Beginning

I'm a homemaker. It isn't glamorous or fast-paced, or even widely respected work, but I love it. My husband and I have been changing over to all-natural and organic food, personal products, and household items over the past several years, and we recently joined a co-op. I have been posting on facebook for a while and people seem to enjoy my food posts, particularly since we joined, I guess because I have embraced the challenge of planning and cooking a menu decided largely by what is in the weekly shipment from our friends at Nature's Garden Delivered.


If you have never been a member of a co-op, it can be an adjustment. My understanding is that we are particularly blessed with the group that we joined, since they allow us to set up guidelines about what we like and what we don't want to see in our basket. On Saturday we get an email from our co-op telling us what is in this week's shipment. We then have a few days to make up to three changes, and then the delivery arrives on Tuesday morning at Hubby's work (his job is inside the delivery area). We started out as bi-weekly members, but we increased to weekly.


I can't pretend that we made the decision to eat all-natural, from-scratch food because of virtue, at least at the start. For me, sensitivities to food additives required me to read labels and cut out many of the foods that I loved. I also had to stop eating out, since every trip to a restaurant was a game of Russian roulette, with the end result often being hives, difficulty breathing and headaches. But that was just what got us started down this road. Over time, reading labels, researching foods, and the inevitable thoughts and discussion that followed, I began to see food differently. I had always loved cooking, but now it was more than a fun pastime. Now I enjoy the challenge of trying to make my own all-natural versions of foods that I grew up eating, and my loved ones seem to enjoy eating the fruits of my labor.


I hope that you may happen by to read what I write, and if I happen to make you think of something differently, I hope you will let me know. Thanks so much for letting me share my thoughts.


Heidi