Our Semi Organic Life

Spring Saturday day in the life

2013-05-20T21:16:00.001-04:00

I’ve been blog light these days. Nothing big going on, just busy with work, life etc. Here’s how our latest spring Saturday went.

7:00 am – wake up - ish. I remember its Saturday so I go back to sorta sleep

7:30 am – finally get up after Cornelius decided to snuggle in the middle of the two of us using half my pillow as his own.

8:00 am – breakfast of toast, butter, peanut butter & blueberry jelly. Tony makes extra dark coffee with his new coffee maker (old one died) and starbucks tribute coffee. They were having a buy one get one free offer on whole bean tribute bags a week or 2 ago. He had a $10 gift card, I had a $5 one (thanks bake sale @ work)… but back to breakfast. I drink my half cup of coffee with chocolate almond milk. Delish! We sit down and watch one episode of arrested development together while eating in the living room. We’ve been watching them in preparation for next week's reveal – in reverse. Like we started at the finale and are working our way backwards on netflix. Its epic. You should try it. So. many. jokes.

8:45 am – get dressed and decide to drive to short pump for some errands. This is a 25 minute drive abouts. We make sure to remember our reusable bags and the screw that broke off the lawnmower to replace.

8:46 am – After cursing our upstairs neighbor for whatever sound she’s been making for the past 12+ hours (vacuuming? fan? sharpening knives on a mill?) Tony flushes our toilet and the noise stops momentarily… and he has an epiphany. We left the outside hose on yesterday. Oops! it leads to this:

9:15 am – we arrive at Helzberg Diamond to get my ring cleaned. I get it done twice yearly (November & May) per the lifetime warranty. They try and sell us something but we politely decline. Then we realize that there is no Sears in short pump and decide to drive to the closest one to get the lawn mower part before getting groceries.

9:45 am – after a very efficient trip to the parts department where they had exactly what we needed and quickly too we head back to short pump to get groceries at trader joes.

10:30 (?) am – we check out with $183 worth of trader joes food. Holy cow!

We hadn’t been to trader joes in about a month and were in withdrawals. Oh the things we got! Frozen stuff, cheese, more cheese, sparkling wine, goat cheese, fancy goat cheese, brussel sprouts, and yum things. Sticker shock makes us work out a menu and hard grocery planning on the drive home.

We see riverrock festival from the road on the way back but think we may not go since the weathers not good.

11:00 am – I do my favorite chore around the house – putting away the groceries! I love it! It’s hardly a chore. It’s weirdly fun to me. Tony puts the menu on the board. Note – the meats on the menu are fake, aka chik’n and 'beef’ tips. The brussel sprouts are very real and so good in balsamic! I must post about our fav fake meats soon…

11:30 am – I find it weird that we’ve done so many things so early in the morning. Normally we don’t make it out of the house before 11 on Saturdays. We eat salad lunches that we picked up at trader joes. Mine is amazing! Its lettuce, some red lettuce, corn, israeli cous cous, walnuts, raisins?, chicken & sweet basil dressing. Must recreate! Tony’s is similar but I can’t rave about it since I didn’t try it. Again, we eat this while watching an episode of Arrested Development. Motherboy XXX.

noon – I start working on the bread. The no kneed bread needs to be taken out of the bowl and set to its’ second rise on parchment paper on the counter. For this amazing recipe see - http://www.frugallivingnw.com/frugal-homemaking/amazing-no-knead-bread-step-by-step-recipe/. I highly recommend it. Even if you don’t think you can bake bread well, or at all, or can’t bake, or can’t cook. This recipe is that easy!

I had started the bread the night before. I mixed the 4 ingredients and set in a bowl with plastic wrap. Around noon it had been 16 hours and the bubbles were exactly like the blog photo showed. I wrapped this dough in flour & parchment paper and set the timer for 2 hours.

12:45 – after the bread and general kitchen cleaning I start on the homemade laundry detergent. We’d run out of my last big batch I made 6 (?) months ago and I wanted to try something slightly different. This time I googled around, found this (http://www.diynatural.com/homemade-laundry-detergent-soap/) and decide to give the powder kind a try versus the normal liquid which we’ve used for the last 2 years. It helps that I only have half a zote bar in the house so I make half a batch.

After wrestling with the food processor and the box grater I manage to get pretty much all of the bar of Zote soap grated with all my finger tips intact. It’s basically 1/2 a bar of any soap, 1/2 a cup of borax & 1/2 cup of washing soda mixed together. I found an old spaghetti sauce jar to hold it in. This is good for 30 loads of laundry!!!

1:15 – 2:00 pm – lost minutes. Was I cleaning? iphoneing? On pinterest? Who knows. I think probably lots of those, plus Cornelius cuddling and some laundry thrown in to try my new detergent. I started with a fleece blanket to test. At 1:30 pm I did preheat the oven and put in the dutch oven in prep for 2pm. Also I seem to remember getting the mail that had come and reading Better Homes & Gardens plus the latest Time magazine on Angelina Jolie.

2:00 pm – its time to finally bake this bread!

It took flipping the dough upside down into the 425 degree dutch oven without burning anything. Then baking for 30 minutes & then 20 more with the lid off.

