Could I Have Fed My Children in 10,000BC?

Always a spring of creativity, Stasha of The Good Life at northwestmommy, challenges us this week to come up with a list for her Monday Listicles on the topic of food and thinking!

Where to begin?
Grocery lists.
Recipes.
Ingredient labels.
Pinterest.

We see the normal, average foods piling up in our grocery cart, lining our pantries, gathering mold in our refrigerators, but how often do we see their origin, unless in our gardens out back?

So in order to make this into a teachable moment for my daughters, and a history lesson for me so I can sound impressive at the dinner table tonight, I've taken it upon myself to find 10 foods that make me think of the world when it first began, well, maybe when humans first started transitioning from being hunters and gatherers to farmers and cultivators.

10 Foods That Make Me Think Of Trying to Feed My Children Thousands of Years Ago 

(in case I climb aboard a time machine and plug in 10,000BC)

1. Insects - So I've eaten a chocolate-dipped cricket, once, a long time ago, but I think I'd have to crawl around in the muck, digging for grubs, and teach my girls how to swallow them whole.
2. Almonds - 10,000BC and I'd be identifying these, scaling mountains and crossing deserts, to get almonds if it means no more bugs.
3. Einkorn grain - Never heard of it, but supposedly it was one of the first cereals available in 16,000BC, right next to Lucky Charms I believe. Pass me the milk, please. But wait, cows weren't domesticated until 6,000BC.
4. Cherries - These may not take the place of chocolate, but if my 1 year old can eat a dozen maraschino cherries in less than a minute, I have to think these would be on our stone slab table for dinner every night.
5. Bread - Thank goodness this was invented in 10,000BC. In my family, "thunder thighs" are a sign we have ancestors who were champion bread consumers.
6. Wine and Beer - Who knew wine and beer count in the food pyramid of the world's oldest foods? As a mother in 7,000BC I wonder which my daughters would have preferred? 
7. Cucumbers - Jumping forward to 5,000 BC, because my middle daughter literally eats six or more cucumbers a day, and I'm not talking about the baby size ones.
8. Ice Cream - 3000BC and I'm dying to know how they made it without ice and our Snoopy snowcone maker and sugar, since sugar didn't appear until 1200BC.
9. Peas and Carrots - Now this is something I could have grown, harvested, cooked and consumed alongside my girls in 3000BC.
10. Blood as food - in the first century, in puddings and soups, and I'm about to barf as I type this, so let's add a #11 to sweeten this list.
11. Cheesecake - also a first century food, and I'm guessing they didn't have a springform pan, but I'd take this over blood pudding any day of the week.

 So maybe we would have been a little scrawny with a few cavities and sticky fingers, but I thank my ancestors from 10,000BC for finding food, cultivating it, cooking it, and providing for their children. I've always dreamed of going back in time to the dawn of Homo sapiens, but I don't know if I could stomach it.

Are You Jingling Yet?

Costco seemed to have passed over a couple of holidays as I'm already seeing Christmas trees lit up in their store! Nevertheless, my favorite month, October, will soon arrive.

The hot apple cider, roasted pumpkin seeds, jack-o-lanterns aglow, cool mornings, sweaters and jeans, and lots and lots of baking.

Of course there is the craziness of stores marketing their holiday gear, but within our little nook we have the simplicity of the holidays. There's also the fact that I'll be turning 36 this month, but I like even numbers over odd. And then there's the hundreds of trick-or-treaters we get, some of whom are adults wearing no costumes and with no kids in tow.

But who doesn't love this time of year! The hustle and bustle and the merry jingle in our footsteps.

So here's how I'm preparing for the holiday season...

1. Stop the flood of catalogs. When we moved to our new home, we received literally hundreds of catalogs in the mail over the course of the first year. I finally found a way to stop them coming once and for all: Catalog Choice! A must for the holidays!

2. Beat the holiday bulge. I'm working on losing 10% of my body weight mainly for the health benefits but also because if I do so I win a prize from an awesome health company!

3. Opting for Halloween toys. Seeing as how we still have bags of Halloween candy leftover from last year that my daughters never ate, this year we ordered a variety of nicknacks and toys from Oriental Trading to hand out to trick or treaters.

