It happened.  Finally.

I got the first cold I've had in a looong time.  I think it's the first one I haven't been able to combat in the early stages since I was pregnant!

I haven't been pregnant in 20 months. 

Truth be told, I haven't really been taking as good care of myself as I ought to.  When I got my period this month I was pretty disappointed.   Things have kind of spiraled out of control from there.  Mister and I have been fighting a little bit.  I have been consuming WAY too much coffee and chocolate.  Then we ventured into San Francisco for one of my best friends birthday last Saturday night.  That's what did it, I'm sure.  SF is a good hour away from us up here in the forest.  I had more than a couple drink.  I mean, I might as well I'm not pregnant, right?  And after dropping off my brother at his warehome...we got in at 3am.  I know, that's shit aint right.  We are getting old!  Relatively speaking, of course. 

Sunday when we got up I thought I was just hung over.  Nope.  I was getting sick.  Bubbie and Papa just moved,  so peanut and I went to help them settle on Sunday.  On the way home we stopped by whole foods, and picked up some elderberry syrup.  This was my first time buying it.  I dont know if I got a "good" one or not.  So these are the things I did to try to kick this colds ass ASAP:

• Taking the Elderberry Syrup twice a day/2 tsp
• Taking Oil of Oregano capsules 2-3 times a day
• Drinking copious amounts of tea.
• Drinking Raw Apple Cider Vinegar in hot water
• Eating raw garlic
• Juicing

I'm still in the very beginning when it comes to homeopathic and natural remedies.    I'm learning. I felt a little confused as to whether I could do some of those things while nursing.  It's so confusing!  I've been reading conflicting information.

I found this post from a gluten-free vegan mom who knows very helpful. 

I'm hoping at some point in time to take some herbalist courses.  It's part of my Mommy Metamorphosis!  Now that it's Thursday, I'm starting to feel much better. 

So tell me, do you go the natural route for healing?  What has your journey looked like? 

So I'm Sewing...Kinda.

Who is on pinterest?  I am!  I love it.  Its a place where you can easily loose several good hours.  Once I got really into it, I found this tutorial on how to make a hobo bag.  Actually I think the person who made it calls it a boho bag.  Who's right?  I'm not sure.  Id like to think me, however she is the one who can actually make the bag. 

This story begins before I became a pinterest fanatic.  Mister, the peanut and I went to the local and super famous pumpkin festival in Half Moon Bay a few weeks before Halloween.  They had A LOT of craft booths.  One woman had these cross-body(hobo) bags.  They were all Tye-dye.  Bleh.  Now while I am working on my crunchiness, I'm not ready to go that far into the hippie realm.  Not to mention they were being sold for something like $40.00.

When we got home I googled the bags.  I had to use nearly a billion different search terms to get what I wanted.  But I found it!  The only problem?  I hated all the patterns.

Epiphany.  I can make one.  Duh!  Because I'm sooo good at sewing.

I'm not good at sewing.  When I was 20, I make a pink terry cloth kangaroo halloween costume with my grandma.  Upon recent reflection, I think my grandma made the whole thing as I watched.  Sewing is hard.  Much harder than I thought it would be.

Any-who, back to pinterest, and the point of this post.  The hobo boho purse tutorial.  I'm very excited. I can do this. I'm going to make 500 of these purses, and sell them on Etsy.  Then I will be a real WAHM.

Here we are almost a month later, and I'm not done with the first one.  I took a crazy long time looking at fabric with my mom.  From now on she will be referred to as "The Bubbie".  I already have the material to make hobo boho bag #2.

The Bubbie used to sew a long time ago, but not any more.  However she is very crafty.  She has been making wreaths like crazy this month, but that's another post.  The Bubbie helped me uderstand the sewing terms in the tutorial.  She went with me and the peanut to Kinko's to enlarge the pattern.  She held my hand as I held the scissors to make the first fabric cut.  Scary! We started pinning it together.  Less scary.  I think she may have run off with the peanut at this point.

The Bubbie doesn't have a sewing machine.  Now we go to my grandma's house.  She does have a sewing machine.  I start sewing the bag up there on a Sunday.  I'm very jazzed about this.  Grandma says I can take the machine home!

I did a little bit the night I brought the sewing machine home.  Then NOTHING gets done for approximately 3 weeks.       

BUT, I've been working on it for the past two nights.  Hard.  Really. Hard. 

You might think that it's complete now.  After all, I'm writing a whole post about it. 
I'm not done.  I'd like to think I'll be done soon.  But I might not be finished for several weeks.  That's just the way it goes sometimes.  I think my Etsy dreams are on hold.  For now.

Do you ever take way longer than you think you ought to, to finish a project?
Tell me about it.
I'd love to know I'm not alone... 

Food...It's what's for dinner.

We like the chickpea cutlets from veganomicon around here.  I was reading somewhere how people are changing the spices and making minor tweaks to change the flavor.  I look at it as the cutlet can kind of be changed the way you can do chicken many ways.

So, I bought a bunch of broccoli on Saturday and didn't end up cooking it.  I had this recipe I wanted to try. 
http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/broccoli_stir_fry_with_ginger_and_sesame/
I didnt think there was enough "sauce" to reduce, so I added more soy, broth, and sesame oil.  Then I got creative.  I added a little mirin, and sriracha.  Sriracha is great.  My "new" sauce reduced wonderfully and the broccoli was super yummy. 


I figured since that was kind of an Asian flavor, maybe I could "asify" my cutlets. 
Here is the chickpea cutlet recipe from PPK.com
http://www.theppk.com/2010/11/doublebatch-chickpea-cutlets/
I used sesame oil instead of EVOO, used 1/4 cup of mirin and 1/4 cup of veggie stock, grated ginger in place of the lemon, and did some space switching.  I used red pepper flakes, onion powder, eden organic's seaweed gomasio, and 1/8 t ground clovers.

I guess this is as good a place as any to let you know I dont measure ANYTHING.  Sometimes not even in baking! 

I did measure the cloves because I didn't want it to be overwhelming.  The flavors were pretty spot on, I think.  But, I don't think I used enough vital wheat gluten (remember I don't measure?).  The husband, from here on out to be referred to as "Mister" didn't like them.  I suspect the VWG was the reason.  I fried 1/2 and baked the other 1/2.  I think baking was better here.  It yielded a denser cutlet.

All in all I haven't been deviating from recipes for too long.  I think this was an overall success, and am excited to try my hand at it again.