2:50 pm – I take the bread out of the oven. Besides smelling like a Subway in our house it actually looks like I followed the directions correctly! I make some comment about how the blog said it would crackle and not to cut it open until that’s done. No sooner and I uttered those words then we heard it! turn your sound up to see this video…

3:00 pm – We drive to get a redbox movie for later that night. Spur of the moment thing since Tony’s been working all day while I make fun things. We rent Life at forty and buy 9V batteries at CVS since a smoke detector one died this week. I get great 20% of coupons with my cvs card and I contemplate buying razors.

Then we decide to walk over to the library since its next door. I get 1 vegetarian cookbook (that only looks so so), 1 workout video and 2 audiobooks on CD. Good haul.

3:45 pm – take silly photos & more bread photos. Yes that is a red paper mache rhino head. We finished it last week and are currently trying to decide how to mount it on the wooden board. Any ideas??? please!

4:00 pm – Tony starts dinner and cutting the bread. Normally we eat much later but today we go with it. We decide to not go by what’s on the menu and make grilled cheese on with soup. Its not raining so we can grill them outside on the grill. He makes the dinner while I clean up the rest of the kitchen and review my new cookbook. Again its not the best book but find a couple things that could be good to try one day.

The bread is the highlight of the day. Its soo good! Crusty outside, soft bubbly inside. This also was a half recipe! I still can't believe I made something this good. Baking bread has never been a particular strong suit for me. Until today.

5:00 pm – after the 3rd episode of Arrested Development of the day I clean up and do some blogging while playing a new game Geo Guessr (http://geoguessr.com/) and general online facebooking etc. I also grab a great video of Cornelius doing his tricks. He’s really coming along! His latest trick is high five.

8:00 pm – we go on a neighborhood walk. It’s pretty much dark out but we go anyway. We just casually walk the streets of our neighborhood and talk.

8:45 pm – we're back! I shower since its hot and humid out then its movie night. The movie was only so so but we had a little snack of raisin rosemary crisps with herb goat cheese so that made it good.

bed.

the end.

Grounded

2013-05-02T11:11:00.001-04:00

Our tomato plants are now in the ground for the season. In the words of one 16 and pregnant episode "there's no turning back now".

We had transplanted them from their seedling sprouting days about a month ago. Smallish individual pots worked with a bag of organic potting soil. They grew quick. Sprouted up like weeds, healthy weeds that you eat. Nettles anyone? Blegh.

read about me

We used the same plot of area as last year except we expanded. The area gets lots of morning/afternoon sun and it worked last time so why not. We're lucky to have a nice backyard free for us to use. The hose is nearby and its close to our back door. It took a while to clean it up though. Digging up some "grass" aka legit weeds that we mow for a sizable 12x12 (?) square.

They grew out of their pot sizes!

18 holes were dug and the plants plopped in. We tossed some more potting soil in each for good measure. 17 tomato plants plus one hole for 4 basil. #survivalofthefittest.

I'm happy to report that they are all alive 1 week later and we even have flowers (on the tomatoes, not the basil)!

today

Planking!

2013-04-28T16:36:00.001-04:00

Sunday dinner is typically one of our best dinners. I say it a lot but I’ll say it again – we eat good!

Quick side story real quick – last week I got a call Friday afternoon from a local radio station informing me that I had just won a contest. Wahoo. What’s with the personal call though? Oh because the prize was $500! I enter these things online all the time so I was thrilled to finally win something big! First stop that evening – dinner & shopping @ whole foods followed by Target. Ahhhh perfect.

We had dinner at the hot bar at Whole Foods of Indian (great), North Carolina style BBQ (good) & one chocolate/mint cupcake to split (terrible, we got our money back). Then a bit of grocery shopping with some live demo watching/snacking action. I almost spent the entire $500 on that vitamix there on the spot, that guy was very convincing.

We got a good haul (sadly not like the last one here) and picked up some salmon to grill (ps we bought a grill) as seen here…

The seafood guy recommend getting a cedar plank to grill on. He had some presoaked ones that promised to make taste extra great. We took it home and grilled it up Sunday.

We also got fiddlehead ferns at Whole Foods and thought it’d go well with this as a side dish. Basically they’re exactly what you think – all ferny. They’re woody, sorta like eating asparagus or crunchy like broccoli.

Trim the ends of each fern and soak the Fiddleheads in boiling water for about 5 minutes before sautéing them. We added some lemon juice, olive oil, butter, garlic and vegetable broth for flavor. Just be sure not to soak them for too long, or they’ll sprout into full-fledged ferns!! (j/k).

Served with cheesy grits and what a dinner!

Foods we've been eating lately

2013-04-10T10:59:00.001-04:00

Salad with fake chick'n, lentil soup, roasted sweet potatoes & onions, invented power salad with quinoa, homemade sweet potato gnocchi with pesto cream sauce, roasted brussel sprouts, brick chicken on the grill, reduced balsamic dressing, fresh $1 pineapple, mexican pizza, salmon, asparagus, homemade made up roasted red pepper sauce, cheesy grits, & chocolate chip cookies (for a work bake sale).

I say it almost every night when we sit down to eat and l'll say it again here. We eat good! It makes me grateful and happy!

