It's a tough life for a pet

So, here's what I think my cat has been saying to me lately:
"Mom, mom, mom, mom, mom I want to go outside. Mom, let me go outside. Please, please, please?" I let cat outside. "Yay! I'm outside! I'm...wait. I'm outside. This is not the glorious outsideness that I wanted. Mom, let me in. Please, please, let me in. Mom!" I let cat inside. "Oh, well, now I'm inside and...and it's the same as it was before. Um, can I try outside again? Mom? Mom? Prrretty please? Mom? Outside?"
Thanks to a video that Drew showed us a while ago, we determined that our cat must be part Russian Blue. He's the same beautiful steely gray (with a white belly, paws, and one adorable white mark on his upper lip, so he can't be pure), he has the same smiling, regal face, and the smarts. But he's mixed with something else. Something loud. Because he's always chatting, scolding, and questioning. He can't seem to rub affectionately unless he's also saying something to me, and only stops chatting when he's purring.
He also very sweetly and lovingly throws a wrench into most of my plans to reduce pet waste. The dog will eat anything set before her (and a lot of things you think are out of the way, like butter on the table or my lunch on the counter) but especially loves the "treats" we giver her: salmon skins and leftovers, pork fat trimmed from our chops, a little bit of moose here and there, etc. The cat HATES all of that. I try to give him salmon and he sniffs it, then shakes his head as if to remove the smell from his nose. Cooked, raw, it doesn't matter. He wants his kibbles, he wants his canned food, and that's it.
I've tried any number of different cat litters for him, but he wants the processed clay litter and nothing else. He hated both the wood chip litter and the old newspaper litter because they didn't clump and he's too fastidious to appreciate anything less. Even if the box gets cleaned out every day, he knows it was there, and it didn't clump and he won't have anything to do with it. (We can always tell he's unhappy with his litter box because he pees in the bathtub. I don't know why, since that's also his preferred source of drinking water, but I won't complain since it's super easy to clean up.) So I end up buying what is essentially the junk food of pet products--kibble, litter with I-don't-know-what mixed in it, and canned food. These things produce a lot of garbage, and aren't good for him. (If you think pet food is good, read the book "Pet Food Nation" and it'll make you think long and hard about what you give your animals. I've certainly limited their kibbles now, although I haven't quite gotten up the will to cook all of their food myself.)
One of the defining characteristics of the Russian Blue, even more than other cat breeds, is that they don't like their home environment to change. It takes him a few days to adjust to anything new or different that we might bring into the house. (And may God help us when we start getting rid of our crappy furniture. Or move.) So I'm sure that part of it, for the litter at least, is a resistance to change. We didn't start him on the more environmentally friendly litter from the beginning, so he doesn't like that it's new and strange. He will accept it if we mix it in with the crappy stuff, but I'm not sure if he'll ever let us switch to it entirely.

So the point of all of this is, if anyone has any suggestions about how to deal with a difficult cat, I'd love to hear them. This is the first cat I've ever been privileged to have, so I'm in new territory. It's easy enough to reduce the dog's minimal amount of waste. As it stands, the cat is one of the biggest garbage producers in the house! Between kibble bags, cans, litter and the bags we use to clean out the box, he's quite a messy kitty.

