Puff-puff is a very important food in Cameroon. It is eaten mostly as breakfast or as supper. You can buy any quantity you want around most junctions and roundabouts in the country. It is often referred to as 'le Sauveur' meaning 'the saviour' in English. This is because it is cheap and also a complete meal when accompanied by beans and pap. It' s the most common take out and everyone relies on it when they need to eat well but don't have enough money or when they are just not in the mood to cook anything.

I made some puff-puff while at my mom's and I thought I should share the recipe with you guys. Here we go.

Like most of my recipe posts, we are not used to measurements in Cameroon and Africa in general. We estimate. Your ability to estimate is your power as a cook. Don't be surprised or wonder why I don't or hardly mention measurements in my recipes.

How To Fry Puff-Puff At Home

Ingredients

- Flour

- Yeast

- Sugar

- Water

- Oil for frying

Preparation

- Sieve the flour into a bowl. Make sure you use a bowl with a lid because you will have to cover it.

- Add some sugar, yeast and lukewarm water and mix. Let the mixture be quite thick and heavy. If you make it watery, it will soak up oil while frying. The best way is to add water in small quantities as you mix so that when you reach the desired texture you can stop adding water.

Yeast.

- Leave the mixture to rise. To be honest, I don't check the time when I allow it to rise. I just check my mixture from time to time to see if it has risen enough. If it is taking a long time to rise then the yeast might not be enough. That was the case when I was making this one. I had to add some more yeast by dissolving it in a little water, added it to the dough and mixed it again.


- When the mixture rises, put a good quantity of oil into a pot for deep frying. When the oil is quite hot, start putting the mixture into the oil in lumps. I can't describe how to make the lumps but the photos I made below can help you understand how to do it. You may not get it right on the first try but with some practice, you will learn how to do it.






- Fry both side of the puff-puff till brown. I love mine quite brown because I'm sure that it's quite ready and it is a little bit crunchy on the outside.


- Remove when ready and put in a strainer for the oil to drip and serve hot.

We had our puff-puff with pap and it was really delicious.

Here are 3 Reasons Why Personal Development Is Not Working For You

1. You are not patient enough

Patience, patience, patience. You are not giving it enough time to work. Change takes time and if you are not giving yourself enough time to adopt new habits, you won't notice any development.

Taking a few steps and expecting to see a huge difference is sometimes not the case in personal development. Take note that the things you are trying to change have been present for a while now and stopping them also requires time to get your mind and body into your new self.

Give yourself time to accept, heal and start a new life when you are going on a journey of self-development.

2. You are not practising what you learn

If you don't implement what you read, watch or listen to, you will not develop yourself. You have to put into practice all the steps and tips that you acquire. It is important to select the best tips and do a few at a time or one at a time to know exactly which one is working for you.

3. You are trying the wrong methods or taking the wrong advice

Merry Christmas to you. Hope you are having a very wonderful holiday.

When I shared about us spending Christmas At My Mom's, I had no idea that plans were going to change. And even if they did, I would expect to be back in Yaounde instead.

I'm writing this post at my grandparents' home. The home I grew up in. I feel good about coming back, especially for Christmas. If you read my post about spending Christmas at my mom's you will understand our Christmas tradition when it comes to what we cook and generally how we spend Christmas.

This Christmas, the traditions were maintained and it brought a very good feeling of being with family.
We arrived on Christmas eve (yesterday). It was a long journey but thank God for giving us journey mercies.  Christmas eve was cosy with good food and watching TV to see how others were celebrating Christmas. We also had a family Whatsapp video call where we all saw each other and wished each other merry Christmas at the same time. It was so much fun and full of smiles. It's the first time we tried this and it was nice to see everyone at the same time.

The evening ended well with us having some drinks. I had a Malta Guinness and ate some chin-chin made by my grandmother.

On Christmas Day (today) we woke up to the morning harmattan cold and cooked our Christmas rice, chicken and egusi soup. It was delicious as usual. What is Christmas without Christmas-rice? lol. We had our Christmas rice for breakfast.

There was a prayer with a man of God who visited us and then later we ate some Achu and drinks. I still had a Malta with my Achu. It was so good. We ate some more chin-chin and everyone just chilled either in front of the TV or in their room.



