29 Friday Jun 2012
Posted in The Daily Grind, Uncategorized
Tags
blogging vacation, California, Family, Home, mom, Parent, parenting, Vacation
I am in California visiting with family and enjoying some sunshine! I can’t wait to share our sunny adventures and get back to my blogging…
I know you have been anxiously awaiting my blogging comeback right?
Here is a little sneak peak 
Ahhhh….
Xoxo,
20 Wednesday Jun 2012
Posted in Projects, Uncategorized
Tags
California, children, Community Garden, Family, Garden, garden grant, Home, My Garden, Oregon, school garden, vegetables
I have always been into nutrition and health and read and inquired about different nutritional topics.
English: vegetables (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Recently with my research on how to garden ( since some of us don’t naturally have a green thumb!) I have really come to appreciate the beauty of veggies and gardens and the work that goes into making them thrive. I feel like such a dork sometimes!
I will look at my garden and just be so excited to see the growth. When I harvest my lettuce, I feel exhilarated that I grew it! When I see other gardens or walk through the produce section at Whole Foods, I marvel at the beauty in the colors… I know… I have gone totally woo woo… ( Is that a word?).
Whole foods (Photo credit: parislemon)
When I heard that an amazing mom at Brayden’s school had applied for, and received, a $5000.00 grant to build and grow a garden at his school I wanted in!I went to our first meeting the other day and I am so thrilled to be on the ground floor of this important project for our kids. The build-out will be in September and I will be in charge of bringing the community and kids in with events and activities. I will keep you posted on our progress 
We are going to construct a garden for and with the school community, compost food scraps from the cafeteria to use in the garden, and eventually use the food grown in the garden to feed the children in the cafeteria.
How cool is that?
For experiential learners ( like Brayden) the garden will be used to teach lessons to meet learning targets for each grade and the kids and community will have the opportunity to work in the garden to make it something beautiful for us all to share…
I am selfishly hoping to gain some gardening tips along the way too!
Take a girl out of California and put her in Oregon and she becomes a hippie!
What are your garden tips for building a community garden?
19 Tuesday Jun 2012
Posted in Everyday Heroes, Uncategorized
Tags
children, dad, dirt bike riding, Dirt Bikes, Family, Father Day, fathers day, Home, Motocross, Motorcycles, parenting, Recreation, riding day
This weekend was our 2nd annual trip to the motocross track for Fathers Day.
Once a year, I go to the motocross with a happy heart, no complaints, no worries (yeah right!) and I swoon over my wonderful husband as he rides like the wind and flings himself many, many feet in the air on his dirt bike.
This is the place where I really see my husband. I see him enjoying his passion, full of life, unburdened by responsibility, and taking care of himself.
Sometimes I forget, as challenging as it is at home with the kids, that his plight has its own challenges. Feeling the pressure that he puts on himself everyday to “take care” of us and all the feelings of pride and failure that can sometimes come with that.
It is nice to spend one day every year with him doing only what he loves and allowing him the time to just really be in his passion with nothing else holding him back.
As you can tell… the boys had NO fun
And then come Monday, it is back to the grind.
And
I am the queen, yet again, and it becomes all about me. ( Did I really say that?) Ha!
What did you spend your Father’s Day doing this year?
18 Monday Jun 2012
Posted in Adventures in the Kitchen, Uncategorized
Tags
Asia, children, Cooking, diet, Family, Gluten-free diet, Home, Mark, Mark Sisson, Mark’s Daily Apple, Paleolithic lifestyle, Primal Blueprint, The Primal Blueprint: Reprogram your genes for effortless weight loss vibrant health and boundless energy
The next phase of our dietary madness has been aligning ourselves with the Primal philosophy.
I really can’t take the credit for this one as Brent has been the captain of this ship.
It started when he found Mark’s Daily Apple online which prompted him to read the book “The Primal Blueprint: Reprogram your genes for effortless weight loss, vibrant health, and boundless energy” by Mark Sisson.
He was convinced that: 1) It made perfect sense and 2) I would love it.\
I have to admit that I was feeling a little resentful of yet another dietary change. I had just gotten into the gluten-free, chocolate-free, peanut-free lifestyle and finally felt that it was second nature and then here is one more curveball being thrown in my direction.
When we make a change in our family, especially in the way of diet, I am the one who is impacted the most. After all, the hats I wear do include the grocery shopping hat, recipe finding hat, chef hat, and many more…
So to say the least I was skeptical…
But how could I resist when Brent had been eating this way throughout his three-week long trip to Asia and was feeling better than he had felt in the last year.
