It's All About Perspective

I've recently been obsessed with the show Walking Dead. I know I'm a bit late to the game, as the show is now on its 6th season. Admittedly, I was very hesitant to start watching because the idea of zombies wasn't too appealing. Having now watched 5 seasons, I have to say that despite all the guts and gore, the show has much more depth than I expected. In particular, there was an episode that really resonated with me.

Just to provide some context for those of you who don't watch the show - the world is in an apocalyptic state as a result of a plague that has turned a majority of the population into mindless cannibals aka "Walkers". The main characters are largely strangers that have come together to form an alliance of sorts in an attempt to survive in the face of Walkers and limited resources.

In one of the episodes (season 5 - episode 2, I think), two of the characters (Bob and Sasha) play this game about "perspective". Sasha would come up with a seemingly negative situation or circumstance and Bob would counter by giving it a positive spin.

"Wet socks -- Cool feet"

"Mosquito bites -- Itching, to remind you that you're alive"

"Danger around every corner -- Never a dull moment"

"Sun beating down on you -- Glorious tan"

"No privacy -- Captive Audience"

Bob is one of my favourite characters on the show. His character's personality and perspective on life is refreshing, especially when juxtaposed with the show's motifs of doom, hopelessness, and struggle. His character is a good reminder that even in times of hardship, your attitude can really influence how you perceive your situation or circumstances.

It's all about perspective.

Even though Bob's character is fictional, people like Bob do exist in this world ... and I admire them! I admire them for their courage to accept adversity. I admire them for their ability to see beyond their current struggles. And I admire them for their unwavering perseverance to continue to enjoy life even when the odds are against them.

Over time, I've come to realize that self pity does no good (in any situation). All it does or will do is create a focal point for you to fixate on all the things that are not going right in your life. Life is not fair. Instead of thinking about how life has treated you unfairly, you should be grateful and thankful for your circumstances because there is always someone out there who is struggling harder. There is no sense in wishing away the negative and wishing for the positive, when at the end of the day all you're doing is wishing. Your life is what's been given to you, so live with it. Live "with" it sounds bad. But, I say that knowing that often times it's very difficult to change your perspective on something, especially when you're used to viewing it as being negative. Ultimately, the goal here (and this is a huge goal for me!) is to become so well-adapted to perceiving the positive in every situation that you're not simply living with it, you just live it. 

So, what was I thinking when I recently got the flu? (or at least I tried  to remind myself to think)

"I have the flu -- It's not fatal, I will recover"

"I have no appetite -- This will help curb my overeating"

"I can't make it to work -- I can catch up on sleep"

"I don't have the energy to workout -- I have more time to watch Walking Dead"

Set Your Intentions and Make It Happen

Welcome 2016!

January 1st came and left just as quickly as 2015... and now we nearing the second weekend of January! I came back from vacation several days after New Year's and never got around to making a post about my new year resolutions.

Although, I make "new year resolutions" in anticipation of a new year (like many others) ... my resolutions are more like daily resolutions that I like to reaffirm when a new year comes around. 

(Similar to how some people renew their wedding vows from time to time)

This is because I can never wait for a new year to come around to resolve to make an improvement in my life. LIFE IS SHORT. However, this is not to say that I don't support people who find meaning in making new resolutions every year. To each their own! For me, when I recognize an area in my life that is in my control to change for the better ... I want to start that change right away!!! At the same, this doesn't mean that the actual change happens right away, nor does it mean that I'm always successful in making every change that I want to make. It simply means that I acknowledge when a change is necessary and I commit to making the change. 

But like I said, I'm not always successful in my endeavours. Change doesn't happen overnight; it's not easy and it takes time. I know lot of people (myself included) often give up before the change can even happen. This is more than understandable, considering most changes involve struggle and failure. BUT, I've learned time and time again that authentic change requires motivation, determination, commitment, and resilience (yes, all those powerful things!). In addition to that, I've gathered some other tips that have proven to be helpful and here they are: 

1. Be positive

Be optimistic about your ability to change and believe that you are capable of doing it!  Be confident in yourself and focus on the little steps you can take to eventually get to where you want to be, instead of worrying about potential hardships or obstacles that might stand in your way.

