Puffy Recipe

I found a quick breakfast recipe hidden in my stack of grocery store cookbook. You know those little cookbooks that stare at you while you are waiting to check out (if not then I know you are secretly reading those trashy tabloids. Not to worry those two head aliens are crazy! Well that and all those glossy celebrity magazines, where everyone looks perfect in messed up relationships and who looks great in a bikini.) anyway I used to have a slight problem that I had to kick. I think I bought all of those little magazines for two years straight. I finally stopped buying them and gave all but four away. One of them is all about breakfast. This is important because breakfast around here is oatmeal, or eggs. I am not a morning person, my kids are. As soon as they wake up they ask what is for breakfast. I growl while I pour coffee and aim for the easiest way to make breakfast. The puffy pancake should called perfect because it requires almost no thought before my first cup of coffee. Here is a link to Betty Crocker's recipe for puffy pancakes  http://www.bettycrocker.com/recipes/puffy-oven-pancake-with-berry-topping/fa1070e1-1aed-438d-87c7-5366ff90fff3


Puffy Pancakes

Ingredients 

2 tablespoons butter (I use the stick kind and don't always measure but it puffs up more with a little more butter)
2 eggs (Farm fresh eggs are the best but any kind will do)
1/2 cup flour (Whole wheat flour also works great)
1/2 cup milk (Any kind of milk can be used. I have used heavy cream, raw milk, almond milk, and whole organic milk.
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon extract (Your favorite extract works and adds a hint of a lovely flavor I have used peppermint, vanilla, coconut, and almond extract but any flavor works. Also instead you can use citrus zest such as lemon and oranges)
Toppings can be anything you like the recipe suggests 2 cups fresh berries, but I dust it with powdered sugar and top with nuts, coconut flakes, berries, apple slices, and dried fruit. Use what you like or what the kids like.

Directions

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Put your butter into a pie pan (or what ever pan you have. I like to cut the butter into smaller pieces so that it melts faster.) Put the pan in the oven. Mix the eggs, flour, milk, salt, and extract in a bowl. When the butter is melted take your pan out of the oven pour the batter into the pan put into the oven for 25 minutes. Serve hot with your topping of choice.

That is it! Easy. My kids think I am wonderful every time I make this, I am willing to bet that your kids will think the same about you.

I do not have any pictures of this wonderful pancake.  Here is the one from Betty's website

http://www.bettycrocker.com

I hope that you have a wonderful week filled with Love and Laughter. Be well Friends.

My faith in the begining

Faith is a personal journey. Each of us has to our own path that fits well with our families and lives. I believe that there is more than one path, religion to God. Today I would like to share with you how I came to God. It is only a puzzle piece to the whole story. Before I found God I lost him. It is true, I have always had a feeling that some supreme being was out there watching over all of us, and I personally was not alone in this world. A few years ago, about four since you asked my husband had cancer. As a result he started researching religions. He is a very meticulous man (One of the many reason I love him) he watched documentaries, he read books, he looked for the beginning until he was satisfied. He also discovered Asherah, God’s wife. There is a story that in the early Jewish religion that all of the priest that worship Asherah were taken to the top of a mountain and slaughtered ending the teachings of God’s wife for political reasons. When I learned about this I realized that all religion is manmade, I felt torn apart. Broken. I struggled for a very long while whether God exists at all. I told you I lost him. I no longer want to celebrate arbitrary holidays, that had lost all many and seemed to become over night about greed. At the same time our family was attending church irregularly. Churches that our friends liked. Churches that did not fit us. Not that anyone of those churches were wrong, they were spreading the word of God and praising him, helping each one of those people to grow. I felt lost, completely and utterly lost. Then Rob and I were asked to go to a small group about marriage. We agreed. This is where I begin to see the beauty of the Holy Spirit. It was through those women that spoke about God that I found the light. God is in each one of us, and if we let him he will work through us. I also joined a MOPS group around this time and again I found God not in the words of the bible (I have 6 versions) but in the hearts of the women at my table and around me. These women who were grateful for life, and were kind to me showed me who God wants us to be. I also watched The Case for Faith and found that faith is a choice. We can choose to believe or we could choose not to. It is a choice. I know believe that all Holy works were inspired by God by written by man. Man is flawed and cannot fully understand the Glory of God. We cannot know the truth. Why else would there be so many beautiful religions that Glorify his Name. None of them are wrong they are each only a small piece of the puzzle, none of them are perfect. We can only strive to do what is virtuous and honor God with our actions towards one another. Because you never know when you inspire an Atheist to believe, you never know when your hope raises another person’s heart .  You never know when or where but as long as you are striving to be better in the name of God he will work through you.

