Eating Healthy On A Budget

Shopping for healthier food choices for your family while staying within your food budget is something everyone can do. Not only is it better for your body and long term health, you can make delicious meals that everyone will love and you will be teaching your children from a young age what good food choices look like.

Here are some very basic tips to help get you started:

1. Planning out your meals for a whole week will save you time and money. Having a list of ingredients for your meals is a good tool to utilize when grocery shopping. Sticking to the list is essential for your budget. See if you can find coupons to go with your items on the list. Look online at your grocery store’s coupons.

2. Avoid pre-packaged, processed foods – not only are these more expensive, they are usually higher in sodium, fat and chemicals and low in nutrients. Home cooking is not only healthier, it’s also cheaper. Eating real foods give you more bang for your buck as they have much higher nutritional content and fill you up.

3. Buying in bulk can save you a lot of money. You can purchase assorted grains, beans, pastas, dried fruits, nuts, flours and even spices in the bulk isle of the grocery store. You can choose any amount that you want and bulk food sections give a lower price per quantity ratio while saving on excess packaging. Places like Costco and Sam’s Club also offer even bigger bulk buys on many items you may use.

4. To save the most money, make meat more of an accent in your meal instead of the focal point. Animal and fish protein is the most expensive part of your budget and if you can make some meatless meals each week and reduce the portion sizes of it in other meals, you will save lots of money on your grocery bill. Beans, peas, lentils, eggs, dairy and nuts are all high in protein and there is also protein found in fruit, veggies and whole grains, too.

5. When buying fruits and vegetables, try to buy locally grown foods when in season for more savings. When local produce is abundant and cheap, you can stock up and freeze for winter eating. Fresh fruit makes a great snack and buying by the pre-packed bag instead of individually is less expensive. Frozen fruits and vegetables can often be less expensive when fresh and local is not in season, plus they are picked at the height of ripeness and flash frozen so the flavor and nutrients are preserved.

6. Condiments add flavor and interest to your dishes and makes preparing different types of ethnic meals quick and easy to do. Keep a selection of dried herbs, spices, curry powder, marinades, vinegars, tomato and soy sauces, as well as stock cubes or powders in your pantry.

7. Use the internet – If you have ingredients you want to use up and are not sure what to do with them, type the ingredient names into a search engine along with the word ‘recipe’ and you will get many great recipe ideas.

8. Use your crock pot – One pot meals generally save on prep time and cleanup and often make great leftovers for future meals during the week. Use small amounts of less expensive cuts of meats for the crock pot (or go meatless) and add extra vegetables and beans to bulk up the dish, add more nutrition and stretch the meal further.

9. Cut down on the amount of snacks you buy. Make some with your kids instead! Kids love to bake and you can incorporate healthier ingredients into the treats so they will have more nutritional value but still taste great. Also, eating fruit as a snack is quick and easy and so good for you!

10. Time saver: If short on time to cook often, pick a day or evening to prep ingredients with your family for the meals that week and store in the fridge. Cook enough whole grain to serve with several different meals that week. You could also cook several casserole type dishes all in one day and freeze for future meals. Also, see #8.

Crafty, Inexpensive Gift Ideas For A Homemade Holiday

Here is my post from last year about all of the wonderful, creative gifts you can make for the holidays. Crafty, inexpensive and filled with love

I have received so many responses from very creative mamas to my recent query about ideas for homemade or low budget gifts (mostly for children) for the holidays. With the economy being the way it is, this topic seems to be one that is on many people’s minds. I’ve divided the many ideas given to me into different categories. I hope there is something here you will find to make and give to your loved ones this holiday season.

Food Gifts:

Make your own peanut brittle, fudge, holiday cookies or another tasty treat and present it in a pretty tin or on a plate you’ve decorated that will also be part of the gift. If you are giving this gift to another from your child, have the child help make it as well as decorate the container – photo tins were suggested a few times, too.

The hot cocoa or brownie kit is another idea for either kids or adults. You can make “hot cocoa cones” by layering the separate dry ingredients in a cone shaped piece of cellophane or a clear frosting bag or in a mason jar and tie it with a pretty ribbon and add an instruction card on how to prepare the mix. Chocolate dipped spoons are another easy gift idea you can add with the hot cocoa cones. If it’s a cookie mix, you can include some cookie cutters. Caramel or kettle popcorn is another fun food gift to make.

If you are a gardener, giving away some homemade canned items from your garden is always appreciated. You can make different jams, salsa, tomato sauce, pickles, dilly beans, pickled beets, grape juice, etc. Whatever you have a lot of just remember to can more of it at the time to give out as gifts. You can even prepare a whole basket of assorted pint or quart sized jars of items that you have made. You can do the same with dehydrated items like fruit leather, apple or banana slices, dried herb mixes, herbal tea blends, spice rubs or jerky.

For Sewing/Knitting/Crocheted Gifts:

If you are a sewer/knitter/crocheter, you have a world of possibilities of things to make! Many suggestions given in this category included crocheting pot holders or dishcloths to go along with the food gifts, sewing fleece blankets or even fringing all of the edges on two pieces of fleece and tying them together for a 2 sided blanket – no sewing there, sewing aprons for kids to wear in their play kitchen – one mama said to use terrycloth material for the kid’s apron. If you are a good seamstress, sewing doll clothes, sun hats, dresses and all the other cute items that your child likes will save you tons of money if you do it yourself.

Knitted or crocheted hats, scarves, mittens, and knitted afgans are so appreciated in the cold weather. To be extra green and frugal, you can get some wool sweaters from the thrift store and unravel them and re-use the wool for your new knitted creations.

