Tuesday, January 24, 2017

the new truck!!! and some updates.....

we finally saw the sun the other day...i don't know which day - i was too awestruck - it REALLY has been grey and foggy and rainy for the past 3 months! i feel like we live in BC, or Seattle or something???


we met up with our Big Sis C and our Big Bro G, and our nearest neighbours, who really are Big Sis C's and Big Bro G's actual brother and sister (bahahahahah! try figuring that one out!!!!) a week and a half ago and had a beautiful meal, gorgeous company and a whole pile of laughter!!!! we had so much fun!!!

we rely on our Big Sis and Bro quite heavily ----- if it wasn't for them we would never know when our birthdays were....or our anniversaries!!! they never let us miss important days!


like our 16th anniversary!!!!


they gave us our new morning tea mugs and a bunch of different teas in a beautiful wood box.


we can't wait to meet up with them and our nearest neighbours E & D soon. we had such a good time - at one point me, E and D, were laughing our heads off. laughing and laughing and our stomachs were hurting! jambaloney, C and G kept asking us what we were laughing at?!?!?!? we didn't really know but kept laughing anyway! over the next 2 days i spoke to most of them personally and they either asked me, or i asked them, what we were laughing about. nobody remembered! how crazy is that?!?!?!?!

anyway - when the man goes into town to pick up his very first brand-new truck - he better bring home a gift for me!


and i know you've all been hanging by your fingernails off a ravine waiting for pics of the truck! wait no more!

it's a ford f-150XL, 4x4, 3.5litre Ecoboost....it's awesome!


the colour is called "caribou" and we love it!


we discussed what each of us needed in a vehicle and when i mentioned i thought i needed running boards - jambaloney agreed!


the inside is top of the line - no real fancy gadgets cuz we don't need 'em!


here's some more pics to bore you all to death!


ecoboost baby! at this rate Winston, Rob, Harry and PP are gonna start calling us "libtards" or worse, "hippies"! you be quiet Winston - i know when you were born!


ya baby - we're now driving a ford f-150....it's just like our last f-150...just newer and cleaner and has rust protection and an undercoating!


it's got 4 x 4 something or other....apparently a good thing when you live in the middle of nowhere. i have no idea. i just know that when we go from dirt road to pavement - if the pavement is dry, jambaloney puts it in neutral and changes the gears. and vice versa. or whatever. i have no idea - i just drove a super souped-up dodge dakota sport with tires that were a hair shy of being illegal in canada for about a year. my american friend went to germany working with a big satellite company and didn't want to put his truck in storage. anyway, that's a story for another time.

truckdura v.2 was bought at the best car dealership in the world - Canso Ford!!!


they have always treated jambaloney so well....and that's why they'll always keep our service! truckdura v.2 has seats for extra passengers!!!


screw passengers!!! we're greedy! and need room for a bucketload of things in our vehicle!


i told jambaloney that after he packs all of the essentials needed in a vehicle that you might find yourself in an emergency with, i told him - i wanted to check over the bins. i want to be 100% satisfied that he and i, and our cats if he is taking one to the vet or something, that we are safe!!! the only way to be safe is to be prepared.

i want to call the new truck "caribou-dura"...but jambaloney says otherwise. oh well...since he never reads the blog, we'll call the new truck "caribou-dura" amongst ourselves, k?

sending much love to all - old friends and new. i forgot to mention that i made a few new friends in the last few weeks. so nice to meet people that make you smile.

bye for now! xoxoxoxso

Monday, January 23, 2017

sooo happy and proud.....

for my man! he's off getting our new truck...he's never had a new vehicle and those of you who have been around long enough...you'll remember that he didn't even get his driver's license until he was 45!!! somehow he managed to get his driver's license in under a month and then drive us and our cats 1,000 kms across the country in the middle of winter - in a 30yr old van!!! since then we have become parents of 2 more stray cats - now there's 4 of them whining for food 2 billion and 70 million times a day (cue a comment from PioneerPreppy here about the numbers)!!!

this has been the crappiest and hardest winter here so far....just grey days since mid-october...but the man has his new truck and the sun is actually shining today...Thank The Dear Lord.

he'll be home soon...with his new truck...i am so excited for him! and sending love to you all - pictures of truckdura version 2.0 coming soon - xoxoxox!