As you know we are working on becoming Catholic. One of the reasons that we chose this path is because the Church allows people to take a journey. Before you can be baptized, confirmed, or take part in the Communion you have to take a class to be sure that you want to commit to the Catholic Church. Many of the other churches we went to in search of the “one” would baptize anyone who wanted to be saved, and you could be saved by raising your hand. There is nothing wrong with this God is supervising and loves all of his children. God knew that I needed to take a slower path, I needed to come to him slowly. Now we have been attending Mass for 2 ½ years and at Easter we will be Catholic. That is not to say that our journey is over, no quite contrary it is only beginning.

Why am I writing to you about my faith today? I wanted to share part of my story, and I wanted to remind you to be gentle and kind and loving to others. Of course I know that you are wonderful as you are. Sometimes we can say things that seem very small but can cause great joy or distress. Be mindful of others. 

I hope that your week is bright with the sounds of Love and Laughter. Be well my friends.

Changing the game plan

This last week I have been in a funky mood, you know the kind that is starting to stink at the back of the refrigerator. My attitude has been in the toilet and mostly blah. I felt totally deflated and then I woke up and realized that I was the problem. Me. I was the problem with my life, not school, not the kids’ noise, not my husband being constantly busy, not the dog eating everything he can sneak while we are not looking, no not anything other thing. I was the problem, am the problem. My attitude, mood swings directly affect those around me and this week it has been a bit sour.



The first step to any problem is admitting the problem. Hello My Name is Trisha and I am a problem. Done. Now for the game plan. One of the things that drive me completely nuts is my messy house. I have two boys who come through it like a tornado every few minutes, a dog that likes to roll around in the dead grass and shake it off the minutes he comes back into the house, a cat who rolls around in the leaves and then lays on the clean laundry, and my husband who thinks it is perfectly acceptable to garden in the bath tub and on any given window sill. These are the people I blame; now I am the person responsible for cleaning after them. I often try to make weekend clean up fun for everyone so that I feel like I am not alone in housecleaning, this past weekend we decided on trying out housecleaning Bingo. Fail, Epic Fail. While I was looking up bingo cards on the web I came across http://flylady.net/. It is a website dedicated to helping poor slobs like me to get their act together. It is a 31 day step program that helps (it claims). So far the website looks like it might help so today I am going to start.



Day 1. Shine your sink. http://www.flylady.net/d/getting-started/flying-lessons/shine-sink/



Day 2. Get dressed to the shoes. (Um, but I haven’t finished my coffee yet.)





Another problem I have been mulling over is the fact that we still eat processed bread. We have given up most other processed food, I say most because chocolate, coffee, flours, and sugar. Am I really so lazy that I can’t make fresh bread for my family, seriously I have a bread maker. The answer is no, I often run out of flour. I think I found a reasonable solution at amazon, I can buy 25 pounds of Organic, unbleached flour and have it shipped to me for free. I love Amazon Prime for this reason, the free shipping that is. They also offer a subscription to the flour to lower the cost. http://www.greatrivermilling.com/. So starting on the first I will be buying 25 pounds of flour every other month for about 92 cents a pound. Problem number two solved.



As for many of my other problems well I think is mostly a lesson in being grateful. Grateful that I have two beautiful children. Thankful that my husband chose me. Grateful for our house that the bank owns but they allow us to act like we do. Grateful that my husband works a job that allows me to stay at home with our children. Thankful that he is willing to pay for my education even though I might not work later either. I am grateful that I have this life. I am happy.



I hope that you are happy today too, and that your week is filled with Love and Laughter. Be well my friends.

Moments

Yesterday was was my baby's birthday. I can not believe that he has grown up so fast. Every time one of my children have a birthday I reflect on the past birthdays and the future ones. One day they may not want to celebrate with their parents. They will want to go out to dinner with all of their friends instead of choosing their homemade birthday dinner from me. I realize that I only have a few years left before they are adults. These sweet years are mine forever, because for them they will become part of the fiber that they are made out of. The story's they tell their future wives and children. I am hoping that by having this tradition of a big meal of their choice and all of us being together will bring them home. Maybe the hardest part of being in the military is knowing that there is a real chance that the kids might move away from us. The difference is I know that I will go to them. I am living the dream right now, living the moments that I will remember my whole life.

