Category Archive for ‘Local’ at eastowners

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Sometimes it doesn’t pay…

Published

dead headphonist

on September 22, 2007

in Local, Politics and Rants

. 2 Comments

Current Mood: F%@k It! & Pickin on the Jones’

I think I’m being taught a life lesson lately, though the ambiguity of it has me confused. The dominant theme, however, seems to be that doing the right thing is the wrong way to go. It’s no wonder so many in this world take the ethical low ground so often and with such zeal. I’ve tried to take the path less beaten numerous times lately and gotten beaten for it. I’m now teetering on the edge of “I can’t blame them.”

Almost, but not quite. Continue reading ‘Sometimes it doesn’t pay…’

Wrapping up Contests Galore

Published

charmaspice

on September 21, 2007

in Contests, Food and Local

. 0 Comments

Current Mood: Ecstatic emoticon Ecstatic

My pal Big Binder has been holding MUCHO contests these past few weeks in her giant effort to get her friends and readers to eat local. She has added a few more contests this week, and has graciously put up a post listing all of them for your ease in entering. Head on over, check them all out….and sign up to win something! Even if you don’t live in our local area, she is willing to work something out in getting you these fine contest winnings. These contests are closing Sunday night at Midnight E.S.T., and she will be doing her drawings on Monday morning. So head on over, look through her 9 contests, and sign up! Do it now :O)

Eat Local Meme: Vegetable Burritos

Published

charmaspice

on September 16, 2007

in Local, Memes and Recipes

. 4 Comments

Current Mood: Happy emoticon Happy & Surprised emoticon Surprised

So, I was tagged by my pal Big Binder to do an Eat Local Meal this week. What this requires is that the majority of your meal comes from within in a 100 mile radius of where you live, and if that’s too hard then at least from the state you live in. The reason being, if you buy and eat local, the majority of your money stays in your local area. Since MI is in such a bad place, the more local things you buy the faster our state will recover.

After some thinking, because it does require thinking to figure out what and where are we going to get local foods, we came up with what we hope to be a tasty Mexican Fiesta! We went to our local greenhouse grocery Horrocks to see what we could find. It didn’t take much looking, or searching for products when we got there…..but thinking of a recipe made me draw a blank - which is why I called on my trusty partner in ~~crime~~ life. Thanks to Brad though, he created what I think is a pretty good meal! So, here’s our recipe for Vegetable Burrito’s ala Brad:

1 1/2 cups Calrose Rice (cook as directed - we use our wonderful rice maker, but you can use the stove. After it’s cooked add the juice of a lime - let steam for a minute or two then add 1/3 cup fresh chopped cilantro, stir well)

1 1/2 cups Black Beans (we found Carlson-Arbogast Farm out of Howard City, MI) Cook as directed, and season with 1tsp. minced garlic (if you do fresh 3-4cloves), 1/4tsp. cumin, 1/4tsp. salt, pepper, 2tsp sugar

1 pepper of each color: Red, Orange, Yellow, and Green (our green peppers came from Brad’s Parent’s garden in Niles - 104 miles away but who’s counting, the others were store bought)

1 Crookneck Squash sliced, and then quarter the slices (Ours is not from within the 100 miles of home, but it’s from Char’s Parent’s garden in Goodells, MI - 164 miles away…hey it was free to us, and something we had on hand)

Saute the peppers & squash in 2 tablespoons Olive oil, add 1/3 cup tequila, salt, pepper, and Fajita Seasoning (all of our spices come from Penzey’s, not local but fabulous!)

1 package of 10″ Flour Tortilla’s (ours were San Marcos from Grand Rapids, MI)

Salsa freshly made by Horrocks

Monterey Jack cheese (also from Horrocks in their local cheese bin) shredded

Steam your tortillas in the microwave for about 1.5 minutes

Build your burritos (by the way this makes about 6 burritos maybe more if you don’t make them too big) by spreading some sour cream on, add the rice, peppers & squash, shredded cheese, and salsa. Wrap up and ENJOY! As a side we also served up our favorite El Matador Tortilla Chips (from Grand Rapids, MI) to dip in our yummy salsa from Horrocks.

