Off to Iowa!

The greens are steamed, recyclables are in their bins, kitchen scraps in the compost and the bags are packed. Mae has a bento all ready with goldfish, crackers, Starburst, granola bars and, of course, gum. Lots of gum! Hopefully the food won't be taken away at the checkpoint. See you in a few weeks! Not sure if we'll be updating from Iowa but see you soon!

Quick Challenge Update

I love challenges and there are a lot of them going on. I think I'm supposed to be updating so the organizers can put up recaps. Since I'll be MIA for 2 weeks, I thought I'd update here and label them, in case someone comes checking up on me.

One Local Summer: lots of local meals this week and I blanched and froze the excess for winter. Meals include:

• steamed greens (CSA) with tofu (local Boulder company),
  
• homemade (local flour) flour tortillas with eggs (Jay Hill Farms), greens (CSA), beans (CSA) and salsa (Rocky Mountain Farms),
  
• radish (Jay Hill) and marinated artichokes (Rocky Mountain Farms) salad (CSA spinach) and of course,
  
• the requisite almond butter (Justin's, local Boulder company) and jam (Rocky Mountain Farms) on homemade bread (local flour).
  
• We've been enjoying Jay Hill eggs and (local flour) pancakes with (Rocky Mountain Farm) strawberry syrup for breakfast all week too.
  
• And loads of strawberries and sugar snap peas from Jay Hill! A delicious week.

Keep Yer Cool
This one is easy so far. It is pleasant in the morning and evening. Mid-afternoon is pretty hot, in the low 90s all week. I've brought back the nap (I read this on a blog yesterday and thought it was ingenious!) Napping from 1-3 helps get through that time of day and lets me stay up later at night enjoying the cool night air. We have the AC set to go on when temps hit 86, although with Paul working at home we'll have to see if that's too hot for him. So far, he chose the hottest week to go to Iowa. I'm doing just fine being hot. It's tough in the car but luckily 2 out of 3 kids enjoy the wind in their face (can you guess who hates it?) so we are doing OK there. So far, so good.

5 Minute Shower Challenge
No problem! Having short hair and shaving infrequently make this easy for me. I think my showers average about 2-3 minutes, a bit less than 5 when I'm counting my warm up water time (caught in a bucket to water the garden, of course!) This one is a no-brainer and I'm mad at myself for not doing this earlier.

The One Can a Month and I'm a Bookworm are starting up on July 1, so I'll jump on those when I get back! Going from half a 32 gallon trash bin to essentially a quarter is the challenge. Try and put the trash out just once a month. I'm eager to learn even more tips on reducing our garbage output. It seems like it should be easier but we are still at 2 full kitchen sizes bags per week. Reading one eco book a month will be the push I need to plow through the Michael Pollan books, so looking forward to getting back into The Omnivore's Dilemma when I finish up Ahab's Wife for bookclub.

The Addiction challenge comes to an end in June. Mine was not eating out unless it was planned and I did great until the boys left. We ate out for girls night on Monday (planned, AOK and was my first time in a month and it was delicious!!) but then Wendy and I took the kids to Noodles after swimming on Thursday, and then I brought home some sushi (from a local restaurant in Superior) for lunch today. And now we're off for 2 weeks of probably eating out a lot. Still, it showed me the value of planning my special occasions and I do plan to pick it back up when we return in July.

The Don't Buy It - Put Your Rebate to Work rebate check is slotted to be deposited into our "Boulder House Down Payment" account. We think it will be mailed sometime after July 4, according to the site. We'll see!

I think that's it for challenges! As a general note, previous challenge buttons are moved to the bottom of the list but are on-going. So many of these are great enough (and easy enough!) to do full time.

