Urgent

Even though this blog is on a leave of absence, I needed to share this issue with you.

According to Food Democracy Now, they are advising that Monsanto's GMO (genetically modified organism) alfalfa is about to be approved as organic by USDA Secretary Vilsack.  This would basically ensure cross-contamination of feed used by organic dairy farmers.  Again, if you haven't watched Food, Inc. - it's time you did because this is scary stuff going on.

You have till March 3rd to either mail a letter or fill out the online form as part of a petition. If filling out the online form, copy and paste the letter to the right of it but edit the quotation marks, the section about the header, put the part in about the "refer to", and edit your name in it. OR you can use this version below that I've edited for you but sign your name at the bottom. Just copy and paste it into the little "comments" box.

Docket No. APHIS-2007-0044
Regulatory Analysis and Development, PPD

APHIS, Station 3A-03.8
4700 River Road Unit 118
Riverdale, MD 20737-1238

Please refer to Docket No. APHIS-2007-0044.

Dear Secretary Vilsack,

As an American citizen who cares about how our nation’s food is grown and produced, I was shocked to read about the USDA’s recent draft environmental impact statement (EIS) that would allow genetically modified alfalfa to enter the U.S. market, despite the USDA’s acknowledged risk of genetic contamination to conventional and organic alfalfa.

I am writing in regard to draft EIS (APHIS-2007-0044) to ask that you reject Monsanto’s GMO alfalfa and to reconsider several of the misleading statements found in the USDA's draft EIS. Since freedom from genetically modified materials is a central tenet to complying with the Organic Standards, failure to reject GMO alfalfa will make the Obama / Vilsack USDA a willing accomplice in the destruction of the organic sector.

As the USDA EIS readily admits, such contamination will cause significant economic harm to small conventional and organic family farmers, not only forcing many of them out of business, but further increasing farm size and consolidating agriculture into the hands of fewer individuals. Hopefully, this is neither a goal of the USDA nor of this current administration or an unintended consequence of any of its policies.

In addition, the implication that U.S. consumers do not care about genetic contamination of organic food shows that the Obama administration is not only out of touch with the American people, but demonstrates how little they understand the fastest growing and most profitable sectors of agriculture today.

As a consumer of organic foods, I care deeply about the integrity of the products that I buy. Not only does organic food production offer better protection for the environment and produce foods that are higher in nutritional density, but it also offers a better economic return for family farmers who have set the highest standard for agricultural production.

It is my hope, that as a Secretary of Agriculture that promised he would represent “eaters” as well as farmers, that you would reject GMO alfalfa so that you can do both.

Sincerely,

Please feel free to share this website with others.

arsenic in my drinking water

I know we talked about drinking water here so I thought it would be helpful to be able to find out what is in our tap water. I added the search box on the sidebar so that you can type in your zip code and see what is in YOUR tap water. Guess what? When I typed in my zip code, I found out that there is ARSENIC in MY TAP WATER among several other contaminates. All the more reason to purify my water.

We use a water purification system that distills our water as described in my drinking water post. That's the best way I know to get everything bad out of our water. As far as detoxing from tap water that we do drink goes, we try to eat detoxing types of foods and we are just now experimenting with detoxing baths. See this post for info about detoxing baths....

The bummer about it for me though is our garden. We are watering our organic garden with the house water which has ARSENIC and other bad things in it. I know people say that it's such a small amount that it's obviously not killing people. But is it? Why do cancer rates keep soaring? Why do other disease rates keep going up? Why do NEW diseases keep appearing? Why does infertility rates keep rising? No, I'm NOT suggesting that the water is the only reason. Just seems to me that in such an advanced country, we ought to be able to purify our water before it goes out to people to fill their swimming pools with, water their yards and gardens with, use for cooking, shower in, bath in, drink, etc..... we can invent incredible computers but we are still sending water to houses with ILLEGAL levels of chemicals in them with a little arsenic sprinkled in?

Okay, this post just got the better of me. I'm done. That's it. No more politics or soap box for me. It's a weakness and I try really hard to avoid the temptation to vent when I blog. So, I stop here. Eat, drink (arsenic free I hope), and be merry!

Here is a great resource for WHAT KIND of water purifier to buy in case you are looking into getting one.

the crumbs in my silverware drawer

Okay. How do I even begin this post? Every house I've lived in I've had this reoccurring problem. Maybe I'm the only one. That would be embarrassing if that is the case.

