Okay, so I have a really good excuse for not blogging. I started grad school, and the first 2 weeks were an intensive on campus residency with days that started at 5am and didn’t typically end until midnight or so. All free moments were spent studying or sleep walking!
FOOD
The university dining did a great job of making me fantastic vegan meals. Everything from tofu with grilled veggies to yummy curry. One thing though – no vegan junk food or desserts! That’s okay (don’t need the junk), but I’ll admit I’ve been craving a vegan cupcake for days!!






We went to the historic Mitchie Tavern – which is a buffet of very southern food. D – the ever amazing husband – called them and arranged a special meal for me! I had black eyed peas, green beans, baked potato, boiled beets, and this ridiculous Spanish gazpacho that I could eat by the gallon…
One of the fun things was answering all the questions from my 27 classmates about my eating habits. One of my cohort is a vegetarian, but the rest are all traditional food eaters. When describing being vegan, it became easier to say “no food with faces” or “nothing that had a mother”. There were a few deeper conversations about why I’m vegan (if I was asked). I found everyone to be incredibly supportive, and it was very nice. I don’t expect people to go out of their way for me (I did have some food with me, and there’s always the salad bar), but they definitely did.
FITNESS
Going to try not to laugh here. I did actually manage one yoga class, some in-room yoga, and two runs. Quite honestly, during those two weeks, it reminded me of Navy boot camp, but instead of my muscles hurting, my brain did!
I have to say though, I started enjoying my 5 am wake up call. I mean – not really – but I got a ton done in those 2 hrs before breakfast! I’m hoping to keep that as a habit.
LIFE
Okay, so yeah – big bomb dropped above. Sorry for no lead into that one over the past few months. Needless to say, I’m really excited and quite busy. Now that the first residency is over, there’s hopefully more of a groove that’ll allow my blogging to be steady again. Next residency is in December (in Brazil!), so that’ll be cool!
It was hard being away from my family for 2 weeks. We had a 25 hour period where we were off, and D came up to visit (my university is about 3 hours away). It was awesome. I have to say that my classmates are completely amazing too – crazy how close you can grow to people when you live with them for 2 weeks!
I did miss M starting university though, and that was quite upsetting. He’s doing great and loves it. He’s also in honors college and is a tutor!
I got home from school late on Friday night, and on Sunday hopped a plane. I go home Thursday, and aside from the occasional overnighter for work, should mostly be home until my Brazil trip.
So until then, here are some pics of the past few weeks, and an upcoming post will be another book giveaway – of one I relied on quite a bit while away from home!! Stay tuned for that 🙂





And a couple pics from the adventures in my program!





Peace friends ~
Crissie