I made my sweet little man a Cape for his birthday.



I hope your week is filled with Love and Laughter. Be well my friends.

From the Farm

I wanted to do a post on why I chose to buy directly from the farm instead of supporting the factory farm industry. It is really easy to tell you that I want to support my farmer that I want to build a relationship with the people who are feeding my food. In a lot of ways I wish that was the only reason we switched to farm raised meat and eggs. The truth is that after making the decision to switch did we start to build the relationships. I am glad we did! It has helped me feel like I am part of the puzzle for the first time. By choosing to buy my eggs from http://www.hansonfamilyfarm.com/index.html I know that my money is going to this family, it helps to feed the chickens an organic feed to supplement when the grass is dormant or the chickens need extra nutrition. They are the stewards of the food I eat, they get up in the wee hours of the morning to make sure that the animals are well cared for, and they don’t stop until it is dark and beyond. I am grateful for all that this small family farm does for my family. They deserve the price that they are asking. I will never ask them to lower their costs because they work hard and deserve the fair price they ask for.



When I was part of the problem and buy cheap eggs, and meat I was supporting a different kind of environment. One where chickens are crammed in a cage, each chicken barely has enough space to sit and rest. Chickens that die are left in the cage to be stomped until it is a crinkled mess. I supported the overuse of antibiotics in these animals so that the people in charge don’t have to treat the animals with respect. I was supporting the cutting off of beaks so the cramped birds wouldn’t get board and peck at each other. I supported the manure being spread in improper ways, the cancer that spread to local neighbors through their drinking water, and I supported the way these companies treated their farmers.  By turning a blind eye, by acting in ignorance I was the problem. What do you think you are getting when you spend 79 cents per pound for chicken? You are not getting the word of that farmer because the farmer is turning a blind eye to the problem because he or she is only making pennies on that product. They are barely making it on the money they receive. Did you know that in order for chicken to be labeled as free range they only need a small door on one end of a giant building that allow them access to the sunshine and grass, but because all of the animals’ food and water is inside the building they rarely if ever venture out? Did you know that arsenic was used to get the chickens to eat more, and to counter act the poison they gave the birds antibiotics? Don’t believe me, here is an article written in August of 2011 http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2011-06-08-fda-chicken-arsenic_n.htm. That is right friends the FDA says arsenic is Okay for chickens that you eat. Would you feed it to your children?



These are a few of the reasons to switch. This is only the very tip of the iceberg. This problem effects the environment. I haven’t even told you the benefits of grass fed beef and why we switched to it. I will be happy to show you my research, to point you to books to read, to the documentaries to watch. This information is out there. Start by googleing factory farms and look at the images. You don’t even have to read the articles look at how those animals are treated. You can google local farmers in your area and see the difference in the pictures. Only you can drive to those farms, or call those farmers and ask if you can see how they are treating the animals. I bet they will let you. That they will be happy to share why they choose to farm the way they do. I was part of the problem for years. Me, I did not know any better. I did not know. That is why I am sharing with you. This is why I am encouraging you, empowering you. Together we can make a change. Together we can change the food system. We can demand better! We can show the FDA that we know better and can do better. They are not protecting us. They are doing tests to see if we can eat small amounts of arsenic, not stopping it. Yes, I know it is expensive. But you can pay the farmer or you can pay the doctor. Let me tell you from my personal experience it is so much sweeter to thank the farmer for their hard work. To hand my money over to them and know the only middle man involved is me because I use the money my husband makes to support this family. I know it is hard to contemplate spending more on food, but maybe it is time we realize as a culture that food is a need and not worth buying cheap quality. Please consider going to a farmers market asking questions. Look into Joel Salatin. You can read his books, watch him on youtube, or find him here http://www.polyfacefarms.com/. His theory on farming is what we should be looking for in farmers. You have the power to change and by changing we change the food system. I am sorry for the lecture. I am very passionate about this topic.



I hope your week is filled with Love and Laughter. Be well friends.

Chicken Pizza

Last night for dinner I made a lovely Chicken pizza. I did not take pictures so you will have to trust me when I tell you it was as pretty as it sounds. Two days ago I made lemon chicken in the crock pot. For this recipe I used the leftover chicken.

