Supermom

This photo is unrelated to today's short post -- it's just pretty, recognizable, vegan food: broccoli rabe, tomatoes, chick peas, pine nuts, sauteed. Yum -- this dish was made and consumed some time ago, but now I'm craving it again. I've only had a fabulous green juice today, and you've seen enough of those on AMLV+, hence the above photo.

I've been thinking about the roles we play. The role dearest to my heart -- the core of who I am -- is MOM. I've been doing a pretty good job of momming lately! No, not mamming (a recent online trend for breast cancer awareness -- google it if you've not seen it), momming. We get to an age where there's no point in being humble about what we do well. I'm tooting my own horn -- TOOT!

Being a parent of teens is no joke. I believe it is much harder now than it ever was "back in the day". I don't need to go into all the ways the world has changed since I was a teen, challenging my own sweet mom. As a mom, myself, I've made mistakes and I've had successes. I have no doubt there will be more of each but today, for my own brilliant, talented, multi-dimensional, out-of-the-box kids, I can see that I'm being a good mom. Ah, the Zen that brings. My husband is being a great Dad too, by the way -- thanks honey!

Yes, I'm tooting my horn, but I want to give credit where it's due -- my inspiration, always:

My own gorgeous, amazing mom, Jeanine McKenzie Allen. Following your example brings sunshine to my life, and I'm so grateful. I miss you, Mommy.

Winding Down

At what point does one decide the summer crop is over? I get a little crop like this every day now. You can see in the Chinese longbeans a certain madness now. Somersaulting, pinching and twisting, they are in a frenetic scramble as they sense the "last call" of the season.  I'm sort of loving the show, but it may be time to pull it all out, dry the pods that remain for a new crop in the spring, clean up the garden and condition the soil for the winter.

Indoors, here's a recent project (I LOVE the warm, soothing light of the very early morning):

Sprouts! My friend, Liat, loaned me this awesome hemp sprouting bag which works so, so much better for me than the tall jar with the rubber gasketed/screened lid. I am ordering one of these bags right away! I showed my daughter my sprouts and she asked, "But what do you eat them with?"

"My fingers!" I answered, demonstrating.

Another bonus is that Liat is the Mom of my daughter's best friend, so the sprouting bonanza provides fodder for hours of eye-rolling, teenage fun at our expense! It is such a joy to make those kids laugh.

Here's another way I eat my sprouts --

This was my breakfast this morning: sprouts (Ezekiel Bread), sprouts and hummus! Delish!

Why sprouts? Bioavailability! Simply put -- the sprouts are alive, with 100% of their nutrition intact, and have converted the starches/gluten of the seed/bean to the phytonutrients we all need for regeneration and fuel for our cells. I'm a newbie in this learning process, so I will share more when I know more.  I'm going to go throw a handful into the juicer now with some kale and maybe a pear. What do you do with your sprouts?

P.S. upon re-reading, I'm happily noticing the sprouts echo the acrobatics of the longbeans, all indeed "winding"!