Pledge to go Veg!

http://getactive.peta.org/campaign/7day_veg_pledge?c=weekly_enews

I am not a vegetarian - let me say that up front. I like meat, chicken, fish, eggs, milk, cheese, all of it. But I do believe that the meat, dairy, and other animal farming industries are not held accountable and are in need of a major overhaul. As one of the biggest industries in America is its also one of the most unregulated and unmonitored. My hope is that with all of this "going green" craze, people will also push for humane animal farming. So I like to read up on this issue through different sources, one of which is PETA. They are no doubt quite radical in their approach to instigating changes - and I may not always agree with their approach, but I believe in their intentions, and I believe in their undeniable results. So with that said, I invite you to click on this link to read about a current campaign. The 7 day pledge simply means that you pledge to go vegetarian for 7 days. If every household went vegetarian for one meal a week the impact would cause an immediate shift in the animal farming industry, our environment, and in your own personal health. If you need recipes check out my link for vegetarian recipes at Go Veg

And if you need 30 more reasons, watch this

Saluting Animal Moms on Mothers Day

According to writer Anne Morrow Lindbergh, the trials of motherhood make moms the great vacationless class. Although she may have been talking about the human variety—the moms who are near and dear to us—other animals show the same tireless dedication to their children. PETA hopes that this Mother's Day, while you are praising your family's matriarch, you'll also remember that some of the best moms in the world are found in the animal kingdom

Northern Fur Seals:
Fresh from foraging for food, moms have to find their young quickly in a sea of hundreds—or possibly thousands—of seals, so both mother and pup depend on their uncanny powers of vocal recognition to find one another. Both will call out and answer, responding selectively to one another until they are reunited.

Elephants:
The TLC that these mammoth mothers bestow on their babies is among their most engaging qualities. Always ready to give an affectionate caress, a gentle nudge in the right direction, or a cool bath to help their babies beat the heat, doting moms maintain constant touch with their young ones, never allowing them to stray too far from their side. Mothers even stay in touch with their adult kids and enjoy close relationships with their daughters that can last up to 50 years.

Cows:
For cows and their calves, it's love at first sight. The first minutes after birth are spent developing a bond that will last a lifetime. Throughout life, mother and child maintain social contact and regularly enjoy each other's companionship. Their attachment and affection for each other is so deep that if they are forced apart, they both suffer severe stress. Moms have been known to escape their enclosures and travel for miles looking for their calves.

Dolphins:
Dolphins are known for graceful synchronized swimming, but dolphin mothers and their babies also synchronize their breathing for the first few weeks following the babies' birth. These dedicated moms may nurse their young for up to 10 years and will also mentor less experienced females by allowing them to babysit as practice for when they have babies of their own.

Cheetahs:
Let's hear it for single moms! These lightning-fast felines have their paws full caring for their cubs all on their own. Not only does mom protect her children from predators while she is nursing them, she also hunts for them from the time they are weaned until they are 14 to 18 months old. Overly active offspring can make the task of hunting even harder: Cubs often scare hunted animals away with their animated antics, leaving mom so worn out that she sometimes falls asleep in the middle of a hunt.

Chickens:
Nurturing begins in the nest for these caring moms. Mother hens will turn their eggs as many as five times an hour and cluck softly to their unborn chicks, who chirp back to her and to one another from within their shells! Once chicks hatch, devoted moms use their wings to shield their babies from predators and have been known to refuse to leave their nests during a fire if they have newly hatched peeps.

This Mother's Day, please take a moment to recognize the unique bond between mothers and children of all species. For tips on practicing kindness and compassion in honor of all animal moms, please visit PETA.org.

Visit the source

13, I mean 2, childhood memories.

13 Childhood Memories

I couldn't make it to 13 so here's 2! :-) Maybe I'll add to the list as I go along.

