have you seen it yet? it's an amazing documentary about commercial food production and i really think everyone should watch it, if nothing else but to be more informed! after watching it and talking about it we've decided that we still like some things and won't be giving them up. diet coke and peanut m&ms, for example, will probably be my personal recipe for prozac as long as i live, josh won't be passing on the cheese-its and mountain dew anytime soon either.
i don't think it was coincidence that after having bar food and beer for 5 dinners in a row and josh and i having quite the discussion about tired we've both been over the winter that i saw the producers of food inc on oprah and martha. on oprah they talked about how there are nations that eat a diet far higher in fat that we do but without the highly processed foods and they have much lower instances of diabetes and heart disease. they also have lower instances of cancer which i realize is not necessarially caused by food but that's another blog for another day. that same show they interviewed alicia silverstone about her new book 'the kind diet' that's all about making the best possible choice no matter the circumstances in an effort to be kinder to your bodies and the planet. taking both ideas into account here's the plan for the bennetts:
1.) seriously reduce the amount of highy processed food made of things that we can't pronounce easily or that have unnatural properties, ie: any food that won't rot or foods that have been 'fortified' by injecting them with something or adding extra things in just to make it 'healthy' (eggs don't need to be high in iron!)
2.) eat more locally grown produce, meat and eggs and the best quality we can easily afford (i still refuse to pay $20 for a chicken just because it's organic, or $5.00 for a dozen eggs just because they're at the farmer's market but i can afford to replace ground beef with ground buffalo every few meals and eat more veggies)
3.) eat as much 'junk' food as i feel like cooking. ie: homemade french fries, onion rings and nachos are a bit of a pain to make every night but if it's really worth taking the time then why not?
sounds pretty simple right? well, that's the plan and we're going to work at it. i refuse to believe that getting back to basics doesn't just mean spending more time with the family and less time and money going out!
for our first homemade, better choices dinner, i made spaghetti with buffalo meat (yet another blog entry for later), and baked garlic bread i found at martin's in the natural/organic section of the freezer. pretty easy, i just read the labels and found things that looked good that didn't cost a fortune and had an ingredient list i could recognize. here's a pic that doesn't show nearly how good it tastes but it did taste way better than the usual quick stuff and it hasn't upset my stomach or josh's yet so that's a good sign :)
downtown nashville IN, such a cute town
and a great place to stop downtown nashville: not just popcorn - truely a must see!
an adorable restored soda fountain in columbus
an amazing glass chandelier inside the columbus visitor's center
as i understand it (and i could be wrong on a few of the details but the general idea is right) the whole process started a few months ago when sara & dave's neighbors (mark, the guy in the above picture, & rachelle) began the process to adopt dorcas, an 18 year old girl from uganda that has been in the united states for a couple of years. they then found out that she has a 9 year old sister named rachel still in uganda and a girl that is like a sister to rachel named fiona, nearly 5 years old. mark & rachelle had decided to adopt rachel as well but really wanted to find a home for fiona as well. dave and sara have been trying for quite some time to have another child and their son tyler, has been wanting a brother or sister for just about as long so after lots of prayer and looking into their hearts they realized that fiona was the child they'd been waiting for. after a very long process they are waiting on a bit of final paperwork and then they'll get their first court date in uganda. a few weeks after that they'll get their final court date to finalize the adoption and get to bring her home. yes, there are a lot of steps that i didn't mention but that's the basic outline.
the largest section of our floors now looks like this
and to top it all off, we had a double yolk in our straight from the farm eggs (thanks again dad)
went to an ND basketball game with my sis, nieces & grandma
finally finished my scarf (just in time for spring)
donated blood for the first time (thanks for suggesting that i go, it was good)
and emptied everything out of and then dismantled the closet that was here
lots of things were in the closet
lots and lots of things
and now there's a new closet built
and tomorrow i'll show you the desk that made this closet project necessary and the room that's nearly finished... if only i could figure out why we had all of this crap in the closet to begin with. thankfully our recycle collectors are nice and took the 12 rolls of christmas wrapping paper and several boxes we were storing for no reason and i got to finish painting the footstool i picked up at the re-store for $7.50 and have a great place to organize and work on my photo projects. oh, and i made a mock-up invitation for the ayo-rader's wedding and am happy to announce that oscar (their dog) is going to be coming home tomorrow after his emergency spinal surgery and is said to be doing wonderfully.
