Good Morning, Yes I know that it is the first of September so time to start my vegan diet. Oh it I knew I was moving when I made this list I would have maybe not picked it. I am going to spend the next few days looking and recipe books etc but not officially start till we return from our mountain trip next week. I do my grocery shopping on Monday for the entire week so I would like to wait till next Monday for my official shopping day. OH...I feel like this is going to be hard and I am so not motivated to do it. The food here is just different and talk about the prices. Certain things you just can not get like brown rice...even in a health food store and a piece..a single piece of tofu if you can even find it could be around 8ch ($8) and that is nuts so I am going to have to be a bit creative. I also do not cook more than 1 meal for dinner..you know no extra things for the kids so I typically cook meals that I know they will eat. I have never been a food pusher and I feel like they eat ok..I mean kid stuff is what they prefer obviously. I would love for them to eat more fruit, vegetables, salad etc and less juice, chicken nuggets, and mac and cheese but they won't and I do not like to have a battle at meal time just not worth it to me so I make what they like, they eat, or don't eat and whatever is fine with me. I guess that is an ok philosophy as I did not eat much as a kid and well they have never been really sick, no antibiotics ever for both, and overall they are really healthy so I have not killed them yet :)! So anyway..I need to think of meals that I can make for my family and just swap things out for my vegan month...you know just leave things out or maybe add some beans or something....we will see and I will think about it this week so I am prepared for my shopping on Monday. It is more tricky than you think since I can not read the labels...the French I can do pretty well but somethings are in German or Italian and rarely English so everything things seems a bit more challenging. When I look at recipe books and I did bring a great one that Melissa made..I just can not find the actual things to make it with so what to do? We will actually be back on Sunday and I did plan to make an Italian dish that I will substitute chicken with eggplant, leave out the cheese, and add some extra veggies. We will see...I need my inspiration to kick in...MELISSA please cook for me!
I do think the food here in the regular grocery stores are much better quality that in the US. The fruit and vegetables are almost always seasonal and you can not get everything all year. They also import very little food and all meats etc are swiss..they even say it on the package. Overall pasteurize things much less here and even packaged foods are fresher tasting overall. It does seem like the swiss take pride in their overall food and how things are prepared and packaged and yes the cheese, chocolate,and bread is very good. Oh a good note I did find out that the baguettes are NOT made with eggs YAY!!! I truly think I could live on those for a month :)! SO yummy!
So wish me luck...I will post next weeks menu when I return from our Holiday as they say here! I am off to have my coffee with no cream :(...no real soy products here so I guess I will just leave it out. If any of my Geneva friends are reading this and know where to buy these things....CALL ME!
School starts on Monday and both my girls have a French day first..oh my! I am way more nervous than they are!
xxoo-Dina
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
last day of august. wow.
flew right by, that August did. but i have to say, i got a lot of purging accomplished. i don't think i have ever got rid of as much stuff, unless i was moving. and then maybe not even as much. i have boxes and piles all over my house for the big yard sale on Saturday. i can deal with this clutter, knowing it will be gone in a matter of days.
Today i went through my storage space in the basement. it is about 4ft. x 15ft....well that is my best guess. i am so not good with guessing measurements though. besides our bedroom closets and the built-in closets (we have 2), this is our only storage space. so, i do have to say, this is much less already than other places i have lived, where i had a whole basement and attic! you know what i have found though...more space=more stuff. was i happier with more space and more stuff. no. definitely not. i love living in this apartment, with my tiny storage area. i have found it is not the space or the things that make me happy. it is the people, the community, being orderly and not everything a mess all the time, but mostly the people. my three favorite homes have had a lot to do with the people i lived around, that were on my block, in my neighborhood or in my building. do i still want a home? with a yard? yes. i still dream about that. but through this month's exercise i am reassessing what that home should look like. what i want it to look like, and be and provide.
so as we move into September, i will be starting vegan month, and finishing purging my stuff month. since the yard sale is this saturday (from 8am-3pm for all you locals, come buy my stuff!) i am planning on spending another day down in the storage and going through the christmas stuff. i love decorating for christmas, but i do think we have more decorations than we need. (here i am wincing in fear of my mother's reaction since most of it was handed down from her.) but seriously, it is just too much, and i don't even use it all every year. no Christmas tree could hold all those ornaments. so if anyone is reading that is family, please, no more ornaments. and this new less stuff thing is going be interesting for the holidays. the kids always get SO much stuff. SOOOOO much. i keep it to a minimum, a silver lining to our always modest income. but relative over buy. i know it is out of love. so i don't want to deny them their joy. i know that joy, i love buying someone a gift they love. it is truly one of my favorite things. which, by the way, reminds me...i hate kid's birthday parties where the kids don't open the gifts in front of the guests. it is the best part people, it's what i came to see. anyway. Christmas stuff, see it send me into a tizzy.
