Foodie Friday: A "Green" Thanksgiving

This year for Thanksgiving, I decided to attempt a "greener" event. I'd use more local and organic products. We also decided to scale back the dinner a bit. We'd have a turkey breast instead of a whole bird, two desserts instead of four, and each person chose one side to go with the bird.

Buzz, of course, selected cornbread dressing.
I wanted green beans.
Spark chose rolls.
Lily got macaroni (she loves noodles). (I added a generous amount of pureed carrots and sweet potatoes to the macaroni and cheese to make it a healthier dish for all of us, but also to add the traditional sweet potatoes to the menu!)

I also made some gravy from scratch, using the turkey drippings in the pan and a recipe from Real Simple as a guide.

I made a batch of brownies the night before, using The Sneaky Chef's quick fix for boxed brownies. Our other dessert was a pecan pie from Tootie.

So, here's the breakdown of our menu and how "green" or local it was:

Thanksgiving Dinner Menu
Free-Range Turkey Breast
Cornbread Dressing, made with almost 100% organic ingredients
Macaroni and Cheese, enhanced with locally grown sweet potatoes and carrots
Green Beans, packaged but prepared in our city
Yeast Rolls, made by a company in Alabama where Buzz and I are from
Brownies, enhanced with organic spinach and blueberries
Tootie Pecan Pie, a company that uses handpicked Texas pecans

At first, we were a bit nervous about changing the dressing, but Buzz said that yesterday's dressing is some of the best he's eaten, so here's the recipe:

Free-Range Dressing
1 whole chicken (preferably free-range), cut up
double batch of cornbread (made with as many organic, whole grain ingredients as possible)
1 medium organic onion, diced
organic dried sage (2-4 tablespoons, to taste)
sea salt
organic black pepper
milk (optional)

Put the chicken in a large pot. Cover with water. Boil the chicken until it's done.
When the chicken is done, remove the pieces with tongs.
Place a strainer over a bowl and pour the chicken broth into the bowl. The strainer will catch any little pieces of bone that might have boiled off the chicken.
Tear the chicken meat from the bones of all the pieces.

Crumble the cornbread into a large bowl.
Add the diced onion.
Add the pieces of chicken.
Pour in all of the chicken broth.
Add about 1-2 tablespoons of the dried sage. Add some salt and pepper.
Stir ingredients together. If the dressing seems a little dry, add milk until it's nice and moist. During baking, it will dry out some, so don't skimp too much.
Taste. Add more sage, salt, and/or pepper, if desired. Repeat until it tastes just like you like it.

This recipe makes enough for one 9x13 pan and one 8x8 or 9x9 pan. Fill both pans with dressing, cover with foil, and cook for about an hour.

Remove foil and cook for another 30-45 minutes or until top is golden.

Almost Perfect Thanksgiving

Flower has Croup, but otherwise today teetered as close to perfect as Thanksgiving can get. We didn't go anywhere or do anything. We had no house guests, no phone calls, and no schedule. It was bliss!

Buzz said I should write about all the things that have made this Thanksgiving better than any other we've had, so I asked Spark, Buzz, to help me make a list.

We didn't have to be around inlaws.
We cleaned the house for ourselves for a change.
We had time to reflect.
We had time to enjoy each other.
We just played all day (from Spark).
We had nap time after dinner.
No TV. At all. (Yes, that's right. No Macy's parade. No football. No loud noisy commercials. Bliss.)

Gift Wrap, Be Gone!

My family has been working on getting greener and greener, starting with setting up a recycling center in our kitchen a few years ago.

One green goal I have for this year: I'm trying to avoid buying any wrapping paper this holiday season. I do have a couple rolls I bought on sale after Christmas last year, so I'm saving that for some of the gifts for Spark under the tree and for a couple of the kids he'll exchange gifts with.

So far, what has worked for me? Using old maps! Crazy but true. I saw this idea in a magazine while waiting at the doctor's office the other day, and I LOVE LOVE LOVE some maps, so I decided to try it. The results are amazingly chic!

Here are some other alternatives I'm coming up with wrapping up gifts:

• pillowcases (These work great with oddly shaped items, like plush animals. Just put the gift inside and tie it up with string.)
• reusable bags and containers (So nice to get a gift wrapped inside a gift!)
• newspapers, posters, anything that you might be about to toss in the paper recycling bin (I've even seen gifts wrapped in user manuals.)
• patchwork wrap-up (Do you have a lot of scraps of this and that wrapping papers? If so, create a patchwork wrap-up out of them. The result can be very shabby chic if your patterns are just right. If you sew, you can do the same with fabric scraps. Hem the edges and you have a cool gift in itself.)
• buy gifts that come in cute (and hopefully reusable and/or recyclable) containers so that you don't have to wrap them at all.
• decorate plain boxes you have stacked in your garage. Instead of wrapping them, let your kids paint handprints on the boxes or stamp them with cute images.

