Four Fun-filled Primarily Paleo Days with a Midwife Blogger

I just spent the last four fun-filled primarily paleo days with a midwife blogger. This is an incredible story. Prepare to be amazed.

Garden of Friendship token, gift from Sandi

The internet does a couple of things really well, inform and connect. You can learn how to do almost anything on the internet (how do you think I learned to garden?) and you can bond with people you otherwise would have never met. When I started my blog in 2012, I connected with Sandi on her blog at http://flamidwyfe.com/. A native of Florida, Sandi was living in China and delivering babies. Sandi has an adventurous spirit and as a midwife has delivered babies all over the world. She shared garden photos on Late Bloomer Show on Facebook, because the Chinese grow their own food wherever there is space.

When my Haiti missionary nephew and wife were expecting their first child last November, and were debating in July whether to have the baby in Haiti or come back to the U.S. (if this seems like a no-brainer, consider that they are in the process of adopting two Haitian children who can’t leave the country), I put them in touch with Sandi for advice. Sandi wound up going to Haiti for two weeks and guiding the delivery of baby Jake. Here’s Jillian’s birth story. I said to Sandi, “Now we are bonded for life.”

Baby Jake Kittrell, newly born, at home in Haiti – Photo by Hunter Kittrell 

Cut to: Last Tuesday I commented on Facebook that I had just seen one of the award-contender movies from this year, and Sandi, now back home in Florida, replied that she was going to the theatre on the weekend to see it. I wrote back, why don’t you come out to California and we can watch all the movies, as I have screeners (as a union actor, I get to vote for the Screen Actors Guild Awards). Wednesday she booked a ticket and arrived on Friday!

Turns out, Sandi is following a primarily paleo diet, and she happens to enjoy cooking! All gardening came to a halt during our brief heat wave and brief rain and glorious weather Sunday through Tuesday. We packed so much into those four days, it’s a little mind-blowing. We caught the sunset Friday evening and the sunrise Saturday morning.

Sunset over Santa Monica Bay, Friday, January 23rd, 2015

Sunrise over Santa Monica Bay, Saturday, January 26th, 2015

I was acting in a staged reading of my theatre lab’s “The House of Mirth” on Saturday, so Sandi got a taste of West Hollywood. We went to the gym and we went for a hike in the Santa Monica Mountains in Topanga State Park.

Kaye & Sandi on hike

We took an 8AM swim in a pool in a highrise in downtown L.A., and were served breakfast by my friend Takayo on the 36th floor with wrap-round windows and spectacular views.

Takayo Fischer at home on the 36th floor, downtown Los Angeles

Takayo is another remarkable friend. A life-long actress and singer, Takayo grew up in the Japanese internment camps and went on to sing and dance on Broadway. She’s rehearsing a play now! Her T-shirt proclaims, “Been there. Not done yet.”

And the Getty Center is a must if you never been, and Sandi hadn’t, so Sunday afternoon was reserved for a must-see career retrospective of Josef Koudelka, brunch in the restaurant and a walk through the gardens (all Getty fountains are currently waterless, except for the big round one in the garden, due to the California drought).

Sandi attempts to photograph a mere fraction of the enormous Getty Center

There were unusual plants on display in the garden, such as this reportedly poisonous nightshade.

Nightshade with needle-like thorns

Monday, a day trip down to Corona del Mar to work with my Late Bloomer editor while Sandi roamed around the Sherman Library & Gardens where she picked up my Garden of Friendship token. Each day we hunted stores for fresh organic meat for our nightly paleo meal, after which we watched movies. When we said goodbye at the airport, I wasn’t sad because we are already planning a trip to England in June.

Kaye and Sandi in the Late Bloomer garden

I will visit a Google+ gardener connection and see his allotment in West London and rail out to Devon to meet another blogger (treat yourself to CrazyTraintoTinkyTown here) who’s dad is a big fan of mine. There are a half a dozen people and places I’d like to visit in England, including Todmorden. Read about Incredible Edible here.

These four fun-filled primarily paleo days with a midwife blogger were memorable, rather exhausting and I ate well. Let the adventure continue! (See my other blogger meeting and post here.) Thanks for reading. If you’ve gone out of your way to meet a fellow blogger, please let me know! – Kaye

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Tags: babies, biodiversity, community, curbside gardening, do-it-yourself, farming on small scale, flowers, Four Fun-filled Primarily Paleo Days with a Midwife Blogger, friendship, gardening, gardening web series, Getty Center, Getty Museum, green your world, growing your own vegetables, Haiti, Josef Koudelka, Kaye Kittrell, Kaye Kittrell Late Bloomer, Late Bloomer, midwife, paleo, paleolithic diet, Photography, Plant photography, plants, urban gardening, web series

Category: Community, Garden Musings