Putting my house in order

About a month ago, Shane and I started doing a workout program. (Insanity, if you must know.) A few days into it, I whined, "But I don't wanna! I'm sore!" Shane answered over his shoulder, "You have a wedding to get ready for." I just stared at him, open-mouthed, in shock for a moment. (Was he seriously trying to say that I needed to lose weight for our wedding?!) When he saw my expression he quickly added, "I do too! I just mean, you know, motivation...." Ah. Well, in some ways he's right. When I'm working out and I just don't want to keep going, my engagement ring will often catch my eye. But what I'm thinking about when I see it is not my wedding (although now that I have my dress, that does enter my thoughts!) so much as it is my marriage. I want to start our life together from a good place, and being fit is part of that. In one of the weddings we went to last summer, the officiant pointed out that, when you're married, you're not taking care of yourself just for yourself anymore. You're doing it for the other person as well, so that they don't have to worry about you, so they're not burdened with taking care of you, and so that they can look forward to a long and healthy life with you. That really struck me.
I think that's one of the main reasons I'm challenging myself this way. For one thing, it's simply healthier to eat good, local foods. We do eat far, far more vegetables when they're local because they actually taste good. And they certainly have more nutrients (they haven't lost most of them during shipping) and we're not consuming all of the pesticides on so-called "conventional" produce. (A term I hate--it's only been the convention for the last 60 years or so to spray them down with chemicals. For the first 60,000 years of agriculture, natural methods of pest and weed control were the norm.)
It's also better for the family we want to have one day. Not only are we making ourselves healthier before having kids, but we're setting ourselves up for a lifetime of good habits. After all, if we can't prioritize health and fitness now, while we're young and relatively unencumbered, how will we ever manage it when we do have kids? And what kind of example would that be setting for them? The old "do as I say and not as I do" doesn't actually work. Kids are smart, but they need to have good examples to follow. (Some of this also applies to the dog and her health--if I don't take her for a walk/run, who will? And if I don't, what impact does that lost walk have on her health? When she--gulp--dies, I don't want to be left regretting all the walks I didn't take with her.)
By budgeting ourselves like this, I'm also ensuring that we're starting our marriage from a solid financial base. We're both savers, so that's not our problem. (Our one splurge does tend to be good food!) But it is tough while Shane's out of work and commodities like food and gas ($4.13 at the moment) are so expensive. I just want to give us that extra little push to make sure we don't run up the debt that so many people have. How can you truly live a full, happy life with huge debt hanging over your head? And I always end up wondering, what on earth do these people spend all that money on?
We've been through poorer than this, so we know how to scrimp. I know money trouble can be something that puts a major strain on relationships, but this right now isn't the worst for us. When we lived in our dry cabin, we were living on 2 part-time student salaries (minimum wage). We were able to joke that our theme song was Bon Jovi's "Livin' on a Prayer". It can be tough on your relationship when you have to run out to the outhouse at -50 (especially when your partner can just pee off the porch), or when there's a pile of dishes that neither of you wants to wash by hand, but for the most part we didn't let it get to us. We joked about how in the future, we'd look back on that time as rather idyllic. (And we do miss parts of it--just not the dishes. We love our dishwasher!)
This new philosophy of mine is also a matter of what will make us happy in the long run. When we first got engaged, I poured through all the wedding magazines. But I gave them up after about 2 months because I realized that it's really just a big sham to make us buy more stuff. Is our marriage going to be any more solid just because we bought a monogrammed silver cake server for our wedding day? No. Most definitely it will not. It wouldn't even add to the enjoyment of the big day itself because, who cares about the cake server? (I'll be too focused on the cake!) The same goes for most of the ideas in those magazines. (When "budget" hotels for your honeymoon are $300/night....) I've been looking around our house with the same eye, now. If we don't use it, if it doesn't bring some measure of joy to our house, it's gone. I'll either donate it to the Rescue Mission or to the thrift store. We don't need to be uber-consumers to have a life filled with joy, and I'm finding that we're much happier when we have less junk and clutter keeping us from the things we really do enjoy.
I'd rather focus on the things that truly matter, and how much stuff we own is not one of them. Where our food is coming from and how it impacts our health? To me, that is worth my time as much as exercising is. I think I'll go take the dog for a walk. :)

P.S. We start month 2 of Insanity tomorrow (in other words, brutal hour-long workouts), and we're not looking forward to it. Oh, the hurt!

Green idea of the day

We go through a lot of milk in our house. I mean, a lot. 3-4 gallons for the three of us. (A little less now that we're not making hot chocolate every time we come in out of the cold. ;) But it always comes in plastic jugs around here. (To buy the paper half gallons would be roughly twice as expensive.) And I hate knowing that we're contributing so much waste through a single-use plastic container like that! So, I wrote to one of the local dairies, the Matanuska Creamery. I explained that I think they would benefit from a sort of dairy CSA, and why I think this.
First of all, a lot of the breweries in the state have growlers, glass jugs that the customer pays for once and can refill as desired. Obviously it wouldn't work quite so well to have the customer make a trip to the dairy every time they want milk, but I think the same principle can be applied. Have the dairy customers pay a small fee for the glass growlers, and then have a set order in every week that can be picked up at a set location (like HG Market), and the old growlers can be returned at the same time.
The dairy benefits because the customer would be completely loyal to their milk (why buy milk at the store, unless you absolutely have to, when you know you have better quality, local milk on a regular basis?) and through lower costs. I can't imagine it's cheap for them to go through all of those plastic jugs. Even if the glass ones cost more up-front, not only do you have the customer paying that fee but you then reduce the costs of operating the dairy. I think this would also bring the price of local milk down to make it more competitive with Outside milk. (As it stands, grocery stores take a loss here on milk shipped in from out of state because, essentially, they can. They make enough money from everything else in the store that they can take a hit on the shipping and storing costs of milk. Local dairies and businesses can't. Rather insidious, isn't it?)
The benefit to the customer would be lower costs, more regular supply (sometimes difficult around here--it either gets bought out to quickly or something like road closures prevents delivery), and of course less waste.
And for a pickup/dropoff point, HG Market and businesses like it would work very well. They would benefit from the increased exposure to their business and the increased traffic to their store.
What's better than a win-win-win? I'll let you know what they say when I get a response.

