I have been selfish today. Absorbed by my own agenda. Inattentive.
Ick.
Tonight's Communion of pizza and wine, with a smear of sriracha.
Oh I love the metaphors.
And again I'm made new...
A space for spinning through life's accidental discoveries...
banana icecream
Da na na na na na nana
Walk this way
Walk this way
Walk this way
This is what happens when you're a child of the 90's. Aerosmith sings in your brain whenever you hit upon something especially unlikely and fantastically mind-blowingly amazing.
Or maybe that's just me?
Well, FOR FACT, Aerosmith is here for this icecream. Crank the bass.
Take 6 bananas. Peel them. Cut them into about 8 pieces each banana. Freeze the pieces on a cookie sheet. Put the frozen bananas in the food processor and chop the heck out of them. They magically turn into the smoothest "icecream" you can possibly imagine. No dairy, no sugar, no nothing.
Add whatever toppings strike your fancy and eat up. I like crunchy peanut butter and a few squirts of chocolate syrup.
Also good...
almonds
blueberries
caramel syrup and a dash of salt
a snickers bar
marshmallows
dark cherries and dark chocolate pieces
Its a life-changer, people.
Da na na na na na na nana
Walk this way....
for real
You know how sometimes you get so overwhelmed by whatever it is, that you feel it even tightening up your hair follicles? And then God blows this little poof of air in your direction... and suddenly you're breathing again, and can manage to laugh and pee yourself a little?
That was my week.
Eva has had a dry cough for the last six months. We have tried...
cough drops
cough syrup
2 allergy meds
prescription nasal spray
prescription allergy med
inhaler
high powered antibiotic
Nothing works. I asked for a food panel at the doctor, suspecting an allergy to dairy, which sometimes accompanies gluten intolerance.
We found out this week she is severely allergic to sesame seed and moderately allergic to corn.
CORN.
We are Americans. Our bodies are made of water, plastic, and corn!!!
Do you know what you substitute for gluten-full ingredients? Corn-full ingredients. Think corn tortillas instead of flour.
FML.
I couldn't bring myself to tell her for a couple of days.
But...
OH PRAISE THE LORD, BUT........
Smitten kitten.
The sun shone, the clouds parted, and Dr. Davis fell from the sky.
He's an MD who owns Prairie Health and Wellness in Wichita.
Its a cross between a doctor's office, spa, and Private Practice (you know, that show). Look at the chairs in the patient rooms!! It smells like Origins, has books like Wheat Belly in the waiting room, you serve yourself Tazo tea while you wait, and there's this amazing herbal lotion in the bathroom. And most importantly, he looked Eva in the eye and gave her confidence that this is going to be even better than just okay.
Dr. Davis spent an hour with us and will run a full food allergy panel (testing for 90 foods, and levels of reactions) for Eva. He talked about kefir (ahhhh! my beloved kefir), quoted Michael Pollan, understood immediately why I give the kids local honey for allergies, and assured us that we'll learn what's causing her cough, treat it with nutritious eating, and then will give her a prescription for an inhaler or whatever is needed.
While, we are still bummed.....
.....its beyond belief that this doctor exists. We are so relieved!
When I had a job where I did home visits, I went to see a family every few weeks that had the most amazing couches. Plush, nice, very we are people with a house and a real job furniture. I thought about those couches often when I looked at my bare, college furniture abode and wondered when I would be grown up enough to have furniture like that. And those exact couches are in my living room now. I craved something like them when I saw them, never thinking they would actually be mine someday.
I know its just couches.
But that kind of "someday" talk is the same way I've carried on about doctors.
And we found him.
He's a real live MD....family practice doctor.....with great knowledge about nutrition and wellness....and interested in finding root causes not just treating symptoms.
To vaccinate or not vaccinate? He says vaccinate. There. See? Less wackadoo than me even!
I'm not throwing our pediatrician under the bus. His office is awesome, and gives us great care. But they just plain don't know what we need them to know about food allergies. They care deeply for our kids, but have not been able to take the time needed to know what we need them to about what "toxic" food does to someone like Eva, and are therefore too quick to medicate with steroids and antibiotics.
So, here we go....
Two years ago we bravely became gluten-free (see the tab to the right for that whole rundown), and now we take it even further. It totally changed Eva's life for the better....this will too!
Pizza Rice Casserole
I don't do any sort of childcare. I would rather eat my own hair.
But my kids tend to multiply themselves.
It makes my control-freak self batty, BUT it is really what I want... our house to be a place where people come in without knocking, expect fun, and can always find a friend to play with and a parent to listen, break up fights, put on band-aids, and feed their mouths.
Feeding them is everything, and this is the supper recipe of champs. The oldest, youngest, and the pickiest in between all ask for seconds.
1 c. rice (cooked to make 2 c.)