It's my daughter's first Christmas so after dressing her up, she wore something nice and took a few pictures with the family. The rest of us were just dressed as we would on any other day. No Christmas dresses or clothes. In this part of the world, special clothes are bought for Christmas and we call them Christmas clothes. I had Christmas clothes as a child (it's bought mostly for kids as Christmas is referred to as a celebration for children. They also bought toys as Christmas gifts). It wasn't a must-have but it was highly appreciated when I was gifted.


That is Christmas for us at this end of the world. Hope you are having a happy holiday. Wishing you all the best and God's richest Blessings this season.

Njama-njama (huckleberry leaves) is a vegetable that can be cooked in various ways. This recipe is made with groundnut oil. The traditional way of cooking Njama-njama is with red oil (palm oil) like in Khati-Khati.

Read: How To Cook Khat-Khati

I hope you like this recipe and find it easy to try.

How To Cook Njama-Njama (Huckleberry Leaves) With Groundnut Oil

Ingredients

To cook this meal, you will need:

Preparation

Christmas has always had the same picture in my head and it is that of me spending it with my family - parents, grandparents and aunts. It's been like that for years and even when I left for the university I will always return to spend Christmas with them.

It's the tradition in many homes but do we ever imagine a time will come when the picture will change? Well, not until the picture actually does change. I remember this one time I spent Christmas in Yaoundé. It was the first time I spent Christmas away from family. It felt weird but it was a new experience so I loved it. At home, Christmas a typical well-spent Christmas day involved eating the special 'Christmas rice' in the morning before going to church. This rice was accompanied by egusi (melon seeds) soup and some chicken. That's my grandma's speciality and no rice on earth tastes as good as Christmas Rice. Upon returning home to have our main Christmas meal. It's often the traditional meal of my village - Bafut, which is Achu and yellow soup with lots of meat because it's Christmas. We also have drinks and just stay at home chatting for the rest of the day. At times we had a few visitors but usually, most people just spend Christmas at home. I always loved to visit my friends and I did it right after church before returning home (with them at times). But Christmas is often a quiet one in my home town Bamenda.

But sometimes we want to try new things or simply break tradition no matter how attached we are to it. My experience with spending Christmas outside the home has been quite interesting though. It was quite different from family Christmas. It included going out for drinks in the evening and the menu during the day was quite different. I could cook anything I wanted or not cook at all. It was left for me to decide. I still missed Christmas at home though.

Over time, I got used to spending Christmas away from home. My family too. When it wasn't possible for me to return for Christmas, they won't make it a problem. I think it comes with becoming an adult. It made me realise that home is now where I live.

Now that I have a baby, I really realise that 'home' has changed or there is another home now - which is mine. All I want is to give my baby a home where we do things that will make her remember her growing up. Will there be new traditions? Maybe. I would have loved to start them this year but due to unexpected circumstances I had to prolong my stay at my mom's and we will be spending Christmas here.

It's my first Christmas here because we are new here and I spent Christmas all the time with my grandparents. I don't know if it's going to be the typical Christmas I know or did mom modify tradition? We will see.

So it's official. We are spending Christmas at my mom's. And I am looking forward to it.

Where are you spending Christmas? Are you spending it elsewhere or at your home?

It's almost 6pm as I write this post. My nine-month-old and I just woke up from a deep nap and she is using my bra strap as an anchor to get on her feet as I sit on my bed to write this post. She is so joyful when she's well-rested - I mean, who wouldn't be? I'm only glad that she didn't develop a fever after her vaccines two days ago.

Her nine-month vaccination day was last Friday - actually, I chose to go that day because nine-month-olds are vaccinated only on Fridays where I currently am. I could also choose another Friday but I just wanted to get it over and done with.

I hate vaccination days to be honest - anyone else? Apart from seeing your baby cry after being pierced (I know it's for their own good- rolling eyes), it's also stressful waking up early and preparing to go to the hospital after a night of insufficient sleep. That's how our vaccination day started but it later turned out interesting.

Highlights of the day

We woke up early - as usual (my little girl makes sure of that) and got ready quite easily as I had packed and set aside our clothes and other important stuff the previous day in the evening. I can't stress enough how much it's important to get ready the day before. It saves a lot of stress in the morning.

