Vegan MoFo #4: Pet Stores vs. Animal Shelters

What's better: buying an animal from a pet store or rescuing from a shelter?

Obviously, rescuing pets from shelters is the better option. But what if you are at a pet store and you fall in love with an adorable puppy there? Should you buy it? After all, that puppy needs a home too! 

Here's the thing. My family has gotten 2 of the 3 dogs we've had from the pet store. We rescued 1 of our dogs from the pound. All of them of been very loving and wonderful pets. Why does it matter?

Since going vegan, I've decided that when I get my own pet, I will be rescuing from an animal shelter. According to peta.org, "Every year in the U.S., an estimated 6 to 8 million lost, abandoned, or unwanted dogs and cats enter animal shelters." These animals then only have a short time to be adopted because they must be euthanized to make room for the other animals being brought to the shelter. This is SO sad, and approximately 3 to 4 millions cats and dogs must be euthanized every year. Even the no kill shelters aren't much better - they keep animals in cramped cages for weeks, months, and years on end. 

Even though I LOVE the dogs I've gotten from the pet store and they have been some of the most fun and obedient pets ever, it makes me sad that I'm supporting animal overpopulation and puppy mills. :(

My puppy, Piper, playing with her dinosaur toy!

In puppy mills, the dogs are often kept in cramped cages with no bedding or protection from the weather. The mothers are forced to breed over and over until they can no longer produce puppies. At that point, they are no longer needed and are auctioned off or killed. Many suffer from illness and diseases due to lack of nutrition and care. 

According to peta.org, there are three reasons for companion animal overpopulation: "Many people fail to spay or neuter their dogs and cats, who then reproduce, creating enormous numbers of kittens and puppies. People still buy animals from breeders or pet stores (thereby supporting the puppy mills that supply them) instead of adopting homeless animals. And people acquire companion animals without considering the lifetime commitment that caring for them requires. Eventually, people turn their backs on their loyal companions when they become "inconvenient" or "too much work."" 

How can you help prevent more overpopulation right now? Get your pet spayed or neutered! This will help SO much. We don't need more animals in the world when there are so many who need good homes. Their lives depend on us. Without a home, they'll die. 

So, when I buy my own puppy, I plan on adopting from a local shelter or animal refuge. I'll be happy because I got a new friend and helped save a life, and the animal will be happy because it has a loving home where it can run, play, and be free to live. It's a win-win situation. 

What kinds of pets do you have?

Much love, 

Pity Parties and Shopping Trips

As mentioned briefly on my last What I Ate Wednesday post, I broke up with my boyfriend of nearly 2 years (1 year and 8 months) on Labor Day. It was NOT easy. Not in the slightest. 

The truth is, I think this is just the best thing for the both of us. Even if he doesn't realize it right now, there is someone better and more perfect for him out there than me. He and I are just two different people. I have changed completely since we started dating and now am now a totally different person. I can't help it. But I'm proud of who I am now and, although this decision was a tough one, I have to hold my ground.

I've been praying about what to do for a while now. I've been asking God to show me what He wants me to do with my life, and although I think there have been obvious signs of God telling me to do this, I haven't exactly been the best listener. I had my entire life planned out: getting married, having kids, where we would live, and how we would build our house from the ground up and be rather wealthy from his aerospace engineering job. 

The truth is, I'm really scared of giving up that plan. Now my future is unsure and I don't know where I'm going to go or what I'm going to do. However, I do know that God has a plan for me. Which is why I decided to do something that I have never done before. I've decided to take a leap of faith and jump into the unknown.

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "Plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart." -Jeremiah 29:11-13

It was while reading and praying over this passage that I decided to take that leap of faith into the unknown. Yeah, I don't know my future. And I'm really scared about that. But I know that God has a plan for me, and to find out what that plan is, I need to give up the plans I had for myself. 

I want to be loved. I want to be held. And kissed. And given flowers and taken out dinner. But these things aren't worth it when you realize that you have to keep trying to make yourself be in love. I love him, but I've changed. I'm not a party girl. I'm not super liberal anymore like I used to be. I want to be true to myself and to God. I feel this is what I should be doing. 

I type this now as I'm really struggling to cope with the situation. I want life to go back to being easy and fun and carefree like it was when we first started dating. I want him in my life. He's a good guy. But this is not where I want to be in life. I need to take time for myself to explore my feelings, meet people, and be carefree again. No more worrying or fighting or pretending. Just me, being myself. Eventually, we will both heal from our brokenness. It WILL take a LOT of time. But I'm willing to take that time. It is necessary in all things. I hope we can still be friends, but if that's what will hinder us from healing, then I'm okay (well, not really, but I'll be okay with it eventually) with putting our friendship on hold. We need to do what we need to do.