Felt:

Felt items are also another inexpensive, crafty and fun gift to make. You can make play food by cutting out the desired shapes and sewing two pieces together and stuff with batting or wool and sew closed or you can leave it single-sided cut to the shape of what you want and since felt sticks to itself, it will stick to a felt storyboard or you can make a felt pizza with toppings, a birthday cake with candles or a felt Christmas tree with ornaments. You can also make easy finger or hand puppets, picture frames and little bags too. Crayon rolls are popular with kids as well. There really are so many fun ideas for things to make with felt and it’s easy to use and dirt cheap!

Jewelry:

Make beaded jewelry – it’s fun and very creative. Go support your local bead shop, take a class or buy a how-to book, pick out beads that you like, a few basic tools, some wire and clasps and you can make inexpensive yet pretty jewelry, bookmarks, hair accessories, window shade pulls, light catchers, the list goes on and on. My step-mother-in-law is really into this and now works with more semi-precious stones and silver combos and she makes some really beautiful gifts. This photo is of some of her work that I received as a gift.

Photo Gifts:

This also is a pretty popular gift. All of those photos we take of our kids, dogs, vacations can be made into photo books, calendars, mouse pads, mugs, pillows, etc. We can also take actual photos and decorate the outside of tin boxes with them and fill the box with yummy treats, too. Kids love to see pictures of themselves so this is popular with them as well as the grandparents. It seems grandparents can never have enough pictures of the grandkids and making the calendars or other photo gifts are pretty easy, inexpensive and much appreciated.

Other Craft Items:

Make your own homemade playdough which is safe and non-toxic and you can even color it with different food coloring. Store it in little containers, tins or even glass baby food jars that you’ve saved. Simple cookie cutters can go along with the playdough for a fun and inexpensive gift.

You can make homemade soy candles in empty jars – using baby food jars again or jam sized canning jars work well, too.

Don’t forget about cardboard boxes! There is just so much you can do with them. We have in just about a couple hours’ time made our son a playhouse and a train car that he can sit in. Now I hear there is talk of a space ship happening soon. You can make the large stacking blocks like the kind that are sold that look like bricks as well as a play kitchen, too. Cardboard boxes, a sturdy knife, duct tape and paint (optional) are all it takes. We have even made him impromptu costumes – wings, a helmet out of a cardboard bucket and a shield we painted as part of his Halloween costume, too. There are so many, many things you can do with cardboard. You can find lots of ideas and instructions on this site.

Wooden Crafts:

Since my husband has a small wood shop and makes unique furniture, last year he decided to make our son a play kitchen for Christmas and a play workbench for his birthday. Both required time but the cost of the materials was pretty inexpensive. He purchased a large sheet of plywood for each project that had a really nice facing on it, some small door hinges, some plexiglas for the oven and microwave door windows and a dowel rod for door handles. He used an older bath faucet he had and a steel bowl for the kitchen sink and faucet. Both the kitchen and workbench were finished with a non-toxic oil and both came out really beautifully and are heirloom quality pieces so we can pass these down to our grandkids. The actual cost of the play kitchen came out to less than $30 with everything – except labor! The workbench was even cheaper.

Easier projects to make with wood are wooden building blocks, a simple pull toy, different geometric shaped puzzle pieces called tanagrams, different wooden puzzles, doll cradles, and wooden memory game squares that you paint the matching pictures on. There are many websites with instructions on how to do all of this and I really like this site.

You can take many different little things that fit into a theme and put them all together in a box or basket for a person or family to enjoy. Several mamas said they were making movie baskets for a whole family – a dvd, different kinds of popcorn and chocolate all packaged in a pretty basket with cellophane or shrink wrap. Pick a theme and go with it.

Stores:

If you don’t want to make much (or anything) but still want to save money on gifts, shopping the thrift stores, garage sales, Craigslist, Freecycle, eBay, Dollar stores and the dollar bins at Target for all inexpensive new or used items in good condition is a great way to get toys and things at a fraction of the price or free (Freecycle). And most children don’t know the difference and wouldn’t care anyway if they did. If it works, they are happy!

New items at greatly reduced prices are sold at many closeout stores such as Marshalls, Big Lots, Ross, TJ Maxx and Tuesday Morning among others. You may have to sweep through these types of stores periodically and keep your eyes peeled for the quality items you want. I’ve found some amazing deals this way including new German wooden toys (which are normally very expensive), nice puzzles and books for my son. It’s fun, too once you get the hang of it.

Wrapping Paper:

It’s fun to unwrap presents but we don’t have to use the commercial wrapping paper which is hard to recycle in many locations. What to do? – make your own!! There are so many options for this. If you get a Sunday paper, save the comic section each week and use that, buy a roll of butcher paper or brown craft paper or visit your town’s local newspaper and ask for their left over end of the rolls (it’s free) and have your kids draw or stamp all over it. Or buy some inexpensive play silks – a gift in themselves which can be dyed any color – and wrap the toy in that, too.

All of these “wrapping” papers listed can be easily recycled and can be a fun craft activity for you and the kids to do together. If you don’t want to do any of the above, try to purchase the wrapping paper that was made with recycled paper instead.

I hope this list has helped you find some new, creative and inexpensive gift ideas for this holiday season. There definitely are many resourceful and creative people out there and I thank each and every one of you for contributing your amazing, thrifty gift ideas! If you have other creative ideas not mentioned here, feel free to leave them in the comments section. I love hearing about other fun gifts to make.