Ted's 1st Swim Meet

Tonight was the rescheduled 1st pre-team swim meet of the summer. Each child did one length of each stroke (free, breast, back, fly). Freestyle used to be, in my humble, non-swimmer opinion, Ted's weakest stroke; his arms were sloppy. But they must have worked on it this week because he did great! 54:06 (they were timed and the time written on their ribbon. Each child received a ribbon after every stroke. Really sweet.)
Breaststroke used to be his best stroke, since they did it with Judy. Ted was pretty slow at this one and seemed to have some sort of weird arm movement going on. 1:14:42. The couch said he was a die-hard butterfly, just look at those arms! Too bad he wasn't doing the butterfly at the time! hee.
Backstroke was awesome. Here's another stroke he does fast and efficiently. 47:03. His comment after that one was "This is a lot of work." hee.
And finally his favorite, the butterfly. At 1:08:96 (96?) it wasn't speedy, but it sure looked good. Their drills this morning at practice were mostly butterfly and it showed.
Great job, Ted and the Rock Creek Flyers! You rock!! They were clearly the youngest team. There were 3rd graders (Jordon and Jacob among them) and BIG kids in general on the other teams, who were faster and more skilled. I hope to keep Ted in pre-team as long as possible (because it's so mellow) so I can why these big kids are there. It did make our team look so very sweet! Some good pics on moeltini.

All this following a day at Lakeside with Alex and Adam. Last year Ted and Sam had a blast and Mae screamed the entire time, only consenting to go on one little horsey ride, with Sam. This year she started out the same, screaming that the roller coaster was too loud. Wendy and I thought it was going to be a long afternoon, but she got through it and actually went on quite a lot of rides, and enjoyed it! Hooray! We predict she'll take, oh, 3 more years, and then she'll try the roller coaster. Hee. Wendy took this shot and when I look at it I see what I've been doing for the past month with Mae. I may not feel like nurturing and comforting her all the time, but I really am trying. It's like the theory that if you smile, you'll eventually feel happy. If I hold and comfort her when she needs it, even if I don't feel like it, maybe soon I'll be able to do it without feeling annoyed. I am happy she ended up having a happy day today. Lakeside is very cute for little ones. I think Alex and Ted are getting a bit too old for it, but they still like it now. Today Alex and Sam seemed to pair up, while Ted and Adam palled around. They have similar personalities so it made sense. All in all, an exhausting but fun day.
The boys leave for Iowa tomorrow morning. Sweet dreams!

Windy Nights

Today was a hot day, in the 90s. This afternoon the wind picked up and the boys (all 3 of them) thought it was perfect kite flying weather. Paul had the kites Nancy had bought them last summer all ready to go for the trip. He put them together and off they went to the top of the hill to fly them. Ted's would only fly at the very end of the string, while Sam's preferred staying closer to the ground. What a great idea. Ted's is the blue jet and Sam's is the red box kite.

Regression

I kept meaning to blog in more detail about Mae's reaction to our reunion but I guess my nose got in the way. On Saturday at the picnic I had a great chat with Renee, Zoe's mom. Her take on it is that Mae has a very strong emotional recall when surrounded by her Huaihua sisters. She's smart enough to understand what being with them is all about, and it probably throws her into complete emotional turmoil to remember, albeit unconsciously, her life before she joined us. And, being the 3rd child, I haven't done much to help her "own" her heritage. She probably identifies more with being Jewish than she does being Chinese. While we get together with Zoe, Angelina and Caitlan on occasion, it's not alot. After this reunion, seeing her withdraw right before my eyes, enduring a return to waking all night long screaming for me ("Mommy, where are you? I want you!") and bearing the brunt of her toddler tantrums ("Mommy! Get me some juice NOW!!") has all been draining. I think I'm willing to give Chinese school a go this Fall. It's a schlep. But it's a good school and a school rich in different activities when the girls are older (dancing, choir, art etc.). She'll be with her friends (Angelina, Zoe, Shayna and Xiao all attend). Maybe, just maybe, putting her in contact with more of her Chinese heritage will help even out all the emotional turmoil into more manageable doses, rather than have it explode in our faces every year at reunion time. I'll call CCAI this week.

Hives

Ted seems to be having a reaction. This is Day 2 of the evening hives. After 2 teaspoons of Benedryl, it diminishes some. It doesn't bother him that much, just enough to tell us about it. According to this article, hives can be brought on by citrus. Ted's been having a lime juice drink for the last 2 nights. Hmm. Paul thinks it's an allergy to the grass. He doesn't roll in it, but he's running around the backyard. Any thoughts?