Power salad

2013-04-10T10:27:00.001-04:00

Power salad is something we made up a few weeks ago. I named it such after eating Panera's power salad and bring inspired. I like ours better. The nuts/ seeds mix came from one of the trail mixes trader joes sells. If you can get itI highly recommend it.

Lots of fresh baby spinach
Nuts (pistachios)
Seeds
Craisins
Almonds
Cucumber diced
Quinoa - cooked in yummy broth
Diced red pepper
Valedia onion dressing - warmed

Combine and enjoy! I was only able to snap photos in a leftover lunch. Normally I'm not a 'salad for lunch' type of girl, but this was an exception. I ate it up.

Enjoy

Tomato Transplants

2013-04-01T20:52:00.001-04:00

Last we left the seedlings looked like this. Nothing. They looked like dirt. Literally. The seeds hadn’t sprouted. We planted mostly tomato seeds but some basil and cilantro too.

Now about a month later… we have real plants! They’re huge!

Since they got so big sitting in the window sill it was finally time this weekend to transplant them to bigger pots. I gathered up all the random pots and containers I could find. Turns out we actually had a lot. Random porch crap clean will yield some great finds. After a quick Kroger run we picked up some organic potting soil and I set to transplanting.

I set each tomato plant in its’ own pot with plenty of soil. I’m still working on the basil & cilantro. I ran out of pots and ideas.

We have 17 tomato plants! What a garden this will be. I stuck them all in the giant tub we have since its still too cold to keep them outside 24/7. The tub allows us to easily bring all 17 pots in each night and set out each morning. Luckily the weather lately has been true to Spring, making this prime growing weather. After the last frost has passed they can live outside a couple more weeks until they go in the ground.

This is today – about 3 days after transplant day. We’ve already got one weak one. 1 out of 17 isn’t so bad. Guess which one it was… He still has time to recover. I added more soil and a little water to perk this fallen one up. Cornelius is also concerned.

***Don't forget to enter the Sunday giveaway here!

Cat People

2013-03-31T21:40:00.001-04:00

**This giveaway is closed. Congrats to the winners!**

Welcome Cat fans! Today is your day (week – see dates below), you have made it to the right blog at the right time.
If you are not a cat person – see ya tomorrow. Although maybe you’ve got a girlfriend, wife, neighbor, mother in law or special someone who is cat crazy and would love for you to win them this. It’s extra forest scented and all natural. Semi Organic; like me.
I have a great giveaway for my readers. I personally use this cat litter and highly recommend it. If you’re new to World’s Best Cat Litter integrate it slowly; for the cats sake. See http://www.worldsbestcatlitter.com/ for more information.
In the theme of today see here for a hilarious cat facts prank to play on your cat people friends. Actually non cat people may get a bigger kick out of it!
note: this is not a prank, the people at World’s Best Cat Litter really are giving away free stuff. Best of luck!

PRIZE: 2 free 6lb bags of the new Forest Scented Clumping formula litter
# of WINNERS: FIVE!
TO ENTER: leave a comment below with your email (so I can find you lucky winners)
GIVEAWAY CLOSES: April 7th 2013 at 7pm EST
SEMI INTERESTING STUFF: One entry per email address please. Winners will be chosen by random.org. Entries must be in the US. Winners' name, address and phone number required to win (I'll collect that later). Cornelius squeaks "good luck" to you.

**This is a sponsored post but all thoughts and opinions are my own.**

Cherry Pineapple smoothie

2013-03-19T21:13:00.001-04:00

To make 3 medium smoothies

1 cup frozen pineapple chunks
1 cup frozen mixed berries – with cherries
1 cup vanilla greek yogurt
small handful of ice
1-2 cups of orange juice
1 handful of fresh baby spinach
small quirt cherry berry mio

Combine all ingredients in a blender until smoothie consistency. Add a straw and enjoy!

The mio gives this smoothie its color and last minute flavor, the spinach gives it its healthiness factor & the orange juice adds to the pineapple tanginess. Great breakfast! Hopefully you’ve got a better blender than me – I can barely blend ice and all 10 buttons do the exact same thing – which is almost nothing!

All Natural Cornelius cat

2013-03-18T09:00:00.000-04:00

Lets be real. Gross things in our house: the basement, cat litter, medical drawings of surgeries and more. Scratch that last one. Although those can be gross. Tony ahem.

No but really... we have an adorable cat who makes un- adorable cat litter messes that is housed in our super gross basement. If there is one thing I can do for both it's use the litter we do. Worlds best cat litter. http://www.worldsbestcatlitter.com/

The newest scent in the worlds best cat litter line is forest scented! When I heard that and my first thought was NARNIA! We love our pine, forest, natural scented stuff here - especially in winter. #WhenisSpring? In our minds they all get classified as ‘narnia’ since that's what it'd be like to go through the wardrobe in the book. I imagine. Now Cornelius can imagine as well when he does his business. Oh boy.

I love to use this cat litter in general since its natural for our baby (Cornelius) and the earth. It's a corn product rather than clay so it's gentle on his furry breathing and safe for everyone. Also it works better in my opinion than the regular stuff. I've used it for years and love it.

Note: this photo is a total exaggeration.

