Do you ever wonder how much we lost with technology? I mean you can go into any grocery store at almost any given time and pick up an entire meal without batting an eyelash. It could be a complete meal from a deli, or a boxed meal from the shelves, or individual ingredients to take home and transform into a meal. The choices are limitless, and they are all within our reach.
But when was the last time you REALLY thought about all that convenience? Do you read the ingredients on packages? Do you know what they are? How to pronounce them? Do you care so long as dinner is ready on time?
I just recently started REALLY REALLY paying attention. It started with my finding out that Pepsi is made by using aborted human fetuses. YUCK! True story, by the way....I didn't believe it either, so I looked it up. As if that isn't bad enough, Kraft and Nestle do the same thing in the making of their products! Double, and TRIPLE YUUUUUCCCKK! And of course the ultimate shocker? President Obama has declared this "business as usual". WHAT?!!! If they can seriously do THAT to our food, what else is in there?
I don't know. Thats the problem. And I'm not looking to take college level chemistry classes to try to decipher those unknown ingredients either. So that is what got me to where I am now. Making as much as possible from "scratch".
I was blessed to inherit my Grandma Birchard's old Betty Crocker Cook Book (copywrited 1956). I love it. I love the comments. I love the nestalgia. I love that almost everything that I've ever tried to make from the recipes comes out nearly perfect. And I love reading the little tips and tidbits so lovingly included. Of course, some of it is purely humorous in todays society, though maybe still applicable? "If you're tired from overwork, Household chores you're bound to shirk. Read these pointers tried and true And discover what to do." Those "pointers" by the way, are things like "wear comfortable clothes and shoes while working" "Use good posture" and "harbor pleasant thoughts".
I would love to see what the grocery stores were like back then. I would love to look at the things they had on the shelves. Apparently, up until the 50s there were hundreds of small little grocery stores all over the place. Did they have "convenience foods"? What were the ingredients in those? I know my grandparents were all farm kids. They grew a lot of their own food. And even into my parents generation my mom will tell you that things like bottled juice were almost non-existant in their household. They worked. They supported themselves. And I bet they could pronounce all of the ingredients in their food and had a pretty good idea as to where it came from. What an awesome concept......
Showing posts with label randomness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label randomness. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 4, 2012
Friday, March 9, 2012
It's FRIDAY...
I have a confession: I caved this morning. Six more days to go and I logged on to facebook. But only becasue I didn't want my brother to feel abandoned. I got a text last night from my other brother saying that Josh wanted people to quit quitting facebook. Josh is in Afghanistan. He doesn't have a lot of ways to keep in touch with people. So he won.
So Friday means a few things around my house lately:
1. Ever since I found allfortheboys.com an their "build-a-fort friday" activity, and Drake got a Build A Fort Kit for his birthday, they LOVE to get to sleep in whatever fort is created for the weekend. They ask (or beg) all week long to be able to sleep in their fort. Its a big deal to them, and I don't care as long as its not a school night.
2. It's payday today. YAY! Payday is always a good thing right? Even when you're still broke like us and all the money already has a place to go?
3. It's my last full day for the week. Already? Yep, tomarrow is Sat. so I only work a 1/2 day, which is nice by design, but could mean bad things for MY check on Wed.
4. And this is really the most important one, only 2 more days till SUNDAY!!! EEEEK! Why am I such a stinkin procrastinator? Yikes! I'm in trouble. I know it. Why?
WEEELLL....My church is throwing a babyshower for lifeway pregnancies, which is a local non-profit organization that offers free services to women such as pregnancy testing, counciling, etc. All wonderful stuff. So they were asking for layette items and hand-made blankets. Awesome. I got to talking to the lady organizing the shower about blankets specifically and she was saying that that was the one thing she didn't really expect to get many of because she didn't think many ladies at our church sewed. I sew. I also make blankets. I'm a total beginner, but this IS something I do. So I sort of maybe volunteered myself to make a few. She was SOO excited. And then I put it off. And put it off. And procrastinated just a tad more. Thus the above panic. Now I only have 2 days and only 1 quilt made.
Fortunately, they come together pretty quick. And I raided my own fabric scraps for material, so I have all the material I need. (Hopefully there are a lot of boy layettes since all I have are boy fabrics!) So it's just a few hours work and actually getting it done.
I better get to it then.......(The first one was SO cute! I'll post pics when they are done! and maybe my own version of a tutorial?)
So Friday means a few things around my house lately:
1. Ever since I found allfortheboys.com an their "build-a-fort friday" activity, and Drake got a Build A Fort Kit for his birthday, they LOVE to get to sleep in whatever fort is created for the weekend. They ask (or beg) all week long to be able to sleep in their fort. Its a big deal to them, and I don't care as long as its not a school night.