So here we are…
I am almost done with the book and it is really interesting.
I have not had bread in three weeks (well except the pizza the other night that I thoroughly enjoyed!!)
I have made Primal/ Paleo granola and muffins ( via Elana’s pantry)…
So far so good! We are only a couple of weeks in, so I will give an update in a bit…
No one wanted to invite us to dinner before with just our gluten-free, everything-free plan, now, we are really on our own!!
Has anyone given the Primal lifestyle or Paleo lifestyle a try?
15 Friday Jun 2012
Posted in Finding Meaning, The Daily Grind
Tags
blooming, children, Family, Flower, Garden, growing, Home, how to enjoy this time, how to stay in the present, mom, mother, parenting, Philosophy, Philosophy of Mind, Plant, Rose, Taekwondo, time flying
My, how time is flying!
Hard to believe I haven’t posted in a week! Seemed like just yesterday that I wrote my last post…
Hard to believe that my baby is done with Kindergarten and will move onto the first grade!
Brayden on his last day of kindergarten
Hard to believe that my youngest cutie turned 4 and is now wanting to be a black belt in Taikwondo…
Just like the last week has gone by in a blink, the last 6 years seemed to have flown by.
Just like that, my kids are becoming more and more wonderful as they move through life.
I am just trying to enjoy everyday and live in the now so that I don’t miss it… although even with this consciousness I still feel like it is going way too fast.
How do we really enjoy this time without it getting away from us?
Happy Friday!! Enjoy every moment!!
08 Friday Jun 2012
Posted in Projects
Tags
Family, Garden, garden mystery, gardening, Home, mystery, Weed, Weed control
Yesterday I shared my garden…
Today, I need help!
As I was pulling a TON of weeds the other day in the garden, I saw this very interesting sprout…
I was sure it wasn’t a weed…
What is this???
Does anyone know what this is?? Could it be a veggie or plant or something?
Is it a weed?
07 Thursday Jun 2012
Posted in Projects, Successes!, Uncategorized
Tags
Brussels sprout, Cook, Family, Fruit and Vegetable, Garden, garden beds, gardening, Home, Kale, learning how to garden, Lettuce, Plant, zucchini
Do you remember my empty garden beds??
And my little baby sprouts?
I am such a proud mama right now!! We just ate our first salad with lettuce and spinach from our very own garden! Yes, it’s true!! Can you believe it??
I am so excited that our garden efforts actually are starting to look like we will have veggies! Wahoo!!
Look at this! drumroll pleeeeease…..
Brussel Sprouts are sprouting!
Lettuce and Kale and zucchini!
It totally makes me want to be a farmer! I am currently batting my eyelashes and very sweetly trying to convince my hubby that we need to have farm fresh eggs… yes, I want to be a chicken lady
It’s not going over too well… but a girl can dream right?
How are your gardens growing?
05 Tuesday Jun 2012
Posted in The Daily Grind, Uncategorized
Tags
California, children, Family, Home, mom, mother, Oregon, Portland, Portland Oregon, rain, raindrops, raining in summer, summer, summer plans, sunshine
This was last weekend…
Brayden jumping off the diving board at his grandma’s pool…
Notice the sunshine?
Doesn’t it look warm and wonderful?
Here is the view out my kitchen window tonight…
Notice the GIGANTIC raindrops? And gloom? And nastiness?
California Sunshine Oh how I miss thee…
I have so many summer sunshine plans! I thought with school letting out next week and fountain play last week, we were well on our way to beautiful Oregon summer.
I was so WRONG! I guess that’s what happens when you put a California girl in Portland, Oregon
At least we got a little hint of Summer last week!
What are your summer sunshine plans?
04 Monday Jun 2012
Posted in Uncategorized
Earth (Photo credit: tonynetone)
Hello Friends! I have not fallen off the face of the Earth…
After quite a vacation ( blogging vacation that is…) I am back!
We took a weekend trip to California for some much needed family time and a very special day for my mom ( more on that later!).
And then came back to REALITY!
The end of the school year is upon us, and boy there is a LOT going on…
So… if I am a little less consistent over the next couple weeks, I am running around like a CRAZY woman with a few screws loose (to say the least!). What else is new?
Just wanted to check in with you all and say HELLO! My dear friends, I have missed the blogesphere
What has been going on in your world over the last couple weeks??
Until the next post…