Get even greener by

• tying things up with ribbon or yarn (If you're like me, you have a drawer of ribbon and yarn just waiting to be used. This option uses no potentially toxic adhesive.)
• using recycled products to create to/from labels, writing your to/from message directly on the package or gift, or

Fun (and useful) embellishments (instead of throwaway bows):

• cookie cutters
• bandanas
• whistles (Spark got a gift at his birthday party and the wrapping was done in the shape of a old fashioned piece of candy, with the sides twisted. The package was tied up on those ends with the strings of two whistles. )
• real hairbows on packages for girls
• something that matches the gift (Think fishing lure on a fisherman's gift, pens to go with a journal, a spool of thread on a sewer's gift...)

Some other tips:

• wrap fragile items in fabric scraps or napkins/hand towels instead of tissue paper
• start a wrap box where you drop items that you think might come in handy for wrapping later on

**This post is first in a series of Green Wednesday Tips. I decided to add it to Shannon's Works for me Wednesday link list. Check out all the other WFMW links on RocksInMyDryer's Works for Me Wednesday post.

Dead Beat Dads Suck

My kids are blessed to have a wonderful father. Two of my first cousins Alyse and Marci are not so blessed. Their biological father, for lack of a better way of saying it, is the scum of the earth.

He and my aunt got pregnant with Marci while they were dating. They married. Then, a couple years later, they had Alyse. The girls are now 11 and 13. About a year and a half ago, my aunt discovered her husband was cheating on her with a younger woman. He decided to have a child with this other woman and moved in with her. He stopped giving any money to my aunt (or his two daughters) and basically disappeared. So, my aunt met with a divorce lawyer, borrowing money to pay for the lawyer's initial fees.

They've been tied up in court ever since then, mostly fighting over the house, which is paid for. Temporarily, my aunt can continue living in the house with the girls. During her marriage to this jerk, my aunt never worked. Instead, she took care of the kids, cleaned the house, and that's about it. The judged ordered her husband to pay for the power bill, the phone bill, and a measly $200 a month for other necessities until the divorce is final. Then, child support will kick in... theoretically. My aunt managed to find a job, but it's not a high paying job, and the bills still don't get fully paid. Oh, and the cad doesn't even send in what he's supposed to. When she has something come up, it's a struggle to make ends meet. Like recently, the heater stopped working on her car. It's in the 20s and 30s where she lives. They have to drive a good 15-30 minutes to get almost everywhere they go. She has no way of paying for car repairs, no recourse at all. Does he help? No.

All my aunt can do is file a complaint with the judge that he didn't pay his required amounts. She has filed these reports over and over again. Did I mention this man is the scum of the earth?!? Well, it gets worse. On a special occasion, his youngest daughter called him. She wanted a new outfit to wear at a special event. He used profanity to refuse her plea. SCUM OF THE EARTH.

Having grown up in a loving family with a wonderful father and seeing the love my own husband has for our kids, I do not understand what in the world makes a man treat his children this way.

November 23

November 23 always brings a strange sense of weirdness. It's the one day of the year that is the longest time away from my birthday. It feels kind of like that deflated moment after you realize that you have opened the very last Christmas gift. The celebration has ended. It's going to be a long time before it comes again.

As a kid, I used to think the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas lasted FOREVER. We went to my great-grandmother's house on Thanksgiving to have dinner with my mother's brothers and their families. We'd eat, talk, play, and usually had a great time. Then, right before everyone started leaving, we would draw names for the Christmas gifts. It was exciting to see who drew my name and would buy my gift when we'd all meet at the same place again for Christmas dinner and opening presents.

Usually, the present I opened at my great-grandmother's house was the first present of the season. Occasionally, my class at school would have a gift exchange on the last day of school, but usually this was the first. I remember being so excited. The hours stretched out. The uncles arrived with their families. People ate, and ate, ate, ate. The kids took turns asking if the time to open gifts had arrived. All this probably happened over the course of about four hours, but it seemed as if we were there for weeks, waiting on time to open the gifts.

Then, the wrapping paper flew. Suddenly, it was over. And there was that moment. Almost like, "Is that all?" Not in an ungrateful way, but in a disbelieving way.

As I get older, I find the years mark on more quickly than they ever have. I watched Spark open his Christmas gifts last year, the first year he really got into it, and I saw the excitement in his eyes. But, I also saw the flash of "is it really over," that slightly deflated moment. But, it didn't last long as he reached for his new toys and started playing.

The pace picks up each year. I find myself thinking ahead too much, or contemplating the past too much. For my 29th year, I want to focus on the present, the current moment I'm in, this place of wonder. I'm looking back today at the past year, and I'm enjoying where I am. Yes, there are things about myself and the world I want to change, and I'm making those changes slowly. I want to look back on the day after I turn 30 and see how I've made some changes.