2. It's payday today. YAY! Payday is always a good thing right? Even when you're still broke like us and all the money already has a place to go?
3. It's my last full day for the week. Already? Yep, tomarrow is Sat. so I only work a 1/2 day, which is nice by design, but could mean bad things for MY check on Wed.
4. And this is really the most important one, only 2 more days till SUNDAY!!! EEEEK! Why am I such a stinkin procrastinator? Yikes! I'm in trouble. I know it. Why?
WEEELLL....My church is throwing a babyshower for lifeway pregnancies, which is a local non-profit organization that offers free services to women such as pregnancy testing, counciling, etc. All wonderful stuff. So they were asking for layette items and hand-made blankets. Awesome. I got to talking to the lady organizing the shower about blankets specifically and she was saying that that was the one thing she didn't really expect to get many of because she didn't think many ladies at our church sewed. I sew. I also make blankets. I'm a total beginner, but this IS something I do. So I sort of maybe volunteered myself to make a few. She was SOO excited. And then I put it off. And put it off. And procrastinated just a tad more. Thus the above panic. Now I only have 2 days and only 1 quilt made.
Fortunately, they come together pretty quick. And I raided my own fabric scraps for material, so I have all the material I need. (Hopefully there are a lot of boy layettes since all I have are boy fabrics!) So it's just a few hours work and actually getting it done.
I better get to it then.......(The first one was SO cute! I'll post pics when they are done! and maybe my own version of a tutorial?)
Saturday, February 18, 2012
Days 2 and 3 without FACEBOOK
Day 2: I spent some time sewing on Drake's quilt and some extra time at my mom's house visiting with my parents and an old family friend who is visiting from out of state.
Day 3: Yesterday I worked late and didn't get home till 6:30-7ish. I did have a good reason though. We are getting a new massage therapist and Tracie let me audition him. So I got a really nice massage...he'll be a good addition to our team I think....but anyhow... I did watch a show with Drake (Terran was busy crying over not getting what he wanted for dinner) and after the kiddos were in bed I spent some time with the husband....sort of anyway. He was at the computer and we were watching the same show....that counts right?
Day 3: Yesterday I worked late and didn't get home till 6:30-7ish. I did have a good reason though. We are getting a new massage therapist and Tracie let me audition him. So I got a really nice massage...he'll be a good addition to our team I think....but anyhow... I did watch a show with Drake (Terran was busy crying over not getting what he wanted for dinner) and after the kiddos were in bed I spent some time with the husband....sort of anyway. He was at the computer and we were watching the same show....that counts right?
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
30 Days without FACEBOOK
As a few of my less fortunate friends and family members know, I have a new soap-box regarding facebook. I've tried very hard for the most part, to NOT bombard everyone with my rant...but since this blog is partially my self-centered vent zone, all of cyberspace gets to have the opportunity to hear it. And then I will get to the fun part of this post. (I won't be at all offended if you want to skip past my rant!)
A couple of things happened recently that started all of this:
First, my aunt died. Not that we were super close or anything, but the ONLY reason I even heard the news was because my brother happened to see a random post about it on facebook. It was burried 3/4 of my page down, lost between peoples' game status updates. No one from that end of the family tree even called my mom. Not one single phone call! If my brother hadn't called to ask if my aunt had died, we never would have known. This was a terrible slap in the face to me.
Let me insert here, that I DO get it. At least to some degree. My cousins were grieving enough. This isn't something you feel like doing probably when you have just lost a close loved one. And how easy is it to just post it on facebook, anouncing in one single fell swoop the tragedy. Now, surely, everyone knows and you didn't even have to deal with all that messy, emotional business of actually telling anyone. But there are just certain things that are unacceptable to me here. At the very least, all of the sisters should have been notified. That has always been how the family newsline has worked. The sisters (meaning my aunts) are notified and then they tell their children, and on down the line.
Then, and this happened like 1 week later, I found out, from a random post, that one of my cousins' wife had left him with their 5 kids (only 1 of which was actually his, btw) and had a new boyfriend! Ok....now I DO realize this is family gossip. And in HIS defense, he doesn't actually facebook that I know of. It was one of his wife's random posts that I saw. But this is still family news.
These 2 events led me to questioning the general reliance on facebook. Are these "friendships" even real? Are we becoming so lazy, that real communication is becoming obsolete? Are we sacrificing our ability to effectively interact with the other humans on this planet all for convenience? I believe YES. YES WE ARE!!!
