Avivah Werner

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  • Fennel seed helps digestive complaints

    Last night at dinner, my oldest son started complaining of sharp stomach pain.  He’s not one to complain, and I saw that he was bent over at the table as he told me that because of the pain.  I asked him when they started, and he said his stomach was hurting a little before dinner, but he thought they were hunger pains.  Once he ate something, they got worse very fast. 

    When I made that herb order yesterday, I had read a bit about fennel on their site, and remembered it was good for digestive complaints.  I ordered some for my husband, but of course the order won’t arrive for a week, so that didn’t help me.  However, I happened to have grown fennel this year in my garden, though I honestly didn’t know what to do with it.  I harvested some of the seeds about three weeks ago and put them in a container in my spice cabinet, and that’s what I pulled out last night.  They have a pleasant, licorice-like flavor.  I quickly made him a cup of fennel tea – a teaspoon of the seeds, 1 teaspoon of honey, and hot water, and told him to drink it. 

    Because he’s fifteen, he didn’t mind the seeds swimming around at the top of his cup – a younger child would have needed them to be strained out.  Literally two minutes later, he told me he was starting to feel much better.  He said, “When you gave this to me, you didn’t think it would really help, did you?”  I told him of course I thought it would help, that’s why I gave it to him!  Anyway, within five minutes of that, he was feeling totally better – he kept saying how amazing it was – “It’s a miracle, I can’t believe it!” 

    Today my dd13 went to a still photography workshop with my dd12, and they both really, really enjoyed it and learned a lot.  But she came home feeling very carsick.  I remembered reading a couple of weeks ago that fennel was good for nausea, so I told her to make herself a cup like what I made for ds last night.  She did, and that was the last I heard about her feeling nauseous!  (I would have otherwise told her to have some fresh ginger and honey, but this was quicker and easier.)

    It’s so nice to be able to quickly and easily help alleviate unpleasant physical symptoms for my family!  Today I called the company back and asked them to tack onto my order a half gallon of vegetable glycerine, since that way I can make tinctures with the herbs and can easily get it into my baby and toddler – I just can’t see them drinking a whole cup of tea when they’re feeling under the weather.  And the tinctures last a lot longer than herbs maintain their pungency, so that will be another benefit.

    Avivah

  • Weekly menu plan

    As I’m getting back into the swing of regular life, I’m getting back to some of my routines that make life feel somewhat organized :), and that means that last night I wrote up the menu plan for this week.  Here it is:

    Sunday – brunch – vegetable omelets with English muffins; snack – popcorn; dinner – lentils cooked in chicken broth, rice, carrot salad

    Monday – breakfast – oatmeal raisin scones with homemade plum jam, nectarines; lunch – veg lentil soup (used leftover lentils from Sunday night); dinner – beans and hotdogs (thanks to the beans that I canned, this is a now a quick and easy dinner)

    Tuesday – breakfast – Southern grits bread; lunch – chili bean soup (with leftover beans from Monday night); dinner – oat walnut burgers

    Wednesday – breakfast – baked oatmeal; lunch – vegetable soup; dinner – cottage cheese blintz loaf

    Thursday – breakfast – buckwheat pancakes; lunch – sandwiches; dinner – leftovers (empty the fridge before Shabbos)

    Friday – breakfast – fried potatoes and eggs

    I’ll post some recipes from this sometime during the week, but if something in particular interests you, let me know and I’ll be sure to post it.

    Avivah

  • Buying herbs and making Supertonic

    Today I was planning to make a batch of Supertonic for the oncoming winter season.  It’s a powerful germ fighting mix that I made for the first time last year (I think the recipe comes from Dr. Schultze) and was glad to have on hand.  Several of my littler kids have runny noses and it’s a reminder to me to get some Supertonic in the works fast!  I bought almost all the ingredients I needed at the vegetable store last week, but still needed to get some echinacea leaves for it so today I popped into the health food store to buy some.

