Food

For fear of sounding crazy...food is so important.  I had no idea how very important it is.  I have learned so much in the past few months.

I mean...well, we have eaten on a variety of different eating plans over the years.  We lost a lot of weight with the Atkins diet.  It isn't healthy long-term, but it did help us get pregnant.  One time we were on an eating plan that we made all our own condiments.  That was my favorite.  But Tim lost weight and I didn't.  We ate a lot of vegetables and a lot of rice, but we never thought about eating organic food.  And then we ate the "Clean Eating" way.  It talked a lot of about making sure to drink enough water.  It said to eat every three hours and to at least eat some protein every time we ate.  This was good, but the meals took too much time and were really too fancy for us.  We kept drinking a lot of water and we still make some recipes from that diet, but most of them are changed or simplified from the original.  This eating plan asked that we eat more fruits and vegetables and eat less processed foods.  We learned a lot from that. 

But we really never lost the kind of weight that either one of us needed to.  And Tim's health got worse.  And finally we decided that the lap band was the only option that would help him to be around for Carl when he grows up.  Not to mention for me.  :-)  I am a little selfish in that way. 

So it has been a year since he had his lap band.  It was expensive.  Was it worth it?  Tim says yes.  Even with the struggles he has trying to find things that he can eat and not get stuck.  But his feet neuropathy didn't get better. I had hoped...

And Tim is really unable to eat as much veggies as he needs.  Not to mention some of the other foods that are tough on him.  I think he misses the bread, rice, noodles, but really that wasn't as bad as we thought it would be. 

In the summer we bought a half share of fruits and veggies.  The fruits came from Yakima.  The veggies were grown locally by a really nice family. 

And then this winter I got sick.  I think I talked about that in and earlier update.  I started watching a lot of documentaries about food.  I have been continuing on that trend.  I think I am becoming one of THOSE people.  I started writing all that I have learned here...but I don't want to be tagged as subversive or paranoid.  What I will say is that it is making more and more sense to me to eat organic.  It is making more and more sense to me to eat more fruits and vegetables and high protein grains.  It is making more and more sense to me to eat as few processed foods as possible. 

Something I learned...or thought about today was how pesticides and chemical fertilizers can affect the farmers, their families and then the people in their communities.  I watched a very interesting film today on netflix.  It was in French with English subtitles and it was about a small farming community and how their mayor decided to change all of their school lunches and all the meals on wheels for the elderly to organic food.  They showed the impact that had on the community and the hope that it gave them for their cancer rates to go down. 

Enough said on that.  The other thing that we have been doing is juicing with vegetables.  Ok, so we realized that we have a hard time finding a combination of veggies that we could actually drink.  So for now we are making smoothies with fruit in the mornings and adding the veggie juice too.  It is a good compromise for us.  And it makes sure that we get fruit too.  I feel a lot better.  I wish that I could get Carl to drink more of it though.  He has a tough time with veggies and he won't eat much fruit. 

We are not able to do do ALL organic food yet, but we are working on a full switch.  We worked on our garden today.  It won't be considered all organic for a couple years because we used weed killer two years ago.  But we did use worm castings for our worm bin to feed the soil.  I have a feeling it will help. 

I am hoping to grow zucchinis, strawberries, carrots, potatoes...not sure what else.  We are trying to start on things that we know we will eat and that we know how to grow.  Oh and that are not too much trouble.  :-)

I read a very good book called "A Dirty Life".  It was a good book to prep me for a garden.  It is a good read if you are interested in reading about a woman who moved from being a free-lance writer in NY to marrying a hardcore organic farmer and building a farm with him. 

Ok, enough rambling.  I will keep you updated.