FBC update and Intro to Treats

It is now Feburary 6, and I have so far made bread every day of February. Every day but yesterday, I have given a loaf away. Yesterday we had friends over and ate most of a loaf together, so I'm counting that.

Here are my thoughts so far:

• baking bread every day has not really been a hassle because I am doing it in a very stripped down way most days
• so far, I have not made any new friends by giving away bread
• since I often vary the variables (kinds of flour; amount of yeast, etc.) if I make one loaf in a day and give it away, I have no way to be certain if it's cooked through, if it's not as dense as a brick, etc.
• people seem very pleased to be given a fresh loaf of bread, even if you tell them you're not sure how it is because it comes out a little different every time: the pediatrician was so touched gave me a big hug
• I can overthink ANYTHING

Last winter when I first started making bread, fresh bread warm from the oven with plenty of butter was such a treat, that we would eat a bunch of it every time I made it. That, it turns out, is a really good way to get fat. Eventually, since I wasn't making every day, I got into the mindset that it would be good if we didn't run out of it right away, and so we got into the mindset of saving the bread, but not too long, because bread with no fat in it doesn't stay fresh forever. So it became a little bit of a rationing and controlling mindset about the bread. Not that I was denying anyone bread, but my approach changed from  "gobble it up (and get fat)" to "save it (and end up eating some pretty stale bread)."

I realized this the first couple of days of this month when I made 2 loaves each day, so we would have one to eat and one to give away. Knowing that there would be more bread the next day really put me  back in the "let's eat all the bread now!" mindset. Fresh bread became a treat again because I wasn't having a scarcity mindset about it.

But I wonder: does something you have every day really count as a treat?

Abundance is the new Austerity

Or, maybe, Austerity is the new Abundance?

Reduce
I have been reading, and trying to put into practice, clutter clearing, such as getting rid of clothes I don't wear. It turns out once you get rid of stuff, maybe giving it to someone else who can use it, you are actually more able to use the stuff you do have. E.g., after clearing out your closet, you can see what's in your closet and actually wear it. You know everything fits you and is something you actually will wear, not something: you hope to fit into someday/someone gave you and you feel guilty about not liking/you wish you were the kind of person who would wear/etc. I have done this, and I actually do feel like I have more.

"Spend out"
Another prong of this Austerity/Abundance thing is using the things you have, not saving your good stuff for some "right" time to use it. Don't save the cloth napkins for a suitably fancy dinner party, or save the Le Creuset dutch oven until you are a better cook, or save the scented candles for the time when you finally have nothing on your To-Do list other than "take a leisurely bath" (haha!). Those times may never come.

Both of those things, reducing and "spending out" seem to me to be related to both Abundance and Austerity.

• You use what you have(letting it sit in your closet, unused, is wasting it).
• give away to someone else what you don't use (sharing abundance with other people), and then,
• having less, you actually have more (because you're actually using it all and can find it all).

This feels very incomplete. I'll try again another day. The first link above is to the Fly Lady, who I have found very helpful in getting ideas for approaching housework and clutter-clearing. The second is to Gretchen Rubin's Happiness Project website. I just finished reading this book, and I got so much out of it. It is the most practical and interdisciplinary book I've found on the subject of happiness. GR and the FlyLady seem to be of the same mind re: clutter clearing and using what you have.