First Snow!

I always look forward to the first snow of the year!  this year it was a little later than most, because we usually have at least one snow in October!  That was not the case this year!  This is from today, Nov. 10th and I would run outside practically every time snow started falling from the sky!  Each time, my co workers would moan about how its already snowing!  This picture, for instance was taken with me outside and my co-worker inside.

Some might call me cold, but I always have said if you don't like winter, then by all means leave Michigan and quit complaining!  The season's are one of the best attributes of the area, besides all the water!

I'm fighting off a cold I got at the beginning of last week...tonight might be the hardest to sleep because all the mucus is draining causing me to cough a lot... I've been living off dayquil, vitamin D3 and tea with some white licorice in it!

I had a lovely weekend last weekend with a lot of great people, as busy as I was!  Wish I could give more details, but not enough time and I'm trying to keep my uber personal life out of this.  

BUT I did cook an amazing meal and I would love to share it since it is also in season!

stuffed acorn squash!!!

cut an acorn squash in half, scoop seeds and guts out and make the holes nice and sizeable!   

In a mixing bowl mix up a stuffing of your choice, below is my stuffing but you have a lot of wiggle room to change vegetables or grains!

couscous

Zucchini

1 egg

onion

minced garlic

dried cherries

salt, pepper, parsley sage

Once you have the perfect stuffing mixed, put it into each hole of the acorn squash!  Bake at 375 in a making pan with water in the bottom and/or brush butter on the exposed acorn squash.  Both these techniques prevent the squash from getting too dry.  It needs to bake for about an hour.  then, enjoy!  I put cheese on the top of mine after it baked for 30 minutes and it added a nice crunchy topping!!

Until next time!

Wrapped up in Fall!

   I've been so wrapped up in fall and integrating myself into my new community, I've hardly had time to talk about it!  I am in one of the best locations for fall, like I've been preaching all summer, due to my location.  I am in a great area to easily obtain local, fresh food!  Last week, to get my pumpkins, I drove about 10 minutes out of my way home from work and stopped at a patch.  I also grabbed some acorn squash, butternut squash for good seasonal cooking!
Tonight I finally carved those pumpkins as a self Halloween celebration, then roasted the seeds my favorite way and made a facial mask with the guts!  Talk about multiple usage of a product!  Also all the ingredients in my home made face mask were from within 100 miles!  I must say, my face does feel soft, but having a food processor would have made the mask more applicable and less messy. Here are the ingredients I used:
Pumpkin
honey
apple cider
milk
an egg
using mainly pumpkin put all ingredients in a food processor and blend,  get it to a think enough texture to apply it to your face without it running.  Leave it on for about 20-25 minutes (or longer if you want) until it is dry, then just wash your face!

Try it, let me know what you think.

This weekend I'll be experimenting with the acorn squash and stuffing it.  Similar concept as stuffing a pepper, but a co worker was telling me about it and just cut it in half and mix up rice and whatever else you want in it then put some cheese on top and bake it!  Yumm! I'll let you know what I find!

On a not to local food note, I bought a harder goat's cheese at Zingerman's in Ann Arbor that I am ecstatic about to pair with a pinot noir that a colleagues son made.   The cheese is from Spain, but well worth the travel....
Last weekend I finally made it to Ann Arbor!!! I miss Ann Arbor desperately and the amazing friends and family who live there!  I will need to be going back more often!  My Halloween costume from Saturday is far superior to my Friday costume.  See picture below.  I hope you can see that I was some sort of abstract, exotic bird

 Below is my flapper costume with my good friends from my dorm hall freshman year!  Love them all!

 Billy and I went to the football game!!! Go Blue!

 If you are easily offended, do not look at this picture of my friends' costumes!  This is me with some of my amazing friends from Nicaragua trip!  Love you all! including those not pictured!

 Billy and John were Zombies for Halloween.  They look super creepy and amazing!

