Experiments in green smoothies.

So I've been watching all kinds of food documentaries lately. Wanting to be more healthy, Wanting to eat more vegetables and fruit, Wanting to look and feel better, Wanting to drop the weight that I added when I let myself go.

Juicing seemed a viable option, But very expensive and I don't own a juicer. I do however have a kitchen ninja. So today I decided to see if it was up to the task of puréeing some fruits and vegetables.

Here's what I got: large leaf spinach, Kale, Strawberries, Plum Orange, Gala apples, Peruvian mango, banana.

What I ended up putting in: Four stalks of kale, two large spinach leaves, Half of the Apple, Orange, mango and banana, and Five strawberries. Then my ninja chopped them all up into tiny little pieces. The result was 30 ounces of green vegetable sludge. It actually tasted really good but seemed like it would be hard to swallow.

So I poured some out and I decided to add some soymilk.

Voilà, vegetable and fruit perfection. It tastes great and there's lots of servings of my daily veggies and fruits, No added sugar, And drinkable through a straw, which is very important to me. Lol.

My goal is to drink three glasses of this each day instead of having breakfast and lunch. We'll see how that goes.

Then I'll eat dinner with the hubby which is usually some form of lentil and barley soup. Sometimes with curry, sometimes with mushrooms, sometimes with potatoes, And once in a while with sausage. We're trying to eat meat very infrequently. We shall see how that goes since we're both huge meat eaters. And I do mean huge, no pun intended.

Has Skinny Bitch ruined my life?

I read Skinny Bitch (it's a book, duh) on the airplane out to Florida for Christmas last week. Ugh. It's about going vegan. It's less about all the wonderful reasons why to go vegan, and more about the disgusting and cruel reasons why NOT to eat meat.

[insert guffaw]

Normally, I give a snort of derision whenever someone brings up the tyranny of the meat industry. I believe that God gave us animals, and once we were in a fallen state, we could eat them. If you read your bible, you can find reference to that actually after the flood, when Noah and his family are given "all living moving things" to eat. But let's step aside from the bible for a few.

The book refers to two types of diets- that of "light" (eating foods that grow on plants, which use photosynthesis to grow), and eating decaying dead flesh. Mmmmm, yummy. But I would argue that once you pick the fruit, vegetable, or leaf, it is dead, or dying. So, um, no, that part doesn't really make sense.

The main issue I have with myself, after reading the book, is how blase my attitude is towards the commercial animal products industry in general. I do feel guilty of supporting a business that abuses animals for the only reason of turning a higher profit. I do feel that since we vote with our money, the way for me to vote against animal cruelty in the animals-for-food industry is to stop buying products it produces. I think the average family really NEEDS one cow, one pig, and a family of chickens to survive. That's the way it used to be- Bessie cut your lawn for free, provided a replacement calf for next year and butter and cream for your table, and in return you brought her to the butcher in the fall so she could stock your icebox. And the hens lay eggs- some you let hatch for fryers, and others you ate with toast.

Now, we go to a mega-market where meat has been lying around for days after a mass slaughter under in-humane conditions. It's in little anonymous packages so you don't have to even think about the animal it came from. There's some kind of "acceptable loss" number in the industry for animals that don't make it to slaughter because they die on the way. There's also an "acceptable" amount of rotten or diseased flesh allowed to make it into the packaging, too, which is pretty gross. And then there's the fact that according to the authors, EVERY person interviewed regarding their jobs at a slaughterhouse admitted to either abusing animals themselves, or watching it happen and doing nothing. The animals are going to die anyway, so why bother being humane to them?

Now let's talk health. When you think about it, you'll realize that it is almost physically impossible to eat enough grains and veggies to make you obese. I mean, a cup of spinach has what, 70 calories? Our nation, including me, is fat and getting fatter (well, not me for that part.) It's probably because of fast food (meat, fat, lard, and stuff fried in fat), and processed foods- which can pack an awful lot of calories in a small package. It's insanely easy to overeat on packaged foods- one box of Girl Scout Cookies Samoas has around 2000 calories- and it's pretty easy to eat them in one sitting. By comparison, to eat 2000 calories of salad, you would be eating about a gallon of salad.

So what does all this lead up to? I'm going vegetarian for a while. I'm going to start with a month, and chronicle the experience. I want to see how I feel physically and emotionally. I like meat, so I don't think I will be a veg-head forever. But when I do start eating meat again, I'm going to see what small farms in my area can offer me as far as ethical meat.

