Reasons to be Vegan

Hello hello,

I should be working on the mountain of essays I have due within the next week, BUT sometimes a blog idea comes to mind that you can just not ignore.

Tis the season of giving, receiving, having and sharing (Friends reference obviously).  What a better way to give to the earth, receive health benefits, have new lease on life, and share new delicious food with the ones you love than by becoming vegan?!

Still not convinced?  Alright, let me give you some other awesome vegan reasons.
(I won't even use animal cruelty as an example because everyone's heard all of that before)

1. For those of you who like numbers and statistics:
840 million people in the world do not have enough to eat
Hunger causes the death of more than 5 million children a year


A varied vegan diet requires around 1/3 the land needed for a "conventional Western diet"
Overgrazing is linked to 35% of soil degradation
Agricultural expansion accounts for over 60% of worldwide deforestation
Farm animals now outnumber humans more than 3 to 1
*all these facts were taken from The Vegan Society's website
** lots of other great facts on World Watch

2. For those of you who like pictures and graphs:

3. For those of you who think it would be too hard:
There are hundreds of companies making vegan substitutes, hundreds of blogs with free recipes, and no one said you had to change over night!
And here are some more pictures to help you out!

4. This is possibly the biggest reason of all:
Beyonce and Jay Z just started a 22 day vegan challenge!  If the king and queen of hip-hop can't convince you than I have no chance!

Well I hope all of you non-vegans out there take this list into account and consider a vegan life style.  Everything is "too hard" until we actually try it!

See you stateside in 10 days <3

Stocking Stuffers and Such

Hello lovies,

I hope Santa does not put me on the "naughty list" because the last post I wrote I promised to write another one that week and now it is over two weeks later.  Sorry Santa!
The end of the semester is basically academic slaughter time.  In Spain their fall semester does not end until mid/late January (I am not sure of the exact date).  However, I leave here in 12 days, which means I need to finish some assignments a whole month before my classmates.  It really is just the bee's knees squeezing two months of work into two weeks.

So let's see, since we last spoke I have:
1. had food poisoning
2. went to Ireland to visit my favorite red head Rita (her blog is really great)
3. "celebrated" Thanksgiving in class because we do not get off for American holidays here
4. did a headstand in yoga (with the assistance of my teacher)
5. went to a vegan cooking class here
6. visited Montserrat
7. took two exams worth 60+% of my final grades (one orally because my professor thought that would "be fun")

I've done some other things as well but I thought those were the most mentionable.
Currently I should be writing my paper for Urban Sociology but I wanted to give you all some vegan-friendly Christmas ideas that you can give to non-vegans too!

1. Heavenly Organics Products

 These little guys are hand and foot lotions that I bought at VegFest back in October.  They are solid lotions, which I had never seen before, but they actually work!  I keep the hand one in my bag for daily use and I really love these little suckers.  And they look like flowers, how freaking cute is that?!

2. Butter London Nail Polish
I have the gold sparkly variation and it lasts for so long!  All their products are vegan and come from vegan sources which means there was absolutely no animal testing done in the making of any of their products!  Hooray hooray!!!

3. Dark Chocolate
Who doesn't like chocolate?  Honestly it's probably like 0.000000001% of the world population, including animals.  Dark chocolate is SUPPOSED to be made without milk so make sure you read the labels first.  Of course any kind of chocolate that uses plant based milks are acceptable!

4. Naturally Made For You

I also got these at VegFest.  I constantly have issues with my feet, mostly pain related.  I had a podiatrist tell me that I had "oddly shaped feet."  My high arches put a lot of stress on my heels making long days on my feet extremely painful.  While that may be more than you needed to know, what you should know is that every time I use this wonderful duo my feet feel brand new.  If their other products are any bit as wonderful as these peppermint foot miracles I suggest you stock up. 
As a side note their website says they do not ship to the states but I am almost positive the representative I spoke to at VegFest said they would.

5. Lush Products
I love Lush because all their products are hand made, free of animal testing, and their ingredients are fair traded.  A few of their products are not vegan (some have milk and honey), but they will help you in the store find what you need.  They are always alarmingly friendly and helpful.  Everything I have ever bought from Lush has lasted a freakishly long time.

I hope this list gave you some good Christmas ideas that are cruelty free!  I know this post seems a bit feminine because it focuses mostly on cosmetics but men need nice shaving cream and moisturizer too!

This semester has flown by, hopefully I finish strong!  I can't wait to get stateside so I can cook up a storm and then have interesting things to post for you guys.  Plus I will finally see my dogs, friends and hunky man candy (don't tell him I said that).