Ms. Inappropriate

Sometimes I get excited. And when I get excited I have a tendency to say things that are a little inappropriate. Sounds like a puppy doesn't it? Maybe that's a pretty accurate comparison.

In the last week I've made some comments to my parents that, upon reflection, were really terrible. I made my mom and my mother-in-law a 30 minute video of their grandson doing miscellaneous things that a 9 month old does. It is a solid 30 minutes of just the baby. So when I was on the phone with my dad I said, "I call it granny porn. It's for their baby addiction." WHY?! Why would I ever suggest that their love for their grandchild is comparable to a sex addict's need for pornography. YUCK!

It gets better. I was chatting with my mother and I mentioned how I left the house without the baby for a good 5 hours on Saturday. She was impressed and so I continued to tell her that when I got home the baby wanted to nurse as a way to stake his claim on me. He wasn't really hungry or thirsty he just wanted to acknowledge me as his mama. In the phone conversation with my mother I likened it to a dog peeing on a fire hydrant as a way to mark his territory. Hmmm...again I have to ask myself...WHY?! Why would I make a sweet and beautiful thing so gross?

Participating in the blog-o-sphere can be a challenge for me due to what I'd like to call a "misplaced" filter. I read some one's post and I get excited. I'm so eager to participate that my fingers have a life of their own and what I write can sometimes be a little inappropriate. So, to any of you out there who have encountered my excited and possibly inappropriate explosions on your blogs...I apologize and thank you for the grace you extended to me. I'm working on thinking more before I hit the "post comment" button.

Feeding our Neighbors - Urban Farming

Everyone is saying buying local is the way to go. I was watching a new show on the Sundance channel called Big Ideas for a Small Planet and the episode I watched was called "Eat". Which partly fueled my imagination for this blog topic. It's a hot topic and it should be. I have a romantic notion of inner city gardens that feed the community around it. Maybe they are roof top gardens, maybe it's a series of small gardens that feed the family that lives there.



Neighborhood gardens or p-patches as they are sometimes called are all over the city of Seattle and I know of a few in Portland, OR , as well.



I don't hear allot about these gardens helping to feed others, but according to the City of Seattle the p-patches here donate to neighborhood food banks.



Also, who exactly is working in these gardens. With most inner city households all the adults are working in order to pay the bills - maybe even multiple jobs. I'm just thinking out-loud here about the feasibility of getting local residents involved in maintaining gardens in the parts of town that need the resources the most. But it looks like it's happening on a small scale right now.

Some interesting links around this subject:

• Canadian work on the topic of community gardens.
• Business week article addressing local vs organic products.
• Soil Association buy local support.
• Interesting article about efforts in Lansing, MI to bring more food options to the inner city.
• Sierra Club article about folks bringing fresh foods to the inner city, through community gardens and the promotion of farmers markets in South Central LA with products grown and harvested by African Americans.
• L.A. community garden information.

So far some things I've found that I find really exciting:

• People's Grocery
• Food Security Organization
• Mo' Better Food

Feeding our Neighbors

In the not so distant past a few of my favorite bloggers have written about issues of hunger and nutrition thanks mostly to Hunger Awareness Week. Being the practical person that I am and really wanting to help I'm on a mission to learn about what kind of things are being done and how those of us who feel called can get involved.

I know there are really cool things happening in the city right now. Folks are trying to bring quality fresh food to places were it's hard to find OR too expensive - I also know that it's still a small movement. My prayer is that somehow I'll help expand the movement and be educated enough to get involved in a very personal way.

So, I'm going to use my blog to track and share what I find. Maybe you'll find some of this interesting. AND I could certainly use help with links to information and suggestions for topics to investigate

Here's my first find. A web side called The Natural Foods Merchandiser has an article about some of the work going on in Oakland, CA (as well as mention of work in some other places around the US).

Read more about People's Grocery here.

Here's Pacific Cost Farmer's Market Association web site.

And I know allot of folks really dislike HMOs but I'm constantly amazed at what Kaiser is doing in preventative medicine. Hearing about the farmers market opportunities they are providing at some of their northern California medical offices is very exciting.

It does seem that the whole package includes availability, affordability, and education - much of which People's Grocery is involved with. You can't FORCE people to eat well. But it's such a shame that it's hardest for those who have the greatest need.

Too Good To Keep To Myself

"...I will not return to a universe

of objects that don't know each other,

as if islands were not the lost children

of one great continent..."

Lisel Meuller, monet refuses the operation





"I don't think much suprises him: this is how we make important changes - barely, poorly, slowly. And still he raises his fist in triumph."