This cat litter will not produce rays of clovers and trees. This is really how gross the basement is however.

On a scale of 1 to 10 I'd give this new scent of the great product a 9.5 since the scent wasn't as strong as I thought it might be. Probably for the best since if I designed the product you'd smell it from a block away. And nobody wants that. I'll leave the hard work up to the worlds best cat litter guys and gals.

I asked the cat what his thoughts were on the new litter I'd given him. All I got was a death stare and a "oh you want me to do tricks?" Up trick. I'll infer that he likes it.

This new product has begun to ship to pet specialty stores (Independent pet stores plus Petco & PetSmart) and will be on shelves by April 1st.

**I was exclusively chosen to test and review this product but all opinions are my own.

Meals for the week – March 3rd

2013-03-03T16:20:00.001-05:00

I must not only find the recipe I have saved (somewhere) for the bell pepper peanut slaw… I must post it! A great slaw for anyone who has never really been into traditional slaw. ie. me!

A well planned out dinner menu each week = easy cooking each night. Not too stressful, not too bad for you. That’s what we do. Happy eating!

How to survive your spouse’s grad school

2013-02-28T10:00:00.000-05:00

Find something to do on Friday nights, Saturday mornings, weekday evenings & Sunday afternoons.

Not ALL of those study times will come in the same week. But if you and your partner used to ‘always have special day something activities’ prior to grad school - think again. Study groups, tests, projects, trip to the library/campus/lab etc will always take precedence of waffles afternoons or Friday happy hour.

Write a blog, meet up with friends, go to the gym, take up a hobby, if you are now poor go to the library, learn to coupon, single parents your kid(s) etc.
Make friends with your spouses grad school friends

Bake the class brownies, run carpool sometimes, and have them over for dinner. They’ll be your husband/wife’s friends, best to make them your friends too. If you’re lucky they’ll be about your age.
Make friends with your spouses grad school friends’ spouses.

Only they know what you’re going through. Hopefully there will be some who you can really relate to whether your a newlywed, parent to 2, or ‘I just relocated to this whattheheck city’. You guys can roll your eyes together when the grad school gang starts talking shop while out to dinner on non study Friday night.
Support them!

Grad school isn’t easy so be supportive! Increase your chore load around the house when they are busy cramming. Make dinner and enjoy eating together for an hour since it may be the best together time you get each night. Make sure they have laundered professional clothes to wear - since grad school won’t allow PJs and sweats in class like undergrad.
Budget

If you have not already be the new accountant of the family. While your partner in life slaves away over a textbook larger than a small child you may now be the one who is responsibly managing the fact that you may have just cut your income in half – or more. Hopefully you’ve prepared yourself for this new way of life with potentially less money.
Count down the days!

Your spouse’s grad school isn’t forever. Day dream what you’ll do with their first big paycheck. I mean… get ready to celebrate their achievements together after graduation! For us that means Hawaii!

---

When Tony started grad school in 2011 we had just moved to Richmond from North Carolina. I (the spouse) had no job, and we knew nobody. We knew nothing about the city or anything to do. We crossed our fingers, looked at our savings, applied for loans and hoped for the best with 2.3 years to make it through. Now in 2013 we know lots of great people, actually manage free time together a lot with even time to socialize. I have a great job and are in the less than 9 months home stretch to graduation. Tony is getting super grades and we aren’t broke. We now actually even have some income – and can budget to gear back up for paying off the loans! ;)

Best of luck!

Daal

2013-02-26T21:44:00.001-05:00

We made a very quick and easy recipe the other night. Vegetarian, vegan, delicious, easy on the budget, healthy… the works. We used this video (http://www.nytimes.com/video/2012/11/29/magazine/100000001927620/dal-tarka.html?ref=markbittman) but had to improvise since we couldn’t find a printed version of the recipe. We may have had to watch it twice going “is that a bowl of shredded coconut or white rice, I can’t tell”… it was rice.

1 cup red lentils
4 cups water
1 tsp turmeric
1/4 cup fresh grated ginger

2 tbsp coconut oil
1 small chopped onion
2 tbsp cumin
1/2 cup chopped tomatoes
small handful of chopped cilantro

1 medium diced cucumber
1 tbsp red wine vinegar

Serve with:
white rice
naan

Bring 4 cups of water with 1 tsp of turmeric to a boil in a large pot over high heat. Add 1 cup of red lentils. Stir only once. Do not over stir this while cooking. Cook on medium per package directions until soft. Ours took about 12 minutes. Grate in ginger.

Meanwhile add 2 tbsp of coconut oil to a pan. Add chopped onions over medium/high heat and simmer until tender and clear. Then add chopped tomatoes and cumin. You could add other ingredients or vegetables here (bell pepper, chick peas, green peas, chicken?) if you wanted. Cook until tender. Add chopped cilantro.

Dice cucumber and combine with red wine vinegar. This is sort of a little side salad. You could add something else to this cool part of the dish if you like.

Combine onion/tomato mixture with done lentils. Serve with rice, cilantro garnish and cucumber. Cucumber mixture can be eaten separately or all mixed in together!

You’ve made daal!

