Road Trip: New Mexico

After exploring the Petrified Forest in Arizona we crossed the border into New Mexico! Talk about beautiful landscape. Once we were in the Native American territories I was completely in awe. What a beautiful place!

We had originally planned to turn around after this stop which you will hear more about later. We planned our trip so that we would be in Albuquerque for Dan's birthday.

We were excited because we were going to stay with a very close family friend, Dan. Since we first found ourselves in Arizona, he insisted that we needed to come to New Mexico to visit him.

Portlandia! The land named after Portland ...Maine.

Find me on Etsy - "St. Helen"

The husband and I took a trip up to the land of PDX. A wondrous place, filled with vegan food, beer, football love, and trees.

Sounds like heaven, right? Right.

Our adventure began with a long, yet absolutely beautiful drive up to Portland from home in the east bay. With some awesome clouds and good conversation, we enjoyed our journey north. One that we hadn't taken in almost ten years.

It turned out that our hotel was across the street from a brewery. Cha-ching, one point to Portland.

We had dinner with local family and got some great tips on what to do for our adventure day.

Denver - A Beer & Brick Adventure!

"Denver" - Find me on Etsy

A while back we planned a trip to Denver to check out the city, along with Boulder. When Dan lost his job we decided to still go on our trip, even though it was in the middle of our move. We had already bought the tickets, booked our stay with Airbnb, and were very excited to go. We ended up having great timing!

Our adventure began with changing our flight out three times. First to book it, then to change the time since we didn't have to worry about Dan's schedule, then to fly out of Phoenix since we were going to be at Grandma's house.

Joshua Tree

Before the government shutdown (luckily) we went to Joshua Tree for the first time. We went with another couple, Dorian an Elizabeth, and their adorable dog, Rocco. It was a great trip and easy planning. She is a vegan and he's vegetarian, so it was fun to come up with food ideas instead of frustrating. Yay for vegans!

The Beauty of Hemp Milk

You might be surprised with the variety of milks available. Soy, almond, coconut, rice, oat, hemp. etc. Each type of non-dairy milk is known for having different properties. Out of all the different varieties of milk, hemp is the most nutritious, and most delicious too. Yet, most people don’t even know that hemp seeds can easily be made into milk.

What is amazing about hemp milk is it is packed full of nutrients. It is one of the most healthful milks one can consume, with the highest good fat (monounsaturated and polyunsaturated) and protein content per serving. It is packed with magnesium, phytosterols, ascorbic acid, beta-carotene, calcium, fiber, iron, potassium, phosphorus, riboflavn, niacin, and thiamin.

It is also one of the best sources of omega-3 and omega-6 in the proper ratio. Alone, hemp contains all 9 essential amino acids, along with all 21 known proteins, making it one of the best sources of complete proteins for vegans and non-vegans alike. It is also great for those with gluten intolerance.

Why make your own?

Muir Woods and An Unexpected Treat

I recently visited my parents for my mom's birthday. We had originally planned to go camping in the RV, but dad's work was keeping him stuck in town. So, we figured we'd stay local, which was fine with me. I was just happy to be in the Bay Area. Like I said in a previous blog, my trip up was a surprise.

We decided to go to Muir Woods which is just north of San Francisco. Dan and I had gone hiking there before we moved to Los Angeles, but I hadn't been since and a trip to the redwoods was just what I needed. We drove through San Francisco and over the Golden Gate Bridge, it was a lovely day and only foggy when we crossed part of the bridge, a little bit of everything. :]

A Nice Surprise

I couldn't sleep I was so excited. I knew that in the morning two very exciting things were happening, the DOMA decision was going to be announced and I was getting on a plane for the bay area. DOMA was potentially a frightening thing (yay for SCOTUS!), but my plane ride was going to be anything but.

It was a surprise.

