I haven’t had much to write about in regards to food because we haven’t been properly cooking for a while.  Family meals were very accommodating, even going past my expectations.  New Year’s eve we spent at Shawn’s parent’s house playing Wii sports and eating food.  Shawn’s Mom made an additional batch of her sausage balls using fake sausage!  They tasted the same as last year when we ate the meat variety :)  Day after Christmas we had egg casserole (no meat) and potatoes at Shawn’s sister’s house.  We ate lots of food and I’d guess I gained at least 5 lbs if not more.  Oh well.

It’s six days until our trip to Disney World.  I’ve put in a hold on our mail, bought an automatic pet bowl for Molly and planned as much as I can tolerate.  We don’t have any dining reservations because neither of us what to commit to a particular park each day.  We may regret this, but we’ll learn from whatever happens.  We did get the dining plan added to our tickets, so we don’t have to fret over shelling out so much money for meals while there.  I’m anxious to say the least.  It’s also been almost ten years since I last flew on a plane.

I got the neck pain again from the bed bowing down the center.  Our tempur-pedic mattress is fabulous, but our Ikea bedframe has trouble supporting it (the same way our platform bed before it did).  We have propped up the center beam with a crate and a bunch of phone books, but the top book became crimped, so the bed bowed again.  It’s fixed now using old shelves, but the damage was done on my neck.  I resorted to a chiropractor on 12/29.  He “cracked” neck and back stuff, which initially hurt.  Took x-rays and put me on a machine that made my back muscles spazm.  The next day I ached, but by Friday I felt so much better!  Friday he showed me my x-ray results and my spine is a zig-zag, my neck is inverted as if I had been in a car accident (he said), but I can’t think of anything recent that would have caused that.  I’ll be going a lot for a while to fix all this, which I expect to fix many of the other problems I’ve been having.  My head congestion has improved already after two visits.  Unfortunately it all drained down my throat last night though.

Between this and the dental work I still need done, it’s going to be an expensive year.  Too bad my health insurance doesn’t cover more of it.  It almost makes me regret the Disney trip, but that can’t be helped now, so I shall just relax and have fun!

We’ve decided to get a meal plan for our trip.  Once i did the math it’s not a bad deal.  The more I priced meals, the more I realised we’d be spending.  The plan we are getting will be $40 per person/per day, with us being able to eat in sit down restaurants.  I think I will actually have to PLAN more than I wanted to because I will need to make reservations at restaurants.  Someday soon Shawn and I will sit down and review the vegetarian options and which parks we may want to go to on which days.  The only thing I have already planned is that we will go to The Magic Kingdom the day we arrive because they have evening extra magic hours that day.

I was so excited after we booked the trip, but for the past weeks or so I haven’t been as excited.  I blame this on not feeling 100%.  Today I am thinking my “sicky” feeling may be entirely the weather.  This morning I felt like crap while it was foggy, rainy and grey.  Around lunchtime the sun came out and the weather cleared up and I actually feel a bit better.  hmmm

We went to Kim’s Korean last week with one of our restaurant.com coupons and had soups that made me feel better.  They told us that they are getting many more vegetarians lately and they are going to expand the menu to feature a vegetarian section!  I couldn’t help, but wonder whether or not my raving about their food and vegetarian-friendliness around the internet helped that? *ponder ponder*  I keep meaning to tell them about how I tell everyone online about them, but can’t think of how to mention it.

I’m trying to think of what recipes we’ve made at home, but I can’t think of anything new.  We made a vindaloo in the slow cooker I have made before and I honestly cannot remember past that.  I really haven’t been feeling well.

Well that’s all for today, sorry for not updating more often!

I am just a little excited that Shawn & I will be going to Disney World, Orlando this January.  When I say “a little excited” I really mean that I get butterflies daily thinking of what we will see and do!  I have never been there and Shawn doesn’t really remember it, so it will be new and exciting for us both.  I’ve been to Disneyland, but the last time I was there I was 16 years old (20 years ago).  I barely remember it really, just snippets like a dream.

Since I got a Zune I have been subscribing to every Disney World related podcast I can find.  I read about vegetarian options at the restaurants, tips for what shows and events to check out and such.  I don’t have anything much to say about the trip yet, but I figured I could compile some of my info here and if anyone has tips please comment.

Here are tips I’ve heard so far:

• we need to get our first time pins, I forget where to get those.
• I am told there is a passport you can buy to have stamped in the different “countries” in Epcot.

That’s it so far.

This recipe for vegetarian beef stew was wonderful!!  Next time I will brown the morningstar farm beef strips longer.  After simmering it for a long time the beef strips broke down a lot and lost the texture.  For the part that says

2 cups vegetable broth
2 cups reconstituted vegetarian ‘beef’ bullion

I used Better than Bouillon no beef base for the whole amount instead.

It flavor was just like my Mom’s stew I grew up on!  It was wonderful!

Turk’y Leftovers!

Quorn brand vegetarian Turk’y roast really looks & tastes like turkey. I think it tastes better cold that warm