Breakfast Granola, finally!

Paul is a big breakfast cereal person. The kids prefer waffles, eggy bread, muffins, etc. But Paul is a cereal boy. So, I experimented a few times with granola and this one got a thumbs up! (Search on granola if you're hitting the link.) This took 9 minutes to prepare and was excellent. I added a half cup each of whole almonds and raisins. Hooray!

The kids helped me cook up a batch of (16) waffles this morning. Only 4 remain. They love those waffles. Usually I use spelt flour but only had 1/2 cup so I used barley flour for the rest. They were still excellent and also were thicker. Yum.

Tonight's local dinner (sans tuna) was soo yummy. Over a bed of CSA frisee & spinach, unlocal tuna, Rocky Mountain Farm's marinated artichokes and CSA radishes, topped with Amber's dressing and some local dill. Served with a side of not local but a local shop Indian paratha. Excellent.

One Local Summer Update - Week 3

Yummy week. Here are the meals that were local:

• CSA radish (and non-local tuna) salad with CSA lettuce
• homemade corn tortillas with local eggs, salsa and CSA lettuce
• Sauteed bok choi & honey baked beans (CSA bok choi, onion, garlic & beans, local honey)
• Asian Tofu & Greens Stir-Fry (CSA mizuna, Yukina, onion & garlic, local tofu)

Here is a great recipe site for Asian greens. I plan to blanch and freeze the remaining greens in this share. I hope to freeze 2-3 "bunches" of greens per week/share to ensure greens in the winter. Oh, how we missed our greens!

I am really loving the lettuce and we haven't even had our standard tofu lettuce wraps or Puree of Spring Greens Soup yet! I pick up our next share on Thursday, the day the boys leave for Iowa. Mae and I leave on Saturday, so I plan to blanch and freeze all greens possible, keeping just some spinach and/or lettuce for me for the 2 remaining days. It's funny: I have one more ziplock of soup in the freezer. Will it be gone before the first of the greens go in?

Annual CCAI Reunion Picnic

Today was CCAI's 14th Annual Reunion Picnic, at City Park in Denver. Paul had a chavurah guys event, so I was on my own. I truly appreciate the age Ted is at now. We bought a large ladybug balloon at Safeway and tied it to our backpack. That and Mae's 100 Good Wishes Quilt made our area easy to spot. So he could wander off, playing on stilts or waiting in line for a balloon, and find his way back. The kids really loved the dragon dance (the dragon is held up by about 5 dancers who run through the crowd holding it up, with a stream of little Chinese girls running behind them (and Ted, of course). The Lion Dance was awesome too. I ran back to the blanket to grab our sun hats and Ted took about 50 pictures. We got to chat with Renee & Rob (Zoe), Megan (Lucinda), Joanne (Xiao-Xiao), Michael & Rachel (Elyana, and how our eyes were opened to the idea of Chinese adoption in the first place!) and even Beth & Julio (Shayna), albeit briefly. We have got to get more organized about meeting up! Every year I vow to find a way to meet up, but it never pans out. Argh! It was so lovely to see all the girls. There were so few babies this year, with the slowdowns and all. Our girls were pretty much the youngest, with just a smattering of littler ones. I suppose with gas prices, out of towners were less inclined to come this year too, so it seemed less well attended this year. It was still lovely though, and with the heat, the water park was a hit too. A fun day all around!
Lots more pic on moeltini.

CSA Pickup deliciousness

Since we had a bunch of radishes, I searched on line for a radish salad. I found this one and added tuna and Amber's dressing. It was a fantastic salad which I repeated on Friday for lunch. And, for the record, I don't (didn't?) even like radishes!

Here's what was in our box on Thursday. We have a full share this time.

• Lettuce
• Asian tenders
(Bok Choi, Tot Soi, Mai King Choi, Yukina)

• Spinach
• Mizuna
• Radishes
• Komatsuna
• Frisee


As testament to the wonderful education we were given last season, we are ready for these greens! In fact, as of Saturday night, only half of a head of lettuce remains! (We were given 5!)

