My Baby's Middle Name is "Egg Roll"

       If you’ve seen the movie Practical Magic, you may recall the line, “You can’t practice witchcraft while you’re looking down your nose at it!”
         Well, I don’t practice witchcraft or anything like that, but I was preparing dinner today thinking that I’m sort of like this when it comes to food. Seriously, it is my least favorite thing to think about, especially given all of the new theories/truths coming out about nutrition. Anybody else think that Dr. Mercola must suffer from serious paranoia? Well, I am officially unsubscribing from his email chain because I am ever so tired of “Find out what toxin every breast cancer patient has in their blood!” Here is the kicker though, I care. I really do.

        I am married to probably the most outspoken, passionate person when it comes to speaking out against the health food movement. And the truth is, we really just disagree at which point you are caring for the temple, or neglecting it. First of all, there is me. I have been chronically tired for the last year. Like, 10 hours of sleep doesn’t do it for me. And every time I go out to eat there is a lingering fear that I will be sick on my stomach before I hit the door. It’s incredibly unsettling, especially amidst downtown San Francisco, “Pull over now, Paul!”

“Where? There is no where!”

One of the more frightening moments of my life. It’s been like this my entire life, actually. In January it all picked up a notch when my heart started beating erratically, and my liver enzymes were off just enough that they were testing me for things such as West Nile Virus, and Hepatitis. An even more frightening moment in my life, I might add. So I consented to making some changes. It has brought me resolve in my health, in fact, when I’m doing it right, I feel much better. It’s hard to know really to an extent because I am still tired, but I am first trimester pregnant too. The real change is that now that I’ve limited myself on sugar and gluten, I can tell when they are back in my diet. Oh, the horror! And the heartburn!

Then there is Paul, who treats himself to two sodas a week (at least) and as well as a Mcdonalds trip or two. And he’s perfectly healthy, surviving on far less sleep that I. Urrrgh. I do not think this is fair. And his face doesn’t break out either, to boot.

Some of you know, my Dad was adopted. That means I really know nothing about his heritage, and I can promise you that he isn’t Asian, but sometimes I wonder if maybe I could be a little bit? Every time I am pregnant I find myself craving egg rolls around the clock. I can remember when we lived with Paul’s best friend (a bachelor at the time) he would come home late and bring me a to-go box of egg rolls.

*Hallelujah Chorus Sounds*

Well, now I have two kids. I don’t stop by restaurants too often and we have no room for a bachelor roommate. So it happened, just once at first. I went by Jack in the Box and got one. And then two days later, I bought three. And I felt like crap, ok. I paid the price. So yesterday when I woke up and thought, If I don’t get an egg roll today, I will kill, and I remembered that this is what the food movement is about to me, it’s finding something you like and figuring out how to do it better. How to do it where you know the ingredients and how your body will respond to them.

So I set out to make my own egg rolls, “healthy ones.” I soaked some organic whole wheat flour.
 I watched Sonora cry at my feet to be held.

I gave Sonora some popcorn to distract her from wanting to be held (popcorn that I popped with coconut oil and drizzled organic butter on).

I grated cabbage and carrots, and mixed in garlic and ginger, and chicken. I rolled out my little egg roll wrappers that I attempted to make from scratch (and that was a horrible, unproductive experience but we won’t go there). And then I fried them up in coconut oil. Dinner was Asian stir fry, because I was meant to be Asian, I am telling you. I soaked my whole grain rice all day, cooked it around 4:00. While I was waiting on my egg roll dough to rest, I chopped up my veggies for the stir fry. Sonora wanted to be held badly at this point so I managed to knead my dough with her on my hip.

In between all of this I found time to make homemade lemonade that I am in the process of lacto-fermenting…hmm, three more days! And no, I don’t own a juicer, so yes, my right arm is feeling sort of numb right this second.

Back to dinner. Jake woke up and realized Daddy had left for work, so he had to mourn that disappointment a bit. I offered him a hug, but “no, Daaaaddy.”

So, oh well. Back to rolling egg roll wrappers and frying them, thinking, I could pay a dollar for someone else to do this for me.

It’s true though, I don’t know what’s in it. I know the oil isn’t good for me. But I am getting to a point, and I am so grateful, that I have sort of found a balance for my family. And don’t get me wrong, I want to build on it, but it feels good to know I can forget to soak my beans and not think I am a terrible mother. I was thinking today as I was making my crazy, high maintenance meal, hmm, I love my kids just as much now as I did last week when I poured a can of cream of mushroom soup over ½ a pound of hamburger and we ate it over white rice.

