Woman in Real Life

In my Gifts for Mother's Day post, I told you that I always love to get a book as a gift. Fortunately, the same is true for my husband. He loves a good book just as much as I do. It makes for easy gift-giving (and very full bookshelves)!

For this Father's Day, I turned to DK Canada's Dads Rock Boutique. This special boutique offers 30% off a wide selection of titles. There's at least one to appeal to every dad, with books about cars, birds, sailing, photography, wine and even Lego!

Picking for my husband is easy. A quick look at his office bookshelves will tell you that this guy can't get enough history books. Probably because he's a high school history teacher. Go figure.

It probably comes as no surprise that I love food. Even my posts that aren't about food often have food in them. Some of my favourite family memories are of grocery shopping with my mom as a teen. Mom loves food too, and she would buy me practically anything I asked for, making it well worth the trip to the grocery store.

I particularly love snacks, especially if they are healthy and nourishing rather than just empty calories. (Don't get me wrong, I eat some of those snacks too.) In my quest for healthy snacks, I have been envious of my friends south of the border who seem to have all kinds of monthly snack subscription services to choose from.

I'm green with envy no more. Recently, I received a box of lovely, healthy goodies from Snackbox by Food.ee. Located in Vancouver, BC, Snackbox delivers a new, carefully curated box of snacks across Canada each month.

Happy What I Ate Wednesday! Taking photos of your food really has a way of making you conscious of what you eat. And, when I take this look back at a week of eating, I see where there's room for improvement.

Like, for example, this week I see that I failed a bit in my plan to eat more fruit. I also really should have taken the time to make more salads with my meals. Every week I buy the big bin of organic mixed salad greens and, most of the time, I let about half of the batch rot. It's so easy to prepare, so what's my excuse?

Not that I believe in beating yourself up about what you eat. Food shouldn't be surrounded by stress. But I do like to gently remind myself to make more of an effort sometimes. Like, I always feel better if I make my own baked goods instead of buying them. This week, I made my favourite no-fail vegan chocolate chip banana muffins. They are great for popping in the kids' lunch bags too.

This week, I'm calling on all of you expert collectors out there to help me with two questions: What is this thing? And, what should I do with it?

My mom gave me this (very large and heavy) crock last time I was at my parents' house. My husband was really thrilled, I'll tell ya. One more thing to add to the collection of dishes, knickknacks and assorted furniture that is crowding our house at the moment. But I am a sucker for anything with a sense of history.