Kickin' it with Karen : Beyond Sauerkraut

"Just a simple sauerkraut without all the fancy stuff, please".  Kickin' it with Karen: Beyond Sauerkraut   A colleague of mine asked me if she could buy some sauerkraut from me. How strange. I never thought anyone would want to buy something made in my kitchen. But, she really wants the natural, fermented probiotics that are bioavailable in a quality sauerkraut and the only place she knows where to get it is from Whole Foods (EXPENSIVE) and well... from me. Probiotics are so important for our gut health. As a reminder from my previous sauerkraut post, "Probiotics are the good bacteria that line the intestines and help break down food and help your body absorb nutrients as well as help regulate and increase energy". We need probiotics to support our immune system and regulate our metabolism (Axe). For my colleague, I am glad to oblige. But it is so easy, anybody can do it. There are a thousand and one million hundred gazillion recipes out there in

Kickin' it with Karen: Beyond Sauerkraut Is anybody else out there a teacher? We are just a week and a half out from winter break and I feel like I have been hit by a bus. Exhausted much? Holy Hallelujah! These are they days when waking up - even if I have gotten 9 hours of sleep - feels like I'm waking from the grave. I think most professionals would say, "What are you doing for self-care?" - something I think teachers regularly forget about. We are so busy caring for our students, making sure they are meeting the standards and making progress, as well as making sure they are "OK" in and out of school. Our students face a myriad of challenges and with that comes the trauma and the drama.  Everything that happens to them out there in their world often comes back with them to school. When we get wrapped up in their story, we can experience secondary trauma.  This takes an emotional toll that if we don't pay attention to it, this can end up having rea

Kickin' it with Karen: Beyond Sauerkraut If you read my last post, you know that the gift giving season is very important for me for one specific reason. As young children, my dear sister and I would make gifts and spend hours happily giggling away as we haphazardly wrapped them with the tape all wonky and the corners sticking up and not really folded where the box had a corner or an edge. Again, the holidays are here and  I rejoice in my memories of my sister, but I miss her so much.  Forty-nine is too young to pass on. However, I was given the gift of those 49 years and I have memories to carry me through another year. So, in my sisters honor, I will make gifts. Not drawings or cut out dolls,  but non-toxic homemade gifts that my colleagues, friends and family can make use of everyday.  As I said in my last post, I believe in gifts with a purpose. I also believe in gifts from the HEART 💖 and not from the wallet. Winter is long here in Minnesota. Right around  Januar