Unclog your drains

Here is a tutorial on how to turn a 2 liter bottle into a drain declogger.

http://dollarstorecrafts.com/2010/12/man-crafts-recycled-plastic-drain-de-clogger/

Homemade Pita Chips

This is a great recipe as it is pretty cheap, fast and easy to make for a party. All you need is a cookie sheet, some pitas, salt, and olive oil.

Just rip or cut the pitas into chip sized pieces. Lay them out on the cookie sheet. Spray them with some olive oil. Sprinkle them with some salt. Put them in the oven till they are as crisp as you like them, if you prefer softer I would stick closer to 350 degrees and from crisper chips closer to 400 degrees. This should make it easier to not overcook them.

Vegan Eggnog Muffins wtih Boozy Raisins

Todays special treat was these eggnog muffins with boozy raisins. These were something hubby saw in my current favorite baking cookbook and decided he really wanted me to make them so today I made a test batch and if we like them then I will be making more for the Festivus party we are going to Thursday night. I know they are a bit too traditional holiday to normally bring to a Festivus party, but hey they do have rum in them so considering this Festivus party is really pretty much all about booze and video games I think I am fine with these muffins.

This recipe is from page 67 of Kris Holechek's The 100 Best Vegan Baking Recipes: Amazing cookies, cakes, muffins, pies, brownies and breads.

Vegan Pumpkin cookies with Vegan cream cheese frosting

This is not the first time I have made these cookies, but this is the first time I have made this frosting and frosted these cookies. These cookies are nice and moist and rather tasty, but let me just say that this cream cheese frosting is incredible and really makes these cookies irresistible. I know this will become one of my go to cookies cause these are so amazing with this cream cheese frosting.

The cookie recipe is from The 100 Best Vegan Baking Recipes by Kris Holechek and the frosting recipe was veganized by me from a recipe I found at Cooks.com

Fitness Challenge - Day 21

Sunday
Tonight we all took a walk to the grocery store for a few items, but that and some weeding is all the exercise I got today.

Fitness Challenge - Day 20

Saturday

After getting home from California Adventure at about 11:30 last night (we walked the half mile to and from the park from the parking structure) I am pretty much just chilling out. We did go to Trader Joe's to pick up some of the basics for Thanksgiving dinner, wanted to make sure we could get our fresh Kosher turkey. I know I will have to make another run for all the little things later like random baking supplies for the chocolate pecan pie I making this year (made it one Thanksgiving previously and it was a hit).

Fitness Challenge - Day 18 &19

Thursday: I got in a pretty god workout with the Kinect and Your Shape (163 calories burned). I played a few of the gym games, did 2 Zen sessions, 2 cardio sessions (including learning the new moves first) and a session of toning. I also did a fair bit of yard work, I finished weeding the front yard (inside the fence), reseeded the grass areas in the front and backyard again (we have a storm coming this weekend so it seemed like a good time to reseed before we get rain) and then I also transplanted 3 of the 4 plants needing to be transplanted.

Friday: Today we are taking the little man to California Adventure to see the World of Color.

Fitness Challenge - Day 16 & 17

Tuesday, what a day for me. I hung 2 pictures did some weeding in both the front and backyards and even laid out a bag of mulch. I also played Kinectimals with my little man. I also did some grocery shopping and had a nice breakfast with a wonderful friend. As for the after effects of my productive day, I am exhausted. After dropping the men off this morning I came home and laid down in the bed and pulled out my computer. I am going to try to rest a little. I always forget how much the time change screws me up and I have just been trying to do too much stuff after being sick, spraining my ankle and having the time change on me. It's time for a much needed day off.

That didn't work out all that well, I did go out and do some weeding again. What can I say I have a hard time sitting still and taking it easy.

Fitness Challenge - Day 11 through 15

Day 3 of my antibiotics. I am feeling much better, but I still have this horrible cough that made it nearly impossible to sleep last night. That being said I did sweep up a little of the debris in the driveway this morning (we have been having some serious winds) and put the fallen pine needles and leaves where I had finished weeding earlier this week (will help prevent new weeds from growing in that area). I also got in a short workout with my Kinect and Your Shape and then played a little bit with the Kinect Adventures.

Friday I got in a short workout with my Kinect before I sprained my ankle.  Saturday I took it easy, one of the most difficult things for me to do. Sunday we took the little man to Travel Town to see the trains and then we did some yard work (we cut back the basil and sorrel plants and uprooted them and hubby also cut down one of the tomato plants and the eggplant). Let me just tell you that sorrel and African Blue basil will both take over your planting area, learn from my mistake where they nearly strangled all my other herbs (since planted in May) and keep these 2 in pots.

Monday, day 15
Due to my sprained ankle, which is actually healing quite nicely I felt it best to skip my usual personal training session and just stick with some of the gym games which require less movement on my bottom half (at least allowing me to not move my ankle too much). Hopefully I can return to my personal training and Zen workouts soon.
Virtual smash = 1032 (new high score)
Loop a hoop = 288 (new high score)
Stack em up =  414
Calories burned today = 110
Total calories burned = 605 (since I began playing Your Shape)

Part of my goal for this month was to blog everyday about my progress so as far as that goal has gone I have failed this last several days, but I chose to let it go as part of my needing to take it easy. I may bot quite be reaching my complete goals for this month, but I think the progress is definitely beginning to show already. Everything is a little less jiggly already, something I have definitely wanted to work on so that come our family cruise in January I can be more confident and comfortable in my swim suit.

Fitness Challenge - Day 10

Wednesday of my second week and I am still sick, well getting better but still sick.

I did stop and pick up some more grass seed to lay out on the front and back yards as we are trying to fill in some dead patches as well as grow all new grass in some areas that were free of grass (this is round 2 of seeding these areas). We are hoping to have the grass looking relatively grown in before Thanksgiving. We did wait till our rainy season started to seed the yard not only because of the extra moisture but also due to the cooler temperatures. Our yard was torn up at the end of spring so there wasn't really an appropriate time to seed the yard till fall, of course we could have laid sod but we decided not to in the end due to the cost and amounts of watering required for it to get itself established.

In addition to reseeding the yard I also found some time to play with my Kinect and the Your Shape game. I am so addicted to this thing, it is so much fun. I really like the gym games cause I can try to outscore myself and the games are only 1 - 2 minutes long each. They are perfect for me while I am trying to get over being sick.

Fitness Challenge - Day 9

Today we are all going to the doctor, finally. It has been over 2 weeks for me, slightly shorter for my son and hubby has been sick since Friday night/Saturday morning. We finally decided that this is not going to go away on its own anytime soon.

Anyhow, I am trying my hardest to really rest up today so I am actually hoping not to give in to the temptation of my Xbox 360 and Kinect. I really don't know how well I will do with this goal as the temptation is far greater for me to play with my new toy than it would be for me to eat cake or ice cream or something along those lines.

The doctor gave me an antibiotic and some codeine cough syrup and took a nasal swab (checking for pertussis "whooping cough"). My husband gets to share my cough syrup and my son gets to continue as he has been. That being said if my nasal swab comes back positive then we all need to start treatment. Can we say that means I need to take it easy for a few days. Frustrating cause I just want to play with my Kinect.