1. BBQ and lots of it Dad was in a different cookoff every weekend. As much as we might have complained about being lugged around, sleeping in campers, and permanently smelling like mesquite smoke, as kids we really did love it. My mom might say differently, but I think just as much of her that hated it loved it. She too would compete in the fajita or beans cookoff and placed several times. Man, Dad makes some damn good bbq. It'd be one thing if he wasn't winning, but he was a constant threat to the other wannabe's. The name of his team was "Whodathunkit BBQ". Clever, who woulda ever thunk that they could make such awesome grub. Other than food there was all sorts of festivities - for example, the ugliest feet contest, the male hula contest, and the white water raft race (sans the white water) where Dad was trampled and a chunk of his nose was gouged out. I'm sure we whined a lot about these weekends, but it was definitely a fond memory, and an early education on how to have a rockin good time after 30.

2. Mom singing in the car Nowadays you’d never catch my mom singing in the car – its rare if the radio is even on, or if it is on it’s the jazz station or talk radio. But I have a vivid memory from my childhood of my mom singing in our little 79’ Honda civic hatchback. It was probably a warm Saturday afternoon, running errands around town. The radio was always on a country station - songs that nowadays are considered “country classics”. I like to recall these fond memories when we go to karaoke. Usually if the crowd is younger in age on that particular evening, they’ll just kind of nod along, clueless to what they’re hearing. But I love singing these songs on the nights when I'm feeling a little homesick.

KooKoo for Karaoke

As you may or may not know, we’ve recently become obsessed with Karaoke. One mans cheese is another mans cheeseburger. Now before you laugh, there are a lot of reasons why we love this so much. First, it was something we both got to be new at. When you date later in life your interests are pretty much full grown, so if they’re not the same it makes it hard to plan something you’ll both enjoy, rather than one conceding to the other just because you love him/her. Walker is great about being up for new things and scenes, so when I mentioned karaoke, he was hesitant but willing. Actually I’d been popping in on my own while he was working nightside and I think his curiosity finally got to him – either way, he was game. And voila! Our love for karaoke was born. There is another reason we love it so much – because people intrigue us. Both analytical by nature, we love to see the way karaoke blossoms peoples personalities. If you’ve experienced karaoke w/us before, you know the myriad of folks that come to our little haunt. You got old people and young people, great looking people, and mousy looking people, hip and not so hip – but karaoke is a place where everyone is accepted and everyone encourages each other to be brave and try that new song, even if you can only hit two of the notes. It’s not always pleasant to listen to; but it is so pleasant to see the way people come out of their otherwise squeamish shells, and take a jab at being outgoing. For a city where so many are away from home it’s a great stand-in family, and one that we look forward to seeing each week.

Wedding love and madness!

I’ve gone and let myself get obsessed with planning this wedding. I’d vowed I would never be one of “those brides” – obsessing over every little detail. Yet here I sit with giant bags under my eyes because I was burning the midnight oil on things like Chinese lanterns, shoes, parking options, and favors. When talk about getting married began it was, “lets have some beer, some music, some grub, and a warm day and we’re good to go”. The idea was to have those nearest to our hearts and to have a relaxing and fun time. We wanted so badly for it to be that simple. But there’s so much more to it than just throwing a good party, there’s so much more to us and to what this wedding represents to us – we certainly didn’t expect to feel this way. A funny thing happened after our engagement…people say as your relationship grows your love changes, and I guess this was one of those changes. I’ve always known Walker was the one for me, but now it’s so very real to look at him as my husband and me as his wife. That’s something that I never thought would mean so much to me. *ew feelings, ew* ;-) All of this solidified to us that this day should be just as sweet and playful and unique as our relationship is.

