Si's Kitchen

Thanksgiving 2009

I hosted Thanksgiving dinner at my house this year and invited my good friends Diana, Lisa, and Mike. It’s been a while since I hosted the big day and I hadn’t cooked a big bird in a long long time. But, once a cook – always a cook, and I am happy to report that [...]

Spicy Tomato Ravioli Soup

I’ve been thinking about a cool pasta based soup so I decided to combine two of my favorite dishes (toasted ravioli and greens) into one nice soup combination. With 9 easy steps you too can be enjoying this soup:

Simple Salsa

Here is a really easy salsa. I make this all the time and it is great. Try adding it in with the veggie tortilla soup just before serving it and you will love it.
Simple Salsa from psyan on Vimeo.
Simple Salsa
2 Jalapeno Peppers
4 Large Ripe Tomatoes
1 Yellow Onion
1 Batch of Green Onions
1 Tablespoon of Chopped Garlic
1 [...]

Toasted Artichoke Ravioli

Hi Everyone,
I have a secret I need to let you all in on. I never ever use recipes and I never ever write down what I make. No two dishes are exactly the same. I believe in a pinch of this and a handful of that. So, making these videos and providing you with recipes [...]

Vegetarian Tortilla Soup

Here is my first recipe vodcast. On today’s menu is Vegetarian Tortilla Soup. The video below will show you the basics to this quick soup. It only takes minutes to prepare.
Spicy Vegetarian Tortilla Soup from psyan on Vimeo.
Vegetarian Tortilla Soup
1 can black beans
1 can fire roasted diced tomatoes (can also add a can with green [...]

Travel

German Summer 2010

I am spending the summer in Brigden, Germany with my boyfriend Stephan. Brigden is a neighboring municipality of Gangelt and is located in western Germany on the Netherlands border.

Stephan is a German officer in the Air Force. He is assigned to the NATO Airbase and is a Tactical Director on the AWACS. You can [...]

My Summer 2009

Hello Everyone,
Some of you may have wondered what happened to me this summer (specifically my mom).  It was a really busy summer with all kinds of cool activities and I did most of my blogging as Utterli posts. Utterli is cool because it allows me to use my phone and do what I call micro-blogging [...]

New Years Eve in Granada, Nicaragua

It is New Years Eve and we packed up our belongings and said goodbye to Ometepe. The first stop was the ferry back across lake Nicaragua. It was a beautiful day and the view of the volcanoes was terrific.
Crossing Lake Nicaragua in route to Grenada from psyan on Vimeo.
We are on our way [...]

Horseback Riding in Ometepe

Here is my accommodations in Ometepe, Nicaragua. We are on an island in the middle of lake Nicaragua. Lake Nicaragua is the largest fresh water lake in Central America. We will be staying here for two days.
Ometepe, Nicaragua from psyan on Vimeo.
I soon found out that we had a family of monkeys living in [...]

Zip-lining in Costa Rica

One of the fun things to do in Costa Rica is to visit the Cloud Forest of Monteverde and go zip-lining with your friends. My GAP gang got up early and headed out. It was an absolutely gorgeous day. After we got all geared up (harness, helmet, and gloves) we set out for our first [...]

Monteverde Cloud Forest, Costa Rica

Today we headed for Monteverde (the cloud forest) Costa, Rica. Almost immediately on our journey we ran into some roadside creatures. I have absolutely no idea what these creatures are called. If you know, please leave a comment below!
Roadside Critters from psyan on Vimeo.
We loaded onto boats and headed across a human-made lake that is [...]

White Water Rafting in La Fortuna, CR

When I went to bed Christmas night it was drizzling. I woke in the middle of the night to pouring rain. It down poured buckets of rain all night long. We woke up in the morning and it was still raining hard. We got picked up by the local guide to go white water rafting [...]

Christmas Day 2008: Would U Drink This?

Our second day started with a 7:30 departure from San Jose and headed north to La Fortuna and Aranal volcano. Deciding where to sit in a 12 passenger van with 12 people traveling is always tricky. There are only a limited number of window seats. I climbed all the way to the back [...]

Photography

Photo of the Month: May

This photo was taken on the San Antonio River Walk. I stopped in San Antonio on my cross-country drive. What a terrific city. Me and my friend Diana did a boat tour. The sun’s rays were coming through the trees perfectly as I snapped this photo.

Photo of the Month: April

Here is an MRI image of my brain. Medical test are just one of the many cool parts about interviewing for the astronaut program. It was great learning more about my body and my overall health. I learned that my brain is “Grossly Normal”…and I’m hoping that’s a good thing!

Photo of the Month: March

The photo above is my natural hair. For most of my life I got my hair chemically straightened and never knew my natural hair was actually kinda nice. Hard to believe…but true. Now that I have had curly hair for about 5 years I wanted to compare it to the straight hair I use to [...]

