"Alternative"

As someone who is "alternative" and has to hide it everyday, let me just kindly present these photos, which just struck me.

Weddings

About a 1.5 years ago I made some bridesmaids dresses for a friend. Whether I was given the wrong measurements, followed my pattern wrong, or just simply fucked up, it doesn't matter. In the end though, she wasn't happy with the dresses, they were all the wrong sizes, and adjustments had to be made at the last minute, and I wasn't there. In any case, here is a good picture of them. I did all the work for free, but I still feel like crap that she wasn't happy.

Food, Food, Food

I can’t tell you how much I love food. Mmm, food. Baked, fried, charbroiled, grilled, sautéed, pureed, or however it comes, I love it. Lately, on Pinterest I have been finding a ton of vegan friendly recipes that I adore. I’m not vegan myself, but I wandered down that rabbit hole and came out with a million recipes to try. Here is a link to my Pinterest for Food and Diet.

Some recipes I REALLY must try soon:

1.      Steamed Chili Lime Tofu with Steamed Collard Greens and Quinoa

2.      Bloomin’ Bree Bowl – yes, like a bloomin’ onion, only with bread and bree!

3.      Matcha Mochi – especially for John’s sake

4.      Bread and Eggplant Lasagna

5.      Veggie Gyros

6.      Black bean and Butternut Squash Burritos

Those don’t even include the fruit tarts, the brownies, or the cupcakes. That is just “real” food, and not junk food. There is a link there for 30 vegan fall recipes. Mmm, I want to try them all.

I would fear turning vegetarian if I wasn’t so in love with meat. But I will say that a friend of ours posted about mushroom and spinach naan pizza, and now that is a favorite to make in our household, plus all the Indian cooking I have been doing in the last year. There is nothing like fresh naan, or cilantro mint chutney to round off a week. There is much baking and cooking in my weekend future, I see it, along with some nice Wood Chuck’s Winter Cider or maybe a Blue Moon Pumpkin Ale. It’ll have to do, at least until we can make our own cider, and more mead and beer.

While I already walk to and from work, I really want to exercise more, but let’s be honest, I am not the best at exercising. I’ll never go to a gym, I’m not interested in tapes long enough for them to matter, and classes make me uncomfortable. I used to fence, but don’t want to fence with the A&M team, and I currently ride horses every week, and occasionally (a lot less than I like) I do archery. Still, I need something more, even just a little bit more. So, again with Pinterest, my current obsession, I found two quick workouts that even I can probably do each day. Probably being the operative.

The first is the 100 Workout:

100 Jumping Jacks

90 Crunches

80 Squats

70 Leg Lifts

60 Jumping Jacks

50 Crunches

40 Squats

30 Leg Lifts

20 Jumping Jacks

Run for 10 minutes

The second is just a series of workouts on the wall that help your butt, thighs, and stomach to be stronger. Simple, easy, no fuss, no gym, no equipment. Now to motivate myself.

My mother-in-law’s birthday is today, and we went last Sunday to have dinner with her since we don’t have time this week, and she lives in Waco. All went well, and we had a good time, but on our way home the Camry broke down and had to be towed. Luckily, we were in a safe place with a wide shoulder, David was home and near a computer so that we could get the number to a tow company, and we weren’t too far from College Station. John was also great and quickly noticed that the car was overheating, plus he thinks he knows what the issue is. If he is right, which he usually is, he should have it fixed by the end of the week. I love having a mechanically inclined husband. Actually, he is inclined to anything he puts his mind to: blacksmithing, brewing, archery, car repair, cooking, shooting, hunting, reloading, writing, science, okay everything, and I am jealous, but it is just part of why I married him.

In turn the car being broken down may prevent me from seeing my brand new niece. My brother’s daughter was born yesterday evening at 6:40 p.m. Her name is Kaylin Victoria Bullard, and she is 8 lbs, 21 inches long, and is very healthy.

We have two cars, but John has to work the opening of deer season to measure antler spreads at the local sausage market for Texas Parks and Wildlife. I will also in turn miss David’s baby shower, and I haven’t seen him in some time.

General Updates

I have a lot of friends having babies, and most of them are lamenting having to go back to work, and how hard it is to leave their babies. I understand this, but if it is so hard find a way to stay home permanently. I think it is a horrible tragedy that women, or men, or whoever, have to work, and can't be home with their children. If children are what you want from life, then I think you should be able to fully enjoy, raise, etc. your child, but it isn't possible when today, to live comfortably, you must have two incomes. In some cases to live at all you have to have two incomes.

I consider myself a very progressive woman, but I think a lot of issues with the world today stem from the fact that one parent cannot stay home with the child throughout its young life. This "luxury," which I feel is a basic function of life, is reserved for only the rich, or the very lucky. The rich, who in turn have money to stay home or hire a nanny, and whose children then get the attention, cognitive development, and so forth that makes them successful later in life. One more way the rich stay rich, and the poor stay poor. Now, I'm not saying a poor child won't become successful, I'm just saying that there is an unfair advantage for the rich because their parents have the ability to not need two incomes. It's just a shame, because the world really would be a better place.

