"A banana should be soft..."

My friends and family used to call me Imelda Marcos. She was the lady who had a huge collection of shoes. There's a museum in the Philippines dedicated to her vast collection! Now, I didn't have quite as many as her, but I did (and still do) have a lot of shoes. At one point in my life, I think I counted around 100 pairs, including many different colored flip-flops. However, even though I had so many shoes, I tended to wear black all the time. This, I'm happy to say, has changed. Not the variety of shoes I own, but the variety of colors in my wardrobe. My friend Rachel has recently commented on the pops of color I have added to my clothing choices. I've discovered that it's fun to change things up and be experimental with the things I wear. In the same way, I have become much more experimental with the foods that I eat. When I was very young, the thought of eating hummus or raw peppers was obsurd and just plain disgusting. Lately, I've become rather obsessed....well, not exactly obsessed, but I've been eating a lot of dried cranberries and cherries lately. I love making fun salads and decorating them with colorful foods like bright multi colored peppers, carrots, dried cherries and also different kinds of nuts and seeds. For an FFS (Food Fork Stacker) like me, it makes for a delicious bite! Perhaps it's the same with clothing. Maybe I'll become a walking "fork" of colorful decorations.

I was excited to try granola this week because after reading the recipe, I knew it would include a lot of different ingredients, which would be fun to eat all in one bite. Now, the funny thing about dried fruit is that I have never liked it. Heather would often like eating dried apricots or banana chips and I just couldn't get myself to eat them. "A banana should be soft when eaten!" I thought. I'm still not a huge fan of the dried bananas, but I can appreciate them. I appreciate how they change "color". Staying a regular old banana is probably boring and it feels the need to change from a soft piece of fruit into a crispy chip that adds texture and flavor to granola! Now that I think about it, the banana has changed its wardrobe!

What I really like about this granola is that it can change every time I make it. Pretty much any kind of fruit or nut is acceptable. Just look at that delicious bowl of granola. Look at the colors and the flavors mixed together. Throw that into a bowl of vanilla yogurt and it's a perfect snack!