Soups 1, 2 and 3

 Well I have somewhat successfuly made my first 3 soups! 

I say somewhat as I have learned a couple of things, most importantly follow the recipe as is. I love to cook, and love to bake even more. My mom was an excellent cook and even better baker and she taught me everything I know. Including a pinch of this and a dab of that. I’ve learned to cook and bake by taste and texture while also somewhat following a recipe, and been very successful with it. There has been some flops, but for the most part success. I’ve found you cannot do the same with soup, at least I can’t yet. 

First soup was Loaded Baked Potatoe - takeaway is don’t go by the ‘rules’ I’ve learned along the way. The soup was good, but not as flavorful as I think it would have been if I’d followed the recipe exactly and used all the spices needed. I also found it to be a bit thick. 

Soup 2 - Chicken Corn Chowder - didn’t learn my lesson from soup 1 and same takeaway. 

Soup 3 - Beef Barley, and in my opinion the best one of the three. And guess what, lesson learned, recipe followed exactly. Flavorful, and perfect consistency. 

While I choose my personal requirements for myself, and choose what I think will be beneficial to me; I did think others would find this one silly when I shared it. But, there was actually some interest, so that was pleasantly surprising, and even a couple of requests to share my recipes. I’ve tried to load the links for the recipes, but it is not working. If you are interested I can copy the recipes I used. 

Haven’t decided on soup 4 yet, but I’ll keep you posted! 

Check In

 It has been an extremely busy few weeks for me at work. RSP and Tax season always come with busy days and extra hours, but this year nothing else seemed to slow down as it usually does. Due to this some of my numbers fell a bit, and I even had to join class online while still at work. The good thing is I am off this week, so I’ll have a chance to catch up and build a cushion. And catch up on things around the house. 

Push ups- 3125

Sit ups and equivalent time with plank - 3200

Form reps - Hand 80 Weapon 30

AOK’s - 121

Sparring (modified) - 65

KM’s - 171

Blogs - 6

Working the Basics

 Part of the progress I’m seeing I believe is because I am focusing on the basics. In the forms I know, I know the stances, techniques, sequence, etc. what I need to do is get the strength back to do everything as it is meant to be done. Some of the moves are coming along slower as I need to build up the strength again. Something I believe helped while healing from injury was not stopping, physically or mentally, but I needed to adjust. Now I’m working on removing those adjustments. 

Many reps again this week, which I am happy about. I am learning new limits and how far I can push them. I am feeling progress in pushing my limits farther each week. Mlong Kuen (sure hope I spelled that right or I’m in trouble lol) is one of the forms I personally challenged myself to properly learn this year. I am behind on this and should be much farther along than I am. Frustrated with this, but determined. Thank you Sihing Burke for taking this on with me, and pushing me. You are a great mentor, and I appreciate all of your help. You will be a big part in helping me to push those limits! 

Push ups- 2500

Sit ups and equivalent time with plank - 2500

Form reps - Hand 70 Weapon 25

AOK’s - 102

Sparring (modified) - 55

KM’s - 142

Blogs - 5

Progress… Finally

 Tuesday - Kicks. Thursday - Forms

This may not seem anything out of the ordinary, and it isn’t. The great thing about this is I did both, as well as my own reps outside of classes. Again, doesn’t seem that special. But to me it was a great positive progress week. I am finally feeling good. I am finally feeling like there is progress towards building back up. I am finally feeling like my old self again. 

I can go in and give it my all. My all doesn’t quite look like it used to…yet. I may not be doing all of the kick reps from my right leg, but I’m doing them. And I feel okay afterward. No more, or very little, short lived swelling. Tired, but not out. It feels like it’s been sooo long, and it has been. Almost two years. And a year and a half before that since the initial injury. I haven’t had a week where I did several reps of kicks one day, and several reps of forms two days later. And my normal weekly reps for both in the in between days.

I know rebuilding, getting the strength and motion back will take time. But it finally feels like it’s actually happening, and actually progressing. It was a great week! 

Push ups- 1600

Sit ups and equivalent time with plank - 1650

Form reps - Hand 41 Weapon 18

AOK’s - 94

Sparring (modified) - 40

KM’s - 115

Blogs - 4

Mastery or Mediocrity

 I had an interesting conversation with a co-worker the other day, which really started me thinking. I drove him home as his husband was still at work. He is on the frontline team, we have different lunch times and therefore we don’t often get much of a chance to just chat. He got in my car and stated I don’t know how you do it. This caught me a bit off guard, and I questioned what he was referring to. His response - your car is so clean. I chuckled and stated that I didn’t think it was very clean with the winter mess. 

It was Valentine’s Day as well. He continued on to say it amazes him how busy I am and I don’t seem to let anything drop, and I had even provided a valentines treat for my co-workers. He explained he does not see how I do it as he struggles with just keeping up with his husbands young adult daughter and his job, and doesn’t seem to fit anything else in. He sees my busy calendar each day, the relationships I build at work, hears me talk about my family and my kung fu, and I still seem to have time to plan events at work, and make sure everyone is thought of. I chuckled again and told him he was making me sound like a superhero, which I was not. He asked me how I do it. 

