Time for Some Change

I've decided that it's time. Things have been slowly evolving for me over the last few months. Big changes in several areas of my life have lead me to make some big changes around here. So over the next few weeks don't be surprised to see a different view until I settle in on what I want to see here. If you have any suggestions on what you would like to see or not see please feel free to leave me a comment. Please bare with me until I get situated here.

And the Winner is....

And the winner in the Grocery Budget Toolbox is....
http://canadianbudgetbinder.com/
if you could contact me with your e-mail I can get this out to you. Thank you to everyone who participated in this giveaway and don't forget that for a few more days you can still receive a discount by using the code "health".

An E-book Review and Giveaway

In recent weeks I've had the opportunity to review this wonderful new e-book by Anne over at Quick and Easy, Cheap and Healthy. As single mom on a budget these days, I was beginning to struggle with maintaining our whole foods kitchen and looking for new ideas. This book was just what I needed to get back on track. It is packed full of resources for eating healthy while keeping within your budget. She covers budgeting, keeping a price book, sourcing healthy food, once a month shopping, price caps, coupons, do it yourself, along with gardening and preserving. There is also information on saving online and an extensive list of resources and printables to get you started. Along the way there are some exercises that help you focus in on finding what works for you. For example, setting your nutritional priorities. In the top seven areas of food what would be your priorities in terms of highest nutritional quality? Mine...

Produce - 1
Meat - 2
Fats - 3
Sweeteners - 4
Grains - 5
Dairy - 6
Everything Else - 7

As a family who eats a mostly plant based diet with meat as needed and a love of sweets, this allows me to see where I want to focus my food dollars.
There are even a few recipes for easy make at home items and ways to stretch the food you have.
From now through Monday I will be giving away a copy of The Grocery Budget Toolbox to one lucky reader. Head over and check out The Grocery Budget Toolbox and then leave me a comment on your favorite way to save. The winner will be chosen on Tuesday. Anne has also been nice enough to offer a 20% discount for the next week, just enter health as your discount code during checkout. If you purchase the book and become the lucky winner you will be refunded your purchase price. Good luck!

Sometimes You Just Have to Have a Little Faith

Recently I've been feeling restless. I'm in that place where dreams and reality are colliding and while things are exciting and wonderful these days, there is also a sense of the complete unknown going forward. I am a control freak and so this not a welcome place. As a sat thinking last week, the tune of this song came to me. It took me a week of humming in my head to get enough of the words together to even begin to look it up on  YouTube but it finally came to me tonight. After listening to it again after so much time, it instantly reminded me that sometimes I need to let go of my need to control everything and just go along for the ride. Sometime I just need to have a little faith, and so I thought I would share it with you. 

Time for an Update

It seems yet again that this blog has gone idle. Life has been full. As you can see above, seven different courses. That doesn't include the daily life of a single working mom. But I have to be honest here. Life is good! You see, I actually started this blog a few years back under a different name. In the middle of being extremely ill, not finding any information that would make me feel connected to my situation, I started this blog to journal my days. Maybe someone else in the same situation would feel a little better. I let it go idle. Life was full of just trying to survive. Then one day I started to finally get better. New blog name, new mission. I was going to now share how I was getting better. Maybe yet again, it would help someone. The funny thing was, looking back, for me getting better was not an easy path. The vision that comes to mind during this time was of the original Aliens movie, when the alien is coming out of the guys stomach. It was agonizing, both physically and mentally. What I've noticed over the last few months though, is that I am no longer falling in a downward spiral of the unknown, nor am I going through an agonizing recovery. I am here.. My life is far from perfect, but I am now in management position. Life is settling into a normal pattern. Things have stabilized for the first time in five years. I am me, myself and I again. I've decided that as much as I lacked the courage to tell my story while I was in it, that maybe now I can go back and share my journey. Over the next few weeks I've decided to use this blog to tell that story. I've also been pretty busy with my workshare CSA. I've actually moved to posting about that over at my other blog, it seemed to fit better over there. So, if your interested in reading about my journey with local, seasonal and organic food, head on over and take a peak. I've have lots of new ideas moving forward here and I look forward to sharing them with you as they come together. It's time.

The Perpetual Student

Life has been full! It seems I have become the perpetual student. I have reached the midway point in my Family Herbalist Program and now my Natural Skin Care Program is just beginning. I am very excited about the prospect of supply my family with our own good quality skin care products. I am running along smoothly with my second year with IIN. The summer semester at the local college is up and running. Two classes back to back on Wednesday makes this pretty easy to fit in. Everything seems to be flowing smoothly. There are days when I wonder what in the world I am doing, and yet I look at this time as a quick stint in a much bigger picture and so for the moment I will play the role of student. The only thing that sits on the back burner is my Yoga. I need to make that a bigger priority. We will see how things flow over the next few months. Well off I go. All those books are calling my name.

Catching Up

Wow! I can't believe how long it's been since I've posted here. It's been a busy few weeks of finishing up the spring semester at school. Take my first Immersion test for IIN and moving along on the Family Herbalist Program. I've been playing the active roll of student.

My first CSA share of the year arrived last Wednesday. I was so excited to see all those greens. I'm hoping to post my CSA share every Wednesday so that you can see all the exciting things that are coming my way. This week:
Leeks
Spinach
Mixed Salad Greens
Dandelion Greens
Turnip Greens
Bok Choy
2 heads of leaf lettuce
I have to say here that if you have never had the opportunity to join a CSA it is well worth it. I acually joined a CSA two summers ago thinking that local, organic foods would play an integral part of healing my body. I came away from the experience with so much more. For me, the wide variety of produce that I had never tried became the highlight of my week and I ended up loving some new foods I had never heard of before then. I missed having that last summer when it was decided that it just didn't quite make the budget. This year I was excited to find a CSA that offers a work share opportunity. Now not only will I get local and organic produce from May to November, but I will have the chance to spend Saturday morning working on the farm and seeing how things are done. I'm looking forward to going behind the scenes to earn my share this year. It is amazing that having local and organic foods is really available to anyone who seeks it out.

With all those greens and the warm days we've been having this salmon salad as made a daily appearance. A quick fix for an on the go mom.

While I've mentioned it before, I couldn't help posting again a picture of my kids favorite go to meal. I've noticed more and more when talking to busy moms that they just don't know what to fix on the run. Between work schedules and kids sports, there just doesn't seem to be time to cook. This recipe cooks up in about 15 minutes. My kids love this so much that they actually didn't leave any leftovers. It's as simple as a bottle of veggie juice, a few cups of your favorite frozen veggies (mine like the mixed veggies in this), and a good quality pasta. It thickens up into more of a stew than a soup. While I admit to bottles and bags on this one, it is a great option for those on the go moments.
With the CSA season in high gear. I look forward to posting more often on all the new foods that are coming in and what I will be doing with them. So until then.....