4. A Minnesota winter. Last year we were running through the sprinklers in December, so we're hoping to see a bit of snow this year when we visit my mom.

5. Sorting and giving away. It's time I go through my youngest closet, sifting through her clothes. Giving away the 12 month, even the 18 month clothes. When did my baby get to be a toddler?

6. Baking. It never ends. With Russian tea cakes, Grandma's jam thumbprints, cyclops, sugar cookies, gingerbread men, Swedish meatballs, date bars, monkey faces, chocolate dipped pretzels, cornflake wreaths, peppermint bark...

7. Card writing. Families keep growing. Friends become dearer. And my list keeps getting longer. Will the USPS raise the price of stamps to 50 cents before the holiday? I've run out of the Forever stamps I bought years ago.

8. Holiday shopping. I'm going to try harder this year. Last Christmas morning it took us hours to open all of the presents. We don't need more stuff. Maybe, just maybe, we could all simply make a gift for each other this year. Or next?

9. The big move. Our time here on the west coast is quickly coming to an end and we will be moving in the spring. Our to do list is huge: new carpet thanks to our puppy, painting the house, giving the landscaping a tune up, collecting things for Amvets before we move, finding a new home, researching the schools and selecting the best one, putting the house on the market, and filing the paperwork with the moving company.

10. Saying good-bye. We've never lived in a place for more than 18 months or so, and here we've had over three years in our home. This will be our last holiday season with friends and neighbors. Our girls will have to say bye to friends. Our dog will leave the only home she's ever known. No longer will we have the luxury of having a swimming pool next to our house. I'll miss the year-round 70 degree days. And I'll miss our friends, our church, our community.

Are We Better Off?

Every decade, I stand amazed, frightened, in awe, fixated, and inspired by the ever changing world around me.

But, are we better off?

Are we better off knowing what life was like before the Internet?

Are we better off having roamed the neighborhood on a bicycle, alone and unafraid?

Are we better off with processed foods?

Are we better off with drones?

Are we better off with zero-lot lining housing, instant mashpotatoes, potted herbs lining the kitchen window?

Are we better off with cell phones?

Are we better off with overnight mail?

Are we better off with shoes that make us jump higher, Wii game consoles that get us moving indoors, schools with no art, music, or PE?

Are we better off with iPad entranced kids in the waiting rooms of doctors' offices, miniTVs in cars on road trips, surfing the Internet, browsing celebrity magazines in the check out lane of grocery stores, ads flashing on websites?

Are we better off with Facebook? with Twitter? 

Are we better off living in a world without dinosaurs?

Is our world better off living with humans?

10 Things I Have a Crush On

When my husband's ship is out to sea and our three girls are screaming banshees and our dog won't stop barking and this darn headache won't diminish, I have a crush or two or three on life...

1. squeeze - my now size ten feet into my old size nine shoes, still defeated
2. crumple - the remains of my daughter's Goldfish crackers under my big feet
3. crease - all of my clothes; did I ever have time to iron?
4. deform - sadly, my face when my girls wake me at 5 after being up during the night with them
5. pulverize - seriously, my brain at the end of the long, long day after a long sleepless night

But there's hope, there's wine and chocolate, there's a good book, there's my husband's ship on the horizon (anchored), there's bedtime, and then I have a serious crush or two or three on life...

6. adore - my daughters laughing at one another over breakfast
7. admire - myself for holding it altogether, getting the laundry done, keeping the house clean, and still finding time to manage my business
8. desire - my evenings to write, to work, to read
9. yearn - more time at the gym, as I'm so glad I finally joined
10. love - my husband and our girls all being together Sunday morning in bed before he heads to the ship

And thank you to The Good Life for bringing back into the swing of lists and Monday Listicles!

A Little Girl's Daddy

"My girls are going to miss their papa."
The words drummed in my heart, over and over. Through the tears. In the silence.
My second daughter turns three today. Last year she was hearing Papa sing happy birthday to her over Dora candles.

And now, my words encompass more than just my girls missing their grandfather.
I miss my dad, too.
The little girl inside of me still is crying for her daddy. And I don't care if it makes me feel childish, it's just the way it is when a woman loses her father.

Summer memories of my dad are surfacing...