"It's been a long day and I'm tired, so I'm going home."

How did the day pass so quickly?
Shane and I realized that we had to go to the store for a couple of (non-food) items, so we biked to Fred Meyers. While we were there, I decided to pick up some Greek yogurt. I love yogurt, but there are no local producers. One of my friends has a recipe for how to make it in a crock pot (it does require a small amount of store-bought to start it, but makes a huge batch--would certainly cut down on my garbage) but we don't yet have a crock pot. (Does every couple count on their wedding registry as much as we are?) As soon as we get one, I'm going to start making my own yogurt. Because I eat way, way too much of it.
This time of year is funny. You'll never hear a local calling it spring, because it isn't. Spring is what happens in about a week, from the first touch of green on trees to full-blown leaf cover. (You think I'm exaggerating? I'm not. It's literally about a week.) This season is breakup. The snow is melting, slowly, and there are suddenly lakes everywhere, and rivers on the roads that are practically big enough for spawning salmon to swim up. It makes biking interesting, to say the least, since there are also big patches of ice and slush in the shade. This is the time of year when ski bums still have the skis in their vehicles, but you can also see boys playing football or throwing baseballs on any available stretch of brown grass. In the afternoons, it's not uncommon for people to be wearing t-shirts, even though it's about 40 degrees. Coming out of winter, that seems warm around here. Especially when the sun is shining.
The promise of summer is everywhere, and it's tantalizing. It's a conscious effort to remind myself that it's not here yet. The nights and mornings are still below freezing, which helps. It's really no surprise to me that this time of year tends to be harder on people than the winter. In the cold and dark months, you hunker down and endure because what else can you do? This tease of what's coming but isn't here yet, when you're so, so ready for it is worse than any of the cold.

This is also the only ugly season in Fairbanks. Not only is dirty, melting snow completely aesthetically unappealing, it reveals all the garbage that people have thrown into it over the winter. There is garbage everywhere. I don't think it's a coincidence that I started my personal campaign against waste during breakup because I'm shown daily exactly what I think is wrong with our current system. Why I think it's imperative for all of us to reduce the amount we discard. How can we not see that it affects all of us, and our home (Earth)?
It just makes me angry.
Moose roast for dinner tonight. So good! With potatoes, carrots and onions on the side. Mmmm. We also had people over for dinner, and I have a favor to ask. If you pray, please pray for our friends James and Lucy. They just found out that Baby-on-the-way has what's called Snowman heart. They have to go to Anchorage next week to see a specialist, and probably Baby will have to be taken for heart surgery as soon as she's born (in Anchorage, via C-section). They're staying upbeat ("At least we have insurance...") and both sets of grandparents have told them not to worry about the cost, but it's worrying. So please pray for them.