Brad did a fabulous job on these, and I hope that we’ll make them again soon. I wish we would have taken a picture of them so you could see our final meal, but it’s a burrito…..do you really need to see it?!?! Everything in our meal was local (if not to our 100 mile area, at least our state) with the exception of the rice, limes, cilantro (maybe?), the seasonings, the tequila, and the colored peppers.

Now, I am supposed to tag 2 people to do this Meme as well. I tag Mom to Two Boys and The Artistic Pursuit of Life on Earth. If the 2 of you actually do this Meme (I sure hope you do…..I’d be interested in seeing what you come up with) please be sure to link back to Eastowners as well as Big Binder. Good Luck, and Happy Cooking!

Contests Galore

Published

charmaspice

on September 14, 2007

in Annoucements, Contests and Local

. 2 Comments

So, apprently September is the month in which the Locavore’s around the world try to promote eating locally. What is a Locavore you ask? It is someone that eats things from within 100 miles of their home. Why eat local…..well, it helps keep the dollars you would normally spend on something from over 1500 miles away (yes, most of our food comes from that far away to our plates) in your local area. There are tons of info on this way of thinking, but most of my info has come from 2 places…..my pal Big Binder and a website that is supporting the Eat Local Challenge in our area: Local First. There are tons of info on the Eat Local Challenge in both of these places. I personally perfer Big Binder, because she sifts through all the info for me! Thanks Big Binder :) She has several posts on the topic, including how to get started. The challenge is supposed to be for 2 weeks, however I think we’ll be lucky to pull together 1 meal in the Eastowner house. It’ll be particularly challenging because we are demi-vegetarian (the only type of meat we eat is fish/shrimp). This weekend I will be making my meal, and then asking someone else to take the challenge! So if you are a reader and would like to be tagged feel free to comment. If not I will be eenie meanie miney moing it!

In the spririt of eating local Big Binder has several contests going on promoting foods that are from our area: Grand Rapids, MI. Head on over and check out the 5 great products that she has up for winning this week. You better hurry because they will end soon!

First Days of Kindergarten

Published

charmaspice

on September 9, 2007

in Annoucements, Family, Kid-friendly, Local and Photos

. 0 Comments

Current Mood: Happy emoticon Happy

I know, it’s been almost over a week since school started…..but things have been busy around here. School started last Tuesday with a 1/2 day. Since she is already in 1/2 day Kindergarten they had 1 hr. and 15 min. of school. I stayed there in their parent room socializing, as there wasn’t far for me to drive before I had to turn around and get her. For those of you that don’t know we chose to send Clare to a Charter Academy for many more opportunites that we thought she wouldn’t get other wise in our fine city’s public schools. I try not to have much against public schools, as that’s once upon a time where I wanted to teach at…..but around here things seemed to have gotten pretty run down and they are still working on getting our schools back in the best order they can be.

Back to Kindergarten……Clare LOVES it, and has great stories to tell me every day. Her teacher is absolutely wonderful, and she is making friends (although she doesn’t remember their names). Some days I feel like a Die Hard Mom….the brute that just drops her kid off and goes away with no feelings of being upset at all that she’s in Kindergarten. Yeah, I had a realization that my baby was in Kindergarten a month a go, but I’m over it and ready to resume life as it was meant to be. She goes to school and I enjoy 3.5 hours of ME time. Some times the time isn’t used for me, I do errands or grocery shop, but I revel in the time that is all mine. There have been many mom’s outside the school this week going “I wonder how their doing”……their fine! Clare goes in every day without hesitation, says, “Bye Mom, Love ya!” and goes on her way. I am still boggled as to why they think it’s such a big adjustment for their children. I don’t want to sound heartless, as I am not…..but COME ON! I am a firm believer in the bigger deal you make about it, the more stress you are putting on your child.

Okay, I’ll step off my Soap Box now.

