The Gay Vegan family and activism

One of my favorite pictures is one I took this past Easter. Mike had, as he does every year, cooked a vegan feast for friends. They had all left and Mike had fallen asleep on the love seat with Monty, Rock, and Suga. Although Shadow and Miguel were not on the love seat, the photo shows so much that I am grateful for.

The Gay Vegan family includes Mike and I and our five companion animals.

I love our family.

Mike and I were married on April 30, 2005. In addition to us we share our home with: Shadow, a 17-year old Cockapoo; Rock, a 12-year old Yorkie; Suga, an 8-year old Maltese mix; Miguel, a 7-year old Chow mix; and Monty, a 3-year old Yorkie.

We live in Lakewood, Colorado, a suburb directly west of Denver. We love where we live.

Mike and I try every day to make the world a better place for all living beings. There are two things that we do more often than others. As most activists, we have chosen to do our activism in a way that we believe benefits the voiceless and also fits into our lives. Although we also raise money through Cruelty-Free World to support animal groups all over the country, these two things we do are more local, more in our community.

Our first constant is that we are a foster home for neglected, abused, and hard to place dogs from several local animal shelters. We have been doing this since before we were married and have fostered dozens of dogs. The benefit for us has been huge as we get to meet so many loving animals and support them as they become less fearful of people. Eventually I want to create a link to photos of all of our fosters. They would make you smile for sure.

Fostering is something that you can do pretty much anywhere. I'm sure that most animal shelters have a need for fosters for some of their dogs (and cats). They would be incredibly grateful to you for helping them.

Another thing we try to do is to turn people on to the delicacy that is vegan food. I'm sure many of you have heard people's concerns when considering veganism, concerns that they are really going to miss out on delicious food if they become vegan. Having been a vegan for over ten years I can tell them that nothing is further from the truth. And being married to an amazing vegan cook, it is only better! So we invite non-vegan friends over for meals, for brunches, for cinnamon rolls (Mike's are THE best I have ever had!)and to meet us at restaurants that serve wonderful vegan options.

There is nothing like having a sweet, beautiful, severely abused dog sleeping on your lap while your awesome husband is baking vegan cinnamon rolls. Hmmmm.

Remember that there are many ways to be an activist. Writing letters, attending a protest, having a chat with a local elected official, passing out leaflets, etc. This list could go on and on. Oh, and spreading awareness for Meatless Mondays in your community!

Thanks for reading our blog. I continue to be surprised by all of your wonderful comments and love. Those who have been reading our blog have really rocked it with spreading the word about Meatless Mondays and I am so grateful.