Monday, May 11, 2009

... in which I talk about a LOT more than plants!

Alright, after months (months!) of procrastination, I'm finally ready to start this blog up! And what better place to start than ... a bit about myself!

I'm Cait, and I'm a 28 year old graduate student. I'm originally from Germany, and I moved to West Virginia three years ago for an M.A. degree in TESOL (Teaching Enlish to Students of Other Languages), which I've since completed. I'm now on my second M.A., this one in English literature. These past three years, I've also been teaching undergrad German, which has been a lot of fun. I don't know yet whether I'll be teaching this next year or whether I'll just focus on my studies. Oh well..... we'll see!

I started being obsessed with houseplants about a year ago, so I'm pretty far from an expert. But most of my plants are doing well, and I love them dearly. Some of them I've grown from seed... this past December, I planted some Rainbox Mix Coleus, look how cute they were when they were all little!



Here are some of those same plants a few months later, one of them actually flowering. Yay!



They live in a southeast facing window in my kitchen, and seem pretty happy.

Now, the current excitement in my life is that om May 31st, I'll be moving from my tiny apartment with very few good windows into a house (with my boyfriend) that has TONS of windows, MUCH better light, and even a little front porch. Whooo!! Man, you have no idea how much worse my plant obsession is gonna get.

Hmm. So when I started this blog, I really thought I'd want to talk mostly about plants. However, I'm a person who is easily excited by stuff and who loves to try out new things! So... I might have to either start another blog connected to this one, or else just ramble about EVERYTHING in here. Hehe. Just to give you an idea, here is an incomplete list of other stuff I do/would post about:

- I'm a pescetarian, and I LOVE to cook. So most likely you'll find a lot of recipes and food experiments on here. Particularly, I've recently gotten into making my own meat substitutes instead of buying expensive, mass-produces crap. It doesn't always turn out right, but that's what experimenting is for!

- I also just started sprouting! I'm a sprouting newbie and have only tried lentils so far, but they are DELICIOUS! Once I move, I'll be sprouting a bunch of stuff, and I'll document it here!

- I just bought a bread machine, and holy crap! It's my new favorite toy. I make tons of bread now, and I'll certainly share recipes and mouth-watering pictures of my successes!

- I'm a big fan of cultured foods, and I make my own kefir and kombucha at home. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, There's gonna be a post coming up on those soon!

- I got into roasting green coffee beans at home, which is much tastier and cheaper than buying good coffee. And guess what: you can do that with a cheap old popcorn air popper! Tutorial coming soon! =)


Alright.... This shall be it for now, even though there's tons more! Let's see whether I get any sort of response to this, I'm new at this whole blog thing! See ya's!

3 comments:

  1. This is awesome! Between you and Jenny, I might be persuaded to start trying to grow things again sometime soon. (All my past experiments have failed miserably.)

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  2. Oh wow...this will be such a great blog! I am interested in all of these things! I usually sprout alfalfa seeds. I have a bread machine too! It is for only 1 pound loaves, but I could adapt the recipes! I adore Lifeway Kefir! Love all of the flavors! Would love to learn how to make it, if you do that! I am a blackberry lover, so blackberry kefir would be awesome!!!

    Your coleus are really beautiful! If you pinch out the blooms it will make your plant fuller and more lush! I always hate to do that because I love the cute blooms too! :)

    Congrats on all of your degrees! My son is in the Army stationed in Germany. I got to take my daughter over for a visit a year ago. I Loved it there!!! Absolutely gorgeous with all of the small villages! Very eco-conscious too!

    Keep your blog going...and remember you can have it be whatever YOU want it to be! Just have fun!

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  3. Misty: You totally should! I love growing stuff! ANYTHING! Be it plants of slimy kombucha scobies, haha! =D

    Julie: Oh I know about pinching the Coleus flowers.... but yeah, just like you said, it's so hard to do! I compromised with this arrangement... I pinched the ones in front, and I let the back one grow. I think it looks kinda cool that way! =) And aww, you just made me miss Germany! Hehe. Where is your son stationed? I went to college in Bamberg, it has a base, and so do a bunch of towns around it! From your description, hw could very well be nearby! =)

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