This Ol’ Domicile Saga : Day 0.5

Published

dead headphonist

on September 7, 2007

in Housework, Local and Rants

. 2 Comments

Current Mood: Tired of Everything

Grr… so we’ve been working frantically to gather the funds needed to fix our house. I thought I had the solution in the bag; I was approved for a home equity loan pending what is called a “desk top appraisal”. That didn’t go so well. Apparently, my house has lost 30-odd thousand dollars in the past year. Yeah for me. The appraisal came back at $1000 less than we paid for the house five years ago. Not good.

And now I’m asking myself why I didn’t just continue renting… too late now I guess.

So now it’s off to see what things I can sell to get this done and get some improvements done to the house so I can continue on my merry way of consolidating some debt and living the American Dream, whatever the fuck that means.

That graph makes me sick inside. Michigan is such an economical wasteland.

Greenest City?

Published

dead headphonist

on September 6, 2007

in Local

. 0 Comments

Current Mood: Shocked emoticon Shocked

So apparently, according to LEED ratings, Grand Rapids, as far as building design, is the greenest city in the US. Here’s some linkage for your perusal. Thanks to the Grand Rapids Photo Blog for finding this.

The Much Needed Date Night & Good Times

Published

charmaspice

on August 25, 2007

in Alcohol, Date-Night, Local and Music

. 0 Comments

Current Mood: Eat Drink Smiley & Happy emoticon Happy & Lovey

Last night we booked our babysitter for a much needed date night. It’s actually been some time since we’ve been able to have a night out as we’ve had a lot going on this summer. We left home wondering what to do for dinner, I made mention of Roses on Reeds Lake in East Grand Rapids. Brad said there was no way we’d get in, as it’s always busy….not to mention on a Friday night. Apparently we got there at a good time because we were seated with no problem. We started out the night with a pitcher of sangria…..YUM! For an appetizer we had the Cheese of the Day which was a baked bri served with toasted cranberry walnut bread, apple slices, grapes, and quince (which is like a jelly spread). It was super yummy and a great way to start out a meal. Because I went with a small plate for dinner I had a Baby Spinach Salad which had sun-dried cherries, red onion, gorgonzola, tosted pine nuts & balsamic vinaigrette. And my Small Plate was Sesame Seared Ahi Tuna with ginger-soy glazed edamame, pearl onions & cashews, with sriracha & sweet soy around the plate. I WISH we had taken a picture of it before I started eating, however I was so eager to try it I dug in with an eager palate. It was ~~wonderful~~ ~~fabulous~~ unbelievably tasty! Brad has a picture of my polished plate on his phone….I’m sure it’ll make it in his blog later this afternoon. I got a head start blogging this AM because I was woken up at 6:30am by our darling daughter. I dozed for a while, but then I was startled awake again to help put “planting pants” on Barbie at 7:30am.

Anyway, back to my review of the evening. We’ve been on the look out for Burnett’s flavored Vodka lately, and it’s hard to find around town as it’s WAY bottom shelf stuff. However, we heard rumor of a great new liquor store up on Alpine just North of the Best Buy & York Creek Apt.’s (our old home sweet home). They of course had the Burnett’s and much more! We picked up Coconut, Grape, & Watermelon for our weekend consumption. It was kinda funny, the lady was like “Having a party?” I said, ”No… we just like to drink.”

We got in the car and decided to head back into Eastown to try our local Hookah Lounge. We went to one out in AZ with Larry & Meghan and that was lots of fun, and it’s VERY relaxing. We ordered up 2 pineapple-strawberry smoothies and a hookah with raspberry flavored goodness. Once again Brad took photos on his phone, I’m sure they’ll be up. We were obviously the oldest people in the room, not that it’s a problem for us…..but we were definitely the people we stared at a decade ago ( or at least I stared at ). We got in contact with a friend that was downtown at a show, and decided to join the party after our hookah was finished.