Rally

Well tomorrow the new country girl heads off to a new city!  Yes I get on the train to go from New Buffalo, MI to Chicago, IL and finally ending up in Milwaukee, WI.  I've never been to Milwaukee, but I loved Madison!
Land Trust Alliance is a national organization for land trusts that offers many services to land trusts like accreditation, training, advocacy etc.  Every year they hold an event called Rally where all the land trusts gather to train, network and share ideas and experiences.  Tomorrow I venture to my first Rally to learn more about my job, and network with other professionals in my field.  I have two seminars and 4 workshops packed into my 3 days I will be at Rally.  Unfortunately I will not have time to see much of beautiful Milwaukee, but maybe it will entice me to return!  Can't wait to report back about this adventure!  I'm sure I will meet a lot of great people and learn about some of the other crucial land protection projects going on around the U.S.
  Last week I had a dinner party at my new apartment, Suzy's Kowa-Bungalow!   I made my grandma Sue's cabbage rolls with soy sausage in a home made tomato sauce with a side summer salad with a home made strawberry basil vinaigrette.  For desert I made my grandma LaCroix's pumpkin brownies (pumpies as Johanna and I call them) with a home made cream cheese frosting and apple butter to put on top.  It was a very lovely party.   I prepped all week for it...
I also  thought I should mention my dream property that I have been on twice int he last week.  A gorgeous parcel owned by a lovely couple.  It is up in the rolling hills of the Valpraiso Morraines, their house sitting on a hill with a lovely wrap around porch that over looks their alfalfa field, a small pond that geothermally heats their home, and a pasture with a beautiful pet dairy cow grazing.  The off to the right is a beautiful forest with trails through the woods and a hidden sedge prairie.  They also have a barn for the cow in the winter.  It truly is a beautiful parcel of land.  I was drooling during the whole property walk....
Well my computer keeps shutting down again, and I'm saving up for a new one but for now this is why my blogs are short and scarce.  I've had to restart it 4 times already due to freezing.  Not even going to try to upload pictures.
I'm glad the Tigers and Lions are doing well.
Also GO BLUE!  (we play State saturday....)
Have a great week, I hope you enjoyed the nice Michigan weather, because its over....
<3 Suzy

Home Sweet Home!

Holy cow!  literally... I know it has been soo long since I have blogged, but you might have known that I was moving!  And all of you know how time consuming moving is... especially when it is to your first unfurnished apartment!  and yes, it was a community effort to make my apartment comfortable for me!  for this I would like to personally and publicly thank Chris Thompson, Peg Kohring, George Lucas, Grandma Sue, and of course, my fabulous parents!  all of these people helped me to make this apartment a home, and I'm such a home body that it was crucial to me to make myself a home.  Pictures are not yet up... except of my Michigan bathroom, but once I am finished decorating and cleaning, I will show everyone my quaint yet guest ready apartment!
 Saturday was our benefit for work at Middlebrook farm, a local farm that raises grass fed beef!  This event also contributed to my delinquent blogging.... but boy was it great!  and this event is what I was holy cow-ing!  The cows were soo cute, see the picture below!

Today I got a new computer at work!  I'm really excited because it is a large screen so that I can make better maps and see them a lot better!  My GIS seminar with DEQ was great and now I'm more of a map nerd!  

I love fall in Michigan!  It is definitely one of my favorite times of year!  caramel apples, regular apples, pumpkin, pumpkin flavored everything, sweaters, pumpkin seeds, cider, falling colored leaves!  Where else can you get all of these products locally?  Here!  There is no better place for fall than here!  

So this weekend I'm taking myself on a date to the pumpkin patch!  Then I will carve pumpkins with myself as another date later in the month!  Its nice dating yourself!  hardly any bad dates!

I also need to mention that during this 20 minute blogging process I have had to restart my computer twice, it is freezing up and i think it is the graphics processor or something malfunctioning... I will probably be buying a new laptop soon...along with a car... Feel free to support my not for profit lifestyle by checking out my Etsy! 

http://www.etsy.com/shop/MaizeInnovations

Also anything in my facebook knitting album can be recreated!  It is fall... Time to keep warm with cute hats and scarves!

Also saw the Foo Fighters live and they rock hard!  They played for 3 hours!  Then I met them, Taylor Hawkins, the amazing drummer called me sweety and I almost passed out!  Also shook Dave Grohl's hand!  What an honor!  (for those of you who are unfamiliar with them, Dave Grohl drummed for Nirvana, a 90's grunge band)  I highly recommend everyone to see this band if you enjoy their music because they sure know how to perform and entertain the crowd!  

Apartment pics soon!  Promise to blog more!

<3 Suz

The Last Sunset of Summer

Tonight I went to the beach to watch probably the last summer sunset.  snapped a few photos of the gorgeous sky and lake.  Since I have so much to do after work.... I played around with the colors on the first one.

A very edited, very dramatic photo! I like silhouettes!   

Beautiful sky with some beach debris

I didn't get very tan this summer :(

This is my tribute to goodbye of many things including summer, college, all my previous years of focusing on being educated, and dependent.  

Now I say hello to fall and winter ( <3)  working, a job, being independent, and very self disciplined.
Once I know what this looks like, I will send pictures.  Hopefully soon it will be of my new apartment that I am wishing to find on Wednesday when my lovely mom and and ravishing Granny come to help me look for a new residence for my new life.
Also, Wolverines have a lot of work to do if they are going to continue winning.... train hard boys, you need to!
Can't wait for hockey season!  I need to see my wolvies play a few times, even if I have to go to South Bend to annoy the Lame-o's.
Don't forget to support my organization!  You can purchase raffle tickets even if you can't make it to the benefit, you can also buy them online with the paypal account, just specify that is what the money is for.  Below is a link for more info.
http://chikamingopenlands.org/inside.php?a=NEWS:318

Thanks everyone!