Alright, here it is. Crumbs in my silverware drawer. Like most people I have a tray in my drawer that sorts the silverware and over time crumbs get in there. I've even made sure that at our current house the drawer is off to the side, it's not near any counter that we do cooking by, there is no bread board above it either. In fact, I have my kitchen stereo on the counter above it so that no cooking is being done there.

We don't put dirty silverware away so why on earth do so many crumbs get into my silverware tray???? Does anyone else have this problem? Am I all alone on this? Does anyone have a solution for preventing crumbs from who knows where getting in their silverware tray?

Help.

Did You Know - Milk, it does a body good? or does it?

Did you know that milk nowadays doesn't always do a body good?

I wanted to share this incredible post about milk. I've wanted to share a post like this for quite some time but the work has been done for me.

If you've had questions about:
~why whole milk is best for you
~why low-fat milk, skim milk, and non-fat milk are actually bad for you (they have oxidized cholesterol in them)
~why powdered milk is bad for you (also has oxidized cholesterol)
~why most grocery store milk may cause cancer
~why homogenization is bad for you
~why you have to be careful about UHT pasteurized organic milk

then this post is for you. The only angle that isn't discussed is why it's important to eat full fats together. For example. An egg is designed to be eaten in it's whole form. It's not intended to be separated so that you take the bad cholesterol out of it. Some scientist are discovering that the two types of cholesterol (the fats) are meant to be eaten together and when they are eaten together the body uses them a in a way to actually lower our cholesterol. Same with milk and other foods with fat. I've been reading up on this topic but need to do more study....maybe I'll do a whole post on this topic at another time.

Those of you who know that I buy organic milk are probably wondering why I buy it as opposed to raw milk.

1. It's illegal in the state I live in to sell raw milk without a permit and permits are hard (almost impossible) to get here. I know of one diary (and trust me, I've researched, that has been in the process for years to get their permit and they still do not have it.) I have nowhere to buy raw milk and since I don't have room for a cow or goat in my backyard it's not an option.

2. I do buy pasteurized organic milk instead of ultra high-temp pasteurized organic milk. Meaning the milk is less "dead" and still has some enzymes in it. This way we are still avoiding the synthetic hormones, pesticides, and infection puss that goes into non-organic cows milk. Here's a tip- in the stores I shop at, the organic milk that is in the 1/2 gal. is UHT pasteurized but the 1 gallon containers are only pasteurized (not UHT pasteurized).

*as a side note I'd add that our family does not drink milk as a beverage (other than every once in a great while when my husband and kids has some with cookies but this is pretty rare). We do not drink it with boxed cereal for breakfast because we don't eat boxed cereal. We use it for cooking and we do put a small splash of it on our oatmeal and ricemeal.

Weening my kids off of milk was a big hurdle in eating healthier but a rewarding one! They drink so much more water and I couldn't be happier with the results. I'm often asked about how my kids get enough calcium. We are liberal with cheese and yogurt (3/4 cup of yogurt has the same amount of calcium as 1 cup of milk). I also try and make sure that we eat calcium rich veggies. I also give my kids powdered calcium gluconate (derived from veggies) as a calcium boost.

Vaccines and Flu Shots

Of all the questions other moms and usually younger moms ask me there are two that I seem to get the most. One has to do with what our family does about Halloween (whether we celebrate it or not and if we don't, what do we do instead) and the other question is about Vaccines/Flu Shots. Moms seem to struggle with this issue as more and more research and debate about vaccines and flu shots comes up.

Positions about vaccines and flu shots are as passionate an issue with parents as any other parenting issue. If you want to get parents riled up, take the opposite position than what they passionately hold when it comes to vaccines and flu shots. I'm not here to argue or to convince you otherwise of your position. Rather, I'd like to have a post to point parents to, who ask me what our family's approach is.

So, I'll cut to the chase and share with you that our family absolutely refrains from the flu shot. We also have concerns about vaccines but realize that there are also situations in which vaccines may be the lesser of two evils.

