* I started blogging waaaay back in 2005 (that was several blogs ago).  I was blogging long before I read other blogs.  I guess I like the sound of my own voice.

* I started this blog on Blogger in early 2008 to put my thoughts about giving up law and teaching yoga full time into words.  It used to be called “The Highs and Lows of a Suburban Yogini” but that was a bit of a mouthful.

* I carried on blogging because I started getting comments!  EcoYogini and Green Spell were my first regular readers and for that I am eternally grateful.  Have you seen that scene in “Julie and Julia” where she gets her first comment?  Yeah, that was me!

* In June 2008 Nadine emailed me and interviewed me on her blog.  Through her I “met” Christine and Mary, through them I “met” Phil and Svasti, through Phil (I think?) I “met” Catherine and Stella and on and on like dominoes all in a line.  And every day I get new readers, new comments, new blogs to read (I also have less and less time to read them all but I try, I really do )

* Sometimes I actually get to meet bloggers in real life.

* There is a code of karma in the yoga blogging world.  We agree to disagree.  We don’t get into flame wars.

* There is a blogging synchronicity.  I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve written about a subject only to find somebody else writing about it moments afterwards.  Or moments before.  There is something special in these here internetz.

* Being a British yoga blogger does mean I’m never going to get the gajillion hits that some US  blogs do, but at I kind of like that.  It makes me feel special (go with me here!) and decreases the likelihood of trolls, spammers and the sorts of comments that would make me cry.

* Some of my favourite bloggers have appeared in my dreams.  Seriously.  Is that weird?  This may be a reason why I shouldn’t blog as often to be honest.

* But most of all I blog because if I didn’t I think my head might explode.

(I have used the word blog way too many times in this post.  It’s not even a word.  It should, really, have an apostrophe before it anyway.)

Why do you blog?

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In honour of all this here blogging, I thought I’d pose the questions that Ivy Black (and I cannot for the life of me remember where or how I found her blog) posted answers to yesterday.  I’d love to hear your answers dear readers.  If you partake, post me a link in the comments.

1) What is your favourite time of day?

Sunset.  I’m not a morning person at all (although on the rare occasions I am out and about in the very early morning I can appreciate why people love it so, I just love my bed more), and I’m not really a nightowl either (the joys of CFS!!), but I do like that in between moment as the sun slips down below the horizon and another day begins to end.

2) Where and when did you meet the love of your life?

Well that depends.  You can either read my story, or his story!

3) What three words would your friends outside the blogging world use to describe you?

Emotional, Imaginative, Loud

4) What country would you like to visit and why?

Finland.  I want to see the Northern Lights.  I want to have a sauna and roll in the snow.  But most of all I want to visit the Moomin museum!

5) What is your favourite dish to cook?

Pudding.  Any sort of pudding really.  But especially cake.  Cake is my speciality.

6) Salt or sweet?

Sweet.  Especially in its proper form of cake.

7) What are your must have make-up or beauty items?

Hair straighteners (without them I look like some sort of bog creature), mascara, Rouge Noir nail polish, lip gloss, Lush’s Karma cream and Karma solid perfume and almond oil for hair and cuticles.  Yeah, I’m pretty high maintenance.

8 ) What are your favourite flowers?

I love roses.  I love the fact that our garden is full of rose trees.  I love flowers in general really but only when they are growing in the ground.  Cut flowers make me sad.  Don’t buy them for me please.

9) What do you think are your worst vices, honestly?

Now that would be telling.  I have no vices, clearly.  I am a yoga teacher after all!  I do swear like a trooper but only in the privacy of my own home!

10) At what time of your life were you happiest and why?

Now, obviously.  It’s all we’ve got after all.

Week 34.  And September.  It’s as though summer never happened.  What did happen to it?  What was I doing?  Did I fall asleep?

It’s been a crazy few weeks and honestly right now I’m suffering from complete overwhelm and exhaustion.  This coming weekend is my last weekend off until Christmas, forgive me if I sleep for most of it!  Rather than fixate on that big picture, let’s look at some of the happy little things.

