Thank you Public School

I constantly question myself. Am I being the best mom I can be? Am I selfish by choosing work, even work in the church, over homeschooling my girls? Am I terrible for happily shoving a 6 & 8-year old into a government institution and hoping for the best?

This morning I left Gracie’s Kindergarten class with tears in my eyes… good tears. For Christmas, I made Gracie a little phonics game I saw on Pinterest using paint chips. I knew I was a little late, and Gracie had mastered all of the sounds, but she had begged me to make it in August, but I had not gotten around to it. She was still happy to receive it and played with it a handful of times. Last night, she got it out, played a little bit, and then looked up at me with her big, round hazel eyes, “Mom, would it be okay if I gave this the Hermon in my class? He can’t read yet.” A little hurt that she would be so willing to give my handmade gift away, I quickly got over myself and said, “Of course!”

Gracie put it in her bag right then and asked me to accompany her to the classroom to ask her teacher if that was okay.

I did as she asked. Ms. Brock called Hermon over to show what his little classmate had brought for him. His face lit up. “What do you say, Hermon?” In a Caribbean accent, he replied, “Tank you!” Her teacher continued, “Gracie, would you like to show Hermon how to use it this afternoon?” She nodded yes with a shy yet excited smile on her face.

I walked out and took one glance back at the classroom. Little Hermon was leaning into Gracie and giving her a big hug.

These are the moments that can’t be manufactured; They can only happen in the chaos of real-life, raw struggle. A little boy can’t read. A little girl wants to help. Gracie goes to school was a purpose beyond herself. Isn’t that the essence of the Christian life? Thank you, God, for a glimpse of You today.

Pinterest Christmas #2

At the staff Christmas party we were charged with bringing a “white elephant” gift for a fun game we played, Left Right Left. You know those British propaganda pieces handed out during WWII, “Keep Calm and Carry On,” whilst bombs were whizzing around their heads? Well, I love the parody, and clearly the American equivalent: “Freak Out and Lose Control”

freak-out-and-lose-control — The White Elephant gift I made

freak-out-and-lose-control-2 — A gift to myself.

I liked the gift I made so much that I purchased a frame from Hobby Lobby and made one for my desk at work.

On a side note, I think Pinterest might just pull the craft industry out of the depths of its own depression which I’m really excited about. While I’m not in the industry anymore, I would love to see the energy and excitement that was enjoyed in years’ past. Pinterest makes crafting cool again!

My Christmas gift to you: Download a 5″ x 7″ “Freak Out and Lose Control” printable pdf.

Pinterest Christmas #1

I just love Pinterest. I think it’s just about the best thing going right now. The idea is simple… it’s a visual bookmarking site with a social component that allows you to see what your friends are bookmarking and vice-versa. No more keeping a ridiculous number of tabs open because I came across something cool and didn’t want to forget about it. Now when I find something cool or inspirational, I just pin it to one of my bazillion boards. And the best part, I can find it again!!

Things I found on Pinterest were actually the inspiration for a couple of Christmas presents this year. For my girls’ teachers, I made an 8″ x 8″ tile. I am blessed with a garage full of tiles from one day when I had the brilliant idea that I was going to sell them and make money. But since I’m on year 3 of life-burnout, it never materialized. But with all of the supplies handy and the coolest printer on the block, I was able to make these while in my PJs. The original is available from Red Letter Words. I fell in love with the statement: “True Love was Born in a Stable.” So amazing to think about the Savior of the world coming as a fragile infant to an unwed mother. It blows me away.

true-love-1 — Inspiration found on Pinterest

Freebie: Download a 6″ x 6″ True Love Was Born in a Stable graphic

Occupy Christmas!

This has been a more challenging “season” of my life, these last couple of months. My daddy died very suddenly in a motorcycle accident on October 17. (johnwilliambeach.com) My dad was so full of life and energy. This all came as an unwelcome shock and yet the knowledge that he is in bliss with Jesus trumps any selfish sorrow I feel. Not to say that I am not still grieving, but I have been blessed with a more eternal focus than ever before.