As convenient as it might be to just go with a packaged wedding, there are many reasons this would never work for me or for Walker. Outside of the fact that we want something more personal than that, we are both card-carrying control freaks. It makes it hard to buy into somebody else’s vision for our wedding, to not be able to say that special touch was our idea as a gift to you. Not that we haven’t seen a few great ideas along the way. But it’s very important to both of us to have an active role in the way the day and evening come together, no matter how exhausting it might be. We’re trying to harness our perfectionist tendencies so that no one gets carried away; of course we’re doing a lousy job. When it’s all said and done though, the satisfaction from feeling like we created a truly personal and memorable evening, and that we didn’t settle for convenience, is worth sacrificing a little sleep. We can only hope that our vision is brought to life on that very special day.

So this weekend I was flying solo in the planning department. I looked at three venues and I think we decided on one. I tried on the dress I had in mind and it was a winner. I was able to see the bridesmaid dress and it was a winner too. Picked out shoes for all the girls to select from. Narrowed in on a caterer and bakery. And finalized on theme and decor, ceremony setting, colors, etc... Here are a few shots from what we've agreed on so far.

Thursday Thirteen #1

Thirteen Things about Casey, featuring the letter T
1. Talk to my cats like people
2. Trying to be more thoughtful
3. Terrible driver
4.Tomato lover
5. Teeth conscious
6. Trying to plan a wedding
7. TOO SHORT!
8. Tasty cook
9. Terrified of tight spaces
10. Taco Bueno - I miss it
11. Tired tonight
12. Thinking about Friday night plans
13. Thick skinned

Menu Planning Monday - budget stretchers

chicken tacos - HEB combo loco (30 min meal) ($5)
buy ground chicken at $2.50 lb, get taco shells and salsa free (and cheese too). One of our new grocery faves is lettuce shreds. Yes, we know we can just thin slice iceberg lettuce and get more out of our purchase, but we really think theres something to the shreds. They actually have flavor whereas iceberg is usually very bland if not bitter. I'm not big on ground chicken - I find it dry, but Walker really wanted to try this cut out. I'm happy to see him getting more involved with meal planning. Served with FF veg. refritos topped with a little FF sour cream, salsa, and cheese melted on top

Hot doggies - HEB combo loco (30 min meal) ($8 w/leftovers)
Buy the all beef lite franks @ $2/ea, get 2% Kraft ched free which will be for taco night too! Buns on sale for a buck. Having these w/lowfat hotdog chili, sliced fresh strawberries/bananas, holy trinity salad. Our quest for more side options goes on, but we managed to start eating carrots by getting creative.

Grilled chicken and veggies salad - BOGO deal (30 min meal) ($6)
Still had a pack of the chicken tenders left from my Kroger BOGO deal. George foreman and a little BW3 grilling sauce, and voila - man food that he'll never know is good for him. Kroger had all colored bell peps on sale for a buck each, a steal in my eyes. He has also approved zuchinni as a veg for his limited farm fresh palette, so I'll grill those up too and throw on my cheap bag salad, topped with homemade citrus vineagrette.

Grilled italian seasoned chicken breasts over spag and veggie marinara (30 min meal) ($6.50 w/leftovers)
Premarinated chicken on sale at HEB, $3.50 for 1.5lb. Had the pasta and veggie marinara in freezer, along with 3/4 of garlic bread loaf. Ceasar lite kit on sale for $3 - we love this so had to have.

Slow cooker - pork tenderloin and potatoes (Crock Pot during the day, 30 mins to finish) ($5)
Tenderloin on sale for $2.77 lb!! wow!! This was so easy! 1 pork loin, 4 russet potatoes, water to cover, and one package onion soup mix. The pork was so tender, more like pulled pork. I removed the potatoes and smashed with a little baked potato fillings - these were the real winner. Also thickened the aujus into a gravy right in the CP and poured over the pulled pork. Served with steamed broc on sale at Kroger for buck a bunch.

Hamburger Helper - makes a great meal apparently... (def. 30 min meal) ($5)
90% lean on sale in value packs - $2.99 lb. Bought a 2 lb. pack and split for two HH nights. Walker had picked up a double box of the "dinner in a pinch" so I figured he could make that a couple nights. Mix in some corn, broccoli, whatever. Serve with extra salad.