We Moved!

Tonight marks the 10th night in our new...room. That's minimalist living for you! We have attempted to take all our most important/necessary items and condense into one room, for the most part at least.

We do have some thing in the kitchen. We brought our juicer, slow cooker, and our knife block. We brought all the peanut essentials. Cups, spoons, pacifiers... We also brought all of our food. I have quite a spice collection. I'm going to guess that I have about 40 different seasoning. Lots of grains in mason jars. Some "milk". Cereal, and a few cans of beans, and various tomato products. I'm hoping to be able to phase out all the canned good soon. I want to be able to can my own stuff once we start our garden.

We did the bulk of the moving last Tuesday. My brother had taken a bunch of boxes up here for us a few days before Christmas, so we ended up with two pick of truck loads. I did much of the moving of the heavy furniture with the mister, and I have really been feeling it since then. Can we say "out of shape?!" I also drove my car up packed to the gills with clothes and things we would be using in the house.

Mister brought 11 garbage bags full of clothes and other things we don't need to the goodwill. I think that's a lot considering I thought I didn't have a lot of clothes.

Finally today I dropped off the last key. It took sooo long and so many days to be done! We opted not to paint and I did very minimal cleaning. All with baking soda, white vinegar, and Castile soap! That's for another post though...
I just needed so badly to be done with that place.

There was huge pile of stuff that had to be gone through down stairs in the dining room. My grandparents have a crab dinner every new years and it had be gone by then...

My grandma has done all our laundry, and I must say it feels nice not to have a huge pile of clothes on my to do list. I got off at 4 two day last week, which allowed us to come home and eat dinner at a reasonable time. My grandpa eats at 6 every. night.


I do miss being able to frequently use only 1 car. I cant walk home anymore...

There still is much to be done. Lots and lots of organizing. I don't know where some things are.

It's almost weird how we seem to be managing on so much less. Space and time, mostly!

I'm still waiting to *really* get back into my rhythm. I know it's going to be a new rhythm but I'm ready! I'm having difficulty getting settled in a way because my work hours have been so crazy last week (the moving week), this week because everyone there is sick and next week because the husband in the family I work for is going out of town.

How has moving been for you and your family? Has it ever taken much longer than you anticipated to become settled? How did you handle it?

Wordless Wednesday--healthy snacking

Mini bell peppers!

Green juice this morning

Recipe:

4 carrots
2 oranges
1 in ginger
4 kale leaves
1 lemon
Spinach


The spinach was much easier to juice than the kale! At the end I ran a little distilled water down the feeder to clean it out. I think it's good. The peanut only took one sip.

I juice because I can.

I think that juicing is very cool.  I thought that long before I ever had one.  Before I knew about the benefits of juicing.   Before I had fresh juiced, juice!
We got a juicer about about 8 months ago.  Mister did all the research and decided the best one we could get for the a reasonable price was the Jay Kordich PowerGrind Pro.

Now, like with most things, all juicers are not created equal.  There are many different kinds with different features, and perhaps most importantly different price tags.  I could be wrong, as I haven't specifically looked into it...BUT I think some are as cheap as $100.  However, some are several thousand dollars.  That's a huge variance in price!    So, how do you decide which to buy?  Here is what I know...
Get one:

• with the most powerful motor you can afford
• that will juice leafy greens
• that is easy to clean (and do it immediately after juicing)
• which extracts the pulp

Okay, so I must be honest.  I hadn't actually juiced anything myself.  Of course, I've drank the juices Mister made.  Never though, had I made my own juicy concoction.  I think I was a little intimidated.
All that changed yesterday, because yesterday...I JUICED!!
And dare I say, I make better concoctions than Mister does.  I think it's like cooking, which I love AND I'm good at. 
So, here is a little looksie-loo at my juicing journey thus far.

Yesterday's Juice

2 quartered organic Fuji Apples
3 thin organic carrots
1 in piece organic peeled ginger
1 organic lemon

It was a little peppery, which I think came from the lemon.  I liked it.  You will probably like it.  The bubbie thought it was just okay (she doesn't like ginger).  The peanut took a few sips, which I think means she liked it too.  I didn't think the ginger was overwhelming, and I'm not a huge fan of it either. 
Please try and let me know what you think.

Today's Juice

4 Dino Kale leaves
2 Rainbow Chard leaves
2 quartered tomatoes
3 carrots
2 lemons with peel
1 clove garlic
3 stalks celery (I used the innermost stalks with all the leaves too)
1 Persian cucumber

Looks good, doesn't it?  Five a day the color way! Everything is organic, with the exception of the garlic and the carrots. 

This one was as good as a veggie green juice can be I guess.  I will say, the smell of the greens being juiced is not my favorite.  I couldn't really taste the garlic, and being that I LOVE garlic next time I might try two cloves.  To get the greens to go down, and not get stuck...I tore them in smallish pieces and looked down the juicer to see they cleared before I added something else.

I'd love to hear your thoughts and opinions on juicing, juicers, and my recipes.

Happy Juicing!