Happy Thursday!!

I did mean to write this pretty much the day after the last post… life clearly had other plans however! So in the interests of those left salivating over the kitchen prep on the last one, here’s what came from out gallant efforts in the kitchen. Christie and Nikki do vegan lasagne! I would say ‘raw’ lasagne but I did cook up a mean nutritional (savoury) yeast (cheese-less) ‘cheese’ sauce! I say ‘cheese’ because I’m sure that unassuming cheese eaters would not spot the difference if it was layered in anyway! That and I caught my ‘meat-eating, milk-drinking, McDonald loving chef flat-mate’ with his fingers in the pot! HA! Go nutritional yeast!!

So we layered the eggplant, sliced broccoli, green leaves, and alternated with pesto, tomato sauce and drizzled in the cheese-less sauce!! It was so scrumptious! I think my favourite part was that I knew where every ingredient came from (including from my back yard!), had prepared each part of the whole and when it came together… YUMM!!!! The whole is definitely more than the sum of its parts!!! Although in this case I think I may have been just as happy consuming each (and every) part!!!

TA DA!!!

Well unfortunately Christie has now left Cairns! I really didn’t want her to leave, it was a bit quiet and I missed her presence immediately! But, life goes on, and so do my healthy habits! I was so fortunate to have at least a week of Christie’s precious time to reinforce, educate, inspire, motivate, infiltrate, dedicate, appreciate and invigorate myself! Christie would probably have to be one of the best “best influence” people I have ever met! I have certainly met a lot of not so savoury influence people in my time, even encountered a few bad influence people, but not so many fantastic influence people. Christie is definitely one of those rare fabulously inspirational, get your ass up off your life and get into it people! Go Christie! It’s amazing what gets me excited now… big colourful salads are SO much more appetising, greens on sale at the markets may as well be a 50% off shoe sale, and when I walked into ‘Where Your Health Matters’ to pick up my Tuesday Takeaway, my impulse items were an organic avocado (mmm so ripe cant wait to eat it later!), a couple of organic tomatoes and for something special a couple of cute little hot peppers in green and orange/yellow! Hello?? I don’t know where my former incarnation is hiding, but I hope she stays there!! HAHAHA!!

Tahini miso dressing!! MMM…

yummy salad

I am also pleased to report that my propensity to follow the influence of others has once again stuck! The nice thing I’ve found is that the more these good influence things stick, the less I am even remotely interested in the not so great influence things! YAY! But back to the point… I have been awake early every morning to meditate, then up to do some yoga and stretching! I have up until this morning then had tea, a green smoothie and started my walk to pick up the car (which lives in my partners garage) to go about my day.

This morning however I changed that up a bit because I didn’t need to walk anywhere to pick up his (other) baby!! Yesterday I took a HUGE leap, packed a HUGE amount of junk that seems to come from everywhere and nowhere, and transported all of my worldly possessions to his home! (Thank goodness for the beautiful ute!) Thankfully getting it in was SO MUCH EASIER at his end, carrying everything down my stairs, across the yard, out the gate and into the ute, vs, pulling up in front of the door (of the ground floor apartment) and unloading directly into the front room! YAY! Needless to say that the boxes full of everything that was hidden away are now safely tucked (hidden) away in the spare room until I take the plunge to unpack! Which will probably be a good idea while he’s still away than attempting it with a (loving and wonderful) man watching over my shoulder!! HAHA

Sunset walk on the Esplanade

One of the most lovely things about Alex’s apartment (apart from Alex when he’s here!) is that it’s literally around the corner from where the Cairns Esplanade starts. So my walk this morning was around the corner and then a barefoot walk along the sand and back! It’s amazing how much of  a difference it makes being able to walk barefoot directly out the door, rather than navigating the 3 main roads and all the streets in between just to get there first! More sand time! I can walk morning and evening on the ‘beach’! YAY!!

I came home to make a delicious green smoothie and figure out my day! My need to live in a clean dwelling has possibly offended the flat-mate who resides here (and has until yesterday been quite content to live in his own filth while Alex is away!). He was also up very early to get out of the house! Haha! Thankfully though, I think maybe change is in the air! Last night (after I cleaned the house) he finally walked the box of his empty beer bottles that has been overflowing in the corner of the porch (for the last 2months!!!) the whole 18m to the trash bin!!! YAY!! I didn’t ask, I didn’t say or do a thing! He got the last laugh though…. this morning while meditating I was distracted by this awful droning sound, it took me a minute to recognise, THE GARBAGE MAN!! Haha, I ran out in my slippers and pyjamas, (something I haven’t done since I was a teenager and taking out the bins was my ‘job’) much to the bemusement of passing motorists to put the wheelies in the street! HAHAHA!

Spring Rolls & Sauce

Ooh… a little way up I mentioned Tuesday takeaways!! Well I placed my order this week and was lovingly prepared some ‘spring rolls’ with a dipping sauce, and a couple of apple-cinammon-ginger cookies for dessert!! Well…. the spring rolls were divine! I was handed a take-away container with four rolls, each a combination of julienned carrot, zucchini, red pepper, red cabbage, baby corn spears wrapped in a bok choy leaf and tied up with a strip of nori! The dipping sauce was a cashew nut cream base (I believe) with hints of chilli, ginger and I almost want to say a hint of lemongrass maybe?!?! I ate 2 last night as an entrée, and lunch today was the other two with a big luscious salad!!

…cookies…

I’m sitting down right now with a cup of herbal tea and the cookies to try them out… not bad! They are really moist, have a lovely grainy kinda crunch to the texture, there’s a good amount of spice (cinnamon, ginger, maybe some nutmeg?!?) without it being too much, but as much as I love my tea after lunch I think these would go perfectly with a cup of coffee!

Well I think I’ve sufficiently entertained, or bored you, to the point of needing a coffee yourself perhaps! I can recommend a few local ones up here if you’re interested! hehe! As for me, sunshine becons! Hope you have a fantastic Thursday, speak to you soon!

NM.