Sunday lunch - an outdated tradition?

Sunday is the only day Craig has off work. It is our 'family' day and whenever possible we try to make the most of it, dashing here and there, activities, lunch and basically trying to fit in as much as possible.

Last week we stayed home all morning, ate lunch at home and then visited our local playground for a couple of hours in the afternoon. It felt quite relaxed in comparison to how the day can sometimes unfold.

This lead on to a discussion about Sunday lunch, as in the 'traditional' Sunday lunch. Memories of Sunday lunch in childhood flooded back - overcooked veg, chewy meat, wallpaper paste gravy. Having said all that I still loved the whole notion of it. We decided that we would sometimes have a traditional Sunday lunch at home, starting this week.

Not sure how, but I forgot that we were planning on starting a new family tradition this week and didn't shop for it. By the time Craig reminded me at 11.45am it was too late to shop but we stayed home anyway and I cooked what we had in the fridge. It was good and I will be better prepared next time. There will still be times when we eat out on a Sunday but perhaps not every week now. Thinking about the quality of food in most child friendly restaurants I feel pleased that we have decided to make this change.

I was still thinking about our decision to make our Sundays more relaxed and home based when flicking through a book by Max Gerson this evening. He set me thinking even more about the way we live and how I feed my family.

'I believe that it is essential that people unite, in the old conservative manner, for the humanitarian purpose of producing nutrition for their families and future generations as natural and unrefined as possible.....We will need again real housewives, not eager to save kitchen time, but home makers who will devote their lives to the benefit of all, especially the task of developing and maintaining a healthy family.'

All sounds great in theory but then of course there are all the other issues such as balancing time spent *looking after* family with time spent actually *with* family for a start. Then there's the question of cost and so on.

In summer time we ate lots of food from the garden. That's stopped now though. We've a few cabbages, chard and leeks but that's it. Racking my brains about how to inject more affordable organic veg into our diet I have decided to start growing sunflower greens indoors. I have a huge bag of sunflower seeds from my last wholefood order. Off to the shed tomorrow to find a seed tray that will fit nicely on the windowsill. A small step I know, but a step all the same.