When was the last time you called your best friend? Or wrote a letter by hand to someone you love? Better yet, when was the last time you actually spent some time actually making new friends? Look at the lives around you. Seriously, it makes me want to cry! Especially teenagers, but society in general is falling into a pattern of non-interaction. It's all digital. From dating, friendships, even sex is a digital affair that no one really has to come face to face with anymore. You can have an entire alternate life on facebook. New job, games, friendships, and up to the minute updates on anything anyone in your virtual world is up too. "my dog pooped on the carpet" "my kid is so cute" "my job sucks" etc. etc. etc.
And that makes me wonder how many of my facebook friends and family actually care about me, or if it is simply convenient to stay "in touch" without the messy business of real interaction. Am I just their friend so they can tell me all about their life? Is it all just a digital facade? At least if we were communicating via email I would know they were talking to me and not just cyberspace in general.
*Sigh* So there you have it. My Facebook Rant.
Now....for the real purpose of this post! 30 days without facebook!
I'm going to extricate myself from facebook for 30 days. I'm not even going to check it. Instead I'm going to fill that time with more meaningful connections. I'm planning on posting as I go so that may be I can inspire anyone else who wants to do this with me too. If you do join me, let me know what you do with your "facebook" time. How do you plan on substituting your digital relationships for forming real ones? I'm curious. Anyone wanna do this too?
Here are some of my ideas so far:
Call a friend and make a plan to spend time together
Do some projects with my kids
Spend some time with my husband
clean my house
reach out to others and try to make some new friends
Those are just a few thoughts to get me started....I'll let you know how the reality sets in as I go!
A couple of things happened recently that started all of this:
First, my aunt died. Not that we were super close or anything, but the ONLY reason I even heard the news was because my brother happened to see a random post about it on facebook. It was burried 3/4 of my page down, lost between peoples' game status updates. No one from that end of the family tree even called my mom. Not one single phone call! If my brother hadn't called to ask if my aunt had died, we never would have known. This was a terrible slap in the face to me.
Let me insert here, that I DO get it. At least to some degree. My cousins were grieving enough. This isn't something you feel like doing probably when you have just lost a close loved one. And how easy is it to just post it on facebook, anouncing in one single fell swoop the tragedy. Now, surely, everyone knows and you didn't even have to deal with all that messy, emotional business of actually telling anyone. But there are just certain things that are unacceptable to me here. At the very least, all of the sisters should have been notified. That has always been how the family newsline has worked. The sisters (meaning my aunts) are notified and then they tell their children, and on down the line.
Then, and this happened like 1 week later, I found out, from a random post, that one of my cousins' wife had left him with their 5 kids (only 1 of which was actually his, btw) and had a new boyfriend! Ok....now I DO realize this is family gossip. And in HIS defense, he doesn't actually facebook that I know of. It was one of his wife's random posts that I saw. But this is still family news.
These 2 events led me to questioning the general reliance on facebook. Are these "friendships" even real? Are we becoming so lazy, that real communication is becoming obsolete? Are we sacrificing our ability to effectively interact with the other humans on this planet all for convenience? I believe YES. YES WE ARE!!!
When was the last time you called your best friend? Or wrote a letter by hand to someone you love? Better yet, when was the last time you actually spent some time actually making new friends? Look at the lives around you. Seriously, it makes me want to cry! Especially teenagers, but society in general is falling into a pattern of non-interaction. It's all digital. From dating, friendships, even sex is a digital affair that no one really has to come face to face with anymore. You can have an entire alternate life on facebook. New job, games, friendships, and up to the minute updates on anything anyone in your virtual world is up too. "my dog pooped on the carpet" "my kid is so cute" "my job sucks" etc. etc. etc.
And that makes me wonder how many of my facebook friends and family actually care about me, or if it is simply convenient to stay "in touch" without the messy business of real interaction. Am I just their friend so they can tell me all about their life? Is it all just a digital facade? At least if we were communicating via email I would know they were talking to me and not just cyberspace in general.
*Sigh* So there you have it. My Facebook Rant.
Now....for the real purpose of this post! 30 days without facebook!
I'm going to extricate myself from facebook for 30 days. I'm not even going to check it. Instead I'm going to fill that time with more meaningful connections. I'm planning on posting as I go so that may be I can inspire anyone else who wants to do this with me too. If you do join me, let me know what you do with your "facebook" time. How do you plan on substituting your digital relationships for forming real ones? I'm curious. Anyone wanna do this too?
Here are some of my ideas so far:
Call a friend and make a plan to spend time together
Do some projects with my kids
Spend some time with my husband
clean my house
reach out to others and try to make some new friends
Those are just a few thoughts to get me started....I'll let you know how the reality sets in as I go!
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