Very Berry Kefir Smoothie

Finding a way to incorporate Kefir into life - beyond our everyday standard issue pour in glass, drink.

This was mixed in a very typical blender - used the 'liquify' button - resulted in a bit over 32 ounces of smoothie.

BERRY KEFIR SMOOTHIE

2 cups ice

1 cup organic strawberry kefir

1 cup organic diced strawberries

2 cups organic blueberries

1/2 organic banana - chopped (mine was previously frozen)

1 capri sun juice bag!  Yes...really...smacks the organic in the face but it's very low in carbs and the liquid was needed.  Any flavor will do.

Roast by any other name....

Adore this way of making a cheap cut of meat (chuck roast) taste a bit closer to a million bucks than the $14.36 it actually cost.  I'm an eyeball it cook and a precise baker.  The photo is as close to accurate as I get.  But one thing I missed - the canola oil.

Heat some canola oil in a big enough Dutch oven or simply use a deep enough chef's pan knowing you'll be transferring into something else. 

I used 1/2 the yellow onion - chopped.  Add it to the meat - which has been rubbed with salt, pepper, & CUMIN - as it's quick searing in the oil.  Throw in some of that garlic too...I like garlic....I LOVE garlic...and I love the convenience of organic in a jar.  I probably used the equivalent of four whole garlics! 

Transfer the meat to an oven-safe dish you can cover or keep it in the Dutch oven.  Add the can of diced tomatoes, 1 cup of raisins, a bit more salt & pepper.  If your canned tomatoes did not have much liquid, consider 1/2 cup of tomato juice.

COOK IT...Low...and....Slow....250F for about 2 hours for a 5lb roast.

Blame it on the Solar Flares

I have determined to blame my behavior on the recent solar disturbances.  The fact that I'm not tolerating certain behaviors is not because I'm judging (you?) - it's the environment I'm subjected to.  There - now I'm 100% American.

So some random (solar flare induced) observations:

• If you don't want to be treated like a piece of meat don't wear words on your butt.

• (see above) but don't wear T Shirts that are far too small with words on your chest.

• Complain about the drains on government assistance only if you've never yourself been assisted.  And think hard before you assume you haven't - because if your company received a bail-out (and therefore your job was saved) congratulations - taxpayers saved your job...there are hosts of ways to be a "drain on government assistance"...think long and hard before you wade into that territory.

• The concept of "fair" does not exist.  Get over it.  Move on.  Re-naming 'jealousy' as something other than it is doesn't make it so.  I tried re-naming 'fat' with 'slender'.  Didn't work.

• Homeschooling your child for your own good will result in really bad homeschooling.  Homeschooling should be utterly inconvenient.  If you're doing it to save money, save time, take vacations in January, prevent germs...none of those are valid reasons and most can be de-bunked.  Just don't bother - there is nothing wrong with utilizing schools.

• Whining is whining no matter how it's colored.  Call it informing - call it sharing - call it making people aware.  Doesn't matter.  It's whining.  Go ahead and whine.  It's your right.  Just call it what it is (see above re-naming).  And don't wonder later why you don't have friends.

• Being a physically ill adult is awful.  No one wishes it on anyone.  (Okay - maybe they do - but we try not to...)  BUT if you had a life leading up to your illness that was free of illness.  If you didn't shoot up insulin at 7 or undergo chemo at 5.  If you didn't have a transplant at 12 or lose a limb when you were 10...well, it seems you are far better off than any ill child. 

• Feel free to exercise and eat right.  Feel free to not share it with the entire human race until you have a proven track record.  I'm really just saving people from themselves here - because if you bought a $5,000 exercise machine, told us all about it....and never used it.  Well you'll just feel silly and get mad at the rest of us for asking how your workout program is going.

Remember - solar flares.  I can't help it.

A Review: full of no regrets?

I received a copy of Regret Free Parenting  from the publisher...that is my disclaimer.  However, what I read and what I have to say probably wouldn't require a disclaimer.  Sometimes a book's title sucks a reader to it, in spite of what their usual preference for reading may be, because the title makes promises. Much like a diet supplement that makes the user pray that a pill will result in a twenty pound loss while sitting on the couch. "Regret free" anything is pretty much a goal of most individuals. "Regret Free Parenting", therefore, is certainly an attractive thought.

Our author is most definitely experienced, a licensed therapist for many years, Catherine Hickem's knowledge and the stories and experiences she's shared with people is most certainly applaudable and not in doubt. Nor is Ms. Hickem's ultimate goal in helping parents - most notably mothers - get past so many parenting nightmares and become "intentional" in all that they do.

The writing is clear, succinct, mostly to the point. The books is clearly divided and written at a level that is understandable. My concern, and the portion that leaves me at 2 stars, is the premise that intentional parenting = regret free parenting. The connection is tenuous at best and while good intentions are well and fine, the idea that by being intentional in my mothering, I will end up at regret-free...well, in this world the connection, to this reader, is just not possible.

Finally, the full title - which I purposely saved for the end of this posting - Regret Free Parenting: Raise Good Kids and Know You're Doing It Right ....it's an unusual premise and title for a piece of work coming from a Christian publisher....no mention of from Whom our help in raising these children comes from.  And, honestly, when my time of raising up my children is done I will be thankful and breathe a sigh of contentment if they end up as Christ-followers..."good kids" is not even on my radar.