After some smokin’ we got in the car and headed downtown to The Intersection to see The North Mississippi All Stars with some of the Geek friends. The show was pretty good I must say…..I don’t like all of their music, but most of it is pretty good…especially their newer stuff. They are though one of Brad’s favorite band, and for a chance to let him see them I would go and enjoy the company of our drunk annoying friends and have a few drinks myself. We stayed until the end, and it made me want to come home to watch Back Snake Moan. We didn’t watch it last night, but I foresee it in our future movie watchings. It was a night of randomness for us, but it was oh so enjoyed by me. I miss being able to wander around town on a whim doing what we do best…..finding interesting things to do. Maybe once things settle down this Fall we’ll be able to get back into do some things for us again.

The Fire Fighters VS the Politician VS the SAHM

Published

charmaspice

on August 21, 2007

in Local

. 1 Comment

Current Mood: Angry emoticon Angry

First off, let me say that I have nothing against fire fighters…..as most of you know my dad & brother are both in the field, and I am very proud of that and normally wouldn’t come accross harshly on the job. However, today I had the WORST experiece at a fire house ever. As a MOMS Club activity we had arranged to have a tour done this morning for the kids. What kid doesn’t enjoy going to see the fire trucks, getting to sit in one, and have mom flash the camera taking pictures of it all? This tour was pre arranged so it wasn’t like we were just stopping by random fire houses around town dropping in begging for a tour. I am assuming they were told the age range of our fair young citizens, and what we might expect out of a tour. We showed up at 10 am with our fire station smiles on, cameras in hand, very happy to be there and maybe learn something new. I had never been in any of the fire stations down town, so I thought it might be kind of neat to see one. On other occasions we’ve ventured out to Kentwood and the like. So, we sat there while the 3 guys tossed around who was going to do our tour….”No you get to do the tour.” Finally it was deemed that we’d follow, Oh we’ll call him Bob, around. They sounded their call siren so to say, so that way if they did have a call we’d know what it sounded like so we could get out of the way and let them get on their fire run. Then Bob led us to the kitchen area, he politely showed us the table where they sat, the living room of sorts they used, and then the comments came. Bob said, “Well, ya know I’m sure most of you voted recently and since you voted for Mayor Heartwell we’ll have even less fire fighters here.” “Sometimes we have 3, maybe 1 person at the station, and sometimes none.” The question was asked of Bob about part time or volunteer fire fighters, and Bob proclaimed, “No, only full timers work at this station…..and since the mayor stopped funding us we don’t get much help, so it may take some time for us to make a call.” Some of us moms had disgusted looks on our faces, come on we were there for a tour not a political debate! What really made me angry is, there are tons of service people in this country that are under paid, under funded, and over worked…..and the people that should be held accountable are the presidents & his cronies, not us. If we’re going to point fingers, maybe we should be pointing them at George Bush. Anyway, we were then commenting on their grocery list on their white board, and telling the kids what they had on it. Bob jumps in and says, “Yeah, we have to chip in every month and buy our own groceries, and sometimes it’s not much.” Finally we got him to move the tour on…..we were hoping that they would show us some gear, nope….maybe let the kids get in the fire truck for a picture, nope…….can they at least see the oxygen mask you wear in a fire, nope. They had 4 vehicles in the station, 1 of which is the only one that is in service…..and still no kids allowed. Finally one of them got into his gear, but it was just his pants, jacket, and hat. They kept proclaiming that most of it was over their heads, and there was no need to give that information. People that aren’t around children don’t really understand that there’s nothing they CAN’T understand. You might have to simplify it a little…but they’ll get it. It just made me angry that he wrote all of our children off because he didn’t keep their attentions….oh that’s right he doesn’t get paid enough because of the mayor we voted for. Why is it that politics have to ruin my good day! Instead of sulking though, we all went to the park for some morning fun and running around. They all needed it because of all this rain we’ve had. I think I need a cocktail now though.

Eastown Photos

Published

dead headphonist

on August 20, 2007

in Local

. 0 Comments

While waiting for a backup to complete this morning, I was cruising Flickr and randomly searched for “eastown” out of curiosity. It came up with this. It’s quite a nice pictorial of our little corner of earth.

Thanks to the Grand Rapids Photo Blog for providing some more time-wasting entertainment for my Monday morning. They have a cool pic of the sunrise up right now, by the way.