In other news, I've been so busy with work I haven't posted here much. I am taking a break early this morning to post an update. I took some pictures of the new place and I will post them later if I have time. Last night I got so excited about finishing all the decorating that I went on a spree, and hung a few things, and sewed a few things. Two things precipitated this burst of domestic energy. One is that the mat for John's degrees came in, and I was so excited to re-use one of our old frames, and put his degrees up with their beautiful new navy mat. In the pictures the mat looks black, but it is a very dark, marbled navy blue. It looks very chic. We also had a custom mat made for an old Keith Parkinson poster I managed to acquire (see dragon art to the left). I had an emerald green mat made for it, and it is such an unusual sized poster that I am happy I found a way to mat it, and frame it without making it look silly. It was 21 3/4" x 31", odd size, no? It now hangs at the top of the stairs and stares down at you as you walk up. Yeah, I'm a dork, what of it? The second thing that precipitated decorating is that we have company on Friday, and I am so excited. Board games, booze, and good conversation. Plus, I'll be making a full Indian meal, fresh naan and all. Mmm, I can already taste it.

Tonight we might head to Bryan and watch Rocky Horror. It's been so long since I went to a live performance of Rocky Horror, and this one is in the gay bar, which should make it all the more awesome. Who would have thought there would be a good gay bar in Bryan...not me, that is for sure, but I am happy for it. It's been since 2006, I think, since I last saw Rocky Horror, which is far too long.

Skyrim is coming out on 11.11.11, and I am so excited. I have been playing Oblivion every night, because I need a fix until mid-November. Goddess help me when Skyrim comes out. John and I will be vying for the Xbox, but it shouldn't be too much of an epic battle as he does have to study sometime, and I don't. 

In not so benign news, my mother's health is quickly deteriorating, and I am having to intervene and take her to doctors. My mother can't get insurance because she has Type II diabetes, and lots of other issues. She has never seen a specialist for her diabetes, which is just crazy. I know it is expensive without insurance, hell it is expensive with insurance, but diabetes is serious.  So, I asked around, and luckily one of our friends knew a premier endocrinologist in Austin, which I am going to take her to see in a few weeks. I'm just happy I have the ability to take time off for such things. In any case, I hope the doctor can help her, because she is in so much pain all the time, and it's getting really hard for her to do almost anything. She has been seeing a doctor in Houston, but he isn't a specialist, and I really don't think he is a good doctor at all. In fact, I think he is an awful doctor.

On other family news, my brother's baby is due any day now. Kaylin will be her name. She is named for the character in Terry Goodkind's novel series the Sword of Truth. Except somewhere, lamely, along the line, her name got spelled in a more modern way, which I think butchers the name, but that is my nerdy side talking. It should be spelled Kahlan, which is a much better spelling. :)  Plus, I might have gone one nerdy step further and used the book character's first and last name as a first and middle name respectively, Kahlan Amnell. Again, I'm a dork, though her initials would have been KAB, hehe.

Well, off to work, enough playing. I will post pictures soon.

Chocolate Frogs with Pop Rocks

This recipe was posted by family and I can't help but share it. It is a recipe for crunchy (pop rocks), chocolate covered gummy frogs. Mmm, I have to try this, and as the people originally posting this point out, Amazon sells gummy frogs in 5 lb. bags. :) Here is the original blog post.

House Cleaning the Natural Way

I recently ordered a few supplies from Mountain Rose Herbs, see my links on the sidebar. Today I can across their blog on green cleaning for your home. I was impressed to find many things that I myself want to replace in our household when they run out, such as a replacement for Comet, Murphy's Wood Oil, and so on. I have always worried about the chemicals I use and their effects on the environment. As these harmful chemicals run out in our household, I find myself making substitutes myself, though using up these chemicals takes some time, as we don't use a lot. See Mountain Rose's Blog here.

Also they have a post on Cold and Flu Remedies.

A salt scrub, massage oil, and bath salt recipe in this post.

Holiday drinks here.

You know what, just read the whole blog, it rocks. Lots of ideas for cooking, herbal infused drinks, honeys, soaps, household care, etc. They rock, I love Mountain Rose. If you want a more local store use Garden of the Ancients (Manor, Texas), whose link is also on the sidebar.

Leather and the Weather

Today will be a high of 74˚F and a low of 49˚F, which is marvelously cold. Maybe this isn't cold to all you northerners, but here in Texas let me just say, woo hoo! I think it is time to take off the heat repellent fabric from the windows and celebrate. 

The best thing about cool days, other than the weather, is the clothing. I wear running pants and tennis shoes in order to walk or bike into work, and after getting to work I change into my work clothes. Many days, even in the summer, my work clothes include my beautiful, precious, knee-high Frye boots, acquired at the good graces of family members as a present for my birthday. Here they are today, sorry for the weird angles:

This morning nothing could have made me happier than the smell of the leather as I put on my boots. There is something to the smell of leather on a cool day that is indescribable. It is the musky smell of well worn leather, of earth and dirt, and all the places you have been. It is the smell of home, and of riding horses in the winter. It is a smell that just sets my heart at ease.

It is officially fall in Texas, and I am officially celebrating with boots, baking, and ____ anyone have another 'b' word, and no not that one.

Though it is "cold," I have had a desire for ice cream. So, one night this week John and I trekked over to the Dairy Queen to eat a pumpkin pie blizzard. Oh my gosh, it was so good. Then I thought, hmm, I have pumpkin pie filling that needs to get used at home...oh yes, this is going there. Last night I made a pumpkin pie, and the crust from scratch, as I usually do. I'd have made all the pie from scratch but as I said we had filling that needed to be used. In any case, the homemade pumpkin pie blizzard was delicious, and now I even have more waiting at home for me later today. Ah, the small things in life.