My Squirrel Friends

In our backyard, we have tons of little creatures that like to visit and take some nuts from our trees. Well, my dogs have never seen a squirrel before! You'd think there would be plentiful in Germany, but really we don't get a lot of animals in our yard like we do here. Needless to say, Meesha and Sammy have their own personal TV in front of the window.

I've noticed some old crackers and almonds in our cabinets lately, so one day I decided to feed the squirrels =D. They seemed to enjoy the free and easy to get food for the day, and my dogs sure enjoyed watching them!

"Cheesecake"

I haven't had much to blog about lately. My life is kinda boring. Hopefully something fun will come up to blog about soon, haha! But for now, here is something amazing to drool over: an amazing, delicious, mouth-watering piece of vegan cheesecake. I bought a slice from Whole Foods a while back and it was orgasmic. Very filling too. Now stare and drool, then go google a recipe to make your own cause that's definitely what I did!

Farmer's Market

I lied. I didn't go to Veggie Fest this year =( I'm really bummed about it, but things came up and I just didn't want to go alone. I WILL go to Veggie Fest one year. I heard it was awesome... booo Carla for not going =(


But I did do something fun this weekend. Me and my mom went to the local Farmer's Market on Friday. It was my first experience shopping there and it was awesome. When we first got there, we saw a bunch of tents with TONS of fruits and veggies just waiting for us to buy. We definitely bought a whole weeks worth of produce. Our fridge is beyond full of yumminess. They even had a variety of nuts that we just had to try and we went home with a lot of flavored pecans. MMMMMMMMMMMMM

I've been lazy.

There is no excuse...I have been lazy. It's been a while, I know! Since I last blogged, a lot has happened but I have just not been in the blogging mood. I have grown out of my funk.

My sister's wedding was on the 31st of July and we all had an amazing time. The wedding was gorgeous, the bride was gorgeous, us bride's maids were gorgeous, and it was totally awesome seeing all of our friends and family in one building dancing the night away, not to mention drinking....a lot....


After the wedding, I have just been lounging around. The weather here in Illinois has been awesome, but the mosquitos here have been HORRIBLE! I wanted to sit outside yesterday and let Meesha and Sammy play while I read a book, but I got attacked by 500 mosquitos the second I sat down. Needless to say every part of my body itches. It sucks being inside because you are afraid to go outside and deal with the blood suckers!

I am so ready for autumn. It is definitely my favorite time of year. The leaves fall, pretty colors everywhere, hoodie weather, the anticipation of Christmas, woo can't wait!

Yesterday, my mom came home late from work and nobody really planned dinner. I told my mom that her and my father are more than welcome to eat my meat-substitutes in the freezer and we can all have a cruelty free dinner =) And that is exactly what we did!


My dad turned on the grill, we added 2 veggie burgers (one for me, one for dad) and one Gardein chik'n scallopi (mom wanted a "chicken" sandwhich). We grilled up the "meat", served it with Ezekiel hamburger buns, ketchup, mustard, onions, and lettuce and away we ate. Dad said he didn't even notice the difference. I am so happy my meat eating stubborn father enjoyed a veggie burger. WOOO HOOO!


Awesome news here in Illinois, Veggie Fest is tomorrow! Me and Mom are going and I am so excited. Admission is free, there are going to be tons of guest speakers, live music, vendors, yummy food, ect ect!! I CANNOT WAIT. I will definitely let everyone know how my first Veggie Fest went =)

Life At Home Lately

It's been so awesome just spending time with my mom. I haven't seen her in so long and I almost feel like we are becoming almost like best friends. It's funny when you move out and have to deal with maintaining a household and being far away from your parents how much you learn to appreciate them.


On Sunday my dad is coming back from Poland! So I get to hang out with both my parents soon. Plus my sister is getting married in about 10 days so I will soon see my entire family all together! Woo hoo!

I discovered Meesha loves the hose! I was watering something down in the backyard and Meesha all of a sudden lit up. We have a hose in Germany but I admit I have never used it. Never really needed to...



So after seeing how excited Meesha got, I ran the hose for a bit and let her chase the water, bite it, try to eat it...haha! She is a goofball! Spunky the corgi already loves the hose. Sammy would prefer to sit this one out and just look cute.



Exciting news on the food frontier, my mother and I managed to make a healthy version of pierogis! As I've mentioned before, my family is Polish and pierogi are very popular in this house, especially around the holidays! My mom usually stuffs them with potatoes, cheese, meat, sauerkraut, ect ect. There are a lot of options for pierogi. Growing up, my favorite pierogi were the ones stuffed with potatoes, onions, and cheese. Obviously I don't eat cheese anymore, so we tried something new!


First, I try not to eat white flour anymore at all, so for the dough we used whole wheat flour. It's the best we could do for now and it's better than white that's for sure!



Whole wheat potato, "cheese", onions, and garlic.
Then for the stuffing, we still used potatoes and onions, but this time we added some garlic for flavor and I bought some vegan cream cheese at Whole Foods! Adding that gave it just the right kind of flavor. Obviously not the same as before, but I can totally eat these every holiday!

