A festival dedicated just to tea?  Yes!  This weekend in Toronto.  Get in out of the cold and come visit our booth – try some fabulous teas – and get some amazing products at festival special prices.  And…best of all…teagirl will be giving a talk on Wellness Tea on Sunday February 1st from 11-12.

See you all on Sunday 🙂

You would think my house is packed with every style teapot imaginable in every colour available.  The truth however is that I have three castiron teapots that are my go to teapots for everything.  And I get as much pleasure using them today as I did the day I bought them.  Part of my new habits for life, although not listed in my original post, has been to develop new rituals that make me happy.  So here it is.  I will often have a cup of tea at the end of the night, but rather than make a mug, I’ve started the ritual of making a small pot with a lovely teacup and saucer on a small tray which I will take up to bed with me.  The teapot you see in this picture is my very first Japanese Tetsubin – it’s 20 years old and as fabulous as ever.

It may be in my head – it likely is – but my evening tea tastes better and I feel better.  Better for saying to myself…you’re worth the time to do things nicely…just for you!  Be good to you.

So here’s a small update for you on my ‘habits’ as well as my cold.  I am well under way on my promise of de-cluttering!  Yay!  I thought this would be the most difficult, which is perhaps why I tackled it first.  I’ve started the de-clutter at home as well as in the office, and it feels great.  I’ll keep you posted on further progress.

As for that cold…after battling through some excruciating pain last week, I ended up at a walk-in clinic and was diagnosed with a full blown throat infection.  So now, I’m on antibiotics and on the mend.  The moral of the story:  stop being a hero, go to the doctor so you don’t end up with a throat infection!

Now on to tea news.  This beautiful article was in the Daily Telegraph recently and I just loved it.  One of my favourite things about tea, as anyone who knows me already knows, is the diversity and the people.  So many different traditions revolving all around the same lovely leaf.  Take a browse for yourself by clicking HERE.

I’ve been fighting a cold for two weeks now, which begs the question:  why have you not gone to a doctor yet?  To which I’ll give the very unsatisfactory response:  it just doesn’t seem to be a priority at the moment.  I know…weak.

What that has left me doing, is self-diagnosing and self-medicating with any natural concoction I can get my hands on.  You see, I’m one of these very unfortunate people who can’t tolerate almost all medications, that includes children’s cough syrup.  My staples for the past two weeks have been:  oil of oregano – vile tasting; Oscillococcinum – an herbal remedy that helps with cold and flu symptoms; and yes…tea.

Interestingly, the thought of milk in anything makes me want to gag when I have a cold – so the teas I reach for are different.  I’ve been downing Ginger Sencha, for its green tea properties, its ginger properties as well as the fact I can squeeze lemon and honey into it to soothe my throat.  Is it possible that a shot of bourbon falls into the cup at bedtime?  Perhaps… Don’t judge a girl with a cold!

I hope most of you have managed to keep yourselves from this horrible virus that has invaded the city, for those of you that haven’t, feel free to use my remedies…or…better yet…get yourselves to a doctor! 🙂

So we’ve made it out of 2014 in relatively one piece and are facing a fresh new year.  It’s a blank slate really, and that’s the way I like to look at it.  Forget detoxing, and re-booting and resolutions.  Let’s just decide to start new habits.  Good habits.  Healthy habits.  We’ve all heard the phrase:  It takes 21 days to form a new habit.  I’m afraid that it is a myth.  Reality is that it takes about 2 months to form a habit – but come on, what’s 2 months relative to a lifetime of a good habit??

So instead of making lists of what I want to give up, I want to make a list of new habits I want to form.  In case it’s not on your list already, quickly add:  DRINK TEA to the top.  It’s such an easy habit to form.  It’s tasty and healthy and you know I could fill this page ten times over with reasons why this is a habit everyone should form.

I want to be realistic about my new habits.  So I’m committing myself to a schedule I think I can keep – regular yoga classes and running as part of my exercise regimen.  I developed shin splints after several years of rigorous running, so am forced to reconsider my habits.  Second, I’m already an avid reader, but am committing to the habit of making a few of my books non-fiction.  The topic can vary.  Next, I love podcasts and listen to them in the car all of the time – so my new habit will be finding a podcast I wouldn’t normally listen to…and just give it a go.  The last habit on my list is a big one:  de-cluttering.  I’m not quite sure how I’m going to master that one, but I think I’ll start by getting into the habit of putting something in a ‘trash’ or ‘give away’ box every day.  I won’t be overwhelmed with the task of de-cluttering all at once.

Most important of all, I’ve wrangled an accountability buddy into this – which means we check in with eachother every month to check on how each is doing with their list of habits.

Some things will be easier than others, but I know I’ve got the best habit already down:  DRINK TEA!  I’ll let you know how I do with  the rest 🙂