This is the season my friends of utter perfection in this state. They days are warm and sunny, with blue skies and white puffy clouds. The warm breezes are gentle and constant. The days are made for going to the beach, the park, the zoo or the back yard. BBQ's are in constant use and the night glows with stars and fireflies and fire pits.
There are smore's and ice cream sandwiches, watermelon and corn on the cob. Farmer's markets are bursting with color and flavor and choices. Just this morning I picked up corn, tomatoes, lettuce, zucchini, patty pan squash, eggplant, carrots, onions and potatoes. There was plenty I left behind.
Then there are the blessings of good friends. They are the ones that call and invite you over for no reason. They bless you with the abundance of their own hard work, sharing more tomatoes and Swiss chard. They light candles and pour wine. You sit under the moon light and talk until suddenly you realize it's midnight and time to go home.
It's the season of tomatoes with every meal, especially for breakfast. I love the pop of cherry tomatoes with eggs and toast. Call me crazy, but it's the taste of summer.
The nights are cool and perfect for sleep. We're in the season of leaving the windows up all the way both night and day. It's the scramble to get in all the last get togethers before school starts. Time to take the last day trips and squeeze in all that you can. It's the time to stretch the day as far as you can, neglecting decent bedtime hours for your kids and seeing them laze before the campfire.
On top of all this, we seem to have been blessed with a glorious return to health for our Little Mr's. For the last several years we have lived under extremely strict dietary restrictions. We basically never ate anything that came in a package, was a grain, starch or sugar. We didn't go out. We didn't do convience.
It was hard. Painful. They learned to live with it. They learned how to shake it off when the other kids asked or teased. They learned to look the other way at parties or family things when there were all sorts of forbidden foods. They learned to pout in private and share their tears with just The Mr. and I. We learned to have a spine, to be hard and unbending with the rules. The cost was just too high. Their long term health hung in the balance.
For myself, part of the struggle was the boredom in the kitchen. I love to cook. I love to be in my kitchen. One of the things I enjoy most is to create a meal. For years and years, I've read cookbooks just for the sheer joy of it. I read and re-read the ingredients, the methods, the process. I stare at the pictures. I stash them all over my house. But, when I cook, I don't use them. I almost never use an actual recipe. Even for something precise like baking, I only use the general measures, but I tweak to my liking.
The blessing is this, The Little Mr's appear to be healthy. For the first time in their lives, they are eating almost anything they want, with almost no side effects. They've finally gotten a chance to eat an ice cream, to drink a soda, to try chips. We've had some fun teaching them how to eat things like sandwiches or hot dogs in a bun. We're teaching them how to eat pizza and chew gum. They're starting to figure out what treats they like and don't like.
My summer has been blessed with the ease of Pb&j sandwiches, fruit, chips and maybe a dessert on a paper plate with a drink of juice boxes! For me, who has not even been able to purchase something as simple as lunch meat or processed cheese, this is amazing. Bread is a blessing. Being able to serve rice or potatoes with a meal makes me ridiculously happy.
So last night, we took it one step further. We revived a tradition from long before kids. We did our Friday night pasta night. As a family, we hung out and made our noodles. We made our sauce. I had a glass of wine. The boys ate their first homemade pasta with looks of pleasure and surprise on their faces.
Oh, what a night, what a glorious night. I'm loving this life of mine.
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