Fitness Challenge - Day 8

My second week of my personal fitness challenge began this morning. I am starting to feel better, hopefully this time it sticks. I did a little yard work today, mostly weeding. I also did some cleaning in the kitchen, including the floors. While the little man was napping I spent a little time with my new toy, the Kinect and my game Your Shape Fitness Evolved. Let me just say that game gives you a pretty good workout, I did an easy workout since I am still getting over this bug, I can certainly feel it in my legs and elsewhere.

I did have to move my Kinect to be closer to eye level as it was having a few minor issues with the detection while doing lunges and things of that nature, it wasn't quite picking up me up as I was doing them and the game suggested moving the Kinect to be closer to eye level. Hopefully moving the Kinect will do the trick and hopefully I will have some time to recalibrate the Kinect tonight after the little man goes to bed.

Kinect is once again calibrated. I played a few of the games in Your Shape, but I didn't retake my fitness test or retry the workout I did earlier today (I actually had a section give me 0% earlier today making me wonder if moving the Kinect sensor closer to eye height would help the situation as the game recommends the sensor being placed at eye level).

Fitness Challenge - Day 7

I am already exhausted. We took a trip to the local farmer's market and did a little shopping downtown and went out for lunch. The pho and vegetable egg rolls we had for lunch really hit the spot and had me feeling a little better but all the walking around our little downtown wore me out, sadly it's only a few block of walking and we really only did one lap around the area. I am certainly hoping to be feeling like myself again soon.

My first week of the fitness challenge is a bit of a toss up for me. On one hand I did get in a pretty good traditional workout 2 of the days and then I got in several other "workouts" that certainly made up the amount of physical activity I was aiming to get in, so while I technically achieved my goal for the week I still felt a little disappointed in myself. I suppose that I am probably being too hard on myself as I am really quite sick and need to get better before I can really get in some serious workouts otherwise I will just make myself worse.

After we put the little man down for bed we spent a little time playing with our new Kinect again. We got a nice little workout in playing some games in Your Shape. 

Fitness Challenge - Day 6

We are all sick today so other than cleaning my kitchen and laundry room and starting on the little man's bathroom I haven't done much but stay in bed. Hopefully we are all better soon.

Fitness Challenge - Day 5

Today I washed the car and then we went to California Adventures and Disneyland and walked part of Downtown Disney and we walked back to the parking structure. I'm gonna say that I definitely got enough activity in cause my feet are definitely telling me I walked enough.

Tomorrow I am planning to get in at least a little more time on the Kinect.

Fitness Challenge - Day 4

I really did take a day off today. I didn't do any yard work or any major house cleaning. Two nights of having an early morning visitor when I am still getting over being sick myself just proved to be too much for me. That being said my Xbox 360 and Kinect showed up so I am sure there will be some playing with that tonight, I guess that will still be some physical activity. I think it's actually becoming hard to not fit some kind of physical activity into my day without even trying too hard. I guess the bigger challenge for me is getting a good workout in, but I suppose I should be happy that I get a good amount of activity into my days regardless.

So as it is now bedtime I got some time in on the new Xbox and Kinect. Let me just say I broke a pretty good sweat considering I was trying my best to take it easy, still getting over this virus or whatever it is.

Fitness Challenge - Day 3

So today I am taking a day off so to say since I was so under the weather yesterday afternoon. I did however do some cleaning around the house. I picked up around the house and vacuumed a couple of rooms (moved the sofa and stuff in the living room to get under everything). I guess you could say I still probably got my 30 minutes in today even though I intended to take the day off.

I also got notification today that my Xbox 360 Kinect bundle and game shipped so soon I should be able to start working out with the Kinect too, exciting. Happy holidays to me.

Fitness Challenge - Day 2

This morning we walked out as a family to our polling place and took the long way home (someone wanted to make an extra stop on the way home). All in all we probably walked close to a mile on our voting expedition.

I also pulled out the Wii Fit again and did the same workout as yesterday on it, I'm still not feeling too good so I wanted to take it easy once again. I did 30 minutes of yoga, 10 minutes of hula hoops and 9 minutes of step.

Sadly just as I thought I was starting to get over this illness I am slipping back a few steps. I do hope this passes soon so I can really kick up the fitness challenge a notch, but I suppose it is also a good lesson to learn how to hold back when you aren't feeling well.

Fitness Challenge - Day 1

I had to give some extra thought to this challenge as it got nearer due to viral bronchitis. Luckily I am getting over it and just have a cough that won't go away, but of course it is still a good idea to be careful after any illness.

To help track my progress for the month: My weight according to my bathroom scale was 161, my weight according to the Wii Fit was about 160.7 and my Wii Fit age was 32.
 I will report back periodically this month on how I am doing.

This morning I did a little yard work (sweeping up pine needles, uprooting a few plants that died and a little bit of weeding). Later I pulled out my Wii Fit and did half an hour of yoga, 10 minutes of hula hoops and 9 minutes of step. For the record I am really terrible at the hula hoops, pretty good at yoga and adequate at step.

Vegan blueberry pancakes

I have made these buttermilk pancakes a number of times, but this was the first time I added blueberries. Usually I add chocolate chips if I add anything at all to them, but last night my son was requesting blueberry pancakes so I went to the store and picked up the couple of extra items I needed to make these pancakes. They were definitely tasty, but I think next time I will also make some kind of a blueberry compote or syrup to go with the pancakes.

I adapted the buttermilk pancake recipe from The 30-Minute Vegan: Over 175 Quick, Delicious, and Healthy Recipes for Everyday Cooking by Mark Reinfeld and Jennifer Murray.

Vegan Pumpkin cookies and Pumpkin chocolate chip jack-o-lantern cookies

We have a party to go to on Halloween and there is a pot luck at the end so of course I had to figure out something to bring just in case we stay for the pot luck. Cookies seemed like a good safe option, especially since desserts are usually the hardest thing for me at parties. Almost all desserts have dairy in them so I usually try to bring a dessert so that I am safe.

I was thinking about making either chocolate chip cookies or peanut butter cookies and then I cam across a recipe for pumpkin chocolate chip cookies and thought for Halloween that seemed pretty appropriate. I forgot to mix the chocolate chips into the mix before putting the cookies on the sheets for baking so I ended up making half with chocolate chips and half without, thus the attempt at jack-o-lanterns for the cookies with chocolate chips. Hopefully the cookies will be a big hit at the party.

Solar Panels are finally turned on

We finally got interconnection permission from So Cal Edison so now our meter can run backwards and our panels can actually start to produce the electricity they were intended to and to think it only took over two months. To be fair though I did hear that there was a big boom in solar panel installations around the time we had Phat Energy install our panels. I guess as the rebates start to run out people rush to do things, of course that wasn't our reason for installing panels. For us our electricity usage went up just enough to throw us into the next usage tier when we had our underwater cistern and all of it's pumps installed and then we discovered all the local rebates in addition to the federal rebate cap being removed for solar panels so we decided to go ahead and install our panels now, solar panels are one of the things we planned to do eventually so the timing just seemed right for us.

