s crazy to think we could’ve filled two of these in the time we’ve been together.

I love the idea of this. It’s neat to think about all that will change in the next five years–we’ll have new jobs, a baby or two, be living in a new place. Think about the people we’ll meet, the places we’ll go, the things will do. I know I’ll treasure this gift even after it’s all filled up.

How it’s going

You’d think this would be easy. It’s a simple journal–you only have to write one or two thoughts per day! You don’t have to get into the nitty-gritty and spend 45 mins scribbling all the details of your day. It’s meant to be quick and painless.

Here’s where I’m struggling:

I usually wait until right before bed to write my thought, at which point my thought is usually “I’m so tired.” I don’t want an entire journal filled with “I’m so tired today.” Maybe writing down thoughts throughout the day would help and then I could choose a thought. Another option would be to write a thought first thing when I wake up the next morning.

It’s also kind of hard to choose one thought. One thought that sums up the day.

I realize I’m probably over-thinking it (as I do with a LOT of things). I think I need to just enjoy it. Write if I want. Don’t put pressure if I don’t have a thought or I forget.

How quickly I forgot what I’ve learned about journaling…

a powerful gift

Posted on October 30, 2012 by jplatt27

In coach training this weekend, I realized the best gift Mike has ever given me.

The greatest gift Mike has given me is the freedom to be who I am, accepting and loving me just the way I am. As long as I’ve known him (since middle school), he has not tried to change me. He meets me where I am without judgement, only openness and love.

My first thought in response to this realization was pure gratitude and wonder.

Next thought: My wish is that I can give him the same gift in return.

Now I realize a gift even more powerful than either of these, one I wish to give as well.

I could give this gift to myself. Imagine if I gave myself 100% freedom to be who I am. What if I began to love and accept myself as the person I am in this moment?

Most of the stress and unhappiness in my life comes from self-criticism. From believing that I’m not good enough, that I should be more, do more. That I should be x, y, or z, even though that’s not me. So imagine how wonderful it would be, how my life would change, if I was kind to myself. If I was as loving and accepting of myself as Mike is to me.

Starting today, I will give myself this gift. And I will receive this gift from myself.

As I type this I’m a little scared. Like wow, this is a big commitment. But I have the power to make this change, one thought at a time. Though it won’t be easy, it will be worth it.

mike's birthday surprise (and mine too!)

Posted on July 16, 2012 by jplatt27

Mike’s birthday was on Thursday.

Remember our gift giving policy? Well I had a great idea…

His present came in a box and included a chocolate cake and something else that Mike goes nuts over…

No, I didn’t pop out of a cake. 😉

I ordered pizzas from Lou Malnati’s in Chicago and had them delivered on his birthday!

I was so excited about this gift, telling all of my co-workers about it and how I made a fake reservation for dinner that we wouldn’t use because once Mike saw the pizzas he was going to want to heat one up and eat it right then.

I was also a little nervous about getting Mike to meet me at our apartment and not the restaurant so he could get his gift but luckily Mike’s pretty agreeable and when I said “I want to bring the car home and don’t know what time I’ll get there, let’s meet at home” he said “sounds good.”

The package was waiting for Mike at the door when he got home (lucky!) and he said it was such a nice surprise.

When I walked in, he said “thanks for my present!” and I was like “oh, yay! it’s here!”

Though he knew what was inside (see outside above) and was smiling from ear to ear and sitting on the edge of the couch excited to open it, he waited for me to get home to open it, knowing that I’d want to take pictures to share with you all. He cut it open, took out one pepperoni and one sausage pizza, and a chocolate cake, said something like “sweet, thank you!”

“Should we go?” he says…

I was like “oh, you still want to go to dinner? I only made that reservation to keep you off of my trail. I thought you’d want to stay in and eat the pizza immediately.”

Literally I thought he was going to go nuts over this. I guess I thought he’d start drooling uncontrollably and jump up and down like a puppy. Apparently he has more restraint that I thought.

But he said he was looking forward to going out for dinner and drinks and relaxing. While I was surprised, I totally understood and thought he might feel that way.

Luckily I hadn’t cancelled our reservation as I’d planned to do, so we headed down to the waterfront for dinner. (check that off the summer to-do list!)

What a view, huh?

It was a gorgeous night and we got a great table at Sequoia.

To be honest, the food wasn’t that great but it was still a relaxing, enjoyable dining experience.

Then, Friday night we had one of the pizzas for dinner.

O.M.G. was it delicious. I honestly wasn’t crazy about the pizza when we got it in Chicago in the fall but this one was so so so good.

Mike was going nuts. He had a smile on his face the whole time he was eating it. I think this gift makes the “best of our relationship” list!

And we still have one pizza and the chocolate cake left! My mouth is watering just thinking about it!

