strawberry banana

we have a huge, and i mean HUGE wall in our living room (ok for those of you who haven’t been to my house, it doesn’t look that big in these pictures. it goes up high, though). it’s been naked most of the 18 months we’ve lived here, mostly because i couldn’t find anything that i wanted on that wall (and because whenever i DID find something, it wasn’t something i wanted at that scale). enter shopping trip with my friend amanda, finding vintage wrapping paper, and several ideas thrown around. i settled on a mirror wrapped with the paper. since the ikea mirror i wanted wouldn’t fit in dave’s car when he was down in LA, i was stuck trying to find one up here, or craigslist. enter home depot (once again, home depot saves the day!). found a mirror, and it was finally go time.

the final product! honestly didn’t take as long as i thought it would… maybe that’s because i utilized our mega-screen and plethora of movies to occupy the girls….. anyway, here’s how i did it:

started out by making my own modge podge out of elmers glue and water. worked great. grabbed the scissors, and started chopping the papers up into pieces that would fit neatly on the frame of the mirror. the corners were a beast. i think i got the hang of doing the corners by the time i got to the last one.

each piece, i tucked a little under the edge of the frame where it meets the mirror. then covered that section with modge podge, then carefully pressed it down on the frame (all the while cursing myself for getting a beveled frame) lots of glue got on the mirror, as you can see:

but dave followed behind me with a razor blade, and scraped the dried glue off the mirror. no marks, it came off easily. then after i got it as smooth as i could, i painted over the top with the modge podge. started out super shiny, but by the time it dried it had a matte finish.

as you can see from the brown paper above, i need to go back and re-glue some pieces. that brown paper was super thick, and didn’t stick as well as the rest of them. i had about 4 different textures going. my favorite was the thinnest, it stuck the easiest.

so there you have it. being not the most crafty of people, i was kind of proud of this, and that giant wall has something on it now! win win, baby.

dave and i found a great veggie/vegan restaurant in SLO a few weeks ago. i noticed that the pictures of the entrees that were posted on the windows were, let’s say, lacking. i mentioned to our server (also one of the owners) that i wasn’t a professional, but would love to take pictures of the food if they ever wanted to update what they have. he said that they were actually looking to re-do their menu and website. fast forward to today, when i got to do my first ever “food shoot”! it’s funny, you’d think shooting inanimate, still life food would be easier that mobile fast kiddos, but i’m not so sure…. but here’s a few of my favorites from today:

(wheatgrass)

our costumes aren’t 100% together yet, but we had a costume party today, so into the dress up trunk we went!

nope. and def not vegan with all that butter. but i love PW (pioneer woman) recipes. so what’s a family-going-as-little-animal-products- as-possible to do? modify. it’s all about modification, baby. we had PW enchiladas earlier this week at our neighbor’s house, and while they were YUM, i got curious to see if i could modify them into our new eating habits. so tonight, i attempted it. here’s the ingredients (and beside them, my modifications, if any):

Ingredients

• FOR THE SAUCE:
• 1 Tablespoon Canola Oil
• 1 Tablespoon All-purpose Flour –(organic, unbleached, white wheat)
• 1 can (28 Ounce) Enchilada Or Red Sauce –(i used TJs, but afterwards found it had a chicken base, so next time i’m going to make my own sauce)
• 2 cups Chicken Broth– (i was out of veggie broth, so i did use this, but next time will use veggie)
• 1/2 teaspoon Salt
• 1/2 teaspoon Ground Black Pepper
• 2 Tablespoons Chopped Cilantro — (you know me, i about tripled this)
• _____
• FOR THE MEAT:
• 1-1/2 pound Ground Beef — (1 can organic pinto beans + 1 can organic black beans)
• 1 whole Medium Onion, Finely Diced
• 2 cans (4 Ounce) Diced Green Chilies
• 1/2 teaspoon Salt
• _____
• FOR THE TORTILLAS:
• 10 whole (to 14) Corn Tortillas –(organic white corn/wheat tortillas)
• 1/2 cup Canola Oil –(omit- i didn’t fry the tortillas before filling/wrapping them and they were fine- corn/wheat combo tortillas are much softer)
• _____
• TO ASSEMBLE:
• 3 cups Grated Sharp Cheddar Cheese –(i used almond based non-dairy cheese- it passed the dave test. to those who know him, that’s a HUGE deal!)
• 1/2 cup Chopped Black Olives –(i just hate olives so obviously didn’t put them in!)
• 1 cup Chopped Green Onions –(at least- between green onions and cilantro, i know 2 of the things we need to plant)
• 1/2 cup Chopped Cilantro –(see above)

these were amazing- dave had 4, and kara ate some of mine. my new task in the kitchen? converting and tweaking great recipes into veggie/non-animal product. stay tuned for more.