Good Haul

2013-02-18T21:47:00.001-05:00

I feel great whenever I make a great trip to Fresh to Frozen. Yep we still shop there. Today was a particularly good day since I left with what I describe as mostly healthy. For us I know we’re more likely to eat well if we stock our kitchen with wholesome food.

We got all this haul for $31!

organic tomato sauces x 3
cans of tomatoes x 3
spaghetti
organic mac & cheese x 2
organic strawberry cereal kashi bars
peanut butter crackers
organic stuffing
3 bell peppers
4 onions
pesto
1 qt blueberries
gum x 2
milano cookies – heck at $1.80 I couldn’t say no!
huge box of cheerios

Fresh to Frozen (aka grocery salvage) is very hit or miss however today was a hit! There were plenty of other great buys I passed up on like peaches, cucumbers, bread, tons of canned and frozen food. That place is all over the place. It’s too bad every city doesn’t have one.

I wouldn’t call this a normal full weeks shopping trip but since this week’s only shopping trip so far we’ll see how long we can make before another trip. We already had some things at home like fresh bananas, apples, potatoes, sweet potatoes, typical pantry items, as well as milk, bread, yogurt & salad. Menu coming soon!

meow meow sniff sniff

2013-02-18T09:00:00.000-05:00

It's no secret that we like to be a little natural, a little semi organic, a little health/earth friendly around here. While it's somewhat easy for Tony and I - we shop partly organically, pay attention to chemicals, cleaners, free range, free trade etc... what about Cornelius?

Our not so little cat Cornelius is a member of our family and we like to treat him as we would ourselves - somewhat naturally the best. Isn't your pet a family member?

Coming soon is a new product from World's Best Cat Litter - it's a new scent! If you've got a cat, and want the best for them, then they will love you (with kitty kisses) for buying them this. It's just like the already great world's best cat litter - but with a mystery (oh so great) scent.

**I was exclusively chosen to test and review this product but all opinions are my own.

Vegetable Patch 2013

2013-02-17T17:26:00.001-05:00

It’s that time of the year again. Gardening time. We’re ready to grow some plants!

We started with a basic indoor seed starter kit from Lowes. $5 for a mini greenhouse. It is still winter after all… but we want to get a head start on things. Something like this will work well for you. It does seem weird to me to grow/hydrate soil but since we are compost-less and this system has worked well for us in the past we went with it. I have actually tried other methods like recycling old egg cartons to grow seeds but never had better results than these pre made kits. I’m a sucker perhaps.

What are we growing this year? The two basic staples – tomatoes and basil. That’s it. We decided not to go fancy. We had all the seeds we needed saved from previous years so it was quick and easy to plant these in their new little hydrated homes. The basil is basic genovese but we’ve got quite a selection of heirloom tomatoes from the union square farmers market in NYC back in 2004. Some yellows, reds, minis, and beefsteaks. Hopefully they all sprout! Eaks.

I set them in our plant sunny windowsill to germinate and grow big. The greenhouse will keep them warm and cozy for a few weeks until they’re bigger and/or spring has come. #pleasecomesoon

This is our plant growing station by the back door and in the kitchen. It’s perfect for plants. Perfect. The custom ledge is built from the original hardwood floor of the house and on a pretty 45 degree angle. That rosemary plant is a few years old and still holding on strong. The tall snake plant was a valentines day gift for Tony and we’re still looking for a nicer pot for it. Our 36 (we were jipped one in the package #stronglywordedlettercomingtheirway) 35 little seed babies grow!

Overnight Oatmeal

2013-02-09T14:20:00.000-05:00

Today I've got a great one. It's overnight oatmeal. Otherwise known as summer porridge, cold oatmeal, fridge oatmeal... who knows what else. Yum is what I call it. Also secretly (or not so) it's healthy, and in our case often semi organic.

I must state that I did not make up this idea. Originally I got it from this blog (as did probably every other Pinterest user out there who's heard of this) but sorta changed it to my own. I enjoy making up my own flavors and mixing and matching ingredients. There are no wrong combinations.

The basic four ingredients:

Old Fashion oats
Milk - we use vanilla almond since that's what we drink in our house.
Greek yogurt - I like vanilla flavored
Chia seeds

One key tool

1/3 cup scoop

Other items needed:

small Tupperware or containers
flavor mix ins

My recipe for overnight oatmeal

1/3 cup oats
1/3 cup milk
1/3 cup greek yogurt
1 tsp chia seeds
lots or little mix ins (it's up to you!)

Mix all ingredients in a small container. Cover. Let sit in the fridge overnight. Next morning eat and enjoy! It may be eaten cold or warmed up. The oatmeal will stay for 2-4 days depending on your mix ins.

As you can see it's pretty simple. You just take a 1/3 cup and portion out everything, then mix it up. We use simple small Tupperware with lids that I like best rather than using mugs, cups or jars. I have been making 2 days worth at a time so Tony and I each get a couple days of oatmeal for breakfast. I'll even tell you that sometimes I cheat and don't use the measuring cup for the yogurt. How much of a pain is scooping, then un-scooping yogurt in a small cup? Not worth it! I eyeball it now that I've been doing it a lot.

Now on to the flavors.

