Celebrating the New Year of the New Me!

I am ready for big things in 2010 and have started out the New Year living my intentions.

January 1st, I fasted on water with the lovely folks at the Naked Food Cafe. I have been enjoying lovely fruits and greens since then. I even served tater tots, a long-time cheat food, to my family today without popping a single one in my mouth. And I didn't feel disappointed at all. They actually kinda stink.

I got a cheapy little electric orange juicer yesterday and we made our first yummy OJ today. My 10 year-old set it up for me and read the directions, and he and the girls did a lot of the juicing while I made the rest of the dinner. Fun and delicious! It was easy to go through 8 lbs. of oranges in one meal, however, which brought up some of my fears about money and the price of feeding my family quality food. Deep breath. Letting it go for right now.

After only 3 days without salt and other junk, I am already feeling a lot less achey and bloated than I usually do. I had fun rebounding vigorously for 30 minutes, as I recovered from my respiratory illness much more easily. However, I have had a little bit of trouble with the timing and quantity of my food, so I am undereating and a bit hungry. Not to worry. I have ripe bananas and frozen raspberries, so I will have a nice big meal for breakfast and get back on track. I also have lots of Barhi dates. Mmmm.

After some research, including this article by Don Bennett, I decided that our family are all going to take a Vitamin D supplement. I am not thrilled about this, but have decided that it is the best we can do for our health in our current location. I have been dreaming a lot about our future tropical paradise where I will grow fruit trees and bask in the glorious rays of the sun year-round. (Hear that, universe?)

I am so happy to have my family and friends, especially the lovely online raw community I have found through this blog, and to celebrate the reawakening of my hope and joy in this lovely New Year.

I'm married to a rock star!

My husband is in a band called The Sound Surround. He's the guy on the left, and that's his "little" brother on the right. I'm thrilled that he can have fun and be creative and live one of his long-time fantasies.

I'm baaaack!

I admit it, I've been a chicken... Since my last post a year and a half ago, I have spent most of my time struggling with myself and hiding from everyone.

So many changes, it would take a book-length post to update you all on them. But here's the highlight reel. I tried to force myself and everyone in my family in a journey of radical self-development, some of which was documented on this very blog. I ran smack-dab into my deep emotional wounds and lack of interpersonal skills. Homeschooling crashed and burned. My family life crashed and burned. I broke up with my husband Jason (meanwhile, unbeknownst to us, we had conceived our lovely baby boy Qian, pictured above). Our children moved with Jason to the small town where he teaches and went back to public school. I began working 50 hours a week at two new jobs, and spent the weekends with the children.

We planned to divorce and give the baby up for adoption, but by the third trimester we could not bear to do either, and chose to reunite and welcome our baby to our family. Meanwhile, Jason had a very serious health crisis which left him insulin-dependent and suffering from severe neuropathy. He has only partially recovered. I have moved back with him and am down to one job, about 10 hours per month. I am just enjoying my family immensely. But the struggles and compulsions that I have wrestled with my entire life are still present daily. I want to engage them with curiousity and compassion, rather than an endless cycle of self-violence.

I have been exploring my emotional health in new ways, and am finally ready to rejoin the world. I missed my community here, and hope to reunite with you all.

I don't like waiting!

The waiting is the hardest part

Every day you see one more card

You take it on faith, you take it to the heart

The waiting is the hardest part

from The Waiting by Tom Petty

Actually, I can stand in line just fine. I don't usually race around trying to find the shortest grocery lane. I don't harumph with irritation if someone is 5 minutes late to meet me.

But when it comes to the changes I want to see manifest in my life, I really feel anxious and well, impatient.

I don't want to spend another week desperately hoping that we won't run out of money for food. This has gone on literally as long as I can remember, no matter what our earnings. We ALWAYS run out of money to pay all of the bills or have to subsist on bananas or dumpster gleanings for the last 3 days before payday.

I don't want to spend another winter shivering and feeling blue from lack of sunlight.

Is impatience a lack of faith? Possibly. Possibly I don't really believe I can create a stable financial situation or ever have the courage to start my life over in a new place. Perhaps I don't have faith in myself. Perhaps I am afraid to make some sort of "fatal" mistake if I make huge changes.