Lemon chicken Arugula Pizza



Ingredients:



About 2 cups chicken

About 2 cups Arugula

6 oz Goat Cheese
A big handful of strawberries

Salt

Pepper

Pizza dough (I make sourdough bread dough but your favorite dough will be perfect)



Preheat the oven 400 degrees. Roll out the dough on to the pan. Spread the chicken around evenly, tear the arugula in to bite sized pieces and spread on top of the chicken. Sprinkle the goat cheese over the pizza. Slice the strawberries and place them on top. Salt and pepper. Put in the oven for about 30-40 minutes or until the crust is golden brown.



The total cost for this pizza is $10 or $2.50 per person in a family of four.

The total calories per slice 132.  I ate two slices.

I hope you discover a new favorite pizza this week, that it is filled with Love and Laughter. Be well friends.

My family is completely obsessed with food

I have a confession to make, one that you have probably already guessed, but here it is all the same. My family is completely obsessed with food. I read cookbooks when I am not reading for my college classes. My husband is getting a degree in Horticulture. My kids wake asking what we are going to eat for all of the days meals. Our food is about more than what we put in our mouth, it is about who raises it, who grows it, how it is grown, where it came from, and what is in it. I know a lot of people who say my kids won’t eat this or that or my favorite they will only eat ______ fill in the blank. My question is this, what have you told your kids about food? Why do you keep giving it to them? When my kids start asking for something and demanding and refusing to eat anything else we stop eating it. Ice cream is a good example we go months without it so that it is a special occasion. Today we wrote our list of meals for the next couple of weeks, Damian pulled out the cookbooks and chose what sounded good to him Spicy sausage tortillas, Chicken pasta salad, Broccoli Orecchietta, and Cassoulet. James wanted Cauliflower Macaroni and cheese and Roasted Root Vegetable Pizza. When I put a meal on the table James asked what it in it so we spend ten to fifteen minutes talking about what the ingredients are and how I cooked them. We talk about gardening, a lot. What we hope to grow, when we need to start seeds, or when to plant the transplants. My kids all ways ask is that edible?

We also talk about composting and recycling. Because of our chose to be as sustainable as possible we only take our trash to the curb once every two weeks, and the same with the recycling bins. It is a nice realization that we have reduced our waste so much. I know that we have a long way to go before we completely sustainable but I know that we will get there one day, year from now. There is no time limit but the fact we are actively making improvements is a success.

Last month I read an article on the use of wood pulp as filler in food. The USDA allows up to 10% of any food to contain this wood pulp. Yeah that extra fiber in your bread or cereal it could be wood, you’ll never know because it is called cellulose in the ingredients. You can read about it here  http://www.thestreet.com/story/11012915/1/cellulose-wood-pulp-never-tasted-so-good.html.  Here is a fun fact about cellulose it is also used insulation, that’s right insulating your house. Wood pulp it is the modern day Soylent Green.  Shortly after reading more about the wood in meat products as well as breads and cereal, we went out to eat for the last time. I ordered nachos and it hit home when that plate was set in front of me. What is in that? I looked up almost in tears and said, “I don’t think we can eat out anymore.” My husband said simply, “Yeah, I think you may be right.” We have taken out almost all processed foods. We still eat frozen vegetables, canned tomatoes, chocolate, coffee, and bread. Yeah I know it probably has wood in it, but it is the hardest thing to switch over to completely homemade bread all of the time. I am hoping to buy flour in bulk this year to make it easier to make bread at home. I want unbleached flour. Turns out it is not readily available at local super stores.  Here is our boards of dinner meals for the next two weeks.  

Now you know I have horrible handwriting.

Why do I have 20 meals listed and there are only 18 days left in the month; you ask. We like to have a couple of extra meals in case nothing else sounds good. I want to share this journey with you. One thing I realized is how much less it is to just eat at home, even with the grass fed meat. A couple of days ago we had Jamie Oliver's Sweet and Sour Pork with brown rice and Roasted purple Cauliflower. The total cost per person was only $3.75. Let me tell you I do not skimp on food either. Don't believe me? Let's take the chicken listed at the top of my list.