Lazy Saturday

So, I did something last night that I swore to you I wouldn't do. I made up my own recipe. For a little background, the last time I tried this, Shane took two bites before saying, "I'm making my own dinner." And I really couldn't blame him. It was pretty bad. Not awful, just not tasty. But it was my turn to cook last night, and we didn't have the ingredients for any of my recipes. So I decided to try it again. Here's what I came up with:
Chicken
Couscous
Boullion or chicken stock (to cook the couscous in)
Garlic
Green onions
Carrots
Basil
Dash of Allspice
I can't give you exact amounts, because I didn't use any measuring. About 2-3 halves of chicken breast, all the couscous we had left, 4 carrots, 2 cloves of garlic, 1 bunch of green onions, and basil and allspice to taste. (Not a lot of allspice--a little goes a long way.) This made enough for me and Shane to each have two bowls and Drew (who claims that couscous is "weird") had one. I liked it, but I was so nervous that Shane wouldn't. I asked him about eight times if he was sure he liked it, until he got his second bowl and I relaxed. He'd finish what he had to make me feel better, but he wouldn't take seconds if he didn't really like it.
With my focus on local, I have to talk about one of my favorite local bands. We saw them at the Pub last night. Steve Brown and the Bailers are AWESOME. Especially in a crowded Pub, dancing with your sweetie. Anyway, I really wanted to get some of their music but I hate buying CDs. Who actually uses the CD anymore? It just becomes another Thing in my house. So I figured I'd ask a friend whom I know owns their stuff, and then I'd just pay the band some money next time I saw them. For a lark, I looked on iTunes this morning and, ta-da! So check out Steve Brown and the Bailers. They're wonderful. Only one of their albums is on iTunes, but I'm hoping the second one will be up soon.
This morning for breakfast, I wanted pancakes. So I made this recipe for Zucchini Pancakes. So good! I substituted honey for the sugar. Shane was wary ("Zucchini bread pancakes? All right, but I'm making bacon, too.") but even he liked them. And it's a really good way of getting rid of our frozen, shredded zucchini. We also used the last of our maple syrup. From now on I'm getting birch syrup, our local version. Drew asked, "What's the difference?" My answer: one is made from birch, the other from maple. He rolled his eyes at me. Silly little brothers. The truth is, I've had some birch syrup, but not enough to be able to explain the taste difference.
Today was also a momentous day because it's the first time I've been able to bike this year. Yes, bike! Other than one large patch of ice and a bit of slush, most of the sidewalks were clear. It helps that it's sunny and gorgeous (37 degrees right now--I wore a tank top and light jacket). So I biked to HG Market. I've been so scared of the grain room, but I used the last of our whole wheat flour on the pancakes this morning and made myself go in there. I jammed the grinder on my first try and had to get help. Those guys who work there are so nice. Anyway, my total shopping there was a big jar of local honey ($35!!), 2 lbs of bulgar wheat, carrots, and asparagus! Shane and I both love asparagus, so the fact that it's in season here (at least for greenhouse growers) made me super happy. We'll have that tonight with the only meat I bought today: kebabs. My mouth is already watering.
The market didn't have milk today, or eggs. We've got 2 eggs left and 2 gallons of milk left. (We usually go through about 3 gallons/week.) So I'm sure I'll end up going back soon.
Also, I only have about $67 left of my budget to spend for this week, and we only have 2 meals planned (tonight and tomorrow). This could get rather interesting. I think we'll be raiding the freezer quite a bit and getting creative.

Good planets are hard to find.