The blow has yielded some other good responses. My escapist behaviors have been relatively positive ones; I have been spending quite a bit of time digital scrapbooking and decorating for Christmas. I have an insatiable need for color, smiles, glitter & joy.

Operation Occupy Christmas is in full swing

Forget this “Occupy x-city”… How ’bout we Occupy Christmas!? About a week before Thanksgiving we dragged all of our Christmas stuff down from the attic. I wasn’t in the mood for our boring green fake tree that failed to make my ornaments “pop” so we went with our 5′ white Dollar General find and our 7′ silver beauty from Garden Ridge. In the center is a red sequence cone, no doubt a 75% off After-Christmas score from Target which is when and where all my favorite decorations come from. A 3′ white and an 18″ silver completes the forest. My favorite part of the whole display is the blanket of snow. We added a little fencing to keep the dogs from playing (and peeing) in the “snow.” Off to the right is our stained-glass & wire snowman that we bought at Sam’s 9 years ago. On the mantle is a Mexican tin nativity that I purchased at a sample sale at Dallas Market Hall many, many years ago – maybe 20 years. Unfortunately it’s missing a wise man and a shepherd but I wasn’t very nativity savvy when I purchased it and I never even noticed. I still love it.

The stockings are another Target purchase but the cool thing about these is that I bought them when there were only three of us with one on the way… and something told me to go ahead and purchase five of them, just in case we one day had another baby. Little did I know that we would be surprised with our Gracie when Ella was just 21 months old. God is good! The “Christmas Mornings” over the mantle is a new addition. It features the last 5 years of our traditional PJ pics. I think it turned out so wonderful. I love seeing all the changes in our family over the years.

Our family is committed to focusing on the TRUE reason for the season this year. It’s so easy to get sucked into all the junk… like Christ isn’t enough already! We are doing the Youversion Rediscovering Chrstmas Season daily readings and I’m so excited! I’ve gotten a little ahead so I can be ready for discussions with the kids and maybe even some extra add-ons that will help us really dig deep this Christmas. We are also adopting a family for Christmas and are focusing on shopping for them, rather than ourselves. This has really made us excited! We are just feeling so blessed all over.

I am sad to be entering into the holiday season knowing that I will not get to see my dad’s smiling face. But knowing that this earth is fleeting and time is short and one day we will all be united again just makes Jesus’ entrance into the world that much more special. Merry Christmas!

Why we can’t eat junk.

Last night was a great reminder about our food choices and the repercussions when we choose to completely throw away all we have learned and act like everyone else for an evening.

Last night was “National Night Out” and our neighborhoods all got together for a wonderful time of visiting and celebrating. I volunteered to work the popcorn machine at 5:30 and didn’t make any food plans for the family. I guess I just got caught up in the whole thing; the Berkner band entertained us, door prizes were being given away, amazing smelling bratwurst was being grilled in the back, chips, sodas, popcorn, snow cones, pretzels, desserts… it was mini-fair cuisine. I met some new people, parents of Gracie’s classmate and got rather involved in talking to them. Ella and Gracie took full advantage (and I completely allowed it) and they had a hot dog, bag of chips, soda, popcorn, snow cone & some cookies. I had a bratwurst and corn chips and even a root beer.

When we got home, little Gracie walked around in a daze, grabbed her tummy, said “I don’t feel good.” She wrapped herself in her blanket and fell asleep on the kitchen floor. We got her and Ella both in bed for the night and all was well. I felt gross, huge, bloated and blah… a great reminder of why we shouldn’t do this.

And then a bigger reminder woke us up around 2 a.m. Ella climbed in bed and told us she didn’t feel well at all. Poor Ella has a history of over-doing it food-wise so Halloween nights and the night after visiting the fair prepared us for what to do next. Get a trash can ready. Sure enough, just a few minutes later I woke up to sounds of gags and the silhouette view of Ben holding Ella’s hair back while she flung forward over the can.