Happy Holidays!!

photo credits: orderonline, kathy marie perez, the library of congress, lil miss maya, nature deva, family fun, nature deva, nature deva

Harvest Time

I love the summer so much because I enjoy growing things in the garden and being outside in nature as much as I can. This was our first full year with our expanded garden space as well as the additional garden beds added all around our house and using our greenhouse in warm weather. And chickens! Who lay eggs! It’s been an amazingly fun summer for me because of all of this! I don’t know if others would think it’s so fun, it does require quite a bit of work to upkeep a large organic garden and some livestock even if they are a small backyard flock. But this type of lifestyle resonates with me and I work hard for its success.

Now we are officially in autumn with the bulk of the harvest coming in and preparing & planting the garden beds for fall/winter gardening under the hoop house and inside the greenhouse. It’s a joint effort, both my husband and I have a shared vision for all of this, we secretly want to be full time farmers because we enjoy it so much. Real farming is such hard work, though! I feel part of the homesteader lifestyle even living here in the ‘burbs once again since my mindset is always about self-sustainability.  I have learned so many skills to enable me to be self-reliant these past 15 years living this way.

I’ve been doing all methods of food preservation throughout the season and especially my most favorite method of all – canning. Some people find canning tedious but I still totally love it – both water bath and pressure canning. Looking at my various shelves filled with jars of produce picked at the peak of freshness ready to be eaten especially on a cold winter evening fills me with a sense of security, really. I know what’s in my food, who prepared it and the fact that it’s there means we won’t starve if ever there was a catastrophe of some kind. Most importantly, it reminds me that I’m self-reliant – one of the most important traits of a true homesteader.

I’ve been freezing and dehydrating lots of produce and prepared dishes, too so I have both a packed upright freezer as well as jars of dried herbs, fruit leather, dried fruit and powdered dried veggies (to add to soup or other dishes for flavor and nutrition) in jars on my shelves or vacuum sealed and stored in closed bins in my basement “root cellar” – a cold, concrete closet in my basement.

I try to process the produce as the season progresses, making lactofermented pickles & sauerkraut as we harvest it (or get some great deals on organic produce from local farmers), making a vinegar dill pickle and dilly beans (that requires no canning), bread & butter pickles, harvesting root crops to store in the “root cellar”, dehydrating some of the many greens we grow to powder them, drying herbs (always dry everything at low temps to preserve the most nutrients), freezing chopped fresh herbs with water in ice cube trays (and store cubes in freezer bags), freezing fruit,  juicing veggies and fruits and freezing in ice cube trays for use in smoothies. By mid-October, we  make cinnamon applesauce which is great to use in vegan baked goods. We also make pear sauce (but not for baking).

I especially love to make and can tons of tomato sauce – so much so that for our 10 year anniversary this past summer solstice, we got ourselves a ginormous pressure canner that can fit 14 quart jars at one time! Now that’s a lot of sauce done in one shot! A huge improvement over our little pressure cooker/canner that could only hold 3 quart jars at a time! Besides canning tomatoes either as sauce or as whole, peeled ones, we make & can jam throughout the season as the fruit comes in (I made lots of very low sugar plum, blueberry & peach jams since PB&J is my son’s favorite sandwich now), we can tomato salsa, tomatillo salsa, fruit salsa (just made some great peach salsa!), canned veggies like beets (some are pickled, too), carrots, hot peppers, etc. I can go on, there are so many ways we preserve the bounty and I look forward to doing it every single year!

Living this way is not only very inexpensive over a 12 month period but it puts me so in touch with the lifecycle of the plants, the Earth, the seasons, the feeling that everything is connected from the stars to the bugs. I’m part of the cycle, too and I can feel it in the high vibration of the food I eat whether it’s fresh and raw or preserved at the peak of freshness for future eating. It does require a lot of planning and effort during the growing season but I wouldn’t have it any other way!

Co-opin’

For the past few years I’ve been feeling like I need to join a food co-op again (I was part of a home based one 14 years ago then part of a store front one in the mountains for many years and again when another store front one opened in my current town but closed down). I did find a co-op group last summer that was located about 20 min away from where I live. It was what I was looking for but it didn’t work out for us for different reasons. I was left with the fact that I would have to take on this job myself and start something here in my town. I was given the different distributors’ info and set up accounts with them right away. I already had a group of interested friends wanting to do this and since I was doing all the coordinating work for it, I chose to keep it small and manageable for me to deal with – we have 11 families in our group and have had others ask to join in but have turned them down until we think we need to grow. We’ve been ordering about 2x/month. The produce selection changes with the seasons so it’s been fun for us to see what’s on the list each week.

I like the distributor we are with who provides the fresh fruit and veggies. They also carry all of Organic Valley’s dairy and eggs, too as well as locally made gmo-free tofu and locally made organic tortillas. For me, a co-op (or buyer’s club) is better than being part of a CSA (which I was part of for a couple years) because I can pick and choose which veggies and fruit I want and if it’s a price I want to pay. Since it’s a group buying these items, we all split the large cases they come in and get just how much we want for amazing prices. And the quality has been excellent for mostly everything. It’s a win-win for me personally since I really look to always save money especially in an unstable economy and still get to have the best quality food for my family that’s mostly local, wholesale and organic.

There is another distributor located near our produce distributor that carries all the bulk organic dry goods such as: nuts, dried fruits, grains, flours, legumes, etc. If we don’t have enough items to meet their minimum order, we can pay a markup on the price of our dry goods items to the produce distributor and they will go and get it for us and deliver it with our produce order. It really has been great having this option for all of us! Last summer I replenished my dry goods depleted stock here at home and split a variety of grains, beans, flours and nuts and we have been eating from our stores all year making fun and delicious ethnic food and other recipes – even homemade pizza night! Since I eat all vegan (and about half raw) and my husband eats an omnivore diet, we agreed to make vegan family dinners from all this bulk and preserved food we invested in and we’ve been really enjoying the variety of recipes we’ve tried out. The fresh produce we get 2x/month is a really nice addition, too.