2. Be realistic

Even though you should always be optimistic, it's important to also be realistic. Ambition is great until it pushes you to make unrealistic goals that lead to inevitable failure. Start small and take little steps. It might take longer for you to get to where you want to be, but slow and steady wins the race! There is no point is setting unachievable goals because that's just going to discourage you from continuing.

3. Have a plan

Another reason why I think a lot of people give up before change happens is because they don't take the time to plan out how they are going to effect the change. You can't get from Point A to Point B without figuring out the route to get there! Visualize the change in your mind and visualize yourself taking the steps to do it. This always helps to motivate me and helps me to take my first steps in the right direction.

4. Be kind to yourself

A lot of people always think to be kind to others, but seldom remember to be kind to themselves. Be kind to yourself! Be patient! Remember that it's totally okay to not achieve all your goals all at once, as long as you are moving forward. And even if you take a couple of steps backwards ... it's ok! As long as you learn from your mistakes.

"It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop." - Confucius

I'm not going to share my entire list of personal resolutions, but for the sake of giving an example:

Ever since I started working full-time, it's been difficult for me to stay on track with my workouts. Being active and healthy is very important to me. So, whenever I feel that I'm not getting in enough exercise, I feel anxious and even disappointed in myself. For a long time, I've contemplated the idea of fitting in my workouts before work. Although I am likely more of a "morning person" than a lot of people I know, I am not a natural early-riser and waking up earlier than I have to (especially on a work day) is difficult for me. At the same time, I've discovered from past experience that working out first thing in the morning makes me feel great. It helps to energize me, boost my metabolism, improve my mood ... and the list goes on. 

Recently, I've decided to stop making excuses for myself. I realize that if it's THAT important to me to stay active, I can find the time and willpower to get up early. I started by committing to waking up early 2-3 days/week to workout before work. I knew that if I started out by forcing myself to get up 7 days/week, I would give up quickly because that would be unrealistic. So far, I've managed to stay on track. Perhaps I'll check back in 3 weeks or so to write an update about my progress :) Once I get used to waking up early twice a week, I'll likely push myself to wake up 4 days/week.  In any case, I realize that at the end of the day ... my reason for wanting to make this change is so I could feel better about myself and be happier. That in itself motivates me to keep going.

With that being said, always remember that any change you want to make should be about YOU. There's no point in trying to change when you don't want the change for yourself. You will not be motivated to work hard otherwise. 

25 Was Good to Me

As I've said before, December is a very special month for me. Especially because my birthday is so close to the end of the year, it's usually the time for me to reminisce about the past year; the time for me to remember the obstacles I've faced and also the good times that I've had.

Yesterday, I turned 26! As usual, I didn't feel any older ... and I am glad. 25 was good to me. 2015 was a good year and I couldn't be more grateful. I finally finished a year of articling that felt like it would never end, I got called to the Ontario bar (officially became a lawyer!), I got a job in BC, I moved to Vancouver, I got called to the BC bar, two of my closest friends got engaged ... and that's just to name a few. It feels like I just celebrated my "quarter of a century" birthday with my friends in Toronto. It feels like just yesterday that I was thinking about what 2015 would bring. It's both thrilling and scary to think about how fast time "flies". Thrilling because I've experienced so many new opportunities in such a short amount of time and scary because I realize that time passes no faster now than it always did. It just seems like it goes by quicker because we forget to live in the moment.

As much as I hate to admit it, living in the moment is actually something very hard to do (at least for me). I'm a "planner" and perfectionist ... and if you are too, then you will understand what I mean when I say that oftentimes it's very difficult for me to enjoy the present moment without (over)thinking about or planning for what's ahead. Nonetheless, I am very aware of this, so I try to catch myself when I'm not being present.