On Tuesday, my friends Elizabeth and Stephanie took me out to Yogurt Vi for frozen yogurt/sorbet. It was delicious. And I needed some time away to focus on friends and having fun. Then we went shopping at Urban Outfitters, AKA BEST STORE EVER. Also very expensive, but still awesome.

I bought new nail polish! These two colors plus a dark purpley color. Sooo pretty.

My new favorite shoes. I love them. They are like the cheap version of adorable slip on Keds.
Plus, they are yellow. And have flowers. Double win.

These are cotton mary janes. SO COMFORTABLE! Not the cutest shoes ever
but they are really comfy and totally worth the 2 for $20 price tag.

My second pair of mary janes!

All my pretty bottles of nail polish!

This whole experience has definitely taught me who my friends are. The people who care the most. The people who hugged me and let me cry to them and vent about my feelings. The people who ate lunch with me to ask me how I'm doing. The people who knew, even from me just walking into the room, that I was not okay. I love my friends.

Make sure you know who has your back. They will be the ones who are there for you for life and will help you through the rough times. In the end, that's all you can ask for: a support group, your strong foundation to keep you grounded. 

Stay true to who you are. It's tough, but it's the right thing to do. 

Much love,

the day she stole my cell phone.

This year has been EXTREMELY busy so far. So for those of you who watch for my Feature Friday posts... I apologize. I haven't been keeping up with them. I will do my best to feature someone when I can!

For starters, I am no longer 100% gluten free. I will be eating and cooking primarily GF, but not always. And definitely not when I'm out with friends. It's really hard on people to find food for me to eat already with being vegan, so gluten free is not a big deal to me. I'll just eat as little as possible. For those who have to be GF because of celiac disease of some other factor, it must be really hard! How do you manage to do it?

From L-R: (Top row) Myself, JJ, Vince, Tim.
 (Bottom Row) Erin, Pammy, Kelsey, Adele, and Dom (our Hall Director)

In the three weeks I've been on campus so far (and only 1 week I've been in classes!) I've noticed a constant theme: friends who care. My Residence Life staff (go Husman Hall!) have been so extremely supportive of everything, and I know I can go to them whenever I'm in the middle of a crisis.

For example, when someone "stole" my cell phone the other day.

Let's be real. I was leading an event with Xavier Navigators (a Christian based group on campus) and I did not have my phone on me for much of the night. It was sitting out, and I was not paying attention to it. Game night was going FABULOUSLY, I was getting to know a lot of the freshmen, and having a great time.

The night came to an end, and after we had cleaned and packed everything up, I noticed one thing was missing.

My cell phone.

We literally turned the entire lounge upside down. We searched inside everything and everywhere. Where could it possibly be? We called other people and told them to look through their things, and we still had no luck.

So, the leader, Mark, told me I could have his old smartphone. I went back to Husman and sat in the office with some of my other staff members and just talked to them for a while. JJ, my building's SRA (senior RA - he's not a senior, but he oversees all the rest of us) looked and me and said I could have his old phone too! (Now I had two phones being offered to me!) It was an ENV3, which is a pretty good phone. And since I had to wait until the next day for Mark's, I decided to use JJ's.

I called my parents and told them the situation. My dad deactivated my phone and said that the phone was stolen. I activated JJ's phone and went on my way.

The next morning, I worked out with Elizabeth, another leader of Navigators, who gave me Mark's old phone (smart phones are so confusing...). I went to class and everything was normal until I hear a little voice say my name from the hallway outside my dorm.

"Rachael....?" I turned around to see Miranda, another leader of Navigators. GUESS WHAT? She had my cell phone!

Turns out someone put it in her backpack on accident. SERIOUSLY?! I spent the whole night spazzing and NOW we find my phone?! But thanks, Miranda. I missed my touch screen!!

I activated my phone again and all was well. Still, what this showed me was that I am surrounded by amazing people in all of the communities that I am a part of. They are willing to do anything for you when you need it. Absolutely anything. College is where you meet your best friends for the rest of your life, right? I think it will definitely hold true for me.

Our welcome board on the wall in front of the office

Another night, I noticed this theme again. I was sitting on duty in the RA office, and I get a phone call saying Navigators had a half a large veggie, no cheese pizza for me! Along with a huge bag of popcorn, fruit leather, and various other vegan friendly items. I was so surprised. They brought it to me while at the desk and we had a fabulous time! Again, this just shows me how the people you're close to really care about you here. College is for life, my friends. :)

I apologize. I know this photo is sideways...

With that, I'll leave you with a few quick things you can throw together for a delicious trail mix! Use whatever amount of each thing you want. I think the more chocolate the better :)

Chocolate Cherry Trail Mix

Ingredients: 
Raw cashews
Dried Cherries
Chocolate chips
Raw pumpkin seeds

Directions:
Throw everything into a plastic bag and shake to combine! Voila :) The perfect easy and healthy snack.