Vegan mac and cheese

In having to give up dairy the loss of my beloved mac and cheese was probably the hardest on me. I was so excited the day I came across the cookbook Quick and Easy Vegan Comfort Food: 65 Everyday Meal Ideas for Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner with Over 150 Great-tasting, Down-home Recipes by Alicia C. Simpson. The picture on the front cover (a picture of mac and cheese) was almost enough to make me buy the book and I must say that I am glad I decided to give this book a try. I have also made the cornbread and both dishes make my husband tell me that I am shattering his preconceived notions about vegan food. 

This mac and cheese was absolutely amazing, it is a baked mac and cheese and it made more than enough for my husband to pack some leftovers to bring with him for lunch tomorrow and to put a container in the freezer for a quick meal another day. It is so nice to be able to enjoy some of our old favorites, especially now that there is often a chill in the air and a desire for a heavier meal. By the way this mac and cheese recipe sneaks in some veggies that will totally go unnoticed by picky eaters. 

Vegan chocolate chip cookies with pecans

Tonight I had a bit of a craving for cookies so I decided to make some chocolate chip cookies. They always seem to make everything better. Maybe it is that they make you think of childhood when times were simpler and a cookie really could make all your problems melt away. For me even the act of making them seems to put everything in perspective. I guess for me baking is a kind of zen like activity and when I am done there is something delicious to share with others.

My husband absolutely loved these cookies. He said they were the best chocolate chip cookies he has had in a long time, longer than he can remember. This recipe was from The 100 Best Vegan Baking Recipes: Amazing Cookies, Cakes, Muffins, Pies, Brownies and Breads by Kris Holechek which is my favorite vegan baking book and one of my favorite baking books period. I highly recommend this for anyone, vegan or not. I bought it because I have severe dairy issues and I am very glad that I did buy this book because the recipes are so good my husband doesn't request recipes outside of this book because he loves these so much.

Labeling all those kids things for school with NameBubbles

My son started preschool a few months ago and of course I was told to label his belongings. To be honest I looked at the fabric store for something to better label his things than just using a magic marker and was somehow surprised that I couldn't find anything. I couldn't even find a magic marker that wouldn't wear off in the washing machine, I tried several stores to find that. After months of labeling things with a magic marker and really not having any luck with that method, we actually lost labeled things and had to find a replacement sweatshirt for him when his favorite went missing.

After the sweatshirt went missing and could not be found at all I turned online figuring surely someone must have come up with a better way of labeling kids belongings for preschool. I came across a few different labeling options and of them the one that seemed like the best option for us was a sticker that could go through the washing machine and even the dishwasher. These stickers were also made with a non-toxic ink and were even made here in the United States. I decided to order a daycare label pack to give them a try. The labels arrived the following week and I went to work labeling everything I could that goes to school with my son, a few of his items he was not happy about having labeled and took the labels off so for those we still just have magic marker labeling. The labels worked out well for us except that I found we went through most of the daycare pack of labels pretty quickly, but now I knew what types of labels I used most and just ordered some more clothing labels and labels for all of his lunchboxes (we actually just use storage containers so overtime all of our storage containers are getting labeled). I like these labels enough that I recommended the school add Name Bubbles to their list of fundraisers and we gave a daycare pack of labels to one of our son's friends for his birthday. I wish I had known about these stickers when he first started school, but I am glad to have found them anyhow.



I received no compensation in anyway to write this review of this product. I purchased the product with my own money and genuinely liked it enough to share my review with everyone.

Monthly challenges - starting November

To really help you understand why I am going to challenge myself to make some changes in my own life I need to tell you what happened to bring me to this point. This is something I very rarely talk about so please bare with me as this is very difficult for me to talk about.

Last spring my father was diagnosed with cancer, when they found it he was already in the end stages, it had spread all over his body already and the outlook for him was very grim. He could have left the doctors office that day and gone straight on to Hospice, the doctor honestly figured he had about 2 months. My dad wanted to fight it and he gave it his all, he radically changed his diet and he started exercising more (he already exercised a fair bit more than most people) and he found the best doctors he could to treat him. He also made sure to live, he enjoyed the time he had left. He took his family which included 2 grandchildren at the time to the Magic Kingdom and on a cruise through Alaska's inside passage, he road tripped with his brother and just enjoyed himself. He died about 6 months after his diagnosis, but almost all of that 6 months were good days for him where he got to enjoy his life.

The other week marked 1 year since he passed away and I still have a difficult time dealing with my loss as my father and I were very close. It is also particularly difficult for me because several years earlier his sister lost her own fight with cancer so of course I am concerned about my own health. I have a 3 year old son and a wonderful husband whom I hope to be around for for a very long time.

Now that you understand why I want to make some changes in my life we can can talk about what changes I want to make in my life. I have been changing thins slowly already, trying to eat in more and to make a point of all of us sitting down to eat our meals together. I have also lost some weight this past year, while all these changes are great I just feel like my approach has been too passive. I don't have specific goals set for myself, my goals have just been very vague and while there is nothing wrong with simply looking at the end of a year and seeing that you lost a few pounds and being happy about it I feel that maybe if I give myself more concrete small challenges that I can achieve more.

Now is the time I got to start thinking about what I want to achieve, what changes I want to make in my life, what is important to me. I know I want to lose some more weight and get in better shape, I know I want to eat healthier, I know I want my family to spend time together and be close to each other. So now that I have identified what my very general goals are I can set out to make specific one month goals that will move me towards the changes I want to see happen in my own life.

General goal #1: To lose some more weight and get in better shape -
I currently weigh approximately 20 pounds more than I did when I graduated high school. I have had 2 back surgeries and after each one I kind of leveled off 10 pounds heavier than before the surgery. I know this isn't a lot of weight and it isn't a huge deal to me other than the fact that for someone with a bad back extra weight adds a lot of extra strain to the back and mine has been fused at L5-S1 thereby weakening the disk area directly above and directly below the point of fusion. I have never stopped having back pain, but it hasn't been bad enough to have to go in for additional surgery either. My desire here is to relieve some of the extra pressure that my back is under and hopefully in doing so also reduce the amount of pain I deal with and as an added bonus maybe feel a little better about my body too.

General goal #2: To eat healthier -
Considering my family history with cancer I feel like eating healthier is something that I really need to do, not that I live at the drive through eating burgers and milkshakes or anything like that. Most of us could stand to eat a more balanced diet, to eat more fruits and vegetables, to eat more meals that just popped in the microwave or oven to heat up.

General goal #3: Spend more time together as a family and be close to each other -
After my father was diagnosed with cancer I found myself calling him most days instead of mots weeks and I flew out to see him every 2 months or so as opposed to every year or so. I know it is normal to put extra effort into our relationships when people are sick and dying, but it made me wonder why people wait until someone is dying to spend time with them? Why don't we actively work on our relationships with those we love on a regular basis? Why do we tell ourselves that we will go visit them later?  It is so easy to put things off till later and then before we know it it is too late.



