Ch. 3: In which Huntress overcommits on the downslope
Saturday, April 12, 2025
I sat down at the beginning of the week and made a meal plan. I think I mentioned before that Mr. H and I did an elimination diet/detox back in February; not wanting to put all that suffering to waste combined with a progressive understanding of the food additive industry had me determined that I can handle making all our own bread products at home by now.
Seriously, do we have any idea what we are actually eating anymore? Is there ANY way to know?
I planned a bunch of hearty meals, but I wasn’t even thinking about the from-scratch bread requirements this menu involved. When I finished planning I discovered the wheat-y common denominator and overconfidently did not revise my plans.
And that was one day before I realized the undercutting of my domestic potential was inbound.
Homemaking with Hormones
Like many millennial women, I’m learning an awful lot about hormones and the menstrual cycle that I didn’t know before. And it would have been REALLY useful to know every time I was feeling like a sluggish failure or having a break down in years past. This I declare with absolute fury.
But, letting bygones be bygones, I’ve finally learned how to work with my body and give it what it needs instead of trying to beat it into the 24/7 consistently productive mold I’ve tried to force it into my whole life. (And I try to plan around the expected fluctuations instead of reacting to them.)
Along the way, I acquired this fancy little chart that tells me what productivity posture I should be taking with each phase of the menstrual cycle, how I’m probably going to be feeling during that phase, what I should be eating and how I should be exercising to support it, and the sort of tasks that are best undertaken at the time.
Well, this week I was exhausted. I told more than one person I could have fallen asleep on an ironing board.
I don’t want to share the whole chart, because it’s not my resource to share (legitimately, I did not obtain this chart from a public source), but I’ll just zoom in on the part that’s relevant.
Lo and behold! It’s no wonder I was dragging. By now (and because I use the Natural Cycles app) I know where I’m at in any given cycle—at least I’m supposed to, but apparently I paid no mind as I was meal planning based on having lots of energy the week prior.
Listen, if it is one thing I’ve learned this week, it’s plan your homemaking around your hormones. I had homemade tortillas, pizza dough, a cake with homemade whipped cream, AND hamburger buns on my list. As a newbie kneader. And that’s before I even get to making the actual meals associated with those things.
One look at that chart, putting two and two together, I said “Ohhhh okay.” And here you can see me yielding to what I needed this week more than homemade hamburger buns:
I didn’t totally give up—we did have pizza dough and a cake—but I mostly spent the week sleeping in or taking naps when I needed them instead of trying to push for things I knew I couldn’t reasonably achieve—at least not with a smile on my face.
I rearranged the meal plan. We had easier things to eat like bacon and eggs (twice) or one-pot dishes, or instant pot things. And, of course, the charcuterie.
And I also managed a quart of home fermented yogurt this week, which was sort of on the back burner. I tried a couple of weeks ago and it failed—but that was on me for doing it wrong. The failed yogurt did yield some excellent buttermilk pancakes. This time I did it right thanks to Celebrating Appalachia. (I put mine in the instant pot to ferment overnight, though, instead of in a cooler with hot water.)
All of this was planned on top of cleaning the house to host our local Bible study (which I am very happy to do, but should also not try to do during the same week as multiple baking endeavors AND peak unsolicited fatigue LOLLL—pick a lane Huntresssss), multiple extracurricular activity attendances, AND taking our boys on a surprise Minecraft movie outing.
And, to my surprise, I did muster the willpower to make homemade tortillas for the first time after all. But only because Mr. H bravely swooped in on Friday and gave me the day off—no homeschooling, no cleaning, no parenting. Just time to think and write alone at a coffee shop. So, I ended up having the energy to venture into unfamiliar territory when I returned.
Turns out tortillas are about the easiest thing you can make with flour, and way worth the effort—so much better than store bought. But I learned that next time I will cook them all at once on the Blackstone instead of cooking 16 of them one at a time in a pan. Not even because it was little cumbersome, but because we had the air purifier choking on fumes for a good half hour. You know how a well-greased skillet smokes something fierce when you don’t cover the whole bottom with food.
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Finally, it was my birthday this week. And I got to share my flat, ugly (but delicious) gingerbread cake and whipped cream with our Bible study.
One of our friends brought me this thrifted harvesting basket with cuttings of her… plant…. I don’t actually know the name of this plant. But I love it!! And the fact that she brought me a thrifted basket and cuttings from her own plant means she somehow knows exactly the sort of homemaking journey I’m on without ever having read a word of this journal.
I have really good friends. I really do.
The Weekly Inventory:
4 pizza dough lumps from scratch (2 for the freezer)
1 quart of home fermented yogurt
A gingerbread cake from scratch with homemade whipped cream
16 flour tortillas
Moral of the story is: I actually did accomplish almost everything I set out to do this week—cause I rested when my body said rest.
Remember: homemaking with hormones means naps (when needed) are your friend. Embrace it.
-Huntress At Home