Digital Art Journalling with an iPad and apps

So I got an iPad. It was inevitable, seeing as I've been having a 4 year love affair with a guy named Mac who spends a lot of time warming my lap :)

I immediately downloaded a bunch of drawing apps, and I also investigated the stylus angle since I know I don't want to draw with my finger. I found what I believe is THE BEST stylus available for artists, it's called The Hand, and it was a Kickstarter project. It's awesome and you can find it here.

On to some thoughts on which apps to try. First, I downloaded ArtRage. I have it on my computer, so I figured the natural extension was to get it on the tablet. It's ok, but not my favorite thing to use. The cool thing is it's connected to my Dropbox and I can send the source file to my laptop for more refined paintings. The bad is that it's a little too complicated for doodles.

Next, I got Bamboo notebook- which is my favorite program to write and doodle in, by far.  And Sketchbook lite, which is nice when you want to do a more robust drawing. But there are a LOT of tools, and it takes some time to do a good drawing.

I tried several others, not worth mentioning.

And then I got Paper by 53. I started just sketching with the free pen, which is nice...but then I decided to get the add-ons for the felt-tip pen and the watercolor brush. Voila, my life is complete :)

About that Plan....

So I'm not a planner. Is that a surprise? Or rather, I do have plans, I do like to "plan" but in the end, when I'm working on plans for things I want to have happen in my life, they tend to be nebulous.

Like, "This year I want to make my business successful so I can quit working a day job." Or my favorite, "I'm going to lose 40 lbs." Ummmmm, exactly how am I going to do that? You know what they say about intentions. Mine are always great, but I don't follow them up. I have been traditionally very resistant to doing the things that other people say work, such as setting goals (writing it down,) and keeping a food diary and workout journal.

So, rather than wait for January to make a bunch of "resolutions" about my life, I've decided to take advice from others this year and do some actual, tangible planning.

#1: found a blog I like, actually from a link my sister put on Pinterest, called Blogilates. It's a cute girl doing a hybrid pilates style workout. She has a calendar of workouts to do, and a fitness journal, that you can print out and use each month for $1.99. Seemed worth it to me, so I bought it.

#2. decided to invest in Leonie's Planner. The calendar is pretty cute. It's the Planner, however, that caught my eye. There are lots of pages in it that really make you stop, think, and write it out- what you are thinking, and what you want.

So, I'm going to print them both out and put them in a 3-ring binder together.

My goals, moving into 2013, are to:

1. Finally lose the stubborn 40 lbs or so I've been holding on to for 10 years. I really don't need it anymore, thank you very much.

2. Make real, clear, practical goals for my various businesses and follow through. I'll be planning what I want to accomplish during 2013, and what outcomes I want to see by the end of the year.

3. Find a voice for my blog, and write regularly.

Inspiration all around

Well, we are back from the CHA show. It was a little disappointing this year, because the economy has hit so hard and a lot of companies just didn't feel like it would be a good use of their money. But what a wonderful treasure trove of information and inspiration! We tried out so many cool things- like one of my favorites- iron-on trims and fibers. I can use my little tack iron to attach them to things and there is no need to sew!!!!
None of the clay companies were there. They must not have anything new to show. Lord knows, the last time we were there so was Polyform- with their Studio product (fail). They had a beautiful booth and a terrible concept. Oh well, they should have asked the accomplished clay artists to weigh in before trying to sell that product.
Die Cuts with a View- their booth was GORGEOUS! It looked like a forest, with big trees and things hanging from them. A bead company went so far as to hang their strands from a faux-tree, it was beautiful. I came home and started making things, how could you not? The BEAE art show hangs in two weeks and I'm hoping to put two pieces into it. I'll post pics later :)
If you are interested, you can check out some of my photos at the sneak-peaks post on ThingsCrafty.

Excited to go to Cali!

Can't wait for my weekend trip to California! Gonna see my 2nd cousin Van, only 9 months old...gonna see my BEST FRIEND Cindy for the first time in 20 years. There's a story there, thank you Facebook. And of course, gonna chill with Ilysa at the CHA convention. Well, more like work our tails off and come back with 50 pound suitcases. I do believe my suitcase is going to have almost nothing in it when I leave. Except maybe another suitcase, debating whether I should bring one to act as a carryon for the trip back.
Right now, we are waiting to hear if we will be chosen for a Reality TV show. I can't believe it, I actually hate most of them. But I love the Cupcake wars, and this show is put on by the same producers. It's kinda like a Crafter war, we don't have a lot of details yet but casting ended yesterday- so keep your fingers crossed. If we get on tv, ThingsCrafty.com will take off like crazy- which is perfect because once again, this year I've already been informed that I'm losing my job in June. Ugh. When will public education get better?