Embracing the goodness that our CSA has to offer!

I've really thought a lot about this food month the past few days and I've decided to make a few changes. I hope this doesn't come across like a cop out... I truly do believe I could live off 7 foods only for a month. Each day has gotten easier. I've grown a new appreciation for foods in their natural state - raw or cooked without any additives. I have a new found love for and look forward to my daily sweet potato (never thought I'd write that sentence... lol... not that I don't like sweet potatoes normally, but it just sounds odd!). My dilemma lies in that in addition to simplifying my food for a month and eliminating excess, I don't want to create more waste or stress for the family.

My family is part of a CSA, which stands for community shared agriculture. We joined Avalon Acres towards the end of this summer and have LOVED it! Each week we get a box of fresh produce, two meats and dozen and a half eggs. Everything is fresh, local, free range, and most of it is organic as well. Each week is a surprise as far as what we will get, but that's been part of the fun! It's forced us into meal planning, which has kept us organized, cut down on trips to the grocery store, helped us use up our pantry as we use what we have to make meals, eat healthier and support a local business. It doesn't get much better than that! We also get to recycle all of our produce, meat, and egg packaging back to the company every week when we pick up our new box, so it's been great for the environment too! That's been a big change for us and it's been a very positive change.

Without knowing what will be in my box every week until we get it, I picked my 7 items in hopes that we'd get some in our box, but I still have to buy a lot of extras (and most have been from the grocery store, and while even though I can and did get organic there... I'd rather be supporting my local farmers) and cook 2 meals for the family and try not to cross "contaminate" seasonings (see last night's butter fiasco... lol). So that's been difficult and has created more waste, which is obviously not the point of this exercise!

So I'm making some changes for this month! I've already bought my 7 ingredients for this week, so I'm going to go ahead and finish that out. Here's what I'm going to do:

Initial fast for 7 days of eating only 7 ingredients (I just finished day 3)

For the remainder of the month, I'll make the most of our CSA and eliminate 7 areas of food related excess instead of limiting myself to 7 ingredients only.

1. No caffeine (water only to drink)
2. No alcohol
3. No sweets or desserts (not even homemade*)
4. No eating out or take out (only homemade meals or raw foods) 
5. Nothing fat free or sugar free (keep to "whole" foods) 
6. Eating out of our CSA box as much as possible and staying away from processed foods as much as possible
 7. No food after 8 pm (goodbye unnecessary late night snacking!)

*homemade breads and muffins are ok, just no cookies/cakes/pies/candy/etc. 

I think these 7 areas will still eliminate a lot of our food excess and also help address some bad habits, while still making the most use of our CSA commitment and not creating extra waste. This is a good compromise for our family and since it's a little less constricting. I think this is something that all 5 of us can get on board with for the most part, which will be even more exciting since we can make a bigger impact as all 5 of us doing this together!

So I'm excited for the next few weeks to come after this. I'm looking forward to my homemade carrot nut bread again and meals with farm fresh veggies and meat.  I've been missing out big time this week, John made these awesome homemade meatballs that we all love with Avalon Acres ground beef for him and the kids tonight and I was sad not to partake! But it's been a great learning experience so far too. It's made me think of the poor and hungry a lot more, to pray for them, and I've been super sensitive for any wasted food so I've been trying to make sure the kids eat as much of their meals as possible and save stuff for the next meal if they reject it, instead of throwing it out. 

I'm still nursing a pretty bad head cold over here, so I would love and appreciate any prayers for health right now.  I'm really hoping to feel better this weekend because I've got my first service project for this month coming up on Saturday, where I'll be getting together with a bunch of people from our church, Life Point, for their annual Sew Much More event, a mission project where everyone works together to sew 250 reversible dresses in one day for orphans in Brazil, Mexico and Haiti. I'm super excited about it since I can use a talent that God has blessed me with to help others! I recently did another event like this, a Sewing Bee with Heart of Worship Ministries to sew up uniforms for the new preschool and Kindergarteners starting at their school in Haiti this fall. It was a great day and lots of fun!