Participate in Life Fund

Posted on February 26, 2012 by jplatt27

We had a great time at Zach and Emily’s wedding last weekend. Blessed to be friends with each of them individually, the happiness I usually experience at a friend’s wedding was doubled for me. Zach and Emily were both so happy and so in love. It was amazing. Emily is a beautiful person but I haven’t seen her as radiant and happy as she was on her wedding day. We had a great time celebrating with them and look forward to sharing more happiness with them in the future.

Part of the reason the weekend was so great was because we didn’t have to worry about money or how we were going to pay for things this weekend. No, a wedding fairy didn’t come down and make the weekend free. We planned ahead for occasions like this in our 2012 budget. While we want to attack our debt and try to save a little bit of money, we don’t want to forgo life events and sharing in special, happy times with friends to do so. We now allocate money each month for upcoming weddings and other celebrations. We call this line in our budget our “participation in life” fund. Because we planned ahead, we didn’t have to worry about where money for gas, meals, tolls, the hotel, and gift would come from or put these things on a credit card.

Cheers to celebrating stress-free!

Our "first" Valentine's Day

Posted on February 18, 2012 by jplatt27

Our first Valentine’s Day as a married couple was probably our best yet. Ok, definitely our best yet. Considering I asked Mike to brainstorm some past Valentine’s Days for a post on 2/14 and neither of us could remember what we did last year.

This Valentine’s Day, Mike had a sweet idea: to try to replicate the dessert pizza from one of our favorite DC restaurants and have dinner at home. I’d been wanting to recreate Matchbox‘s dessert pizza since we started making our own pizza months ago so I loved this thoughtful idea.

Mike let me choose what we had for dinner so we made this amazing lasagna. We made this lasagna over a year ago and hadn’t been able to find the recipe since. But with a little searching, Mike was able to find it. (Click here for the recipe.)

I had the sauce for the lasagna working when Mike got home from work. And he quickly got to work on the dough for the pizza. We had the Pandora love songs station going and were totally in our element.

After the lasagna was in, the dough was rising, and we had some dishes done, we sat down at the island for a little appetizer. (I can get grumpy when I’m hungry so I this was a precautionary measure that turned out sweet.) We had the rest of that delicious bread leftover from dinner on Sunday, dipped in a little olive oil, salt, and pepper, and some wine.

I was so happy. We were chatting, reminiscing about past Valentine’s Days, and kissing and I got really emotional and started to cry happy tears.

The lasagna turned out delicious and we ate on the couch while watching an episode of our new show Modern Family. I later thought that it was odd that we ate in front of the TV instead of at the table on Valentine’s Day but we were in the kitchen for so long prepping the meal and washing the dishes that we probably both just wanted to relax on the couch.

Then it was time for the dessert pizza. We did a little “recon” on Friday night by going to Matchbox and ordering dessert pizza. OK, we planned to go out to dinner that night to catch up and we hadn’t been to Matchbox in quite a while and chalked it up as “research.” But I’m so glad we did. Our server was able to shed some light into the icing which we would’ve never gotten close otherwise. We were also able to focus in on some of the flavors to make sure we didn’t forget anything.

Well, the pizza was a success! All the flavors were there: cinnamon, sugar, blackberry, raspberry, strawberry, mint, and balsamic reduction. The dough was very chewy and we’ll probably make some changes to that next time but overall the dessert hit the spot. We were so proud of ourselves. We ate our pizza on the couch while watching another episode of Modern Family.

Honestly, this was a perfect evening. We talked, we laughed, we cooked, we ate delicious food. We were really connected and really enjoyed each other’s company. It was different than a normal night because we were technically on a date and neither one of us was expecting to do anything else other than be with each other.

Neither of us wanted the night to end. When I woke up on Wednesday morning, I was bummed that it was all over. I wanted to stretch the date and stay in our happy, relaxed, connected state. You know, like a long weekend that you just don’t want to end.

Definitely the best Valentine’s Day yet.

A Valentine Treat

Posted on February 13, 2012 by jplatt27

I had big plans yesterday to make these beautiful Valentine’s Day cake balls and share them and clear instructions with you here today so that you could make them for your loved ones tonight just in time for the big day tomorrow. I thought it would be super cute to do strawberry cake with chocolate coating and then chocolate cake with pink coating.

Well, I made them and they didn’t turn out great even though I “perfected” the method two weeks ago. But this is real life and I want my blog to reflect that so instead of scrapping the whole post, I’ll guide you through the process–it’s actually pretty easy–and where I went wrong.