Wednesday, January 11, 2017

a boring update

it's been grey and then grey some more!


thank goodness for fruit salad in the morning with cilantro just to give you the extra boost you need!


some women expect that when their man leaves for the day, that when he arrives home, he should have a gift. perhaps chocolate, perhaps some roses, perhaps a new diamond something????

me? in the beginning of january i can't think of a better gift than some fresh dill!


that dill was put into a special vase on my brand new lazy susan and it is the most beautiful centrepiece!

when The Man brings you dill and his Greek ancestors are calling (he has NO greek ancestors btw) then you have to break out the hummus, the tzaziki, the parsley salad, cucumber salad, kaftas and grilled veg! him and his greek ancestors (he has NO greek ancestors) would settle for nothing less!


and on his latest excursion into town he found a pile of ground lamb on sale. he knows how much i love lamb.


i made a tiny but proper shepherd's pie using lamb....won't be making that mistake again! it's soooo much better with beef!

we are up to our eyeballs in the worst part of winter..we have 4 cats in this tiny house and all of them are suffering from depression...but we are the types who bear the good with the bad. we'll be singing and dancing nekked come april...oh you know we will - bahahahahha!

hoping you all are making it through this long winter ok! and sending love!

Thursday, January 5, 2017

5 days in and 2017 is looking good!

so far, for us at least, 2017 is looking very promising! even though since 2017 began, we have already had 2 major storms that kind of fizzled by the time they got to us. here's a pic of a few days ago:


not a terrible amount of snow and actually quite pretty! but sorry snow - some rainy, foggy, above zero days does this to snow:


that's a pic from this morning - snow all gone! woohoo! so far, this winter has been usual. temps either normal or below normal and still no staying snow - another woohoo!

my friend TB, who writes for the blog The Forty-Five has had some interesting posts lately that have got me thinking. in one of his posts here he thanks all of his readers and commenters for returning, whether regularly or not, whether commenting or not, but for just being there and reading. i thought it was a wonderful thing to do (say, or rather, type). so to all of you who are our dear friends, online or in "real", regular commenters (like Sweet Sandy, TB himself, Mr. Flashman and if the post is right - PioneerPreppy among many others!), frequent commenters (like Dani, Susan, Fiona and a bunch of others!), sometimes commenters (i'm talking to you Deb Harvey!), friendly lurkers (thanks guys!), not so friendly lurkers (and you know who you are. maybe you should get lives perhaps!) and of course those dang pesky Russian hackers, jambaloney and i say thank you very much!


(written with the beautiful fountain pen that i got from my good friend Ed last year. thank you again Ed! you can read more about the beautiful, hand-made pen from Ed here.)

at this point i know that my friend TB is probably blushing! but even though i haven't been keeping up with blogging and commenting lately (i know - my BAD!), i still do read all of your new posts if you are listed in our blogroll. our favourite blogs are listed there and i try to stay on top of everyone's new posts. even if i don't comment - please know that i keep up with you all and forgive me for not always commenting. i so enjoy reading about what you are all doing, thinking about, eating, who you are spending time with, magazine/book/movie reviews....all of it. the people listed in our blogroll are very interesting people and if you haven't already checked them out - you really should. and if you would like to be listed in our blogroll - send me a link to your blog and i will check you out and see if you fit our required profile of homesteader, wanna be a homesteader one day, gardener, survivalist, prepper, nut-case, weirdo, fisherman, and/or someone who just loves life. you will definitely get a spot in our blogroll if you are someone who tries, sometimes fails/sometimes succeeds, but always trying to learn more and always trying to share with anyone who will listen (or read).