Since we live in CO, in winter there isn’t that much growing here on a large scale besides potatoes and indoor herbs, sprouts & mushrooms so more items are brought in from organic farms in CA and other states like TX or even Mexico that we will buy (like citrus, greens & now artichokes!) but during the warmer growing season, our distributor really tries to work with as many CO based organic farmers as possible – several are even from the town I live in which makes me happy to support those farms as well as other organic farms from the surrounding 100 miles of our town. And CO is known for its amazing western slope fruits like peaches, nectarines and cherries and they distribute these as well!

Even though there are 2 large farmer’s markets near me, the exact same produce from some of the same farms are carried through our distributor at much better pricing for us. We only have to meet this company’s minimum order of $200 and they deliver the order to my home for free (where a few of us divide it up for the group) since we are on their delivery route for stores. Since everything through the distributor is sold by the large case or pound sacks (50#), we are actually buying bigger volume from the farmers than if we just bought a pound or two at the farmer’s market or if I had a CSA share. I still like to support other farms and enjoy the farmer’s market atmosphere so we go to the really big market on Wednesday nights in summer and buy assorted items from the booths for a picnic dinner and watch live, outdoor music performed nearby.

We are also growing a much larger garden this season, too. I’ve been trying to figure out how much I might want to purchase outside of the bulk buying of certain fruits and veggies for preserving for winter. We increased the amount we preserved last summer (by canning, drying, freezing & lactofermenting) and have been really good about using our frozen veggies, canned sauce, salsa and pickles and other lactofermented foods like sauerkraut. Even the dried produce and herbs are being used up well. The seasonal food cycle really makes such logical sense to me to live like this and eat really high quality food all year. You can totally taste the difference – even my frozen veggies still have such good flavor and crispness when we cook with them. The frozen fruits (mostly used in smoothies) have been delicious, too.

Don’t believe that eating organic food has to be more expensive – for us, it’s cheaper than buying conventional produce & dry goods at the supermarket. We are also supporting organic farmers from our state as well as a few other locations by buying large quantities from them. Our distributor even gives back to the farmers they work with through their annual profit share program. The more we buy from the distributor, the more the farmer’s make.

And what about me and all my hard work in coordinating all of this? In lieu of payment for me I’ve asked that the co-op members chip in and buy an extra case of fruit each time we order to donate to the food bank in our town. It’s our way of giving back to those less fortunate and who pretty much rarely if ever get to eat fresh fruit or veggies. I am very lucky I don’t have to worry about that so I wanted to donate my “fee” and give fresh, organic food to those who desperately need it.

My Holiday Update

Happy holidays, everyone!! As you can tell, I have not been blogging much this month of December. Besides all of the craziness and hoopla of everything involved with the holidays, I had a major muscle spasm this month that had me on my back on a heating pad and taking muscle relaxers for almost a week then I was still very limited in what I could do.

I also have scar tissue in my knee for many years and it has steadily been getting worse as I age and all year I’ve been going to physical therapy to deal with it so I could exercise more without so much pain. After all of these sessions with not that much change they tell me at my last session that I may need surgery. Ugh.

I went back to the orthopedic surgeon who occasionally gives me cortisone shots in my IT band in my leg so I can exercise without so much pain (and he also told me to do PT) and as my last ditch effort before surgery he decided this time to stick a giant needle directly into my lump of scar tissue. I thought I was going to die from the pain that night. It was almost as bad as when I was in labor and my son got stuck and caused ligaments to tear inside my hip. The only thing that helped was icing it for 48 hours straight to keep it numb and immobile until the injected fluid was absorbed into my leg and away from expanding the scar tissue. It took several days of no moving and icing it but at least it was over a few days before Christmas and we were able to enjoy a really fun family day. Now my knee feels great and I am hoping it did something in breaking up the mass and I can avoid surgery!

We also had a really nice winter garden of hardy greens under a hoop house and big cabbages ready to be harvested when my back issues were going on and my husband was crazy at work. He was going to harvest lots of it that weekend and one morning early in the week he says, “I think the digital outdoor thermometer is broken, it says it’s minus 15 outside.” We both were like, uh-oh and turned on the weather and sure enough, the arctic cold front came down overnight and I was too distracted with pain to watch the news that week and the sub-zero temps basically ruined our lovely winter crop!! We were sad. The cabbages were huge, too. At least we started growing our indoor sprouts again but I was really looking forward to the spinach, kale and collards that were doing so well out there. Damn Arctic cold front!!! We did finish building a new, little greenhouse by late November but didn’t get anything planted in it before the cold came so we decided to just rely on the hoop house this winter instead. Ha! Now we know better for next year.

Another change that happened this month was for my husband. He received a surprise call in November from a consultant that had worked for him this past year. It was for an unadvertised position at a good company in his field that is poised to do even better in a recession. This consultant became a full time employee there because of the economy and because it’s such a good place to work he said. My husband was not looking for a new job, his was pretty safe even though his present company has done a few rounds of layoffs this year. He decided it was something to go for and he fit the bill perfectly for what they wanted. We think it was meant to be since they chose him and he starts next week. The only downside to this is that he now has to commute 20 minutes instead of working down the street. He gets a better salary, more paid time off, better job security and more exciting work to do so that was the trade-off. He’s really excited for his new adventure.