Just call me Ma Ingalls

Today was a good one. One of the first days I've really felt ... I'd say 98%! After retrieving my bike from Stacy's, I took a pleasant ride around Rock Creek. It was still cool out and since I didn't have the kids with me, I could stay in the street where it's not as bumpy!
I got home and started the bread, then set about putting together my Wonder Wash. It was a terrible mess of plastic and I felt very guilty about it. But, it only took 1.5 gallons to wash and 0.5 to rinse, so 2 gallons in total. Pretty good. I did a small wash for my first time and it took me all of 20 minutes from start to finish (including hanging it up on the line). I can see that I'll have to use the regular washer for most of the our large loads, but on a day when I normally would skip a load and then be annoyed the next day when it had gotten too big, it'll be of great help.
After picking up Mae (Sam went to Jason's, of course), we took Ole to the dog park which he seemed to enjoy. Mae enjoyed "writing" in the sand with a stick. I enjoyed the shade of a tree. Then we ran our errands: dropping off books (scored $50+ in credit) at The Bookworm, picking up eggs, strawberries, sugar snap peas and dill at Jay Hill farms, and finally, picking Ted (and Jack) up from camp. We then changed into our swimsuits and headed out on bikes (even Mae) to Lakeshore, where the kiddos swam for hours (and ate up all the strawberries and sugar snap peas). Paul meandered by with Ole and Sam wanted to bike home with him. I think Ted, Mae and I got home around 8:30. It was great fun.
Tomorrow is the CCAI Reunion Picnic. Paul has a guys chavurah shooting/biking thing, so it'll just be me and the crew. Hope I don't lose anyone!

Fun Days

The nose is improving (this one's for you, Mom!) You can see I still have a teeny bit of a black eye. The nose itself is still somewhat swollen, but not bad. The incision is healing nicely, although there is a spot in the very center that is not knitting up as cleanly as Dr. Allen would like. All in all, no biggie. (click for a larger view, Mom)
Tonight Ted and I rode our bikes to Stacy's (about 2 miles) for a book club meeting. It was very uncomfortable with sunglasses so I eventually took them off and just squinted. Pressure on the nose at all is just not fun.
Ted had a blast at HHS camp today. They rode the RTD to Eben G. Fine park, then hiked Red Rocks, then went to Pearl Street to play in the fountain and have Italian Ice. He was beat!
Sam and Mae went with me to my TKD class. It's my first time back and I elected to walk, not run, my laps. Other than that, I feel fine. I'm learning Inwa I and it's cool!
Ted and I picked up our CSA share today, chock full of greens. I plan to blanch the greens and freeze them as long as the lettuce lasts. Once the lettuce is on its way out, we'll eat the greens too. There is a lot of lettuce in the early weeks of the CSA! It was great to be back and I know we'll have some delicious salads this week!
Tomorrow is everyone's last day of camp til we return from Iowa. We're going to head to Lakeshore's pool with Tara and Stacy at 4 (Sam will be so psyched. Every time we bike behind Lakeshore he begs to go swim there.) Saturday is the annual CCAI Reunion picnic and Sunday, I believe is free. I can't believe June is almost gone already! This summer s flying by!

Natural Rememdies

When Amber came to take care of Sam and Mae on Thursday, she ended up taking amazing care of me as well! One of the things I was very into when I lived in Chicago was "natural remedies." I pretty much dropped it after getting married and moving out to Colorado, busy with school and babies. But Amber has turned me back on to it. I am impressed with the body's ability to heal itself on its own (I haven't been given any antibiotics or even a pain-relief cream for the area - it's healing itself just fine. A few minor spots to keep an eye on, but no problems.) I think that's just amazing, since I certainly associate medications with any sort of surgery, no matter how minor. Besides the wonderful potato that brought my swelling down in a matter of hours, and the arnica cream that has helped the massive black eye shrink to almost nothing, Amber has suggested other natural remedies to help strengthen my immune system and assist in healing, as well as generally keeping myself healthy.
I was feeling a bit weak after the stitches were removed today, probably much more of an emotional reaction than a physical one. So I decided to have a power lunch - a lunch chock full of all the things I had learned about.

