Questions

In my first blog I detailed how i stumbled onto a new direction. As with any new discovery, every question that gets answered leads to 10 new questions. How am I going to keep up with K focused me to what is the best way to get good food onto my table? This in turn lead me to question what could be done to fix my overall physical fitness, what did healthy eating really mean, where is my food coming from, what other things could I be doing to help the environment, why am I unhappy with myself and how do I cook 5 lbs of kale? So many issues and so many options. The more I looked into it, the more dissatisfied I became with my own choices and lack of action. So, after a year of floundering around, reading what I could in my spare time and feeling overwhelmed to the point of indecision I have decided that, for better or worse, I would start making some solid steps in a direction--hopefully the right direction-- and that the best way to keep myself accountable would be to blog about it. There are several categories and lots of little things that I would like to focus on and since I cant focus in enough to make that list manageable I will just post it here as it comes to me and I will add to it and elaborate more in future posts.


Physical Self
-Weight Gain
-Knee Injury
-Lack of energy
-Stamina to keep up with K
-Looking Good
-Poor Self Image
-Exercise

Nature
-Connection with the earth
-Environmental Impacts
-Sustainable Building
-Water shortage
-Rainwater catchment
-EcoVillage
-Pollution
-Alternative Energy Sources

Food
-Hormones
-Where does it come from
-Shipping food contributes to carbon footprint
-Sustainable growing methods
-Organic/Free-Range/Cage-Free/Humane Treatment
-Healthy eating
-Community Supported Agriculture
-Local Food

Just Starting

One year ago K & I moved here to Northern Virginia not knowing the area or anybody here. I knew that this was going to be hard but it was the best way for me to make enough to provide for a good life for K and give me the career satisfaction that I had given up to stay at home for her 1st year. The scariest thing about this move was the though ow what I would have to give up in order to make things work for us. These fears included giving up on things like health eating when I worked long hours, a orderly house with an infant/toddler and no one else to help clean up, a rural setting as I choose a short commute in order to maximize the little time I would have at home, and a social life since I knew nobody within 3 states.

I had the good fortune to grow up in varying degrees of rural locals but always in proximity to a garden and the Pacific ocean and now I was willingly locating myself near neither of those things. So one of the first things I did when I was house hunting was scope out the local farmers market web pages . OK, so there are an abundance of local producers and several nearby farmers markets. This was good for my impending life as an overworked, single mom. Next I began to research the concept of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA, something I had only briefly heard of while browsing the stalls at my local Northern California Farmers Market but knew nothing about.

From http://www.localharvest.org/csa/ I learned that: "A CSA, (for Community Supported Agriculture) is a way for the food buying public to create a relationship with a farm and to receive a weekly basket of produce. By making a financial commitment to a farm, people become "members" (or "shareholders," or "subscribers") of the CSA. Most CSA farmers prefer that members pay for the season up-front, but some farmers will accept weekly or monthly payments. Some CSAs also require that members work a small number of hours on the farm during the growing season. "

Much to my surprise Northern Virgina, and good lands on the other side of the Potomac in Maryland, support a good number of CSA Farms. I found several different styles of CSA nearby. Some would deliver to your door at a scheduled day/time, others brought your share to a central location like a farmers market for your to pick up, and a few allowed you to pick up your share at the farm, usually offereing other activities there as well. While becoming a CSA shareholder did not seem immediately attracitve to my budget or my practical sensebilities, it appealed to my ideological side and seemed to be one answer to my dream of reclaiming my some sense of connection to nature and the land that I was lacking. My biggest fear was that I would receive all kinds of good produce but not have the time, skill, know-how or energy to use it all.