Since he used to eat lunch at home almost every day, I decided to get him a rockin’ lunch box of some sort that he would love and where I could make him some interesting, healthy lunches in. I did some research and ordered him a Mr. Bento Stainless Lunch Jar – aka a “bento box.” I gave it to him as one of his xmas gifts and he loves it. It has 2 insulated containers for hot or cold food (one even holds soup) and 2 for cold or room temp food. It stacks inside this steel, vacuum sealed cylinder and even has a carry case and comes with a spork but he added chop sticks, too. There are several bento box “food p*rn” sites and blogs to get ideas of what to make from simple to gourmet and we being the gourmet types are geeking out a bit over it, I have to say!

He gave me as one of my gifts Veganomicon, an amazing (cooked) vegan cookbook. There are so many great recipes in there and even meal ideas for the different recipes so I’m sure I’ll be making him lots of good food from that book (plus sneaking in some raw recipes, too!).

Right now while he’s on vacation til the new job starts, we are trying to finish up some house projects and major re-organizing. It feels good to move stuff around and get rid of things. He is building some new shelving in our multi-purpose rec room to make it more user friendly for each of us that uses that room for different activities. I am ready to start doing yoga again there now, I figure that won’t hurt my back if I start slow and build up again.

I’m sure I’ll be back to posting more after the new year and settling into my family’s new daily routine.

I hope you all have a very happy, healthy and prosperous new year!!

My Green Goings On

This time of year is my busiest. I have more orders to fill for the holiday season for my herbal products that I make & sell, the summer veggie garden must be put to bed and all the veggies and herbs dealt with before the first frost (this week).  We are also doing more home improvement projects – installed the last 5 new energy efficient windows our house needed plus we are building a greenhouse with reclaimed materials and have expanded our garden space (greenhouse is incorporated into the new space and acts as part of the fence). We are attempting our first winter garden as well and have to put up the hoops and cover.

Since the bay window I really wanted for growing herbs and sprouts in our south facing window was like quadruple the price of a standard window and we will eventually move, we went with a standard window but my husband, Michael was able to set it out a bit further and now he is building a new sill that will be larger on the inside so we can grow some plants there.  He also did this for the kitchen window so we have 2 spots for more growing.  It’s not a bay window but it is an economical, functional and attractive substitution.

Michael had to cut down an Aspen tree in our yard that really was at the wrong elevation for it to thrive (and was blocking our expanded garden) but decided that he would leave about 9feet of the trunk in tact and build a platform/treehouse structure for our son on top of it. He’s got big plans for this structure with a trap door, some kind of peaked roof and maybe a slide (and of course my request – a very kid proof tall railing!) all with reclaimed building materials, many of which he already has. This is also part of the new fence line of the garden and is next to the greenhouse so it really will be interesting looking in that section of our yard when it’s all done.  Needless to say, we are a bit frantic running around trying to get everything done (although the treehouse will have to wait) and we leave town next week to go to a wedding of an old friend and spend time with other friends and family, too.

And we also are still doing food preservation.  Every year we can, pickle, dry, freeze and root cellar garden veggies.  This year we have amped that up all summer and included more items we have harvested from local u-pick farms and farmer’s markets now that my son is older and able to appreciate harvesting his own food more.   This is important to do especially with the economy the way it is and you never know what is going to happen in the world and if you are not prepared, well, you know.  I just think it’s a good way to live regardless and doing it every year adds a good rhythm to life and is a skill to pass down to future generations.

I still have many posts I want to write about but just don’t have the time at the moment including the part 2 of my detoxing adventure.  Amazing, btw the internal changes I feel and I’m not fully done yet.  I am hoping to get to that update before I leave on my trip.

I hope you all are keepin’ on and don’t let the worries of the failing economy keep you down.  Things in our world are changing for sure but if you are aware and don’t slip into panic and anxiety (which is easy to do when watching the news!), you’ll weather this situation and see that we are all transforming into a new way of living which, in the end, will be great for us all.  Last year we decided to stay put and batten down the hatches and ride out this storm of chaos/transformation where we are hence all of the improvements we’re still making on this house to help us function better here.

Since we are in a big time of change, keep thinking about what changes/improvements you can do that’s economical for your life, promotes your health and adds quality and enjoyment.  Even small changes can add so much and makes you feel so much better.  For example, some of the greatest things ever in making my time in the kitchen better? Drawer organizers and more shelves. When I know where things are and can get it in 2 seconds when I’m in the middle of a recipe, I’m a happy camper.  Being organized and clutter-free helps me function better and saves lots of time.  There is an old saying, “A change is as good as a rest.”  I totally agree.

Fruit and Veggie Seeds At Risk

Well this is yet another bit of highly disappointing information I learned today. The Path To Freedom Blog posted today that Monsanto owns about 40% of all the fruit and veggie seeds sold in the U.S. and they are growing.  It’s not bad enough that they’ve taken over grain production and made it into frankenfood and are destroying many family farms in the process but now they are invading the fruit and veggie seed market, too.

Here is what the PTF folks have to say about this:

We aren’t talking genetically modified seeds here were are talking about who is supplying the seeds.  Even if you purchase non gmo seeds from a seed company who touts a ‘Safe Seed Pledge’ that variety may still be OWNED by Monsanto.  Sorry to break the bad news to you, but that’s the facts folks.  We, yes even PTF, is supporting the big M by purchasing seeds from our favorite seed companies and you probably are too.

