Inspiration Video for Parents

Kids & Greens

Create a mouth-watering crisp green salad and set it on a plate before my children and they'll invariably push it to the very edges of the plate and ignore it.

Set out a tarp, one pot per kid, a big bucket of soil, seeds and water - and kids will spend an hour mixing up the soil and compost, poking seeds in, and sprinkling water to their hearts content! They'll delight in continuing to water, and watching daily for the first signs of life. They'll ooh and aah over the bright green shoots as they poke out of the dirt and run to check their progress every morning. Finally they'll watch carefully when you show them how to snap off a big juicy green leaf and take a bite and then try it for themselves. They'll marvel at how yummy it is and suddenly how much energy they have!

This was my experience planting spinach with a group of six 2-8 year olds. Yesterday each child harvested a couple leaves from the pots to add to our banana smoothie snack!

First Ever Raw Mom Summit

Interested in nutrition, pregnancy, childbirth, and parenting from natural, healthy and holistic perspectives? You'll absolutely want to check out the Raw Mom Summit starting online for free June 22nd.

Summit organizers, Shannon Leone (author of THE HEALTHY LUNCHBOX: Nutritious Meals Your Kids Won't Trade for a Lollipop!) and Tera Warner, (from www.rawmom.com) are teaming up to interview health, nutrition, and lifestyle leaders such as Susun Weed, Byron Katie, Jean Liedloff, Victoria Boutenko, David Wolfe, and many more.

I personally love getting free access to inspiring audio interviews to give me good ideas and keep me motivated, and connected. Check it out!

The Dirty Dozen & Clean 15

This past Spring the Environmental Working Group (EWG) released their latest Shopper's Guide to Pesticides.

You can find the full list of 47 fruits and vegetables that they tested and ranked here.

"An EWG simulation of thousands of consumers eating high and low pesticide diets shows that people can lower their pesticide exposure by almost 80 percent by avoiding the top twelve most contaminated fruits and vegetables and eating the least contaminated instead. Eating the 12 most contaminated fruits and vegetables will expose a person to about 10 pesticides per day, on average. Eating the 15 least contaminated will expose a person to less than 2 pesticides per day. Less dramatic comparisons will produce less dramatic reductions, but without doubt using the Guide provides people with a way to make choices that lower pesticide exposure in the diet."

You Are Brilliant & the Earth is Hiring

Check out Paul Hawken's inspiring commencement speech at the University of Portland! The Yes Magazine website is also well worth your time.

Favorite quote - "Life is creating the conditions that are conducive to life inside you, just as in all of nature. Our innate nature is to create the conditions that are conducive to life. What I want you to imagine is that collectively humanity is evincing a deep innate wisdom in coming together to heal the wounds and insults of the past.

Lessons from the Compost Pile

Our family dog, Luna died at the beginning of the year. We knew the end was near the last few weeks of her life and each one of us grieved in our own way. My 9 year old son connected with Luna and me several times to cry and release his sadness. The day I took her to the vet for the last time both boys gave her a big hug and said their goodbyes.

This was my 3 year old's first experience with death and it took several weeks for him to come to his own understanding. The first few weeks after Luna died he continued to speak about her in the present tense and I would remind him that Luna had “died” and in various different ways try to convey that her body was no longer with us but her spirit was off living on another adventure. But it was clear he didn’t really get it.

One morning as we headed out the door he noticed that the pumpkin that had spent several months on the stoop was gone. I explained that it had started to rot and I’d thrown it in the compost pile. He wanted to know more so I explained that basically the pumpkin had died and was now spending time with the worms being broken down so that the seeds inside could get into the dirt and later this spring they would start to grow into another pumpkin vine and eventually grow more pumpkins. That sounded pretty fascinating so he tested out the idea as we drove through town. Looking out the window he asked about the things he saw,

“Look at the trees Mama, what happened to the leaves?”
“The leaves died and are now getting down into the ground and feeding the worms and making the soil healthy. Later the tree will grow new leaves.”

“Look at the ice Mama, what’s happening?”
“Yes, the ice is melting, changing back into water. It’s like its dieing and changing into another way of living.”

On and on he asked about the signs of death he saw out the window until he commented,
“Just like Luna.”
“Yes, just like Luna. Her body died but her spirit continues to live in another way.”

After testing the theory out with a few more questions he said,
“I think I too will die someday.”

He spoke so simply and clearly it caught me off guard. I looked back at him in the rear view mirror as he continued to look out the window completely open, content, and at peace with the concept. Nature in all her straightforward wisdom and closed loop systems had taught him about death free of cultural baggage and complex language. I think we'll take our big life questions outside sooner next time!

Healthy Banana Ice Cream

My youngest's favorite food related activity this week has been the creation of raw Banana Ice Cream. I give him a couple fresh bananas, a butter knife and cookie sheet. He goes to work slicing and arranging. When ready to his satisfaction he places the tray in the freezer and waits (this is the most difficult part). After the bananas are frozen we get out the juicer and he feeds the banana slices in to mush them up. Then the bowls come out for eating time! It's an easy snack activity for any child 3 and over. Here's a video from Raw Divas of another version that looks just as yummy and easy and a bit quicker.