On Friday, Sameer planned a surprise birthday dinner for me. The plan was for us to go to Chewies downtown Vancouver for dinner.  I thought it was just going to be the two of us, but he had invited a lot of our friends without me knowing and it was an awesome surprise. At the beginning of the night, I caught myself obsessing about insignificant things i.e. whether I was over/underdressed for the restaurant, I forgot to spray on my perfume before I left the house, whether I seemed surprise when I walked in ... and the list goes on. There was actually a moment that I remember very clearly when I looked around at all the people who had come out to celebrate my birthday and I realized that likely no one really cares. And in that moment, (believe it or not, in my state of semi-inebriation), I had some form of epiphany ... in 10 or 20 years, what I'm going to or want to remember from the night is not that I was over/underdressed or that I forgot to put on perfume, etc ... What I would want to remember is:

1. how happy I felt to be able to enjoy such good company;
2. how grateful I was to have someone who cared about me so much to go out of their way to plan a surprise for me; and
3. how lucky I am to have so many people who would take time out of their day to celebrate my birthday with me.

"Forever is composed of nows." - Emily Dickinson

Tis the Season of Giving

If you are not already familiar with the Christmas song, "My Grown Up Christmas List" ... listen to it! (the Michael Buble version is my favourite). It's a great song and I've really been relating to it this holiday season. As much as I have been enjoying the season's celebrations, I've also been very mindful to all the adversities that people are facing around the world. Especially with all the tragedy that has been happening around the world recently, I am reminded everyday that I am incredibly blessed to be living the life that I live. With my birthday also coming up, I've had a lot of people ask me what I want for Christmas or my birthday. When I think about it, I realize there's nothing that I really need. 

When I used to think of Christmas or my birthday, the first thing that would come to mind was presents, food, parties, and more presents. Now, I think of love, happiness and family. Maybe it has to do with maturity ... maybe it has to do with moving across the country... maybe it has to do with being away from my family. Regardless, I am determined to do my best this year to help out those who are less fortunate. Everyone deserves to be able to celebrate love, happiness and family 365 days a year.

So, I am starting a personal tradition this year (and I hope some of you will join me!) to pledge gifts to the homeless in my community :) Homeless Partners is a great non-profit organization that allows homeless communities to post their personal stories and gift requests online. You can then pledge/donate gifts based on the wish lists and drop them off to different locations. 

Unfortunately Homeless Partners does not include homeless communities in Toronto. But for my Toronto friends, who are interested in doing something similar, Covenant House and United Way have created lists of items they are collecting to gift to those living in poverty.

With that being said, if you are someone who is thinking of what to get me for Christmas or my birthday, please save the money and donate it or a gift to someone in need this December! (or donate to cause/organization/charity of your choice).

Love openly and give generously, my friends! 

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

This post is long overdue!

Although I'm not a huge fan of the winter season, December has always been my favourite month and Christmas has always been my favourite holiday of all time! There's something about the spirit of the holiday that cheers me up even when I'm in the worst mood. It also helps that it's also my birthday month :)

In light of that, I was very excited to be able to decorate my apartment this year. We haven't had a Christmas tree at home for the last several years because we were travelling during the holidays. So, I made sure to get one this year. And because I'm a true believer in spreading Christmas cheer, here are some pictures that will hopefully do just that:

Of course I had a festive candle burning in the background - Frosty Pines!

I actually didn't get this one from Bath & Body Works (I felt so guilty).  I got this one on sale at the Superstore and it smells just like a live Christmas tree!

Since my tree wasn't real, the candle really did its job. Got this 6.5 footer from London Drugs and it was super easy to assemble.

Although the whole tree decorating process took awhile, I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it. We used to decorate the tree as a family every year when I was younger and it was always a really good bonding experience. It was something that I looked forward to every year as December approached. Even as I was decorating my own tree this year, it brought back a lot of fond memories I had from my childhood. It actually made me realize how lucky I was to be able to associate this holiday with so much love, warmth, and happiness.

After we assembled the tree, we obviously had to stop and enjoy the sunset...

As always, Dollarama saved the day.  I got all of my tree decorations there for around $30.