    The price for the echinacea wasn’t marked, and to my good fortune, I had to wait a long time for the person who knew what the price was to become available.  Finally I decided to put it back  and order it online instead (though I did buy three homeopathic remedies once I was there – arnica – I keep one of these in my purse all the time; spongia tosta – for my dd who tends to get a croupy cough in the winter; thuja- for my 2 year old who has warts).  The good fortune part of the clerk not being available is that by buying from www.bulkherbstore.com I can spend much less and get much more! 

    I haven’t ordered bulk herbs since I got a huge amount of pregnancy herbs, I think when I was pregnant with my 2.5 year old.  I had enough to last me through the pregnancy after that, too, and in fact, I bought so much that I still have a large bag of red raspberry leaves.  I was very happy with their prices and quality.  Most of the herbs I bought today I’ve never gotten before, though I’m familiar with a number of them from reading – here’s what I got: alfalfa, bentonite clay, comfrey, echinacea, fennel, lobelia, mullein, olive leaf, Pau d’Arco bark, spearmint, stevia leaves, spirulina, and some salve (one small container to keep in the car, and a larger one for the house) – they were out of peppermint and chamomile, which I really like, but I did get some Jasmine green tea.  I also got some arrowroot powder, which I need to start using more of since my ds15 has announced last week that he doesn’t want to eat gluten.

    Some people like to load up on over the counter medication in preparation for the winter, but I’m not a fan of allopathic medicine and I don’t touch any of them.  I’d rather learn more about how to take care of my family safely and in ways that build up and strengthen their bodies.  Each of the herbs some in a half pound bag (though a couple of them I bought more than one bag full), so this order that should last for quite a while.  I spent a little over $100 for all of it, and would have spent several times that if I bought it all at the health food store. 

    Here’s the recipe for Supertonic:

    • 1 part fresh chopped white onions
    • 1 part fresh chopped garlic cloves
    • 1 part fresh chopped grated ginger root
    • 1 part fresh grated horseradish root
    • 1 part cayenne pepper
    • 1 part dried echinacea

     Put it all in a glass jar, and fill with raw apple cider vinegar (I use Bragg’s) to cover.  Close the jar and shake vigorously.  Let sit 14 days or longer.  Strain and keep in glass jar.  Take 4 – 5 droppersfull (can use a teaspoon, too) in juice several times daily when first feeling sick. 

    I don’t usually give my kids juice, and we alternate between going through it very quickly when using it as a base for vitamin c powder or Supertonic, and not having any at all.  So what I’ve decided to do this year is buy the juice concentrate, so I can keep several in the freezer and use it as I need it.  I have about ten concentrates of different flavors waiting in the freezer for just this reason right now.  🙂

    Avivah

  • Be gracious to yourself

    I had a very late night (it was 3 am when I got to bed – should I call that an early morning instead?) last night, so I committed to myself to get into bed early tonight.  But before I do, I want to share a thought that’s been on my mind for the last few days which I’ve found helpful.

    I have a tendency to feel inadequate if I don’t constantly meet my expectations of myself, regardless of how legitimate a reason there may be for not doing something, or how unrealistic the expectation may have been.  Even with awareness of this negative tendency, since I have yet to maintain a smile on my face and a perfectly sunny disposition every moment throughout every day, I continue to periodically fall into the trap of negative thinking. 

    Last week, I read something somewhere that made me think of us moms, who do so much every day but so often feel like we aren’t good enough, or haven’t done enough (unless I’m unique and all of you never feel like that?) – about the importance of having ‘grace’ with ourselves when we’re feeling under the weather for any reason.  The word ‘grace’ really resonated with me, since to behave graciously to others is a mark of fine character and doesn’t imply that there’s a flaw that needs to be forgiven; it’s about understanding and pure acceptance of who and where we are right now with no judgement at all.  Isn’t it amazing how we don’t think to extend ourselves the same graciousness that we routinely show to those we interact with on a regular basis?

     I mentioned in my last post that I’ve been feeling really out of kilter for a few weeks (since Rosh Hashana), and I keep reminding myself of this idea.  I’m finding it helps me to recenter myself, which is helpful until I physically get recentered by being back to my normal sleeping/living schedule!  I hope some of you find this thought helpful to as well.