Farm Sanctuary

So, I'm very excited about this post (it will be long!). I've been wanting to go to the Farm Sanctuary for quite a while and it just has never seemed to pan out. We had decided to try and go on the weekend after the Worldfest, but while we were there we heard Gene Baur speak. He's the co-founder and president of Farm Sanctuary. After his piece on veganism he mentioned that "Hug a Farm Animal" was coming up in their schedule of events. We decided to go right then and there. :) That meant that instead of going the following weekend like we planned, we waited an extra week to go. Torture!

Worldfest

When Dan and I went to the Vegan Beer and Food Festival, we came across a flier for another veg friendly event, called Worldfest. Based on the flier, I was not completely sure if it was going to be a festival geared toward everyone, vegetarians, or vegan specific. Either way, I wanted to go because it looked like another fun event with vegan vendors, and of course, beer.

We were pleasantly surprised to find that it was indeed an all vegan event and wandered around to see what was there. I was excited (and Dan nervous) that there were pet adoptions from a variety of different places. Of course we went and talked to the cats for a while, it is me after all. And of course we both fell in love with all of them. I was also surprised to find that they had two specific dog adoption groups for the types of dogs I would want once we finally have a permanent yard, Beagle and German Shepard. I really would love to get one or the other, but I refuse to purchase an animal when there are so many in need and in danger of euthanasia. Here is a list of all the vendors from the event, I only wish I could talk about all of them.

Eating Out, Vegan Style

Is it hard? No. I mean, it can be, but it doesn't have to be. You just can't be lazy. >_<

This is one of those things where you may tend to shy away from eating out with friends or going to a hole in the wall joint. I know, I've been there. It can be frustrating when you want to go to a veg restaurant and your non-veghead friends say they don't like/eat vegan food.... um... so no apples? You can't eat any vegetables? And wait, you don't like fruit!? Okay, let me get this straight. You want a salad, but you won't go to a restaurant that makes bomb salads because it's vegetarian?? Sigh. It can feel very one sided when people curl their noses at vegan restaurants, but then want you to join them at their meatfest restaurant. They have that one vegan option! >_< Also, watching people chow down on a burger or chicken leg is very unappetizing.

J.R. Organics

I recently made my way down to Escondido to check out our CSA farm for their 6th annual event. I had decided on the first date available because I was really excited to finally get the chance to check out a farm. This is our second CSA and we never had the chance to visit the one we were a part of in Berkeley, so you can imagine how excited I was.

In case you didn't already know, CSA stands for community supported agriculture. Getting a CSA box is a great way to support local farmers, get surprisingly affordable fruits and veggies, get you to eat healthier, and they can on occasion get you to try new foods you would never buy on your own. It's also a great way to find out what's in season, and when. All around a great deal.

Vegan Beer & Food Festival

Golden Road!

We recently enjoyed an amazing day full of music, food, and beer tasting. Did I mention it was a vegan fest?

The 3rd Annual Vegan Food and Beer Festival took place in Hollywood on Sunset Blvd. They apparently expanded the event from the previous year, bringing it across the street from the Roxy Theatre to an empty lot, instead of in the Theatre and it's small parking lot.

This was a great event. Knowing that all the food there was edible was very exciting, especially since they had a lot of yummy things, i.e., sushi, nachos, sliders, pretzels. Believe you me, I could go on.

Mr. & Mrs. Hochreiter Tie The Knot!

My cousin (twice removed) recently got married in Arizona, and you know what that means... Road trip!

Davey Havok's "Pop Kids" Book Signing

So a co-worker/friend of Dan and me offered to let him interview and me photograph Davey for the book signing of his first published novel, Pop Kids. Being an avid AFI fan, Dan was really excited to interview Davey. I'm not a huge punk music lover, but I love Davey because... drum roll.. he's a hardcore vegan!!