At this point, perhaps impatience is simply a symptom of system overload. I literally cannot take this amount of pain and stress for much longer. I have reached the end of my tolerance. Much more, and my spirit may sicken and die.

Our New Thanksgiving

This year, we decided to begin to break away from the toxic traditions and behaviors from our past and begin to establish our own family tradition that is more in line with our values. We value togetherness, love and gratitude. We value health and happiness.

We were very afraid to simply say to our families, "We are not coming to the Thanksgiving gorge this year, because ____________." We also realized that it would be futile to say, "We are coming, but we will only participate in our way." We have tried that in the past with no good results.

So, in lieu of brutal honesty, we chose escape. We planned a small trip to Madison, to a Holiday Inn that has a small indoor waterpark called Crawdaddy Cove.

Our children, particularly our oldest, were a little skeptical. The night before we left, he spent quite some time crying and listing all of his fears about how horrible the trip would be and how upset he was that he was going to miss out on turkey and Cartoon Network at Papa and Grandma's. However, as you see, he revised his opinion and all the children had a great time.


For our Thanksgiving dinner, I prepared a surprise plate. It LOOKS like an ordinary salad, right?

But this surprise was hiding beneath. The children enjoyed uncovering the design and eating "special occasion food" such as raisins, figs, and raw peanuts.

After dinner, we read three special Thanksgiving stories, all humorous and with the theme of sparing the turkey. I read A Turkey for Thanksgiving, by Eve Bunting, illustrated by Diane DeGroat.

Our son read A Plump and Perky Turkey, by Teresa Bateman and illustrated by Jeff Shelley.

My husband read 'Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving, by Dav Pilkey.

I will rate the whole experience as a qualified success. My husband and I had a bit of trouble relaxing and enjoying ourselves, preoccupied with many major decisions and changes facing our family soon.

Crawdaddy Cove was just o.k. The chlorine was overpowering and our five year-old got sick from it.

Next year, our Thanksgiving trip will hopefully be an utterly joyous occasion that will take place somewhere with fresh water and sunshine.

Salome with her Grandpa (my father)

My farmer friend Phil hangin' out at Willow

Busy, busy weekend! Saturday was Farmer's Market and then the kids and I headed out for the Willow Creek Folk Festival that is held in a picturesque little churchyard in the country about 25 minutes away from here. Willow attracts a ton of amazing talent from all over and is a big thing for all the crunchy/ hippy/ liberal folk around these parts, but believe it or not, we've never been. We made a special effort this year, as my husband's brother's band had secured a timeslot to play. My husband was feeling really low with a rib injury, however, and decided to stay home and rest.

We had a WONDERFUL time. I had a few welcome but unexpected encounters, including with my parents! My parents had decided to take a little mini-vacation and stayed in a hotel in Stockton with my four youngest siblings. The sibs decided to sit out the festival in favor of swimming in the hotel pool. But my parents had a great time. It was nice to visit with them a bit. The kids ran me a bit ragged, especially at the end, when two of them disappeared into the darkness and it took a little while to find them. We enjoyed hearing my brother-in-law's band... They played a really fun cover of Folsom Prison, by Johnny Cash, an original murder ballad that my dad deemed "inappropriate for a churchyard," and a White Stripes song.

Today, we had Salome's birthday party in a local park. Nobody blinked when we served a watermelon cake. Aside from a lot of sweating and my nephew Sam's dramatic spill off of a swing, a rolicking good time was had by all.

Food from today and yesterday (* denotes local)

LOCAL WATERMELONS ARE HERE! I am so excited.

I ate a lot of watermelon* and some cukes*, tomatoes*, lettuce, peaches and a few grapes.

Eating Locally, in fits and starts

Photo from Seeds of India

Photo from Ozark Gardens

I LOVE those cucumbers. One of the best things about this summer has been discovering what I love to grow and what I love to eat. The Poona Kheera cukes were grown by another farmer's market vendor, not me, but I'm definitely growing them next year. They are so sweet. I did, however, grow the Armenian snake cucumbers. They are very mild, but not so sweet, have very small seeds, and are very crisp. They have a very tender skin and since you don't have to peel them, they keep this cool shape, like the cogs of a wheel. They also sell like hotcakes! Luckily, the plants really produce.