How we got here: I'll start with vaccines. There has been a lot of concern about autism being linked to vaccines among other health concerns/risks. Here is a post that has several links to wonderful articles and information about risks concerning vaccines. Vaccines When it comes to vaccines we basically have these same concerns. Our own story concerning vaccines is as follows:

Our daughter was born healthy and thriving. She was a healthy weight and left the hospital with no concerns. I breast fed her until she was about 8 months old and within about a week of weening she became ill...very ill. She was vomiting every 20 min. for 8 hours....soon she had nothing left and she started throwing up blood (the inner lining of her stomach) at which point we checked her into the ER. This was only the beginning of unexplainable sickness. After a year with her becoming very ill (raging fevers, vomiting, being lethargic, etc.) every two weeks and no answers from our family physician we were referred to a Pediatric Infection Specialist (the best in the state). After extensive testing we still had no answers.

We continued vaccines, kept illness charts, and visited the specialist regularly. We tried asthma treatments, quarantine, sanitizing our whole house and her room, etc. Still, the sickness continued. It was exhausting and we felt helpless when it came to helping our baby stay well. By the time she was two years old I had began to hear and learn more about vaccine concerns and risks. So, we stopped vaccinating. Low and behold she improved.

So, we continued to avoid vaccine and she continued to improve over the next two years. She got sick a lot less often but when she did get sick she was still getting severely sick. It wasn't until we started changing our eating habits and pursuing natural remedies that the severity of her illnesses improved as well. She has never been healthier... and I'd go so far to say that she is healthier than a lot of vaccinated kids (like our son).

Our experience matched up with the concerns and research we had read about. Thankfully we did not experience symptoms of autism. To do again, we would avoid vaccinating our children other than required for traveling abroad. Watching your children suffer because of something you thought you were doing good for them is a horrible experience. I am aware of the reasons for vaccinating. I'm not ignorant of how vaccines have benefited our country. But I do believe that natural living would solve many of the infection/disease issues without the use of vaccines. Often, other parents who do vaccinate their children become angry with parents like us. They feel that we are putting their children at risk. They'd rather my child suffer than know that a child is walking around without antibodies to each disease out there. Let me point out that if you vaccinate your kids, then you don't have to worry about people like us infecting you. You are already vaccinated for it.

If you have concerns about autism you may want to consider holding off on vaccines until your baby is older despite the grief you will be given by others. Spacing vaccines out has also been suggested to help their little bodies handle the overload of vaccines given in combo shots so close together. Or, avoid vaccines altogether. But first, do your own research. Don't rely on what others say.

The flu shot is a slam dunk for us. My husband first had concerns about the flu shot when our daughter was recommended to get one when she was suffering. We did extensive research. We even called the United States Department of Health and Human Services to which they told us that they "can not actually say that the flu shot will help at all." They explained that they take a "guess" at what strain of flu might be the worst one that will go around the next year and often guess wrong.

From there our concern grew. I observed other people who were getting the flu shots only to end up being sick within two weeks of getting it and ended up being some of the sickest people I observed that year. Since that time I've met several families who had autistic symptoms start up the week of a flu shot or other vaccine combos and seen some stories of others who have suffered from flu shots enough to concern us. So, we took the opposite risk and decided that we could probably find better ways to help prevent her from getting sick. Now that we are pursing real foods and home remedies we are sick a lot less often, have avoided the flu for the past 3 years, have avoided even a cold for one of those years, and when we have been ill it's been very mild and lasted only a few days. Here is another great link to a post with links to articles about the Flu Shot.

These are the conclusions we've come to for our family. I hope that this has been a helpful amount of information for those who have asked me our thoughts on the topic and that I've been able to point you to some links that will help with your own research. What does get to me though are people who are cruel to people who choose not to vaccinate. They point to research....I can point to just as much research by bio-chemist that I know that prove there is risk.....it just depends on who you choose to listen too. Taking away other's freedoms, thinking you have arrived (pride) and know the only right way, and being judgmental of others is just sad. We all struggle with that in our humanness. We all want to think we've figured it all out. I for one have not and God has continued to show me that I'm hopeless when it comes to my prideful thinking...so blessings to you on whatever you choose to do for your family.

Vaccine Ingredient List

a video worth watching....

January and February plans

January is almost over and I haven't even covered all the topics that I said I would....so I'll be spilling over into February trying to wrap up all these topics. Once I finish this list then I'll answer the Q & A questions that have been posted here. You still have plenty of time to get more questions in.

still eating out of the freezer

Remember this purge post? Well, I'm still working on it. We've eaten lots out of our pantry. We keep eating out of the freezer. Today I'm going to go through our house freezer...clean it out and defrost some things. Then I'm hoping to move some of the deep freezer stuff into it so that I can defrost the deep freeze.