Now onto my first monthly challenge, I realize that it is the middle of the month right now so that may not seem like a good time to some of you to make a commitment to a monthly challenge but I think it is the perfect time because this allows some time to plan for that first monthly challenge. For the month of November my challenge is to exercise at least 4 days a week.

The terms:

1. I will exercise for at least 30 minutes each day on at least 4 days of each calendar week. My week will start on Sunday morning and end on Saturday evening.

2. What counts as exercise? Pretty much anything: walking, yoga, running, WiiFit, WiiSports, etc. The point of this is just to put more physical activity into my daily life. Even a 5 minute walk counts towards that daily goal of 30 minutes, so even an after dinner walk with the family counts!

3. I will write a blog post everyday to keep myself motivated and I will also write what prevented me from actually getting at least 30 minutes of exercise in on days I don't meet that goal.



Please feel free to join me in the month of November on my fitness challenge or feel free to start your own challenge. Also, feel free to track your own progress by commenting on my blog each day if you would like to. Remember sometimes the added accountability helps us stick with things and I would really love to hear about your own challenges and how they are going.

Vintage coral

My family came out to visit a few weeks ago and my mom and brother drove out with all these fabulous pieces of coral along with many other goodies. Yes, these pieces of coral are real. One of the pieces even suffered a little damage in the trip out here, but how great is it to have all these pieces of real coral to show my son and help him to better understand the ecosystem in our oceans.

My mom has been buying old coral pieces at yard sales for years for me as I refuse to buy real coral that isn't someones trash and why would I want to buy the resin pieces when I can have really old pieces of coral that might have otherwise ended up in the trash. These pieces will not all stay on our built in china hutch, but for now at least they have a home outside of the boxes they arrived in.

Our new vanity mirrors

I finally got our new vanity mirrors hung up last week. Now I just have to put the shaving mirror up and paint the room a lighter color. I am thinking a pale yellow, something lighter and brighter. I am just not personally a fan of the muddy brown wall color, especially first thing in the morning when I am waking up and want to be in a good mood not start of the day feeling a little depressed.

Day 3 of the solar install

All 18 of our solar panels up on the roof

Our inverter all hooked up and ready to go

"screen shot" from our inverter

"screen shot" from our inverter

"screen shot" from our inverter

"screen shot" from our inverter

Day 2 of the solar install

The braces for the solar panels went up and then half of the solar panels went up.

The inverter went up on the wall this afternoon.

Day 1 of the solar install

The footers went up on the roof of our house this morning in preparation of the panels being installed tomorrow.

At lunch time our POD showed up with all of our solar panels and our inverter.

A low carbon footprint dinner

Tonight for dinner my husband and I made spaghetti. I know, nothing special about that, but we made the spaghetti sauce almost entirely of food from our back yard and also made the spaghetti noodles from scratch.

The spaghetti sauce used tomatoes (lots of organic heirloom tomatoes), basil, oregano, parsley, thyme, and lemon all grown in our back yard. The only things we added to the sauce not from our garden were vinegar, brown sugar, salt and pepper.

The pasta was made using eggs, whole wheat flour and some water. Of course we used a pasta machine to make the pasta.

We rounded out the meal with some wine, baguettes and homemade lemonade. For desert we had some vanilla soy ice cream with chocolate sauce.

The only trash we had that didn't go in the compost bin was the bottle from the wine we drank and the container from the soy ice cream we had for desert. It was also a relatively inexpensive meal, especially if you consider what you would have to pay at a restaurant for a similar meal.

It was a wonderful meal that we were lucky enough to share with a few friends under the stars on our patio, well we do also have some string lights up to provide a little light when the sun has already set like it had tonight.

Making your money go further

As times have been lean for so many of us and in many cases continue to show no real signs of improvement I thought it might be fun to see what ideas some of you have for ways to cut back a little more here and there to make our limited incomes go a little further. There are so many things we can do, but it seems there are always more things that we haven't thought of so lets start a list of some ways to cut back our spending. I like to think about the way my grandmother lived and use that as a guide to helping me find new ways to cut back. Yes, I do realize that not every one of these suggestions will work for everyone but it is still good to think about where we can make changes to help make those dollars go a little further.

These tips are in no particular order and are far from an extensive list of ways to cut your costs. Please feel free to let me know what ideas and suggestions you have so that they can be added to the list. Thanks.

POWER:
* switch incandescent light bulbs with CFLs or LEDs, you just switch them as your current light bulbs burn out
* turn lights off when you aren't in the room
* plug non-essential electronics into power strips so that the strips can be turned off when items are not in use, we even found one with a switch external to the strip to make it even easier to turn the power to the strip off
* use fans to help keep your house feeling cooler, depending on the temperature outside you may be able to get away without using the AC very much if at all (we bought several oscillating fans for $18 each so we could put a fan in every room of the house)
* use drapes and blinds to help block out the harsh sun in the summer (put them down during the day and lift them at night to help the house cool off more naturally) or cold in the winter (lower them at night and raise them in the morning to let the sun come in and help warm the house naturally), this will help cut your heating and AC bills
* use timers on outdoor lights, you probably don't need them on all day and/or night but only for a few hours

WATER:
* use a bucket to catch the water in your shower as it is warming up, use the water to water plants
* turn the sink off while washing hands and brushing teeth
* buy a water efficient shower head (we found the Kohler K-10240-CP "Forte" which uses only 1.75 gallons per minute and still has plenty of water pressure and gets the shampoo out without problem)
* don't buy bottled water, use a water filter instead to fill a reusable bottle
* use the water from the condensation of your AC unit to water your plants
* use an aerator on your kitchen sink to help conserve water when washing dishes

LAUNDRY:
* hang your clothes to dry, you can use collapsible drying racks inside or outside of your home if you can't or don't want to use a clothes line (I bought several of them for $7 a piece and bought some clothes pins for another $2 per pack of 50)
* use cold or colder water to wash your laundry
* wait until you have a full load to wash your laundry
* use a little less laundry soap in each load, most people use more detergent than is needed to do a sufficient job
* hand wash your cashmere items in baby shampoo instead of taking them in to be dry cleaned, your cashmere will be nice and soft

YARD:
* check your sprinklers periodically to make sure you are not wasting water
* set your sprinklers to go off early in the morning when the ground is cooler and there is still time before it gets too hot, this helps minimize evaporation (I was advised to set my sprinklers for 4am in the warmer months as by 7am the ground is already pretty hot)
* use mulch on your planting beds to help keep the moisture near the plants instead of evaporating (when mulch decomposes back into your soil it makes your soil healthier)
* use a broom to sweep your driveway and sidewalk instead of a hose
* cut your grass a little taller, it will help keep your grass healthier in the heat of the summer and you can even leave the clippings on the grass so that they provide extra shading to protect your grass even more and the clippings will decompose and make your soil healthier
* try cutting your own grass instead of having a lawn person do it for you, same goes for other normal yard maintenance