My whole night was restless and not just because of Ella’s intrusion. It was the food. I just didn’t feel right. I had just an awful feeling all around. Bad dreams, bad thoughts, just really restless.

I am incredibly thankful to God for a night of fun and visiting with new and old friends. And I’m thankful to God for the gentle reminder that we all got: we can’t go back. It still amazes me how much bad food assaults so many facets of our life -it causes physical pain, disunity as a family, grumpy moods, negative thoughts, etc. It was an eye-opening night that showed me that we have to continue to fight for the freedom He gives us from junk food. We aren’t “cured” from the desires of this world. We’re not going to wake up one day and never again desire something that is bad for us. This journey is about daily surrender to our God who can carry us through tough situations not with pride but with grace and peace.

This week’s webwork

Two small projects fell in our lap last week and we managed to bring both to a close this week. Nolen has officially come on board Beachsmith and we will be heading to Wells Fargo to open his Teen Checking Account on Monday.

Project 1

Findyourtime.com
My sweet friend Virginia’s niece, Michelle Privett, is starting a new service business helping people with everything from house cleaning to party planning. She had a clear vision for what she wanted for her site and it really came together quickly.

Project 2

Ourworldgis.com
My friend Emily Adams and I sat at my kitchen table and with dueling laptops whipped out this site in 4 hours flat. Thanks to her mad planning and graphic skills, I got to spend my time on implementation and styling and the site turned out beautifully.

I’m continually blown away with WordPress and the explosion of functionality and options. Last night, Ben spent our date night at Starbucks with our laptops open, styling sites and discovering new things. I’m not sure there is anything more exciting to me than stumbling across amazing leaps in web development that are easy to implement and FREE! I HEART WORDPRESS! And I can’t even say enough about my amazing husband who patiently completes the tedious style issues that require an ounce (or ten) of more know-how than I posses. So glad we are such a great team!!

Our next big project should be to get our own site up featuring our mad design skills… but money talks loudly, especially when we have a falling fence and foundation repairs to tend to.

Dinner Tonight

We are finishing a WONDERFUL dinner tonight! I want to be sure to document this winner.

Quinoa Cakes with Spinach, Goat Cheese & Mushrooms

(makes about 12 cakes)

Ingredients:

2 cups baby spinach
3 tsp garlic, minced
2 cups cooked quinoa
4 ounces of goat cheese
1 tbsp flax seed & 3 tbsp water mixed together (egg substitute)
Greek Seasoning to taste (Penzey’s)
Pepper
olive oil for frying

Instructions:

1. Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a skillet. Saute the garlic and mushrooms then add the spinach. Cover, and cook until wilted. Set aside and let cool. (I then put the mix in my nifty Braun hand mixer to cut it all up.)

2. In a small saucepan, mix the quinoa and the goat cheese over low heat until the cheese is all mixed in. Remove from heat when well combined.

3. Put the mushroom. garlic, goat cheese mixture in the quinoa along with the flax seed mixture and stir well. Add Penzey’s Greek Seasoning to taste or just season with salt and pepper.

4. Heat a little olive oil in a skillet. Form the quinoa into 3? patties about 1/2 inch thick. Cook until well browned on one side, 2-3 minutes. Flip and cook on the other side, then set on paper towel.

Ben’s Harvest Salad

(I’m sorry I don’t have specific measurements. Ben threw this together. It was AWESOME and totally trumped my greek salad. It was almost like dessert! YUM!)
Salad:

Mix of 1/2 Baby Spinach & 1/2 Spring Mix

Toppings:

Red grapes, halved
Pine nuts
Craisins
Granola (We used “Ancient Grains” Cereal from Costco)
A sprinkle of Orange Peel (Penzey’s)

Dressing:

Emeril’s Simple Balsamic Vinaigrette minus the brown sugar

I can’t forget our new favorite BOXED wine – BOTA BOX. And yes, I totally embrace this because one glass is all I need. We are nearing the end of a Shiraz I bought at Fiesta in July but Costco now carries it. Rock on!