Let's say I paid 18 dollars for that lovely bird. First, because I haven't learned to cut up the chicken I will usually roast it in the crockpot with an onion $1, a couple of cloves of garlic 20 cents, sliced lemons $1 and rosemary from our garden. So far for the chicken it is up to $22.00. Wait I use this chicken for two meals and chicken broth. So lets divide the price by 2 which is $11.00. So here is what we might have with the chicken.

Chicken       $11.00

Brown rice  $     .50

frozen veg   $   1.50

Total            $13.00 now we divide that by four and we have $3.25 for our whole meal. A lot of times we will have a green smoothie but we use the greens we are growing in our garden and a handful of frozen fruit at most it might make that individual total go up fifty cents. I want to encourage you to eat at home too. I have tons of cookbooks and I am more then happy to tell you how it is going complete with the total cost of the meals. It is completely reasonable to buy organic food, local food, and grass fed meat.

I want to leave you with a quote from Oprah Winfrey, "When you know better, you do better."

I hope that your week is filled with a revelation that moves you, Love and Laughter. Be well Friends!

Instant coffee

This morning it was a sad realization that we were out of coffee and it is still two days before we can go to the market. I reluctantly drug (side note, isn't it funny that the paste tense of drag is drug which also the word for treating illness with medication, illegal substance, and to cause harm to a person by use of a narcotic. I took the time to look it up because I thought I was wrong and I was not, it is the English language. I am milking the side not this morning. Blame the instant coffee) my trusty jar of instant coffee that I use as an ingredient in stews, cakes, frosting, and whatever else comes up. In goes a teaspoon of coffee crystals, and to help me over how gross instant coffee really is I break out my secret weapon, sweeten condensed milk. It is wonderfully decadent all creamy and delicious. But it is instant coffee so no matter how hard a person tries to dress it up in a show stopping dress the first sip is awful. Hitting my taste buds like damage goods. They screamed "Why, why are you torturing us?" But by the half way mark they settled down resigned to my addiction to coffee to which has driven me to this sad state of affairs. To make matters worse is the last cup of coffee that I had was the most incredible, heavenly tasting cup I have ever had. My friend made me my very first cup of vietnamese coffee. When I went to Paris all I drank was french coffee, I loved their coffee. I dreamed of that coffee for months. Friends let me tell you vietnamese coffee is going to haunt me for a lifetime.

I hope that your morning started with a better cup of coffee than mine did. As always I hope your day is filled with love and laughter. Be well my friends

Protein and how to get it without eating meat.

As my family is preparing for lent this year the biggest discussion is what each of us would like to give up. Last year we gave up meat with a loop hole where the boys could eat anything when we ate out. This year around the table Damian asked if we could do it again without cheating. I try to say yes when I am able so that it doesn't sting too bad when I have to say no. We all agreed to give up meat for lent which starts February 22 and ends on Easter Sunday which is April 8. This year it is important to us because on Holy Saturday (the day before Easter) we will be confirmed into the church. I think after almost three years of Mass we are ready to make the commitment.

Really this post is about protein.  I get asked about protein a lot because there is a misconception that protein only comes from animals. Although meat has the densest amount protein per unit it is not the only way to make sure you are getting enough. Here is the link to what the CDC recommends for daily protein intake http://www.cdc.gov/nutrition/everyone/basics/protein.html the chart below is from the CDC. It was easier to follow than the USDA's chart. I highlighted the values my family needs.

Recommended Dietary Allowance for Protein
	Grams of protein needed each day
Children ages 1 – 3	13
Children ages 4 – 8	19
Children ages 9 – 13	34
Girls ages 14 – 18	46
Boys ages 14 – 18	52
Women ages 19 – 70+	46
Men ages 19 – 70+	56

We eat farm fresh eggs that come from grass fed chickens. One egg has 6g which is about 12% of the daily protein that is recommended. Here is a great link to a family farm that explains the benefits of grass fed, free range chickens. Plus to be totally honest this is where I buy my beautiful eggs. http://www.hansonfamilyfarm.com/eggs.html They have a lot of great information on the benefits of grass fed animals too. I recomend that you check them out and then maybe find a local farm that can help you, while you help them.

1/2 a cup of dried oatmeal contains 5g of protein. Peanut butter has 7g of protein in two tablespoons. Milk has 8g in an 8oz serving. One slice of whole wheat bread has 4gs of protein. For 1/4 cup of beans it ranges from 7g-9g depending on the type of bean. I only looked at about 4 kinds of beans.

