Luscious Fibers, Food and Life

a little road trip

This morning's sunrise was was beautiful and I was definitely up to see it. I woke up at 4:30 and couldn't get back to sleep, so I did some reading and then enjoyed the sunrise.

In the afternoon we decided to take a drive to Harrisonburg, Va. It was kind of hot in the house (and outside) so we thought a road trip was a good plan. Why Harrisonburg? I'm not really sure. It's a larger nearby town and after doing a little research we learned they have a restaurant with vegan options and that sounded good to us. We headed out and on the way we met up with this guy...

We've seen a lot of deer on this trip but this one was different. She didn't run. She just stopped and watched us for a long time. As you can tell we were pretty close to each other. It was a sweet moment and she had the most beautiful eyes. 

After our friendly deer encounter, we headed to Harrisonburg and walked around the historic downtown. We stopped at a used book store and picked up some cool postcards. We checked out a wine store just in time for a beer tasting of Terrapin beer from Athens, Ga (oh and we picked up a six pack). Lastly we went to The Little Grill Cooperative for dinner. It's a cozy little place that has been around since the 40's and it's actually owned by the people who work there. It definitely has character and they serve up good comfort food including many vegan options.  Both Grant and I ordered the barbecue tempeh sandwich and shared some nachos. It was all very good. The tempeh had a lot of flavor and it's something I might try to replicate at some point.  We ended the meal with a coffee and oatmeal cookie to go.

Now we're back at the house, sitting on the deck enjoying the cool weather. I've put on a sweater and I have a blanket wrapped around my legs. What's not to love about that in the middle of August?!

camping, dc style

As many of you know, Grant and I are camping at Greenbelt National Park this weekend. We're home for a little while to feed the cats and get out of the heat!  I've made a slide show of some pictures I've taken so far, but here are a couple of the red-bellied woodpecker family that kept me entertained most of the morning.  The female is inside the tree, sitting on eggs I assume, and the male visits her often, especially when she calls him.

More pictures and news to come.

looking for alligators

Grant, Grant's mom and I just left the Savannah National Wildlife Refuge. It's a favorite place to visit when we're in town. Today we saw many beautiful birds and 4 alligators sunning themselves. One interesting thing I noticed when I was looking at one of the alligators with binoculars, less than a foot away from the alligator, just hanging out next to it was this good sized brown rabbit. Yes a rabbit and it was alive. We thought we might witness some national geographic but the rabbit did hop away, at least for now...thank goodness.

Chilly Breakfast

One thing I love about being at my parents is watching the birds and squirrels eat together at the feeding sanctuary my father keeps stocked (and shoveled out) during the winter months.  Each day you can see blue jays, finches, doves, downy woodpeckers, chipmonks and squirrels.  There's a place for everyone to feed and it's really quite something. My dad has always had a soft spot for animals (I could actually see him being a vegetarian.) and he nutured, or at least understood, my compassion for animals when I was growing up.

More shots from the Thurston Winter Feeding Sanctuary...

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We're not in DC anymore...

As you can see I'm up in chilly Maine. There's lots of snow and it's really quite beautiful.  This picture is of my parent's front yard.  My parents made the big welcoming snowman a couple days ago. You can read more about that on my mother's blog.

Last night we had dinner with my brother. He made a fantastic lentil soup (read more about that here). It was good to visit with him, Mira-Su and Chris.  Their tree looks beautiful and the house is festive!

It's nice to be home for the holidays. I'm looking forward to when Grant, James and Daryl join us.

Pigs in the Sun

 

We visited the pigs after a great (and sometimes treacherous) walk in the woods. The pigs were sunning themselves and happily eating grass. Dina is currently taking care of 12 pigs.

The White Pig

 

So we have arrived and the inn and grounds are beautiful. There is lots of pink and pigs (not real)...very cute. How many pigs do you see in this picture?

Our room is lovely and though the innkeeper is at her house down the road, she left us a nice note, wine, chocolate and vegan pumpkin cheesecake (Grant was quite excited by all of that.) We had a piece of cheesecake with tea while sat on the front porch. 

Fun on the Farm

Grant and I had a great weekend in NY. The snowy drive was a bit stressful at times, but it was more than worth it.  The celebration for the turkeys started off with an amazing VEGAN potluck at the Watkins Glen Community Center. There were about 150??? people there and everyone brought a vegan dish to share. The food was fabulous and it was great knowing anything I chose was animal free - yeah!

I also got to meet Colleen Patrick-Goudreau who has been an incredible inspiration to me during this past year as I've made my journey to being vegan.  She signed her book, The Joy of Vegan Baking, for me and we had our picture taken.  Interestingly, we also found a friend (actually she found us) who we hadn't seen in a couple years and we happily had dinner with her and her partner and were able to catch up.

After dinner and presentations, we headed to the Farm Sanctuary and spent the afternoon celebrating with the turkeys and visiting the other animals.  It was in incredible event and hanging out with the animals was amazing. They are such wonderful creatures and we are so happy to spend time with them.

We took lots of photos of the animals and the farm. You can see all the photos on my flickr.  Also, this time we remembered to take some video. So check out the videos below. Grant with the cow is typical Grant....

At the Farm

This picture is from the Poplar Farm Animal Sanctuary open house fund raiser. Grant and I went to it last weekend and it was really nice. The weather was perfect and we were able to visit with all the animals they've rescued and take care of. We also ate some really incredible vegan food. We look forward to visiting again soon, but hopefully as volunteers.

Hanging out with the animals

I took some photos of my parents pets today.  They were acting photogenic so I took advantage.  My parents have a dog, Murphy and 2 HUGE cats, Stashu and Shamus...all quite cute of course. Have a look-see...









This is Stashu letting it all hang out next to me while I was doing some work.  He was a happy cat. You can see some other shots on my flickr.

Tomorrow we're taking a road trip to some place yet to be determined, but definitely  near the water.  You can bet I have a list of yarn stores ready to find their way onto our route.  I'll bring you up to date later this weekend.