Flashback Story: Dan actually ran into him and a band-mate after a Gilman show back in the day and asked if he and his friend could tag along while they went on a hunt for ice cream. Davey said sure, probably thought it was cute some kid wanted to hang out with him. Anyway, they were looking at ice cream and Dan kept saying, "just get that one." To which Davey replied somewhere along the lines of, "I can't! It's not vegan!" Which confused the heck out of Dan. Little did he know, ten or so years later he would be marrying a vegan.

CoDeSports Championship

As you may know, Dan works for Activision, specifically Beachhead Studios which puts out Call of Duty: Elite. This tends to be awesome. We've gone to some epic parties and of course met some rad people. Although, it is a lot of work for Dan, especially when a new game is announced/released, he loves his job which makes me very happy! It makes having to live in LA okay.

Activision recently put on an event with Treyarch and Xbox for eSports. But what are eSports?

I actually asked myself the same thing before going. Dan wanted me to come and take photos, but was worried I would be extremely bored all day. That of course put me on edge thinking this was going to be really lame. Wow, I was completely wrong.

Homebrewing with Brewers

We recently had an amazing Saturday. We signed up for a homebrew demo at Eagle Rock Brewery. There were about 15 people there and two of the brewers, Lee and Andrew. We had a blast!

Dan already has brewed a handful of times at our various homes, but was never satisfied with his beers. I enjoyed them much more than he did. He also didn't like our old kitchen, so he only brewed their once. I thought this would be a great opportunity for him to learn somethings that would give him the kick he needs to get back to brewing.

The setup at the brewery is nice. They have a taproom out front and a big window looking into the brewery, which is pretty small. It was neat getting to go back there and feeling right at home. Some fun bit of info, most of their equipment turns out to be dairy machines converted to work with brewing. Pretty awesome. They actually got most of their equipment from AleSmith when they were upgrading.

Noël Jams

Noël Jams is my jam company!

While I'm still working it out, and it's not actually a business yet; I have a blog you might be interested in checking out. It talks all about my experiences creating jams, starting a business, and everything in between.

My jams, jellies and nut butters will all be as organic and as local as I can make them, vegan, and low (or no/alternative) sugar.

Please check it out and let me know what you think!

www.NoelJams.com

If you are interested in having me make you some jams, let me know! I can do wedding favors, individual jars, even mix and match batches, or custom flavors.

Also, if you know of any jam fans or someone who is looking for fun gift ideas, send them my way!

Follow my Twitter here: Noel Jams

Thanks for your support guys! Who knows, maybe I'll give you some jam! ;]

St. Patrick's

Dan's heritage escapes for a day. 

 I hope you had a nice Sunday with whatever you ended up doing. We had a grand ol' time this weekend.

We started our morning at the farmer's market to pick up our CSA box and found they have strawberries! And oh my are they juicy and delish. I bought a bunch and hopefully will be making a strawberry jam soon. I also picked up some oranges which I used to jam with when we got home. Find out more about my jam session here!

Bad Religion & Pizza Port. Yes please!

So, we have been vegan for a week now. It was a little difficult for Dan this weekend, but he survived it and he doesn't seem deterred yet. Especially since today at work he got a peanut butter smoothie made with rice milk. I'm jealous!

This photo is actually from their 30th anniversary tour.
I hate being one of those people who hold their phone up the entire concert so my pictures aren't very good.

vegan

I am a vegan.

Holy moly, what a statement. I have been a vegetarian for 9 years, and what a better way to bring in my 10th year by going vegan. Now, this isn't really a new thing for me. I was vegan for about a year in college, but lost sight of my convictions and let peer-pressure and laziness take over. That followed with the years of, "I shouldn't eat dairy because I'm lactose intolerant, but I couldn't give up cheese!" argument. I even reached the point where I started to think eggs were good again. The last straw was that I started buying "humane" and "healthy" bacon for my husband, and cooking it myself. I don't know what came over me. But not anymore! A weight has been lifted off my shoulders, my soul has been cleansed, and I am relieved. Why?

I am a vegan.