Anne Lamott, Plan B Further Thoughts on Faith



"Even as we improve as teachers and as students, the children continue to have raging impulse-control problems; they very thing that made them spontaneous and immediate could also make them mean. One day, a mouthy eight-year-old said something insulting about my dreadlocks. Rather than hit him over the head with the Wiffle Ball bat, which was my first impulse. I sat beside him and said, 'It's only been in the last ten years that I learned how beautiful my hair and I are, so please don't say critical things about me. It hurts my feelings.'

He gaped at me and said,'You're freaking me out, Octopus Head.' "

Anne Lamott, Plan B Further Thoughts on Faith

Ahhhh...Humility

Seems we spend our early twenties gaining and exercising confidence and then we spend the rest of our adulthood learning how to temper that confidence with humility.

As painful as the thought is to me, the last couple of years have been about growing some humility. It's painful because in recognizing what God is doing I am required to join Him in this work! And, man, humility...I mean really...how much more painful does it get? At least that's what's going through my head.

Death to self. Submission. Not my will but His will. Not just admitting but believing that I don't have the answer. Trying to change things I worked so hard to create - whether consciously or unconsciously.

But I'm realizing that if I'm going to do great things for Jesus this is a lesson I should (at the very least) get used to.

Ten Commandments on "This American Life"

I was pleasantly surprised to find last weeks theme for the NPR radio show "This American Life" was the Ten Commandments - the biblical Ten Commandments. I don't have any strong opinions about the coverage. I guess it seemed fair and unitarian in nature. I'm still impressed that they tackled this biblical text on NPR.

Mornings Like This One

On Monday my son woke up extra early so we ended up walking to the store a little before 7am. In a drastic change of course the weather has turned (dare I say it) summer-ish. It was 50 degrees and clear skies when we left the house. The baby snoozed, I did some shopping, and on our way home I had to admit that I know why so many people have settled in this part of the world. From one of the higher points in our neighborhood I could see Mt. Rainier, the Olympic Mts, and the Cascade Mts. There are not many days that I meet the formidable presence of Mt. Rainier while walking in my neighborhood. It always takes me by surprise. Upon reflection I wonder how I could forget that huge snow-capped mountain that seem so close I could touch it.

I was tired that morning. And I had spent most of the return trip physically and emotionally struggling. The way home is almost entirely uphill and my 20 lb son along with a few groceries made it so the uneven sidewalk became literal stopping blocks for the stroller. At the same time I was cursing my husband for not having to get up with my early rising son.

By the time I reached the high point in my walk, where the mountains were revealed to me, I was feeling allot better. We were starting the last 5 minutes of our walk home and it was all downhill - at least until the next time we need to walk to the store.

Recipe for Left Over Meat

I am a big fan of the roast. I'm trying to perfect my roast chicken and my husband and I love to eat the leg and thigh hot out of the oven. Usually that leaves the breast that ends up getting used as left-overs. A pretty easy thing to use. However I'm stuggling to get my husband to eat chicken salad sandwiches - which was my first use of the meat. I found this recipe in a Cooking Light magazine. The recipe calls for 1/2 lb of cooked shrimp but I think this salad handles chicken and probably even pork and beef very well. It's a satisfying salad with nice flavor. And all in all I think it's fairly economical. WARNING: This recipe makes ALOT of salad.

Maybe you'll enjoy it too:

Soba Slaw Salad with Peanut Dressing

6 - 8 oz uncooked soba (buckwheat) noodles
6 cups shredded red cabbage
2 cups grated carrot
3/4 cup thinly sliced green onion
1/2 lb shredded or chopped meat of your choice (I think you can add as much or as little meat as you want)
3 tablespoons low-sodium soy sauce
3 tablespoons rice vinegar
1 tablespoon canola oil
2 1/2 tablespoons creamy peanut butter (I think chunky would work, too)
2 teaspoons Thai chile paste with garlic ( I love the heat, but if I'm sharing with a group I only put 1 large teaspoon of chile paste)
2 tablespoons chopped dry-roasted peanuts (I usually don't add these)

1. Cook noodles, drain, rinse with cold water
2. Combine noodles, shredded cabbage, carrot, 1/2 cup green onions, and meat in a large bowl
3. Combine soy sauce, rice vinegar, canola oil, peanut butter and chile paste in a small bowl; stir with whisk until blended.
4. Add dressing to noodles, cabbage, carrot, and meat.
5. Garnish with rest of the green onion and peanuts

Enjoy.

I find that this salad makes a great lunch as well as a nice snack. OK, can you tell I'm a big fan of this salad!