1 lb. ground beef
1 onion, chopped
2 c. tomato sauce
1/4 tsp. garlic
1 tsp. sugar
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. oregano
1 tsp. parsley flakes
dash of pepper
1 1/2 c. cottage cheese
1/2 c. shredded cheddar
Brown the ground beef and onion together. Add the tomato sauce and all spices (don't measure - just err on the side of more everything), and simmer for 15 minutes. Combine the cottage cheese and cooked rice. In a greased 2 quart casserole dish, layer 1/3 rice mixture, 1/3 meat mixture. Continue alternating layers, ending with the meat mixture. Sprinkle with the shredded cheese. Cover with foil and bake at 325 degrees for 30 minutes, or until hot and bubbly.
Its from my mother-in-law, and the good old More With Less cookbook. Sorry - no time for pictures.....mouths to feed!
oh Canada
It was lovely.
I took a geography class in high school, I promise. But so did some of my favorite note-writing friends and also two hot guys. So while I am quite smart about quite a few things, I don't know whether Winnepeg is a province or a city or what. I don't think its a country. But I'm here to say, whatever it was, it was just lovely.
Canadians say words like lovely to describe things like toast. I like that a lot.
We dropped off the kids and went to pick up the rental car to drive through a few states before crashing at a hotel for the night. The girl giving us the car:
A.....was new
B.....liked my jokes
C....knocked our price down to $3.33 for the entire thing, including tax. Total.
D....all of the above.
Its D!!
Which was good because we sprang $150 for our hotel for the night. I just wanted one of those thick down comforters and a good breakfast. And a bed that didn't vibrate when you put in a quarter. And we got it....the last room in the place (but don't they always tell you that?!). It had 2 double beds, so I offered to sleep separately because Ryan loves to have the bed to himself, and since I got my comforter, it would be win-win....but what a mighty fine man.....he let me sleep in his bed all night and I was love love loving it because it was smaller than ours and we were extra cozy all night. (If he was up for it, I would have all 5 in our family sleep together every night. I so like skin on mine while I sleep!)
We drove to the border, which I thought would be like going through a toll booth. I almost didn't even wake him up for it. For the past month, he had been making a thing about our passports arriving on time, crossing into a new country, etc. and I was annoyed and wanted to play it cool.
Turns out, its not such a small deal. The border agent examined us, cross-examined us, criss-cross examined us, examined us backwards and forwards. Then calmly told us we needed to pull our car around, step inside, and talk to an officer.
So we did. Sure. Ain't no thing. But I was a little shaky on the inside, which probably meant Ryan was mentally writing his own obituary.
The new officer.....a heavily armed he/she (with a bulletproof vest....what?!!) rapid fired questions. They were the simplest of things but as soon as you answered one, they asked another one, totally unrelated. Where did you go to college? Who is keeping your kids? Where did you live when you were 8? What time do you expect to arrive at your friend's house tonight? Have you ever been arrested? Have you ever been committed of an offence?
Then we went to sit down while he/she watched us and "looked up a few more things" on the computer.
Then I thought of this one teeeeny tiny, really its minuscule, thing. I did have an offence - in college. Not that. Or that. Ok fine, in the interest of full disclosure, it was an MIP - minor in posession of alcohol. I haaave to say that, just for the record, I wasn't even drinking. I swear. But I was in possession and got to go to court and plead guilty, allow it on my permanent record, the whole nine yards. And I happened to forget to tell that the person who would decide whether I would pass into the country or go home.
We got to sit there long enough for me to get hives.
Then they handed us our passports and wished us a nice weekend. You know, like when you leave the dentist's office after a filling and they wish you a good day, as though you just went shopping together.
Everything....every single thing....after that in Canada was awesome. Randy and Heidi live in a 3 story walk-up in downtown Winnepeg. I've known Randy for 15 years when we were college admissions counselors and went on a roadtrip to the Mennonite high schools across the country. Spend 14 days in a car with someone and you get to know them pretty well. We went to celebrate his 40th birthday - a fun party at a local rented-out cafe.
We met incredibly lovely people. Liberal, interested in what matters, experts in their field (lots of therapists), spirited, spiritual, people with big laughs and kind hearts, and even a few Mennonites. And it was a great party besides!
There was also my very first off-roading bike ride, where I couldn't enjoy the scenery because I was far too busy protecting my increasingly aching whoo-whoo. I think maybe your bike is supposed to have suspension when you off-road? Wowza. During one horrible section, Randy circled up behind me and started cheering me on. I screamed at him to shut up and quit making me feel like a fat third grader. (Interestingly, the therapist with the long hair in the cake picture above helped us "unpack" that at the party.) It actually did make me want to go biking more often though. There have to be some trails around home somewhere?
But we saw the Forks, slept til noon, ate on the deck, stayed up til 3, enjoyed tapas (I tried muscles! When in Rome...), shopped at Ikea, and solved all the world's problems.
Randy and Heidi....that's her singing in the party picture - an amazing singer and entertainer......are truly awesome hosts. The good old US of A welcomed us in without cavity searches, and we were home a bit too soon.
Lovely!
I took a geography class in high school, I promise. But so did some of my favorite note-writing friends and also two hot guys. So while I am quite smart about quite a few things, I don't know whether Winnepeg is a province or a city or what. I don't think its a country. But I'm here to say, whatever it was, it was just lovely.