1. Last summer he awarded his oldest granddaughter, not yet even four years old, a gold medal for reading books with him.

And now I wish he could hear her actually read her first book aloud.

2. We spent summers traveling up and down and all around the Midwest for soccer tournaments.

And now I wish I could recall the details of our conversations.

3. He took my two sisters and I to a cigar shop in our early 20's and we all shared our first cigar standing around his car.

And now I miss the sound of his voice, calling me "Kimmie."

4. He blasted me off his knees in swimming pools on family vacations.

And now I remember him teaching my oldest how to swim last summer.

5. How we devoured my mom's fresh fruit and veggie plates in the hot Memphis sun.

And now I miss baking Christmas cookies for his sweet tooth.

6. I loved that he took his mother and father-in-law with us to Hawaii, giving them first class seats.

And I miss my own Papa and Grandma, so much.

7. Last summer he played Candyland with my daughters, showing more patience with them than I had.

And I miss our game marathon summer days from my childhood.

8. When I worked for him one summer at the Budget Rent-A-Car lot we often played racquetball together at the end of the day.

I miss my dad, my coach, my workout buddy, my competitor.

10. When he opened up his own bakery, enlisting the help of my mom, my sisters, and me, we sweated through the Illinois summer in front of the hot oven and loving Fresh Bread Tonight.

I miss the comfort, the safety, the devotion, the love, the joy my dad gave me every day of his life.

Summer memories are all I have now of my summers with my dad.

Celebrating My Mom

The Time cover, both image and words, are etched in my brain. Seared in more like it. I have refrained from reading on the web all of the heated discussions I imagine going on right now because of that cover, mainly due to lack of time to be on the internet. In the bulk of weighty issues concerning our world and the country I live in, I am surprised how much of a ripple 'motherhood' can create.

Mother's Day. It is every day. And being a mother has certainly created such a ripple that it's taken me on an amazing ride so far, a journey I'm so grateful to experience by being able to stay home with my three girls.

I don't remember every day I had growing up with my mom, but I do remember the feeling, the comfort, the relief of knowing my mom was home with my sisters and me. I celebrate my mom today and her mom and all of the mothers around the world: stay-at-home moms, working moms, single moms, step-moms, moms of foster children, aunts who are like second moms, dads who are both dads and moms, teachers who fill in the role as moms, and everyone else who has ever stopped to squat down, look a child in the eyes and listen.

I celebrate you, Mom! You are my inspiration every day!

Ten Days, Ten Moments Celebrating My Mom

10. Returning home one day in 4th grade to find my mom opening the front door and hugging me.
9. Coming home from school to freshly baked chocolate chip cookies.
8. Seeing my mom's minivan pull up outside of TCBY on a hot summer day to bring us home after my sisters and I walked a mile to get there in the sweltering heat.
7. Sitting on my mom's beach towel on top of the hot leather seat of her Monti Carlo after swim practice.
6. My mom singing the words of "Amazing Grace" while vacuuming just as I began to type those exact same words on the computer from the den.
5. Smiling at my younger sister curled up on my mom's lap after her nap.
4. Playing with my toys while my mom watched "I Love Lucy" while she ironed my dad's clothes.
3. Opening up an enormous care package in my dorm room and sharing my mom's sugar cookies with all of the girls on my floor.
2. Seeing my mom's face watching me from the stands during my basketball games.
1. My mom comforting my dad as his spirit left his body, telling him over and over that we would be okay and that he didn't have to worry, and feeling her strength and love surrounding all of us.

I love you, Mom!
Thank you for every day, every moment you give me!

Celebrate your mom today with a list of ten and share it with Stasha on The Good Life!

Love Beats

Here's a little flashback to Biology 101: When in isolation, the cells of our hearts don't beat in sync with one another. One sings "Da Dum Da Dum" while another chimes "Dum Da Dum Da." But bring these cells together and they start to beat in rhythm with the others.

Love is beating all around us, all around the world.
We are walking cells of the heart.

Are we beating in sync with one another?
Is love universal?

Whether or not my love is in sync with your love is not important.

What is important is that love is there, beating, pounding, crashing against the inner walls of our bodies, and ricocheting out of us and into the universe.