... Oh Christmas tree! :)

Yes, I took this picture a day before I wrote this post.

A quick look at the rest of my apartment:

Welcome!

Snowflakes galore!

And now that decorations are done ... onto Christmas cards! Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and happy holidays!!! xoxo

I <3 Avocados

I LOVE AVOCADOS. They are yummy, nutritious, and filling.

Fun fact: an avocado contains more potassium than a banana. 

As much as I would love to say that I love avocados because they are healthy ... the reality is that I love them because they just taste so good. If we're friends, you'll know that I always have a craving for comfort food. For some reason, avocados taste like comfort food to me. So actually, I'm just lucky that they're good for you.

In any case, since I eat avocados pretty much everyday, I figured I would share my favourite ways to eat them.

I rarely measure ingredients precisely when I'm making food so I can't attest to how much of anything I'm really using. The exception to this is when I'm baking - I'm always very exact with all my measurements.

1. Avocado on toast.

Aside from cereal and granola with yogurt, avocado on toast is probably my #1 go-to breakfast. It's quick and easy to make - perfect for mornings before work.

I use one avocado for two pieces of toast. After I mash up the avocado in a bowl, I add in some lemon juice, garlic powder, black pepper, and salt, and then mix it all together. I spread that onto my toast ... and I'm good to go!

Banana AND avocado.

Sometimes, I like to get a bit fancier on the weekends. I add in some chopped up red onion to my usual avocado mix, and then I top it up with some chopped up grape tomatoes, green onions, and eggs.

I love eggs benny :) (almost as much as avocados)

2. Baked eggs in avocados.

This one is another one of my breakfast favourites - tastes great and looks nice too. It takes a bit longer (since you have to wait for the eggs to bake), so I usually save this one for a weekend morning.

To make room for the egg, I scoop out a bit of the avocado. Fear not! The excess does not go to waste. I usually mix up the avocado in a separate bowl and then save it for later to dip my crackers in as a snack. I bake them in my toaster oven because I don't want to bother preheating my standard oven. I keep the avocados in the toaster oven until the eggs whites solidify. Once they're ready, I top them with some sriracha sauce, salt & black pepper, and paprika.

Sriracha makes everything better.

3. Avocado in salad.

If you follow me on Instagram (@lamcj), then you've probably seen this picture already.

This was a quinoa salad with chicken, red peppers, red & green onions, baba ganoush ... and avocado! Avocado added to chickpea salads and green salads are also awesome.

4. Avocado sauce on zoodles.

I almost feel like this deserves a blog post on its own. I only discovered zucchini noodles (aka zoodles) recently when I bought a spiralizer. I found one sale for $12, and figured why not? Turns out it's super useful and easy to use.

All you have to do is chop off one end of a zucchini and feed it into the spiralizer in a twisting motion. I cook the zoodles on a pan with some olive oil, salt, and black pepper until they become soft. To make the avocado sauce, I chop up an avocado, then add it to my magic bullet with some water, lemon juice, salt, and pepper. I would've added in some cilantro to the mix too, but I didn't have any that day. Once that's all blended together, I just scoop it out onto my zoodles.

Lots of love for this green duo.

5. Guacomole!

This one is a given. I mean, who doesn't love guac? 

I make mine with: avocado (obviously!), lime juice, cilantro, roma tomatoes, white onions, minced garlic, salt, and black pepper. If I'm not having this with nachos, then I'm most likely having it in some tacos :) 

Birthday Cake With a Twist

I'm so happy to be finally able to make a post about the "making" of this cake:

About a month ago, I got the idea to make a hat-shaped cake for Sameer's birthday. Initially, I had no idea how to even go about doing it. So naturally, I searched "how to make a hat cake" on Google and watched every YouTube video tutorial out there on making hat-shaped cakes. 

Another piece of interesting information is that I've also never baked a cake from scratch. So, on top of my hat cake research ... I also did a bunch of research on tips for baking a perfect cake. Thankfully, I came across Yolanda Gampp's amazing blog (How to Cake It) - she had the perfect vanilla cake recipe for cake decorating and also a YouTube video on making a baseball cap cake. And so, I decided to go with her vanilla cake recipe for my cake. 

