Is it really March?  Does that mean the snow might melt off sometime??  There are only twenty days until spring and I am itching for the seasons to change. Monday – Loaded baked sweet potatoes Tuesday – dinner at Columbus Home & Garden Show or nachos at home Wednesday – spaghetti and meatballs (bison!  from the Columbus Winter Farmer’s Market!) with Alex’s family Thursday – chili corn pie and salad with friends Friday – fish [...]

This week we cooked two black bean dishes at the Kids Cook class.  Beans of all kinds are high in fiber and protein.  The following two recipes are easy for kids to make and enjoy! Black Bean Salsa 1 avacado, chopped into half inch pieces 1 green onion, chopped 1 red pepper, chopped into small dice 1 clove garlic, chopped 1 16 ounce can black beans, drained, or 2 cups cooked from dry beans 1 [...]

I recently spoke at the Ohio Ecological Food and Farming Association (OEFFA) on the topic of Urban Gardening.  Approximately fifty attendees discussed their urban gardening challenges and together we brainstormed solutions. I transformed my handout for the workshop into a guest post for Kimberly Hartke, writer of Hartke is Online and publicist for the Weston A. Price Foundation.  My Tips for Gardening in Small Spaces with lots of pictures is over at her site. I [...]

When I was twelve, my family hosted a Japanese girl named Megumi for one month during the summer through the Ohio 4-H International Program.  Hosting challenged us all to communicate differently, show off our community, and open our hearts to new relationships.  We learned so much about ourselves and had so much fun that the next year, my parents agreed to host a high school girl, Miyuki, for the whole year. Miyuki became a lifelong [...]

“We live in an amazing country where it’s perfectly legal to feed your kids twinkies, hoho cakes, and mountain dew, but raw milk, that’s dangerous.”  So began Joel Salatin’s Saturday keynote address to the Ohio Ecological Food and Farming Association annual conference on February 13, 2010.  I attended the talk.  The writing below is my best effort to impartially summarize Salatin’s opinions as he shared them. Joel Salatin is the farmer behind Polyface Farms, a [...]

We’re switching things up a little bit here because Lil wanted to do a video yesterday afternoon.  Here she is to tell you about our Mindful Menu of the week! Monday – Lil is eating with my Mom, Alex and I are FEASTing at Haiku.  Perhaps I’ll earn a $1000 grant for a play with your food workshop! Tuesday – Roasted chicken and alphabet vegetable soup Wednesday – Lentil spaetzle and chard -  Columbus Foodie [...]

From February 27 – March 7, the Ohio Expo Center will host the 2010 Central Ohio Home & Garden Show.  With an Art in Bloom theme, the show will feature living landscapes, works of art, and appearances by home and garden celebrities.   Mary Alice Yeskey and Geof Manthorne of Ace of Cakes, Jamie Durie, star of HGTV’s The Outdoor Room, and HGTV’s Designed to Sell host Shane Tallant have scheduled events. While I have [...]