Friday, February 18, 2011

Valentine's Day Recap and a Veggie Recipe

First, thank you to all of you who left such nice comments on my last post! It means so much to us to know our friends and family support these irrational choices =).

Valentine's Day at our house is never a big holiday, and this year I relied on that knowledge and the fact that Josh brought me flowers on my first day of work when I made the decision to treat Valentine's Day like any other day. Namely, going to work, spending time with my adorable mentoree (eating pink cupcakes and drinking coffee), riding my horse, and going grocery shopping. By the time I got home at 9:45pm there were a dozen red roses, a clean house, a card, and chocolate waiting for me! I was SO surprised. And happy.


See the top middle piece? This was my favorite- milk chocolate and honey. YUM.

I've made vegetarian meals all week, and so far it's going well. I am not missing meat, but I don't know if I can give up milk and cheese. We'll see.

The first recipe I want to share is this colorful, flavorful, filling baked dish: I modified the recipe from the New York Times (original here).

Veggie Bake

Brown 2 tablespoons, 1 chopped carrot, 1 chopped celery rib, 1 chopped small onion, 4 cloves garlic in large saucepan

Add 2.5 cups of water, 1 small can tomato paste, 1 can butter beans or lima beans or white beans, 1 bay leaf, 1 teaspoon herbes de Provence, 1 teaspoon parsley, salt and pepper to taste, and simmer
Rinse well 1 bunch of kale and rip into small pieces and add to saucepan (leaving out the stems), and stir

Transfer contents of saucepan to 13x9 pan and bake for 2.5 hours at 250 degrees. Sprinkle 1/2 cup of breadcrumbs on top and bake for an additional 10 minutes at 300 degrees.

I served it with pita, hummus, and a sliced apple. The pita was really good dipped in the casserole. I hope some of you try it and let me know if you liked it! Also, I almost didn't purchase the herbes de Provence thinking it wasn't very important, but I think they really made the dish!

This picture doesn't really do it justice- it was actually very pretty =).









Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Our Very Own Revolution

Hello friends,

Josh and I have made a lot of life changes in the past two weeks, and this post will hopefully shed some light on what we are doing and why! There are a couple of purposes of writing this: to keep you all updated on what the hell we're doing (there has been lots of wondering), and to document for myself (so I can look back and remember).

So, here goes!

1. I quit my job, and got a new job.
The motivation behind this was to leave my job before I got bitter and angry- I was working 50ish hours a week in addition to being on call 24/7. I miss the kiddos SO MUCH but am happy for a change of pace! I am now working at Imago Dei Community, a church in SE pdx that has a large focus on social justice and community service.

2. Josh quit his job, and will be exercising his entrepreneurial/inventor mind.
Josh has wanted to work for himself as long as I've known him, and this is a great opportunity for him to pursue that goal!

3. We're moving.
We live in a 1 bedroom condo and need a bigger space (in pdx) because....

4. We want to be foster parents.
We've been having this conversation for a couple of years, and finally can make it happen!

5. We are changing how we eat.
Less meat, more fruits and vegetables. If you are super duper interested read "The China Study" ;-).

Whew! We are really excited to be on this adventure together, and we feel amazingly lucky to be able to change our lifestyle at this point in our lives.

Thanks for listening, and I'll be posting updates on how this crazy experiment goes and some veggie-based recipes =).

Friday, February 11, 2011

What I've Learned from the Girls

1. You are not wearing make up unless you have on at least 3 shades of eye shadow and 2 mascaras.

2. Always ask if someone needs to talk "to" you or "at" you. This will save immense amounts of time.

3. The line between teasing them and hurting their feelings is thin, always changing, and impossible to predict.

4. Donuts and/or cookies are a good ice breaker. So is nail polish.

5. If you say you are going to do something you better do it. Or else. They do not forget.

6. Be prepared for your outfit, shoes, hair, make up, weight, nails to be picked apart at least ten times a day.

7. Sometimes "you look like a soccer mom" is a compliment.

8. Going outside is not fun.

9. Answer their questions with "no" about 90% of the time- when you say "yes" they will be so grateful.

10. If you don't pull out your "nasty disgusting gray hairs", they will do it for you.

Monday, February 7, 2011

Best. Spaghetti. Ever.

This sauce is sweet with a little kick, and the angel hair pasta (instead of spaghetti) is more tender and soaks up the sauce really nicely. Mmmmmmmmmm.

For two hungry people:

1 can tomato sauce
1/2 lb Italian sausage
1 splash of red wine
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon sugar (brown or white)
a few dashes red pepper flake, Oregano, Marjoram, Parsley
2 small, or 1 large, Bay Leaf
1 clove crushed garlic
2 small handfuls angel hair pasta
Parmesan cheese

Brown, rinse, and drain sausage. Add remaining ingredients except pasta and cheese. Simmer for 30 minutes- 2 hours. Boil pasta for 7 minutes (add a small amount of olive oil or salt to water) and drain. Sprinkle Parmesan cheese on top of individual portions. Enjoy!

Sunday, February 6, 2011

Super Bowl Thoughts

I really enjoy watching football. I really enjoy watching clever, fun advertisements. I really enjoy eating nachos, guacamole, pizza, soda, and beer. I should love the Super Bowl! And I do look forward to Super Bowl Sunday for all these reasons, but I hate the sexism that's become such a central part of the game. Advertisers spend millions of dollars for a Super Bowl commercial slot and, apparently, they try to make the most of it by being as disgusting and offensive as possible.

Top Three Lessons I learned from Super Bowl ads this year:

1. People won't buy sneakers unless Kim Kardashian is half naked and sort of having sex with her personal trainer.
2. Chevy is not only sexist, they're racist too! (really, Chevy, really?)
3. If you ask a woman to take off all her clothes she will, even if she initially rejects the idea. Just ask godaddy.com!

On the other hand men are stereotyped as single-minded simpletons, or as power hungry sexist jerks. So dumb!

On a positive note I award the Darth Vader VW commercial the best ad of Super Bowl XLV! It was cute and funny and original.

P.S. 8 of the players in today's game have had sexual assault charges brought against them. Hey, I have an idea! Instead of putting them on tv and paying them millions of dollars let's send them a message that mistreating human beings is not ok and kick them out of the NFL!