How To Stop Hiccups

The title of this post makes me giggle. Really it should be entitled, "How To Stop Hiccuping" or "How To Stop Your Hiccups." Or better yet, "How I Stop My Hiccups," because I have no idea if this will work for anyone else. But the image of a bunch of animate hiccups taking down TSA, or whatever it is that rogue hiccups are wont to do, was too good to delete. Or is it just me that gets amused at all the images in my head? 

I really hate hiccuping, so several years ago I figured out how to stop. When I was on my mission in Romania, I got a hiccup attack and my companion stopped it my demanding that I hiccup for her immediately. After that, I tried to do it without her authoritative presence nearby, and it was harder. But I figured it out, and since then I haven't had a major hiccup attack since. 

Well, that's not totally true. Several months ago, I was at Ikea with a rambunctious preschooler and a hungry crying infant, and I got a major case of the hiccups. I tried to do my little trick, but it didn't work and I hiccuped again and again and again. So finally I sat on a couch, breastfed the baby (in public! The scandal!), told the preschooler to calm down, and did my little trick. And then it worked. So you need to be able to focus, okay?

So here are the steps:

1. Get in a focused, calm frame of mind.

2. Force yourself to want, more than anything, to hiccup--to experience that sensation. Let go of all other thoughts.

3. Try to remember what it feels like to hiccup. Try to pinpoint exactly what parts of your body do the job. 

4. Keep at it, letting all other thoughts slip away.

When I first started doing this, it took a while for the hiccups to go away. But now, like I said, if I'm in a calm, focused frame of mind, I don't hiccup more than once. And a bonus is that when it's over, I'm in a calm, focused frame of mind.

I'm curious if this works for other people, so let me know in the comments! 

Read more...

Confessions

The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem, right? Okay, here it goes:


I'm obsessed with baking and cooking.

Banana Cake with Mocha Frosting, and the most beautiful icing job you've ever seen.

Not all the time. This is kind of unusual. Generally speaking I like it, but these days, I can't stop. I think about it constantly. Every time I nurse Henry, I whip out my phone, go to Smittenkitchen.com, and hit the "Surprise Me!" button. It's crack, I swear. I want to make everything! I'm going to go to it right now. What recipe will it be? Lemon yogurt anything cake! It has blueberries! How can one resist?

Summer enjoying the Mocha Frosting: the cake was a little neglected

When I'm not nursing Henry, I frequently find excuses to sit and flip through my new favorite cookbook: Ready For Dessert by David Lebovitz. Well, honestly I only have three cookbooks now so it's not hard for it to be my favorite, but it's still really good. There isn't a dessert in there I don't want to make, but I've really got my eye on Orange Almond Bread Pudding with Tangerine Butterscotch Sauce. And Chocolate Gelato. And definitely the Apple-Frangipane Gallette. So far I have made his Fresh Ginger Cake, Banana Cake with Mocha Frosting, and Caramel Ice Cream, and they all are so amazingly good. And just now Summer and I ate the last of the mocha frosting with some of the caramel ice cream and it was heavenly. Maybe my favorite dessert ever. Or at least until I make Buttermilk Panna Cotta with Blueberry Compote. Doesn't that sound dreamy?

Caramel Ice Cream with Mocha Frosting--tastier than it looks!

Speaking of dreams, did I mention I dream about food too? I don't remember the dreams now, and even if I did I probably wouldn't blog about them because sharing the details of a girl's food dreams? If I saw someone else do that I'd probably think that person was a wee bit pathetic. Unless the dreams involved flying flower cupcakes or something, but I'm pretty sure mine are just "Dang, that spaghetti looks GOOD!"

Summer documenting her ice-cream-making activities.

So Nathaniel has taken note of my dessert obsession and suggested I channel it into making freezer meals, which is a brilliant idea, no? I've made freezer meals before based on Pinterest suggestions of taco soup and other Mormon-y meals like that, and it was a disaster. They were so gross. Oh, I still cannot believe I made tater-tot casserole. Why? Did I think that once I had a my second baby my taste buds would lose all sense of decency and totally go for deep fried potatoes on top of meat goo? I guess babies have made people do stranger things. But this time I'm being smarter and a) taking the recipes from a good source and b) trying them before making a triple batch. I know. I'm a genius.

This kid may or may not have snuck bits of all the desserts. He admits nothing.

So far I've made butternut squash bisque and spinach and white bean pot pie, both of which were big hits and I wish I'd made a triple batch, but hey, at least I'm not throwing away trays of food. I also made gnocchi, which didn't turn out so great because inconvenient stuff like giving my kids naps and administering medicine prevented me from making the gnocchi right when the potatoes came out of the oven. But my taste buds aren't so discriminating so they'll get eaten.

Gnocchi. I took a picture and blogged about it; ergo, it actually happened. 

So right now my big challenge is to stop thinking about the ingredients I have for Vanilla Ice Cream and Orange Pound Cake and Cheesecake Brownies, and start working on my new year's resolutions (of which I have many, and no, I don't consider myself a failure just because it's already January 16th and I haven't even started to do several of them). Or, if the new year's resolutions thing doesn't work out, at least I'll start working on freezer meals. Seriously, guys, wish me luck, or I won't be able to fit into my clothes anymore.

Read more...