Now for the surprising facts on Vegetables Are you ready? Here is the link to an excellent chart on vegetable nutrition http://www.healthalternatives2000.com/vegetables-nutrition-chart.html I am only going to chose some of our favorite fruits and vegetables and some really common vegetables.

Vegetables                                                                                             Fruit

1/2 cup Asparagus = 2.16g                                                            1 Apple = 0.47g

1/2 cup beets = 1.7g                                                                      1 Avocado = 4.02g

1/2 cup Broccoli = 1.86g                                                               1 Banana = 1.29g 

1 cup Brussels Sprouts = 3.98g                                                      1 cup blackberries = 2g

1/2 cup Cauliflower = 1.14g                                                           1 cup Blueberries = 1.57g  

1 cup Celery = 1.25g                                                                      1 slice Cantaloupe = 0.58g

1 ear of Corn = 4.02g                                                                     1 cup Dates= 3.6g

1 cup French beans = 12.48g                                                          1 cup Grapes = 1.04g

1 cup Kale = 2.47g                                                                         1 cup Mulberries = 2.02g

1 cup Leeks= 1g                                                                             1 Orange = 1.23g

1/2 cup Mushrooms = 1.08g                                                           1 Peach = 1.36g

1 cup Okra = 3g                                                                             1 Pomegranate = 4.71g

1 cup Peas = 8.58g                                                                         1 small box of Raisins = 1.32g

1 medium Potato = 4.33g                                                                1 cup Strawberries = 0.96g

1 cup Summer Squash =1.87g                                                        1 Tomato = 1.08g

1 cup Swiss Chard = 3.29g                                                             1 Slice Watermelon = 1.74g

As you can see there is protein in almost all of the fruits and vegetables that we eat. Wait there is more ways to get protein in our meatless diet. There is cheese too.

1 Cup Cheddar Cheese = 28.14g                                  1 cup Cottage Cheese = 13.37g

3 oz Cream Cheese = 5.04g                                          1 Goat Cheese = 21.58g

1 cup yogurt = 8.5g                                                        1 cup low fat Yogurt = 12.86g

These are all meatless ways that we can easily get the reccomended daily protein. Seeds and Nuts are also high in protien you can look here for more information on nuts http://www.healthalternatives2000.com/nut-seed-nutrition-chart.html This website has some really great charts to help educate people of the nutrition of food.  I also want to give a shout out to Tofu which I like to cook with. Half a cup of Tofu has 10 grams of protein. 6oz of beef has 49.2 grams of protien which is my daily value and more then double what the boys need. Here is a sample menu that I found on a vegan website http://www.vrg.org/nutrition/protein.htm.

		Protein (grams)
Breakfast:	1 cup Oatmeal	6
	1 cup Soymilk	7
	1 Bagel	9
Lunch:	2 slices Whole Wheat Bread	5
	1 cup Vegetarian Baked Beans	12
Dinner:	5 oz firm Tofu	11
	1 cup cooked Broccoli	4
	1 cup cooked Brown Rice	5
	2 Tbsp Almonds	4
Snack:	2 Tbsp Peanut Butter	8
	6 Crackers	2
TOTAL		73 grams

Although we will be eating eggs and dairy it is an excellent example of how a person can get protein into their diets. Anyways I hope that this post helps people understand more about protein. I am sorry it is so long, I wanted to explore the subject to the fullest. Thank you for reading.

I hope that your week is filled with unexpected learning, Love, and Laughter. Be well my friends.

Love Language

Have you read The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman? My husband and I read this book a few years ago, I think maybe four years ago, I can't remember if we had James yet, I just remembered we did have James he was a baby so three years ago we read the book. I know it is not important when we read it, but it was bothering me so I had to work through it. Thanks for bearing with me. This month we have made it to being married for Ten Years. I have been thinking a lot about why we only have one single day to reflect upon our marriage and celebrate each other. I love my husband every day, and I am still thankful that he chose me even after all of these years. This morning that book came floating into my mind and I was inspired. I am going to reread this slowly working through all of the activities with the hopes of building my husband up without his knowing. Also I wonder if it would work for my kids. I have no idea what love language each of my children speak so it might be revealing and help to bring us all closer together, and it starts with me. Yesterday at dinner Damian asked if we could give up meat for lent, and my husband said he didn’t want to give up meet and alcohol (I had talked about giving up alcohol, wine for lent). That is when it hit me hard, these people depend on me to guide them, that I am the spiritual guide for our family, and I am the one that they look to as an example (well the kids, and my husband is the head of the house). I think maybe this is a good opportunity for me to become a better version of myself as a mother and a wife.