Tonight my two-year-old pointed to a star during our walk and exclaimed, "There's Papa!"

"Yes, Sweetie," I said. "That's Papa. Papa is all around us."

Love crosses that gap between Earth and Heaven, between the tick of time and the band of eternity.

So my Valentine's List of Love this year stretches into a realm where time and space are dimensionless...

Love is...
1. remembering only happy memories.
2. talking to my father in the stars.
3. feeling my grandfather's hand on my hand many months after he passed away.
4. placing the palm of my hand on my belly in response to the phantom kicks.
5. watching my daughters run around while holding my heart in their hands.
6. forgiveness and compassion.
7. living in the flow of nature's energy and God's great spirit.
8. letting my father go peacefully even though inside I was shouting "Stay! Wake up! Don't go!"
9. creating a life only to learn it left this world before having a chance to be born and having the courage to create another life.
10. knowing what matters: the smiles, the cuddles, the caresses, the kisses, the everything that makes my family.

For in the end, love is... we are... all that matters is... family.

Thank you to Stasha's Monday Listicles for bringing me up to the surface to breathe. Some day I hope to come back to blogging to read more blogs, comment on more blogs, and write on my blog. But for now, these lists are all I can do.

My Bucket List

To see a World in a Grain of Sand

And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand,

And Eternity in an hour. 

By William Blake

My Bucket List of 10 Things I Want to See Happen Before I Die

1.  My three daughters become women.
2. The elimination of cancer-causing carcinogens.
3. Reforestation of barren lands across the globe.
4. Me keep a clean house for more than three days in a row.
5. A woman elected president of the United States.
6. An end to human trafficking.
7. Me lose the remaining 30 lbs. of the 60 I gained during my last pregnancy.
8. My husband and I growing old together.
9. The legalization of marriage between any two adults.
10. A home established for every homeless child.

Thanks to Stasha and her Monday Listicles for getting me back in my blogging saddle.
Thanks to Two Normal Moms for this week's timely topic.

Homecoming Moments

My Top Ten Favorite Moments

1

First Kiss

2

Waving to the Ship

3

Handing out American Flags

4

Finally Home

5

Seeing the Ship

6
Waiting, 35 Weeks Pregnant, With my Two Daughters

7
Going to the Pumpkin Patch

8
Watching my Husband with our Daughters

9

Relaxing and Breathing Again

10

Doing Normal Things, Like IHOP for Breakfast

New Mom Tips

In one month my baby girl will arrive!

Her two older sisters are now almost 4 1/2 and 2 1/2, so one would think that I could recall the newborn stage with ease; that isn't quite so.

I get a flash of memories here and there, but I still find myself overwhelmed with questions. So I've been trying to grab hold of those short clips of memories in hopes that I'll remember more...

Ten Tips for New Moms (and Moms Who Can't Quite Recall All Those Details)

1. Hunching over for a few days after a c-section is normal, but to heal well get up on your feet AND stay on top of the Motrin.

2. Wiping away the yellow poop with a very wet wash cloth is much easier than wipes, and how diaper rash doesn't happen when I use water in place of wipes.

3. Patience for the initial days when a newborn's latch has the strength of iron jaws, desperately sucking for the milk to come in, or when a newborn's latch is still a work-in-progress until he or she finally gets the hang of it.

4. The c-section incision is kind of icky, so try to keep it clean AND dry despite the "Mother's Apron."

5. The second best thing to the nipple: my pinky finger, often useful when driving in the car with a baby who won't stop crying.

6. Phantom kicks may occur within the belly after the baby is born; this always makes me wonder if another baby is still secretly in there.

7. A touch of olive oil rubbed into cradle cap softens it, so it can come off if you wish for it to.

8. Layers! We learned with our first baby that she slept so much better dressed in layers at night.

9. Sometimes a baby will cry, no matter what you do and how you try to stop it. Our first baby was colicky for 13 months, crying all day and night due to built up gas we think (she never would burp or spit up or fart). We tried everything and it stressed us out the entire time. Now I wish I had just tried to relax more and felt like it was okay to hold a crying baby, soothing her, but being okay that she was crying.

