Carrie Saum

We saw Hurricane Ike coming for days before it made landfall. It was just two short years post-hurricane Katrina, and all of south Texas and Louisiana were still reeling from her trauma. My husband and I began deliberating if we should stay or go. This is my story of surviving natural disasters.

Friends. I have discovered something magical.

Am I the only one who gets pumped about using a crockpot during the colder months?

If you tend to eschew your inner child and prefer to feel somewhat sophisticated and faux-healthy, you can call a frozen wine drink a smoothie and it totally counts. Because we are all of a legal drinking age here and there is no shame in consuming your daily super fruit serving in a nutritious, fermented, frozen liquid form. The best part about all of this is you don’t need GOOD wine, you just need not-chardonnay.

This is by no means a comprehensive list of internalized toxic beliefs, but it’s a start. Keep fighting the good fight, friends.

Food is fun and chicken soup is hard to mess up. Truly! Enjoy this Lemongrass Ginger Chicken Soup recipe from my heart to your stove.

I say this: Stop fat-shaming my toddler son. Fat will not make him fat. Fat does not make him unhealthy.

One of the very best gems my friend brought to me were these goat cheese medallions. I couldn’t wait to try them and now share them with you.

Something powerful shifted for me when I turned 30. I decided to stop caring about my weight as a means to measure my success, beauty and worth as a woman. I gave myself permission to care for my body, and to care for the woman inside that body first.

I have a thing for a certain Asian-inspired restaurant chain. Their food isn’t Michelin-starred, and doesn’t often make it into my regular rotation for eating out because, well, we don’t eat out much, and I like only a few things on their menu.