Location, location, location

Wow!  September is amazingly busy.  on top of the tons of fun Chikaming Open Lands (COL) events, I also am trying to find a new place to live for a year or more... not easy in a tourist area....
COL had a dedication ceremony on Monday to welcome 6 acres to preserved land.  This wonderful donation put us at over 1,000 acres protected!  We had GREAT turnout!  about 80 people gathered on the side of a street because of their interests in protecting land!  It was to refreshing to see that many people mobilized about this topic, especially because across the street there is 11 acres for sale that we would love to mobilize to protect, but can not commit any funding for it.  A few community figures have offered to actively work with us, but we need to fund raise for it more than anything.
  Made several jars of pickles today, since they are so delicious and the cool weather with decreases in local veggies is on the way.  yesterday I stopped by a farmers market where I was able to get local garlic, edamame, and onions so most of the object in my pickle jars are local ingredients!  I feel so much better about my food when I know it is supporting someone from this community and since I know where it came from.  Not a lot of gas mileage went into moving this food either, therefore it is more sustainable environmentally and economically.
I start my real job Oct. 1, which means no vacation for 6 months starting Oct. 1, but with all the weekends i'll probably have to work, I will hopefully get some comp. time to use around Christmas, since it is my favorite holiday as I am already thinking of it in September.... oops....
  I'm trying to decide what I am looking for in a place to live, and while I wish I was in the position to buy a few acres in the area with a cozy house, that might take a few years.  instead I think I need to find something reasonably priced and relatively close to the office so that I can save up to get a house in the future, pay off my student loans and buy a new car this spring.... YIKES!  all checks can be sent to my parents house.... haha kidding, unless you want a knit hat or a jar of dill pickles!
  at first I was leaning towards living in a youthly populated area, perhaps a more thriving area, but then I realized I can easily drive to Chicago, Kalamazoo, St. Joe, GR when I need some sort of interaction with people my age.  The thing I will be doing every day is working, so being close to that and saving money should be my priority.  I know, for a 22 year old single, I'm pretty much shooting myself in the foot, but I believe in karma and fate so who knows, maybe some sexy farmer will have a stand at a farmer's market, or I'll run into a sustainable forester in the woods? Its a possibility, right?   Guess I'll find out!  But my point is that my living quarters shouldn't be based on a location of being near activity that I would probably only use once a week if even.  I'm still going to frequent Greenbush Brewery with my co-workers and probably be too tired after work to socialize anyways.  I'd rather find somewhere comfortable and economical in a home to work sense.  Too bad stuff out here is priced like housing in Ann Arbor, who do these people think they are? The places here are certainly not 3 blocks from the Big House, or next door to the best pizza in town open until 3 am... in fact many places here close for 1-3 months a year...
Oh yeah, its a tourist area with a beautiful, grand lake, some of the best sunsets in the country and polluted air, big thanks to "The City".

Teamwork

In life we are on many different teams, not necessarily sports teams, or other competitive teams, but groups of people who work together with goals and achievements in mind.  I have been very fortunate to be on many great teams, and will soon be joining another awesome team.
    Today I was offered a formal job offer from Chikaming Open Lands.  While I pretty much verbally accepted this position on Monday, today I was given a formal proposal/job description on my new position as Assistant Land Protection Specialist!  I could not be more happy to have a salaried job in my field of study with benefits only 4 months after graduating.  I am also thrilled to become part of an amazing team, one that I will work with every day and push forward a mission we all are passionate about.   My co-workers, board members, and committee members have all proven to be a varied yet knowledgeable and kind team. They see the major benefits from investing in a young college graduate like me to make me a valuable asset to this team.  I truly believe that I can help this organization forward the mission and get through the transition period while achieving our over arching environmental goal of preserving and protecting open spaces.
      However, I could never have made it to this team without the help, love and support of the teams I have been apart of in the past, friends, class mates, colleagues, club members, other co-workers and especially my family.  These other numerous teams have helped push me to join this team, so I am appreciative of the other teams whom I may not be as close to but who definitely influenced me and worked with each other to achieve our goals.  I hope other members of current and past teams feel like our teamwork has accomplished as much as I do right now!
   Even the bad teams, what hasn't worked, or when you had a sour team mate or ten, teaches you something. and even though bad teams may be miserable, there is still the will to push past them and keep the end goals in mind.  
  So this day, I celebrate successful teams, because without all the people we have worked with in our lives, no one would be where they are now.
  I know i still have many teams to join, but this is a landmark in any person's life: their first salaried with benefits job!
and now that I'm all optimistic and happy.... its time to start looking for a place to live in a VERY rural area....
BLAH

A much needed long weekend at HIGGINS LAKE this weekend, I'm sooo excited to be with family and friends to celebrate this.


Here is the sock I just finished! now I need to make one to match it!