Zuchini Marion Berry Pie

I have a lovely crop of basil growing in my garden this year. All basil is yummy, but this was the tangy version used in Thai food--which my husband and I love. Though my husband requested pasta because he was going to run 10 miles in the morning, I was set on making massaman curry with our garden harvest vegetables and herbs.

I have three very productive zuchinni plants this year, so am always slipping them in meals (berry, peach, banana, yogurt, zuchinni smoothies have been a regular part of breakfast since the harvest season started). My sister made a zuchini pie a few years ago, that resembled apple pie. I thought I would top this delicious Thai meal off with a yummy marion berry-zuchini pie.

The massaman curry was delicious. I used garlic, basil, zuchini from my garden. I added orange bell peppers, potatoes, peanuts, chicken, and curry paste to the coconut milk. After dinner, my children were gathered around the island and my husband was cutting into the beautiful pie (sometimes I burn things, and my meals are not always delicious, so this seemed to be a good food night). My husband had much anticipation for this very beautiful pie. He cut into the pie and as he dished out the first piece he got this disgusted look on his face, gave me a dirty look and stormed off to his room--big baby. The kids and I enjoyed the zuchinni/berry pie with ice cream. I guess my mistake was not pealing the zuchinni--that way it would have been apple berry pie.

Pride…thank goodness life keeps you humble.

My daughter (almost 10) is a fish. She was just born that way. The summer she was almost two years old, she would stand at the edge of the swimming pool and repeatedly jump in the water, swim back to the edge, over and over again. She wanted to be on the swim team, so at six years old I hired a teenage neighbor, who was a swim team member to teach her some of the strokes. She worked with her twice, then I sent her to the rec team tryout. She was my third child, so I knew better than to waste my money on the rec center "swim lessons" route (though she did have one lesson this way when she was four or five). She luckily made the team (maybe because the 6-year-old standards were not as strict as the older ages). She was on a summer league recreation team for two years and loved it. She did quite well, and in her second year made it to the "Gold Meet."

By her third year, we had the three boys take the swim clinics necessary to learn the strokes. They also made the summer recreation team, so we became a family of swimmers (except me and my husband who are capable of not drowning, but that is about it). The boys made the Silver Meet and did okay on their first year. They were natural breaststrokers, so that gave them a bit of confidence. My daughter placed first or second in each of her events at the summer league Gold Championship meet. It was kind of fun to have a kid finally excel at something. She was a natural racer and enjoyed beating the other girls. She would look side to side, to make sure she was in the lead.

Because she was doing so well, and now we were a family of swimmers, we had the three oldest join the local competitive club team. What a difference! She went from placing first, to becoming a "no time" competitor, because she didn't have any recorded times in the USA League. She did fine, but not winning every heat took her back a bit. She lost her drive and motivation. We kept taking her to practices, but she just went because we dropped her off, not because she wanted to do it. She spent the school year attending practice three or four times per week and competing in a meet about once a month. She did alright, but kept saying she hated it and asking when could she quite. She wanted to go back her old rec team for the summer. We overruled her decision and had her stay with the competitive league since a couple of her brothers were also swimming on the same team by now, and we thought the coaching would be better on the club team.

Sure enough, she did fine all summer and placed 6^th in a b/c state meet. The fun part was, that since she hadn't been on the club team a full year, she could also swim on this Rec Center's summer rec team meets. She had fun at these meets because once again she was the champion. On the final meet of the summer, she was told that she would not get a rec league trophy because she had qualified for the b/c state meet—it is all about the trophies and ribbons at this age.

Here is the part about me and my pride…It was really fun seeing her win and excited about swimming again. The swimmers were allowed to swim in three events at the meet. She enjoys the 100 IM, and it has always been one of her best races. It is a little difficult for rec swimmers, since it is four different strokes and they all have their different ways of getting disqualified. She was in the final heat with the "fast swimmers" as they arrange the heats by historical times. I stood up in front of her lane to cheer her on. I was getting excited for her as she was for sure going to take first place. I suddenly had a feeling of pride that went something like this, "all these people are going to see me cheering for the champion and they will know she is my daughter."

The buzzer went off, and the racers began. She was getting off to a slow start, and all the other racers were ahead of her mid-way on the first stroke. "What was going on, her dive didn't look that bad?" I thought to myself. Then I looked over at the other swimmers. The IM was an open race in the rec league since they probably don't have enough entries to hold a heat for each age group. She was swimming against all the older girls—you could see this by their body sizes, some of them were full-grown and woman-size. She took last place in the heat, all the other girls were at least half a pool ahead by the end of the race. So instead of having the champion glory, I had the last-place glory (even though she still took first in her age group and got a blue ribbon for it). The rec league parents wouldn't have made that connection, and it looked like my daughter was a last-place swimmer. I had a good laugh at myself, then went over and found a garbage sack and started picking up trash for an hour and a half as part of my parent service assignment (which is a humbling experience all by itself).