We are currently at my mom's in a village called Tangui. The hospital we went to for the vaccination is in a neighbouring town called Mbanga. It's a district hospital and I quite like the organization of the vaccination days, especially for nine-month-olds. Nine-month-olds are vaccinated only on Fridays unlike the clinic I would have vaccinated her at which collects numbers of the mothers and call them to come for vaccination when they have up to ten babies to vaccinate. From what I was told, one bottle of the vaccine used can vaccinate ten babies and once it is opened it expires after 24 hours. So it's necessary to have ten babies before opening each bottle of the vaccine in order to avoid wasting it.

The vaccines at nine-months are against yellow fever and measles. There is often a small talk given to the mothers before the vaccines are administered. We got there very early - when the nurse was still cleaning up. Usually, she waits for the other mothers to come before she starts but she explained that she couldn't keep us waiting till the others come so she started with the educative talk on what to do in case of a fever after vaccination and how to properly feed the baby at nine months.

It was quite an interesting talk and here are a few points that I retained from it.

Care before and after vaccination

- Don't give fever medicines to babies before or after vaccination until they show signs of fever like high temperature.

- In case of high temperature, wet a towel in lukewarm water and dab the baby with it.

- Rush back to the hospital if the fever persists for more than 24 hours and if the place injected still hurts or swells after 24 hours.

 Nutrition

- It is important for babies to have food which contains iron because it helps in blood formation and prevents the baby from being anaemic

- Vitamin C is important for babies as it helps their body to easily absorb iron. Oranges, pineapples and other fruits containing vitamin C should be given to the baby.

- It's important to introduce meat and fish to their diet once a day. It should be well cooked before giving the baby.

- Milk is very good for babies because it contains all the nutrients that they need.

- Breastmilk/milk alone at this stage is no longer sufficient to properly feed the baby. They need other forms of food to complete their diet.

- The baby's diet should contain a wide variety of food like vegetables, cereals, animal protein, nuts and tubers.

 Weaning

- Weaning a baby is a gradual process. It's not advisable to wean abruptly.

- Babies can still breastfeed for up to 3 years. (I intend to breastfeed till two).

When I asked to know if my baby's weight was normal, the nurse explained to me that the baby is expected to double its weight every three months. This made me realize that I had to make more efforts for my baby to eat well as she didn't meet her expected weight. I already know it's not going to be easy but I'll make the effort to get her to eat more

Read: What my six-month-old eats in a day

Overall, I had a nice time at the hospital. We were done by 8:30am and got home by 9am. If you are wondering how much she cried after the vaccine it was quite intense because they were done in two different places - the arm and the lap. But the crying only lasted until I suckled her immediately after. She fell asleep after that and I backed her and we left for home.

One of the things that made my day easy at the hospital was the niceness of the nurse. She was very nice and took time to explain many things to me though she is originally french-speaking and she had to explain to me in English.

It's really important to be nice to people because it brightens up their day.
 
Read: How I Manifested My Baby - My Birth Story
          Why I Started Jogging Six Months After My C-Section

Earlier, I shared with you guys HOW TO LEVEL UP YOUR LIFE and a lot of you loved it. I found out some new ways to level up and decided to do part two in order to share with you as much information as possible on this topic.

You can read the blog post or watch the video below. The video has more explanation and depth into the topic so you might want to consider watching it.

Self-awareness helps you to know yourself. It reveals to you the things you like and don't like. It also enables you to have a deep understanding of your reactions to different situations. Self-awareness is like having a new friend and making efforts to know them in order to build trust and a deeper friendship with them.

Take time to know and understand who you really are. It's very important to your level-up journey. It will help you to define your personality and what you want in life. And that is the foundation of your level-up journey

Doing the things that you love sparks some energy into you and motivates you to do even the things that you don't enjoy doing. Take a hobby or a passion and do it. The fulfilment you get from it will make you really happy and you need an energized and happy state of mind to level up your life.

Meditate on your desires to help them manifest. Meditate on them with belief and with a very positive mind. Think of all the positive ways that your desires can come to pass.

You can't do it all by yourself. You need God to make all your efforts worthwhile. Believe in God and ask him to help you do the right things to level up.

Believe in yourself because you were born to win and shine. You have all it takes to be a better person. You need to believe in your capacities because you were born with them. All you need to do is develop these capacities and become a better person.

This is one of the most important points you should consider. Work hard at the things that you need to do in order to level up. God will bless your hard work. Your desires will manifest faster when you work hard to achieve them. You will succeed easily when you work hard. Work hard and make your dreams come true.

