MEET IZZY

Photo by Mary Moon 🙂

 

Hi!  I’m Izzy – the mother to a wild and crazy 3 year old boy, Elijah, and a 7 month old boy, Sawyer, who I’m sure will be just as wild and crazy 🙂  We live in New Mexico with my husband, Eric, and our curious orange tabby, Cheeto.  About six years ago I created the blog She Likes Food and I’ve been sharing healthy, vegetarian recipes there ever since. 

I’ve always been a relatively healthy eater, but after having children I’m even more conscious about what I feed my family.  As soon as my three year old started eating, I became passionate about creating healthy, kid friendly recipes that were also easy to make.  I understand what it’s like to be a busy parent who strives to feed their family healthy food but doesn’t have much time to prepare it.  In the past few years I’ve really embraced 30 minute dinners and they make my life so much easier!  I’m primarily vegetarian but my husband and 3 year old are not, so I may share non-vegetarian meals every once in a while.  

My goal is to inspire other parents to prepare healthy, easy and delicious meals that are satisfying to both parents and their children.   And, of course it’s important to indulge in treats every now and then!  I’m not quite as crafty as Mary 🙂 , but I’m also hoping to share a few crafts and activities with you as well!

And, just for fun, here’s a few random facts about me:

• I’ve lived in 6 different states.  New Mexico is definitely a favorite and I hope to be here for a while!
• For the first few years of my life, we lived in a cabin out in the middle of the woods with no electricity and no running water.  I’m pretty sure that is where my love of nature came from.
• My first labor was about 64 hours long which made the 24 hours that my second labor took seem quick 🙂
• I love muffins!  If we have muffins in the house I’m probably eating them for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
• In a former life I worked as a wildland fire fighter.  It’s still hard for me to believe I actually did that!
• I met my husband at Zion National Park, where we both worked, and that place will always have such a special place in my heart.
• We got married in Las Vegas 5 years later.  It was a planned wedding and an Elvis impersonator did not officiate but it was still fun 🙂

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MEET MARY

Hello and welcome! I am Mary and I live in New Mexico with my husband, Arthur, our two wild ones, Dinah (six) and Charlie (three), our cat, and a few backyard hens. My friend Izzy and I created this blog to help other parents on their journey of growing happy, healthy kids. Aside from my biggest role: mother, I am photographer, baker, and lover of nature. I love wearing hats and linen dresses. Whenever I can steal away a quiet moment, reading with a cup of tea and a cat purring on my lap is probably my favorite thing.  I’m always on the hunt for new hiking trails, cake recipes, and a pretty light to photograph. Someday, probably when I no longer have a small child clinging to my body, ha ha, I’d really like to learn how to knit.

When I became a mom, six years ago, I didn’t really know all that much about it, but I did know one thing for certain – I wanted my little ones to be happy and heathy! It’s been quite a journey and with each passing year, my kids and I grow and learn so much together.

One of the most important lessons I’ve learned is how to prioritize and more importantly, how to sloooow down. It’s easy to get too busy, especially as your kids get older, but I’ve found living slowly and intentionally to be extremely important for my family, but it’s only a realistic expectation when I am engaged, organized and calm. This blog has grown out of me and Izzy’s mutual love of meaningful parenting and intentional living. We’ve found this to be much easier with plenty of resources on hand, which is why we’ve organized this blog into three categories: recipes, crafts and activities, to help YOU stay engaged, organized and calm as well. 

Embracing the slow and intentional life probably came from my own childhood. Like Izzy, I also started my life in a cabin in the middle of the woods with no electricity or running water (only mine was out in the bush in Canada). Later, we moved back to the states and I grew up on a small ranch nestled in the mountains of rural western Montana. It was hard work, homesteading, but my childhood was sweet in a lot of ways. My siblings and I grew up, mostly barefoot, wild and free…as long as our chores were finished, that is. We woke with the sun, drank warm milk from my mother’s milk cow, then we pulled on our muck-boots, and began our routine of morning chores, before running off to play (or going to school).

Chores occupy significant space in my childhood memories. Mine were usually collecting eggs, feeding the chickens and hogs, tending the garden in the summer and hauling in firewood in the winter. I helped my mother with laundry, changing diapers, and cooking and baking and preserving the food we grew. In many ways it wasn’t really fun work, but it did teach me plenty of practical life skills, which have influenced so many of the activities I choose to introduce to my own children, which you will often find on this blog.

After our chores were done though, it was time for fun! My brother and I would grab our baskets or backpacks and head to the woods, with my mother’s words, “be home for supper!” still trilling in our ears. We spent hours of our childhood foraging for mushrooms or berries, collecting, making, creating and building something from nothing. We climbed trees, and hiked, and looked for animals to watch and listen to. We built forts and shelters and pathways through our property. We spent entire summers wrapped up in a daydream: chasing fairies and hunting for gnomes or elves or the mushroom-capped forest children. We dammed the creek and swam and fished. The free-range childhood my brother and I enjoyed makes me eager to provide a similar experience to my own little ones. You will find many forest school and Waldorf inspired crafts and activities on this blog that emulate the free-range childhood I so loved. 

As an adult, I now live in Northern New Mexico, and instead of homesteading, I live in a hundred-year-old adobe home in a really funky and busy emerging arts district in Santa Fe. I don’t live alongside cattle, horses, hogs, and poultry as I once did and I don’t have an acre of land to dedicate to an extensive vegetable garden like my mother had. Instead, I have neighbors on both sides and a busy street out front and I only have room for a tiny garden and three backyard hens, but even in this much different environment, I think I can offer my children an equally nourishing and wild childhood. Mountains and forests and the high desert are all around us to explore and learn from. We can ride our bikes to the library and farmer’s market. And unlike some of the Southwest, we are fortunate to have all four seasons here, which provide an exceptional natural rhythm for the crafts and activities we choose to spend our time on – a common theme you will find on this blog.  

Watching my children grow and thrive has been the most rewarding experience of my life, and on the daily, my two wild ones encourage me to join in their wonder and always help me find a way to create and find joy. My goal here, is to share a little bit of that with you too!