Photo of the Month: February

I needed to get orthotics and had x-rays taken of my feet. I thought this photo of my feet was unique and interesting. I wish I had video taped the doctors explanation of why orthotics would be useful with all my physical activities but so far my feet feel great.

Photo of the Month: January

Come on…you knew I was going to pick a NASA photo, Right??? It was one of the best professional experiences of my life and this photo sums up my childhood goal of wanting to be a Space Shuttle Commander. I had always seen the road to being an astronaut through a military lens and flying. [...]

Photo of the Month: December

Horseback riding in Ometepe, Nicaragua. Lucerious is my horse and we are riding along the beach of Lake Nicaragua.

Photo of the Month: November

This is a photo of a high altitude balloon with payloads from Arizona State, U of Arizona, Embry-Riddle, Pima C.C., and South Mountain C.C.. It is part of the Arizona Space Grant Consortium in association with NASA. We have a team of 6 students from South Mountain Community College. Their goal is to create a [...]

Photo of the Month: October

F-22 Demo flight at Miramar Airshow 2008. An absolutely incredible piece of machinery.
This photo has not been enhanced in any way. San Diego is always great for generating moisture compression and the afternoon lighting was just right!

Videos

Favorite Aviation Photos

Here is a video album of my favorite aviation photos. All the photos were taken by me. I really enjoy aviation photography and I hope you like the album. I’ve been trying out Animoto and so far I like it.

Peruvian Rain Forest and Grubs!

My best friend Diana will eat anything. That’s just one of many reasons why she is so great to travel with. During our South American jaunt we stopped in the Peruvian Rain Forest where Diana put her survival 101 skills to use. I entered this video in a contest and you can see what I [...]

Health & Fitness

First Walk in Germany

This morning I went for an exploration walk around Stephan’s village. Just a few steps out the door and I am in the country. It’s hard to describe just how beautiful the landscape is here. The weather so far has been perfect! Stephan’s village is in the background. Checkout my runkeeper.com map below to see [...]

New Hiking Program: RunKeeper

Today I started using a new program to track my hiking. It’s called My Runkeeper. I hiked South Mountain Preserve and was really happy with the results. Below is the route map I hiked. You can also see statistical data on start and end time, how far we hiked, our pace, and how high we [...]

Hiking South Mountain Area

For the past couple of weeks I have been hiking South Mountain Preserve. The preserve consists of over 16,000 acres and is considered the largest municipal park in the country. There are over 51 miles of trails for horseback riding, hiking and mountain biking. For the past month I have been hiking the Mormon and [...]

Spirits

My friends have decided to utter their spirits (Wine, Beer, and any other alcohol). Since I am not a big drinker I probably won’t have a lot of utterz. However, I think you will enjoy my friends unique tastes!

Health and Fitness

Trying to achieve or maintain good health and fitness seems to be a recurring theme in most people’s lives. I am no exceptions. I have found that my 20 year old, track running body, no longer exists. I miss the days of being able to eat anything I could imagine and not have one ounce [...]

The Colony

The Colony

If you are interested in information about The Colony please see the Discovery Channel Colony website or my public facebook page Sian Proctor. If you click the like button on my facebook page you will automatically receive updates when I post new information about the show.

NASA Astronaut Selection 2009

Final Results from NASA Astronaut Candidate Application 2009

Dear family and friends,
As you know my journey to become a part of the 20th Astronaut class has come to an end. On June 22nd I received a call from Astronaut Sunita Williams. She was really nice as she informed me that I didn’t get selected and encouraged me to try again.

Me with Sunita [...]

Call From NASA

Dear Family and Friends,
At my age I don’t expect really cool birthday gifts but yesterday I got the best belated gift ever, a call from NASA. To recap the situation, NASA conducted 2nd interviews with 40 individuals from the original pool of ~120 candidates. I went on the first interview but didn’t make the second…at [...]

My NASA Astronaut Interview

These last few days have been some of the best of my life. I interviewed for my dream job and in the process I got to meet some amazing people. What more could you ask for? Interviewing for the Astronaut Program isn’t just about the interview. It begins with meeting your astronaut candidate group. These [...]

Day 1 at NASA

This morning I got on a plane and headed to my Interview at Johnson Space Center for the NASA Astronaut Program. I am really excited to be here and also in shock. I feel like harry potter when he finds out he’s a wizard and says, “I can’t be a wizard, I’m just harry!” [...]

NASA Interview!!!

Dear Friends,
I got my interview with NASA. It is January 14-16. (BTW – I jumped up and down and ran all over my campus hugging my colleagues!) There is no way I could have done this alone. I want you to know that each one of you has had an impact on me and my [...]

Astronaut Update!!

This week was like any other except that my boyfriend called from Prescott, Az to inform me of a letter from NASA. “What do you want me to do with it?” he asked. I was in North Carolina at a Sustainability conference and wasn’t due back into the valley for two more days. “Open it!” [...]