Ten Years To Forgiveness

Thanks to my earlier bedtime, I awoke yesterday to the news of Osama Bin Laden's death at the hands of a group of braver-than-I Navy Seals.  I missed the parties and revelry and random public demonstrations that ensued at the announcement and I even missed the early social media threads.  Thank goodness Facebook and the like allow me to go back in time and relive every moment of consciousness shared by the populous.

Thank goodness.

Ten years ago I sat at home holding an infant, just shy of her first birthday, watching the Today Show as a bottle was distributed and another toddler played cars at my feet.  The first plane was an 'accident'.  The second had Matt Lauer wondering aloud whether this was premeditated.  By the time a third fell into fields in Pennsylvania we all knew in some measure what was happening.

Ten years later we've had the benefit of the news media pointing out the frivolity of our then Commander-In-Chief attacking terrorists verbally and otherwise.  We have had movie versions and been Datelined to death and in some psycho experiment drawn from The Twilight Zone we are officially desensitized to the massive loss of life and the fear that some moms felt while holding infants somewhere in the Midwest.

Except when it comes to those poor terrorists.  We should be loving all over them.  Or so goes the hoax of a quote that has traversed its way through Facebook.  I'm not even going to re-quote it here because it's a dreadful, made up sentiment attributed to Martin Luther King, Jr.  (Google it and you're sure to find all sorts of information on MLK, Jr. loving his enemies.)  The quote doesn't make historical sense and it doesn't make present day sense.

Yet here we go again.  Loving our enemies and choosing to forget that God is "jealous"...that He "hates"...we pick apart Scripture (and more often than not shove it aside for what feels right) and avoid things like:

"Evil men do not understand justice, but those who seek the LORD understand it completely."  (Proverbs 28:5, ESV)

God does love.  And He surely longs for our reconciliation.  And for those concerned more about repaying evil for evil, consider instead that ten year have passed.  TEN YEARS.  That's a decade.  For that baby I held it's approximately a lifetime.  There has been ten years to forgive, to receive a mea culpa from the enemy...ten years is plenty of time to allow for peace.  And so 66 years to the date that another madman, one A. Hitler, met his Maker another master of terror has met his.  I choose to hate what is evil and cling to what is good.  I suggest you do as well.

Why Being 10 With Diabetes.....

......really stinks....

• growing....growing is cool.  Growing throws off blood sugar.  Crazy.  Can't win this one.
• hormones....I don't know if I'd call them "cool" but they are necessary.  Yup.  There goes the blood sugar.
• numbers....now the 10 year old I love is good at math.  But her life is now governed by numbers.  And that's not always fun.  Sometimes the challenge is at least interesting...not "fun"....and when the number is too too high that same 10 year old feels like she failed.  Big time.
• shots.....my lovely little brunette girl is a trooper.  These aren't bad.  But trying to look "normal" and needing shots at really inopportune times stinks.  Really stinks.

.......can have it's okay moments....

• it can be hard being unique as a kid...it can be hard being unique, period.  This earns a gal some unique points.
• when an athletic little girl has Type 1 diabetes, there are moments of utter bliss called post-sports low blood sugar.  Now I don't advocate low blood sugar, but...but....BUT....when they happen after, say, a basketball game?  Carbs!  Free carbs to get the level to a sane level.  That kind of rocks especially after a particularly hard week.

It's been "one of those weeks"....of super highs after weeks of lows....of tears shed over numbers.....a bit of mourning over what was (and perhaps not knowing what we had until it was gone...like a fully functioning pancreas).....but it wrapped up with some well-earned carb celebration thanks to two (plus) hours of basketball.  And the smile that resulted kind of wiped away the tears of a week.

"Mom, who did you tell first?"

It seems that we all get to that age where we realize that the hallmark of friendship is "who did you tell first?".  My daughter reminded me of this tonight when she asked - quite out of the blue - who I told first about her diabetes.  She wanted to know who got the info while we were still in the trenches of the ER.  It was an interesting conversation and one of those moments where you realize that your little girl is becoming an older girl and remember a lot of the angst that comes with being a girl.  Who you tell first is integral to womanhood.

What I didn't add to my (short) list, was the fact that I don't think we should be blamed for not calling everyone first.  I mean, really, does "first" mean anything if everyone gets to be it?  It's like those darn "Participant" ribbons they started handing out for every athletic event in elementary school.  I mean, I'm not inherently cruel and I'm all for soothing the child who is crying over last place, encouraging the 8th place runner to perhaps shoot for 7th next time, and maybe even guiding a 4'1" hurdler into the 50 yard dash.  But I'm also all for acknowledging 1st and 2nd and 3rd....especially when we know those individuals really worked to earn these places.

So to with friendship.  I am blessed to count many as friends.  I'm uniquely blessed to count some old-time friends in that mix...the people that knew me back when.  And I have friends and acquaintances and family.  But someone had to be first and second and third.  And that's how it goes.  And I think it's okay. 

And in case you wonder, I'm okay with not being the first call for everyone....though I fully expect a call from a few friends rather than a participant ribbon.....