Happy Earth Day!

Yep, I care about the Earth, now. I'm becoming such a cliche.

Farewell, my sweet addiction

Goodbye, delicious chocolate cake. And brownies. And Mrs. Field's chocolate chip cookies. As of today I've added sugar to the list of foods that I don't eat. My addiction to sugar is so out of control that yesterday, in a pre-sugar fast binge, I made and ate almost an entire half-batch of chocolate chip cookies. It was not my finest moment.

So, friends, I am posting this to keep me accountable. I already made a bet with my parents, as we are all giving up sugar and caffeine, but a little extra support won't hurt. I'll let everyone know how it goes.

This past weekend was General Conference, a special time for members of our church, where we get to hear from our leaders via a worldwide televised conference. We had been talking to Amira all week long about the importance of General Conference, and had also spent time talking to her about the passing of our beloved former prophet, President Hinckley. As conference was about to begin we encouraged Amira to play close attention to the words of our new prophet and asked her, "Amira, do you remember the name of our new prophet?"

Without skipping a beat she gave us a big smile and said, "Yep. His name is Obama."

PS- if you are wondering what relevance the rather strange Moroccan picture has to this post- the answer is "none." See previous post for my "random picture" disclaimer.

So, what do you eat?!

It always makes me smile a little bit when I tell people I don't eat meat and their response is, "So what do you eat?!!!" Well, I eat all the other food that isn't meat. Mainly a whole lot of beans.

Becoming a vegetarian was like this, for me: my research into healthy-eating led me to decide I would only eat organically-fed, free-range meat. That kind of meat is both insanely expensive and very hard to find in Hawaii, so we just stopped buying/eating meat. Also, my religious beliefs advise that meat should be consumed during "times of winter, or of famine" and since it is always sunny here, and we aren't starving, I figured that supports my decision.

My primarily financial reasons for becoming a vegetarian have evolved, over time, to include many reasons to not consume meat. Here are a few of them:

- More than 70% of the grain raised in our country is used to feed farmed animals. "The world's cattle alone consume a quantity of food equal to the caloric needs of 8.7 billion people—more than the entire human population on Earth. About 20 percent of the world's population, or 1.4 billion people, could be fed with the grain and soybeans fed to U.S. cattle alone." quote from here

-I've done quite a bit of research on factory farming, and the way meat is raised and slaughtered in our country is terrible and disgusting. If you really want to stop eating meat, but don't know if you can kick the habit, try watching some of the mini-documentaries on youtube about slaughterhouses.

-Due to the way meat is slaughtered in our country, our meat supply is unsafe. Read Fast Food Nation for more information on that subject.

-It really bothers me to buy meat at the grocery store and have no idea where it came from. There is no way to know how the animal was slaughtered, how long ago the meat was processed, how long it has really been sitting on the store shelf.

Let me just add, that while we were in Morocco I did eat meat, without feeling guilty at all. In my mind it is very different to eat a goat that was raised by Mohamed's family, allowed to graze and wander around like goats were meant to do, and then ceremoniously and respectfully slaughtered. I still didn't love the taste, but at least I knew where the meat I was eating had come from, and how long the animal had been dead.

A few quotes on vegetarianism:

"The question is not, Can they reason? nor, Can they talk? But rather, Can they suffer?" - Jeremy Bentham, 19th century Philosopher, Oxford University

"Many things made me become a vegetarian, among them the higher food yield as a solution to world hunger."– John Denver

And my favorite:

"You ask people why they have deer heads on the wall. They always say, ‘Because it’s such a beautiful animal.’ There you go. I think my mother’s attractive, but I have photographs of her." – Ellen DeGeneres

Happy Birthday, Amira

Faithful friends who still check my blog after all this time, take heart. I am posting again! Although, I am quite tired, so this will be short and lazy style.

Amira turned 3 today. We are waiting to have her official birthday party until my family comes to visit next week, so I will post pictures of the party, then. Still, Amira ended up having a great day. Her best friends from next door are moving out of their house, so they spent the day at our's. I let Amira pick out a bunch of snacks (strawberries, goldfish and lollipops are what she picked) and some movies. She spent the day playing with her new ponies (presents from her friends) and watching Aladdin.

I know I really should include pictures of my beautiful daughter on her birtday, but I'm worn-out from baking and decorating sugar cookies with 3 toddlers. No small task, I assure you. I recommend, if you ever have a kitchen full of kids and decide you want to make cookies you either 1) make chocolate chip cookies, they don't require decorating or rolling or 2) you eat strawberries, instead. Kids like those just as much. At least mine do.

Oh, and since I never got around to posting the rest of my Morocco pictures, I figured I'll just randomly post them, on occasion. Hence the picture of Amira and the palm tree.