last night we did our now annual (?) tractor riding, pumpkin patch picking, trip to the avila barn. it was perfect weather, and not as crowded as in the mornings!

hay does not taste good:

“i want THAT one!!”

kara has discovered her nose, and enjoys picking it these days.

she also found herself getting caught in a pumpkin vine.

ariana saw a grasshopper and decided to pretend to be one:

and this would have been a darn good one if kara’s eyes hadn’t rolled sideways, oh well, she’s still cute

ok i admit it. every other sunday evening stinks. it is better than him gone an extra 3-4 hours a day in traffic. maybe it stinks now because i’m used to having him around more.  yes, i’m used to it, as are the girls. regardless. every other sunday at about 7pm…. megh. that’s all.

afternoon on the beach. with the whaleys. taking pictures.  LOVE! (i’m not used to being in FRONT of the camera, ha)

i’ve always been a somewhat decent eater,  whether it’s because my stomach rebels against too much grease, or because i was raised without much fast food. but i have always liked to splurge, especially on good french fries. i’ve always tried to avoid fast food, like mcdonalds, and stick with the in’n'outs, chipotle, etc, and places that have a little higher quality meat and food, and less preservatives. we’d drink the rare soda, but never diet, because of the aspartame and artificial sweeteners. but i believe in butter and sugar, baby! and until recently, didn’t necessarily buy organic on purpose. then we met bert enriquez, and then the whaleys changed their life.

our friend bert is basically vegan. i’ve seen him eat the occasional dairy or egg, but he tries to stick with a raw food diet. we have friends the hudgens who also eat a raw diet, but because bert was around more (just a few minutes away before we moved), it impacted us a little more. he never pushed anyone to eat the way he did, but led by example. so we started watching food documentaries. super size me, food inc, and king corn. we started to make sure most of our produce was organic, but didn’t change much else. during this time, our friends the whaleys radically changed their lifestyle by going all organic. we chatted a lot with them about their research, the whys, etc. it made sense to us. but we still didn’t do much. we watched a couple more documentaries, including some french one, and fat, sick and nearly dead, and for some reason, something clicked. the guy in fat sick and nearly dead did a fruit/veggie juice fast for 60 days and lost 90 lbs. now obviously dave isn’t wanting to lose weight like i am, but he’s wanting to be healthier. we researched all the pesticides that go into produce, and the effects they have on food and people in the long run. we read about the “dirty dozen” in produce, the ones that are the most susceptible to more penetration by the pesticides, and the dirty dozens in foods, in all the processed foods. Even in a Biblical sense, were we honoring God with our bodies by putting a bunch of crap in it? not really…. 1 Cor 6:19-20 says “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.” we decided to try to do a more organic, veggie, less meat, less processed, way of eating (NOT a diet), and try to basically eat more pure foods, and put less garbage in our bodies.

so what does that leave us to eat? surprisingly, a lot. we don’t go out to restaurants quite as much, because, well, there aren’t many places that have food that isn’t organic or sustainable. we’re cooking a lot at home, eating a lot more vegetables, and honestly, i think we both feel better. we know it’s not realistic for us to go 100% organic, because we don’t want to make it so we can never with someone who doesn’t eat the way we do. if someone invites us over for dinner, we’ll eat the food. we don’t want people to think we’re “off limits” or something. this is just our choice. we’ve found we eat less food overall, grocery shop a little more, buying less, but wasting less, as well. for meat, we’re buying grass fed instead of “ordinary” meat. costco has organic beef, which was nice to find. we’ve also found that we get intestinal distress when we eat the “old” way! dave had burger king on his way back up from LA, and that didn’t go well (this coming from a guy who used to have a stomach of steel) and i’ve had issues with just mayo or regular cheese. it’s interesting, too, that i don’t crave the stuff i used to, that i thought i’d miss. and it’s not like i bake any less, i just buy organic ingredients (which gosh darnit, they taste a lot better!) i made chocolate chip cookies for the first time with organic bittersweet chocolate chips, and my gosh, did they put nestle to shame! seriously, taste alone is a reason to switch!

while we don’t crave the “old” food as much, it’s still there, and i’m sure we’ll eat it on occasion…. overall, we’re just trying to eat more pure, unadulterated food. it’s not the easiest, but when we think about the benefits to our bodies and to our children, it makes it easier.