Which one is better?

The BF told me I needed “real” hiking shoes. We enjoy the occasional hike with our dog, but I’ve never owned proper hiking shoes. I was warned to fight my instincts to buy a shoe that was sleek and pretty. It had to be function over form this time around, ugh. I tried on almost every shoe in REI before narrowing it down to these two. I think the gray one on the left looks nicer, but the brown one on the right was more comfortable and provided more support around my ankles.

I went for the brown ones. They’re pretty hideous aren’t they? Oh well… I followed the advice to get them a half size bigger to allow room for my feet to grow. They’re so clunky, but not as bad as I imagined before trying them on. Look at that aggressive styling on the heels! They’re like rubber tires. These are going to last at least a decade!

I added a few plants to my apartment this weekend and thought I’d give ya’ll a tour of all my plants. I’m still learning how to keep them alive, but here goes.

Here’s my apartment’s very first plant. As I’ve mentioned before, it had 10x more leaves when I bought it. The thing was beautiful. Over 3 months, most of its leaves turned brown and fell off. I think maybe I over watered it? I’m going to let it dry out and hope it bounces back but it may be too far gone by now.

This rubber plant is a recent addition. It’s adorable, isn’t it? I wiped down the leaves with a damp cloth and placed it near the window. Rubber plants are supposed to be pretty resilient so I’m optimistic about this one. I’ll have to rotate it every month to prevent it from leaning too far one way. The cement pot was purchased at Nebraska Furniture Mart in Texas.

I’m not sure what this plant is called. But the guy at the store said it enjoys indirect sunlight and is also pretty difficult to kill. The ceramic pot was purchased from Studio McGee. There’s no drainage hole at the bottom unfortunately, so I covered the bottom of the pot with pebbles to prevent root rot.

I found this beautiful bouquet at the farmer’s market going for only $6. It’s a form of eucalyptus. I love that subtle shade of faded green and how the leaves drape. It should last 2-3 weeks. The vase is an oldie from TJ Maxx

And now for my attempt at an herb garden…. Here’s my english thyme in a Studio McGee pot. The leaves used to be bright green, but now there’s lots of white speckles and browned leaves. Not sure what that means, but the thyme still tastes good when cooked.

They say you can’t kill mint. They are incredibly robust. But my mint began growing these white speckles on them. Again, I’m not sure what it is, but it’s probably not good? I’ve pruned a few rogue branches that bent way out of shape in it’s effort to catch more sunlight. This is my 2nd mint plant (I killed the first one). I’m not sure if it will last, and if this one dies, I’m giving up on mint. I think it needs more direct sunlight and there’s no place in or around our apartment that gets direct sunlight.

Here’s my dear parsley plant. It’s been through a few phases of yellowing. I’ve trimmed off most of the dead and yellowing leaves. It seems to have bounced back nicely. I used a bit of it for pasta last night. The pot was purchased at Nebraska Furniture mart in TX as well.

This used to be a pot full of chives, but it died off a few months ago. I trimmed it down completely, and it’s just now starting to grow back. There’s 3-4 new sprouts coming up. My sage plant, in the back, is holding up nicely. It seems to withstand a lot of abuse. The leaves are smaller than I’d like. I might re-pot it in a larger pot to encourage growth.

In other news, I recently discovered a nice co-op organic grocery store nearby. It inspired me to get back into cooking again. I’ve had luck with many New York Times recipes in the past and decided to subscribe to their recipes page, for $5 per month. It’s a bit of an experiment for now. If I don’t end up cooking at least 3 meals from it per month, I’m going to cancel my subscription. The first thing I cooked from the NYT was this mushroom stew recipe. It was relatively simple to make and very good. I like that the NYT community is active in the comments section, providing helpful tips and reviews of the recipes. How about you? Have you tried any good recipes lately?