Anyone else eating out of the freezer and pantry still?

Oh, and the next gas bill hasn't come yet so I don't know if we've saved any money by freezing our buns off lowering our thermostat. I'll let ya know though when it comes.

the worship of food

Here is an excellent post about natural living becoming an idol. I can't agree more with Lindsay on this and appreciate her sharing her struggles and convictions. When we put our natural living preferences over people we've mis-prioritized life.

I get asked from time to time about things like: do you eat out? do you go to other people's houses for dinner and eat their non-organic food? and questions like these.

Do we eat out? Yes and No. No because we try not to eat out in general to avoid eating unhealthy and to not spend the money on eating out. Yes, we do eat out every once in awhile as a treat and usually to fellowship with others. We currently eat out about once a month.....when we are invited to join another family. We try to make good choices when we are eating out. But other times it's about celebrating or enjoying our time together and we don't worry about what we are eating so much.

Do we go to other people's homes for dinner? Yes! And we eat what we are served and we enjoy every minute of it! Food is not more important than fellowship and we enjoy the food we are served! People will always be more important than what we eat, what our pet peeves are, our differences in how we live our lives, etc. Now having said that, I've found that some people are hesitant to have us over....they worry about whether or not we'll like their food. I LOVE other people's food no matter how healthy, how fancy or how simple it is. I'm not focused on the food anyway, I'm focused on the fellowship with them. I think some people are intimidated to have us over because I love to cook and entertain and that just makes me sad. I love hanging out just as much as the next person and my mind is on social things not on inspecting your home decor, how clean your bathrooms are, or how fabulous your food is....although I will compliment your fabulous food! I'm just focused on the fact that you've offered hospitality to us and grateful for the time to fellowship and be involved in each other's lives. If I could change the fact that some are too intimidated to offer us hospitality I would but I don't really know how other than trying to be as gracious as I can be which I think I am. And man are we blessed by those that do have us over and minister to our family in that way!

One thing to think about concerning the two above issues is that when we do eat healthy most of the time (at home) then our bodies are more capable of handling those special times when we don't eat the most healthy items. A meal made of processed/microwaved foods isn't going to kill us especially if we are eating healthy most of the time. Our bodies will be healthy enough to process and detox the not so good stuff.

What foods do you enjoy splurging on that you don't normally eat as part of your healthy eating? This is another question I get. Shrimp. Shrimp would probably be the biggest one for my husband and I. We love shrimp but since it takes 2 months to digest in your gut (that tells you how hard it is to digest) and it's a bottom dweller (doesn't bring much that is healthy to you) we don't normally eat it. But we do enjoy eating it as a treat from time to time and hopefully since we eat healthy most of the time our bodies can digest it faster than 2 months. That's my hope anyway.

So, read Lindsay's post and be encouraged that people/relationships are more important than food and being a purest. Don't be tempted to make natural eating and living an idol.

cleaning out the brain

I'm cleaning out my Home Management Binder today. Time to throw out last year's records and start fresh. I've added a new category for my "every day recipes"....the ones I make weekly (ie. bread, snacks, seasoning mixes, etc.).

If you keep a Home Management Binder, consider putting your every day recipes printed up in it for a quick reference.

a handy book to have

This is a really handy book to have on hand. It's called How to Store Your Garden Produce The key to self-sufficiency by Piers Warren. The book is well laid out. Part Two of the book is produce listed by alphabetical order and instructions for the ways you can store it including recipes listed under several of them.

Got Water?

Other bloggers are blogging some really good stuff right now and I really don't see the point in me rewriting the same thing and posting it when I can just point you to their posts. This post about water is excellent. I've had several discussions with people about the reasons we need to drink water instead of milk, soda, juice and other artificial drinks. Her post covers several of the reasons our bodies need water!

If you don't like water, it's worth developing a taste for it. Not only is it what your body needs but it will also save you money! People often don't realize how hard it is on your kidneys to have to process other drinks. On the flip side, water benefits your kidneys by flushing them out. I also appreciate the comment at the end of her post about drinking with your meals. I learned that truth awhile back.