*FYI – the pic is from The Barefoot Kitchen whose recipe I followed with a few changes like the addition of mushrooms and the substitution of flaxseed to avoid the egg.

Mom is winning!

The plan is working… big fear of course is: how long can I keep this up? Everything fell into place yesterday. The other kids wanted their lunches, they loved their food, they felt loved, etc. and… Ella discovered that she loves kiwi. The pictures kind of speak for themselves. I, for one, am having a blast!

bento-1 — Handwritten lunch notes on pre-made backgrounds. They LOVED this touch.

bento-2 — Day 1: almond butter & jelly sandwich, fruit kabob, chocolate covered banana chunk & crackers

bento-3 — Day 2: almond butter & jelly sandwich, kiwi, crackers, turkey breast and gouda hearts, fun Korean treats & a mint.

Mom vs. the school cafeteria

Mission control – we have a problem. Here’s the long and short of it. My girls, 5 & 7, are BEGGING to eat cafeteria food at school. GASP! They are relentless. Even after a staying up late, watching youtube clips of Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution, they implore me to allow them the thrill of going through the cafeteria line like cattle being led off to slaughter. My line of “I just love you too much to allow you to eat cafeteria food” has fallen on deaf ears.

Things really came to a head this week. My Gracie, my sweet fragile kindergartner, left her lunch at home. I was at work so there was nothing I could do. When her teacher called, she told me that Gracie was crying because she said “my mom won’t allow me to go through the cafeteria line.” Of course I denied, denied, denied being opposed to that hideous junk the school district calls nutrition and told the teacher “oh, don’t be silly… of course she can eat in the cafeteria.” Of course, I knew that Gracie was just covering up. She was just scared and sad not to have the delicious lunch her mom made her with her own two hands.

All afternoon I longed to hold my sweet little girl in my arms and tell her how sorry I was that she had to endure such stress at school. When I picked her up, she had a huge smile on her face; not the whimpering, mournful look I had expected. And when Ella showed up, things went downhill fast. Ella: “Gracie, what happened today? I saw you with your teaching heading to the principals office.” Gracie: (full of elated giddiness) “Mommy forgot to put my lunch in my backpack so I got to eat in the cafeteria!!!!” Ella: “I knew it!! Not fair!!!” Gracie: (with a smile that could hardly be contained) “hehehehe, yep!!” This conversation continued for the entire walk home and into the evening.

I had never intended on putting one thin dime in their cafeteria accounts. In a weak moment, I told the girls maybe we could allocate $20 a month and allow them to go through the line once a week. This was before I downloaded and printed the menu to review our options. As soon as I did that, I began to back peddle with the “well, we’ll see…. I need to talk to your daddy about this… I have to figure out how to get money into your account…”, etc. But Ella is implacable. She is not going to let me back down from the compromise I suggested, regardless of what vulnerable state I was in when I did so.

So on Friday, as I lamented my little girls drooling over Wednesday’s “breakfast for lunch” involving french toast drizzled with high fructose corn syrup, I realized that I need to come out fighting. Google to the rescue. I began googling creative lunch options. I have long wanted to get rid of plastic baggies and I’ve even sewn my own snack bag that we all love – but I’ve only made one. The more I googled, the more excited I got…

I discovered Bentos! Here’s the best defintion I could find:

Bento is the Japanese art form of making a packaged lunch. They have taken a meal and turned it into an occasion, with beautifully designed lunchboxes and food that is so fun it resembles culinary art. Traditionally in Japan a bento consists of rice, fish, and seaweed. In recent years Americans have taken the concept of the bento lunch and run with it. New American Style bento lunchboxes have hit the market and kids all across the country are eating bentos at school. Gone are the days of boring brown paper bag lunches… here comes the bento!

