Transitioning to a Whole Foods Plant-Based Diet

Elly and I have always ate well, we had thought! All of our meals were prepared from scratch and cooked at home. No processed food, little sugar & salt, hardly any red meat, always organic vegetables & spices, olive oil & homemade bread.  Boy were we wrong! We probably own all the DVDs about how food is grown, and processed, the cruel way animals are raised and processed and  know all about the chemicals & junk that goes into our food.

We have already read the book "How Not to Die" by Dr. Michael Greger, but it all just came together and a light went on in our heads after seeing the movie 'What The Health" and the new movie "H.O.P.E   What You Eat Matters."  We finally came to the realization the everyone in America on the Standard American Diet has heart disease.  And I mean EVERYONE, diagnosed or not, including US!

Together with the an older You Tube Video by  Dr Michael Greger  "40 Year Old Vegan Dies of Heart Attack." and thgese two movies, Elly and I had an epiphany.  Watch the  You Tube video below:

So we threw out all of our oils, and started transitioning to a Whole Foods, Plant-Based Diet. It was very difficult not having the correct ingredients, spices, recipes etc. But we are slowly learning to change over our total diet.

This week we found a Vegan/Vegetarian take-out restaurant in Worcester called the Belmont Vegetarian Restaurant.. It received good reviews on Yelp, etc so we decided to try it.  For $12.56 each we got a tin of everything on their menu.

Belmont Street Vegetarian Restaurant

The Menu

Elly waiting for our order

Our order after we arrived home

The food was delicious, especially the BBQ. We will definitely be going back

Birds, Wildlife and the Return of the Phoebes

Spring is always a busy season in our backyard as the birds and other animals return. The turkeys are one of the first to be seen, especially since spring is the mating season. The toms "puff-out" trying to attract and impress the hens. The hens seems to care less most of the time. It's actually amazin that a regular looking tom can puff up and become a big "picture perfect" for Thanksgiving turkey.

We always wait and wonder to see whether our Eastern Phoebe friends that have taken up residence on my fishing poles in the garage for the last for years will return again. After four year, they had built the nest so high that it almost touched the ceiling and would leave little room for the baby phoebes. So earlier  this Spring I cut the next and took down half of it hoping they wouldn't mind since they always add on anyway. Well last week they returned for the 5th straight year! I managed to get a photo of the mom in the nest, hopefully babies will follow soon.

Mom Phoebe at night in her nest

Today we saw the coyote walking trough the yard. He seemed particularly interested in the tom turkey.  But as he ran after the turkey, the turkey just flew away.  We must be sure that we keep our cat inside as we have already lost may of our pets to wild animals in the past.

Going after the Turkey, but he has wings!

We are very excited that a pair of Baltimore Orioles visited our feeder this year. Last year they showed up for a day and left. This year we put orange slices on the feeder after we saw them and they have been staying around for a few days.  Hope they decide to stay all summer, but I will have to keep them stocked up with oranges.

Spring is in the Air?

First day out in the gardens. Rototilled the vegetable garden after a year off. We need a garden this year because we ran out of our two year supply of tomato sauce & green peppers. Plus organic veggies are pricey, so we put in a little "sweat equity" to grow our own. Getting to old for this stuff!

The garden after rototilling

Then it snowed again!

The garlic garden is in good shape with the garlic greens already popping out from underneath the mulch. There are over 300 hard-neck Garlic bulbs which will be harvested in July.

The "hardneck" garlic will also produce garlic scapes. This is an added bonus over "softneck" garlic which produces no scapes. The downside is that hardneck doesn't last as long, but it is easier to turn into garlic powder because the cloves are bigger.

Garlic Garden

These are the scapes that can be used in salads, stir fry, etc.

Garlic Scapes

The deer have been coming around. I would rather that they wouldn't because they will eat my garden when it starts to grow.

Deer in the Front Field

The Robins have to be confused by the snow.



We finally did get to move the raspberry plants, put in the onion sets and planted lettuce & arugula seed this week.  Forecast is for 70's & 80's next week . YEAH!