People often ask me if I drink tap water, bottled water, filtered water, or distilled water. I'll comment on each of these types of water and share what we drink.

tap water- what is in your tap water varies by where you live. For example, some areas have lots of fluoride in their water and others have none. Fluoride in your water is another whole topic so I won't get into that at the moment. You usually can find out the content of your water by contacting your local water company. You can usually find out the fluoride content of your water through a pediatrician or naturopathic. You can also purchase a water testing kit to find out the levels of minerals and chemicals in your tap water. You'll want to know things like how much chlorine, calcium, floride, magnesium, etc. are in your water. I've lived in areas where I would not drink the tap water but at the moment I live in an area that I drink the tap water some of the time.

bottled water- many test have been done on bottled water to show that it often is not much better than tap water. It's worth doing some research if you are paying for a bottled water company to deliver water and be very leary of buying individual bottled waters at the store besides the fact that the plastic bottles are quite a bit of waste and usually are not BPA-free. For a safe, economical, and less wasteful alternative consider purchasing a BPA-free insulated stainless steel bottle. We have this one, this one, and this half size design for the kids. These stay very cold for hours even in the summer heat.

filtered water- while filtered water is a good option and often better than tap in some areas it is still not pure water. Usually we think of filtered water as pure but it's actually not completely pure. Depending on the filter system it can actually end up taking out the minerals you want in it and leaving in the things you don't want in it. It's worth doing some research on your filter system as well. Usually the more expensive the better the system.

distilled water- What is distilled water? Distilled water is water that has been boiled and then the steam has been collected. You drink the collected steam. This is as pure as you can get it. Minerals can't float up in the steam so the minerals are left behind and the steam is collected into another container. I own a distiller and we distill about half of the water that we drink. My distiller is similar in look and price as this one but mine is made by Kenmore and from what I can tell they don't make it anymore. I want us to get some of the minerals from our tap water but have benefitted greatly from drinking the distilled water. When there are no impurities in your water, the water can work even better to detox your body. Distilled water is great for pulling out salt from your body. One way I've benefitted is with my carpel tunnel. It was getting so bad I thought I was going to have to have surgery like my mom did. I heard that drinking distilled water would most likely cure it and it did. It will start to flare up if I stop drinking distilled water from time to time.

Real Food Face Off

Kitchen Stewardship blog is doing a series of interviews of other bloggers who blog about REAL FOOD. Real food means whole foods, unprocessed foods, local food, natural food, nourishing food and has nothing to do with the Standard American Diet (SAD). I GREATLY encourage you to read the interviews which have VERY good questions and incredibly INFORMATIVE answers to them (complete with links to great resources) for anyone that is just starting to make healthier diet changes or even those of us who are well on our way to a new eating lifestyle.

Today began with two bloggers, one of whom I follow, Ren of Edible Aria, and you can read the first "Face Off" of interviews by clicking here. The interview is well laid out and easy to follow.

I hope you enjoy it!

Purge

Purge is such a fun word to say. I love saying it. P. u. r. g. e. It feels good to say the word and to purge! I cleaned out my fridge today. Ya, it was getting bad. Neglect is a horrible word. It's not even fun to say.

-So the fridge is cleaned out and wiped down.
-I took inventory of the kitchen freezer and the garage deep freeze.
-I made some menu plans for eating out of the freezer and the pantry.

I know I just did this not too long ago but see, I have a disease...it's the hoarding disease. Apparently I hoard food. I was appalled when I realized this but as I analyzed it more and more I realized there are some reasons.... good reasons. Yes, I'm relieved that I could come up with some good reasons!

a. I buy food in bulk now. No brainer on that one. I'm obviously going to be stocked up on food.
b. I make freezer meals. I've just trained myself to always cook in bulk which honestly has really helped since I'm working now. As soon as I eat out of the freezer I end up restocking the darn thing. It's just habit. It's also stocked with leftovers because I HATE to waste food and frankly can not afford to waste food.

Okay, see, I have good reasons. Well, good enough for me anyway.

So, since I need to save money everywhere I can we are once again eating out of the freezer and pantry this month. It's a way of purging and making sure nothing goes to waste.

Next, I need to defrost the deep freeze. That was my original plan the last time we ate out of the freezer but as you can see, I restocked it before I got a chance to defrost it. So, I'm going to give that a try again. I even started to make a double batch of stuffed shells today and had to force myself to not put a pan of them in the freezer....since the whole idea was to eat the ricotta out of the fridge.....to only put it back into the freezer as stuffed shells? Doesn't make sense to me either. Wow, I'm really rambling. So, we are eating the stuffed shells for dinner tonight. Problem solved.