A friend told me the other day that she doesn't even want to acknowledge her birthday anymore. She's in her early 40s, and that depresses her. I don't know what I'll feel when I'm 40, but right I still look forward to my birthday. Even though I am winding down my 20s, even though I do see the small signs of aging. I have had a great decade. I expect to my 30s to be even better.

Age-Appropriate Gifts

According to my baby book, where my mother documented every happening of my life until I was about five years old, I got some cool gifts on my fourth birthday. Topping the list were Barbie and Ken, a paper doll set, and a gum ball bank. My parents gave me a Care Bear room makeover, complete with a sheet set, bedspread, and drapes.

Today, 25 years later, I celebrate 29. Topping my list of gifts were a citrus juicer and stainless steel colander. Oh, and some beautiful lilies from my best friend Welby. Aren't they gorgeous?

A citrus juicer, a colander, and vase of fragrant lilies make for quite the age-appropriate gift for an almost-30 mom who loves to cook and enjoys nature and natural essences. Much more practical than gum ball banks and Care Bear linens. But I have to confess. I still have one of the pillowcases from the Care Bear set. The years have made it soft and worn, and I feel special when I use it on my pillow at night. Some gifts break the age barrier.

Foodie Friday: Conquering the Smoothie Dilemma

For years, I've wanted to make smoothies. My first attempt failed miserably. MISERABLY.

This event happened many years ago. My first mistake in this process involved the equipment. Not knowing the ins and outs of blender technology, I bought the cheapest blender at the local Wal-Mart. Not a good idea at all.

I browsed online for smoothie recipes. I envisioned creating something akin to a Strawberry Orange Julius. I searched for Orange Julius smoothie recipes online. I found various recipes and made my second mistake. Instead of selecting one recipe and going with it, I decided to combine the ideas in a few and create my own Julius. The result of my strawberry, milk, orange juice, and ice concoction? Something very weird tasting, and nothing smooth at all. Trying to salvage the ingredients, I added sugar and more milk. Blend. Still bad. I add more strawberries. Blend. Worse. I had to just toss it.

Fast forward a few years. I move to Texas. I almost left the blender behind, but I thought I might need it at some point. It's stashed away until one night a friend and I decide to do a liver flush. I like to think my friend Welby and I are intelligent women, but when I think back on the liver flush days, I'm not so sure. Just how strung out on grad school were we?!?

We met every morning for 7 days straight, mixed up the flush, drank it down, brushed our teeth, and didn't eat or drink for 30 minutes after. Not the kind of smoothie I had in mind when I bought my blender, but at least I was getting some use out of it. Also, Welby and I could smell the garlic as it oozed out of each other's pores in class later in the day.

A few years later, I move across the state. We leave the blender behind. Buzz and I have Spark, and I decide to make my own baby food for him. And, I'm interested in the smoothie option again. We need a blender. Third mistake: I buy the most expensive blender I can find thinking that it will improve my odds of smoothie-ing with success.

I do manage to make some great baby food, but the blender I bought (KitchenAid's most expensive one that converts to a food processor) had way too many buttons to know how to use, had a tricky sensor on it that would prevent the motor from starting if everything wasn't lined up perfectly, had so many parts and pieces, and I couldn't keep up with which ones were dishwasher safe and which ones weren't, and it was such a pain to hand wash the parts that weren't, that I abandoned the cause soon after Spark was no longer eating purees. The blender/processor beast took up so much counter space that it was relocated to the utility room: that is the kiss of death for my appliances. Go the way of the bread machine, the Wok, the electric skillet, and likely you shall not return.

So, no breakfast smoothies for me.

I confessed to Welby that I had these smoothie catastrophes going on. She mentioned that her blender was simple: two buttons (on and off), just a few basic parts (all dishwasher safe), and blended things up like a charm.

So, after Flower was born, and I started thinking about making baby food again, I bought a new Osterizer blender and life has been sweet. I started whipping up some fabulous smoothies, experimenting with different combinations of fruit, yogurt, protein powders, and more. Now that Flower is eating solid foods, I'm a baby food making machine on the weekends. We stock up on veggie baby foods in the freezer, and I buy jarred fruits. I'm considering, though, tackling the fruits soon. I tried applesauce once, even in the new blender, and it did not go so well. Baby steps.

This morning, though, I made a terrific smoothie. It was nothing like an Orange Julius. I had my first Orange Julius in years a couple weeks ago, and I realized how sweet it tasted. I could barely taste the orange for all the sugar! This morning, I poured some Odwalla orange juice into my blender and opened a bag of frozen strawberries and dumped them in. The result: a perfect smoothie that actually tastes like fruit!