Amber gave me a recipe for tempeh with a dipping sauce that I knew I had all the ingredients for (always a plus!) After nuking the sliced tempeh for about 5 minutes to pre-cook, I fried it in peanut oil (plus some garlic. I heart me some garlic.) The dipping sauce was a mixture of soy sauce, sesame oil, seasoned rice vinegar, mirin and a few drops of hot chili oil. It was good but I overcooked the tempeh. I can see that it would make a tasty snack.
After sauteeing the beet greens in the leftover garlicly peanut oil, I topped it with Amber's dressing: some DHA 369 Blend (Omega Fatty Acids), Balsamic Vinegar, a generous squeeze of half a fresh lime, and a dash of salt. I have to say, that was a good dressing. I'm going to try it on a spinach salad tonight. Mmm. I think she should write a cookbook.
I added about 3 ounces of Aloe Vera (Gel & Juice, berry flavored) to the rest of my Synergy Kombucha (guava flavored) bottle for my drink.
After lunch, 2 TBSP of Probiotic Acidophilus (it has a yogurt texture and tastes of blueberry) finished up my meal. I feel full and full of energy, and it's about 3 hours later. Cool.

For anyone who's interested, here are some of the natural rememdies I'm trying:
Colloidal Silver: a natural antibiotic (we're excited to try this for Mae's ear infections. That and garlic should help keep her down to fewer than one a month! It's been suggested to me that constant ear infections are a sign of a food allergy, so we're going to run her bloodwork at her 3year and see.)
Probiotic Acidophilus: probiotics keep the organisms responsible for strengthening the immune system healthy and happy.
Aloe Vera
Omega Fatty Acids
Tumeric: a powerful antioxidant that is said to help prevent cancer. it's also a good healing agent, so I've been adding a dash of tumeric to my daily (non) petroleum jelly that I apply under the bandage. I also tried a tea; it was OK but I'll stick to my green tea for now.

Mosaic Meme

Inspired by The Purloined Letter:


How many of my answers can you figure out from the photos?

Questions:

1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you go to?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What do you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One word to describe you.
12. Your Flickr name.

The instructions to create the mosaic are:

• Type your answers to each of the questions below into Flickr Search
• Using only the first page, pick an image
• Copy and paste each of the URLs into the mosaic maker

One Local Summer Week 2

This has been a hard week, obviously. I didn't manage much this week. But by Friday I felt better. For Paul's bday dinner I fixed homemade corn tortillas with his favorite filling, black beans and corn. The black beans and corn were CSA, frozen from last year and the onion and garlic from Jay Hill Farms. But I "cheated" in that I bought a can of Kuner's Black Beans with Cumin and Spices and drained the "juices" to use. When I add my own cumin it's just not as flavorful. We would have had local Jay Hill Farm steamed greens, but I got lazy. It's about the best I could do this week. We're out of homemade almond butter and homemade bread/waffles. I hope to get on that tomorrow.
On Thursday night, I pulled out a ziplock of Pumpkin Black Bean Soup (100% local) frozen in January). That was delicious!

Testing

This morning the boys tested for their next belts. Sam is a Tiger Belt now (Orange Belt Decided) and Ted is a Lion Belt now (Camo Belt Decided). Sam indulged all of us in some deja-vu. Just like when Ted tested for his Tiger Belt, Sam goofed off and was only rescued by some gentle yet firm talking to from Mr. D. I am so relieved we're past the Tiger Belt! It seems to bring problems to the Moeller boys! Ted was excellent. He was very serious and focused. His maturity has come a long way. I was so proud of him. It's funny, though, how when he fooled around I was furious, disappointed, embarrassed and a host of other emotions. With Sam, good 'ole #2, I can smile and say, "It's a stage." Poor Ted. It's tough to be the first born. Anyway, tons of pics on moeltini.