My plans of becoming a mommy who didn't 'let herself go' failed right from my pregnancy days. I always thought I was going to be the type of mom who is able to be on top of her self-care game as I was before getting pregnant. But as soon as I was two months pregnant, I couldn't keep up with my self-care routines and tips. I was too sick for that.

Right until now that I have had my baby, self-care is still a struggle for me. but with time, I have come to learn how to care for myself by putting myself first.

There are many ways to put yourself first and as a mom, it can happen in the simplest ways. It's a way to frequently remind yourself that you also have a life and you matter. Sometimes motherhood takes the most of you and you lose your identity. You are no longer identified as you but only as somebody's mom. Every joy or pain you know comes from or hides behind motherhood. your needs are left behind. If you feel this way, then you need some self-care.

Putting yourself first isn't a bad thing. Kids are fragile and need to be taken care of but their caretakers need to feel taken care of as well.  You need to feel worthy too. Your needs matter. Your feelings matter. Your desires matter.

5 ways to take care of yourself by putting yourself first. 

1. Attend to your basic needs first

This one goes especially to my new mamas out there. When you've got a new baby, doing basic things like eating, sleeping and showering for yourself feel like such a luxury. In fact, it becomes a real luxury because you barely have time to do these things.

It is easy to forget yourself or put yourself behind while taking care of your baby. You may feel overwhelmed and don't know how to go about it. But the best way is to think about it this way. You need your basic needs like showering, eating and sleeping to be met so that you can be a better mother to your baby or kids.

So you have to put these needs first. I had a hard time doing this but on the days I did, I felt so good about myself and the day was easy to manage. Find a way to eat and shower first then make sleep a priority by going to sleep while the baby is sleeping. I know you may have lots of work you need to do while the baby is sleeping but you can take just a few minutes to rest mama. It will do you a lot of good during the rest of the day.

Eating first gives you the energy to take care of your child. You may run out of energy because it takes a lot of it to be in top form for your kids. So eat well and make sure you don't skip meals. When you find the time to eat before them, then do so. Feeding a child can be so energy-draining so you need to be well-armed.

Also when you shower early, you feel clean, worthy and ready care for them. There are fewer fears of transferring germs to them or anything like that. I used to feel that way a lot when I have to breastfeed my baby before I shower.

Acts as little as these make you feel cared for and it really makes you feel good about yourself.

2. Work on your career, passion or hobby

To sum it all up, find something you love and do it. If it means going back to your career then find a way to do it. Find a passion that makes you feel fulfilled or a hobby that makes you happy.

These things will energize you and give you a break from your routine of motherhood.

3. Love yourself as much as you love your family

Love yourself that much. You need to love yourself and show yourself that you love yourself. That's a great way to care for yourself. Loving yourself is offering the best to yourself and putting yourself first.

4. Take care of your mental health

Motherhood is beautiful. But being a mom keeps your mind thinking for so long that it can drive you insane. You need to take care of your mind and protect it from depression. Take out time to relax and destress. Alone time will be fantastic if you can get some.

5. Work on improving yourself

Improving yourself is one of the best ways to care for yourself. personal development is important and should be high up on your list. It's important to improve and be the version of yourself that you will be proud of.

So work on yourself to be a better person just like you work hard to become a better mom.

This is the first of a monthly update in which I will talk with you guys about how I have been doing with personal growth. Each episode will contain lessons that I've learned and how I managed difficult situations during the past month.

This is the first episode and it is for the month of November 2019.

I was very excited to be in the month of November and it felt so close to the end of the year already.

I reflected on the fact that the year is almost over and I am not where I want to be, nor have I achieved the things I hoped to achieve by this time. But I didn't want to stress that. I let it pass as a thought.

The most difficult thing I faced this month of November was combatting the feeling of stagnation and this made me feel so powerless. I realised that there are things beyond my control and it can be so frustrating to not have control of the things that mean a lot to you.

The one thing I'm proud of is that I was pushed beyond my limit of patience so many times and I still managed to stay calm and talk myself into keeping going ahead and finding new ways to obtain results.

Following a dream can be frustrating at times when you can't see how it will end and facing the fears of what if it doesn't work out. I think that's the hardest part of chasing your dreams. I was tested with this a lot this month. But I am glad that I am still here believing and pushing harder to make this dream a reality.