Everyone,

The first time I gave these smoothies to my kids, Butterfly said, “Oh wow! Chocolate!” Sadly, there is no chocolate in this drink, but the kids just guzzle it down. It’s oh so healthy and super easy to make.

First, you start with some yogurt. I use the yogurt I make in my crock pot using whole milk and this recipe. Totally works.

Next, add some honey. I honestly eyeball the honey in my smoothie. I’m guessing it’s about a 1/4 of a cup that I add. I add the honey because frankly, that yogurt I make is not sweetened and is pretty strong! I’m sure you can use less honey if you want or omit it completely if you’re using sweetened yogurt. I just choose not to.

Then toss in some fruit. I’ve got small bags of 8-10 strawberries frozen in my freezer that work out perfectly. I also really like bananas, frozen kiwi (just skin the kiwi and pop them in individual bags in the freezer), frozen blueberries, etc. You can use any fruit you’d like. We just happen to love strawberries and blueberries here so that’s what we use the most. You can use fresh fruit if you’d like. I like using the frozen stuff because it makes the smoothie cold and have a good smoothie texture.

Now this is the secret ingredient. Spinach. You read it right, a whole huge handful of spinach. I buy it in big bunches from the Asian market here. Wash it, and break any stems off and put it into the blender. You don’t have to dry it because the extra water helps it blend together.

Next, drop in a few ice cubes. If you can.

This last step is important. Add a splash of juice. You can use any kind of juice, but I like the nectars that are a little more thick. I also LOVE to put carrot juice in here. Right now I happen to have guava nectar.

Now blend! If you find that the spinach isn’t blending down, stop the blender and push it down. You can also add another splash or 2 of juice or even milk to get things moving.

No Chocolate Chocolate Smoothie

1 cup whole milk plain yogurt
1/4 cup honey (or less)
8-10 strawberries, frozen or fresh
any other fruit you want- bananas, blueberries, kiwi (which is excellent frozen), pineapple, pears, berries, peaches
one BIG handful of fresh spinach, stems broken off and washed
one handful of ice, or 6-8 ice cubes
a splash of juice- 100% carrot preferably

Blend it up and enjoy! Makes enough for 3 full tall sippy cups of it as well as a 16 oz glass for me.

Yes, it’s brown when it’s blended. Yes, Butterfly thinks there is chocolate in it and I haven’t told her there isn’t. Yes, it’s GOOD. This is what Butterfly requested on the morning of her birthday for breakfast. I don’t have an after picture for you (I think I was tired that morning) but it’s really great. I feel good that the kids are getting their veggies in, and also their fruits and yogurt!

Today’s giveaway is a big one. First, look at this cute picture of me and my boys.

Aren’t we adorable. We were hiking with Lolli and her family in Harper’s Ferry that day. I had one of Lolli’s wraps on the front and a Ergo carrier on the back. It was my very first use of it and it was amazing. Boy do I love this carrier. It’s easy to put on. It’s easy to put the kid in. And it’s so very comfortable! I like that I can carry both boys around and still have my hands free with this set up.

Now, after having it for over 2 months, the boys scream “RIDE!!” whenever they see it. I either leave it in the car tucked under the seat (and out of sight) or I’m constantly getting it shoved in my face with little boys who want to ride in it. Juice has even carried Butterfly around in it, in all her 60 lbs of limbs. And really, the carrier can withstand up to 90 lbs so she’s perfectly safe. She even said it was really comfortable.

Do you want one? I have one to give away. It looks just like the one I’m carrying Pirate with on my back in the picture.

To enter, you must do 2 things. First, leave a comment. I love comments. Next, you have to join my blog via my cool new thing: Google Friend Connect. If you were a previous follower of my blog before, you get an extra entry! And for one more extra entry, you can tweet about it, including @safirecat so I can keep track of them.

As always, this giveaway will end a week from today.

Happy Commenting and let me know how you like that smoothie!

Safire

Everyone,

This past Saturday at 8:30pm found Juice and I (and the kids who were asleep) sitting in the dark. While it’s not unusual for us to turn off the lights on a Saturday to watch a movie or something, this Saturday was different. We turned off the lights as part of the World Wildlife Fund’s global Earth Hour.

What is Earth Hour? According to their website, it is an hour when millions of people, governments, etc, around the world come together to make a statement about the climate by turning off their lights for one hour.

Not just people are doing this. Governments are turning off spotlights on their buildings. The Las Vegas strip turned off their lights for an hour. See this cool video slide show from last year.

At the last minute, Juice and I decided to participate. It was kind of cool to feel like we were part of the millions of people also sitting in the dark. I saw a lot of people with candles (you can send in pictures of what you did that hour) and those cool glow in the dark necklaces that Butterfly loves so much. We joined over 4,000 cities in 125 countries that sat in the dark for an hour.

Yes, I realize that an hour is probably not going to do much to globally impact the world. It really didn’t do much for us but made us cheer when we turned the lights back on. It also made us realize that we should really find all of our flashlights. It was a preparedness reminder. Next year I’m going to make it fun for us and have a candle light dinner. And flashlights. With working batteries!

This is the 3rd year that they have been doing this Earth Hour and it’s grown very rapidly. From this, Mt. Rushmore has decided to turn off it’s lights starting at 9 pm, instead of 11 pm every day. They are making a progressive change in their business style. So it got me thinking about what kind of change I could make in my own life for the environment.

As I got to thinking about it, I’ve already made my own change. I’ve been using the SEED shampoo bar for over a week now and I seriously love it. But what does this have to do with the environment? Well, the bar has a smaller ecological footprint than the big liquid bottles. They don’t have plastic packaging, use less water to make and cost less to ship. They are made right in the USA. Their packaging is 100% biodegradable. Plus it makes my hair more fluffy and shiny. That’s my favorite part.

It may be a small change. A tiny change, in fact. Just like us turning our lights off in the house for an hour was tiny. But every drop in the bucket counts. And sooner or later, that bucket is going to fill.

So I’m glad to be doing my part by putting my tiny drops in the bucket one at a time. And I look good doing it too.

Safire

PS- TOTALLY check my blog tomorrow afternoon for a HILARIOUS video staring myself and Lolli. Seriously, it’s worth watching!

PPS- Written in hopes that SEED and Jen from Hip As I Wanna Be will pick me for a sponsorship to BlogHer 2010. Pick Me SEED! I really want to go and celebrate my 30th birthday with you.