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.