the mullies: the trip that started the green juice... and gave inspo for a food tube star entry

good stories are sometimes long stories:)

i want to tell you how my "Jamie Oliver and Uncle Ben's search for a food tube star" entry was born. it's always fun to look back on a sequence of events and marvel on how it came together.

so here goes...

it begins with a little road trip to see my chimmie laura.

this is my favorite spot at her house. she got me hooked on her morning ritual: these green smoothies. i have made them before, just not every day... we lingered in our pj's every morning watching our kiddos play in the backyard.

this adventure cleared my head a bit. there is nothing better than getting out of your own kitchen sometimes!

this was the one night we went out on the town, that's why we look so darn cute. so of course, we couldn't get our "going out" clothes all messed up! we donned some aprons, cooked fast and got outta there with her hubby as soon after babysitter arrived. he had a ball taking these pictures of us goofing off.

she makes me laugh so hard i pee a little.

can you tell we are both obsessed with kale chips? the butt of many jokes...

made from scratch pizza, ranch and kale chips with some fruit and veggies - a dinner plate of champions.

uuuuuuummmmm you have something on your face... the spirulina shots came later...

i think these pictures say it all.

laura (with her sweet nutritionist background that i mooch off of) has been telling me about kimberly snyder for months. and i was like "ok, sure, i have to check her out!" and i'm pretty positive laura responded, "i'm gonna cut you if you don't!!!!"

a light bulb came on about a week later for something i was dragging my feet on.

one of kimberly's recipes (the nuttty butter spread from her cucumber asian rolls) gave me the inspiration for a beach day cooking festivas with megan, one of my best girlfriends and hot mamas in the mullies. i figured this might just be a good time to try taping for my entry. would it work out? who knew!? who cares!? it was gonna happen no.matter.what. so i just jumped.

on a friday morning, megan came over with three kiddos and i had my 3 crazy daisies. we had a cooking class of 5. we cooked, prepped and assembled as fast as we could cuz they wanted to hit the beach! she took all the pictures, took all the video (my computer got in on the action too) and boy oh boy did we have fun. we just rolled the tape. she's a teacher, i'm a coach... not a bad team when you're working with kids! the kids came in and out, others left and played at times... it was a team effort.

megan's brother paul (who has a full time job separate from his super.crazy.mad.videographer.skills) edited the video for me. i found the oh.so.perfect.lightening.from.the.sky music online and sent it to him to use with the footage. i'll never forget the moment i started listening to "this is the future" ... the song gave me the tinglies:

oh wow, this sounds like the beetles...

i love the beetles...

oh man, this has really good energy...

and oooooh it's about today being the future...

kinda like cooking with kids is our future...

ohhhhhhh the kids ARE OUR FUTURE... OMG *(&&&*^(*&^*&^*&^*&^(&^(*&^*&)....

i immediately dumped the other "favorited" tracks cuz i knew i had found the one.

here's the part that i'm.still.scratching.my.head.at: after paul and i discussed what i envisioned, this crazy talented man sent one, ONE draft of the video to me about a week and a half later. i told him to fix some spelling, add a few more video clips, switch the order of a few and add some pictures at the end. he dropboxed it back a few days later, all pretty and perfect. i submitted the entry about 15 minutes after receiving it from him. i think i shocked him:) that was it. done. he'd never created a video quite like this for the mullies (he collaborated twice before with meg to put these two montages together: our first mullies cooking class and our food revolution suit and tie party).

paul and meg knew exactly the energy, the message, the story that i wanted to convey (and continue to convey) and he did it so perfectly i could squeeze him (and her) to bits. it's like we all share the same brain... i think it's because i too have a red headed brother and sister... it must be our families' ginger power. i put some ginger in my green smoothie this morning. it's the best stuff ever.

so that's the story of how my food tube entry was born. chimmie and i spent the most amazing weekend together. she introduced me to kimberly snyder's awesome orange book of glorious clean food. i hooked up with miss memories by megan photography for an unscripted beach day cooking adventure. mr video keepsakes waved his magic wand with his sister's fairy dust and poof.

we have a pumkin!!!