* One red tomato.  For some reason (maybe the hot June and July and wet August) everyone’s tomatoes are huge but green.  I feel a small sense of achievement that one of our has gone red.  I don’t hold out a lot of hope for the other tomatoes and see vats of green tomato chutney and salsa verdi in my future.

* This card, bought for me by Himself to celebrate you know what.  Seriously this sums me up perfectly.  The little person even kind of looks like me.

* Hot air balloons.  On these late summer evenings there have been a lot of balloons above the fields at the back of our house.  They look so majestic just hanging there defying gravity.  Himself wants to go on a trip in one.  I’m not so sure.  To me they seem to be one of those things that only looks good from a distance.  Quite a big distance.  Anyone who has read the first few pages of Ian McEwan’s “Enduring Love” will know what I mean.

*  Green tea.  I really used to hate this stuff but either my taste buds have changed or green tea making has come on in leaps and bounds as I love it now.  Problem is I didn’t realise it has caffeine in it until it was too late.

*  Cake.  If in doubt eat cake!

Tell me what little things you love today!

Firstly a big thank you readers for all your kind words, comments and emails on yesterday’s news.  I’m excited.  And scared.  And excited.  And ludicrously grateful.  I’ll let you know how everything turns out!

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Now moving on from my news, today is a very special day for a dear friend.  The gorgeously fabulous Phil is getting married today.  For various reasons I couldn’t make it to her Big Day, so instead I have made a delicious cake “for her” and I will congratulate her to myself as I eat it!

HAPPY WEDDING DAY PHIL AND TOM – LOTS OF LOVE TO YOU!!

Now, I don’t know about everywhere else in the world but in the UK traditional wedding cakes are like Christmas cakes – rich fruit cake, slathered in marzipan and royal icing.  These cakes are being displaced by less traditional sponges and cupcake towers, which is all well and good but I like the traditional cake.  I used to work in conference and banqueting and I cannot tell you the number of wedding cakes I have had to cut up.  We had a special silver knife and everything.  And no of course I never ate the icing.  Of course not….

As I have no intention of getting married I have to make sure I get invited to plenty of weddings to eat the cake these days.  Either that or make my own.  So let’s do this….

As you can see, we’re just going to concentrate on the cake.  Remember this recipe readers as I shall be testing you on it later in the year when I shall be using it for the Christmas cake part of a “Have a Very Vegan Christmas” series of posts.  It is a then that we shall deal with the icing part.  I may even persuade Pa Yogini to divulge his secret marzipan recipe.  But I’m getting ahead of myself again.

Ingredients

12oz/300g self raising flour
12oz/300g mixed dried fruit (pick what you like, I used raisins, sultanas and mixed peel but you might like to use dried cherries, cranberries or apricots)
4oz/100g ground almonds
3oz/75g dark brown sugar
1 mashed banana
6fl.oz/175ml sunflower oil
6fl.oz/175ml fruit juice (any flavour)
1 big tablespoon of treacle (molasses)
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ginger
1 teaspoon allspice

Firstly grease and line a cake tin and put the oven on 170*C/325*F/Gas Mark 3

Then on the hob heat up the sugar and treacle with a little bit of water

Turn the heat off under the pan once it is all melty and add the mixed fruit, ground almonds, sunflower oil, juice and banana and leave it all to soak for half an hour.

In a separate bowl sift the flour and spices.

And mix the marinated fruity treacly goodness into it until your wooden spoon can stand up in the batter unaided.

Do not be tempted to eat the cake yet.

Instead, put the batter in your cake tin and cover with tin foil and bake for 1 hour 15 minutes.  After this time take the tin foil off the cake and bake for a further 20 minutes.  Allow to cool in the tin for about 15 minutes and then turn out onto a wire rack.