And after looking at all the cool online options I discovered my favorite which was laptop lunches. But OUCH on the price! There is simply no way our family could justify such an expense. So my mind began racing about how I could create such a lunch experience on a shoestring budget.

And so the hunt began. I found cute insulated lunch bags that the girls liked with a big flat bottom at Home Goods on clearance – 2 for $15. I bought them each a Sistema Lunch Cube at Bed, Bath & Beyond for $4.99. And, I found some super cute shaped silicone baking cups also at Home Goods, a dozen of them for $3.99. All total, $30 or $15 each. Not too shabby.

There are other options out there. The brand that really caught my eye was Fit & Fresh. Lots of good options and the prices aren’t bad. But bad enough for this cheap mama.

My sister, who is in Korea teaching English, is now on the track down for some other cute accessories to give my girls a seriously unique and enviable lunch experience that truly trumps anything the school has to offer. (hoping, praying…)

So tomorrow begins my Bento adventure. Mom’s lunches rule! School’s lunches drool!

Not going back!

The food journey continues. Exactly what I was hoping would happen has happened. Post detox, I have found that I really enjoy raw food and have continued to eat probably 70% raw. The 100+ Texas temps have sure been helpful in this process. Even my 5 year old said she didn’t want anything cooked last night for dinner because it was too hot outside! (The little girls had Muesli and a hard-boiled egg and Nolen and I had a Greek salad and a hard-boiled egg.)

Two recent incidents have shown me that there is no going back. About a week after the detox was over there was a celebratory time for one of the pastors leaving for sabbatical and Chick-Fil-A breakfast burritos were served. I literally inhaled mine. I didn’t mean to but before I realized it, I was done and everyone else were just beginning. Next thing I knew, I got a bad taste in my mouth, kind of metallic (the kind you get when you have a stomach virus and are about to throw up), headache, upset stomach, etc. I could not even believe how badly I felt. All I wanted at that point were apples on my stomach to erase the mess I had caused. Three apples later, I felt much better. Wow. What a wake-up. There is no going back to THAT.

Second incident involved coffee. When we started the detox we threw away the coffee maker. The $5 Craigslist purchase had seen better days, made obvious by the duct tape keeping the lid secure. Post-detox Ben has returned to his joy of making cappuccinos in the kitchen with his little espresso maker, but with the new twist of steaming almond milk. So Sunday morning I asked him to make me one too. I drank it and it was fine – nothing earth shattering. But standing in my bathroom drying my hair, I felt this terrible feeling – a definable feeling of an acid wash over the inside of my stomach. I immediately felt nauseated and out came the cappuccino in the sink.

What I have learned and experienced over and over is that I am not missing out. When I think I want something, the anticipation never meets reality. Nothing really tastes as good as I remember it. And yet when I bite into an apple or a peach, it tastes better than I thought it would! This is a great place to be.

Cookie Recipe

We have been enjoying this cookie recipe a couple of times per week. It makes a small batch so depending on how big I make the cookies, each of us get 1 or 2 cookies (family of 5). They are a great treat!! I don’t get that feeling where I can’t stop eating them and I don’t get that horrible feeling of eating too much. They are perfect in my opinion.

This recipe is from The Gracious Pantry

Clean Eating Chocolate Chip Cookies

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.

Tools

Food processor
Large mixing bowl
Spatula

Ingredients

2/3 cup almonds
1/3 cup cooked oatmeal, cooled
3 tbsp. agave or honey
1 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/8 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 cup grain sweetened chocolate chips (or dairy free chips)

Note: If you don’t want to use the chocolate chips, they could be very easily substituted with raisins, nuts or dried fruits of any kind.

Directions

Step 1 – Mix everything except the chocolate chips in the food processor. You should have a nice wet, sticky dough when you’re done.
Step 2 – Using your spatula, scrape dough into your mixing bowl and mix in chocolate chips.
Step 3 – Spoon onto a parchment lined cookie sheet.
Step 4 – Bake for 20 minutes.