Of Sprouts, Swearing, and Strawberries

There is absolutely nothing tying these subject together, other than all of them starting with S. Also, every time I re-read my posts, I cringe. Just remember that this blog is not supposed to be a great literary work -- it's a place for me to brain dump and write whatever is going through my mind at that moment! So if it seems stream-of-conscious, that's why.

Sprouts
I made French Garden sprouts this week. This is a combination of clover, arugula, cress, radish, fenugreek, and dill. Yummy! Actually, it tastes pretty much the same as plain alfalfa sprouts. Maybe if I actually pay attention when I'm eating them I could tell the difference. This jar started out with 2 tablespoons of seeds, and now these are packed in here tightly:




Swearing
I swear now. Really! Are you shocked? I started swearing, oh, probably about 2 years ago. My kids learned how to swear from watching Back to the Future (and from The Ex), and I started copying them. Yes, I am so mature that I copied 3 and 5 year olds. I am not sure if I was trying to shock them, or be funny, or what. But anyway, it became a habit, and now I swear sometimes. Never at work, never outside the house. And only when I'm angry. I figure I'm at a tipping point now. I can either move on to hard-core swearing, and start swearing all the time and add in the 'F' word, or I can stop swearing. I think I'm going to stop. It's just not me. It definitely comes naturally, but it just isn't how I want to sound. My goal is to sound gentle, loving, and kind, and swearing doesn't exactly do that for me.

Strawberries
I went to the grocery store and saw strawberries on sale for $1/pound. Usually if they're that cheap, you know they're going to be disgusting, but these smelled good, so I thought they might be OK. I use frozen strawberries in the Hot Pink Smoothies that I sometimes eat for breakfast. They would also work well in Green Smoothies. Frozen strawberries are regularly $3.49 for 12-14 ounces, so if the bet worked, I would save $$$$$.

First I washed 4 pounds of strawberries in the sink. I cropped out the timestamp on this picture so that you wouldn't know I was doing this at 2 in the morning. Oops.


Then I cut the tops off and put them on a cookie sheet:


Then I carefully stuffed them into the freezer, hoping that they wouldn't come crashing down the next time I opened it:


Freezer commentary: There's butter in the back - it was on sale for $1.58/pound this week. In the lower left corner is the frozen yogurt the kids chose. I said they could choose ANY ice cream. ANYTHING. And they chose that. Gross. I am obviously not raising them well. On the bottom, next to the ice cream is some asparagus that I got on sale LAST OCTOBER, whoops. Next to that is some bread crusts for making bread crumbs. On the right is some chicken. Everything else is fruit or vegetables. I bought a couple 1/2 bushel boxes of peaches over the past 3 weeks and those are in there.

The next morning, I put the strawberries into freezer baggies. I realized that since I am going to be using these for smoothies, I didn't have to worry about cutting the tops off - that saved a TON of time. I was running out of room in the freezer by the time I got to the last 10 pounds, so I streamlined the process even more and skipped the tray. After washing the strawberries, I put them straight into the baggies and into the freezer. They got all frosty, but oh well. Hopefully that doesn't ruin them.

And here's the freezer once I had added about 27 pounds of strawberries:



The bag on the top center is cubes of coconut liquid. The hot pink smoothie calls for the liquid from 1 fresh young coconut, but if I buy a whole box, I never use them before they rot, so I process them all at once and freeze the liquid in ice cube trays. I freeze the flesh in baggies and use it to make the most delicious vegan chocolate pudding ever.

This morning I had some of the strawberries in a hot pink smoothie. They smelled really gross when I opened the bag, but the smoothie was OK.

Oh, and Clothes
My outfit for the day. My posture looks so strange in these pictures. I am sure it is because my kids hold the camera really weird. Yeah, that's it. I actually wore these heels all day and didn't die. Mostly. My legs felt like they were broken because of the hike, but the heels themselves were OK.