Two Nor'Easters in Two Weeks in March

After two days of 70 degrees in February, everyone had though that winter was over.  But, NOOOOOO!  Mother nature graced us with three Nor'Easter storms in three weeks.
In January our backyard looked like Spring was coming

Then we got hit with the first March storm on march 7th.
 Below is our patio at night and the next morning.

Total of 15" of wet snow. Had to use the tractor to clear the driveway. Elly says no more winters in new England for her. Looks like we will be heading south next winter.

On March 12th they forecasted another Nor'easter. Here is the projected snow totals. We live in Sterling where I drew the circle. Looke like we will get around 21 inches of snow tomorrow. t

Well, we were hit with another Nor'Easter snow storm!  This time is was over 19" of wet snow.  The snowblower handled it because I cleared the driveway 3 ties during the storm. We also had to clear the patio so that we could feed the birds.

Final cleanup will be tomorrow. Hope it melts soon.
Final cleanup, had to use the tractor on the driveway. will melt to blacktop once the sun hits it.

From the middle of driveway looking toward the road,

Same spot, just spun around and looking at the house.

Tractor & house after final cleanup

Now they say we might be getting another one next week. Hope it just goes out to sea.

Christmas Time

Celebrating Christmas at our house.

Dining room all set up for Christmas Dinner.

leah, Josh, Evan & Elly after opening the "crackers". Celebrating an English Christmas.

Elly's Vintage Christmas display on the bookshelf.

Trans-Siberian Orchestra - DCU Center Worcester

Yesterday, on the day after Thanksgiving,  The Trans-Siberian Orchestra played at the DCU Center in Worcester.  Their CD is a staple on our Christmas playlist.  When we were in California in 2012, we visited a neighborhood of 19 houses all lit up in Christmas lights and blinking in time to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra on our radio. You can check out this blog posting here: CA Christmas Lights

They really know how to put on a show.  The first half of the concert was sort of a musical opera with a Christmas story about a young girl with a narrator.  The second half was just their music.  The lighting and light show was amazing. The back wall of the stage was an entire video screen.  Pieces of the stage move up & down.  A balcony catwalk appeared out of nowhere and the performers and singers were on the catwalk. Here are just a few of the videos that I took that night.

A balcony catwalk appeared out of nowhere and the performers and singers were on the catwalk.

It was a great concert, didn't have to drive far, had great seats, and a wonderful way to spend the day after Thanksgiving getting ready for the Christmas holiday.

Little bit of Trivia:  There are actually 2 Trans-Siberian Orchestras on tour.  One on the East Coast & another on the West Coast.  also, When they are touring a specific area (like new England), they use local youth musicians for the violin string section.  What a trhill that must be for these kids.

String section in the background

Avery Hill Farm, Ledyard, CT - Another Primitive Antique Open House

Today Elly & I ventured out to Ledyard,CT to see another Antique Store that sell primitive American antiques.  The Open House with the house tour was on Friday night, but we had decided to go to our neighbor's live Band House Party instead.  The ride took about 85 minutes.  There were no signage or arrows pointing to to location, but Google Maps showed us the way.

View of the house from the parking lot.  The right side of the house was built first around 1740

They had a few animals, 2 Donkeys, 2 sheep, 2 geese, 2 chickens

Here's lookin' at you!

There were only 3 other cars in the parking lot and we were a little apprehensive that we got the day correct, becuase other that the Open House days, they are only open by appointment.  We were OK that we missed the house tour on Friday.

The antique shop was in the barn, so we walked on up to the shop. Here are a few of the items in the shop.  The prices were very expensive, but we loved looking at all their items.

There were four other ladies talking and as they headed out the door they turned and asked "Do you want to see the house?"  They didn't have to ask twice.  We were going to get a special guided tour of the house without all the crowd that was there the previous night. Yeah!

Living Room

Kitchen with sink, dishwasher (covered by cabinet) and Range with wooden surround

Nice dry sink & bowl collection

Elly admiring a dead fraser fir christmas tree

Dining room

 It was a nice trip and a beautiful house decorated in primitive antiques, worth a trip.