Out of the 2,500 varieties that Monsanto has acquired from the Seminis takeover, here are a few of the published veg varieties that we know that Monsanto owns:

Beans: EZ Gold, Eureka, Goldrush, Kentucky King, Lynx, Bush Blue Lake 94

Carrot: Nutri-Red, Sweet Sunshine, Karina, Chantenay #1, Chantilly, Lariat

Cucumber: Dasher II, Daytona, Turbo, Speedway, Sweet Slice, Yellow Submarine, Sweeter Yet

Lettuce: Esmeralda, Lolla Rossa (and derivatives), Red Sails, Red Tide, Blackjack, Summer time, Monet, Baby Star, Red Butterworth

Melons: Alaska, Bush Whopper, Casablanca, Dixie Jumbo, Early Crisp

Onion: Arsenal, Hamlet, Red Zeppelin, Mars, Superstar, Candy

Peppers: Valencia, Camelot, King Arthur, Red Knight, Aristotle, Northstar, Biscane, Caribbean Red, Serrano del Sol, Early Sunsation, Fat and Sassy

Spinach: Melody, Unipack 151Spinach, Bolero, Cypress

Squash: Autumn Delight, Bush Delicata (producer-vendor), Really Big Butternut, Early Butternut, Buckskin Pumpkin (AAS), Seneca Autumn, Table ace

Tomato: Big Beef, Beefmaster, First Lady I and II, Early Girl, Pink Girl, Golden Girl, Sunguard, Sun Chief Sweet, Baby Girl, Sweet Million

Watermelon: Royal Flush, Royal Star (pet), Stargazer, Starbright, Stars and Stripes, Yellow doll, Tiger

Zucchini/Summer Squash: Blackjack, Daisy, Fancycrook, Sunny Delight, Lolita, Sungreen

They aren’t not done yet!  Recently Monsanto purchased one of the largest International Eurpoean based Seed Company.

Monsanto is now the largest supplier of vegetables seeds.

So what to do?  Start saving fazing out listed Monsanto owned varieties, reach where your seeds come from and or save your own.

Taking Back Our Food Supply

Before agriculture became an industry, every gardener, farmer was responsible for the availability of seed for next years crop.  With this recent merger and marketing tactics that has allow a certain “M”-onopoly to take over over the majority of the seed population. Seed-saving is one among many tactics of reclaiming our power (and freedom) to grow our own food, and an indispensable step towards fully sustainable and secure future.

The shift from public to private seed systems

Monsanto Purchases World’s Largest Vegetable Seed Company

The seeds of vegetable diversity

I kept having insights and dreams about saving seeds before this growing season started.  I was shown a local seed bank happening in my area and really, I’m not that skilled at seed saving and all it entails even though we have owned the book, “Seed To Seed” for many years just for this reason that one day we would have to rely on ourselves for ensuring our food production.  Needless to say, we’ve slacked in that department over the past few years what with moving to the ‘burbs, major home renovations and having a kid and all.  I’ve even discussed this a few times this past spring with different people in my area (including my friend Julie, a master gardener) to find out if there was a seed bank already happening where I live – there isn’t. Clearly why I’ve been shown this over and over again before we started growing anything this season was for a reason and we have been diligently saving heirloom organic seeds this summer the way my husband learned from his homesteading mom and step-dad.

This is bad news, people.  Being more self-sufficient even with your own garden is becoming increasingly more important everyday. I recommend that you read up a bit on this topic if you don’t already know about what’s going on.  It’s a big deal and I’m not kidding.  Those who control the seeds of life control everything and they definitely do not have our best interests at heart.

Btw, which political party do you think they are affilitated with? Just saying.

What Are Your Skills?

I’ve been thinking of writing about this for a long time.  I don’t talk much about preparedness on this blog but it is something I am very well informed on and we have been prepared for anything since the late 90’s.  I’ve been reading many different preparedness blogs for the past year and I always get a sense of urgency when I read those posts and that urgency for me is based from fear.  I won’t live my life in fear mode but I do live by the old saying of “tie the camels” which means to be prepared for anything but live your life normally.

Here is where I’m at with all of this: yes, we all need to have some preparedness skills in our tool box of life skills and supplies at our homes in case there are going to be food shortages or if there’s even a chance you or your spouse will be laid off from your job while prices are rising and winter will be here soon.

There are many blogs and websites to read up on all the details of what to store and how much, etc so I’m not going to go into all of that here.  One thing I will touch on that those sites do not is to add sprouting seeds to your food storage because many sprouts are so easy to do in just a couple of days and only require a glass jar with mesh screen lid or even cheesecloth with a rubberband and water and only cost you pennies.  The vitamins, enzymes and just life force energy you will get from sprouts is very important in my opinion. You could live on sprouts if you had to.

What I wanted to really talk about is actual skills.  What can you do? What do you want to learn about but rely on others to do for you instead?  This comes up for me a lot because my husband is one of those renaissance men that really can do anything – he’s got mad skills both the blue collar and white collar type.  I, on the other hand, have learned many things from him over the years in terms of developing my own sustainability life skills and being pretty much a city girl, this was big for me. I always have a little fear of what if he’s not around and I have to take care of everything myself for me and my son in bad times? This drives me to keep learning even the stuff I don’t really like but it’s all good because it makes me more confident and feel self-reliant and like I can survive anything but in a good way!

So, can you work with power tools or even manual hand tools? Can you make a fire in a fire pit or a wood stove or even a fireplace? Can you cook basic foods like grains and beans correctly and store them properly? Can you sew? Do you have camping skills/basic wilderness skills? Can you fix a flat tire on a car or a bike? Can you grow food? Do you know CPR and basic first aid? I can go on and on but you get the idea. I still have more to learn in different areas but I try to watch and observe as much as I can and try to practice some things or just file it away in case I need to use it by myself or get someone to help me if for some reason he’s not around. That is a gloomy thought, I know but anything could happen and we all need to be responsible for ourselves.

