"I wish I could make it all black," she said, after she tried for the third time to get the last of the chaff out of the finished seed. "That’s all right, a little chaff is good for us." "But you want it to look good on your website, so you can impress people." Ha! Funny. "Well, it gives me an opportunity to discuss the importance of fiber in the diet." "Oh. OK," and she let the finished seed alone and went back to winnowing more. (Chaff is fiber, which we cannot digest. Fiber works almost like a broom to brush off all the junk that is stuck to our intestines. Make sure you have plenty of fiber in your diet!)
As the seeds accumulated, the girls marveled at how soft and smooth they were. Amaranth seeds are tiny, perfectly round, shiny soft spheres, and the girls just kept pressing their fingers into the small pile and rubbing them. "So soft!" they exclaimed, as if they had discovered a hidden treasure. Indeed they had.
After all that work, we only collected a few tablespoons of amaranth seed, but it was worth it. We had collected something even more valuable: a treasure of discovery, learning, memories, and wonder at the world.