    Avivah

  • My newest kitchen appliance

    Last week I made a big decision, one that I’ve been thinking about for a few months, and couldn’t justify doing.  I purchased a new dehydrator, an Excalibur.

    I mentioned that I had a small dehydrator that my mom had left behind for us, right?  Well, a month or two ago, I went down the basement and discovered that someone had apparently stepped on it (!) since the trays were all broken.  Please don’t ask how it’s possible for someone to step on a dehydrator without noticing what they’re doing, or why it was on the floor instead of where it was supposed to be.  That’s the kind of question that comes up very often here, and to keep my sanity I’ve tried to accept a certain amount of collateral damage is an inevitable part of living with children.  🙂

    Anyway, as long as we had that dehydrator, even though it wasn’t very good, I couldn’t get something else, because that would be wasteful.  And if I was going to buy something, I wanted it to be top quality and large enough to handle the capacities that a family our size demands, and that meant the Excalibur, which meant $$$.  I’ve spent plenty these last few months on my other projects that I didn’t feel it was right to spend on a luxury that I could do fine without.

    But then I found out about these dehydrators – they are being sold direct from the manufacturer, but are only $149.95, including shipping.  It’s the largest size they have (not including the commercial ones), with nine trays.  I got mine on ebay, and that listing expired, but here’s a link that will be current for a couple of days: http://cgi.ebay.com/Limited-Offer-Excalibur-2900-3900-R-FREE-Shipping_W0QQitemZ120322998919QQcmdZViewItem?hash=item120322998919&_trksid=p3911.c0.m14&_trkparms=72%3A1421%7C66%3A2%7C65%3A12%7C39%3A1%7C240%3A1308.  They are unused, but for whatever reason were returned to the manufacturer (eg, store display, wrong size ordered, etc).  They are thoroughly checked over to be sure that everything works as it should, and come with a ten year warranty – if you buy a new one direct from the manufacturer, you get a three year warranty.  So it’s a lot cheaper with a much longer warranty!

    I also ordered three Paraflex sheets, to use for making fruit leathers.  I’ve so often seen ripe bananas and other fruits that I’ve passed on because I couldn’t use it all up fast enough, and I thought that having an option to turn them into fruit leather would be nice.

    It arrived yesterday, and right away everyone was commenting on the obvious difference in quality and size.  I decided to inaugurate it today with sweet potatoes since I had about twenty pounds around and some were starting to get soft spots (and I’m going to be doing a big shopping trip very soon and buying more).  We cut away the soft spots, put them in a pot to steam lightly (they ended up getting more than lightly steamed, but as I said before, letting go of rigid expectations of how and what everyone does things is a big part of a pleasant home atmosphere), sliced them, and then put them in the dehydrator.  They’re still going right now – the kids were commenting about how much faster they seem to be drying – with the old dehydrator, it took over 24 hours and we had to rotate the trays, and still the tray on the bottom was too crispy and the top one not dried enough!

    I’m amazed that only 4.5 of the nine trays were filled – it really has a large capacity!  I’ll turn it off before I go to sleep tonight, and once they cool off, I’m sure they’ll take up a lot less space than they were before!

    Avivah

  • Getting back to regular life 🙂

    It’s so nice to be back with all of you!  The holidays have been wonderful, but I have to be very honest and say that I’m really glad that I’ll be able to get back to my regular weekly routine.  Particularly the way they fell out this year, it’s been a marathon for three weeks of cooking, cleaning, cooking, cleaning, etc.  And my sleeping schedule is totally out of whack, along with my baby’s – this morning I didn’t fall asleep until 4 am.

    Four of my kids volunteered to help out at the synagogue on Sunday to prepare a communal meal (served yesterday for lunch) for 120 people.  Except for the chef who also volunteered, they were the only people who were able to take time out of their schedules to help out – it’s such a busy time for everyone.  We weren’t planning to attend the communal meal, because after a busy morning at shul (synagogue), we wanted to have a quiet family meal together.  The kids just helped out because they like to.  But the night before, the person in charge of organizing it found out that we weren’t planning to be there, and told my dh they really wanted us to come, and were waiving the fee for our family. 

