Christmas & Pictures!

 Mele Kalikimaka & Hau'oli Makahiki Hou!

(Merry Christmas & Happy New Year)

Breakfast of grapefruit, kiwi and tofu scramble

A little coffee to get me through my last minute shopping. I got an iced soy toffee nut latte, mmm.

This was my Christmas dinner. It was my first time ever trying Tofurkey Roast. I have to say that I am not super impressed with it. I think I am just not a big fan of mock meat. I guess it's because I don't really even like anything that resembles the taste of real meat. I suppose if you used to enjoy turkey you may like this. I have a ton left over and the only way I have been able to eat it so far is to slice it up and put it in a sandwich with cranberry and Veganese. Oh, and I didn't like the mushroom "giblet" gravy at all. 

So... in this picture I was attempting to take a good picture of my smoothie and then noticed Sonic outside just staring at me. 

This was about 5 seconds later. He LOVES to run and especially loves when people watch him run. It must be the greyhound in him. 

This was a sign I found at a craft store. I love it! It's up in my kitchen now.

I wanted to share this present that I got because I thought it was so sweet. We stopped by a friend of my husband's home on Christmas day and one of them gave me this lovely VEGAN gift basket! How sweet huh? I was so excited and happy for the thoughtfulness of the gift! I mean, no one has ever bought me a vegan present before besides my husband. It had lots of goodies in it too :)

This was a Chinese tea set that my brother bought me for Christmas. I love it!

My Christmas was great! Did everyone else have a good Christmas?

Thoughts leading up to Christmas

My random Christmas thoughts...

• This is the first Christmas that any of us three have been away from our families for Christmas. I hope there isn't too much crying...
• For the first year ever, none of my cats have tried to climb the tree...yet.
• Please let there be a hedgehog, great dane, snake or tarantula under the tree on Christmas! Please let there be a hedgehog, great dane, snake or tarantula under the tree on Christmas! Please let there be a hedgehog, great dane, snake or tarantula under the tree on Christmas! 
• I still need to buy one more present for my husband and brother, thank goodness I get paid on the 22nd!
• I wonder if the church we are going to now does a candlelight Christmas Eve service?
• I love Advent!
• Thanks little brother for buying me a life sized stuffed reindeer! 
• What in the world am I going to make for Christmas dinner?
• I miss my family and friends.
• I still need to get stocking stuffers.
• I wonder if it's too late already to do an angel tree gift?
• Soy Peppermint Hot Chocolate at Starbucks, I must try you!
• I want one of those "Keep Christ in Christmas" magnets for my car.
• Is it going to be a "White Christmas"?

6 days to go!

Pinky Smoothie

Strawberries

Blueberries

Banana

Agave

Chia Seeds

Apple Juice

Udo's DHA Omega Oil

Raw Protein Powder

A B K Juice

(Apple, Beet & Kale)

Ingredients I used to make some pancakes this morning. They were very coconuty. I wasn't thrilled with them, so I'm not going to post the recipe :)

This was breakfast this morning of tofu scramble and coconut pancakes. I try to stay away from soy lately so this was a treat. I bought some tofu the other day and decided to use part of it for scramble. This is what I used for the tofu scramble:

Organic Tofu

Sweet Green Bell Pepper 

Onion

Garlic

Spinach

Nutritional Yeast

Turmeric

Himalayan Sea Salt

Pepper

My husband took me out for Thai the other day. In case I haven't said it before, I absolutely love Thai food. We had vegetable dumplings, tofu pad thai and basil coconut curry. Oh, and how could I forget, I got a Thai iced tea as well. Love those. 

This is pretty much how the weather has been lately. Ew. 

Nano found his new hide out. I don't know if he thinks no one can see him in there or what. I wanted to throw that away, but it looks like I can't now. He loves it in there! Sorry for the dirty laundry on top, but this picture was just too cute to not post. 

Only 7 days left...

Merry Christmas time everyone! This is by far my favorite time of the year. We are kind of sad right now because we are so far away from home and family, but we are making the best of it :) First off, and most importantly, a few pictures of my Christmas babies.

Rahjah's santa outfit from last year no longer fits him. He's gained a few pounds since then.

He was NOT impressed with his Christmas outfit.

