My Daily Rind Journey of a Mom: Reflections on Health, Unschooling, and Love.

So there I was in the grocery store in Bellingham, WA last week minding my own business, picking out a gorgeous head of Russian kale. A woman walked up to me and asked me “What do you do with that kale? I have it coming up in my garden, but don’t know what to do with it.”

I shared that I was buying it to make kale chips in my dehydrator, but that usually I use it in green smoothies. She was intrigued and had more questions. We started talking for a very long time. She revealed that she had actually been to a raw food preparation class (taught by a woman named Shauna!), but hadn’t really started doing it for herself. As the soulful talk continued, spirit took over. She became tearful because she knew that she wasn’t living the life she is meant to live. She is overweight and obviously unhappy. She doesn’t have any health conditions yet, but is setting herself up for them. I embraced her and told her that her inner knowing is calling her home.

You see, when we are ready, spirit guides us to people and experiences that will innocently touch our hearts and propel us forward. Living a heart-centered life means that we are open to this flow. We welcome it.

That beautiful woman gave me a gift that day too. It is always mutual. By sharing my truth with her, I got to reaffirm my commitment to my path. I really give thanks to her and to spirit for always having a guiding hand in all of our simplest actions.

After all, I was only buying kale.

I wrote about how to make them a while back on a blog post at got greens? revolution.

We always have these on hand. They are so versatile. You can flavor them any way you want. Some examples of ones we’ve done are: italian with oregano, basil, sundried tomato; indian with curry spices; mexican with jalapeno and south of the border seasonings. The sky’s the limit.

You can snack on them all day as is or add salsa, sliced avocado, tomato, hummus dip, or even cheese like my stepdad does.

You don’t have to be a raw vegan to love these crackers. You’ll feel good about your kids munching these between meals.

For dinner tonight, we whipped up a cashew-sundried tomato cream and a “cheezy pesto” with slices of yellow bell, tomato and cucumber. We piled all of it high onto the thick crackers and enjoyed a fulfilling meal.

So tell me, what are you crackers for?

In Joy,
Shawna

I’ve been out of touch on here while on vacation, but I’m back home now and full of ideas, experiences, ponderings, insights…

The first thing I want to share is that I have succeeded in staying 100% raw vegan while on my travels. It was easy, actually. I shared with you the triggers and my way of handling them, and it worked for me this week.

I’m feeling icky, actually, despite eating raw and healthy. I’ve got a splitting headache and low energy. My bowels have been raging a revolution for about a week. I passed something that looked like a tapeworm early this week. I wonder…

I’m sticking with this wholeheartedly, however. It’s worth it to clean my Self out and be renewed. Oh, and I’m going to start posting what I eat again so that I can keep track and it may be helpful for you on your journey.

And now for something completely different…

Last night at 3:30 a.m., my sweetie was awoken by a ruckus outside. He got up to find a HUGE black bear rifling through our trash. He got me up and then we got our son to watch the debacle. It was exciting and frightening too. That bear went to our neighbor’s house after we scared it off and tried to get INTO their house. His nose prints were on every single window on the ground floor. And every screen was torn through, including the one into their son’s bedroom. He destroyed their chicken coop.

I feel so sad for this bear. Our neighbor got a nuisance tag to be able to shoot it. He’s going to wait up all night with his shotgun “every night watching movies until he gets it”. I know the bear will be back tonight. My sweetie and I are sending up a prayer that he’ll just head back into the high mountains from whence he came. But trash is yummy, so I think he’ll be dead tonight.

Speaking of trash…As I was cleaning up 4 cans worth of trash at 4:00 a.m., I was paying attention to our trash. Funny how the ego can be stroked by something as silly as garbage. But mine was. I was proud that we recycle and compost. I was proud that you won’t find old meat bones or food packaging of any kind. But then…I felt guilty! We can do better. There were a lot of disposable diapers and pieces of plastic wrap (you know, for leftovers). We used to cloth diaper, but stopped about 2 years ago because of rash problems. Anyway, I think we can do better. Scraping up smelly trash in the wee hours was a consciousness raising activity.

On that note, here’s what I’ve eaten today (dinner is still to come and probably 1 or 2 more snacks):

• peach
• apple
• 1 piece dried pineapple
• 1 medjool date
• large salad with greens, 2 roma toms, 1 1/2 mushroom, 1 T yellow bell, dressing of sesame oil, Braggs, and apple cider vinegar.

Thanks for stopping by.

Bear Hugs,
Shawna