I talked with Shane last night about my blog and the challenge I'm setting before us. For the most part, he was really supportive. When I mentioned the budget, his first comment was, "Not possible. Not with Alaska prices." It's true, food costs a lot up here. I mean a lot. And when I dug a little deeper, I found out that his main concern was beer. A 12-pack of beer he actually likes to drink (the Alaskan brewery just rolled out their summer variety, his favorite) is around $12-15. When you're looking at a $125/week food budget, that makes beer extremely expensive. So I exempted beer. Well, most beer. I don't drink beer, for one, so that's purely his expense. But I say "most" because I do use it for bread. Mmmm...beer bread. So that will be part of the budget.
He also made me think of how I'm going to budget this out. I think I'll just make a spreadsheet and enter our food expenses every week, then add it all up at the end of one year (so April 14th next year) and get the average. Some weeks we go to the store several times and spend a lot of money, other weeks we go once and spend less than $50. But knowing that I have this budget means that I'll be far more careful when I shop, too.
The final thing Shane was concerned about, since it truly affects him, was my waste reduction campaign. So I figure I should define what, exactly, I want to do. I should start by saying that Fairbanks is far behind the rest of the country when it comes to recycling. The University is the main place for people to recycle things, and for those not on campus that takes a serious effort. At our house I keep a box where we put our recyclable plastics (only #1) and cans. When it starts to get full, I drag them to work with me and toss them in the proper recycling bins. Plastic bags can be recycled at Fred Meyer's, but I'd much rather not use plastic in the first place.
In my mind, not all waste was created equal. If I can, I would love to completely eliminate plastic from our garbage can, and from most of our house too. It's unnatural and the plastic we've already put in the environment has done and will continue to do immeasurable damage to the planet. The toxins it will be leaching into the environment for years to come is our legacy to future generations, and it's despicable. I really don't think they'll thank us for it. So getting rid of plastic whenever possible is goal #1. I'll need Shane's help since he uses plastic bags for the kitty litter. I do have some biodegradable bags that I use in the bathroom trash bin, but I've heard mixed opinions about those and I'm not sure I want to use them so much. We do keep our old bags from things such as pet food (they're covered in plastic--so I need to figure out a good alternative to them, too) and the bulk flour I buy (paper bags, thankfully). Perhaps we can use those for kitty litter, and leave them in the garage until they get full.
Metals and paper are natural resources, so I don't see them as being as bad as plastic. This does not mean, however, that I'm not doing what I can to reduce them. I'm trying to reduce the amount of paper I get for things like bills (yay for online bill paying!) and junk mail. Even in packaging. I look at things now by how much waste they will produce, and then decide if it's something I really need. As I said above, I recycle our cans and whatever plastics are possible, but I feel that I could do better in reducing the amount of waste I purchase.
One thing I've started doing a lot more of is buying in bulk. I've always bought our white flour in bulk from the Alaska Feed Company (although not wheat flour--it has a much shorter shelf life), and things like dried cherries. But now cereals, all of our other dried fruits (which tends to be how we make it through the winter--you cannot imagine our joy when summer comes and we get fresh fruit!), nuts, and even pastas come out of the bulk area at Fred Meyer's. (Even better, HGMarket just announced that they now have local pasta! I'll check it out this weekend.) Instead of grabbing new plastic bags every time, I simply bring the ones I already had at home and reuse them. At the zero waste home, they have glass jars that they've had the market weigh and put a label with that weight on, but I don't have so many jars. At least not yet. Mostly I've been using mason jars from stuff Shane's mom has given us (canned salmon, cherries and pears she canned years ago) and other glass jars I've saved from products I've bought.
Bea from the ZWH also uses jars for buying meat, and I might actually buy some jars for that. We're not going to store all of our moose meat and salmon in jars (currently it's in plastic and paper), but for bought meat I don't see why it wouldn't work.
One thing we use far too much of are Ziploc bags. The way I've been reducing our wastefulness on that front so far is by washing them out and reusing them at least a couple of times. (The only time I don't do this is when they've had raw meat in them--another reason to switch to jars!) On average, they get used about 3-4 times before getting holes or just falling apart. But I'm hoping that we can even reduce the number of them that we use. I want to get a bread box soon (I found a beautiful bamboo one), and I keep mentioning those jars I need to get for meat. There's also a local business that sells stainless steel sandwich boxes, and I have a coupon for 15% off. I'll go there soon and get one or two of those.
One little thing I've done recently was found a place that sells loose-leaf tea. I'm addicted to tea. Generally I have at least three cups each work day. I've been dissatisfied with the little plastic packets my favorite black tea comes in, so I found a local business that sells organic, free-trade loose leaf tea. And it comes in a stainless steel container! I'll see if the woman who owns the store will buy those back for a few cents so that it gets re-used. If she can't buy them back (or even take them back), maybe she could just refill mine? I'll see. It's good tea, too. Speaking of which, I think I'll go have another cup. :)

How to get started?

