Mimi's Thoughts

I took an evening drive yesterday with my bake shop family and my son. We talked and laughed and then suddenly without warning, I stuck my hand out, waving and screaming “JJKK alias the wonderful boy who crossed river benue with a jagajaga bicycle”

I had just seen a boy I used to be neighbors with. Well he’s a man now, and that’s how we used to greet him. I couldn’t even remember his real name now even if I tried.

The thing is, my people and son were shocked to see me shout and wave like that, and that name? That one really got them laughing. I laughed along with them and explained how such names weren’t strange for the kind of neighborhood I grew up in.

I’m playing the whole evening in my head and I’m loving how playful I was. Got me remembering something I said the other day…I’m on a quest to find little Mimi, the playful little girl I once knew. Maybe she can show up a few times and make this big girl relax and smile when things get really hard and tiring. I hope I find her.

For someone who loves numbers and works with numbers/record keeping, I always get excited when I get my reports at the end of the year. Google photos showed me my most photographed colours and the number of smiles (my smiles) I captured in the photos for 2024. Spotify showed my wrapped; most played songs and artists. I found out that I had listened for over 40,000 minutes in 2024 and Morgan Wallen was my artist of the year.

I opened my WordPress, I wanted to know the numbers. I looked at my writing statistics for 2024 and I wasn’t too excited. Apparently, I had performed lower than the previous year. I went from 4,788 views in 2023 to 2,710 in 2024. I had also written only 70 posts in 2024 as compared to 172 in 2023. My reading suffered too. I didn’t read as much as I wanted to, books, blogs and my Bible too.

No wonder I felt a tad disconnected with myself somewhere in the middle of the year. I feel more in tune with myself when I write.

I must say, other aspects didn’t suffer quite like the writing; I learned a few new things this year, I learned to speak up for myself a little more, I learned a lot more in my line of work, I started a new certificate program and I also got a professional certification in accounting.

I know for certain that my decision to trust God and to let him whisper the right track to me helped a lot. I won’t let go of Isaiah 30:21 just yet.

2024 was a good year and I’m thankful.

See you in 2025

I was talking with my cousin this morning. We talked about how his birthday was the next day and how we made a huge mistake as we hadn’t planned it better. We could have planned for him to spend it here with family, rather than alone, at school. He dismissed it, saying;
“It is what it is
I am already used to a horrible birthday.
Last year my birthday passed before I realized that I had a birthday two days later”.

I knew he really didn’t mean it. I began to preach to him. I realized I preached to myself too.

“Tomorrow is not yet here and you are declaring it horrible?
You need to be intentional about your mind set.
Plan your emotional and mental activity in advance.
Prioritize YOURSELF.
No one can love you better than you can love yourself”.

In less than five minutes after that, we had mapped out ideas and plans right into the new year. He came up with these great ideas, all by himself.

He asked about my son and when he was due back from school and I replied “Friday”…I was about the add, “the thirteenth” but then I paused, suddenly cautious. Then I dismissed it. I readjusted my mindset on the fear of Friday the 13th. I already got that covered after all in Friday the 13th.

This Friday the 13th of December is going to be an amazing one, SonTer will be home for the holidays.

Can hardly wait.

They called me upstairs. My darlings. My friends. These two.

It was a Saturday morning. We had had a sleepover along with my sister’s, the ones born by my mother.

But these two, they are sisters too.

I remember when they arrived on Friday evening at the sleepover venue and one of my older sisters said; “Mimi’s sisters have arrived”.

Isn’t it beautiful?, to have people who mean so much, even your own blood know.

So, like I said, they called me up, right after breakfast and we began to remember some tough seasons. We talked and we laughed and we cried.

One of them said to me; “Look around you. There’s so many broken people around you and you are always there for us….I wonder, what is it that broke you that made you know how to be there for us? How did you know exactly how to hold my hand to make me feel better when I was going through my divorce”

I’ve been thinking so hard since that day. Looking for answers and deeper meaning to all she said.

Did something break me? How come I’m surrounded by broken people? Is there a purpose for and to this?

I’m sitting here and thinking afresh, 27 days later, because I just saw one of them put up the photo below with my name to it.

Aunty wait, wait” Jacob shouted as I drove out this morning. Jacob is our security/handyman.

I panicked and stopped. Did I have a flat tyre that I didn’t notice?

I rolled down the window and Jacob said “aunty you are wearing two glasses”.
I laughed. “I know” I said to him and then I drove off.

I woke up dull. Tired. Unwilling to go to work. But I had to.
I strolled on Pinterest for some motivation.
Jabbed at husband with some ‘misyarn’ and he had some good come backs that really made me laugh. The day was getting better.

I got ready for work.
I made myself some coffee and went to the car and played my song of the day…I wake up with a song on my mind every day.

The two eye glasses story is that I was undecided about whether to match my shoes or my tee shirt. I’m at work and I decided.

Matching the shoes was the better option. A bright colour to liven up my day.

I’m not sure how I feel about birthdays.

When I was younger, I wasn’t particularly excited about it. I found that I often cried on my birthday…somehow.

This has somehow continued on some of my birthdays.  Just a few of them though. My 40th was the last one I cried. I cried so much I walked out of my own gathering to stop myself from crying anymore. This was a gathering I had arranged myself but I just had to bail on them… I think I will tell this story another time.

No matter how I feel about birthdays, since I became a baker, I’ve made sure to make a cake for myself on my birthday.

I’m showing some of these pieces off here just because…

The latest below is a butter cream heart shaped vanilla cake.

For my 40th I carried all of me in a 4 tier cake…coffee, music, books, movies, wine.

For my 38th, it was my theme for the year “live, love, laugh”.

At 36, I went old school with a cassette tape.

For 35, I modeled my dream bake room.

I barely eat cake, but I love to speak in cake.

I’m passionate about cake and I want to keep being interested in it.

I have been doing a lot of travelling back and forth for some weeks now, and even though these have been work related trips, I have considered them vacations because I have been away from home and off of my day to day chores…plus, i have been spending a lot of time bonding and being with a lot of loved ones.

No matter how much I love the time away, it always feels good to be back home after every trip because as they say; “North south east west, home is best” and “there is no place like home”.

I remember one trip I made 6 years ago, I made notes and took photos of my brother in-law’s house plants and how his wife has arranged them. I brought that thought back home with me…I wanted something just like that. Took me a while but I’ve begun to recreate it.

Today, I just got back from a work trip where I stayed with my friend from University. We have remained friends for over 20 years. We have a good friendship. When we stepped out of her house this morning, she busied herself through her plants and returned with these:

I have gladly added them to my collection.

I’m glad I brought back these plants, whenever I return, I try to make sure to come back with something, not always physical things, most of them come in my mind.