When I first moved to Colorado to transform my life and become an Herbalist 14 years ago, I became obsessed with permaculture and self-sustainability and medicine making, too. I did not know my husband then but I read and learned and surrounded myself with others on this same path and learned more from them. For my graduating final project (almost like a mini-thesis, we worked on it for a long time) I did an entire very detailed permaculture design for a piece of land my friends and I wanted to buy in the mountains of CO.  Once I graduated, I went right into getting a permaculture certification and worked for a year with a landscape designer that also did xeriscape and permaculture designs in her work so I got hands-on training, too which taught me even more.

At the time, many people I knew thought this was fringe and unnecessary – everything in our country was going so well, life was easy, etc.  I felt differently, kept having visions of a different way of life and also felt that it was the most natural way for a human to live in harmony with all of nature.  I still feel this way and thankfully, so does my husband. I kept expanding my skills and knowledge and still to this day I keep pushing myself to learn more and more – even if I don’t really like what I’m learning! I feel that bartering for goods and services is going to become something big in the not too distant future and people with needed skills will be in high demand.

The first book that I bought for myself when I went to herbalist school to start learning the “old ways” of self sufficiency was Reader’s Digests’ “Back To Basics” book.  I highly recommend this book as a good place to start to learn if you are just getting started and you can usually find a copy in a used bookstore – that’s where I got mine.  My husband got to grow up with a mother that basically embodies this book – she is a real homesteader and this is where he’s learned the majority of his life skills.  Not a bad way to raise your children and something we are trying to slowly teach to our son in our daily life.  I was raised the exact opposite way and really felt like a fish out of water a lot of times.  So much about our consumeristic society always bothered me and feels shallow and pointless, really.

So, if you are starting to feel worried about the economy or natural catastrophies possibly happening in your area, let that fear drive you to prepare with the basics in taking care of yourself and your family better.  If nothing happens then great, you can still use all of your stored vegan foods which are healthier for you anyway, having extra warm clothes, blankets, flashlights, solar-rechargeable batteries, water, firewood, etc is all going to be used and you have saved money in the long run, too. The life skills you aquire will always be put to good use, too and makes you feel better about yourself.  If nothing else, it will give you more to talk about at a party!

Live your life with joy and consciousness in harmony with nature but always remember to tie the camels, just in case.

Some Pickin’ Fun

We went to an organic “pick your own” berry farm this past weekend with my friend Amy’s family (Crunchy Domestic Goddess) in hopes of picking lots of luscious strawberries and raspberries. Boy were we sorely disappointed! The strawberries were slim pickins but we did get about 4 quarts worth (around 5#) and the raspberries were still 2 weeks or so behind schedule. Thankfully all was not lost and we wound up with a buttload (30#) of juicy peaches instead!

I remember going peach picking when I was growing up and really enjoyed it and it was really fun for my son and his friend Ava to get to pick an abundance of ripe peaches from the trees. They were so cute to watch and of course, we all ate peaches and strawberries as we picked them. Yum. Ava’s little bro, Julian was covered with berries and peaches. Needless to say, the toddler had a great time eating his way through the farm, too!

When we got home, I selected the most ripe fruit to work with that day and made some fruit leather, dried slices for use in granola, cereal and desserts and we also froze a bunch of slices for smoothies and raw ice cream. For my measly 4 quarts of strawberries, I made fruit leather and dried the rest for winter recipe use. Man did my house smell amazing with all of that dehydrating going on!

I am planning on making a bunch of raw peach cobblers and pies and freezing them for future desserts. I bought the low sugar pectin for my husband to make jam but he only wanted to make himself strawberry or raspberry jam and doesn’t like peach jam. He also doesn’t like canned peaches. Figures. So, we will be preserving the rest (that we don’t inhale fresh over the next couple of days) using the methods that work best for me and the raw vegan diet.

This organic farm also grows many things that they sell in their storefront so we also bought a huge watermelon, freshly roasted green chilies, purple green beans, roja garlic, candy onions and a melon (that was marked as a cantaloupe) that was called “Israeli Perfume” and when we cut it open it had green flesh and tasted very similar to a honeydew. I saved the seeds from it because it was so tasty I want to grow it in my garden next summer! They sell many other items but were already sold out of much of it by the time we made it into the store.

It was a fun yet hot day in the sun and Leif definitely was tired by the end. He finally got to experience real fruit picking at a farm. We like to expose him to lots of different activities in nature and especially have him learn about where his food comes from. I know he enjoyed it and would love to do it again, as would we!

photos © Nature Deva

Preserving The Bounty

Well we have been busy around here this week! Michael and I have been doing all sorts of preserving of our garden and finding really good deals on organic produce at the store and farmer’s market. We are looking at this season as more of one of experimentation because we are trying not to water bath can or pressure can (what we normally do each year) but to do more low tech preservation methods that keep the enzymes alive and nutrients intact since this is very important to me now.

So here’s the recap of what we’ve been doing every evening and last weekend: First, Dehydrating – both solar dehydrating outside and also with my new-this-year-and-I-love-it-so-much dehydrator. I purchased an Excalibur 9 tray dehydrator with teflex sheets back in January when I went raw and I couldn’t be happier with it. What an amazing investment this was – it has a temperature control on it and it’s square shaped so it feels like an oven so I can even put a lasagna pan in there to dehydrate a raw, living lasagna recipe. The 9 trays don’t have to be rotated since a fan blows on each individual tray from the back, there’s no dripping onto the trays below and I’ve dried both sweet and savory at the same time on different trays and there have been no crossover of flavors or any problems. The electricity usage when it’s on is low, too. It uses the same amount of power an ordinary light bulb uses when you dry at the lower temps.

