Category: Try Your Best Tuesdays

It Ain’t Easy Being Green – The Kale Fail

We all try our best to do right by our families when it comes to nutrition.  Sometimes it’s easier to plan and prepare meals than others.  Sometimes the schedule allows for home cooked meals while other times eating out is the quickest option.  Eating out doesn’t necessarily mean fast food for us but we do try to avoid it because of the expense.  Plus, you cannot really control what’s going into your food when you eat out.  Unfortunately some weeks those eating out days are more frequent than I like to admit.

When I am cooking at home, I try to feed my family healthy foods and make sure we eat at least one green “super” food each day.  Most of the time our super food is broccoli but I also squeeze in some brussels sprouts and kale on occasion.  I think I am finally brain washing my family into kind of liking brussels sprouts but the kale is a hard sell, especially to my son.  It’s fun to watch him squirm as he makes faces like he’s trying to choke down his kale.  I just keep telling him how good it is for him even though I don’t think he believes me.  I like to think I’m doing the right thing by feeding him this yummy super food even if it does seem like torture for him.

Well, I have a little secret to tell.  Something was rotting in our refrigerator.  I cleaned out and threw away all the leftovers, even the ones that didn’t have mold on them.  Some things get pushed way back in the refrigerator and forgotten about.  We’ve had some pretty good science experiments come out of our fridge.  Anyway, I really cleaned it out.  I thought I’d taken care of the smell but…no.

It was one of those smells that took your breath away when you opened the refrigerator, like one of the dogs secretly left a little doggy deposit in the fridge.  I mean it was a BAD smell!  I kept searching for the smell.  This went on for several days.  It got to the point I would hold my breath any time I had to go to the fridge.  I knew something had to be done so I bravely walked up to the fridge, didn’t hold my breath and put my sniffer to the test.  I kept sniffing different areas of the fridge.  Nope, not there.  Not there either.  THEN, I sniffed the vegetable crisper.  Oh my goodness!  My nose burned from the smell!  The vegetable crisper?  I looked in the crisper and it didn’t look like anything had rotted in there.  Then I picked up the bag of kale that was fresh on the top but very rotten on the bottom.  Could it possibly be the kale, my yummy super food, making this unbelievable smell for the last few days.  Well, you’ve probably guessed by now, it was indeed the kale.  The kale on the top of the bag was fine but somehow the bottom of the bag was a mushy rotten and smelly mess.

I thought for sure that bag of kale couldn’t be the only culprit.  I threw the bag of kale in the trash and kept sniffing and looking around in the refrigerator.  I never found anything else.  Once the bag of kale was gone the smell was gone.  I couldn’t believe this super food would betray me like this.  How was I going to tell my family that the nose burning smell came from the kale.  They would never eat it again!  I kept quiet and thankfully they never asked how I got rid of the smell.  I’m safe for now or until they read this post.

I don’t know if there is a moral to this story or if it’s just a cautionary kale tale.  I guess if there is a moral to the story it could go something like this:  In the fridge if there’s a terrible smell, sniff around a smidge but it’s probably the kale.

PS: Please don’t tell my family.

Honest kids!

Kids!  You love them but you never really know what will come out of their truth spewing, even when the truth hurts, mouths.  They are mocking birds, repeating just what you do not want them to repeat. They are givers of new perspective.  Kid’s brains are swirling, churning, just waiting to say the perfectly right thing to embarrass their parents at the perfectly wrong time.  On more than one occasion I’ve felt the embarrassing sting in my bright red cheeks as my kids did just that.

My kids are blessed with the gift of gab.  They never meet a stranger, much like my dad and me.  On more than one occasion people have told me how my child or children brightened their day.  Proud mama moment!  Then there are those times when their curiosity, innocent childlike curiosity, leads them to ask the “hard” or should I say embarrassing questions.

We were standing in the busy check out line in one of those, “buy everything in one stop” stores.  To pass the time my son started up a conversation with the woman behind us in line.  My son started off with the usual stories he tells someone he just met.  All of a sudden the conversation headed in another direction.  There I stood, helpless to stop it.  All I could do was stand and listen as the words, “Are you having a baby?” fell one by one out of his mouth.  After a brief pause she chuckled, “Oh!  I’m not having a baby.”  At that moment, I wished I could crawl behind one of the cashiers or, better yet, vanish into thin air.  No such luck.  Thankfully the woman was very gracious and smiled through it all.  I could feel the sting of embarrassment in my cheeks and knew they must be redder than a stop light.  After we left the store I had a brief talk with my kids about when it is appropriate to ask a woman if she’s having a baby.  I told them it’s only OK if you know for sure she is pregnant.  Actually, scratch that, don’t EVER ask!

Apparently those words did not sink in where I was concerned.  It was one of those Sunday mornings where I just couldn’t quite figure out what to wear.  Half my wardrobe lay on my bed, tried on and discarded.  I couldn’t find anything I felt comfortable wearing.  I finally dug a dress out of my closet, put it on and was looking in the full length mirror in our hall to make sure it didn’t look too bad.  My daughter came out of her room as I was examining my attire and she offered her solicited advice.  She’s eight and has more fashion sense than I’ve ever had.  After she finished imparting her words of fashion wisdom to me, she patted my belly and said, “Mom, are you sure you’re not having a baby.”  I’m not sure what emotion was on my face but I tried to hide my shock and deflated ego so she didn’t know she’d hurt my feelings.  I still don’t know why she asked me that dreaded question.  I know she wasn’t trying to be mean.  Maybe she asked because she and her brother have been asking for a baby sibling (ain’t happening).  Maybe she didn’t have the heart to tell me the dress didn’t look all that great and this was her way of letting me down easy.  No matter, I didn’t have time to stand and ponder what was bouncing around in my eight year old’s head.  I rushed back to my closet and grabbed another dress to wear to church that day.  I’m still a little self conscious when I wear that dress.

I love my kids and absolutely adore them for their honesty and truthfulness…most of the time.  They really are great kids and have a such a positive outlook on life.  We teach them to share their positive outlook, to be kind and honest.  After all honesty is always the best policy, right?  Well, at this moment, I can think of one good exception to that rule.