This year marks the first birthday that I celebrated as a vegan. After 33 years of enjoying butter cream, milk chocolate, and ice cream on my birthday, this year looked different – but, truthfully, only a little.

Vegan Meal

From all appearances, the meal and dessert were stereotypical American birthday fare. But what you can’t see is the ingredient list, which contained no meat, dairy, or animal products. I wanted to indulge a little bit. [C’mon, it’s my birthday!] But I also didn’t want to overdo it, or compromise my standards for eating healthy, sustainable, and ethical foods. So we had burgers [vegan burgers, of course] and hot dogs for the kids [vegan hot dogs] with home baked buns and a side of salad and French fries.

My birthday dessert was still cake [vegan chocolate chip banana cake] with frosting [vegan cream cheese frosting], which I baked myself because really who would want to bake a birthday cake for me knowing all of my complicated ingredients requirements like organic, fair trade, ethical and sustainable, not to mention vegan [which in itself would be enough to scare away the average person]? Anyway, I love baking, so I wanted to make my own. And this was the first vegan cake I’ve ever made.

I thought it was really yummy.

Zero Waste Gifts

Now that I have been [nearly] zero waste for several years, everyone knows to give me sustainable gifts, which is awesome.

This year, my partner gave me a safety razor which I have been wanting for so long, but was waiting until we used up our stash of disposable razors [don’t even ask why I have such a large stash of disposable razors…]. Now I can donate the rest of my plastic razors to our local compassion center in town and switch over to a more sustainable razor. Even my children and in-laws gave me thoughtful, meaningful, and sustainable gifts like bar shampoo, crochet hooks and yarn to make my own washcloth, a reclaimed puzzle, and wireless earbuds.

My sweet Auntie sent me these beautiful flowers.

And probably my favorite gift this year was from my six-year-old daughter, Evangeline, who asked me to teach her to braid so she could make me this very special bracelet which I love so so much.

And my last bit of personal news: for the first time in exactly one year, two weeks, and four days, I was able to put my hair in a ponytail!

Anyway, today is also the 3rd birthday of this blog! 🥳 It’s been a great adventure so far, and I’m grateful to all of you for joining me!!

To many more!

🥂

Karis