MNW Day 4

Today was the best day so far. I was able to schlep the children, cook black bean and corn stuffing with homemade corn tortillas, and lemon cake (sort of, more on that later) for Paul's little birthday party.
Today the swelling is down to barely noticeable. It looks bad, but doesn't affect my vision at all. Ahh. Back to blogging. And, I was able to finish my bookclub book, An Irish Country Doctor, which was lovely. The very top, on the bridge of my nose, is the most sore. I wonder if that's because there isn't any fat there to protect things. Very ouchy. But the rest of my nose feels ... bulbous. But fine. It's still swollen enough to have that odd sensation of not feeling it when I touch it (does that make sense?) but that's better than it hurting, I suppose.
People have been so nice. Amber was an absolute godsend. Paul has been amazing, never complaining about everything he had to do this week. Wendy rescued me on Wednesday when I really didn't know how I was going to manage. Louise has called just to check in. Tawnya has called every day to see how I'm doing, offering her "been there, done that" support. I've been talking to my parents almost every day for a month now, since my mom's hospital stay. She's home and fine now, but I find that our calls are now reversed and it's them comforting me. Thanks, Mom and Dad. I appreciate it. I appreciate all of you.

As for the cake, I think adding the extra flour you're supposed to for high altitude would have helped. Luckily, it still tasted delicious, just like I remember my mom's. Happy 39th, Paul. We love you!

MNW Day 3

WARNING! PHOTO BELOW NOT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART!!

So, the bandage came off today. It looks much better than I thought. I took the pic before cleaning it, so it's a bit better looking than that. Also, I had a babysitter today for Sam and Mae. She brought me a potato, sliced it up, and instructed me to use it as a compress on my (swollen shut) eye. 15 minutes later and my eye was open! Hooray! She's versed me in some "alternative medicine" approaches to healing and I figure, why not? OK, are you ready for the pic? Don't look if you don't want to. Or if you're my dad, click for an even larger view! heh.

Day 2 update

Ain't I purty? oy. Thanks to Wendy's awesomeness, I was able to stay home and not (attempt to) drive. She brought Sam and Mae home for me; Paul left work early and brought Ted home from camp. Tylenol is working well. It's just all the pressure from my eye that is the problem. I hope the swelling goes down soon. Tomorrow I need to venture out into the world to take the boys to TKD since testing is on Saturday.

MNW Day 2

Terrible night of sleep. I don't tolerate Vicodin. I feel better this morning. My eye looks crazy. My nose hurts.
Just wait til tomorrow, Dad. The bandage comes off! Ahhh!

Mohs Nose Woes

The pic is for my dad. Plus, I've never had a black eye before. I haven't blogged about my adventures in basal cell carcinoma, but it's been a ride. Liquid nitrogen didn't do the trick, a biopsy confirmed the cancer diagnosis, and I spent 4 hours today having the Mohs procedure done. It took them 3 passes to get it all out but the procedure itself was completely painless (i.e., Dr. Allen is fabulous.)
More info when I'm up on my feet again. Right now the Vicodin is making me really nauseous and, did I mention? my nose HURTS.

love this!

I love love love hanging out the laundry. It's a bit of a pain when it's raining because my house resembles the inside of a laundromat, but it's good practice for winter. On warm sunny days, I actually take my time, just listening to the birds and soaking in the sun. It's a nice, reflective time for me. I do a wash every day. Most of the washes are small, so I was psyched to see this cool, no electricity, minimal water usage, Wonder Wash. A perfect 10 year Anniversary gift for me, don't you think? "For the woman who has everything.." Bwa ha ha. Seriously though, I think I'll give it a try. I do have some small loads that give me serious guilt trips. Then again, Mae's monster loads are worth the real machine. We'll see. Yet again, very nice to see something out there that is an alternative to using energy and water for something I do every single day.

Ted starts HHS camp tomorrow and the other two JCC on Wed & Fri. I'm looking forward to a brief 2 weeks of routine before another week of mellow summer. Today, after biking to swim practice and then to the other pool, I swam laps again. My breaststroke is fine but my ridiculous ski injury (rotator cuff?) made freestyle slow and painful. Ted spent lots of time in the lap lane practicing his strokes or, literally, on the bottom of the pool sneaking up on me. Both Sam and Mae did a lot of swim-float-swim to me today too. A nice, mellow day.

make that no cars!