TRANSPORTATION:
* walk, ride bike, take public transportation, or carpool when you can
* cut back on the number of cars in your house if you can, you may be surprised how easy it is and you can always rent a car if you only have that extra need once in a while (we got rid of our second car 5 years ago and haven't really missed it, yes it makes things a little more challenging once in a while but honestly it is very rare that we really feel a second car would make life any easier)
* be a little gentler on your gas pedal, you will burn less gas and put less strain on your car
* crack the windows in your car ever so slightly in the summer so that some of the hot air can escape, this really does make a huge difference
* try to drive a little less
* drive for closer trips instead of flying, especially if it's for business and they will reimburse you the mileage

SHOPPING:
* ask yourself if you really need something before you buy it, often times we think we need something but when we really think about it we realize that we can do without or find a cheaper solution
* slip covers are a great way to breathe new life into an old sofa or chair that is still in good shape other than the upholstery (I like to buy upholstered furniture at Ikea so I can easily purchase new slip covers when my old ones aren't looking so good, we are on our second set of slip covers and have had all the furniture for 6 years)
* trim your own hair or even give yourself or family members haircuts
* look for rebates and other incentives when you need to replace things like appliances (we got money back on both our washer/dryer and our refrigerator which made the more efficient ones more affordable)
* look at all the rebates your utilities and government have available for you (we found a turf rebate from our water department as an incentive to get rid of your lawn, you don't even have to get rid of all your grass to qualify)
* shop second hand when you can, for books I love to shop abebooks.com (a website with tons of independent book sellers carrying all kinds of books, even out of print books)
* if your prescription doesn't change and your glasses are still in decent shape keep them instead of replacing them
* if you really don't need contacts and already have glasses then skip buying contacts
* use a broom and dust pan to sweep your floors instead of a vacuum or Swiffer
* use flower sacks, rags, or microfiber towels (buy these in the automotive department for the best deal) to clean up spills instead of using paper towels

FOOD:
* grow your own herbs and produce, depending on your needs and what various produce costs where you live you can really save a lot of money (fresh herbs are usually several dollars per small container and a small plant is about the same price so don't worry if the plant doesn't survive you didn't really lose much if anything)
* make your own lemonade, it is much cheaper to buy a few lemons and some sugar than it is to spend a few dollars on a bottle of lemonade at the store (I use 2 cups water, 1/4 cup sugar, and 2 lemons and boil at least 4 ounces of water to dissolve the sugar in)
* make your own Italian sodas (apple and orange sodas are super easy just put about 1/2 juice and 1/2 carbonated water, for lemon soda use 3 lemons and 1/2 cup of sugar with about 8 ounces of boiling water and the remaining water carbonated)
* pack your own lunch for school or work, even just once in a while like if you have leftovers that might otherwise go to waste
* use reusable containers to pack things like leftovers and your lunch in rather than throwing out all those plastic Ziploc bags
* try adding some vegetarian meals to your diet, it tends to be cheaper than meat and may help you get more creative as you seek out less traditional meal ideas
* get a glass of tap water for your beverage when you go out to eat
* try cutting back on the sodas and other beverages in favor of more water, if you aren't that fond of water try adding a slice of lemon, orange, apple, cucumber or even mint to add a little flavor

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Some very general concepts to keep in mind that will help you find more ways to save money:

(1) using products that have more than one use in them are cheaper in the long run (case in point is the mop I used to use was a Swiffer wet jet so I was always replacing the mop head cloth as well as the specific bottle of solution and now I switched to Method's Omop which has reusable cloth heads that you throw in the washer so even though the initial investment was about the same I have had the Omop for going on 3 years now and haven't had to purchase new mop heads)

(2) doing things the way your grandmother would have done them is cheaper (case in point hanging my clothes out to dry instead of using a clothes drier saves a lot of money on the electric bill and in the summer doesn't really take any extra time)

(3) remember that something may be cheaper upfront but if it doesn't last it will end up a lot more expensive than the more expensive option that will last (case in point is my pots and pans, I originally had a set of T-Fal that cost about $100 and they lasted me about 1 - 2 years and I replaced them with a set of professional grade Calphalon that I spent about $200 on after discounts and other incentives and I have already had those pots and pans for 9 1/2 years making them by far the better deal).


Note: I am trying out a new editor so please bear with me.

French Toast Muffins

Yesterday we had our parent teacher conference at our son's school. Our son's lead teacher told me to feel free to bring coffee and such to eat while we met as it was a morning meeting. Since I love to bake I figured I would take this opportunity to try out a new muffin recipe I had been eying for a few weeks now. French toast muffins. What an interesting idea to make french toast in the form of a muffin, how could I resist but give this a try. I must say they were not too difficult to make and were quite tasty and when they were baking my whole kitchen smelled like french toast, that yummy smell of cinnamon and maple syrup. This is one recipe I will definitely be repeating. Thanks must be given to Kris Holechek and "The 100 best vegan baking recipes: amazing cookies, cakes, muffins, pies, brownies and breads." This has quickly become my favorite cookbook. Everything turns out really great and tasty and no one ever knows the goodies are vegan unless I tell them.

SodaStream

This morning I saw an article on TreeHugger about the SodaStream, it was asking if home carbonation is the next big green thing? Of course I instantly thought about just how much we love the SodaStream that we bought at the beginning of the year and prompted me to look through my list of blog posts to see what I had written previously about our own SodaStream. I was a little surprised when I didn't find a post about our soda stream, I'm not 100% convinced that I just didn't notice it but it made me realize that even if I had posted about the SodaStream maybe I should post again now that we have had it for a while and have really had time to use it.

There are several things that I really love about our SodaStream. First of all is that I don't have to buy bottles of carbonated water and bring them home and find a place to keep them and biggest of all is the guilt that I feel when I throw those plastic bottles into the recycle bin after we are done with them, granted due to the guilt of throwing the bottles in the bin we hardly ever purchased carbonated water. Second, we can now make our own Italian sodas instead of spend a few dollars a bottle on them. I do still occasionally purchase Italian sodas from the store, but I keep the glass bottles from them and reuse them to make my own sodas in. Making our own Italian sodas has been a lot of fun. My husband and I have grown very fond of adding soda water to our morning glass of orange juice, it makes an Orangina style beverage. Another juice we have tried adding carbonated water to is apple juice, it is really tasty this way and makes apple juice a bit more of an adult beverage. Of course my favorite thing to make with the SodaStream is homemade lemon soda.

We have our own lemon tree so this is a good way to put some of those lemons to use, I just make a simple syrup (boil enough water to dissolve the sugar in) and then add the lemon juice and carbonated water. I usually use 1/2 a cup of sugar and 8 ounces of water to make the simple syrup, then while that is cooling off in the soda bottle (I reuse the glass Italian soda bottles from Trader Joe's) I juice 3 lemons and then add the juice to the soda bottle. When the contents are close to room temperature you can fill the bottle the rest of the way with carbonated water. I use a funnel to get all the ingredients into the bottle and of course once the soda is made you will want to put it in the fridge to cool or if you want to drink it right away add some ice to a glass and then pour your soda in.

part time vegan

These days I am a part time vegan, I am aware that saying I am a part time vegan sounds a bit odd and probably even makes some people question my commitment to a change in my lifestyle but this isn't about getting acceptance from others. Over the years I have made a lot of changes in my life and I think how I got here and why this works well for me and my family is an interesting story that may make you think about what is the best way for you to make long term changes in your life, should you wish to make changes.