There are endless combinations I think you could make successfully for overnight oatmeal. Our favorites so far has been berry/lemon. You get lemon curd (ours is from Trader Joes) and raspberry enlightenment (from Penzeyes Spices) and some blueberries. Here are some other options.

Fresh apples and applesauce are good. Brown sugar is great, I love raisins, bananas aren't bad if you eat them the first day. Fresh strawberries are amazing. Also I lied above when I said there are no wrong choices. At the time of this photo I hadn't tasted chocolate but was testing that since I found it on the original post. Never again. That's all I'll say.

I like mine heated up in the morning. I'll just zap it in the microwave for 30 seconds. It's a great start to your day! There you have it! Mix up your favorite flavors and have quick and easy overnight oatmeal.

Changes around the house

2013-02-09T13:05:00.002-05:00

1. We got an exercise bike. It lives in the living room. So we can watch House of Cards and work out at the same time. The arrangement is working out great.

you can tell I'm not actually working out since the machine isn't on

2. I updated that container you use to hold cooking utensils in your kitchen. We were previously using an old wine cooler thing that was free at a thrift store once when I bought a electric cork opener. Here's a tip - don't buy an electric product at a thrift store that doesn't have a charger. 4 years later and we're still using the old too tall/too thin container for our wooden spoons.

Enter winter. I got a new amaryllis lily from Target after Christmas sale last month. I noticed that my old one from 2009 has kinda sorta died. I dump the plant out and see that the ceramic cream colored container is perfect to live next to the stove and hold spatulas and such. One dishwasher load later and we have this...

Original 2009 plant. It bloomed despite being kept in a box with no soil, water or light, in a closet for 6 months.

MUCH better. Why did it take me 4 years to do this?

I'd also like to pat myself on the back since basically I have this although mine cost way less and I got a free plant with flowers for 3.5 years out of it too. Go Robin.

3. I got a real adult job!!!! Basically I got my own job. Heck I've been doing it for the last 10 months, but now I'll be paid like a real person. I'm moving from contractor to employee A new badge color coming my way. Years without company benefits and they now feel like I've won the lottery.

We're going to be rich! jk. We may be able to buy a couple more organic things each week at Martins but that money is going straight into VCU's CRNA program. Ah tuition. Only 9-ish months until that's done with (minus the years it'll take to pay off the loans). Guess we won't be rich after all.

RVA Sunrise

this is cheesy

2013-02-04T20:13:00.000-05:00

Today I've done a little guest post over at Culture: the word on cheese. They loved my DIY mozzarella post so much I've added it on today's blog. Head over and check it out: http://www.culturecheesemag.com/blog/curds-and-whey/30-minute-mozzarella.

Remember this? Yep we still make cheese sometimes... perhaps this week calls for another ball of 30minuteandyourdone goodness. Whey.

To read my original post see here.

Post Graduation Trip

2013-01-25T08:29:00.000-05:00

My dear, dear husband graduates from Nurse Anesthesia school this year. I'm already beginning to plan the celebration vacation we'll take!!! Wahoo!

With an odd graduation date of December 2013 (instead of the traditional spring date) it makes travel plans interesting. Should we take a trip before the holidays? Should it be before or after his board exams?

See Tony has to take his board exams to be a CRNA (that's the certified part!). Many students it seems take a month or two to study before sitting them after graduation. Some students seem to go straight to vacationing, then study in January.

Option 1 -

graduation (early December 2013)
vacation - 2nd week December
study for boards
Christmas (more travelling?)
more studying for boards? (for someone who needs a lot of study time)
take exam (Jan/Feb 2014)

Option 2 -

graduation (early December 2013)
study for boards (Tony doesn't think he needs much time #hesmysmartyhusbandbackoff).
Christmas (travelling?)
take exam
vacation early 2014

Option 3 -

graduation (early December 2013)
study for boards
take exam (may or may not be able to get Dec date)
vacation OVER Christmas (sorry family)

What vacations do people take in December/January? We'll probably want to spend the holidays with one of our families in VA or OH, but still want to fit in our vacation, and potentially other things like moving/relocating and starting a new job(s).

Tony thinks that if we take a vacation before his boards it'll detract from the fun. I think I would feel the same. We'll enjoy it more if we can both go free, with nothing hanging over our heads. Nobody wants to study while in Hawaii (except those who live there; lucky).

That brings us to... location?!
Our first thoughts - Caribbean to escape the winter cold... or maybe ski vacation.

Ski bunny Robin circa 1991; Chamonix, France (?)

Going somewhere international could be awesome sauce and something we've wanted to do for years. Yep we went to Puerto Rico for our honeymoon - does that count? We could also skip over to hawaii since that would be amazing in January (winter is for suckers). OR, in a winterisNOTforsuckers way, we could go skiing. OR something the middle (what would that be?). Oh the choices.

It doesn't help that we have no budget yet. With some 2013 income still up in the air we have no idea how much we should spend or what realm we should begin looking. Hopefully we'll know more the farther we get in the year, that way we can begin saving and planning.

Any recommendations?

Favorite Things

2013-01-20T11:09:00.001-05:00

I've put together some of the things we've been loving here at Our Semi Organic Life. Our favorite things!