This question always seems to be the problem; people want to make changes but starting can seem so daunting. I guess in my case it's a little easier because I've been starting to slowly make changes in my lifestyle for the last several years.
From the time I was 12 until last year, I didn't eat beef or pork. This started out as kind of a fad (I had friends who were doing the same thing), but as I grew older there were so many reasons (health and the environment being the two biggest) that I kept it going. When I read the book "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle" by Barbara Kingsolver, that was what made me decide that eating meat again wouldn't be such a bad idea. As long as it's local, without hormones, and pasture raised, I don't have a problem with it. (So many locavores and others will be apologetic about their meat eating, but I will stand firmly by my decision to eat meat.) Reading Michael Pollan's "The Omnivore's Dilemma" took away any doubts I had about the ethics of eating meat. (No matter what I eat, it's an act of killing. So I might as well not be so selective about what I kill and instead be thankful that I have food and for the life that was given to sustain mine.)
But the question of where to find locally raised meat in Fairbanks, of all places, stymied me. It was purely by chance that a friend on Facebook mentioned HomeGrown Market. So I looked at their FB page, and finally went to the store. I explained my recent decision in favor of meat to the man behind the counter, and how long it had been since I'd had a steak (over half my life!). He very kindly wrapped up a small portion of New York cut steak and gave it to me for free to try. (I also bought some chicken for dinner on that trip.)
Well, it was amazing and I haven't looked back since. We get almost all of our meat and eggs from them, which is based on availability and in some ways that's really nice. I'll see something in the counter or hear someone else ask for something and think, I haven't eaten that in a long time! What could I make with it? (This is why I made pot roast last week--it was amazing!) And by watching the FB sales, we can stock up on things while they're cheap.
The one thing I'm trying to convince Shane we absolutely need to start buying there is bacon. That's the one meat product we consistently get from the grocery store and it has to stop. It doesn't even taste as good! But HG bacon is expensive. So today, what's their sale item? Bacon. Shane's going to stock up for us. And if I can save money in other ways, I can convince Shane good bacon is worth the price.
I've been gardening for the last couple of summers, since we moved into our current apartment, and it's been hit or miss for me. The summer before last I had zucchini practically growing out of my ears. (Not uncommon for zucchini.) Last summer, not so much. (Luckily, I've shredded and frozen it so I still haven't had to buy zucchini for over 2 years now.) This year, for the first time, I started my own plants from seeds. Of course, all I got was squash (btw, I love squash) and promptly forgot to label any of them. So somewhere in my army of squash starts, I have 8 zucchini plants, at least 5 yellow summer squash, 6 pumpkins, and any number of winter squashes (I got a mix packet). I still need to start my tomatoes, because I really would like to can as much of my own tomato sauce as possible. I've never done that before, so you'll get to hear all about my adventures in canning. (The only thing I've canned, plum jam, I burnt my face with boiling water. This year, I'm getting actual canning tools.)
So, I said in my last post that my first thought was about everything that I don't have. So I want to make a list of some things that I do have. The first is meat. Lots and lots and lots of meat. Moose, to be more specific. We have a chest freezer for all the moose that we get each fall. Shane's family goes hunting and whoever gets moose shares it around. It's in steaks, roasts, sausage, and ground up so we use it in place of beef most of the time. (I was even eating moose before I decided to eat beef again.) We also have another resource most people would love to get their hands on: wild Alaskan salmon. And it's free. In fact, we give leftovers to the dog. (She gets really excited when we pull a fillet out of the freezer, because she knows it means she'll at least get the skin.) Salmon, here, is so plentiful that one type (pinks) are even known as dog fish because it's oilier and "fit only for the dogs". (If you ever buy canned salmon, that's what you're getting.)
I also have my garden, as I mentioned, and a soon-to-be-mother-in-law who gardens. The kindergartners in Soldotna go to her house to plant or dig potatoes, depending on the time of year. So we rarely buy potatoes. (And that practice will stop soon.) Or rhubarb (which I still need to bake up, since we have plenty of leftovers from two summers ago....)
Things I want to do: can and freeze more of our grown and local veggies and fruits for winter. I went through our blueberries way too fast this last winter, and a lot of things I never froze. I could easily freeze things like broccoli.
I need to rearrange my recipes (I say that as if they're in some kind of order right now; so not true) so that they're more seasonally friendly. Shane made salmon chowder the other night, which is both hearty and yummy, but we ended up buying potatoes because the ones in our garage have grown huge roots (I'll plant them) and we didn't want to deal with them. It would be a recipe much better for autumn and winter, when we have a ton of potatoes and no idea what to do with all of them. Other recipes are better for spring and I need to dig those out. Of course, I'm always looking for new recipes.
And I bake. A lot. Who needs boxed cake mixes, chalky cookies, and cardboard-y bread? I made four loaves of bread just last night, and had both of the guys hovering until the white bread was out of the oven. (I make wheat bread for myself.)
One last thing I don't have: I'm not a great cook. I bake really well, not so much with cooking. Most women on these blogs say that, and then come out with amazing recipes that they've created using only what's on hand. And I'm getting a little better about being able to do that (or at least stocking up on things that can be used in multiple dishes and then making all of them) but I have to have a base recipe. I don't create my own. So don't expect that from me. I'll pass along great recipes that I've found, and send you to the source. Probably, a lot of them will have to do with squash. :)
Oh, as one final strike to me, I have a picky eater. Shane loves some things, and is willing to try just about anything once, but he doesn't like a lot of the same things as me. I love butternut squash soup, and he says it's like eating baby food. I love sweets, he loves salt. He's so adventurous in so many ways, such a risk-taker, who would've thought I'm the more adventurous eater?
The farmer's market here opens May 7th and I'll be totally ready by then to see what they have to offer. Usually not much the first week, but probably I could at least stock up on some more plants, like herbs. I think I'll even get my own rhubarb plant this year.