A few years ago I was introduced to the idea of being a part time vegetarian for environmental reasons and we thought that sounded like a good way to start eating less meat. Both my husband and I had tried to go vegetarian in the past (independently of each other) and found after time that we weren't feeling our best so we went back to eating meat again. It seemed that eating a well balanced vegetarian diet would take more time to plan out than either of us had so as my husband says we were non practicing vegetarians.

When we decided to give part time vegetarianism a try we decided to aim for no more than 7 meals a week that included meat. This may sound like a lot, but if you think about it a lot of people eat meat with all 3 meals every day and that is approximately 21 meals a week. Since we had a newborn at the time this part time vegetarian diet made balancing our diet a little easier on us. Over time we tended to eat less and less meat, but we never gave up meat completely.

About 2 years passed with our part time vegetarian diet I began playing with some vegan recipes due to my ongoing issues with dairy and our son's upcoming birthday where we would have a few vegan and non-dairy friends in attendance. I didn't want these kids to not be able to enjoy the cupcakes or to have to bring their own meals to the party. I found that vegan baking wasn't all that difficult and no one knew the food was vegan if I didn't tell them. My cookies, cupcakes, muffins, and even pancakes were just as good as the traditional diary versions I made.

Over the next few months I ended up being very happy that I had begun learning to bake and even cook and eat vegan friendly meals because my diary issues really started to flare up again. This time I had already done much of the homework to make the transition easier, previously when my diary issues flared up badly I really didn't know what I was doing and had a difficult time eating dairy-free. I do still eat a little bit of dairy here and there, but when I do have a little dairy I often end up feeling really sick after wards.

I have been very happy taking my dietary changes slowly and have found that easing into these changes has made it much easier and I also feel much healthier than in my previous attempt at a vegetarian diet and a dairy-free diet. Now I am a part time vegan and really don't feel deprived. I still have to try making a vegan cheesecake and tiramisu, as those are two very dairy heavy deserts that my husband and I both love.

beating the heat with soup

It has been very hot all week so today I decided to try something a little different for lunch. I made a cold mango papaya soup. The ingredients list was simple... mango, papaya, vanilla ice cream (I used soy ice cream), and maple syrup. I cut the fruit up into tiny pieces and threw it into the blender making a puree, then I added the ice cream (I added a bit too much ice cream) and a little bit of maple syrup to sweeten the soup. It was very light and refreshing, but as I added too much ice cream it wasn't as flavorful as I would have liked. All in all though it was pretty good and I feel it was excellent as a first attempt at cold soup.

Repurposing bread clips

Here is something my husband shared with me recently, he saw it on LifeHacker. Repurposing those plastic tags on your bread to label the cords on your electronics. I thought it was such a simple, easy and yet brilliant idea.

Here is another article with some more ideas for repurposing those bread tags.

Reel Lawn Mower

We finally bought our fist lawn mower. We bought an old fashioned reel lawn mower with an 18" cutting width. Please keep in mind that we got rid of most of our grass prior to buying our lawn mower so we have a small grass area to be mowed. This lawn mower was a perfect choice for us since all in all it would take about as much time to mow our tiny yard with a gas or electric mower and this mower is one we are fairly comfortable with letting our 3 year old help us mow the lawn with, of course we supervise him and help him push the mower and make the turns but he just loves mowing the yard with this mower. This was also a nice choice for us being that the initial investment was about $100 and the only money that will go into it in the future is the occasional blade sharpening and these mowers will last for many years to come. We are also very happy with how much more peasant it is to mow the lawn without all the noise and fumes of the gas mowers we both used growing up.

3.78 kW - measuring day

So today our solar panel sales person came by and took measurements and readings and all that good stuff for our system. I was very happy with the readings on the various sections of the roof on the back of our house. The readings ranged from 97 - 99% meaning that we have at most 3% shade on any of the sections of our roof facing the back yard. This is great news because this allows us extra space to add on to our system later if we decide to. Next steps are bringing them our first payment, we already gave them our deposit, and then they can order our panels and get our CAD drawings ready for where all the panels will go on our roof and start on the paperwork for our rebate from our electric company (So Cal Edison).

3.78 kW

Well we just signed the contract for our next major project on the house. We are getting a 3.78 kW SunPower system for the house. This should cover pretty much all of our electricity needs, based on our current usage. We only had about 9 months of electric bills to base our usage on and our usage jumped when we installed the rainwater harvesting system for irrigating the backyard, we had to add several pumps to the electric to circulate the water and pump it into the sprinkler system. It didn't add a whole lot of electric usage, but it did add just enough to put us into the next tier of electric usage out here which meant a significant enough bump in our bill to make us consider installing solar panels sooner rather than later. The added electric usage/increase in the bill coupled with the incentives from our electric company and the federal government made us realize that now was definitely a good time to look into adding solar panels to the house. Of course there is also the knowledge that our electric rates will just keep going up and the incentives to install solar are only going to keep declining as the demand for solar is met (our electric company pays us money for every watt we install so that they can meet their renewable energy requirements).

We found a great local company who installs premium solar systems and are very much looking forward to getting our panels installed. The system will be tied into the grid so as we produce energy that we aren't currently using it will be added to the grid (peak hours) and then when we are using power and are not producing any electricity of our own (at night/ off-peak hours) we will take power back off the grid. This prevents the need for batteries to store the electricity we are generating so that it can be used later, if we were off the grid then we would need batteries and we would need to maintain the batteries and allocate space to all the batteries. For us being tied into the grid is a good choice, but it doesn't mean it is the right choice for every situation. It is just one way of doing things.

Cookies and Cream Cupcakes

These are a variation on a recipe in The 100 Best VEGAN BAKING Recipes by Kris Holenchek. The recipe in the cookbook called for green and blue food colorings to make the cupcakes look like Earth, but by omitting the food coloring I have cookies and cream cupcakes.



I frosted these with a buttercream frosting (from the same cookbook) and mixed crushed cookie pieces into the frosting so that I had a cookies and cream frosting for the cupcakes. The first time I made these cupcakes I made the buttercream frosting, frosted the cupcakes and then dipped them in crushed cookie pieces. The cookie pieces didn't adhere too well to the frosting by applying them to the frosting, but mixing them into the frosting really did the trick.

Lemon Almond Bling Muffins

I have made these muffins before and one of our friends really loves these, she said these are the best muffins she has ever had. I tried this recipe when I was in the process of majorly trimming back my lemon tree, I baked and cooked all kinds of things with lemon. I also made lots of lemonade and lemon soda at that point in time. Now that the lemon tree is healthier and isn't quite so full of lemons I can use them at a more sane pace, but I still love these muffins and a few other recipes I found during that lemon period. This recipe is in The 100 Best VEGAN BAKING Recipes book on page 66. Seriously I know it seems like I only make things out of this book, honestly I don't, but it is an excellent book. I love this book very much and recommend it to all my friends who are looking for vegan baking recipes, this has definitely become one of my favorite cookbooks.