So, if you have a food stocking issue....and want to join me on eating out of the pantry and freezer this month, feel free to jump in.

Side note on saving money....I turned down our thermostat 2 degrees to see if it saves us money. No, I'm not going to tell you what it's set at because I don't want you laughing at what a wimp I am. I'm hoping that at the end of this month it has saved us money. Now we wear layers in the house!

New poll, on the side bar.....if you click on other, please take a moment to share with me on this post in the comments what your "others" are. =0)

Happy Monday!
I'm off to go do some more food prep for the week, finish schooling my kids for the day, and I can hear the washer and dryer calling me....buzzzzzzzz, buzzzzzzzzzzz, buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Home Remedies

If you are interested or into home remedies you might want to see this post.....

Good Deal- Eating Well Magazine

I wanted to tell you about this good deal. I love this magazine and have wanted to get it for quite some time. The subscription is on sale for only $5 through Amazon right now and I used my swagbucks to pay for it so I got it completely free!

This blog is still on break. Not ready to come back yet. I will though sometime this month. =0)
Happy New Year

Merry Christmas Blogging Break

This blog is officially on break for Christmas. I won't be back until sometime in January..... You will however see a quick post on my birthday....that will fall during my blogging break.

I know that I keep promising printable recipes for purchase but my web guy (my handsome husband) has been consumed with working anytime he can get side jobs and when he isn't working he's looking for work and filling out job applications. We haven't forgotten but rather just have our hands full at the moment. I'm so eager to get them up for you as soon as it is possible. Thank you for your patience.

In the meantime, have a wonderful Christmas hopefully filled with yummy and nourishing things to eat.

Stay warm. Keep it simple. Stay focused on your life's purpose and the chief end of man. Delight in family and friends. Worship the King.

Recipe for a Hanky

Well, we finally did it. We made the switch from store bought tissues/Kleenex or actually Puff's in our case, to handkerchiefs. I've been wanting to try this out but was, well, to be honest, worried about the snot. Here I go being yucky on a cooking blog again....but seriously this is saving money BIG TIME! I read some other posts and articles (thanks Becca for your article on the subject) and was grateful to hear other's experiences with returning to handkerchiefs. My fears about tons of snot in a piece of cloth have being alleviated. The amount we have is very excessive for regular daily use but since we have allergies and I wanted to be prepared for the next round of colds, I supplied us generously. We have roughly about 50. About 7 per person in the family is probably sufficient to get through a week but you could very well use even less or if sick, possibly several more.

What I did:
-cut up cotton flannel squares (receiving blankets work great!) in about 6x8 sizes and hemmed them (or you can surge them with a surger.)
-gave each kid their own stack of about 6-10 handkerchiefs for their nightstand drawer.
-put a stack in our master bedroom.
-explained to the kids that they should stick one in their pocket at the start of each day.
-explained that they could use the hanky many times over and then put it in the laundry at the end of the day if it was used up or continue to use it the next day.
-filled an old Puff's tissue box with our handkerchief's folded in half for the kitchen (we all tend to use that box the most) and figured that out of habit we might still reach there for a tissue.
-if we use one from the kitchen box we toss it in the laundry room basket.
-kept a store-bought box of tissues in the guest bathroom for guests who may find our hanky going ways a bit strange.

Why We Will Never Go Back:
-using a hanky is nothing like I thought it would be! It's WAY better!
-the cotton flannel is soft. Way softer than store bought tissue, even the lotion version which is what I was buying.
-it's way more absorbent which means you can use it over and over again and it even drys out quickly (we live in a dry climate so I don't know if all climates would be the same in that regard.)
-it doesn't shred.
-it doesn't fall apart when it gets wet.
-you can blow more than once in it.
-you don't have to look for a trash can when you are done with it. It goes right back into your pocket.
-you don't have to buy tissue.....you can cross that expense off your grocery list. (and man! tissue isn't cheap!)
-your nose will be happier because it's so soft.
-you can carry just one in your purse instead of a whole wade that gets torn and ruined anyway.
-my kids absolutely LOVE this change as do I.
-I've even got my husband using them now...shhhh, don't tell anyone.

How did tissue companies ever talk mankind out of hanky's? I have no idea!

a taste of victory

My husband just said one of the best things in the world to me today!