Come Christmas there will be the addition of brandy, but why not practice with this for now in honour of Phil and Tom’s wedding, in honour of friendship, in honour of the glory of cake itself.  Yum!

life is blurry!!!!

The last day of summer has always brought changes with it.  New schools, new terms, a new university.  In law the start of September always marked the start of full blown busy-ness after the lull of August when you actually managed to get some filing done.  Last year it heralded a new house in a new town after many, many years in London.  This year it means new enthusiastic yoga students!  And then some…

Some of you may have realised from the odd remark here and there that the life of this Suburban Yogini is in the process of change.

I’ve mentioned before that us yoga teachers often need day jobs to keep the wolf from the door.  We don’t teach this yoga for the money believe me.  We do it for love, because we want to share what we’ve learned and learn from those with whom we share.  But bills still need to be paid, so we temp or work part-time as needed.

For various unbloggable reasons my day job just wasn’t doing it for me anymore.  Instead of lightening the load and stopping me from worrying it was becoming a source of worry, blocking my creativity and my ability to be the best yoga teacher I can be.

So I quit.

Without any other source of income.

Yikes!

And I’m scared.  But perhaps not for the reasons you immediately think.

I’m scared because for the first time in my life I have absolutely nothing stopping me from living the life I want to live.  I have nothing to hide behind.

And that’s bleeding terrifying!

So to make myself accountable here’s what’s going to be happening around these parts over the coming months.

* I will be teaching as per my schedule – Cambridge readers come join us!  Around the time I decided to quit my job so did one of the only local pregnancy teachers.  And guess who she asked to take over the class?  Serendipity right?

* I have some freelance transcription work which is kind of awesome because although it doesn’t pay that well, I can do it from home, in my pyjamas if I so desire.

*  I have lots of exciting plans for the blog, including guest posts from Ma Yogini, videos, podcasts, more yoga sequences.  We’re going to have such fun readers!**

*  I have a monthly newsletter – the first one comes out in late September.  It will be full of yoga tips, recipes, sparkle and glitter.  Sign up here!

*  I am working on getting some more freelance writing gigs.  I have an article coming out in Yoga and Health magazine this month!

*  And this is the big scary announcement.  The one I’ve been procrastinating over for four years and finally got around to doing two weeks ago.  I’ve enrolled in massage school. This time next year I will be a massage therapist.  Now all I have to do is buy my uniform, go  back to school on Saturday mornings and learn to get used to touching naked strangers!  Yowzer!!

So readers, what changes is autumn bringing for you?

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** there will be some other changes on the blog, such as formatting and so forth.  Bear with me and feel free to offer suggestions either in the comments or by email to suburbanyogini [at] gmail [dot] com.

There is something so decadent about Bank Holidays. Something so naughty about lying in bed on a Monday morning instead of doing usual Monday morning-y things. And this long weekend at the end of August is always particularly bittersweet as it’s the last Bank Holiday until Christmas, which seems oh so far away.

We spent the weekend with Brother Yogini and his girlfriend who have just bought a flat in Loughton, East London right on the doorstep of Epping Forest.  Brother Y taught me how to podcast (I know!!! Watch this space and be afraid, very afraid!).

We played the Wii (please note my look of epic concentration)…

…and walked through miles of foresty-y goodness. It was hard to believe we were still officially in London!

(photos courtesy of Himself)

Then we had lunch in the oddest named pub I’ve ever seen.

Sixteen String Jack was a dandy highwayman who apparently tied his breeches with 16 silken strings! You can read more about him here. This led on to a conversation about Dick Turpin, another dandy highwayman who I always thought came from York. In fact he was a butcher from Buckhurst Hill, just down the road from Loughton. The York connection comes from the legend of him riding his horse, Black Bess, 200 miles from London to York to escape arrest. Personally I think Black Bess is the hero of that tale!

Himself, less interested in history lessons, tucked into a huge roast dinner of the kind he rarely gets at home (ie real meat).

And we were home last night after sitting on the slowest train in the world in time for sunset.