a cooking pot and twisted tales
Thoughts and Tales…A Lifestyle Blog with a Zing.
![1456555828677[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/14565558286771.jpg)
Bliss is waking up late on a beautiful Saturday morning, lounging in bed, cocooned beside the warm body of your loved one and talking about everything and nothing.
Bliss is eating a robust, nutritious home-made breakfast, smiling about nothing and everything, and generally feeling happy.
That’s my bliss. So, what’s your bliss 😉 ?
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
I am quite sure that I am just one out of the billions of women who started a good argument thread with yours sincerely darling husband or partner, believing that you had all your words lined in a row, only to find yourself perplexed after a bit into the lopsided argument and at a loss for a good parting shot to drive home your thoughts.
Fast forward two days later, while on the hot stove turning the soup, a phrase just pops into your head and you think to yourself.
Ah Ha! That’s it! I should have said that line as my nailing shot.
That would surely make him realize how much thought I gave to the matter.
You traipse to the Living room to deliver your parting shot which is two days late and your husband who is flipping the sports channel thinks you are a lunatic, because for all intents and purpose, he has blissfully forgotten what it was you were talking about 🙂
Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
The Daily Post prompt drawing a blank.
When was the last time your walked away from a discussion, only to think of The Perfect Comeback hours later? Recreate the scene for us, and use your winning line.
![1456129319423[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/14561293194231.jpg)
All the hullabaloo about Technology will only impress me, when I can download those delicious platters served up online 😉
After turning the house upside down over the weekend, I found a ton of stuff. You will never know what you have, until you spring clean your house. Then you will find all sorts of things that you can’t even recall. Sometimes, in pairs 😉
It’s always lovely to start the week and each day as much as we can with a smile and positive outlook. I find Leannenz Monday memes interesting.
Do have a fruitful and blessed week awesome people.
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
![1456063599630[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/14560635996301.jpg)
It’s a no-brainer that I should follow my heart when I toppled over in love with my husband, right?
Or, should I say, when he didn’t let me get away?
I was so focused on building a career. I had a fantastic job with The Delegation Of The European Union. A young lady with a bright future and a job that opened up so many doors and windows.
Then love came calling and stole my heart away and before I could even say Jack Robinson, he whisked me off to the altar, after a whirlwind courtship of six months.
That was a bold step and today, here we are, sixteen years after and counting.
It was a tough decision for me to leave my job and join my husband back in Lagos and we tried the long-distance thing for a while which was maddening for both of us.
At a point, I knew that I couldn’t take it much longer and decided to resign from my mouth-watering job.
I committed my steps into the hands of The Lord and joined my husband with my rounded belly in tow.
It took no time at all for me to gain a solid employment with British American Tobacco and the rest is history.
Sometimes, I do ponder on the thought: what if I had refused to get entangled with my husband and had stuck to the vision of working my way up as an aspiring diplomat?
I would have probably met some of those diplomatic career goals, who knows.
I will never know the answer to what my life might have turned out to be, but I can’t visualize a life without my family and I have no regrets to have taken this path.
All I know is that ‘all things work together for the good of those who love the Lord.’ Rom 8:28
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
The Daily Post The Road Less Traveled.
Pinpoint a moment in your past where you had to make a big decision. Write about that other alternate life that could have unfolded.
![1456041233427[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/14560412334271.jpg)
A Thousand Deaths
I died a thousand times
When you said to me
‘It’s over now’
I carved out my heart
And handed it to you
Wrapped in bows and kisses
Expecting you to know
That to drop my heart
Would cause it to shatter
Fragmented in a million places
But drop it you did.
I died a thousand times
When you died in my arms.
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
The poem above came to me when I read Lily’s heart rending post I don’t know her in real time. I only read her blog now and again.
The broken pain of her heart reverberated in her words.
How do you condole a woman just bereaved of her loving husband?
Indeed, how do you condole any grieving heart that’s lost a loved one?
You cannot! You are simply there to listen, to offer a leaning support and to help as they find their way.
Every one grieves differently.
There’s no specific order or way to deal with this painful reality that life hands out.
Sometimes all we need is a quiet friend.
For this week, here are a few of the posts that I would like to share with you:
To television or to tell a vision from Tunisia Jolyn.
Flaws can be adjusted from Joe Cosme.
Personally recommended author services and promotion sites from Smorgasbord.
ABC List from talking to my weight loss Counselor I must chip in here that you should watch out for her inspirations for victory over the scales.
Thank you good people.
My regards.
‘Icho ime ife, ime e ya ofuma.’
These wise words echoes in my ears as I write this post and it translates to mean ‘ anything worth doing, is what doing well.’
I remember growing up and having to go to our farm with my parents to till the ground for planting maize, cassava, potatoes, pumpkin and any other crop that was due to be planted. Back then we grew most of our food.
With my hoe, I would make what I considered a nice mound of red earth and when my dad comes round for inspection, he would call me by his pet name for me and in his gentle way, he would say: ‘you’ve done well, but it would be better if the mound was just a little higher’ and would complete his correction with that sentence up above.
This was repeatedly applied in so many ordinary things that we did, from our house chores of sweeping with the broom, washing plates, clothes, weeding the compound to our studies.
Thus it became embedded in my mind, that if you choose to do something, give it your best shot.
If you choose to love someone, love them without placing the conditions that they must fulfill to become worthy of your love.
If you are working for someone, do it wholeheartedly because some day, someone will probably turn around to work for you. As my people would say ‘when you respect the King, Kingship will also come to you.’
In everything that one does, they should do it to the best of their ability. Not for the sake of eye service, but for the sake of self-service.
Sow and Water and leave the bountiful harvest to providence. It always pays in heaps and spades.