There are Five Love Languages



1. Words of Affirmation

2. Quality Time

3. Receiving Gifts

4. Acts of Service

5. Physical touch
 

When we read this my love language was Acts of Service and physical touch, and my husband’s was Quality Time and Physical touch. It is possible that they can change but it is unlikely. Still I am going to work slowly through this book starting at Chapter 1. I will update you on how it is going in the next week or so.



I hope your week is filled with Love and Laughter. Be well my friends.

My scale is after me!

The thing about the new year is facing the holiday aftermath on the scale. It is bad, real bad I gained between 4-6 pounds by eating yummy holiday food. Which is never nice to see after I worked so hard to lose the 15 pounds last year. I of course started searching for diets that I could try. Last year I gave up meat for lent, tried and failed at the 17 day diet, and also sparkspeople. Sparkspeople is a great website to help a person lose weight. The problem I found is the calorie counting, I make so much of our food from scratch and we also switched to only eating grass fed animals which are lower in calories then the grain fattened animals I was spending a lot of time on sparkspeople recipe calculator to figure out how many calories I was eating. Basically the problem with all of these diets was me. Writing this I realize that what I need to do is to throw out all of those wonderful excuses and buckle down. Between you and me I am not likely to do that. Currently I am taking two courses toward my college degree, homeschooling the boys, cooking our meals from scratch, and trying to keep up on the house work. I am not interested in spending twenty minutes calculating the calories in say a roasted chicken, roasted brussel sprouts, couscous, and a slice of bread (dinner last night).  I am just going to focus on exercise this year and not what the evil scale tells me to focus on. How many of us let the scale boss us around, put us down, and cause drama? Please don't let it be just me (fingers crossed). I am going to walk on my treadmill at least twenty minutes 5 days a week. I would like to increase my exercise a little bit each month. I am hoping that by doing this will help me feel better and maybe lose a little bit of weight as a bonus.

The number doesn't matter that much right?

I hope that you don't let the scale get you down because you are beautiful just the way you are. Also I hope that your week is filled with love and laughter. Be well my friends.

Garden update

Yesterday I went out and took pictures of the garden. It is winter and all of the trees are naked, the grass is hibernating (a nice way to say dried up and died), and the lovely asparagus has been cut back. Basically the garden looks sad but I love it. In the winter when all things are dormant and the possibility of a spring wonderland is still just a sweet whispered secret. We have added a couple of new trees. We are still waiting for a mulberry tree to arrive (Rob ordered it online months ago. We are hopeful), and in the spring a couple of lemon trees and that should be all of the trees we can possibly fit into our back yard (according to my lovely husband) but there is a chocolate persimmon that I have my eye on and I think it could fit. I like to daydream about the trees being all grown and leafy with lovely fruits hanging so low the children are never hungry. I can only hope that we will be here to see the fruit.

Let's take a walk around the garden together.

We planted eighteen feet of these little beauties. Candy Apple oinons and a sweet yellow onions.

We are hoping to actually use these in the kitchen one day.

Candy apple onion. I am going to use this one in a lovely sweet potato salad this summer.

This is a Pecan tree by far the prettiest of all of our trees, mostly because it is taller then the other trees and it has branches. The down side is it will take 4 years to get any nuts. I'll wait and I hope the military doesn't send us away before I get to bake cookies with homegrown pecans.

This is a Mulberry Tree. Jam's and pies sweet and delicious. First this tree needs to grow branches.

This is the pinapple pear. The Bartlett pear had fire blight so bad that it was taken out and in an extreme effort to save this pear Rob cut it back. I still think that it will grow up to become a lovely tree.

Potatoes!

Baby lettuce. These greens are one of the good things about south texas. We can still grow stuff in January.

This is the fig. Last year it grew branches and leaves. I can't wait to see what it will do.

This friends is a Jujube tree. I will let you know what the fruit is like when I see some but my dear husband thinks they will be worth the wait.

The persimmon tree. Still small. Those are onions around it.

Funny story, we bought a little three inch plant that smelled wonderful that grew into a tree. It grew about three feet last year so we had to move it away from the house. Lemon Eucalyptus tree get big. Good to learn after it's been planted.