Here is everything I used to make the cake:

- 1 and 1/2 cups of unsalted butter
- 3 cups of sugar
- 1 and 1/2 tsp of vanilla extract
- 6 eggs
- 1 and 1/2 cups of milk
- 3 and 3/4 cups of flour
- 1 tbsp and 1 tsp of baking powder
- 3/4 tsp
- 2 large mixing bowls
- 1 stainless steel bowl
- 1 hand mixer
- 1 sift
- Duncan Hines' vanilla buttercream
- Bristol board
- Wilton's Black and white fondant
- Wilton's fondant decorating tools
- 1 cake board
- 1 rolling pin (or wine bottle)
- 1 serrated knife
- 1 sharp paring knife
- 1 mini paintbrush

I had planned on taking pictures of every step ... but at one point, I got way too into it and completely forgot to take pictures. Here's a collection of pictures I did take:

I took the butter, eggs and milk (I poured the amount needed into a bowl) out of the fridge in advance so that they could be at room temperature. This allows the ingredients to blend together better.

Step 1: Sift the flour, salt and baking powder and whisk them together in one bowl.

I made sure to level off each measurement with the back edge of a knife to make sure the amounts were exact.

Step 2: Cream the butter and sugar.

I put the butter and sugar together in another mixing bowl and used my hand mixer to blend them together. A good tip I learned for using the hand mixer was to place the mixer in the ingredients before turning it on ... as opposed to starting it and then going in from above. Yes, I learned this the hard way because the latter method caused A LOT of splattering. Once the butter and sugar is well-blended, the mixture should be completely smooth with no lumps or bumps.

My rubber spatula came in really handy when I needed to scrape the sides of the mixing bowl.

Step 3: Add the eggs.

I cracked the eggs into one bowl and added them to the mixture two at a time (as suggested by Yolanda Gampp). I made sure the eggs were fully blended into the mixture before adding more.

Step 4: Add in the dry ingredients and milk to the mix.

I followed Yolanda's instructions for this step and it worked really well. She suggests adding the dry ingredients alternatively with the milk, starting with the dry ingredients - 4 parts of dry ingredients and 3 parts of milk.


Step 5: Dye the batter (if you want to).

I wanted to dye the batter a dark purple colour (for the Raptors!!!). I started by adding the red food colouring... then the blue food colouring.

Step 6: Line baking bowl with parchment paper and grease bowl.

I cut slits into a circular parchment liner to line the bottom of the stainless steel bowl and then greased the sides of the bowl with some butter.

Step 7: Pour in the good stuff.

... and after this, I started slacking on the picture-taking. I followed Yolanda's instructions - pre-heated the oven to 350 degrees, and then plopped the batter into the oven. Based on the amount of batter I made, the bake time should have been 1 hr and 20 min. BUT because the bowl I used to bake the batter in was so deep, it took closer to 2 hrs for the whole thing to bake. I checked on the cake periodically and stuck a knife down the centre to see if if it would come out clean. Once the knife came out clean, I took it out out of the oven and let it cool over night. I draped a clean dish towel over it to keep the cake from drying out. 

Step 8: Remove the cake from the bowl.

I had a HELL OF A HARD TIME taking the cake out of the bowl. I ran a knife along the side of the cake and tried to shake it out while holding the bowl upside down, but no luck. It took me about 15 min to finally get the thing out. I had to eventually use my knife as a lever to pry it out. When the cake finally felt loose, I flipped it over to let us fall out on its own ... and

IT FELL OUT IN 3 SEPARATE PIECES. After having a panic attack and nearly crying over the cake disaster ... I improvised a bit and glued the pieces back together with my vanilla buttercream. Surprisingly, this actually worked out pretty well. 

Step 9: Shape the cake.