1. Raspberry Enlightenment. This stuff is the best! It's sort of a jam that you can put on anything and mix with anything. We've done it on toast, mixed on salads, topped french toast, mixed with greek yogurt, put in oatmeal. You can also use it on meat, veggies and more! It's from Penzeys and we'll probably have to order it in bulk soon.

http://www.penzeys.com/cgi-bin/penzeys/p-penzeysraspberryenlightenment.html

2. Our Kitchen Aid hand blender. We're practically on soup week 3.0 here and one of my favorite types of soups is pureed soups. Thus the hand blender is necessary. We use it a. l. o. t.

3. Kiss my Face - olive oil soap. This bar is lasting forever. I love it in the shower since it's light, not drying like most soap, and it's organic. I had a coupon for something like $4 off so it was a great deal.

On a side topic - I found this site (http://www.vine.com/) and love it! How cool that they have all natural/organic brands all in one place. Love this. I am not paid to say this, I just love playing on the site. No orders yet since we're still not rich. #oneday

4. Chia seeds - we've been eating 'summer porridge' or overnight oatmeal from this blog: http://www.theyummylife.com/Refrigerator_Oatmeal. One thing I love about it is the addition of chia seeds. Makes it extra healthy.

5. My iPhone 5. I finally got one for Christmas. There was a sale at Best Buy for the 16 gb for $150 (down from $200), then they had to price match Walmart for $127. Then I sold my old iPhone 3GS for $40 here, which brought the final price of my phone to $87! Worth every (discounted) penny.

Ditalini Soup

2013-01-16T05:00:00.000-05:00

We've been on a soup kick at our house lately. It's winter and despite the warm weather here lately (65?!) I enjoy soups' comfort. While I never really ate soup as a child growing up (except for canned vegetarian vegetable occasionally) but I've been loving it lately! As usual we're into vegetarian soups, and if possible organic.

We made this soup from the recipe on the box. It was great. The key I'm finding in brothy soups is to - get this - use good broth. I sort of made my own in this case with vegan bullion cubes.

Ditalini Soup

1 onion, diced
2 cloves sliced garlic
olive oil for your pan
3 quarts of broth (you could even use more than this if you want)
3/4 cup of barley
1 cup ditalini pasta - or any small pasta shape
2-3 carrots, diced
1-2 celery stalks, diced
1 medium potato, peeled, diced
salt/pepper
1 tablespoon lemon juice (alternative apple cider vinegar or any acid)

optional toppings - Parmesan cheese, nutritional yeast

I petite diced all my veggies. It's important to try and make them all about the same size. It cooks more evenly and I think is easier to eat this way.

Cook garlic & onion for about 3 minutes in olive oil. Use a heavy pot or your favorite soup pot. Add the broth and barley and simmer with no lid for 30 minutes. Then add the veggies and salt/pepper to taste. Cook on medium/high for about 6 more minutes (2/3 of the traditional cooking time for whatever pasta shape you're using). Then turn off the heat and let sit on the stove (no lid) for 20 more minutes. The pasta will absorb some more liquid. Taste and add lemon juice and any more salt if needed.

It was fabulous. Starchy but fabulous. Eat with hearty bread.

Some alternatives I'll change for next time: add a handful or two of spinach in the last 6 minutes, some diced tomatoes, some diced zucchini perhaps. I'd like to even up all the veggies and downsize the barley for a little healthier dinner. I googled this and of course came up with tons of different variations. Ones with beans, tomato sauce, chicken, or sausage. Basically you're making minestrone. The possibilities are endless.

We gobbled it up and didn't take any photos. Imagine yummy soup here >

Blogger meet up - it's veggie time!

2013-01-14T09:15:00.001-05:00

Last week we had another Virginia is for Bloggers meet up, and what better way than to do it around food (again!)?! We went to Kitchen Thyme and got to get a wonderful food demo by Chef Tammy. She made us some wonderful vegetarian food that I loved. Great to meet bloggers I follow online and new girls too!

I even picked up some cooking tips such as: counterbalancing lemon (or acid) with salt and vise versus. You can put a moist paper towel over an open avocados to keep it fresh. I learned that anytime you're using low fat or light products (ie sour cream, milk, cheese etc) you re getting more water content than the full fat. Good to know.

We ate kale chips - which were waaayyyy better than when I made them at home. Hint: you don't have to make them all 'chip' like. Eating them soft with a bit of crunch is still good. Also add Parmesan. Yum!

I got my first taste of ABC juice - apple, beet, carrot. It wasn't bad. I got used to it after half a cup. I could totally see drinking this regularly. Chef Tammy's hint: don't peel anything, use all the skins. Obviously you'll need a juice, probably the one gadget our kitchen doesn't have.

We had this recipe - http://www.relayfoods.com/Recipes/CHO/4KLK4/YB7QM/carrot-pineapple-muffins. Delish! The fresh pineapple was perfect!

Other recipes we tried and I loved (heck I loved it all!) were:

Thanks to Relay Foods for sponsoring the event and providing all the food. The folks there are great!!

yummm... these mustard greens have butter and heavy cream. No wonder they're good!

Thanks to everyone who came out. I had a great time meeting everyone and watching Chef Tammy.