On Friday I was dreaming about our gentle footprint once we move to Boulder. With access to the bike path, Boulder's supurb bus system and being close to school, the Farmer's Market and a grocery store, we could easily go down to one car. But something was nagging at me. Something I had heard of but couldn't remember. Renting a car? But you paid a membership? What was that? Thanks to a favorite green blog I read, the answer was presented to me tonight. It's Zipcar. With a zipcar membership, you have access to an entire fleet of (often hybrid) vehicles depending on your need. A quick zip to the grocery store sans kiddos on a snowy morning? The car above fits the bill. For a family trip, a larger vehicle would be better. Etc. So, next week I'm going to contact them and see how we go about starting this program in Boulder. Seems to me it would be very successful here. If so, I hope/dream/vow to get rid of our cars for good. Woo hoo!

Update! Thank you to a reader who let me know about Boulder CarShare! Rock on, Boulder!

One Local Summer-Week 1 Recap

One delicious week of June has come and gone. The traditional way to do this challenge is to plan one meal for the week made from exclusively local ingredients. Well, this is easy for me for lunches but since we're going through the stores in the freezer and pantry, not as easy for the main meals. Here are some meals we've enjoyed.

• a lunch staple for me: quesadillas with local tortillas, local MouCou cheese, Jay Hill greens & eggs.

• a lunch staple for the kids: sandwiches on homemade bread with local flour/honey, homemade almond butter and Rocky Mountain farm cherry jam.

• a breakfast staple: homemade waffles with local flour/honey and local Rocky Mountain Farm strawberry syrup.

• One of our favorite meals this week was homemade french fries with local potatoes, Jay Hill rainbow chard and veggie brats grilled on the grill. Such the quintessential summer meal.

• Another was baked (local) potatoes with Punk Rock Chickpea Gravy (made with CSA Indian Woman Beans, Farmer's Market onion & garlic), and a side of Jay Hill beet greens. YUM!!!

• Lastly, from the freezer, black bean loaf (CSA black beans, onion & garlic) with a side of Jay Hill spinach. The loaf was a bit chewy after being frozen but still good.
  

Our plum tree is producing! Last year, we had a crazy windstorm that blew all the baby plums down before they had a chance to plump up. I hope these make it. We have a TON on the big tree. Our other plum tree is 2 this year, so next year we can expect some fruit from it as well. Mmm...

2014?

2010 is the year we hope to move to Boulder. Part dream and part goal, I hope that 2014 will see to the installation of a LifePort garage. The average system size is 4.8 kW, which will satisfy 100% of the annual demands of an average $120/month electricity bill. (Our ave. monthly bill is $115, lower in the summer, a touch higher in the winter). Yippee! Daydream or not, isn't it fabulous that such things exist and are becoming more and more mainstream? This system will pay for itself in 6 months to a year. Among other lofty goals for our Boulder existence, I also want to go down to one car, keep chickens, and perhaps volunteer our front yard (maybe some of the back yard too?) to the Boulder Community Roots Urban Gardens program. Today we were all starving at 2pm (we hadn't eaten since breakfast and constant swimming had finally fatigued us all into agreement: let's get lunch! We came home and I made PB&Js, sliced up some organic watermelon, and poured homemade soymilk into our Mason jar glasses. A few months, heck, a few weeks ago, I wouldn't have hesitated to make a quick stop at Noodles, Wahoos, Taco Bell or Panda Express for a quick meal to satisfy our growling bellies. But with goals like these, a spur-of-the-moment, quick and convenient purchase seems unattractive. Plus, my almond butter is seriously good. Yum.
I highly recommend the book Living Simply with Children by Marie Sherlock. It's a nice blueprint to adjusting life to how you want to live it, rather than how society dictates you should want to live it. Great book.

the garden is growing!!!

The garden is starting to perk up! The mint is doing great thanks to all the rain but everything else was starting to worry me. We have zero tomatoes! I don't understand! In years past, cherry tomatoes were the only things I could get to grow! I may get a few larger, further along plants and pop them in. Tonight Ted and I took a closer look at the carrots and sugar snap peas and lo and behold! They are up! They are still small (although we couldn't resist pulling up a few teeny carrots just to talk about root vegetables) but they are so cute! We started those from seed on February 22!! Talk about a long wait. The sugar snaps and carrots were the first to sprout. Hooray!! I just don't understand those tomatoes...