I tried to answer him, but instead advised I wasn’t sure, I just do it. I often feel there is a fine line between living mastery and high performing mediocrity, if that is a thing? I am busy there is no doubt. I don’t like to let anyone down, people depend on me. Always trying to be my best at being the wife, mother, grandmother, a martial artist, and most tenured person at my branch, leader, trainer, confidant, and so on. And then carve some time for me. Roughly 18 hours each day to fit everything in, working 10 - 12 of those hoiurs 5 days a week most weeks. 

Make the best of my time. Prioritize. Do I drop the ball, or a few of them? Absolutely. But I try not to drop the important ones, if that makes sense. There is deadlines, and those must prioritize. Family, prioritize. Kung fu, prioritize. The rest falls into place. I’m working on the mindset of just get it done. Don’t leave it for later, or tomorrow. This is helping my time management actually, as tomorrow will bring enough to do. 

I told my co-worker we would plan some time to sit and chat. He was really reaching out for some help. He is feeling overwhelmed, and maybe in some small way I can help. This will be a priority as well. I do not see myself as doing anything special, I am living my life and trying to the best I can. This conversation caught me off guard for a couple of reasons. 

1. I never realized what I do in a normal day was noticed by him, or anyone for that matter.

2. I was honored that he reached out, and respected his openness to share with me. 

Push ups- 1525

Sit ups and equivalent time with plank - and 1575 

Form reps - Hand 15 Weapon 7

AOK’s - 71

Sparring (modified) - 25

KM’s - 86

Blogs - 3

Personal Requirements Part 1

 This year I chose my personal requirements specifically for areas of growth for myself. While the personal requirements are meant to be chosen to improve yourself, I chose specifics this year that I feel need the most attention for me. I am also committing to blog about my growth through the year, as I haven’t done this in the past. 

Two of the goals I am most looking forward to are weight loss, and it may seem silly, but my other goal of making soup. 

At the beginning of this calendar year as a family we adjusted our eating habits. In the last couple of years we have let that slide and it was past time to make adjustments. We are eating less carbs, less red meat, less sugar, and way less unhealthy snacks. We haven’t even gone down the chip isle in weeks. It may not seem that impressive but believe me it is. Snacks now include things like celery, rice crackers or a few unsalted nuts. And the wonderful thing is this is already now becoming a habit. We actually miss not having salad when we have something else with our meals. 

I had set a weight loss goal of 5 pounds per quarter. I’m happy to say less than half way into the first quarter, I am down 6 pounds so far. Now I realize the first initial pounds to lose are the easiest, and this will get much harder, but it also tells me the changes in eating habits are having a positive effect.

Making soup. Sounds silly. I love to cook and bake, but have never made homemade soup. I committed to 10 homemade soups this year. I’ll be making my second one tomorrow. It’s not about the soup. Making soup is easy. It’s about the time. I am committing to make soup, learn something new, and grow my skills. But it’s mostly about committing the time to do it. Not just the prep, but cooking the soup through the day, and keeping my attention on it instead of running in 10 different directions. 

These are a couple of my personal requirements, and while there is more to the commitments and changes in place to help make them successful, this is a start. I plan to blog throughout the year on the progress, and my other commitments. 

Push ups- 1425

Sit ups - 1425

Form reps - Hand 9 Weapon 2

AOK’s - 44

Sparring (modified) - 20

KM’s - 52

Blogs - 2

Year of the Snake 2025

 A few little tidbits for my first blog for the year of the snake. 

- First, congratulations to our two newest Black Belts - Todai Mike Kohut and Sidai Aviva Csillag. Very well deserved for all of your hard work. 

- Congratulations to all of the award winners of the year. You make us all proud to be a part of your team. 

- Anither wonderful, successful banquet. Thank you to everyone for the work put in to make it happen, and the hard work of everyone throughout the day. It certainly is the event I look forward to each year. 

- An amazing end to the Year of the Dragon, and start to the Year of the Snake thanks to Todai Nigel Bauer. The Kindness Project was such a thoughtful and Amazing idea thought of and brought to life by you. I very much enjoyed taking part, and digging in to provide meaningful thoughts to each of my teammates. It brought tears to my eyes to read each of my own, and it means so much to me. Thank you 💜

I have put my numbers below for the final numbers of last year, and the first few days of this year. 

Year end - 

Push ups- 36,870

Sit ups - 36,820

Form reps - Hand 680 Weapon 735

AOK’s - 1667

Sparring (modified) - 950

KM’s - 1779

Blogs - 54

I’ve decided to keep putting my blog numbers for this year, as it keeps me accountable for blogging. 

Push ups- 540

Sit ups - 540

Form reps - Hand 5 Weapon 0

AOK’s - 15

Sparring (modified) - 10

KM’s - 24

Blogs - 1