Fireside Chat

"The kind of beauty I want is the hard-to-get kind that

comes from within - strength, courage, dignity." - Ruby Dee

I went to Findlay Market yesterday morning with my parents. Findlay Market is sort of like a giant farmer's market, both outdoors and indoors. Local vendors come to sell their products - home grown fruits and vegetables, handmade soaps, ice cream, gelato, fruit pops, clothing, bread, meats, salads and even gyros - you name it, and you can probably find it there. I love going there at least once a summer, and since my summer ends next week, we decided to make the trip yesterday.

We got quite a few large, beautiful, heirloom tomatoes. So yummy! I love heirlooms more than any other kind of tomato, but they are just SO expensive. I think my favorite so far has been the Purple Cherokee. It's such a pretty dark purple color and is really sweet and delicious. It makes a great tomato sandwich (which I'm eating now, by the way!)

I also grabbed some lunch at this little vegan friendly Vietnamese place (name of which escapes me.) I had two summer rolls with a peanut-hoisin dipping sauce and a salad served in an edible bowl made from black sesame seeds and rice. I thought they were both okay, nothing special. There was an overwhelming flavor of celery and some Asian herb I can't really describe - but it's not something I love, that's for sure! 

My post today is a more serious one. 

This morning I woke up to an unexpected text message which made me feel, well, kind of crappy. I won't get into the specifics about it. But it was all I could focus on all morning and all day. I got really emotional and stressed out and spent the day wiping tears away from the corner of my eye. Then my stomach started hurting and I felt like throwing up. 

Which, thankfully, I didn't do.  

I was supposed to work at three today, but I called in sick because I definitely would not have been able to make it through a seven hour shift while feeling really sick and still pretty emotional. Instead, I ate some veggies and hummus and went out with my parents. I trudged along all day, car rides making me feel queasy. Then I started feeling dizzy. 

We got home, and I felt a bit better. I flipped through the Sunday ads, saw a Target ad for a $15 small pink vacuum cleaner (which I needed for my room this fall!), and my mom drove me over to buy one before they all were sold out (I also got a large thing of hand soap, some face wash, and Fruit Roll-Ups that are healthy for you!! WIN.). 

Now I'm sitting in my room with a pounding headache as I type this little blog up for you guys. I've just been thinking a lot this whole day, really wondering how to get through the hard times in life. 

Sounds pretty depressing, right?

I'm not trying to be. I'm just a very naturally happy person, so when things suck for me, I take it pretty hard and get pretty emotional about it. 

As much as I like to think I'm a liberal, I've become pretty conservative recently. I've been struggling a lot with grasping what I believe and what I stand for, and standing up for those things when put to the test. I feel like today has been a small test for me from God. How will I react to the situation at hand? Will I break down or hold my own? 

Besides the little conflict I had earlier today, I've been struggling a lot with how I feel about myself physically, mentally, spiritually, and emotionally. I'm not fat, but I definitely don't see myself as skinny. I struggle everyday because I think to myself "I shouldn't be eating this much food," when in reality, I'm eating things that are really healthy for me like fruits and vegetables and grains. Of course, I eat anyways, because a) I love food and b) I could NEVER starve myself. That's a stupid move and will just end in lots of harm for myself and my family and everyone involved. It's just a battle I have with myself every day. 

I also struggle with my emotions. Normally, I'm a pretty chill and go-with-the-flow type of person, but I can be VERY headstrong. I hate being wrong. I HATE being wrong. So when people challenge something I say, I get very defensive. But I'm trying to work on that, too. I'm also trying to dig deeper into my faith, and with that comes a lot of difficult times. It's hard to reconcile what I want to do in life with what the Bible says I should be doing with my life. It's hard when I just don't want to. It's hard that God has so many expectations of me. It's hard, but it's necessary, and I'm learning to overcome challenges and go in the right direction. 

Basically, the point of my post is this: we are all BEAUTIFUL people. We all want beauty that is something more than just what's on the outside. We want to be noticed for our character, our morals, what we believe and stand up for on a daily basis. We think too lowly of ourselves when really we should be thinking that we are amazing people who rock!!! It's just that society has put out this image of the perfect person in the media: skinny, tan, had plastic surgery, popular. Things that we can't live up to. But you SHOULDN'T live up to that standard. You are perfect the way you are. Make the sun shine out your rear end. 

I know it's hard to do. I struggle with that too. All the time! It's hard for me to think that way when I look in the mirror in each day. But you know what? For every negative thought I think of myself, I try to think a positive one right after. And it usually helps. 

I wrote this because, in the comments of MY GIVEAWAY (which you should enter!), readers have been saying they want to see some more personal stories. Well, here you go! Personal AND super serious. How's that?! :)

Love who you are. We all have our faults. But we cannot change who we are. So smile, look in the mirror, and say, "I am an amazing and beautiful person." Then go treat yourself to a piece of dark chocolate :) 

Much love,