Canadians say words like lovely to describe things like toast. I like that a lot.
We dropped off the kids and went to pick up the rental car to drive through a few states before crashing at a hotel for the night. The girl giving us the car:
A.....was new
B.....liked my jokes
C....knocked our price down to $3.33 for the entire thing, including tax. Total.
D....all of the above.
Its D!!
Which was good because we sprang $150 for our hotel for the night. I just wanted one of those thick down comforters and a good breakfast. And a bed that didn't vibrate when you put in a quarter. And we got it....the last room in the place (but don't they always tell you that?!). It had 2 double beds, so I offered to sleep separately because Ryan loves to have the bed to himself, and since I got my comforter, it would be win-win....but what a mighty fine man.....he let me sleep in his bed all night and I was love love loving it because it was smaller than ours and we were extra cozy all night. (If he was up for it, I would have all 5 in our family sleep together every night. I so like skin on mine while I sleep!)
We drove to the border, which I thought would be like going through a toll booth. I almost didn't even wake him up for it. For the past month, he had been making a thing about our passports arriving on time, crossing into a new country, etc. and I was annoyed and wanted to play it cool.
Turns out, its not such a small deal. The border agent examined us, cross-examined us, criss-cross examined us, examined us backwards and forwards. Then calmly told us we needed to pull our car around, step inside, and talk to an officer.
So we did. Sure. Ain't no thing. But I was a little shaky on the inside, which probably meant Ryan was mentally writing his own obituary.
The new officer.....a heavily armed he/she (with a bulletproof vest....what?!!) rapid fired questions. They were the simplest of things but as soon as you answered one, they asked another one, totally unrelated. Where did you go to college? Who is keeping your kids? Where did you live when you were 8? What time do you expect to arrive at your friend's house tonight? Have you ever been arrested? Have you ever been committed of an offence?
Then we went to sit down while he/she watched us and "looked up a few more things" on the computer.
Then I thought of this one teeeeny tiny, really its minuscule, thing. I did have an offence - in college. Not that. Or that. Ok fine, in the interest of full disclosure, it was an MIP - minor in posession of alcohol. I haaave to say that, just for the record, I wasn't even drinking. I swear. But I was in possession and got to go to court and plead guilty, allow it on my permanent record, the whole nine yards. And I happened to forget to tell that the person who would decide whether I would pass into the country or go home.
We got to sit there long enough for me to get hives.
Then they handed us our passports and wished us a nice weekend. You know, like when you leave the dentist's office after a filling and they wish you a good day, as though you just went shopping together.
Everything....every single thing....after that in Canada was awesome. Randy and Heidi live in a 3 story walk-up in downtown Winnepeg. I've known Randy for 15 years when we were college admissions counselors and went on a roadtrip to the Mennonite high schools across the country. Spend 14 days in a car with someone and you get to know them pretty well. We went to celebrate his 40th birthday - a fun party at a local rented-out cafe.
We met incredibly lovely people. Liberal, interested in what matters, experts in their field (lots of therapists), spirited, spiritual, people with big laughs and kind hearts, and even a few Mennonites. And it was a great party besides!
There was also my very first off-roading bike ride, where I couldn't enjoy the scenery because I was far too busy protecting my increasingly aching whoo-whoo. I think maybe your bike is supposed to have suspension when you off-road? Wowza. During one horrible section, Randy circled up behind me and started cheering me on. I screamed at him to shut up and quit making me feel like a fat third grader. (Interestingly, the therapist with the long hair in the cake picture above helped us "unpack" that at the party.) It actually did make me want to go biking more often though. There have to be some trails around home somewhere?
But we saw the Forks, slept til noon, ate on the deck, stayed up til 3, enjoyed tapas (I tried muscles! When in Rome...), shopped at Ikea, and solved all the world's problems.
Randy and Heidi....that's her singing in the party picture - an amazing singer and entertainer......are truly awesome hosts. The good old US of A welcomed us in without cavity searches, and we were home a bit too soon.
Lovely!
Ten
Hello long lost friends, relatives, neighbors, strangers, stalkers!
Sorry to be absent from our blog-home for the last forever. Summer has taken me by storm and while the days are longer and sincerely more fun, time to do anything but swim, shuffle kids, clean up, work, swim, and swim some more is at a premium.
So here's 10 on the 11th. See the index for more "Tens".
In the middle of all the swimming, we roadtripped to Canada. A post is forthcoming on that, but in the meantime, allow me to brag about my new Ikea shelf. Because what better thing to do when crossing the border than shop? Geez, Amercans.
Ok, that's only six. But this couple gets the last three slots all to themselves...
Happy Anniversary, Mom and Dad! I don't know how many years its
been, but I'm feeling like its been a lot because I'm 29 plus a few, and
while Mom looks the same, Dad has significantly less hair than in those
wedding pictures.
Happy Anniversary, you two.
And happy summer, One and All. Back soon with a rundown of the good times we had in Canada, I hope. First, we are going swimming. Really.
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