Meals for the Week - January 6th

2013-01-06T13:20:00.000-05:00

Welcome Our Semi Organic Life back to the blog world! It's 2013 and I'm ready to blog more. Sorry for that long pause over the holidays. We're finally back to the normal schedule of full weeks of school and work. That means meal planning 7 days a week. Here's what's on the agenda. All vegetarian.

We bought a work out bike and can't wait to get skinnies again!

#putabirdonit

Christmas wish list 2012

2012-12-21T08:57:00.000-05:00

I've selfishly put together a Christmas wish list. You can think of it as one of those 'gift ideas' lists... but it's not. It's a Robin list. Sure maybe one of your loved ones has similar taste and you get a great idea for a last minute (4 days people!) gift, but these ideas are all mine. Think of it as a semi organic gift ideas list (that just happened to be Robin approved).

Most of these are links to amazon but for sure not the best prices or anything. They're just links so you can see what they are. Not sure what size scooper is best, or what's the safest electric blanket out there is. Also I'm usually on top of all things chap-stick - but where have these 100% naturals ones been?! The essential oils I want need to be narnia themed - as in pine/forest/winter esk. For winter themed kitchen spray and a holiday smelling house.

Yes I finally broke down and got an iPhone 5 so that adapter may come in handy. So far the battery has been doing great but it can't hurt right? I got it for an amazing deal of $127 at Best Buy, so I was thrilled (even if that blog ad money may never come)!

I've had this tiny heart necklace on my etsy wish list for forever. I love all the tiny things in this shop. Yes I know if I'm going to buy scentsy I should buy local, or from the thousands of scentsy bloggers out there. This is just a link. The digital timer is for a. the Christmas tree lights, and b. for our crock pot which is old school and doesn't have one built in. I had one of those timers with the pins you pull in/out, but it doesn't work right. Our Christmas lights were essentially on 30 minute blinking blocks. #notcheery The Amato's need their homemade soup, and they want it when it's convenient for us. #whatshowisthatfrom?

One of my favorite book themes is 'memior' so this book is on my list. Hope it's good. As usual I'm looking for book recommendations for 2013. Remember this?

Hope everyone has a great Christmas! Hope you can celebrate with family, friends and loved ones. Be happy and safe.

*These links may contain affiliates

Books I've read 2012

2012-12-15T07:00:00.000-05:00

Hello 2013! Hello forty three books that I've read this year! 43?! I've been a busy Robin. Back in my mid year recap I'd only read 22. If anything I'm consistent. Almost all of these consist of library books, both physical and audio books on CD & digital download. I like them digital and I like them free.

2012 Books I've Read

Holidays on Ice - David Sedaris
Vanishing Acts - Jodi Picoult
I know this much is true - Wally Lamb
The Jane Austen Book Club - Karen Joy Fowler
Dreams of Joy - Lisa See
A Gate at the Stairs - by Lorrie Moore
The Buddha in the Attic - By Julie Otsuka
Bringing up Bébé - Pamela Druckerman
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night - Time Mark Haddon
A million little pieces - James Frey
Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) - Mindy Kaling
The Middle Place - Kelly Corrigan
Two Kisses for Maddy - Matt Logelin
The Immortal life of Henrietta Lacks - Rebecca Skloot
The House I loved - Tatiana de Rosnay
The Tipping Point - Malcolm Gladwell
The Glass Castle - Jeannette Walls
Extra Virginity: The Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil - Tom Mueller
French Kids eat everything - Karen LeBillion
Cutting for Stone - Abraham Verghese
Seriously I’m Kidding - Ellen Degeneres
The Butterfly’s Daughter - mary alice monroe
Bloom - Kelle Hampton
Whitethorn Woods - Maeve Binchy
French Women for all Seasons - Mireille Guiliano
The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb: A novel - Melanie Benjamin
Heart and Soul - Maeve Binchy
Faith - Jennifer Haigh
Carry On, Jeeves - P.G. Wodehouse/Martin Jarvis
Let's pretend this never happened - Jenny Lawson
The shoemaker's wife - adriana trigiani
A Wrinkle in Time - Madeleine L'Engle
Gone Girl - Gillian Flynn
Just my Type - Simon Garfield
The King's Speech - Mark Logue & Peter Conradi
Young House Love - Sherry & John Petersik
Packing for mars - Mary roach
Hitler - A. M. Wilson
Where we belong - Emily Giffin
Objects of our affections - jill smolinski
The New kids - Brooke hauser
Wildwood - Colin Meloy
The Casual Vacancy - J.K. Rowling

My top favorites

Least favorites :/

Packing for mars
Extra Virginity: The Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil
A Gate at the Stairs

Funniest

Holidays on Ice
Seriously I’m Kidding
Let's pretend this never happened
Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns)

Most Depressing

Two Kisses for Maddy
A million little pieces
Hitler
The House I loved

Kids Books

A Wrinkle in Time
Wildwood

Also I should add that I read the book Lift by Kelly Corrigan about 5 times this year. I just listen to it over and over in the car when I have no current book and there's nothing on the radio. It's very short, and this is not an exaggeration.

To see my 2011 books check this out.

I have more books that are coming up next that I can't wait to read! Any recommendations?!