10. Soak up the skin-on-skin time. I got so much of it with my first baby, but when my second arrived it was hard to connect in that way. Still I loved holding her close to my body as much as possible.

Thanks to Cookie's Chronicles for a great topic this week!

And thank you to Stasha for her wonderful Monday Listicles, the one thing I find myself looking forward to doing on my blog these days as I near the end of my pregnancy and the end of this deployment. I am happy to say that when I post the next Monday Listicles my husband will finally be back home!!!

Unplugging...

Last week, in a town not so far north of where I live, a man shot to death eight people in a beauty salon and injured a few more; his motive: a custody dispute with his ex-wife over their 7 year old son. This is just one of many stories I come across on the news websites I frequent. It's depressing. I don't want to live in the dark, but I also wish I didn't have to read stories like these on any news website I go to. Almost daily now I find a story like this.

Would it be better to just unplug entirely from the Internet?

From this story my mind is questioning everything I've taken for granted: my innocence, the world in simpler times, my life before the Internet arrived.

While I am very grateful for computers and Internet, I struggle with the loss of so many things my daughters will never experience.

This topic comes up frequently on my blog, because I don't think I've ever quite adjusted to life back in North America after living in the rainforest without electricity, indoor plumbing and telephones. In those few short years I experienced a lifetime of simple and extraordinary joys.

William Blake said it best in the Auguries of Innocence:


To see a world in a grain of sand,
and a heaven in a wildflower;
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
and eternity in an hour.

That is exactly what I felt, what I lived every moment, in the rainforest.


In a world humming on social media, I realize how much I took for granted before the invention of the Internet...

1. The reward of working hard to answer a question on my own.
2. The skills I developed to communicate verbally.
3. The number of hours I spent running barefoot outside with children in our neighborhood.
4. The thrill of playing something as foreign as Donkey Kong on our Zenith TV.
5. The absence of the addiction to "hop online" to connect.
6. Using encyclopedias to study a foreign destination.
7. Using maps to calculate distance and time for a journey.
8. Writing artistic letters to family and friends and reading letters received.
9. Following weather patterns in the daily newspaper.
10. Pen pals with people living around the world.

I've come to accept that I will never be able to get into Twitter.

I know that Facebook and blogging have helped me stay connected to adults during my husband's deployment, and that I'll most likely pull away from them a bit upon his return home.

Not so long ago I joked with all of my friends that I would never get a cell phone. Actually I was quite serious. I said I would be 90 years old and be the only one without one. Then I met my husband and saw the value in getting a cell phone so I could talk with him when he was stationed in Japan and I was still in the U.S.

I still don't like having a cell phone. I often leave it off and forget about it.

When I took a blogging vacation for a year I still was online constantly, working on the digital magazine The Motherhood Muse, that I published for that year. But it was a break from this blog and I was fine with it.

So I am seriously thinking now about taking a break from the Internet entirely. Unplugging it completely.

Have you ever done this?

In order to ensure that I don't live in the dark, maybe I'll subscribe to the newspaper. We don't have cable, so maybe I'll call my parents daily to get the news. They'll weed out those depressing news clips.

But then I wouldn't have email, so I'd be forced to use my cell phone more. Hmm...

Just beginning to contemplate unplugging, seriously.

The Zook Book Nook Reading List

Some like a laugh, some like a cry, and some like a rush of adrenaline.

Here at the Zook Book Nook, I like a thought-provoking read.

So I present to you my "work-in-progress" list of my favorite literary works that have enriched my mind and soul. (I will keep adding to it over time.) They may have made me laugh, cry, or jump out of my chair, but they've also given me so many thoughts to reflect on and grow from.

I hope you'll find this list of insightful books useful on a cold winter day when snow-bound or on a hot summer day when home-bound in the AC.