You’ll need:

1 box of cake mix (and whatever ingredients it calls for)
1 container of frosting
bag of chocolate chips
vegetable oil
food coloring (optional)
decoration of your choice (sprinkles, nonpareils, M&Ms, whatever)

Directions:

Prepare cakes according to package directions. Let cool completely. [The cooling is important. The first time I didn’t let them cool enough and it didn’t turn out great.]
In a large bowl, crumble cake until fine.
Add frosting and mix to combine well. [Usually the ratio is one container frosting to one box of cake mix. However, with the strawberry cake I made one container was too much. So I recommend starting with about half the frosting and going from there.]
Roll the cake mixture into balls and set on cookie sheet. [I like to use a 1 tbsp measuring spoon to help here.] Update: you can use a small cookie scoop for this step, my friend Amanda did and it saved her a ton of time. I’ve thought about buying one but didn’t want to part with precious “household/personal items” money. But I think I might have to invest. Considering I’ve made about 4 batches of cake-balls and see many more in my future, it will be worth the six bucks.
Put in freezer for 30 minutes or more.
Melt chocolate chips and mix in vegetable oil (and food coloring if desired) in a double boiler. Use 1 tbsp vegetable oil for 1 cup of chocolate chips. [Double boiler: heat pot of water on stove and put a glass bowl on top. The steam will heat the glass and the chips will melt.] Update: What does the vegetable oil do, you ask? It thins out the melted chocolate to make it easier to work with.
Once chips are melted, pull cake balls out of freezer and dip each one in chocolate until fully coated. (I use a combination of spatula and fork to assist here.) Put back on sheet and sprinkle with decoration of your choice.
Pop back in freezer about 15 minutes to harden chocolate.
Enjoy!

Notes/Advice:

Leave enough time to complete this project. Maybe like an afternoon or spread it out over an evening. Update: I’ve crunched the numbers and you probably need about 4 hours total for this project. I’d say only an hour/an hour and a half is work time.
You can also use almond bark or the melting chocolates that they sell at craft stores.
Be sure to chill the balls before dipping them in the chocolate. If you don’t the cake can start to crumble off into the chocolate and it’s just messy and difficult.
My love for cake balls started when my co-worker brought them in. He is engaged to Miki from Miki’s Kitchen and my team often gets to taste Miki’s latest creations. Miki has a great tutorial for how to make cake balls and cake pops.
Have fun with this and don’t get frustrated. Even if they don’t look that great, they’ll taste delicious. And sprinkles make everything prettier!

I’d love to know:

Have you made cake balls or cake pops before? How did they turn out? Do you have any tips to share?

6 great wedding gifts

Posted on December 16, 2011 by jplatt27

While most brides would say they want cash or something off their registry, I know some people feel uncomfortable giving money or towels. They want to give something more special and personal. Here’s a list of gifts we received that were not on our registry and that I loved/appreciated.

Painting of the church we were married in

My aunt and uncle gave us this water color painting of the church we were married in. In my thank you note, I wrote “we’ll hang it in our new apartment and be reminded of the joy of our day when we walk by it.” And sure enough when Mike put it up, it made me smile with delight and joy and gratitude for my new husband. In addition, it helped make our new apartment feel like home.

Wine rack and bottles of wine

We registered for wine glasses and my creative and thoughtful friends Leslie and Bridget gave the gift a personal touch. With the wine glasses, they gave us a wine rack and two bottles of wine. They selected bottles of wine that relate to newlywed issues: Clean Slate and Tempra Tantrum and attached notes to them explaining when to open them.

Love and wine grow better with time

Open your home to entertain and eat,

catch up with old friends and new ones to meet.

When the night is over share this bottle of wine,

but don’t sit down yet–it’s clean up time!

Love and wine grow better with time

When fights occur as they sometimes will

and tempers are steaming hot,

pour a glass, take a sip, and be thankful for what you’ve got.

For in a marriage if everyone agreed life would be a bore,

and by asking for Joanna’s hand, Mike is surely in for more!

We haven’t opened the bottles of wine yet, we haven’t had a massive fight (woohoo) or entertained much (goal for December?) but I’m looking forward to it. Edit: when I originally drafted this post we hadn’t opened either bottle. After the bed bug incident we broke into one.

Flowers

This sweet, colorful set of seeds and pots came from my best friend and bridesmaid Amanda via Red Envelope. I haven’t planted them but I’m looking forward to it. (Note: until midnight tonight get 10% off using the discount code KANE (courtesy of my favorite radio show)).

Mr. and Mrs. Aprons with Newlywed Cookbook

This set also came from Amanda via Red Envelope. This was the perfect gift for us. We love to cook together, it’s one of the things that keeps us connected, and we always cook from a recipe.

Williams-Sonoma Bride & Groom Cookbook Set

Still love this gift from my friend Jordan.

Night at Bed and Breakfast

My girlfriends from college got us a night at a B&B in Virginia, about an hour from the city. We spent the night at Stone Manor B&B in October and enjoyed relaxing together. It was so nice to get a break and some quality time out in the country.

Thanks, everyone!