"After eating home cooked meals all the time fast-food doesn't even sound good."

be still my heart. One word. Victory! It's been a longggggggggggggggggggggggggg road when it comes to the husband eating healthier issue, as I'm sure it is for a lot of men. Let me say that again, it's been a LONGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG road but the taste of victory is so sweet! I had to record his quote here so that when I get discouraged with the cooking healthy for my family (who can be picky sometimes) I'll remember this.

Series- Making Organics Affordable

I'm going to dedicate the entire month of October to a series called

"Making Organics Affordable"

If you've concluded that buying organic foods is worth it because you can cut down on pesticide consumption, GMOs, refined sugar, etc. then the next thing to consider is the cost. Buying organics can be very expensive but there are ways to work around mile-long-cash-register receipts.

My biggest fear when I wanted to switch to organic foods was the cost. It takes time, research, and hard work to search out affordable organic foods and I won't lie that it's been a huge challenge for me. But maybe I and others on the web, can encourage you with ways to make it affordable. I've mentioned resources for organic foods a few times but I'll include them as points in this series as well for those that are searching for purchasing resources.

So, this series is going to highlight some of the ways that I've been able to keep my household budget the same. (I call it "household" instead of "grocery" because mine includes more than just food....ie. toiletries and cleaning supplies included.) Did ya hear that? The same.

Now, I should preface that by saying that I am not a coupon queen gal. I have a lot of reasons for NOT trying to get out of the grocery store working the coupon system (and trust me, I've tried it several times) but the main one is because coupons are usually for unhealthy foods. Feeding my family is one of the most important things I do as a wife and mom and I take that job very seriously. How we eat affects how we feel, how we sleep, how we digest, how often we get sick, what illnesses we catch (or don't catch!), how well we concentrate, how our internal organs function, and so much more.... Shouldn't the foods we put into our bodies be worthy of our spending money? I just can't take it lightly. I had to make a choice, I can invest in the food we eat because it's one of the most important things we can invest in or I could be a coupon queen spending very little on groceries while feeding my family junk. I know I'm not as eloquent as I'd like to be so read this incredible blog post for a well written approach on the topic. She has nailed it on the head as to how I feel about coupons verses a healthy food budget.

So, when I started shopping for organic foods, I already had a decent size food budget in place because I was already committed to buying whole foods for our family and not processed foods. The success was being able to switch it all over to organics without changing that budget.

Well, I'm excited to share this series with you. It has a lot to do with my journey to eating healthier and it's also just plain old fun. I love the challenge of hunting for the best price and the hard to find product.

So, happy Fall and hope you enjoy this series.

beyond vitamin C

It's October 1st and while I have a whole series planned for this month on a different topic I wanted to first post about the flu season.

So, flu season has already begun and I've been gearing myself up for all the ways I can prevent illness in our home. I know after reading this you'll think I'm a germ-a-phobic and I risk exposing my Nazi-germ ways, but let me preface this by saying that my daughter had immune system issues as an infant and her specialist made me this way! To be fair, I was also raised by germ-a-phobic parents. Seriously though, a lot of this started because I had to with my daughter but I quickly learned that these things REALLY DID cut down on how often she was sick. Her specialist was on to something. From there I learned more about how we eat and how that contributes to our body's ability to fight off illness.

These are things I've been doing and testing over the past several years and I'm happy to report that our family gets sick on average once a year. That means that some years we get a head cold twice a year and other years we don't get sick at all! To boot, I've also noticed that we are sick for only a short while when others that have the same thing are sick for more than 2 weeks. I'm all for a short duration! Now, our daughter does get sick more often than the rest of us because of her issues with getting sick so easily but I know that if I didn't do these things that she would be sick much more often like she was in the first years of her life. Now she will get sick just a handful of times through the winter with the stomach flu but the rest of us don't get it.

Here are the things I'm gearing up for that I already know WORK......

- Lysol.
you think I'm kidding? oh no, I'm not. So, here's the deal. I buy those little sample size bottles in the check out isle of Walmart and keep them in my purse. So, every time we go into a store with a cart, my kids are trained to not touch the cart till it's been sprayed. I know you are thinking "overkill!" but trust me, this works. I was SHOCKED at how much less we got sick when I started this scene-causing-practice. You know, there comes a point in life...say about 30 yrs old, when you just don't care what people think anymore! To save some face, I only do this through the flu season or when something is going around....uh, I guess that's almost all the time. Oh well. Now, I know that Lysol isn't the most natural chemical I can spray around my family but considering swine flu and other green nasty things I see coming out of kid's noses who suck on the cart handles....ya, I'm thinking we'll go ahead and suffer the effects of Lysol as opposed to stomach flu, influenza and swine flu. I saw such a significant drop in our illnesses when I started this practice that as crazy as it is, I keep it up. Oh and my kids only panic and scream every once in awhile when someone goes to touch a cart without me spraying it first. BUT having said that, it leads me to my next one.......