I get tired of being scared into the movement. I can remember one person in particular saying flat out, “sugar is the cause of all childhood cancer.” The minute I saw my husband giving my kids a soda I was secretly hyperventilating. Because I love my kids, I don’t want my negligence to be the cause of any demise. Which this is probably a good time to mention that the discussion of food has been one of the most divisive things to ever come up in my house. One time Paul didn’t come home from work and I casually thought to myself that if anything happened to him I would make sure my next husband would let me eat whatever I wanted. Hahahahahaha, I’m so clever. But the truth is, my relationship to my husband is bigger than all of this, and way more important and valuable to me. When I really think about it, I want to stay married to the guy. And I’ve tried to be careful about respecting his boundaries. (He would probably deny this claim)

I look down my nose at it all because it has hurt me. I have been excluded from get togethers of friends I am guessing because I might have brought potato salad laden with mayonnaise. There was also a time when a friend didn’t realize I fed my kids go-gurt and said outright she couldn’t understand parents who feed their kids junk like so. Or a friend whose family salary is three times more than my own recommended that I just straighten up my diet with everything organic. Or a friend that I am very aware of how they eat at their house offered us some food and it was box mix. Something they would never feed their family.  Or when a friend of mine that I trust called out a non-beleiver on her food habits, and I can't get her to come back to church.  I also had a friend who straight up said she wouldn’t feed her husband the “junk” I buy for my family.

It’s just hard, it is. But the reason I continue is because the people who have really taken me under their wing and chose to shepherd me in what I am learning are telling me, “take your time, one thing at a time, there has to be a balance,” and when I think that, I have peace.

(My "culture corner")

I am total “frenzy girl,” I get worked up an bent out of shape when I am worried. Being calm and collected is not my forte by any means….although Jesus is changing this in me. As I allow Him to. Anyway, I was speaking to a girl at the pregnancy center who asked me if I could help her understand what she should be eating. So I open up a booklet on the food pyramid and I’m thinking to myself, that lying government!, but I have to help her, and I'm going to send the booklet home with her.  I find out that although she loves fast food, she has taking a liking to tuna salad. So of course I mention that I make mine with olive oil, not mayo. And she looked so confused, “But I just love mayonnaise!” So I told her to eat what she could keep down. I mean, we’re talking about someone who just quit smoking, who regularly eats fast food, really, isn’t mayo the least of her worries? Well, some of you would probably answer no, but I just saw her concern for nutrition as a step up. And she can’t keep a lot of protein down, so I told her to throw some peanut butter into her diet, and eat oatmeal. (I’m thinking, oatmeal needs to be soaked!) But can you see where I’m getting at? I’m done freaking out about my food because you know what, in January I was eating Mcdonalds every week, easy. My kids were too. Although I did typically make nutritious dinners, well, now I am a lot more conscious about what goes into what I make. I am getting to a place where I don’t sit around and think about what a bad mom I am if I just can’t make something especially nutritious for dinner one night, or two nights, or three in a row. And I sure as heck don’t sit on a little pedestal in my kitchen when I have a productive night like tonight, thinking, I deserve the best Mom award, while pointing my nose down at all the people eating taquitos for dinner. Because I don’t care…because I do what I can, and especially am willing to work with what God provides me.

I hope that’s ok for me to share. I just really got to a point, my husband called it idol worship, I hardly think it got that far, but there was fear in my heart. And I don’t want it there, I can’t do this if any of it is birthed from fear. Wisdom, yes. Fear, no. So it is really unfortunate that all of the little voices telling me that sugar and wheat are eroding my body from the inside out just have to go, because if I’m doing one thing at a time, that just has to be good enough. Or I quit. 

So I have been thinking about why I have been working harder at feeding the family. It’s a little more money (which is a lot more money for us), and a lot more time. Definitely more dishes to do. Here is my kitchen after dinner:

Here is what comes to beckon me as soon as I try to clean my kitchen:

(She likes to be held while she takes her poops...moral support, or something)

So I abandon the kitchen and save it for when I'm really tired.  Because first, I am a Mom. Oh, look who feels perfectly fine now:

But I feel better health wise, and I am rarely getting sick now, which is amazing. I don't want to be the person where "food" is at the top of my interest list on facebook.  I want to do this without being annoying, going around telling people what they eat is going to kill them, and if they really love their children they’ll sell their nice things and buy organic food. Jesus said something like that, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t so we could have the money to purchase organic hay for livestock or whatever.  Guess what, even making basic, unprocessed foods is a stretch financially for my family.  And I'm glad to do it. 

I also decidd recently that I refuse to wear myself out over it, except when I hand squeeze 8 lemons because I know my kids will love me for it in a couple of days. Jake actually cried because I was making that instead of ginger ale. Those kinds of experiences bless me and give me the strength to continue. At the end of the day, my egg rolls were edible (no, I couldn‘t even bring myself to take a picture of them). Dinner was decent, but no one touched any of it, as you see. Don't worry, I'm no short order cook.

We all oo’ed and ah’ed over the cream cheese that resulted from the yogurt I drained for whey. Then we made toast and tried it. It was just fun.

We went over to visit Mommy’s plants and Jake gave them the daily inspection, “They are just too cute, Mommy.”  I am just enjoying myself, and you know, beyond that I probably will not be good for much.