New Foods

In which I overachieve, and not only eat new foods, but cook them too (#83).

Over the past couple of years, I have become a much less picky eater. I am trying to continue that trend because I feel like it will open up more choices — at home and away, healthy and not so healthy. I’ve recently been watching my nephew refuse to eat most food that is offered to him, unless said food is drenched in ketchup.

In order to make “meh” foods more exciting, I’ve been experimenting with roasting (cauliflower), soups (butternut squash, zucchini), and, of course, cocktails (bloody mary with V8 left over from chili). It has introduced a different mood in my meal planning and a different mindset in my kitchen. Without realizing it, I choose and cooked three entirely new foods over the past months. First there was the spaghetti squash experiment. Then the fish tacos. And finally, we just grilled eggplant, something I’ve always avoided in the past.

Now, these aren’t risky foods by normal standards, but they are all things that I would not have eaten a couple of years ago, and are therefore risky by my standards. Perhaps there’s hope that we can expose our future kids to a wider variety of foods. If I demonstrate a willingness to experiment and take a chance on something new, hopefully the mindset will rub off, even if none of us ever gain any real enthusiasm for the foods in question. I don’t love any of these three, but each were good enough to attempt again. Good enough, even, that I’m excited to attempt again — I might be able to tweak things so that they are fulfilling and tasty with no caveats.

In addition, I enjoy that moment of realizing I completed one of my goals without making a big point to do so. Small challenges like this may not seem like much, but they can make a big difference in my motivation towards the rest of my list and the rest of my life. This goal, like all these goals, was about more than the three foods. It is about recognizing small ways that I wish I were different and taking action — no matter how small. I’m cultivating control and responsibility through my life.

One new food at a time.

One Year Down!

In which I reach the halfway point in my plan to track my credit (#15).

I have completed one year of two for checking my credit reports. Obviously, this was mainly to help us gear up for house buying, but I hope to keep it up once we are all settled. I did find an error to be corrected on my first report. Even requesting that fix was entirely painless, so there is no reason that I can’t hold to my schedule for a long period of time.

Second Soup

In which I post about the second new soup recipe of five (#73).

One night back in March, we were very behind on running our dishwasher and had to pull out our wedding china to taste the new soup recipe I was attempting. Turns out that the recipe was worth the bit of glam — this Avgolemono is definitely worth a try. The freshness of the lemon juice and basil make it perfect for the spring weather. You can see that I got half way through my bowl before I even remembered to take a picture of it. The leftovers were just as delicious.

I can’t wait to make this again. Want to give it a try? Check out the recipe here.

Botanical Gardens

In which I post about my new membership (#69).

The hubs and I got out of the house this weekend and headed over to the Norfolk Botanical Gardens. We really enjoyed being members of the botanical gardens back in Richmond, so I was excited to see our new surroundings. The two gardens are very different — NBG feels much more like a sprawling park. There’s a lot more water, not surprisingly, but there are also more wooded areas and grassy nooks. There were more flowers in Richmond, but I think we’ll do better hanging out and reading here. It was a nice day, but we were able to get away from people for long periods of our wandering.

I took lots of pictures, and we really enjoyed ourselves. We decided to take advantage of the membership on that day, since our admission would be subtracted from the purchase price. We got the family membership, which means that we’ll each have cards that will get a car with up to six people in for free. We also get discounts in the gift shop, which of course I am excited about.

We still have plenty left to see for the first time, too. The gift shop was closed by the time we left, and we only saw a portion of the gardens. They have picnic shelters that I’m sure we’ll make use of, and a cafe that we didn’t even see. I am excited to explore it and take visitors in. I’m sure there are favorite areas in there just waiting to be found.

I’m also excited about becoming members. We’ve had great success with memberships when trying to have a full life while keeping costs down. If we each go out to the gardens four times over the next year, the membership will be paid for in full. It’s the first thing we’ve committed to doing fairly regularly here, and I feel like I’m finally excited over something in this area besides the beach. This membership probably won’t lead to meeting many people, but it does provide discounts on classes and programs that might. It is a step, and every step counts.

Another Movie

In which I post about a goal I’ve already completed, because I underestimated how many movies were a challenge (#59).

Unless you live under a rock, you’ve probably heard this a ton of times, but man did we love The Artist. We saw it a while back, but it will be released on video near the end of June, so now’s a great time to put it back on your radar (or Netflix queue). It was just so very interesting, we talked about it a lot after we’d seen it. I can definitely understand why it got so much critical acclaim and awards — most of the time those are things that I take as a bad sign.