Raspberry Lime Muffins

I know for a 3 year old's birthday party you need to have lots of cupcakes and of course I will, 4 dozen cupcakes. But then I thought what about something a little less sweet for those who maybe find cupcakes to be too sweet or for those who might be watching their weight and so I decided to make 2 kinds of muffins as well. I saw the recipe for Raspberry Lime Muffins in The 100 Best VEGAN BAKING Recipes (page 68) and thought that these would be a nice alternative to a cupcake with frosting, something a little sweet with the raspberries but not overly sweet and no frosting necessary. I can hardly wait to try these at the party, I'm even kind of hoping they don't all get eaten so I can have some for breakfast next week. I guess if they all get eaten though that would be a good thing, it would show people enjoyed them. I guess either way I'll be happy.

Banana Split Cupcakes

I found this recipe in The 100 Best VEGAN BAKING Recipes by Kris Holenchek (page 98) and they sounded so amazing that I couldn't help but try the recipe out for my son's birthday. After all they sounded like something a crowd of toddlers would love. I have had amazing will power to resist eating one myself yet (I admit I did taste the batter as did my little helper) but I did give one of the cupcakes (unfrosted) to one of my son's teachers the other day to say thank you for an amazing act of kindness on her part. She loved it, she said she was expecting blueberries and then realized there were chocolate chips in it and was very pleasantly surprised.


I am planning to frost these cupcakes with Fudgy Frosting (page 157) and then sprinkle them with some chopped up salted peanuts and top each one with a stemmed maraschino cherry. Of course another fun option would have been to use Buttercream Frosting (page 157) and then drizzle some chocolate syrup on top and then sprinkle on the peanuts and top with the cherries. Anyhow, I am really excited to have such fun Vegan cupcakes to serve for this birthday party. Especially since my son has 2 friends who can't eat dairy. It makes me feel good to know that I can provide a yummy birthday spread that all the kids can enjoy. I'll try to remember to take pictures of all the cupcakes when they are frosted.

Make your own pita chips

This week I am preparing for my son's 3rd birthday party. Among other things, that means lots of baking. This year I am making 2 kinds of Vegan cupcakes and 2 kinds of Vegan muffins as well as some pita chips and "egg" salad sandwiches and cucumber sandwiches. Of course the cupcakes won't get frosted till the day before the party so you'll have to wait to see them all frosted.

I started off by making lots of pita chips. I bought 4 bags of whole wheat pita chips. Then I cut them up into chip sized pieces. I used a bread knife to do this and simply cut each piece of pita into 4 strips lengthwise and then cut the strips into smaller pieces and ripped the edges where the front and back meet so that I have thin chips. Once all that is done I line them up on cookie sheets and spray them with a little olive oil and then sprinkle them with a little bit of salt. Once all of that is done put them in the oven at about 350 degrees until they are as crispy as you want them. If you are baking 2 sheets at once I suggest rotating the sheets about half way through so that both sheets get baked about the same. I will admit it takes a while if you make as many at once as I do, but I really think they taste so much better than the store bought ones which tend to taste greasy to me.

RainXchange

We had our backyard dug up to install a 2,500 gallon RainXchange cistern to store collected rainwater in. When one of our landscape designers came by today to check on the progress of our large project, we are also having our driveway, patios and entryway redone in paving stones, she said how when she saw the hole in our backyard she began to think about converting her own swimming pool into a large rainwater cistern. I was so excited to hear that what we were doing in our own yard got someone else excited about doing something similar in their own yard, especially one of the landscapers who is responsible for helping us achieve our own vision for our project.

Our RainXchange and paving stone project is nearing completion and we are very excited about it. It is so beautiful and relaxing to have a waterfall and pond in our backyard. The sound of the waterfall really does help filter out the sound from the highway a few blocks from our house. It is also very relaxing and the sound of the waterfall just lulls us to sleep now. It is so much better than we even expected going into this and it's not even done. It just keeps getting better and better looking. We will have a truly amazing yard when all of the work is finally done.

Busy days

It has been very crazy around our house lately. We are getting ready to undergo a major project in our yard. We are getting a 2,500 gallon rainwater storage tank buried in our backyard. We are getting a waterfall and pond put in our backyard. And we are getting our driveway, patio and walkway redone in paving stones. That is the short explanation of all the work.

In order to make way for the expanded backyard patio (which will have gardening areas built in along the edges) we needed to move some of the plants that were back there that we wanted to keep. We also had to move some of the plants in the front yard that we wanted to keep in order to make space for the new walkway to the front door and the new patio area in front of the house.

We also had to get rain gutters installed on the house in the areas that correspond to the intake areas for the rainwater storage tank. We are also having a trench put in under the driveway to catch any water that runs down the driveway, even with the paving stones due to the grade of our driveway we are expected to water make it down the driveway (especially in heavy rains).

We have also been busy going back and forth with the designers to make sure everything is going to work together properly. We had them go back last week and maximize the size of our storage tank for the rain water. They also added to the design for the backyard irrigation to be fed off of the rainwater when it is available, three separate types of irrigation for the backyard (one for our citrus trees, one for our garden and one for the small grass area we are keeping back there).

We are really looking forward to this very large project being completed. Of course at that point we still need to plant things in the yard and have a fence installed in the front yard, but we are certainly getting there.

We just got our Smart Meter

This morning Southern California Edison came by and installed SmartConnect Meters in our neighborhood. As a society we use considerably less electricity during off-peak hours than during peak-hours, this is common sense, but what is less common sense is the fact that we waste electricity during the off-peak hours. To put it really simply, this is due to the fact that it is not efficient to power down and then power back up our power plants as demand increases and decreases, so we waste a lot of electricity in the night hours when energy demand is considerably lower than during the daylight hours. This is energy that can very easily be used during these off-peak hours for any of our needs.

Learning all of this, as well as knowing that smart meters were coming in the near future, when we moved to California we began to change our energy consumption habits. We began doing our laundry at night, and since we bought our new washer/dryer this has been much easier as we have one unit that washes and dries our clothes. We simply put in a half load (still a big load of laundry) if we are going to use the drier too. We can even delay the start of our load if we like. We do have a preference towards hanging our clothes out to dry, but they just seem to take forever to dry in the winter months so we do use our drier. Of course even in the winter we do hang some of our laundry up to dry.

Simply moving some of our energy use to the off-peak hours has been an easy adjustment for us and now that we have our smart meter we will really start to see it pay off in our electric bill as well as simply knowing that we are helping to keep the demand for electricity from growing as quickly as it would grow if everyone kept using mostly peak electricity. All we have to keep in mind is that some things can be done any time and those things are definitely worth considering doing during off-peak hours so that we are lowering our impact on the environment. It is easy to make small changes that have an impact on the world and if we encourage others to make small changes too then the overall impact can be really big.