    So we agreed – the kids were happy with that idea! – but then when the time for the meal rolled around (for which two of my kids spent another hour helping set up), there wasn’t a table where we could sit together as a family; they had all been half taken by smaller families.  It’s not my idea of a holiday meal to have my family scattered in a large crowd over three tables, so we decided to head for home.  And we had a very nice meal, in spite of the particularly strong disappointment of a couple of the kids. 

    Last night, after the holiday was over, the man who organized it told us how disappointed they were that we didn’t stay, and that we were welcome to take home any of the food that was left.  There were a bunch of pans (9×13) of beef stew, as well as a couple of stuffed peppers and another of rice, so we took six pans of the stew, one of peppers, and one of rice.  Oh, and two pans of chicken – I almost forgot that because it went straight into the freezer.  We’ll have one tomorrow night for Shabbos dinner. 

    They were so glad that we were taking it; I think they felt badly that my kids did so much work and didn’t get to taste anything they had prepared, plus it was really nice food so of course they were glad that it would be used (though I know they would have looked for people to take it, they wouldn’t have let it get thrown away).  Usually I wouldn’t know what to do with so much stew, since I don’t have room in my fridge or freezer, but you know that now that I’m an avid canner, I’m not limited by those petty considerations anymore! 

    I couldn’t believe how meaty the stew was – each pan was mostly meat chunks with a few pieces of carrots and potatoes (the opposite ratios of how I make stew, lol!), and the gravy, which didn’t look so appetizing when cold.  I put the meat, carrots, and potatoes into a large pot and added water, leaving the gravy behind (you’re not supposed to can things with gravy or flour, because the thickener can prevent heat from being properly distributed when being canned), and it was amazingly good when it was heated up and thinned down.  So far I’ve canned seven quarts, and have another batch of quart jars heating on the stove heating up right now, along with a big pot of the stew, and I think this will finish the stew off. 

    When ds15 went to shul this morning, he was told again how disappointed they were we didn’t stay, and urged to take any leftovers.  Ds told them we did take some, but they found a couple dozen hotdogs to send him home with that we hadn’t noticed the night before.  I’ll do something with those next week – I have a bunch of hot dog recipes on one of my recipe pages (I think I told you how I section my recipe notebook into pages with nine recipes per side) so I’ll see what will look good.

    For dinner, we’re having the thick meaty gravy mixed with rice – I think everyone will enjoy that; there are still plenty of little pieces of meat in it.  My fridge was stuffed last night with pans of food, but I’m working my way down to being able to see some space when I open it up!  🙂

    Avivah

  • Oh, what a fun day….

    My nine year old son woke me up with exciting news today!  He informed me that our garage had been broken into last night, and our bikes and lawnmower stolen.  Then he told me that the thieves decided for fun to stick some of the bikes they decided not to take into my neighbor’s garage, so they didn’t take all of them after all.   The ones that were left were obviously the ones that weren’t in great shape, but at least some of them were left.  I jokingly said that it saved my husband the job of reorganizing the garage to make more space, so it wasn’t all a loss!

    Now my dear 9 year old son has been baking cookies for his business.  I told him I was very unthrilled with the idea of him baking today, and that for this one time, I wanted him and his partner to use his friend’s kitchen instead of ours.  But they couldn’t do that because his friend’s family had other plans.  Then he told me his friend couldn’t come and would bake on his own, so I somewhat reluctantly agreed.  The reason I agreed was that they had taken orders for over 10 family packs (usually they sell door to door), and I didn’t want to keep him from being able to meet his commitments. 

    When he started baking, I supervised him, but since he’s been making these cookies on his own for a while now, I haven’t felt it’s been necessary.  That was too bad, since today he decided to make five times the already large recipe, and filled the very large mixing bowl to the very top with a dense mixture of chocolate chip cookie dough.  Surprise – when he turned it on, it started making a very unpleasant sound and stopped running.  I called the Bosch repair company, and it seems that he managed to ruin the transmission. 🙁  I really wasn’t pleased with that; their transmission failure rate is less than 1% over 20 years, and I’ve only owned my Bosch mixer for eight years.  When you get a mixer this expensive (it was $500 at the WA dealer my mom bought it, with the accessories), you look at it as an investment, as something that you’ll use forever. 