Well, as you can see from my August expenses record, we are eating a LOT of nonlocal food. On August 1st, I felt pressured to eat 100% local (solely pressured by myself--just a typical bad habit I get into, an "all-or-nothing" mindset). I hadn't done much homework and had no local fruit to eat, so I ate 7 large ears of local raw corn that was too old and starchy. I spent the entire day of August 2nd violently ill and feeling dumb. I will remember that lesson.

After calling around and asking all of my market vendors, I have found that there are virtually NO local fruits available right now. Melons will not be ready for another week to 10 days. The second crop of raspberries are not ready yet. Peaches in this area were all killed by a late frost. Plums and pears are not quite ripe. There are some sour apples; we bought 25 today. Let's face it, we can't survive for even one week on sour apples, cucumbers, and tomatoes.

This does NOT excuse buying nuts, which is certainly not good for our insides or our budget! Today, I re-read that both "raw" cashew nuts and Brazil nuts are decidedly NOT raw. O.k., I admit it. I am soothing the savage beast of emotions run amok. I need more rest, need to overschedule myself less.

I had a WONDERFUL time working together with my whole family at the Farmer's Market today. I had a WONDERFUL time reading archives of Suvine's blog. I had a WONDERFUL time with my family watching Dr. Who (the 9th doctor?). They have all been into Dr. Who lately, from the 60's stuff and onward, but I have been resisting because I generally don't like science fiction. But I liked it. We have also been reading Bone together.

I am done with the nuts. I am breaking up with cashews. They are mean to me. LOL! I will eat local melons as soon as I can get them. I will keep eating all of my lovely garden produce. Okra pods are coming. Tomatoes of all kinds cover my countertop. I have too many beans to keep up with picking. We had some nice savoy cabbage leaves tonight, although I have gas now. I can't digest the cole crops really. But the savoy leaves work perfectly for wraps. In my defense, I tried to sell the savoy at market first.

We also got some DELICIOUS sweet corn, which I will eat in moderation. I will trust my tastebuds on the corn! I will eat enough sweet fruit to prevent cravings and fuel my body properly.

Today's Food (Local food has a star* by it)

Morning during Market: Nectarine, Mexican Midget tomatoes*, Armenian snake cucumber*, yellow cucumber*, 1/2 large ear of corn

Around noon: Various tomatoes*, 4 medium ears sweet corn*

Around 4 p.m.: Savoy cabbage leaves* with mashed avocado (only one between the 5 of us) and salsa (tomatoes*, onion*, sweet corn*, lime juice, cilantro)

Around 6:30 p.m.: Banana and raspberry ice cream

Around 8 p.m. Several handfuls of cashews and an ounce of Brazil nuts

If you are a committed 80-10-10-er, you probably are groaning because you know that if you ate like this, your stomach would hurt. Yes, I admit it, my stomach is hurting. Well, tomorrow is a new day!

Chicago Saga, Part 2 Cousin's Incredible Vitality

I'm on the outside looking in

Thursday started auspiciously in Chicago. We woke to a lovely cool morning in our friend's cozy Uptown apartment. My daughters wanted to find some dates and so we headed out on a little walk on Devon Street, reknown for its cultural hodgepodge of ethnic markets and restaurants, many of them from the region of the world known for growing dates.

Actually, my sense of direction was a bit off, and we walked for some time on a street that was NOT Devon. I didn't even have the sense to look at a street sign and know that I was lost. However, after we had walked over half a mile without finding anything but a few Mexican tiendas with no dates, we decided to turn back. The girls were getting restless and irritable. They peed in the bushes outside a Chicago Public School. I snickered a bit about the symbolism.

Then magically, after cutting over one block and walking only 2 blocks back, we ended up on Devon, right in front of the Devon Market where they not only had dates, but they had mangos, 4 for $1, a young coconut for $2, sweet corn 8 for $1, figs both fresh and dried, and lots of other fun stuff to look at. The dashing young owner stood in the front, gently nodding to the grandmotherly lady who was attempting to explain something in Polish (or some other tongue) . He understood without having to understand the words--another magical moment. It was like taking a wrong turn at Albuquerque and ending up in heaven.

We got a rather handsome load for under $25. Plus, our little shortcut landed us only 2 blocks from our friend's apartment. Good thing, since we had so much to carry.