Top Favorite Books at Zook Book Nook

1. ??? (I'm still undecided on my all-time favorite book; the rest of this list is in no particular order; however, I want to say this spot for my favorite book once I figure it out)
2. The Pillars of the Earth - by Ken Follett
3. World Without End - by Ken Follett
4. The Shack - by William P. Young
5. Memoirs of a Geisha - by Arthur Golden
6. Anna Karenina - by Leo Tolstoy
7. Fahrenheit 451 - by Ray Bradbury
8. The Hunger Games - by Suzanne Collins
9. Lord of the Flies - by William Golding
10. Life of Pi - by Yann Martel
11. The Time Traveler's Wife - by Audrey Niffenegger
12. The Lovely Bones - by Alice Sebold
13. The Glass Castle - by Jeannette Walls
14. The Namesake - by Jhumpa Lahiri
15. The Witch of Blackbird Pond - by Elizabeth George Speare
16. Island of the Blue Dolphins - by Scott O'Dell
17. to be continued

Staying Positive

My husband's ship is due to return before Halloween after being deployed for six and a half months.

With the excitement of his homecoming plus the approaching birth of our baby plus the anticipation of holiday season, one would think that I would find these last few weeks easy and joyful.

But they're not. They are the hardest weeks of the deployment.

I just really miss my husband a lot.

I've tried really hard to be strong during this deployment, even at the worst moments like when my girls and I were sick for a week straight throwing up during the night and all day long. We made it through those rough times, and I know we'll get through these final weeks.

But for the first time during the deployment I am finding myself in tears, wanting my husband home. Why is the end of deployment so difficult to get through? I can only guess it's because all of the emotions, all of the dreams, all of the plans, and all of the hopes I have inside of me are all mounting together.

My daughters keep saying every day how they are going to give their daddy so many hugs that he won't be able to put them down. I think they feel it, too.

So to give myself a pick-me-up today, I am going to create a list of the Top Ten Reasons to Stay Positive!

1. Weeks are mere seconds compared to months.
2. One can never have enough pumpkins or pumpkin seeds.
3. The vision of my husband's ship approaching from the horizon will make me feel giddy and tingly.
4. My girls twirl and shriek and go berserk every day when we talk about Daddy coming home.
5. Our baby girl will arrive less than one month after her daddy gets home.
6. My 33 week pregnant body is starting to finally cool off in this fall weather.
7. My parents are the most incredibly strong, supportive, and loving parents I could ever have.
8. My sisters make me smile every time I think of them.
9. My daughters finally sleeping in until 5:30a.m. for three days in a row now.
10. This:

and this

and this

and this

and this

and this

and this

and this

My 3-year-old's drawing of us on the day of Homecoming!

Back in Time

Thank you Stasha (@NorthWestMommy) for your wonderful Monday Listicles and Bits of Bee for choosing this week's awesome topic of ten things quotable!

I kind of, sort of, maybe miss teaching in a classroom.
I miss creating quizzes.
I miss taking my sword and slashing through incorrect answers.
I miss wondering what I did wrong as a teacher when students failed my quiz...

My sword these days is still my pen.
My quizzes these days challenge me more than they do my 4 and 2 year old daughters.
And I still wonder what I could do better so my children succeed and triumph over moments when meltdowns are bound to happen.

To relive my 'glory days' as a teacher, I have decided to create a quiz for you today using Monday Listicles topic of 10 Things Quotable!

Except I have a problem, my mind is a little spent these days.
So I'm going to take it easy and rely on the 80's. Those were easier days as I was only a child.

Do you remember those great feel-good movies from the 80's?
I do.

Just pulling up memories of E.T. and Sixteen Candles makes me feel like a kid again.

Well, let's see how you do on my quiz!

10 Summer Moments

I'm fortunate to live in a land of perpetual spring-summer.

The calendar tells me we are past the summer months; however, my daughters and I are still running through sprinklers, eating fresh watermelon on picnic blankets, and splashing on sunscreen daily.

Stasha's Monday Listicles this week is devoted to Summer 2011, so to recap June, July, and August I've put together my top 10 favorite summer moments from 2011!

1

Happy Birthday to My Little Two-Year-Old!!

2

Our puppy Willow has demolished all of my flowers in the backyard!

3

Flying to MN to be with family!

4

Grandma's Girls!

5

My Girl's First Medal: Awarded by Papa for excellence in reading!

6

I finally broke down and gave my 4-year-old her first hair cut!

7

Daily Floor Puzzles Wipe Us Out!

8

Happy 4th Birthday to My Mermaid SuperGirl!

9

A Walk on the Beach With Papa!

10

We're cheering the end of summer as Daddy's ship returns this fall!