I’ve been dehydrating herbs especially culinary ones like rosemary, mint, parsley, basil, dill, etc in it at a low temp and then crush and store it in little glass bottles for seasoning especially for this winter. I will continue to do this as the harvest progresses because it’s so damn easy and quick and I get a superior product to what I can get at the store – it’s still technically raw and organically grown, afterall – not to mention cost savings! I usually hang dry my herbs but wanted to try it out on the spiffy machine this time.

We also bought several pounds of local, organic apricots from a coop recently and ate a bunch right away but we wanted to preserve some, too so instead of just dehydrating them, Michael wanted to try to dip them in something to preserve the color, too. He mixed up some raw, local honey with some lemon juice that I had juiced that day (we go through lots of lemon juice here, I’m always juicing lemons!) and dipped the apricot halves into that mixture then dehydrated them at a low temp for a couple of days and they came out awesome! So tasty and with a bright color.

We’ve been drying berries, too. Organic strawberries are on sale in my town for $2.19/pound which is ridiculously cheap for here so I’ve been stocking up for the winter – we of course ate all the berries we grew in our garden already! I make smoothies with frozen organic berries a lot in winter but we also wanted to try dehydrating them and using them in recipes more that way. Oh man, so delicious! I will have to go back and get more because dehydrated strawberries are unbelievable. We plan on trying out dehydrating more produce, too over the next 2 or so months.

We’ve also been Freezing produce – ok, not low tech but we do have an energy star freezer and I like my frozen, organic fruits in the winter so this is a large and important step for us to do during the height of cheap produce season. I’ve been freezing mangos, strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, etc. I will freeze some organic corn when it becomes less expensive and other veggies, too. We wash and vacuum seal pretty much everything we store in the freezer. We’ve experimented with juicing some fruits and greens and freezing them right away, too. It’s not as good as fresh juice but may be pretty good still – we’ll see in a few months.

We purchased 10 pounds of local, organic snap peas and 10 pounds of local, organic green beans and we 3 literally ate several pounds of each fresh already this week and have tried out different methods of preserving the rest. We have dehydrated a small amount, froze some (we soaked in hot water but did not blanch and will see if they will be ok in the winter. If not, we will blanch then). We also have lactofermented some of the beans.

Lactofermenting is how you make real sauerkraut and pickles and any other kind of pickled produce or Kimchi but without heat or vinegar. All you add is sea salt, good water and the vegetable then let nature do it’s thing. Once fermented, you then add in other seasonings if you like. We have glass bowls all over with plates fitted on top and a weight on that with either beans or assorted greens from the garden lactofermenting right now. The beans are at the fizzy and fermenting stage and we just transfered them into glass jars. They need a bit more time to sour.

This is a super cheap and easy method to do and very healthy for you. The good bacteria is in there, you are eating probiotics which help your digestion and immune system stay healthy and strong. Vitamins, minerals, fiber and live enzymes all are in there and it’s very tasty and a living food, too. Some Kimchi contains a natural antibiotic to e-coli so that would be good to consume with meat if you eat that. Sauerkraut is one of my favorites and once the cabbage harvest comes in, I will be lactofermenting like crazy! We have some beets to process and we are going to try out lactofermenting some of them, too. This could possibly become a new addiction for us!

There are lots of resources on the web and in books for more info but a really good blog to read for lots of detailed info on all things food preservation is Casaubon’s Book. Sharon is really very talented in explaining all that you would ever need to know on this subject whether you are a suburban gardener or have a small scale farm. She also talks about Peak Oil and all that entails, too.

We also have recently purchased bulk dry goods from the coop for our food storage. I always like to have dry goods on hand for some reason – it gives me a sense of security, I guess plus it’s the most economical way to buy it, really. This year, we purchased several items that can be either sprouted to eat in recipes for my way of eating or cooked for my husband and son to eat. At Leif’s camp, they have been preparing both quinoa and millet for snack time so he has gotten used to eating those two grains which he has been refusing to eat here at home. Now he will let me make them for him so we will buy more quinoa this fall and have already bought millet, buckwheat groats (my favorite for raw recipes), black oil sunflower seeds for sprouting & eating the greens, assorted beans, popcorn, some brown rice and some whole wheat & rye flours – we store both flour and brown rice in the freezer.

Quinoa is technically a seed and can be eaten sprouted or cooked. Buckwheat groats, too and millet can be sprouted or cooked as well. All are considered non-allergenic, too. All healthy, versatile foods and organic, mostly locally grown and pretty cheap! We vacuum sealed everything in smaller 1-2 pound packages and store all of it in bins in our root cellar closet. We do always rotate through what we store over time and many of these dry foods when properly taken care of can be stored for years without going bad.

We feel that with the rising cost of gas and food (and availability), it’s better for us to put in the effort and stock up now with replenishing our dried food stores. The glut of fresh produce takes effort to preserve but when winter rolls around, I am always happy to eat something preserved from our garden or the market at the peak of flavor and obtained at the cheapest possible price. And no, I don’t have to do it, I can live like most of America and not put up any food, ever. It just feels like the right thing to do since I live in a colder climate, there are weird climate changes happening affecting the food supply everywhere you look and gas is only going to keep increasing so less driving to the store for us. I think this is a knowledge that needs to be taught and passed down because everyone’s health and finances could improve by doing this every year. These type of vegan foods are healthy for most people to eat at least several times a week and they save you money and time if you do it right.

Michael and I have been doing this for as long as we’ve been married (except the lactofermenting – we failed at that sev’l years ago and haven’t bothered to try again til now). It only takes some focused effort in the summer and fall, you can even do little bits each night like what we have been doing all week that will supply us for months in the winter.

Next, we are on to conquering the cucumbers coming in!

photos:Ginsky, babybee, racheliscoconutandlime, Ian Riley