Let me leave these three extra farming proverbs for you to mull over with your cup of coffee:
‘Good gardens are not made by sitting in the shade.’
‘As the farm grows, so does the farmer.’
‘If you tickle your earth hard enough, she will laugh for you with bountiful harvest.’
I would like to thank Maria Jansson for her generous invitation to participate in the quotes challenge and would like to extend the invitation to these lovely bloggers.
P.S. No hard rules to participate.
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
![1455685840627[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/14556858406271.jpg)
Mummy, I want to let you know what you mean to me.
You are like an Angel in the sky
Even at night you shine as bright as a star.
I want you to know, I love you mummy.
Why do I do these gratitude challenges every week? So that I don’t forget to pay mind to the little things that I would have probably taken for granted in the bigger scheme of life’s rat race.
It’s done as an open confession of little positive affirmations in my life, both online and real time. Of course it can be done through private journals *I still do that*, but then an opportunity would be missed to inspire even one person to embrace the attitude of gratitude.
The private journal practice becomes easy to forget or set aside at times when life gets hectic and we continue to roll along until it is completely left unsaid.
This way, I am compelled to pause and appreciate these things openly. It’s like unwrapping a present.
The attitude of gratitude has expanded the coast of my mind and it keeps growing in very positive ways. I find that more and more, I dwell barely on negativity because it’s almost as if my mind is on training on how to swat negative thoughts.
Ordinarily, I would probably have taken for granted the small hands that helped me push my shopping cart, weigh my fruits and tick off my shopping list *making me buy one or two extra tidbits, with a grumble and secret delight.
How will I take for granted how you all supported my blog party over the weekend?
Try cooking a large array of dishes (in this case, blogging hard for days) and inviting people to eat and they don’t turn up. You will be sorely disappointed and upset.
The essence of Valentine might have become subsumed in the cheesy commercial aspect of things, but there is absolutely nothing cheesy about the extra doses of love and attention that I received from my family, from hand-made cards to shop bought rose and chocolate with their pocket money, coupled with lots of pampering 🙂
There are so many little things to be grateful and thankful for. What are the things that decorate your life, be they little or large?
You can join Colline’s or Maria Jansson gratitude challenge platforms.
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
The voice of the security rang sharply and intermittently over the Mall’s public address system.
‘There’s a missing child with us, he is four years old, he is dressed in brown slacks and a blue shirt, please contact the security to identify him,’ the speaker kept announcing.
This went on for hours, but no one came.
Little Ashif was tired, tearful, hungry and hoped Mama would come and get him soon; he promised to be a good boy, if only she would come.
As days passed no one came and the little boy wondered why she never came back, after all, he had been a good boy when she said he should stand and wait; he became the ward of the State.
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
P.S. This story came to me based on an experience at the Mall. A child went missing and the loud speakers went on for hours announcing and describing that child.
I was there for three hours or thereabouts and I left with a heavy mind. I wondered if the parents of that boy picked him up or not. I couldn’t help wondering how they misplaced him in such a huge mall in the first place.
*As a security caution, once we arrive any of the Malls here or anywhere, I look for the information desk and get a name tag band which my children wear on their wrists with my number and their dad’s own written on it, where that is not available, I write on a piece of paper and tuck it into their pockets, just in case there is a pandemonium or anything of the sort.
Image credit: Pinterest
Quirks are idiosyncratic habits that distinguishes us as individuals.![1455205959464[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/14552059594641.jpg)
It may not necessarily be peculiar to us, but those close to us identify us with these little quirks which can be sometimes amusing or annoying.
It may or not be found attractive by your close ones, but they live with it out of love for you 😉
Please, there is a huge difference between bad manners and quirkiness. They are not interchangeable.
Some people behave badly and bad manners is not cute, period! I just had a little rant post, about such here.
For instance back home, we have something they call ‘African time’ it totally gets on my nerves.
You invite people for a ‘do’ that is scheduled to start at 2pm and they turn at 5pm and it’s viewed as normal.
I respect people’s time, so, whenever we are invited out back home, I will want to go on time, but my husband, will drag his feet until two hours later before we leave and truth be told, he is usually right, because others start arriving at that time and we are not left coming too early and possibly catching the hostess still in her hair net and night gown.
Personally, I had a habit of eating out of my husbands plate and feeding him tidbits of the day’s events. I wonder why his food always looked tastier – meanwhile, I am the one that prepared it.
The poor guy was askance and it took a while for him to get used to my dipping into his plate.
Funny enough, I have let go of this habit, which I got to realize that I picked up from my mother who used to do exactly the same thing with my dad all through their lives together. I was becoming my mother.
I let it go because my husband tends to eat late and it wasn’t helping my weight matters, now, he is the one trying to coax me to join him – looking for a partner in crime of eating late, though on some days he succeeds in persuading me 😉
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
The Daily Post Quirk of habit.
Which quirky habit annoys you the most, and what quirky habit do you love — in yourself, or others.
On the day that you wake up
Doubting yourself
On the day that you wake
Wondering if you are doing okay as a parent
On the day that you wake up
Feeling that you suck at being a mother
On the day that you wake up
Worrying if you are raising them right
On the day you wake up confused
Not knowing what the next step should be
On the day that you wake up
Wanting to cry instead of laugh or smile
On the day that you wake up
Huddled and not wanting to climb out
It takes the lovingly made card
Of small hands
The painstaking drawing of hearts and kisses
Of the warm hug and the beautiful words
That sounds like music in your ears
‘Mummy you are the bestest ever!’
‘I made this for you’
For you to learn,
That you are doing well
That you are the bestest, despite your shortcomings
Those words are the turn key
That makes you climb out and wear your smile with joy
To flip pancakes with oodles of syrup
Sniffing and thanking God for these young arms.
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
a cooking pot and twisted tales 