- shop online!
Yep, we've seriously cut down how much we go into the store thanks to doing our groceries through delivery! But that's not all you can get online. You can do tons of shopping on line through places like Ebates.com, Amazon.com, Drugstore.com, and many others. Watch for free shipping promotions and you save yourself a ton of flu season exposure by shopping from the comfort of your own home. Need to know where the deals are? Go to www.dealnews.com.

- don't go around sick people.
okay, duh. We'd probably all agree with this one but truly how often do we sacrifice fun and socializing because someone has been sick, might be getting sick, or IS SICK! There doesn't seem to be a general rule with moms like you'd think....you know, the "I won't get your kids sick with my sick kids" rule....Nope, I'm convinced there is NO SUCH understanding in the mom world. Thankfully, my friends know how Nazi how important this is to me and have been super about not exposing my kids to even the slightest possibility of germ sharing. Thank you friends!

- hydration.
this is usually called "fluids" once it's too late and you're already sick. "Drink lots of fluids"...which, hey, is great, but seriously, if we drank more water to start with and our kids weren't running around dehydrated we'd fight off sickness better. I get my kids to drink distilled water to help detox during flu season. Besides detoxing, keeping our mucus membranes moist from hydration helps stop germs from going further and plain old helps our bodies function better. I read a study once that showed that most preschool children were dehydrated every day....which was the cause of many other ailments that they had.

- vitamins.
not from a bottle. Gotta get those germ fighting greens in. Power greens like broccoli, kale, spinach, etc. are awesome for ultimate health as flu season approaches. Don't forget everything that is packed into squash, green beans, and cauliflower. Pump up your blood with beets and almonds, and cream of wheat. Get your vit. C from citrus and red peppers. Fruit has got lots of vitamins and detoxes our bodies as well. Sprouts are an awesome food for good health.

- detox.
some foods that help us detox are brown rice, beans, barley, millet, quinoa, greens, cabbage, lemons, and fruits. Try to cut back on meats, dairy, and sugar.

- homeschool.
yep, believe it or not it cuts our illness I'd say at least by 75% from our friends that don't homeschool. Now, of course, this isn't the reason you should decide on what form of schooling you should provide for your kids but as an observer, I have to say this truly does cut down on exposure. Just a fact.

- change out hand towels often.
I try to change out the bathroom and kitchen hand towels more often as flu season approaches and during flu season. I also change sheets more often and try to air out the house from time to time....especially once I know we've been exposed or are coming down with something.

- wash hands after being out.
every time we come home from a store, I have my kids go in and wash their hands with soap immediately. I also carry handiwipes in my purse so that they can use them when we are out, especially before eating.

- train your kids.
train your kids to wash their hands regularly, to not pick up trash off the ground in public, to not put things in their mouths, cough into their elbows, etc. Kids are amazingly capable of meeting the expectations set for them. Prevention on this level is huge! I've noticed that a lot of parents do "damage control" parenting with their children and miss out on the benefits of training their children first. It's worth it to train them for prevention purposes. (Training them has other great benefits too but since this is a cooking blog I won't go there.)

- cut out refined sugar.
refined sugar lowers our immune systems. Cut out refined sugar and limit natural sugar.

- prevent mold and air out.
my daughter's infection specialist had us clean our daughter's room thoroughly regularly. Vacuuming daily even under the bed. Making sure there was no mold in her room (or in the house for that matter). Using allergy grade filters on our furnace. Wiping down her windows and sills regularly. Changing and washing her bedding often (all of it, dust ruffle, comforter, etc) and we used allergy covers on the pillows. Airing out the room with the window open every few days. These were all things that we did for her and then started doing with the whole house. This made a huge difference in how often we got sick.

- in the end, still make contact.
all of the above can sound very cold and unloving. Let me encourage you to still make contact with others, hugs, kisses, hand shakes, and gatherings. Fellowship and human touch are so important even through flu season. Just do it with discernment. Don't become so paranoid that you don't have any contact with the world outside of your front door.