We loaded up our car and drove some distance to go to a Persian grocery store I knew about in Boys Town. It was unchanged, but they had little to tempt a raw vegan. I bought some Iraqui date syrup and some halvah as gifts for a friend. Then, we headed to one of only two raw restaurants in Chicago, Cousins Incredible Vitality, for lunch.

When we lived in Chicago years ago, we had visited Cousin's Middle Eastern and Mediterranean Restaurant and enjoyed it immensely. Of course, that was a time in our life when we enjoyed the Epicurean lifestyle of eating and drinking ourselves into a stupor (and bankruptcy). LOL!

Anyway, we were immensely drawn to Chef Mehmet's story about transforming his life after converting to a raw lifestyle. And of course, we are always drawn to a food adventure.

One look at the menu online and I was sure that this wasn't exactly paradise for the 80-10-10er. The opening page lists the "Cousins IV Pyramid" as consisting of 50% greens, 25% nuts and seeds, and 25% fruit. I'm sure they're referring to volume, not calories, which would make this your typical 50-75% fat diet that gets so many raw fooders in trouble. Oddly, there is no mention of oils, yet they figured prominently in virtually every dish we sampled.

Though I was skeptical, my husband and children were eager. They salivated over the idea of a raw pizza and chocolate smoothies. I was sure I could get some fruit and greens on the salad bar (and admittedly, I was secretly a bit excited to try something a little exotic like a recipe or a little rich like some nut pate or guacamole).

We were the only customers for most of our lunch time. Maybe Thursday is a slow day? Or maybe raw foods is a totally foreign concept in the Midwest? We got to sit in a lovely window seat on beautiful cushions on the floor.

The wait staff was attentive and just enthralled that our entire family would eat raw food. Our waitress proclaimed that we were only the second raw family she'd ever met and that most people told her that their children would never try this kind of food. I felt the need to gently explain that we were really "80-10-10ers" and didn't eat this way all the time. She had never heard of 80-10-10. She seemed confused. "So you don't eat many greens?" No dear, we don't eat so much fat!

We were disappointed to learn that there was no child price for the all-you-can-eat buffet. We also had to patiently wait for them to finish readying it, although we came in half an hour after it's scheduled start time. Also, the smoothie menu was significantly shorter than the one online, and unfortunately, virtually every smoothie offered contained cacao.

We were offered flax crackers while we waited, which my husband and children gobbled greedily, voicing their hearty approval. They tasted like salty cardboard to me.

Despite the shaky start, we were thrilled by the beauty of the dishes as they were brought out to the buffet carts. There were stuffed marinated mushrooms, stuffed peppers, guacamole with tomatoes, a festive corn salad, two "pasta" dishes, one with marinara, one with pesto, several green salads (all with dressings and dried fruits and other vegetables), a "curried rice" dish made from cauliflower, a "falafel" made from nut balls wrapped in collard greens, a dish that had wild rice in it (is that REALLY raw?), a sweet carrot salad, a papaya custard, and a dish of whole pears and apples. No plain greens and no sweet fruit, I noticed. Hmmmm.

In addition, we ordered a raw pizza appetizer, a chocolate banana smoothie, and a smoothie with durian and cacao. I ordered this one against my better judgement because I so badly wanted to try SOMETHING with durian. That and perhaps I was trying to compensate for the sinking feeling I was getting as my husband and kids got more and more excited about this food that I know is just not optimal.

The first bites, for me, were painful. The food literally burned my tongue it was so saturated with spices and salt. The guacamole was intensely garlicky. The cabbage salad was downright HOT with pepper flakes, the curry in the "curried rice" dish tasted like dirt mixed with a caustic chemical. The durian smoothie was possibly the worst thing I've every tasted. Even the papaya custard had some mix of spices so that the taste of the fruit was completely covered over. I felt immediately depressed. My husband, noting my discomfort, said, "Now why couldn't we enjoy a meal like this just once in awhile?" He and my children began eating large quantities rapidly. My son was particularly excited as he consumed mushroom after mushroom.