    The problem with owning such an expensive mixer is that it isn’t cheaply repaired or replaced.  The advantage is that it’s such a high quality that repairs should be uncommon, but I think that might not be taking into account nine year olds and their idea of what is appropriate usage.    I give my kids a lot of leeway in using things that a lot of parents wouldn’t, and for the most part, that’s worked out well.  But there are times like right now that leave me feeling a little grumpy and irritated.

    Avivah

  • Cooking plantains

    My mom brought over three plantains a few days ago – you know, those fruits that look like green bananas?  We’ve never had them before (which is why she brought them – I asked her to bring us a new fruit for Rosh Hashana, and she was hoping this would serve my purpose). The kids peeled one to taste it, and right away made faces – it’s not meant to be eaten raw and it’s not very tasty like that.  My husband has some coworkers from Central America, and he said they eat them like potatoes, cooked into stews.

    Tonight my ds15 was hungry and I told him to look in the fridge for something, and he pulled them out.  I suggested he slice them up and fry them.  He used coconut oil, but then I mentioned butter, so he prepared some with each.  They were so yummy!  It took about one minute for them to get finished once he passed the slices out to everyone, but we all really enjoyed them.  They’re kind of starchy, but the cooking breaks the starch down and brings out the sweetness.

    It’s nice to be familiar with yet another food, and if I ever see them on sale, I’ll know what to do with them! 

    Avivah

  • Frontier House – dvd review

    We finally finished watching Frontier House, a PBS six hour presentation that we got at the library.  It was about three modern day families (2001) who ‘went back in time’ to 1883, to live in a way that would have been authentic for that time period.  They had a two week period of training to learn how to take care of animals, use period appropriate tools, etc, and then as closely as possible, they duplicated the homesteading experience of that time. 

    Our family enjoyed this so much!  It was definitely entertaining, but was also very thought provoking, and has already led to a number of family discussions.  (Warning – there are about ten minutes in the first session that discuss menstruation and birth control at the time – I keep the remote in my hand constantly whenever I watch anything with my kids, just in case, and this was something I fast forwarded. There are a couple of other references to intimacy later on, but after the first thing came up, I previewed everything else before watching it with my kids to se where the issues would be.  Very easy to preempt everything by doing this.)  Seeing how difficult life was at that time makes you think how you would have fared, if you could make it.  And it makes me think about all the things we’ve gotten used to having, that we consider necessitites, that are really luxuries.

    When I got rid of my window air conditioning units, most people were appalled that I could give that up.  Around here, a/c is considered an absolute necessity.  But surprise! – it really wasn’t a big deal.  Yes, sometimes we were hot, but our bodies adapted, and we were able to be comfortable at temperatures that others would consider way too hot. 

    So we got to talking about how many things there are like this in our daily lives – washing machines, mixers, electric lights, grain grinders, even running water – believe me, I’m glad to live at a time when we have all of these modern conveniences that make our lives so much easier.  But I don’t want to become so dependent on them that I can’t imagine living otherwise, or would feel totally incapacitated by their loss.  So we’ve started brainstorming how a family could manage without these things.

    It’s been an interesting mental exercise, and I’m interested in exploring more of those options some to see if any of our ideas can be integrated smoothly into our life.  When I started talking to my kids about it and discussing some of the ideas (and there are SO many!), they were really excited about it.  I had hardly mentioned at dinner that thinking about our energy usage is an important first step, before one child had turned off all the lights and lit tea lights to eat dinner by.  🙂  Right now I’m looking at a wringer washing machine; I have to do some more research and talk to dh about it.  He doesn’t get too excited about all my ideas, though he’s a good sport about going along with them.  🙂

    Avivah

  • Staying open to the unexpected

    I hope everyone who was celebrating Rosh Hashana had a wonderful holiday!  We certainly did.

