Monday, January 23, 2012

A little update

 Once again, your Monday is my Saturday. Today has been a great day even though I woke up to the gray clouds and the melting away of the snow from the rain in January. (p.s. last night there was a thunderstorm. In January.) 

I woke up today and took care of some insurance business. Matt had class most of the day today so we spent the early afternoon together and grabbed some lunch at Chipotle. We had the vegetarian burrito and Matt was a little sad that his had no sour cream. Which leads me to the vegan diet update. 

It's been over a week now of no meat, no dairy, no eggs, and we definitely feel better. It has been hard at times. We are big breakfast date people. We had a hard time and we're missing eggs and sausage. We improvised and found Gimme Lean sausage. It's vegetable and soy and it tastes JUST like sausage. So delicious. We mixed it with some hash browns, onions and some salsa and it took away our craving. 

We've enjoyed all the meals we've eaten. To be honest, I do not miss meat at all. The hardest part is the eggs and cheese. I don't miss milk because I thoroughly enjoy soy milk. 

I tired the vegan gourmet soy cheese and it was nasty. I couldn't handle it. 


Matt and I have done a lot of talking lately about the future. We're still up in the air about where we will be in 5-6 months. We've talked about all of our possibilities and back up plans. We know that it is inevitably not in our hands and trust that God has the plan all settled for us. We're trying to trust in that now. It's exciting all at the same time not knowing where in the U.S. we will be in 6 months.


Here's a phone photo dump from today. 

Vegetable stir fry with tofu and jasmine rice. 




Vegan mayo! I made this--- 


Vegan cole slaw!




Matt is in class this evening.


This is what my night has in store for me. 

Netflix, Tazo passion tea, plenty of candles and Trader Joe's dark chocolate. 




Happy Monday!!!!

Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Veganism



About a month ago Matt and I started watching different documentaries on Netflix. It's been a really good thing for us. We watched "The Business of Being Born" and it really changed my opinion of Labor and Delivery in hospitals. Interestingly enough I want to be a Labor and Delivery nurse. We'll see what happens. I will be interested to see when I can get a job in L&D if the documentary portrays the hospital setting correctly. 

Another documentary that really changed our minds was Food, Inc. 


 This movie highly changed our opinion of the food industry and the food we were putting into our bodies. I could not believe how bad the conditions were in some of our farms and "factories" in this country. I have never really been one of those "animal rights" types. I never really saw myself feeling that way. I was more like the rest of America with my beliefs of "God made animals to eat them". Not true at all. 


After we watched this documentary I tried to be more cautious about the food I was purchasing. I tried to buy more grass fed meat. I tried to buy more cage free eggs and free range chicken meat. It was hard to find and becoming a bit expensive. So, I eventually gave up and just kept buying my meat at Super Target. Then, Matt and I watched another documentary (I'm coming to the conclusion that maybe we shouldn't watch these things?! maybe we're too easily swayed?!) 


 We watched, Forks over Knives

  
After watching this movie we literally decided sitting on our futon that we were.... going vegan. A couple years ago I tried being vegetarian for a week. It really wasn't that bad, but I literally lived on a college campus and ate at a cafeteria, there was no way I could be a vegetarian eating in a college cafeteria. 

Matt and I made the decision to try being vegan for a month. No meant. No dairy. No eggs. We cleaned out our fridge and got rid of some of the lingering dairy and turkey hot dogs we had. We still have some ground beef in our freezer (just in case we change our minds, if not we'll donate to our friends). 

So, I started to do some research on what essential vitamins and nutritional supplements we needed. We went to Trader Joe's and loaded up on produce, rice, Quinoa, rice noodles, soy milk and other necessities. We had such a great time. We've been looking up new recipes and filling our mouths with fruits, veggies and nuts. After 4 days I have felt so good. The first couple days my stomach FREAKED OUT. I think I was getting rid of all the nasty sugars and "toxins" I had put in my body recently, but I was feeling better. I have cut out as much coffee as well. I've only been having 1 cup each day with just a little bit of soy creamer and attempting to cut out Splenda. I have been waking up around 6 or 7 in the morning with more energy than I have ever had. I was typically the person at work during my 12 hour shift that I would need a large coffee just to be motivated to talk in the morning, not to mention half way through the day I would CRASH and burn. Yesterday, I worked a 12 hour shift and had energy all day. I could not believe how good I felt. 

Here are a couple recipes I've tried so far and loved. 

I modified this one from one I found on 101cookbooks.com. I have found this blog really helpful. It's not all vegan but she has an archive of her vegan recipes. 

So far I think I can stick to this for the month and even longer. I think I can see Matt and I adding some meat occasionally. I have talked to a couple of the doctors I work with and they say a little meat every so often is okay. They did discourage the amount we consume in our country. 

Anyways, it's been fun so far. We've had a good time and feeling great. the next goal is to go to the gym. I am still working on that. 

I'll start posting some more recipes and keep ya'll update on our progress.

 I highly suggest watching those 2 documentaries if you're interested.

Saturday, January 14, 2012

Happy Weekend


Happy Saturday! 

It's a blustery winter day here in Chicagoland. 
Matt and I have separate plans today. His involve board games with guy friends, mine involve outlet shopping with the girls of the husbands playing said board games. Tonight we plan on eating a good homecooked meal and watching a movie or two cozied up on the couch.

We're soaking up the bits of winter here. We got our first big snow of the winter just a couple days ago. I have a pretty much hate relationship with snow. It's pretty and lovely, yes but mostly it is cold and blustery and I am the type of person always on the go and sometimes the snow prevents me from doing that. 

As the snow lays outside Matt and I can't help but think about what the spring and summer will bring us. Matt will graduate in May with his masters degree (a 4 year masters at that...). He has recently finished all of his applications for PhD programs. We're in the in between right now. We have no idea where we will be in 5 months. As excited as we are for the next phase of life, we're a little bit worried and anxious as well. There are a lot of ifs, whens, what ifs going on in our minds. Right now we're just trusting in God knowing that he has already figured out where we will be next. 
As the snow fell and as I unburied my car yesterday I was voting for Fuller University in California to be where Matt gets in.  Sunshine, sunglasses, sun dresses, sun tans. I think I can be okay with that for a few years (even if it is far far away from our families. Major downfall...).


Happy Weekend everyone! 

Enjoy! ;-)