and tonight i am happily leafing through vegan cookbooks and others i can get vegan ideas from. i am so excited. tomorrow i am cooking food for a friend and i think she'll love a vegan meal, perfect. So far i am thinking about a summer vegetable ragout with exotic curry sauce. that's really the name. printed in Bon Appetit from an LA restaurant, Hatfield's. we'll see.
and then later this week, pricing my stuff. hard to do. too high and no one buys. too low and you don't make any dough. and i want to go to Europe people. :)
xoxomelissa
Today i went through my storage space in the basement. it is about 4ft. x 15ft....well that is my best guess. i am so not good with guessing measurements though. besides our bedroom closets and the built-in closets (we have 2), this is our only storage space. so, i do have to say, this is much less already than other places i have lived, where i had a whole basement and attic! you know what i have found though...more space=more stuff. was i happier with more space and more stuff. no. definitely not. i love living in this apartment, with my tiny storage area. i have found it is not the space or the things that make me happy. it is the people, the community, being orderly and not everything a mess all the time, but mostly the people. my three favorite homes have had a lot to do with the people i lived around, that were on my block, in my neighborhood or in my building. do i still want a home? with a yard? yes. i still dream about that. but through this month's exercise i am reassessing what that home should look like. what i want it to look like, and be and provide.
so as we move into September, i will be starting vegan month, and finishing purging my stuff month. since the yard sale is this saturday (from 8am-3pm for all you locals, come buy my stuff!) i am planning on spending another day down in the storage and going through the christmas stuff. i love decorating for christmas, but i do think we have more decorations than we need. (here i am wincing in fear of my mother's reaction since most of it was handed down from her.) but seriously, it is just too much, and i don't even use it all every year. no Christmas tree could hold all those ornaments. so if anyone is reading that is family, please, no more ornaments. and this new less stuff thing is going be interesting for the holidays. the kids always get SO much stuff. SOOOOO much. i keep it to a minimum, a silver lining to our always modest income. but relative over buy. i know it is out of love. so i don't want to deny them their joy. i know that joy, i love buying someone a gift they love. it is truly one of my favorite things. which, by the way, reminds me...i hate kid's birthday parties where the kids don't open the gifts in front of the guests. it is the best part people, it's what i came to see. anyway. Christmas stuff, see it send me into a tizzy.
and tonight i am happily leafing through vegan cookbooks and others i can get vegan ideas from. i am so excited. tomorrow i am cooking food for a friend and i think she'll love a vegan meal, perfect. So far i am thinking about a summer vegetable ragout with exotic curry sauce. that's really the name. printed in Bon Appetit from an LA restaurant, Hatfield's. we'll see.
and then later this week, pricing my stuff. hard to do. too high and no one buys. too low and you don't make any dough. and i want to go to Europe people. :)
xoxomelissa
Saturday, August 28, 2010
inspiration, from tiny places
http://www.tumbleweedhouses.com/
then I found this post on a blog for simple living...interesting thoughts on how just focusing on having less stuff isn't really the key to being happy either. i like the idea here, and think it important to share and live into.
"Most of us would agree that a materialistic life is not a fulfilling one. More clothes, bigger houses, the latest electronic gadgets, newer and flashier cars… these things might bring temporary enjoyment, but a life based around acquiring things can feel pretty empty. The reason is simple… “stuff” doesn’t equal happiness.
So what about the idea that many people have nowadays that less stuff equals happiness? It’s really the same mindset carried to the opposite extreme. One group thinks that buying another new thing will make life better… one more purchase will make life happier. The other group thinks that ridding themselves of another existing possession will make life better… one more act of purging will make life happier.
Both groups are putting far too much importance on “things.” It’s possible to be happy living in one room with few possessions… or in a mansion filled with the finest of everything. It’s also possible to be miserable in both situations. Lasting happiness comes from relationships and spiritual and emotional fulfillment… it isn’t determined by how much stuff you have, or the process of acquiring it or purging it. The person who has simplified his life isn’t happy because he has less stuff… he is happy because he has achieved inner peace.
There are some very good reasons for purging and decluttering, but compulsive purgers who purge for the purge itself are just as excessively focused on stuff as compulsive shoppers are.
And that is not the path to achieving true and lasting simplicity."
i know this has been out there for a number of years, so many of you may have seen it before...but if you have not watched this little cartoon, The Story of Stuff, i highly recommend watching it.
thanks to all that have been leaving me little clips and such via email or FB for more inspiration. i love it! in fact, here is a story someone shared from the Seattle Times about a tiny apartment, enjoy! and thanks Amy!
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