food Archives - Moving Peaces

A table can represent many things. Meals, bills, homework, art projects and board games all have a place here. There’s a lot of community that can happen around a table. When meals are shared, conversation often ensues. It’s a wondrous thing.

This is our table. I’m sure you thought I’d never actually get around to showing the inside of our home but here’s a glimpse, kitchen and all.

Food can sometimes make me feel like an outsider sadly. I’ve gone through bouts of serious sickness in the past and have mourned the loss of several food types. It’s easier than it was at first, but sometimes it’s still hard to keep going. While I haven’t been sick as often or intensely, I have to keep with it. Crazy food restrictions are still there. Sometimes I want to throw all caution to the wind and occasionally, I have. It ends in mixed results ranging from seemingly no change to an onslaught of sick.

At first, our meals with others seem to revolve around what I can and cannot eat. It’s a good story but by the end of the night it can be pretty exhausting to relive it all again and go through all the ins and outs of it. When just about every meal you share with someone involves you talking about all of the things you can’t eat, it can get overwhelming.

So, while I’d love to paint this beautiful picture of all the table can mean in community, it’s not the whole truth. It IS a wonderful setting for community and many meaningful things have happened there, but it’s also a hard and painful place for me. Food has caused so much stress and frustration, both as a result of eating it and of avoiding it. It can make me feel so disconnected from people, whether it’s because my meal will inevitably be different or maybe even because I have to physically leave in order to find something else to eat since nothing on the table will work. Yet at the same time, people have rallied around us and have been so kind and thoughtful as we’ve fought to figure this all out. There’s really been so much love and for that I am so grateful.

In the end, the table is a complicated place. Community and relationships are equally complicated. People have shortcomings and insecurities that cannot be as easily hidden in real relationships. Ultimately, it’s worth it to share in community and come to the table.

This week has felt incredibly long. Perhaps it was the mini-vacation we had in there or the fact that my shortened work week has dragged on in all of the worst ways. Thankful though for a weekend coming our way and time to clean house a little. Here’s the Thursday Three…

1. Did I mention a mini-vacation? Why yes. That happened, unexpectedly. We have some amazing friends who called and said they were flying standby and would be at our door the next day. They wanted to take a little babymoon before she was no longer allowed on airplanes (35 weeks preggo!) and I could not have been happier to see them. Seriously. I was getting a little Iowa-sick (like homesick, but when you feel at home where you are now) last week and they were just the ticket. We did our best to be good hosts and took them to some of our favorite spots in the Triangle and then headed out to Nags Head to hit the beach! Love, love, love them.

2. We ate like foodies. I am not a foodie, generally speaking. Between a long list of allergies and a weakness for nibbling, I mostly survive on fruit and cheese. While they were here, we went all out and ate so many amazing things I think I could write about those meals for the next ten posts and still be licking my lips. French bakery goods, specialty pizza, fresh seafood, more seafood and local ice cream…what more could a girl want?

3. We balanced the weekend out by looking at the budget. I know, super lame sounding compared to all of that wonderful and epic fun we just had. But it was time to look over our spending habits, make some adjustments and talk about what was most important. I think something I’ve learned with budgets is that it doesn’t actually have to be restricting. It’s almost more freeing to say, “I am going to spend this amount of money and not feel guilty about it because it is in the budget” as opposed to being oblivious to what spending is happening and feeling like you must be doing it wrong unless you avoid it altogether. It made me feel more relaxed once it was done. I’m definitely thankful for a hubby who is on the same page with me as we strive to be good stewards of our money, not to mention, glad he was willing to allot a fair amount for vacation money!