Back home!

This morning I had drip coffee, you know what that means....

I'm back in America!! I already Americanized my nails

Much to my surprise, last minute I made the stand by flight & I got to spend a good 13 hours in the very back of a plane in between 2 men. FYI sitting between 2 men on a flight is the worse because they always take over BOTH of the armrests. The feminist in me fought for my armrest long & hard the whole flight. Besides the bad seat, since I was standby I couldn't order a special vegan meal, & not expecting to get on the flight, the only thing I had eaten was a bowl of warm muesli that morning.

The flight was a vegans worse nightmare: creamy fettucini, a roast beef roll for a snack, & eggs w/ grey sausage. Ick! I had to go non vegan a bit & had a small croissant, green salad, pretzels, chardonnay, & coffee. I was starving when I got off the flight! Thankfully as soon as my mom picked me up from LAX she brought me to a vegan restaurant that I have been meaning to try- Veggie Grill. This place was reminiscent of Native Foods (my all time favorite). I had the Santa Fe Crispy Chickin' w/ crispy chillin' chickin', lettuce, tomato, red onion, avocado, & southwestern spiced vegan mayo on a bed of kale w/ a side of chili.

My mom had the VG- Cheeseburger done El Dorado style w/ jalapenos, caramelized onions, & ketchup w/ a side salad w/ miso dressing. I thought it tasted yummy, but my mom still thinks Native Foods is way better.

Later I drove back to the airport & picked James up from his flight & we came home to a nice homemade meal. Knowing the both of us too well my mom made James a big pasta w/ chicken while I had brown rice topped w/ broccoli cooked in garlic & truffle oil. Truffle oil is sooo good!

This morning I had copious amounts of the coffee shown in the first pic & made breakfast for the family. Cooking for everyone else made me not so hungry, so I waited until the fam (along w/ James & Dru) & I went to go see Eclipse to have my first feed. My friend Dru, the person who originally got me into veganism, has recently converted back to her vegan ways so I brought us some healthy snacks to the movies. Chili & lime cashews, dried apricots, & pepitas.

For lunch I made myself a simple wrap w/ a whole wheat tortilla filled w/ shredded soy cheese, guacamole, tomatoes, & arugula. Doused in tapatio.

Tonight both sets of my grandparents came over for dinner & we drank peach sangria...

& I enjoyed an arugula salad w/, sugar plum tomatoes, & garlic croutons....

hummus, grapes,pita chips and a cold pasta salad....

Yum! It's nice to be home & w/ the family. Hoping for nice weather tomorrow so I can enjoy the beach. Cheers for now.

It's a Wrap

I've been a bit behind in blogging so brace yourself this is going to be a long post. Life gets kinda hectic when your trying to simultaneously take finals & pack up your apartment.

Wednesday:

1/3 cup oats, soy yogurt, crunchy peanut butter, pumpkin pie spice

(pre mixage)

(post mixage)

I normally never eat soy yogurt because the few times I have tasted it, it was really awful. The only reason why I purchased it this time was for my muffins I made the other night, and I had some left over so i tried it with my oats. It was really yummy! I wish I remembered the name of the brand. Of course I had coffee too.

While I was at Starbucks I bought this Gojiberry Granola bar by Two Moms in the Raw. I love how Starbucks carries all of this really great wholesome snacks now. The first time I saw them was when I was stopped off at Starbucks on a road trip to New Mexico and I bought an armful of snacks for the car ride. This bar was delicious! It was super crunchy and oddly enough almost spicy?

You can't beat these ingredients. Raw, no refined sugars, no added oils, 100% organic, 100% vegan.

I was so engrossed with studying that this bar and a coffee sufficed for lunch, and I did not stop to eat until dinner time.

I bought dinner on campus and had the sorina salad w/tofu in a spinach wrap w/ a side of BBQ for dipping, and a bunch of grapes.

Lettuce, tomato, tofu, onions, raisins, carrots, almonds w/ balsamic vinaigrette.

Thursday:

My eats were almost identical to the day before, I was busy cramming for my advanced stats test so I didn't have much time to eat let alone to try and be creative.

1/3 cup oats, 1/2 banana, soy yogurt, walnut bits, and pumpkin pie spice

Coffee!

A wrap again. It was definitely a groundhog day.

This time it was grilled w/ a spinach tortilla filled with lettuce, spinach, tomato, onion, jalapenos, and cucumbers and a side of pasta salad.

I took my stats exam which ended up being pretty tricky. I'm done with school now, yey!!!! Four months of freedom! I cannot even begin to explain how happy I am to be done with school.

After finishing the final I came home to start packing. It's time to say goodbye to my 1st apartment ever where I have lived for the past two years. I'm excited because next year I am moving to Santa Monica which has a lot more going on than Malibu, and Cami and I will still be living together. I can only hope that my new house is even close to as nice as the one I am leaving. I have made a lot of great memories living here w/ my roommates.

My bedroom.

Night table

Inspo board

Living Room

Kitchen (where the magic happens)

Ahh... goodbye Villa Malibu apartments, but not so quick... first I have to pack all of this up! Before getting down to business I enjoyed a snack of 1/2 banana, the last of my soy yogurt (I can't believe this 1 container lasted me 3 days), and a scoop of crunchy peanut butter.

After finishing packing up my desk, I got ready to go out and celebrate the end of the school year. First my friends Cami, Tyler, and Nick, and I went to go get dinner and drinks at Charlies in Malibu. The only other time I have been here was once for karaoke, and I didn't get to try the food.

We started out with a bottle of sauvignon blanc and copious amounts of foccacia bread.

I'm no wine connoisseur, but I would not not recommend this bottle. The bread was delicious though.

For dinner I had the seasonal vegetables- they were very bland, and the waitress offered to have the cook saute them in olive oil, after which they were a bit better but still not great.

After dinner we went out to Irish Pub in Santa Monica called Fin McCool's. It was a great way to finish out the school year.

Here are pics of me & my roommates that I have lived w/ in the past 2 years.

Emily, Cami, me, and Erin.

(yes i think that is my lipstick on Cami's check)

Me, Cami, and Diane (I'm getting Cami back in this one).

Friday:

Thursday was a veerry long night, I'm embarrassed to say what time I woke up at today but let's just say it was way bast breakfast time. I decided to make a very large portion of savory oats.

1 cup oats, peas, roasted corn, shredded soy cheese, nutritional yeast

These oats were the epitome of comfort food. Yum. I could not eat all of them at once so I kept snacking on them throughout the day. While the oats were cooking I munched on some soy nuggets w/ BBQ.

I spent the day packing, packing, packing, interspersed w/ catching up on lost and modern family. I made a smoothie too.

1/2 banana, vanilla almond milk, crunchy peanut butter

I also added a scoop of my roommates hemp protein- I love this stuff it tastes amazing and is really good for you too. This smoothie ended up being my favorite color- green.

i

Isn't it purdy?

I tried to ignore my pounding headache all day, even after 4 tylenols it would not stop throbbing, so finally at 5 in the afternoon I had to give in and grab a Starbucks. I didn't get a picture, but it helped relieve my headache immediately. Oh addiction, it's a b*.

I didn't have dinner until way later, and when I did it was quite odd. My fridge is running low, and I was not sure what I felt like... sometimes I eat really weird stuff. I ended up having spinach and meatless meatballs topped w/ vegan caesar salad dressing. Believe it or not it got even weirder after I took this pic.... I added nutritional yeast and garlic croutons. I know your probably gagging as you read this, but i thought it was quite delish.

Wow that was a long post!