Today at swim practice Ted learned the "inchworm" move, the first step in Butterfly. Most of the kids would "wiggle, wiggle, rest... wiggle, wiggle, rest... "etc. Not Ted! He wiggled his way from one end and back again four times (which was the drill) with enthusiasm. After practice he said his stomach hurt. He'll have rock hard abs with that drill! They also did a few laps of "whatever you want to do" and he chose backstroke (usually he chooses breaststroke). He looked so confident and graceful. He is not a fan of freestyle at all (neither am I!). Coach Brooks said he was going to be great at the Butterfly. That's exactly what Judy says about Sam (he does the wiggle thing all the time, just to be fancy).

Monday is Shavuot, no camps for any of the kiddos so we'll do our bike to the pools routine. Tuesday Ted starts HHS camp and Wednesday Sam and Mae start JCC camp. Tuesdays and Thursdays will be our pool days for the next 2 weeks, although I expect we'll spend some evenings there as well so Ted can get some fun in. He is very tired after practice and usually lies on a chair for about an hour before getting in the water to play. He is also eating up a storm, probably due to the swimming. I am so happy he is enjoying it!

more on the simplicity front

Tomorrow is Friday already! This ends our first week of summer vacation. Tomorrow we'll bike to swim practice and then to South Pool, unless the weather is cold and rainy. The kids really want to go to the ghetto Elitches', as Wendy calls it, so we may need to schedule that for the week of the 23rd, before we head to Iowa.
Today we signed Ted (and Sam by default) up for the library's summer reading program. It's cute. They have a pirate theme this year. They got their Pirate Captain logbook and a treasure map. The point of the map is to teach them how to use the library. This week's clue was found by finding a book with a specific call number (step one towards library independence!) Ted is very hyped about it.
Tonight at the cul-de-sac Mae was rocking out on her trike, although she was frustrated with her limited wheels (they kept spinning on her because she was pedaling way faster than a trike is built for!)
This weekend should be fun. Saturday the chavurah is up at the cabin in Estes Park and Sunday Paul wants to try Sam out without training wheels. Bring on the hot weather! We're all a little tired of the chilly, rainy days!

Homemade Almond Butter

I got inspired today to try my hand at homemade almond butter. At $5+ a jar, it gets costly around here with the amount of nut butters we go through. I found a recipe here and it sounded simple enough, and didn't REQUIRE a Vitamix or something fancy. My Cuisinart did smoke at the end, though. Hmm. This is easy and delicious. I ended up adding 2 extra tbsp of oil (!) and a tbsp of honey to the liquid. It's a grainier texture than store-bought, but just as good if not better. We had it with Rocky Mountain Farm's Cherry Jam on homemade (local flour) bread. Oh yeah. Next up, cashew butter.

First Official Day of Summer Break

Whew! I survived! We left this morning at 8:30 for Ted's swim practice at North Pool, about a mile and a half away. Ted rode and I lugged the Burley with the 2 kiddos and all our swim stuff. Ted really enjoyed practice (hooray!) and we biked back to South Pool for a few hours of play. I swam laps the entire adult swim, making this the official day of most exercise I've ever had in my life. Then we biked home (uphill) and had lunch. After naps, Sam and Mae wanted to bike again so they did some around the garage and driveway before heading up to the cul-de-sac for 2 more hours of biking and a picnic. LOVE Ted's choice of picnic food: graham crackers, rice cheese shreds, marshmallows and dill pickles! What a nut. (Paul brought us a pizza later on.) It was an exhausting day but a good one. We'll repeat this on Wednesday and Friday of this week!

Here is Mae riding her trike! If she keeps this up, I'll let her do the next bike race with Ted!



Plus a cute one of Sam. Keep in mind he's been terrified of his bike (after a terrific summer last year) so we are PSYCHED that he is back at it.