The Middle of Now

  
   The first step to becoming self-sufficient is not a garden, solar panels, or a big plot of land in the country.  It's becoming debt free.  Because if you carry debt you will never truly be free. My husband and I have made the commitment to ourselves and our family to stop the cycle of debt.  We stopped using any and all credit cards and are following Dave Ramsey's plan of the 7 baby steps.  We have finally gotten to a point where we are not pulling money out of savings every month to catch the money left after our month. Every week or two Erik and I sit down and go over what's come out and what will be coming out soon. With the help of a tax return we were able to fund our starter emergency fund and pay off 2 cards and put a big chunk on the next card we are currently working on. We also have 2 Sallie Mae loans that are on the list.
   This has really put things into perspective for me. Looking at our fiances makes us realize that our next move won't be to a couple of acres in the country. It will probably be a house more in the suburbs with a big yard. Somewhere where I can learn more about gardening and raising chickens. See, Dave Ramsey's plan doesn't just show you how to get out of debt it shows you how to become more patients and to work for what you want. I know that one day we will have the property in the country. It most likely won't be for years but we are still young. Maybe we'll even be able to pay for that perfect piece of property out right, the way it was meant to be.
   Since we have started we both have felt a great sense of peace and feel more in control of our money and our lives.

The "garden" is coming in nicely.  Here are some pics of the area and what I have growing.

A couple of weeks ago I went to Joel Salatin's lecture.  My sister and I actually volunteered so we could get in for free. His lecture was awesome his first lecture was answering the question how can we feed the world and elitism. I video taped some of the lecture so you guys could have a taste. The second lecture was The Ecstasy of Being a Lunatic Farmer. Which he said he has a book coming out with the same name in September. (I'll try and get the other video up soon).

The Future of Food
1:28:54
The Future Of Food offers an in-depth investigation into the disturbing truth behind the unlabeled, patented, genetically engineered foods that have quietly filled U.S. grocery store shelves for the past decade.


Super Size Me
1:39:56 Rating : PG-13
Documentary filmmaker Morgan Spurlock puts his health on the line in this examination of the food industry.


The World According to Monsanto
1:48:57
On March 11 a new documentary was aired on French television - a documentary that Americans won’t ever see. The gigantic bio-tech corporation Monsanto is threatening to destroy the agricultural biodiversity which has served mankind for thousands of years.


I'll add more as I find them. If you know of any let me know.

Here is a little something that I've been making for breakfast a lot lately. It's called Shirred Eggs. I got the idea from a little book called The Bad-For-You Cookbook. I had to improve on it some what and as far as I know it's not their original recipe so I feel comfortable enough sharing it with you.
It's super simple to make and tasty too.

Ingredients:
You will need ramekins for this dish.
Butter
Eggs (as many as you want to serve)
Salt
1 Tbs Heavy cream per egg

Heat your oven to 350 degrees. Butter your ramekins. Crack one egg into each ramekin. Salt the egg. Then dribble one tablespoon of heavy cream over the egg. Use a pie tin or shallow pan to create a water bath so the eggs don't become over done. Bake the eggs between 13-20 minutes depending on how you like your eggs.
It's literally that easy. I like mine runny (we call them dippy eggs) because I like to dip buttered toast into them. Yummy!

I made my first chicken stock, or bone broth as the traditional food experts would say.  A few month ago the doctors at the clinic I work for bought 2 copies of Nourishing Traditions for our lending library.  I brought it home and read it all the way through.  After that we made a few minor but important changes, we replaced our cheap margarine with cheap butter, got rid of all pop (soda) in the house, and cut back on our sugar intake a lot.  I brought the book back to the clinic and hoped that someday soon we would be able to pursue other aspects of a traditional diet like raw milk, grass fed/pastured animals and fermented foods.
Shortly after that the restaurant that my husband had been working for closed. We ended going on to WIC.  What a sad disappointment WIC is.  Knowing what I know now I hate even buying the stuff.  Even though they've added a lot of things including fruits and vegetables (organic included) and bread, all the bread they have chosen has high fructose corn syrup in them, and they changed what type of milk you can get from 2%, 1%, and skim to just 1% and skim. I really debate even using the WIC checks for the milk and just buying whole milk myself, unfortunately raw milk is out of the question right now even though I found a supplier. 
So some of the things that we just started doing is buying organic eggs from local neighbors (we can get these through WIC too), I just started making water kefir (were on our third batch), and just today I made the chicken stock.  I used the bones from a chicken I roasted last night and an uncooked chicken, sadly they were just store bought chickens so they aren't going to be as nourishing as if they were pastured chicken but you've got to start some where.
So begins my journey of discovering whole real foods.