Food Is Life — by Guest Mom Jora

When I first found out I would be a Guest Mom here, I was thrilled! Design Mom was one of the first blogs I regularly followed. At the time, I had a brand new baby girl and a toddler boy and was feeling a wee bit overwhelmed. When I found Gabby’s blog, I admit, I developed a bit of a mom crush. Five kids? Interesting career? Loving relationship with Ben Blair? And she seems like a totally cool chick to just hang out with? I figured I could get through my situation.

So, like I said, I am thrilled to be guest blogging here this week. But. And you knew there was a “but” didn’t you? Panic set in a few days ago. What on earth would I have to add to this site? There are crafts, products, clothes, tons of inspiration and ideas wherever you look. (Just hit the archives if you haven’t already.) And so I told myself to take a few deep breaths, and the following came to mind: just write about what you know. And what I do know is food.

I’m one of those food and cooking obsessed people that you might know or have maybe heard about. One of my first memories is being 3 or 4 years old, sitting in front of my mom’s pantry, studying and organizing and re-organizing the ingredients (OK, I am a bit of a geek too). I was reading cookbooks at the age of 5, and by 10 I talked my mom into letting me make dinner for the family. Pre-kids, I would entertain one or two times a week, sometimes more. But none of this is to say I am a fancy cook or an expert in any way, or that I have any special training. I just enjoy it, have learned from lots of mistakes through the years, and have a couple of tricks and ideas up my sleeve. So this week, I hope to give you some ideas for both feeding your family and (hopefully, hopefully) enhancing your life just a bit. Because everybody, most especially the self-neglected mom, needs that.

I leave you with one of my favorite quotes by the food-is-life and life-is-food writer M.F.K. Fisher (that’s my description of her, I hope she wouldn’t mind):

“It seems to me that our three basic needs, for food and security and love, are so mixed and mingled and entwined that we cannot straightly think of one without the others. So it happens that when I write of hunger, I am really writing about love and the hunger for it, and warmth and the love of it and the hunger for it...and then the warmth and richness and fine reality of hunger satisfied...and it is all one.”

Find more of Jora at Domestic Reflections.

photo credit: Ben Blair took this photo of me making a pie crust on New Year's Eve. I think I may have already shared it here on Design Mom, but it's such a nice shot, it's worth a second look.