Author: Naomi Valdivia

Naomi Valdivia is an artist originally from the South Bay area of Los Angeles County, California. Growing up in a large house that was constantly under construction by her grandfather, using mismatched and often found materials heavily influenced her creative mind. There were always nooks and spaces to hide in and create different worlds from her imagination. Because there was no standard in her environment that looked normal, out of the box thinking was the baseline for her developing brain. Her younger education consisted of strict, evangelical Christian schools until she was dropped into Hollywood for high school at the Fairfax Visual Arts Magnet on Melrose Avenue. This was a culture shock that opened up a whole new world to her creatively, and it was then that she decided to continue her art education with a Bachelors of Fine Arts at Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles. Meeting her husband in college, graduating, then having 3 kids while maintaining a career in graphic design and illustration, she has been quite busy with very little time to create as much personal art as she had originally planned. She has held positions in various areas in the field, including scientific, biomedical, patent illustration, label and package printing, and publishing. This career has spanned almost 20 years. She now resides in the Greater Phoenix area of Arizona, and is excited to work with Aurtistic Zine, as she has only recently discovered that she is on the spectrum. It took all of the time at home during the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic, away from an office and people that she would constantly mask in front of, for her to be able to research and finally accept the fact that she is Autistic. At first, it was scary, but quickly became freeing. Her mission now is to help educate more people about what Autism actually means and includes; as it is such a broad spectrum, and no two Autistic minds are alike. To be able to combine her identity as an artist and an Autistic person, a truly Aurtistic individual, is extremely meaningful.

Hard Work at Home Monday

Today was a difficult one for me. Didn’t get any cleaning done and barely any cooking. I am prone to depression and for whatever reason, it got a hold of me. We moms have a lot of things we have to deal with for everyone else in our families. Sometimes it’s hard to just do the things we need to do for ourselves. Nobody is perfect, even us supermoms! So make sure to take some time for yourself and to admit to yourself if you’re having some issues. Admitting that they exist opens the door to doing what you need to do to help yourself. You have to help yourself in order to help your family and be the mom you want to be. Keeping that short and sweet, and moving on…

Here are some pics of my work in progress last night:

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Toddler Time

Some mornings are harder than others, especially with a toddler. They have no sense of work or deadlines. They just want to spend time with mama! I gave up trying to work at the computer because his crying and screaming and pulling were such a distraction it was pointless. So I’m working on my phone, with the boy standing on my back. After he roughed me up and messed up my hair and gave me a few headbutts. Feeling a bit defeated but I will figure something out…

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Italian Sunday

Creating your own marinara sauce is very easy and customizable. Just make sure you make this on a day where you will be home for the majority of the time. This is why this has become a Sunday tradition for us. We start the day with coffee, breakfast and slicing up raw tomatoes! We spend Sunday as a day to refresh, renew and prepare for the coming week and the smell of homemade marinara throughout the day is extremely comforting!

Here’s the basics of creating a good marinara sauce. Please edit to your likings and make this sauce your own!

1. Chop up 3-4 lbs of tomatoes. (We get them cheap at the farmers market by grabbing the super ripe tomatoes they want to get rid of) the riper the better!

2. Sautée 1 chopped onion and minced garlic (we use a lot but put in as much as you’re comfortable with) in extra virgin olive oil and a bit of butter until they are both soft.

3. Add any dried herbs you’d like such as rosemary, oregano, thyme. Add salt and pepper and stir everything together.

4. Deglaze the pan by adding either water, wine, chicken broth (we didnt have any of these so we used about half a can of Sapporo instead!)

5. Add the tomatoes to the pot.

6. Add more olive oil and herbs and stir it up!

7. Switch your heat to low ad cook it down for at least 4 hours, stirring throughout to keep it from sticking to the bottom of the pot.

That’s it! Enjoy!

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A Super-Healthy Butter

I am a huge fan of mung beans, or as my grandma called them, mungo beans. I will definitely be trying this recipe. I’ve got a bag of the beans in my pantry to use right now!

cicizhou's avatarKITCHEN CICI

Peanuts, chickpeas, almonds, hazelnuts. Those are all healthy things by themselves, but when we make butter out of them, we put in a ton of oils. Yes, oils do have good healthy fats, but let’s be honest — how many of us actually only manage to eat recommended servings of anything with the word “butter” in it? Yeah. I didn’t raise my hand either. 

So I decided to use something else: mung beans. 

To be honest, smashing mung beans and making it yummy isn’t a new invention — mung bean paste is something used across Asia to jazz up pastries. This mung bean butter is more like a simplified version of an old Chinese favorite.

Whoa. That just sounded like a description of me, in comparison to my parents. 

Also, mung beans are really healthy. Just ask my friend the Nutrition Label: 

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(Don’t be freaked out by the 330 calories thing. Unless you’re…

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Farmers Market and Still Life

Healthy eating is a very high priority in our household. With the current issue of GMOs in food these days, we choose to buy almost 100% organic and non GMO foods. I know what you’re thinking, it’s expensive! Let me tell you, we are definitely not rich (yet) and I have to make each paycheck stretch. But where there is a will there is a way! I actually end up paying less for healthy options most of the time than the norm. Coupons, clearance items, farmers market/local produce, and cooking majority of our meals at home make this possible.

I’ll delve into more of that in later posts, but for now check out these beautiful pictures of organic grapes, mini peppers and red green beans! These will be incorporated into a still life painting!

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