Just living is not enough... one must have sunshine, freedom, and a little flower. -Hans Christian Anderson The little bit of sunshine I enjoyed yesterday has me dreaming of warmer days coming. I would love to spend some of the early spring with you at a cooking class or local food event.

Classes taught by Rachel at Franklin Park Conservatory

Greens (ages 3-5) Winter greens are so sweet and tasty that even veggie-averse kids will be tempted to taste the green monster smoothie, kale chips, and pesto we cook up in this vitamin rich class. Thursday, March 10, 11 a.m. - 12 p.m. $15 Members; $20 Non-Members

Charcuterie Charcuterie is the act of curing meat by salt, smoke, or dehydration. Home cooks will learn how to apply these concepts to their cooking to delicious effect. Participants will enjoy a light meal featuring cured meat and stuff sausage to take home. Tuesday March 15, 6:30 - 8 p.m. $30 Members; $35 Non-members

Growing Young Chefs from the Ground Up! (For children entering grades 1 - 6) Spend Spring Break cooking and eating at Franklin Park! We will discover all the different parts of plants that we eat, from roots in the ground to fruit hanging from branches. Young chefs will help set the menu and cook tasty snacks and lunches, visiting bees and edible gardens along the way. Register by March 4. Monday - Friday, March 21 - 25, 9 a.m. - 4 p.m. Monday - Friday, March 28 - April 1, 9 a.m. - 4 p.m. $180 Members; $190 Non-members

Seeds to Grow and Eat! Seeds, the starting germ of a plant, can be eaten, sown, or sprouted. We will explore all three options in this family workshop. We will cook three snacks from seeds and create an indoor herb garden to take home. Sunday March 27, 2 - 3:30 p.m. $20 Members; $25 Non-members (price includes one child and one adult)

Condiments Condiments can be made at home as easily as opening a jar from the store. Participants will practice making mayonnaise, aioli, ketchup, mustard, and barbecue sauce. After creating the toppings, we will taste them on sandwiches. Sunday April 3, 4 - 5:30 p.m. $30 Members; $35 Non-members

Butterflies Did you know that all it takes to make butter is to shake up some cream? We’ll make butter from local Snowville cream and use the buttermilk to whip up whole grain pancakes with seasonal fruit. Thursday April 14, 11 a.m. -12 p.m. $15 Members; $20 Non-members (price includes one child and one adult)

Local Food Events

Maple Sugaring - 'Tis the season for making maple syrup. Instead of repeating her work, I direct you to the concise list of sugaring events at local parks on CbusMom.com.

Dine Originals Restaurant Week - March 7-13 Visit an independent Dine Originals restaurant during restaurant week for creative prix fixe meals at a steal of a price. Check out menus on the Dine Originals website.

Ohio Market Day at Hills Market - Saturday, March 12 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. This free community event showcases the wares of thirty food purveyors and organizations from around Ohio. Each of our Ohio vendors will demo their wares. We'll be hosting several workshops featuring recipes and accompanying samples. As always, Boar's Head will be giving away free hot dogs from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. and we will raffle off more than 100 prizes and giveaways.

Central Ohio Food Forum at Wild Goose Creative - Monday, March 21st from 6:30-8pm Join Edible Columbus, Local Matters, and Wayward Seed Farm for a series of open and honest conversations about our food system. With topics ranging from production to distribution, community gardens to backyard chickens, and everything in between, we invite you to join us. Bring your ideas, questions and thoughts, your neighbors, friends and family.

Edible Books Contest at Northwest Library - March 31 from 6 - 8:30 pm View the tomes turned to treats by professionals and amatuers or enter one of your own! Registration starts at 6 with viewing by the public from 7-8:30.

Zen Retreat and Cooking classes with Edward Espe Brown at First UU Columbus and Franklin Park Conservatory - April 1-3 Zen Columbus Sangha announces a weekend with Zen Buddhist priest, author, and chef, Edward Espe Brown. Detailed information, including schedule and registration, is available here: http://www.zencolumbus.com/EEBannouncement2011.pdf

PS. It's March 2, the birthday of my sister Sarah, uncle Mike and Dr. Seuss!

As the Hounds in the Kitchen are cooking over a campstove in Canada right now, we've invited some of our favorite bloggers to come fill the space here. Today's guest post is from Kristin Marks, the awesome CbusMom.

“We found it!” Cheers and excitement filled the air as we held our first box full of hidden treasure. It was a small gray box placed inside a tree log and inside the box were small gifts left behind by someone named namaste98. My children, a good friend, and I traipsed through Whetstone Park of Roses for almost three hours on our “Family Stroll in the Park” mission in search of this gray box. We were hot, sweaty, and tired, but determined to find that box to complete our very first Geocaching adventure.

Geocaching is basically high-tech scavenger hunting. Seekers use their GPS device (be sure it offers longitude and latitude) to locate a “geocache” which could be a box, bag, tube, or whatever the hider uses that is weather resistant. The website offers all the information you will need to go hunting: www.geocaching.com.

My experience was a really great one for the first time. I went online to sign up for a free membership and began searching for a geocache in my area. Turns out there are tons of geocaches hidden around Central Ohio and people have been doing this for years! I phoned my friend and asked her to come with me because I was a little apprehensive doing it alone with two kids. We chose the mission I mentioned above “Family Stroll in the Park,” mainly because namaste98 stated it was family friendly and had trinkets for children in the box.

We tried using only the google map we printed off the site’s page, but it gave a very loose frame of location for the geocache. So, I downloaded a free app for my Droid that told us where we were in regards to longitude and latitude because the basic GPS on my phone did not. Once we understood how to read where we were in regards to degrees North and West, we were on our mission.

The search lead us into the woods, we crossed over streams, patted nice dogs…and kept retracing our steps. The satellite signal to my phone kept bouncing off the trees and giving us incorrect longitude and latitude numbers; but, we reached the correct area, incredibly determined to find that geocache. Now, these geocaches aren’t always found. Sometimes you can search and search and not find it – and that is okay. It is the adventure of trying to find it that is fun.

After we knew we were in the correct area and not finding the hidden geocache, I was almost ready to call it quits. My friend asked “are you sure you checked every hollow log?” So I pouted a little and checked again. Wouldn’t ya know it?! I found it! Hidden by a broken branch in a hollow log was the little gray box we had spent hours trying to find. We opened it up and gazed at the little treasures inside. My daughter chose a piggy and my son chose a car; and if you take something you need to leave something, so we left a pirate figurine and some beads. We all felt accomplished and my kids got rewarded for their scavenger hunting abilities. When I got home I went to geocaching.com and logged my experience. The hiders sent me a congratulations email for finding their geocache. I’ll definitely do it again, and try not to pout next time.

Read Kristin's website, CbusMom for more fun family friendly ideas.