    Leading into the holiday things were very, very hectic, due to a number of factors that were all outside of my control and planning – it was actually remarkable to have so many things all fall through in such a short time when I had planned everything so thoroughly in advance (I won’t detail what those things were – but when I told my good friend yesterday about them, she got tense just listening to them).  So much so, that it was clear to me that it was a Heaven sent test, giving me the opportunity to respond with calm and positivity to all the pressures, even under the circumstance of having only 6 hours to complete all of my holiday preparations for two days (we do all the cooking in advance).  I kept reminding myself to keep the most important thing in front of me, and the most important thing is to have an atmosphere of joy, not tension or frustration, no matter how much did or didn’t get done.  When I say I kept reminding myself, I really mean I kept reminding myself.  I was having ongoing conversations in my head with myself, saying, “Just keep your mouth shut and smile”, “don’t make her feel bad for not having done what she said”, on and on and on, and I wasn’t sure I was going to make it until the holiday began and I knew I had successfully kept a good attitude.

    But the reality of having so little time was that some things that I wanted to have done weren’t done at all, or weren’t done in the way I generally try to do them – like, my house was mostly in order but not sparkling at all.  The floors were swept, but not mopped, etc.  And I thought to myself on Monday night how glad I was we weren’t having guests or I would have felt pretty embarrassed.   

    Well, I really, really believe that G-d is the One who orchestrates everything (and I kept telling myself that on Monday afternoon when one thing after another kept happening), and that thought immediately came to mind today when we were asked at the last minute to host a young couple with two toddlers for lunch.  It seems they were visiting from another city and didn’t have an invitation for this meals, so when my daughter gave me the message from my husband, asking if we could have them, I sent her back to tell him it would be fine. 

    As I was walking home from synagogue a few minutes later with our guests, I was thinking of the condition of my house and wondering what I would pull together for the meal.  Then I remembered that I ran out of napkins the night before, and asked my husband to go a couple of houses back to borrow some from a friend of mine, and then he could catch up with us.  We got home and my husband still hadn’t caught up with us.  As I was busily getting the table set and the food warming up, I reminded myself that more important than if every corner was clean was the atmosphere.  And then I started wondering where my husband could be.  After 15, then 20 minutes, I started to worry what could be taking him so long.  Finally he walked in and announced, “We have another guest!”

    You might be wondering how he found another guest in the short walk home – I certainly was!  It seems someone had been driving down the main street where he was walking, and stopped at the side of the road to ask him where there was a synagogue he could go to and give a donation today.  My husband got into a conversation with him, told him today wouldn’t be a good day for synagogues to accept donations, but since he was in the neighborhood, why not come to our house for a holiday lunch?  The young man was embarrassed to accept, but my dh spent 20 minutes convincing him that we would love to have him, so he finally agreed, and they walked in together. 

    So clearly I was meant to have holiday guests, despite me thinking my house wasn’t clean enough – and it was all orchestrated from Above.  🙂  Our meal was really lovely, and I had plenty of food.  The guests all enjoyed the food and the company, and we enjoyed having all of them.  My younger kids loved playing with their toddlers and taking care of them (their mother didn’t mind it, either :)), and our older kids were very interested in our adult conversation.

    It turns out that our guest who my dh convinced to leave his car and come to us is here on business from Israel, and is the son of the owner of one of the largest export companies in that country.  It’s good I didn’t know that before he came, or I would have felt like our home was inadequate, too small or too simple, or something, especially with things being the way they were – but he loved being here and we really enjoyed having him.  I had to leave before my guests left because I had a prior commitment, but my dh and kids said he was choked up when he left.  The couple with the toddlers was also lovely – hopefully we’ll have the opportunity to have all of them again in the future!

    So my lesson for myself in all of this is was, to stay open to the messages that come my way, and not get caught up in thinking that I know what’s best and how things have to be.  And to realize that clearly are the way they’re supposed to be according to Someone Else’s plan, and instead of getting frustrated or resentful at what seem to be roadblocks, I can skip that and go right to the acceptance and even joy of what is.   

    Avivah