Farm Rescue

I'm pretty sure all active facebook users have heard of the game/application on facebook called Farmville. It seems pretty popular among all of my friends. I won't lie, I used to play Farmville myself. I got pretty bored of it though, then deleted the application.

Well recently I read an article about a new application called Farm Rescue. In this application, you rescue virtual hens that have been abused in battery cages all their lives and nurse them back to health. This also helps spread the word about what really happens in the egg-laying industry.


My growing little rescue farm.
I decided to give this game a try. I can't say I'm addicted to this game, but it's pretty fun. I so far have adopted out 7 healthy hens and am currently working on nursing 2 hens back to health. I can also say I have learned a lot already from this game. I knew a lot about this industry already, but this game has an option to earn more money by answering multiple choice questions about hens and the industry. Here are some of the questions I have answered...

Q. How long may domestic hens take to find an appropriate site to lay an egg?
A. 2 hours!

Q. True or False? Mother hens will gently cluck to their chicks while they are still inside their eggs, and the chicks will peep back.
A. True!

Q. Undercover investigations of United Egg Producers-certified facilities have revealed what?
- decomposing hens in cages
- sick and injured hens
- living/dead hens stuck between cage wires
- all of the above
A. All of the above.

Q. Only female chickens lay eggs. What happens to male chicks of egg-laying breeds?
A. They are killed.

Q. What percentage of eggs produced in the U.S. come from battery hens?
A. 95%

Q. How many hens are typically confined in one battery cage?
A. Five to eight hens may be confined into a single battery cage for their entire 12-18 month lives.

Can you believe some of these answers??? Some make me want to throw up, others make me smile. I love learning about hens and their way of living. These poor battery caged hens... =(

Also in the game, to nurse your hen back to health, you have to click on a few options to help them out. These include: feed, drink, nest, perch, explore, exercise, and dustbathe. After the hen has done this for the first time...a little paragraph pops up saying this:

Congratulations! You hen has EXPLORED outside for the first time! Chickens are inquisitive, curious, and intelligent animals who would spend more than 50% of their time scratching, foraging, and exploring their surroundings. Chickens in battery cages act out their strong urge to explore by pecking at each other, causing wounds and feather loss.

Congratulations! Your hen has stretched her wings and walked on real dirt for the first time! Like all animals, chickens need exercise to stay healthy, and being stuck in a tiny place unable to move is painful and causes health problems like osteoporosis.

Congratulations! You have helped your hen DUSTBATHE for the first time! Chickens need to dustbathe in order to keep their skin and feathers healthy. When your hen was in a battery cage, she tried to dustbathe on the wire floor, because that's all she had, but it didn't help.

Congratulations! You have helped your hen NEST for the first time! Hens have a strong urge to lay eggs in private. It is so strong that they will go without food to find a secret nesting place. This was impossible for your hen and her 6 cage mates when she lived in a battery cage.

Congratulations! You have helped your hen PERCH for the first time! Modern egg-laying hens are descended from the Red Jungle Fowl, who sleep perched in trees at night. Your hen couldn't perch during her 18 months in a battery cage, she had to stand on wire the entire time.

All in all, the game is entertaining and it's fun knowing I am virtually helping hens. I may not play this game for long since I'm not a fan of facebook games, but it really is a good game to spread the word about battery caged hens. Maybe invite some of your friends today ;)

Our Home Made Pizza!

Last night was a lot of fun. After Mom came home from work, we decided to make home made pizza so we could try out the Daiya cheese I bought at Whole Foods. We bought some pizza crust mix from Whole Foods as well. The company that makes it is called Namaste Foods, plus the pizza crust mix is also gluten free. The ingredients looked great. They included Brown rice flour, arrowroot flour, tapioca flour, xanthan gum, Italian seasoning, cream of tartar, baking soda, salt and ascorbic acid. Probably not the best we could buy, but I think it's pretty good.


We baked the pizza crust in the oven. While it was baking, we grilled up a bunch of yummy veggies marinated in balsamic vinegar. Those veggies included zucchini, red onions, garlic, black olives, and red bell pepper. We bought those all of those from Whole Foods the previous day =)

The pizza turned out amazing! After the crust baked, we added some tomato sauce, the veggies, and topped with the Daiya cheese. Then, we baked it for another 10 mins and tadaaaa. All ready to eat!


So about the Daiya cheese, I can say that it is okay. Truly, I feel like I can live my life just fine without it. It's obviously not real cheese so it doesn't taste like real cheese. It has a good consistency and the flavor is okay. I do think it's a bit too salty, but all in all it was just okay. I don't think I will ever crave that cheese and I will maybe buy it again one day, but like I said, I can live just fine without it. I did eat the leftovers we had from last night for lunch today though. Next on our menu for this weekend will hopefully be something with quinoa so my mom can experience this little grain.