Resolutions, Shmezolutions.

I got a lot of flack during Christmas break about my cessation of blogging...Apparently my family members enjoy reading Shenanvegans, which makes me pretty happy because I like the attention. So, to recap (for my 4 readers out there), here is a list of the Very Important Events of 2009 (after August, because I can't remember anything before that!)

1) Baby Hudson
2) Baby Anabelle
--I'm an AUNT x2?! Crazy talk. Anyone who knows me knows that I'm the least maternal person ever. Which is why some friends were shocked to see this picture on facebook... No, seriously. I never hold children, thanks to a margarine-fingers tendency I have to drop things, but I made an exception for these cute little nuggets :)

ps: like the Christmas sweater? Ultra rad.

3) Bernadette's wedding! The highlight of last semester was definitely getting the chance to hang out with my whole family while noshing on some glorious Indian food at my dear sister's wedding in November. To the sadness of all, my eldest sis Elizabeth couldn't attend...because she had to like give birth or something...but we'll forgive her that minor indiscretion just this once.
It was still very fun doing bridesmaid duties with my two other sisters, Victoria and Erin.

What else did I do with my 2009? I took a bunch of English classes, and whoever said that being an English major was easy has clearly been deluding themselves, because it was one of the most intense semesters of my college career. In the last two weeks of classes, I had some brilliant technological failures, which left me sobbing in my professor's office begging for term-paper extensions since I lost all of my work. Fortunately, it all worked out and I now sit at a brand-spanking new laptop that I bought with some cashola brought to me by Mommy Claus :)

I rang in the New Year with my bbfls by watching a few choice episodes of Criminal Minds, because that's just how we roll.

Whats up for Miss Shenanvegan in the new decade? (whats that you say? I should stop referring to myself in the third person? NEVER.)

Welp, for starters, I'm trying to kick my nasty Jif habit. Apparently, the stuff is full of these newfangled things like trans fat and hydrogenated oil which aren't too good for keeping the Shenanvegan's girlish figure. So, I've been heavily munching on some MaraNatha Almond Butter from Costco of all places, especially in the form of ABU--which I learned about while stalking some old posts of Heather's from Heather Eats Almond Butter. BEST IDEA EVAR. I feel like this calls for an old Xzibit macro (ever seen Pimp My Ride? If not, you will not get this at all.)

AND I'm trying to stop eating refined sugar, and trying to focus on naturally sweetening things with dates, agave and stevia. This has generally been working out quite well, except for the totally awesome cookies my roommates got for me today (its my half birthday and we love any excuse to celebrate!) from my favorite place in the world, The Little Grill. Their vegan cookies are so awesomely glorious that I gave up my sugar-sabbatical temporarily just so I could nosh on one.

I'm also taking an Environmental Literature class this semester...with an entire section on animal ethics. And we're doing an entire segment on animal ethics in a philosophy class as well! I don't think many people get excited about that, but I do :)

Continue reading, dear friends, as I hope to update a bit more frequently in 2010.