Found: recycled milk jug fence

We just had our second fence contractor come out to the house to give us an estimate on fencing in our front yard. We were a bit shocked that they had a recycled milk jug fence option since we had looked and looked for something like that for months before giving up on actually finding what we really wanted. We knew we really have to fence in our front yard in the next few months, but we really wanted an eco-friendly fence. We always ask whether or not each fence company has an eco-friendly option available, but it seems to come down to vinyl or wood.

When we called the fence company our neighbor used they said they did in fact have an eco-friendly fencing option available. This fence company said that they had composite fence material called Timberwolf. The fence contractor showed us a couple of pieces of this composite material. It was very nice looking. It had the wood grain detailing and all, similar to a real wood, but it has a lifetime warranty similar to the vinyl fences that everyone sells and installs around here. I really liked this option as I think it would fit the look of our 1948 cottage much better than a vinyl fence.

For anyone who is interested in seeing more about this fence please feel free to look at the Western Fence Co. website. I linked to a picture of the white picket composite fence that we are considering.

Meatless Monday...

I know that Meatless Monday has been pretty widely publicized, but I thought I would share the goal that we have made in our house.

I really liked the idea of getting people to make a small commitment like 1 day or 3 meals a week. Well since we haven't been eating a lot of meat for quite a while I figured that we would do better to do Meat Mondays. By Meat Mondays I mean that we try to eat meat only 3 meals a week. We figured that this would make a bigger environmental impact and would encourage us to keep getting greener in our eating.

An unexpected side effect of eating more vegetarian and vegan meals is that we are getting more creative about what we eat. We have really begun to enjoy our local Farmer's Market more and more as we have been adding more vegetables into our diet. It is a lot of fun to go to the Farmer's Market and see what looks good and just buy some to bring home and figure out a yummy meal to make with the fresh vegetables we picked up.

Last week I made baked potatoes with fresh broccoli, red bell pepper, onion and a little cheddar cheese. They were so yummy. There is nothing more tasty than some truly ripe and fresh food.

Greening up our Trash

Now that we have our own house with a yard and we aren't planning to move anytime too soon we decided that we would like to try out composting. This is a great way to lower the amount of waste your household produces because lots of things can be composted depending upon which type of compost bin you have. We haven't yet started a worm bin so we can't put dairy and meat into our compost bin, but all of our fruit and vegetable scraps are able to be composted. We can also compost a lot of our yard trash, though currently the majority of our yard trash goes into a yard waste bin that the city composts. The reason that most of our yard trash ends up in the bin is simply because we are still getting our yard in order which has involved a lot of major trimming of some of the trees and bushes. This results in a lot of yard trash. Of course trimming back some of the trees and bushes has been really important to the health of them so that we can remove diseased branches and clear enough of the limbs so that the sun can get through to the leaves on the inside of the tree which were dying.

One way to make composting a little easier for us was to get a small crock for our kitchen counter that we could put scraps in while we are cooking. This prevents us from having to constantly run outside to the compost bin and also allows us to leave the scraps for several days before we bring them outside to add to the bin in the yard. This was especially great when we had several days of rain and didn't really want to run out to the compost bin in the yard. It's also nice when it is really cold out or really dark out or we just don't feel like running our scraps outside.

Greening up my Cooking

In our last two rentals we had a built in microwave oven so we left our old microwave back in Wisconsin when we moved out to California. Now that we finally bought our own house we ended up losing our microwave and dishwasher. It turns out that we really don't miss having a microwave oven overall. There are really very few things that it is really that much nicer to have a microwave oven for and even those we have managed to find ways around using a microwave. The only problem we have had with ditching the microwave oven is that now all our leftovers must be cooked on the stove or in the oven, also not a big deal to us except that our gas bill shot up with all the extra oven usage. We finally got around to getting ourselves a nice reasonably sized toaster oven for our kitchen.

Replacing our Clunker Refrigerator - the saga continues

Soon the moment of truth came when the refrigerator was delivered. The old refrigerator was moved out of our kitchen and into our garage so that it could be picked up by our utility company who was going to recycle it for us. Our utility company offered a small rebate for buying an energy star qualified refrigerator and another small rebate for having it recycled.

When the new refrigerator was slid into the open space of our old refrigerator we found out that it was a little wider and a little taller than our old refrigerator, but that it will fit with the removal of some of the "trim" on the bottom of the cabinet above the refrigerator. Well removing the "trim" was easier said than done since these cabinets are over 60 years old and are solid wood. It took several hours of chiseling and smoothing out and shaving off the heads of nails and such, but we careful removed enough of the "trim" without causing any real damage to the cabinet or leaving the cabinet unsupported.


The end result was worth it to us. We got a beautiful new side-by-side refrigerator with ice and water in the door, complete with a lock for the ice and water. That being said there is no way that a bigger refrigerator would ever fit in that space without removing cabinets so we will enjoy our version of a jumbo refrigerator and just feel spoiled as if this were the biggest refrigerator ever, because for us this is the biggest refrigerator ever to fit in this house.

Replacing our Clunker Refrigerator

It is kind of funny that we requested this refrigerator be left in the house when we bought it since shortly after we moved in the fridge started to leak. That left us mopping up our refrigerator. Of course mopping up a refrigerator isn't really something we wanted to keep doing so we looked to see what the cause might be and if it was something we could reasonably fix. Well it turns out this is a fairly common problem with this particular model of refrigerator and getting it fixed requires someone who knows what they are doing, in other words it's a costly repair. Well to us a costly repair on a 9 year old refrigerator that isn't very energy efficient to begin with just didn't make sense.

That left us to decide on a new refrigerator for our kitchen. That was not nearly as easy a task as you might think. Since we still have the original cabinets in our kitchen from 1948 we didn't have a huge opening for a new refrigerator to fit into. We carefully measured the existing refrigerator and looked online to find out what our options were going to be. In figuring out the right refrigerator we also had to decide what color we wanted to go with, we were deciding between another white fridge or going with stainless steel (or the metallic color).

This led us into thinking about what we want to do with the kitchen when we update it, this is probably several years down the road for us. We knew we wanted to go with a cottage style for the kitchen and to keep the old cabinets if at all possible. We also knew we didn't want a white counter top or floor. It took a lot of looking around and thinking to decide that gray would be the way to go for us. We are thinking a medium gray counter top and darker gray floor. Once this was decided we decided that maybe going with the more modern look of stainless steel would be our best bet as this would give the kitchen a more high-end professional look and would blend well with the gray counter tops and floor.

From there we narrowed our search down to see what we were left with as options. There wasn't a lot left. There were a number of top and bottom units and one side-by-side that we thought would fit the space without much if any chipping away at the cabinet above the refrigerator. When we went to the store the sales person told us that the same manufacturer made another brand and they were the same exact refrigerator other than the name. We were fine with that and then we were also told, when we asked about a lock on the in door water dispenser, that they had one and it was the same dimensions as the other one also. We were all settled on the new refrigerator now and happy with our decision. Then my paranoia set in that somehow this refrigerator wouldn't fit the opening.