I am really low on cash this year, so one thing I made was some dog biscuits for my friends and family who have dogs. They are vegetarian biscuits, not vegan so you can alter it to be vegan. Just make sure all the ingredients are doggie approved :) Here's the ingredients I used:

3/4 cup Milk 

1 Egg

1 cup Plain Peanut Butter (no added sugar)

1 cup Brown Rice Flour

1 1/2 cups Oat Flour 

1 Tbsp baking powder

Roll out, cut into shapes, and bake at 375 for 15 min. 

*I would like to add that I don't normally just have oat and brown rice flour lying around. If you have a good quality blender, you can just make your own. Simply take the brown rice and pour it into your Blendtec (what I use) and blend until it is flour! Same goes for the oats.*

This is how mine looked after. I used my Christmas cookie cutters. 

Here is the bird feeder we made for our birdie friends. All it is is a pinecone dipped in peanut butter and covered in bird seed! The birds love it!

This was the easiest, funnest homemade Christmas gift I made. These are some homemade soap crayons that I made for my nephews. They are super easy! All you need is:

1-2 bars of Castile soap

Warm water

Food coloring

Take the soap bar and grate it with a cheese grater. Mix it with warm water and your choice of colors. Put it into any type of mold and let it sit in a warm, dry place for 2-3 days. Then your soap crayons are ready! 

My little brother having fun decorating the Christmas tree.

Merry Christmas everyone! I will try to post again before Christmas. I have really been slacking and for that I am sorry. I need to do another food post. This was doesn't have any food in it! What was I thinking? 

Happy Late Thanksgiving

Sorry everyone for the super late Thanksgiving post. Better late than never though right? In this picture above I brought Sonic inside, because there was a squirrel in the tree and he was going nuts! I know that Sonic wouldn't intentionally hurt the squirrel because I have taught him better than that. I was just worried that the squirrel would have heart failure from all the barking. This was Sonic's first squirrel sighting ever I think. If you look on the first branch on the right you can kind of see the squirrel up there. 

Groceries!

Rolls

 Brussels Sprouts with Pomegranates 

• 6 Tbsp Earth Balance butter
• 1 vanilla bean
• Salt and pepper
• 1 pound Brussels sprouts

Mix all above ingredients. Put on a baking pan and roast in oven at 375 for 20 min. Take these out and set aside.

• 
  
• 3 Tbsp pomegranate molasses
• Seeds from 1 pomegranate

Pour pom and pom molasses over brussels sprouts. Eat!

Pumpkin Orzo

This was awesome!

• 1 1/4 cups vegetable broth
• 1 cup fresh pumpkin
• 2 Tbsp Earth Balance butter
• 1 tsp agave
• 1 tsp balsamic vinegar
• 1/2 tsp grated fresh ginger
•  Sea salt
• Black pepper
• 1/2 cup orzo
• Fresh Sage leaves (to taste, I added about 10)

Combine the broth, pumpkin, butter, agave, balsamic vinegar, ginger, salt, and pepper. Bring to a boil, then add orzo. Reduce the heat to low, and simmer until the orzo is tender.Add sage last.

My vegan feast of cornbread stuffing, mashed potatoes, green beans casserole, pecan pie, yams and pumpkin orzo. 

Panther sunbathing. He enjoys basking in the sun whenever he can. It's not often sunny here like he was used to. Good bye fall, hello Christmas!

Autumn Eats

Looky looky what I found at Target! I tried it, not bad. I think I will make a pumpkin pie and add this to it. I will give you guys the recipe if it turns out good.

Here is my pumpkin right before it went in the oven for an hour and a half. Fresh pumpkin is so worth the time. It's so much healthier for you fresh as opposed to the canned stuff. I am not sure what I am going to do with this cooked pumpkin yet.

Two organic apples, two large leaves of organic rainbow chard and two tablespoons of chia seeds all blended in the Blendtec.

Dinner last night was oatmeal. The following is what I added to it:

Steal Cut Oats

Almond Milk

Brown Sugar 

Golden Raisins

Dried Elderberries

Vegan Chocolate Chips

Chia Seeds

Maca Powder

It was soooo good. It was like dessert for dinner!

This was dinner tonight. I tried my hand at some African Yam Soup.