A sad, lonely feeling came over me as I watched them. What IS wrong with entertaining oneself with food? With consuming toxins in order to get an artificial high feeling? With eating things that make one feel physical discomfort or even pain? I felt miserable, but pretended I didn't and started filling my stomach with a large quantity of food. As a result, I felt ill for many hours afterward, and it cast a pall over all of the fun we had later in the day. I felt highly guilty as I charged $78 to my credit card. And ALL OF IT was my choice. What I ate, how I felt... It was a good experience for me, because now I never have to feel attracted to the idea of a fancy restaurant meal. I enjoy my simple meals of fruit and greens and I enjoy feeling light and happy and healthy.

Lest you think me cruel, I will say that if you are accustomed to eating "recipes", raw or cooked, this would be some of the most delicious food you've ever tasted. It was beautifully presented, very fresh. The ingredients were of high quality. The pizza actually tasted pretty much like pizza. If you are a cooked foodie who wants to try a "healthier" meal or a raw fooder who eats recipes, dehydrated foods, salt, spices, etc., you might LOVE this restaurant. But, if you're an 80-10-10er, skip it and head to the Devon Fruit Market.

Next up, Part 3 of our adventure, where we go to the zoo and find possibly the only producing tropical fruit trees in Chicago. Stay tuned!

Chicago Saga: Part 1

Cover Art for the The Decemberists' latest album The Crane Wife

Our driving force behind our visit to Chicago was to hear The Decemberists give a free concert at Millenium Park with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. The Decemberists are cool, Millenium Park is cool, and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra is cool. Put them together, for free? And you get way too many cool people in one place. LOL!



It helps if you get there more than 10 minutes before the concert starts. We got there 10 minutes before the concert started. The seats were filled, the lawns were packed, the sidewalks were body-to-body with people on their cell phones frantically trying to locate their friends who just MUST have magical lawn seating, not that you could get to said seating without teleporting. We were also supposed to locate our friends with magical lawn seating. My husband got out his cell phone and tried calling. When he reached voice mail, he immediately went into a panic, accelerated by the fact that a large storm began to gather overhead. Sigh. I started having fun, however. The band took the stage and they sounded GREAT.



People were smiling at our children, who were remarkably blithe about being pressed body to body with crowds of hipsters. Eventually we found our friends. Their lawn seating wasn't so magical--it was on the outer lawn and the sound out there was good, rather than excellent, as it is on the inner lawn. But still, it was seating and we could hear. We ate some grapes and celery and nectarines and enjoyed the show. The Decemberists played The Tain, a rambling 25 minute song which lent itself well to the presence of the orchestra, but which also happens to be my husband's least favorite song in their catalogue. However, they redeemed themselves with a rousing version of The Mariner's Revenge. Nature joined in with several dramatic cracks of thunder and lightening. But the heavy rain held off until we were safely deposited on the train to our friend Rob's house.



If you would like to see photos and a review of the concert, check out the Chicagoist.

Next up, the family visits a cool neighborhood fruit market and tries Cousin's Incredible Vitality, a raw restaurant in Chicago.

Yesterday I was busy in my garden until after sunset and when I got home and nursed my daughter to sleep, I fell asleep also. Guess I needed some rest!

Today, I sold some lettuce to a local eaterie, brought the Farmer's Market donations to the local food pantry, and then the whole family headed to visit my parents to go swimming. Some of you may remember that last week our swimming was cut short by a surprise swim meet. This week it was cut short by thunder and showers.

As usual, it was a fun/ tense combo of hanging out with my family. I asked my mom some parenting advice about my children and their food choices, but she didn't really answer me. My mom doesn't like to give advice. She likes people to make their own way. I love my mom! (But I'd love her advice sometimes. At least I think would.)

Bad news! Aldi is closed for one week for remodeling. The horror! How will I replace the hundreds of dollars of free produce I get every week?



Today's food

9 a.m. About 10 cups watermelon
1 p.m. About 3 cups sweet cherries, large salad of iceberg and Four Seasons lettuce, more of that salsa made with Roma tomatoes, colored peppers, onion, cilantro, lime juice, agave syrup, cumin, and salt. I added a lot less salt this time (although I should NOT be eating any!)
4 p.m. About 4 cups watermelon
6:30 p.m. Zucchini "Pasta" with Raw Pomodoro sauce made with blended Roma tomatoes, a little avocado, fresh oregano and tarragon, lemon juice, and a bit of agave and a sprinkle of salt

About 1600 calories