I used one of my Blue Jays hats and traced the shape of the base of the hat and the brim onto a piece of bristol board. I then flipped the cake upside down and trimmed it with a serrated knife to the shape of the base of the hat. I also trimmed all around the cake until I got it to look more or less like the shape of a hat.

I set the template for the brim of the hat aside until I got the fondant ready.

Step 10: Frost the cake.

In the professional caking world, I believe this step is called "crumb coating" ... because it coats the outside of the cake and keeps the crumbs in. I put layer of vanilla buttercream evenly over the entire surface of the cake. Then I let it set in the fridge for about 30 - 40 min.

Step 11: Put cake on cake board.

Once the frosting on the outside of the cake was set (it's hard to the touch), I carefully removed the cake from the baking sheet and placed it onto my "cake board". You can buy actual cake boards that are specifically used for cake presentation. I used a canvas board that I got from Dollarama for $2. To get the cake to stay put, you can put more frosting on the bottom of the cake before placing it onto the board (and then let set for another 30 - 40 min). I didn't bother with this because I didn't have time. I placed the cake directly onto the board.

Step 12: Fondant time.

I got my fondant from Michael's. I bought 1.5 lbs of black and white Wilton's fondant. I wasn't sure how much I would actually need. I only needed the white for the lettering on the front, but I figured I would get extra to be safe. 

I started off by kneading the fondant to get it softer for rolling. After that, I used my rolling pin to flatten out the fondant. At first, I rolled it in all directions. When it started getting thinner, I started rolling it out from the centre to make everything even. I think the general rule is to get it to 1/8th of an inch thick. Once I got it to the right thickness, I lifted it up on one side and rolled it halfway onto my rolling pin ... and then I VERY quickly flipped it onto the cake. 

The one thing I've heard time and time again about fondant is that you have to work very quickly when you're covering the cake because the fondant stretches when you lift it and can rip easily. 

When I was happy that my cake was covered evenly, I cut off the excess fondant (leaving about 1 inch around the cake) with a sharp paring knife. Then I pushed the fondant that was left gently towards the cake, in a tucking motion. I've heard that fondant tends to shrink up the sides once it starts to dry, so I wanted to avoid that. After that, I used my paring knife again to cut away the remaining fondant, keeping as close to the cake as possible. I used the template I had made out of bristol board for the brim of the hat and traced around it to cut the fondant into the same shape. I cut slightly bigger around the template, to avoid the same shrinking problem I mentioned earlier. Before connecting the brim to the rest of the hat, I rolled a random piece of fondant to place under the brim to give it a natural curve.

Step 13: Decorating & detail time!!!

This part was my favourite part of making the cake. It was so fun to add on all the details and slowly watch as it became more like a hat. 

Here are the fondant decorating tools I used: 

The stitching tool (mini pizza cutter looking thing) was so clutch for making this hat cake.

I started by rolling and flattening out a bit of fondant for the top nub of the hat. Then I used the stitching tool to create the stitch lines on the brim of the hat.

I used one of my Blue Jays hats as reference for doing the segmented lines. The hat is actually divided by 6 lines that all connect to the top nub. I used the side of a fork to lightly imprint the lines on the fondant. Then, I went over the lines with the end of the stitching tool with the bigger wheel. On either side of those lines, I noticed there were finer stitched lines. So, I used the other end of the stitching tool (the one with the smaller wheel) to create those lines. Lastly, I used the sharp pokey tool to poke 6 vent holes around the hat, in the centre of the lines. To make the vent holes stand out more, I cut out tiny circles from the black fondant to place on top of the holes that I had poked. 

Last, but not least ... I cut out the "WE THE NORTH" letters from the white fondant that I had rolled out. Initially, I had printed out the words onto a piece of paper to use as a template for the letters. However, the knife I was using wasn't sharp enough, so I was having a really hard time cutting through the paper and the fondant. So, I ended up free-handing the letters.

To attach the decorative fondant pieces to the cake, I added a small amount of water to the pieces with a mini paintbrush.

To finish it all off, I used a tube of black glitter sugar gel to write my birthday message onto the cake board :) HAPPY BIRTHDAY SAMEER!!!