"Welcome fall" party!

Saturday was the first day of fall...didn't feel like it here in our part of Texas however. There was recently a bit of fall-ish weather and it was perfectly delightful. Loved it. I am a summer girl at heart (love the heat!) but I do so love the changing of the seasons and it was enjoyable for sure. But alas, it's gone! Twas only a tease of what is yet to come...soon hopefully.

Regardless, we decided to "welcome fall" on Friday with our natural parenting playgroup with a little party at the park. Everyone brought their own picnic lunch and we brought the sweets and the decor (of course). I mean, what's a party without those, right? As is usual in the fall around our nest, we recently bought some little pumpkins and gourds so we brought those, along with burlap runners I quickly cut from a roll I have lying around. The leaves, acorns, and pinecones we gathered on a walk the day before. So really incredibly simple, but it added a nice special something to the party.

We made a gallon of apple cider that morning...yes, a gallon. We are still drinking it! Although it was warm out, the warm-ish cider still was nice. The kiddos thought it was funny to be drinking a warm drink on a warm day though. The compostable cups and plates we had lying around from a past outdoor party...both are from here I do believe.

The treats were vegan gluten-free pumpkin chocolate chip cookies and raw apple cinnamon cookies (recipes here and here)...both of which were delicious if I do say so myself. I recommend both of the recipes and the only thing I did differently was add dark chocolate chunks to the pumpkin cookie one.

A friend brought delicious fresh figs to share with everyone - YUM! We all played, chatted, and had a jolly time. Despite the non-fall weather it really was the perfect welcome to fall!

P.S.
Here is my little sweet/silly assistant that helped put it all together!

The rest of our weekend was wonderful too...it included a movie date with my bestie who was in town from Cali, a homecoming football game, gardening, home projects, family leisure time, and soccer, soccer, and more soccer (we all play). It was awesome but I'm ready for the week...bring it on Monday! Have a blessed one.

TGIT!!!

Thank goodness it's Tuesday!!! I'm not really Monday's biggest fan. I like the fresh start to a new week but Mondays are often just harder for us. We miss my Love like crazy after being spoiled by his presence for two days! :) But it's Tuesday now, so yeah!!!

Lovebug and I started our day off with a bowl of raw yumminess - sprouted oatmeal with blueberries! I haven't talked too much about it lately but the raw journey we started at the beginning of the year is going wonderfully. We eat raw for breakfast, lunch, and snacks...so about 80% or so raw.

What I've really been loving is exploring the raw breakfast world. Sprouted buckwheat groats, coconut cereals, chia cereal, sprouted wheat berry cereal, homemade nut milks, even raw pancakes, and of course the raw oatmeal - YUM!!!! I SO look forward to breakfast!

We also make a daily fresh juice (LOVE!!) using our Vitamix and nut bag so we get lots of goodness in that. And we also tend to make a green smoothie later in the afternoon as well. So to say we create alot of compost in one day is a big understatement :) and our incredible Vitamix gets quite the workout being used 2-3 times every day.

SO raw snacks come pretty easily as well (juice, green smoothie, sprouted seeds, sprouted nut butters, dried fruit, and of course fresh fruit, etc.) but we've had some issues with raw lunches. We typically just have big salads but I'm tiring of those. We've made many raw soups and other types of "salads" but raw lunch recipes tend to be very nut heavy (raw organic nuts = expensive) and overall don't go a long ways. So we're working on expanding/improving that. If you're raw and have some good lunch ideas/recipes, please send them my way!

I also wish I could do more raw lunches here and there that weren't too time-consuming. After making fresh juice, most likely a smoothie, and whatever snacks, I often wish I could just pull out something raw and delicious from the fridge for lunch instead of having to chop/prep much. Of course you can do that with raw soups pre-made beforehand, but like I said, the ones we have made require LOTS of organic produce and nuts but don't last too many lunches for us.

We also got a dehydrator back in May so that's been fun. We've made raw flax chips, wheat berry bread, kale chips, corn tortillas, almond cookies, and much more. Of course the dehydrator is most used when drying our nuts, seeds, and fruit. We've done alot of solar drying of our fruit as well which sure doesn't take too long with this Texas heat. The deyhdrator was a wonderful addition to our raw food journey though.

So although I've been LOVING our raw eating during the day at our nest, I do REALLY look forward to our cooked dinners! It's a good balance I think. Plus we often treat ourselves to cooked breakfasts on the weekend with sprouted wheat waffles, tempeh, sprouted English muffins, and so forth. I must say that my Love has really been cooking up some incredible cooked dinners recently too. He constantly amazes me with what he creates!

Anyway, that's where things our at with meals around our green nest...mostly raw and loving it (despite our lunch rut)!

Hope you're glad it's Tuesday too...

This week's meals

I hope everyone's week is going well! The weather has been really lovely for us and the time we have been able to spend outdoors has been most enjoyable. It's been an incredible food week too! My Love really outdid himself with a delicious lunch and dinner menu and I am SO in love with my lunch shown above. It's raw pecan "meat" with pico on romaine tacos served with carrots on the side. YUM!!! It's so so so good and all raw, which is a big goal for us in 2010. FYI, the tacos are inspired by Sara's walnut taco salad.

Lately, we've been eating raw throughout the day and then doing a cooked dinner, and it's been great so far. I gave up caffeine too so it's been different, but I feel really good and know it was something I definitely needed to do for the continual improvement of my health. Anyway, our cooked dinner this week has been roasted eggplant paninis on sprouted bread with basil, red onion, and mustard, with a side of roasted potato fries. See, I told you he outdid himself! It's so very delicious and I look forward to dinners every single day. My breakfasts have been sprouted raw buchwheat groats with homemade raw almond or pecan butter and a banana - YUM! I've been learning about and doing more soaking, sprouting, and other raw techniques which maybe someday soon I'll go more into. I'm really excited about this new mostly-raw road for 2010 and the good that will come of it...

SO, what have you been eating this week? Please do share!