Thursday, February 14, 2008

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

I got the name wrong in a previous post; funny how after reading 200 pages the NAME of the book wasn't on my tongue. Anyway, it's "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle" by Barbara Kingsolver with Steven L. Hopp (her husband) and Camille Kingsolver (her daughter), and I just finished it.

I'm mulling it over, but I am determined to make some changes in my life.

For one, I can't wait to get to the farmer's market this weekend.

For another, I bought some little blueberry bushes to plant in our yard, and Ryan and I are actually talking about turning part of the front yard (seems crazy to have it in the front, but that's where the most sunlight is) into a small vegetable garden, in addition to planting zuchinni and pumpkins in the back yard's raised bed.

And I'll throw this out in internet land: does anyone have a bread machine languishing in their cupboard, closet, basement or garage? I'm intrigued to try using one for a while....whole grain bread with flax seed is on my list. Anyone? I'm not willing to buy one until I've figured out if it's something I'd use a lot...plus, I'm trying to buy less stuff! Anyway, anyone know where I can getg a used one? Anyone have one to give away or loan out?

I'm still not going to raise my own poultry. No way. And I'm going to keep drinking coffee. Organic bananas are so tasty, and Tessa and I really adore mangoes...

But I think I've committed to spending blackberry season picking buckets of beautiful berries and turning some into jam and freezing some. And I'm thinking of taking a trip to a strawberry farm to do that, too.

I swore off partially hydrogenated oils, food coloring, high fructose corn syrup, soda a long time ago. I seek out organic eggs, free range/organic chicken, meat raised without hormones, organic produce. I aim for whole grains. I'm on the right track, I know that. I feel certain of it, and I'm looking forward to the next parts of this adventure.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

You might be able to find a bread maker on freecycle.com (I think that is what it is called, Haakon always does the tech part for me). It's a great service for people who are interested in reusing instead of buying new. Glad you liked "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle". It really made me think too. I just finished "In Defense of Food" which is quite good as well. Though I might ponder the one before jumping straight into another similar book. Thanks for all your thoughts! It is good to hear others who are on a similar track.