Lettuce, Radishes, and beets.

Swiss Chard

Mustard greens

 

Autumn decorations that wanted to grow. It makes me smile when I see it.

This is one of the gauva bushes. We are so lucky that we only lost one tree, and that this one came back to life.

The herb beds. In front is peppermint that is growing like crazy.

This stick is really a Celeste Fig

The other side of the house is busy growing too.

Thanks for letting me show you around our winter garden. I am excited for spring to come and transform all of the random sticks into lovely leaf baring trees. I left out the olive trees, orange tree, pomegranate, and much more. As you can see by all of the pictures it was hard to control myself, but I did. We have big plans for the gardens in the coming year. When we moved into this house 18 months ago the yard was just a big slab of dead grass with a trampoline in the middle. Now with more then a few truck loads of dirt it is coming along slowly.

I hope that you can find the beauty in nature even when it is sleeping, and that your week is filled with Love and Laughter. Be well my friends.

Why Hello 2012

I started to read Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert recently and at the beginning she is struggling with what it is she wants. An Honest question that I have asked myself many, many times in all of the variations of that question, the answer often changes or sound contracting even to me.

Who is it I want to be?

I want to be a good person.

            Sometimes I feel like I am not as good as I can be. I want to be better, so that I can teach my boys by example of what a good person looks like. I want to be someone they can be proud of for their whole lives.

I want to be a good mother.

            I am mostly a good mother. I know I make mistakes and sometimes I know right in the moment that I have screwed up and will never live it down. Between you and me being a mother makes me a better person for them. It is one of the few things I would consider to be my best quality.  I love being a mother 99.9% of the time.

I want to be a good housekeeper.

            This is my weakest link. I am a better housekeeper then my mother when I was growing up but I often fall behind. I have a terrible habit of putting mail down here, there, anywhere so clutter stacks up.  I am always trying to improve to force myself to be better at staying on top of the house cleaning.

I want to be a good wife.

            If you ask my lovely husband he might proclaim me a work of art, perfection in the works. I pay him to say things like that. I love him and I am glad that we get to grow old together.

 I want to be a good cook.

            I love to cook. I read cookbooks for fun. Seriously I have been reading Jamie Oliver’s America (I need this book) I got so excited reading about roasting avocados and how it gives the creamy fruit a nutty rustic flavor.  I love, love food. I can always improve by trying more recipes. I stopped letting the kids eat store bought cereal so I could use some easy breakfast recipes.  

 I want to be a writer.

            Even if I am terrible I write poems in the shower, at night before bed, while washing dishes. I also dream about fictional characters’ lives waiting to be told. I randomly take notes on ideas I have to come back to later. I write this blog, and school papers. At the heart of this the very fabric of me is a writer good or bad.  

 I want to be educated.

I am getting a B.A. in English in about six or so years. So I am getting there slowly but surely.

I want to be sustainable.

            Right now we buy about 80% of our food from local farmers all located within twenty miles give or take a few miles. We planted fruit trees, and vegetables. We are getting there.  We stopped using paper towels, plates, napkins, personal products, and are washing then reusing the cloth versions of all of these things. I am sure there is more that we can do like solar panels but we cannot afford them now, and we are not sure if our HOA would allow us to put them in.

I want to be happy.

            I am happy. I believe that happiness is a choice. I actively choose to be happy even when it is hard.

I want a relationship with God.

            This is something that has taken me thirty years to come to this point in my life. Easter of this year we will become Catholic. I have struggled to find where God wants me to be. When I attend Mass I feel like I am home. After many churches, and reading on many different religion’s I found my place. If you are an Atheist and wonder how an intelligent person can believe in an invisible man in the sky, It is a choice. I see God’s work in the trees, flowers, and I feel at peace knowing that God is with me and my children. It is the one gift that I am most proud of giving to my children. I believe.

This list is a fraction of the things on my list of who I want to be. I am glad that you are on this journey with me. I am a work in progress, but aren’t we all progressing in one way or another. Your list may not look like mine but I bet you have one too. Something that helps guide the path you travel in life.  I want to leave you with Robert Frost

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim Because it was grassy and wanted wear, Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I marked the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way I doubted if I should ever come back. I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference

I hope that 2012 is filled with Love and Laughter. Be well my dear friends.