African Yam Soup

2 yams- peeled and cubed

1 can chopped organic tomatoes with juice 

1 stick celery

1 onion

4 cloves garlic

1 thai pepper

1 anaheim pepper

2 Tbsp tomato paste

2 Tbsp organic peanut butter

2 cups water

Olive oil

1 bay leaf

Turmeric- to taste

Cumin- to taste

Allspice- to taste

Black pepper

Sea salt

I threw this all in the crock pot on high for about an hour. You can let it cook for 1-2 hours and then just eat as is or you can do what I did and puree it. I pureed it in my Blendtec on the soup setting. Garnish with whatever herbs you like. I used cilantro and basil.

Beer Hair Rinse

Equal parts 

Water & flat beer

Half as much

Apple cider vinegar

(ex: 1 oz water, 1 oz vinegar and about 2 tsp vinegar)

5 drops or so of 

Rosemary essential oil

Mix together everything and put in spray bottle. Spray in hair after shampooing to remove build-up in hair. This is good if you have some extra flat beer lying around. This is hippy to the max!

Lastly, my boy Sonic wanted to show off his new winter sweater. He was giving me a weird look here because I was taking a million pictures of him :) Goodnight all!

Tinctures & Soaps

Good evening all my friends. Today, I wanted to show you a few things I made recently. We haven't had internet for a while since we moved into our new placed and just recently got it back. That is why I have been MIA.

This was just a plain ol' Castile soap bar that I grated down with a knife (a cheese grater works great as well.) This is the base for my laundry soap.

Gentle Lavender Laundry Soap

1 part soap bar

1 part baking soda (aluminum-free)

to 1 1/2 parts borax

a few drops essential oil lavander

a few drops essential oil tea tree oil (optional, I use it for the antibacterial properties) 

You can also add 1 part washing soda, but I don't because I have a hard time finding it where I live.

Combine all ingredients. Use 2-3 Tbsp for a large load of laundry. I suggest washing with warm or hot water when using this laundry soap so that everything dissolves well and works to its full potential. 

My elderberry tincture cooking away.

Elderberries, for those who do not know, are tasty little flu fighters. They have been used for everything from allergies, constipation and common cold to emphysema, rheumatism and fever. 

Elderberry Tincture

1/2 cup dry elderberries

1 cup or maybe a little more water (enough to cover elderberries)

1-2 Tbsp vegetable glycerin (make sure it is food grade and add more if you want it sweeter)

Bring elderberries and water to boil and then turn it to low and let it simmer for a couple hours. Then add glycerin once cool. Keep refrigerated and this tincture lasts about 3 months. This recipe is good for children. Below is the recipe for adults. The adult recipe is more potent and lasts for years. 

1/4 lb. dried elderberries

16 oz. Everclear

Blend this mixture together and let it sit for 2 weeks in a dark closed jar. After two weeks, strain. You can add either one part honey or maple syrup to one part mixture to sweeten. This recipe will last for years if kept in a dark place (like a closet just like any other alcohol.) 


I also made a headache tincture the same way, but with equal parts peppermint and lavender herbs. Peppermint is suppose to be good for tension headaches. I get tension headaches all the time, so I am trying this tincture out to see if it helps with these type of headaches. Lavender is also good for headaches because of its soothing properties. Aside from making a lavender/peppermint tincture for your headache, there are other ways you can use these herbs to help ease your headache. You can rub either peppermint or lavender oil on your head and temples or you can make a steam treatment. If you would like to read about how to do steam inhalation, you can check out THIS website.

 Simple Soap Recipe

2 quarts water

2 cups Castile soap (grated)

2 Tbsp vegetable glycerin

2-3 Tbsp dried chamomile 

5-10 drops lavender essential oil

5-8 drops tea tree essential oil

Mix all ingredients except oils in large pot over low heat, stirring occasionally until all grated soap is melted. You can pour this into soap molds and it will hold up as a bar soap. If you want a more liquid soap, then add more water and strain the chamomile before mixture cools. Add essential oils last. 

I like to put chamomile in my soaps because it is soothing and gentle on my skin. I have very sensitive skin, so I have to be careful. Lavender is also a gentle and calming oil. Tea tree oil is antibacterial.

Happy late Halloween! 

These were my brother, husband and my pumpkins we carved :)