WEX - Spring Break

My fingers glided across the small key pad and the words showed up immediately. Before I was able to press send, my phone suddenly broke out into a vibration. "New message," it read. Immediately the screen changed to reveal that the text was from Jasmine who'd just got back from South America. My reaction to the text truly left me dumbfounded. I felt a warm feeling rush through my veins as if I'd been sitting in front of a warm fire with my feet being toasted. The text read: "I MISS YOU SOOO MUCH TOO! seriously, I was analyzing our friendship and I realized that you are a great friend... one of the best, so sorry if I treat you like shiz sometimes." My eyes began to water as I'd never been this emotional. I had best friends before but all of them turned out to be shallow girls who don't really give a crud about you. Jasmine is an amazing person with so much integrity. Although she may not come across like it, she is the most trustworthy and decent woman I have ever met. If she tells you that she is your friend you can bet that she will have your back no matter what. It really pisses me off how all these other girls think that she is promiscuous just because she is full chested. They're just hating because they're jealous of Jasmine who is hilarious, kind, compassionate, trustworthy, and polite. They wish they could be friends with her. Not only is she beautiful on the outside, but on the inside as well... and that's rare to find now-a-days. In a world full of fake girls, she is real. Thank God for that.

WEX - Judging

It was that really annoying girl in the other class who every time we ever had a field trip I ALWAYS ended up in the same car as her. It was the girl who would always sit next to me when we had STAR testing since our last names were so close. It was that girl who had the annoying colored yellow and green neon braces who would always flash a huge dorky smile when she would get a better grade then me on the most recent math test. This was Katie who I hated so much. Not because she had ever been mean to me, or called me names or hurt me like the other kids, but because something about the way she looked bothered me. Without knowing it at the time (in the 6th grade), this was also the girl who would end up being the absolute best friend I ever had. Ironically, I've never met somebody with a personality more similar to mine... ever. Imagine a girl version of me and that's my best friend, Katie!

WEX: First Kiss

"Teehee," sounds of 11-year-old giggling were everywhere. I re-adjusted my position as I felt comfortable sitting around with all my girl friends playing truth or dare since that was a normal occurrence. I lifted up my palm from the wet dew on the grass we were sitting on. My palm was drenched, but not from the grass... from my sweat. We were sitting in the courtyard of her condo complex next to the trickling water fountain which was usually relaxing but not now. I was scared of the person I was sitting directly across from. I tried to avoid direct eye contact since her appearance was so intimidating. She was a big-bad 7th grader, she was tall, tan, had a big 'chest', and worst of all, an evil devilish smile. They called her Jasmine Thomas.

"Um... Jasmine! I dare you to kiss Dominic," Pia, Jasmine's sister shouted. Immediately my whole body froze up like a dead fish in a freezer. My 11-year-old figure began quaking like a leaf. She flashed that evil smile of hers and got up from her side of the circle. She approached me menacingly like a lion about to prey on a helpless little animal. I tried to escape, but then I felt my friends holding me down! There was no escape! I squeezed my eyes shut as I felt a wet, slobbery kiss on the lips for what was in actuality, a second, but felt like an hour. So that was my first kiss: me being held down as some stranger planted a huge kiss on me!

Cooking Blog

PROCESS

Finally as the LULS project draws to a close, we finally get to enjoy the fruit of our labor: the herbs. In order to explain exactly how I got a cayenne pepper from the vine to a plate, I must first start from the process of harvesting. After researching how to harvest, I discovered that they should be harvested when they turn red (mine were green at the time), and to cut them with scissors directly above the pepper.

The recipe I chose was a 3 Cheese Macaroni pasta. This recipe required many ingredients, most of them similar to the traditional macaroni pasta. The element that gave it the extra kick was organic, homegrown Cayenne Pepper. The recipe ordered for the Cayenne Pepper to be sliced into small pieces. These pieces would then be poured into a sauce consisting mainly of milk, cheese, and butter. I feel that the Cayenne Pepper definitely complemented the cheese and gave it an extra flavor to really push this recipe over the top in terms of flavor!

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WONDER

During the LULS project, I think that growing an herb garden was a very important part of the theme of sustainability because if we tell others to live sustainably, then we must do something as a class to live sustainably as well. Growing an herb garden is a simple and fun way to live sustainably without even knowing it. With the knowledge we learned about plants we can go on for the rest of our lives and bring that knowledge into our homes so we can continue to live sustainably. Cooking our herbs just shows how living sustainably can also benefit you! You help save the environment and you can eat yummy herbs too!

After finishing the LULS project, I feel that this final activity really addresses the essential questions of the LULS project because we live more sustainably by growing our own herbs instead of buying them from Henry's or Vons. We are teaching others to live sustainably by showing how we grow herbs and cook them on our blogs so that people all around the world can learn from us.

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REFLECTION

Overall I had fun baking with my herbs. But if I'm being honest, my meal tasted horrible! I must have done something horribly wrong with the sauce because when I took it off the stove and combined it with the Penne paste, the sauce became like glue! And on top of that, it was really bitter and disgusting...

Honestly, I don't really feel that growing herbs has changed my thing thinking in any ways because although it was a cool experience, it's not something I can see myself doing. Gardening has never been something I've been interested it so I haven't really done any critical thinking about this whole gardening thing. I think in the future I will find alternate ways of living more sustainably that appeal more to my kind of personality.

TIB

After reading many different genres of TIBs (This I Believe) Essays, I finally found one that really struck me the first time I read it. This essay showed how sometimes foriveing and forgetting isn't always that easy. That is definitely something that has always been true for me, so I was inspired by reading this essay.

Recipies

From the Simple Recipes blog I found a great Cilantro recipe, that I would like to do.

Also, from the pioneer woman's blog, some good 'ol chili!

Recipies

http://recipes.epicurean.com/recipe/22660/black-bean-soup.html

Black Bean Soup

http://recipes.epicurean.com/recipe/12517/mexican-popcorn.html

Mexican Popcorn!

http://recipes.epicurean.com/recipe/16288/pesto-cheesecake.html

Cheesecake