Hey all.

As much as I love writing about Austin, I will be away from Austin for a year (and so will be taking a year long hiatus from this blog).

I will still be writing, but I’ll be devoting my energy to my travel blog. There are also sections on my new site dedicated to vegan travel. I’ll be adding info to them as I go along, so please check them out if you’re interested:

CircleOurEarth.com

Thanks for reading!

-Cristen

I finally updated my photos from our vegan potlucks. You can check them out here.

There are probably still some unidentified photos floating around on my computer (I still haven’t figured out the best organization system for all the hundreds of food photos I take on a weekly basis), but for the most part…they’re all there. I’ll continue adding photos as I find them.

If you’ve ever eaten at a restaurant with me, you’ve probably noticed that I always photograph my food. This is so I can write food reviews for each place I visit. There are lots of sites that review restaurants, but not many sites that review them from a vegan perspective. This is my goal.

You’ll notice that I just added a new link at the top titled “Food Reviews”. I have lots of new places to add, so I’ll be playing catch up over the next few weeks. Here you can check out the Austin Food Reviews I have so far. If you have any suggestions of places you think I should visit, let me know!

-Cristen

Hey all. While I’m on the topic of cats, my kitty needs a temporary home! If any of you know of a good person for the job, please please let me know!

Here are the details:

I am leaving the country at the end of September and will be traveling around the world for exactly 1 year. You can view my route here: http://circleourearth.com/about/my-route
I’m desperately seeking a kind, trustworthy person to be a foster parent for my kitty, Pandora.

I’ve had Dora for over 6 years. She’s very affectionate, talkative, quirky, and amusing. Her interests include cuddling on laps, chasing bugs, stealing soybeans off my plate, lounging around like a drunk old man, and sleeping in the strangest positions for as many hours as possible. Pandora absolutely loves people but unfortunately cannot tolerate other animals. She’s a really easy cat to take care of – she just requires food, water, love, and a stable living situation without other pets.

If you’ll be in Austin for the next year, you like cats (but don’t currently have any), and would like a free furry friend for a year, I would love to hear from you!
I’ll of course give you money for all her living expenses and bring you cool gifts from my travels.

Please Contact Me:
Cristen: 512-731-8544
cristenrene@gmail.com

I while back, I wrote a blog post about some terribly injured kittens that I found and was taking care of. Since then, I’ve been getting lots of emails from people wondering how they’re doing. I realized it’s been a year since I’ve written about these little guys, so it’s definitely time for an update.

Fidel (aka Snake Plissken) escaped from Miguel’s screen porch the first day we brought him home. He was missing for about a week until we found out he had found his own wonderful home with Miguel’s neighbor Bonnie (who is now our good friend). His eyeball has healed almost completely and he’s super happy in his new home.

Captain Ron was adopted by our friend Ada. She’s extremely energetic, playful and unpredictable. When we found Captain Ron, she barely had the energy to lift up her head. Now she enjoys jumping all over the furniture, climbing up Ada’s blinds, and playing with whatever she can get her paws on (in the picture above, she’s stealing my camera cord as I’m trying to take a picture of her).

If you’re interested, here are previous posts I’ve written about these kittens:

7-3-2007

7-6-2007

7-18-2007

Sorry for the long hiatus.

Here’s a fun picture of a cookie cake I made this weekend for my sister’s birthday. I made two different types of cookie dough (this one and this one). Then I got carried away with the icing and blueberries, and it ended up looking like a bunch of evil eyes.

I’m sad I haven’t been able to post in a while, but I’m having trouble uploading pictures all of a sudden. Hopefully my problem will be fixed soon.

As soon as I figure this out, I will cover these topics:

1.) Vegan Biscuits

2.) Titaya’s Thai Food

3.) Vegan Camping Food Ideas

My friend Sarah recently recently returned from Panama. While she was there, she met a group of women artisans who live in an isolated jungle village and make these amazing bags woven from organic plant material. Since she met them, her goal has been to empower these women by helping them sell their bags.

You can learn more about this project on her blog, where she charts her progress towards her goal of making a luxury brand of handmade, fair trade, and 100% environmentally responsible bags.

http://www.bagsmakeadifference.com/

My trip is finally booked!

Here is my itinerary. If anyone knows people in these places or has recommendations of things to do, I’d love to hear from you. I plan to blog about my search for vegan food while on the road. Advice is welcome.

Oct 1: Los Angeles, US – Auckland, New Zealand

Oct 29: Auckland, New Zealand – Perth, Australia

Nov 26: Perth, Australia – Osaka, Japan

Dec 20: Osaka, Japan – Beijing, China

Jan 13: Kunming, China – Bangkok, Thailand

Feb 24: Bangkok, Thailand – Penang, Malaysia

March 20: Penang, Malysia – Madras, India

• buy round trip flight to Borneo

April 18: Bombay, India – Istanbul, Turkey

April 28: Istanbul, Turkey – Damascus, Syria

May 22: Aleppo, Syria – Cairo, Egypt

June 19: Cairo, Egypt – Athens, Greece

July 17: Athens, Greece – Zagreb, Croatia

August 10: Zagreb, Croatia – Copenhagen, Denmark

• buy round trip flight to Iceland

September 8: Copenhagen, Denmark – London, England

September 30: London, England – Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

I don’t feel like writing, so I’m just going to post this pretty picture.

My friend made this for breakfast the other day. Not sure what all was in it – he mentioned something about flax seeds, hempseed oil, asafoetida powder, and beets.

It was good!