so i should have called this post - "a post about my friend TB" because he has another post recently found here about changes in his diet. being more consciously aware of what he is eating and why. we are in the same place. we are trying to be very conscious about our diets for several years now. we went dairy-free (minus butter and eggs - can someone please tell me why eggs are included in dairy???) over a year ago and about a month back, went to a friend's party. they were serving pizzas to each table and of course, we looked at each other, knew better, but ate a piece of pizza each. not trying to gross anyone out - but on the whole drive home our stomachs were in knots! and i only made it in the door and barfed my guts out!!! and being that we are dogs for punishment, a week ago, i wanted nachos with cheap cheese and sour cream. i used to load my nachos with an entire container of sour cream!!! one bite and both of us were turned off for good! when you remove things from your diet, things like milk-solid products (whatever they are) and caesin - your taste buds change and some people, like us, find that when you eat that stuff again - it either turns you completely off or, like me, you barf. sorry kids, just sayin'.

anyway, a few months ago we removed gluten products from our diet. after 3 weeks of absolutely no gluten, we tried some fresh bakery bread. it wasn't so bad. kind of enjoyable. so now, every now and again, we will have some bread and we haven't suffered for removing it, nor introducing small bits back into our diet. it's all about portion-control for us and not eating 8 pieces of bread a day.

over the past several years, our diets have gone from a heavy dairy (and i mean cheese - lots of it every day!), heavy gluten, heavy meat diet to one that involves more whole foods with tons of fresh veg, fruit, legumes, seeds and nuts. and we have certainly not suffered from it!

here's a delicious dinner of butternut squash and pumpkin puree that we made up and canned from last year's harvest.


add in some coconut milk, cayenne, turmeric, cumin, cilantro, sea salt and pepper - and that will keep you fed until supper!

we eat a variety of different salads made from scratch every single day. it's interesting but i read a quote from some nutritionist who said something like - even if you can't get access to organic fruit and veg, then non-organic, even if it is GMO fruit and veg is better than no fruit and veg at all. i tend to agree.


a lovely mid-afternoon snack for the 2 of us to share:


parsley salad with red onion, a ton of fresh garlic, cumin, cayenne, turmeric and fresh- squeezed lemon, some home-made from-scratch hummus, and some home-made radish and carrot kimchi.

a lovely supper of vietnamese pho done the correct way (frozen slices of beef added to the bowl with the boiling broth and veg poured over the beef):


jambaloney wanted some steak with his and so had this lovely cut:


normally he can eat twice that much steak but with us incorporating more raw, fresh whole food - we are both eating much less meat. fish and seafood, however, will always have a happy place on our plate! and of course, fresh veg stirfries! yummeh!


sometimes you just don't need the carb or the meat in a meal. and like most of you who are regular readers already know - we aren't regular dessert people. dessert for us is about 2 hours after supper and usually consists of raw veggies or fruit. we try to consume as little refined sugar as possible and when we do, it's a choice. a conscious choice.

our diet has developed over the last 15yrs eating and cooking food together. now don't get us wrong - when we want a full english-style breakfast - it'll be a throwdown! no one on the planet can eat more hollandaise sauce than me. but that is saved for occasions when it is appropriate - otherwise - we choose to have a few meatless days a week (it happens by accident), we eat a ton of fresh veg and fruit, we eat almost no processed foods, and we have learned that we love pickled veg, fresh from our garden and pickled and/or canned when at it's freshest. we try to be conscious eaters.

so if this post was long, boring and drawn out - you can blame my buddy TB because it was reading a few of his previous posts that i started thinking about these things and remembering when we started making conscious decisions about food - and remembering things like thanking your readers, commenters and lurkers.

last but not least - he has a post up about determining what the essentials that you require, specifically you,
in order to lead a fulfilling life. oh jeesh. i've spent all day on that one. am gonna spend some time thinking about it for myself, have jambaloney think about it for himself and then on sunday - another snow day for us - we are going to do what we always do - sit down together and figure out what our real essentials are in order to live the best life that we can live together.

i feel like i am ripping off of TB's posts...but i found them very thought-provoking and what better time to be thought-provoked than at the beginning of the year!

thanks TB...and thanks to all of you! we hope that 2017 is looking as good to you as it is to us. and we wish you all of the best in this brand-spankin'-new-year!