Tuesday Afternoon – Thursday Afternoon

My family’s Christmas Eve party is tonight and we’ve got lots of setting up to do so this will have to be kept quick.

Tuesday Afternoon….

After my last post Adam and I set out for some exercise.  We ran on the waterfront downtown together.  We did walk/run intervals for 40minutes.  I’m not sure exactly how far we ran but I burnt 450calories.

Adam and my parents made chili for dinner (which I’m really not a fan off, unless it’s from ED&BV) so I pieced a few things together.  Like a smoothie –

1/2 cup low fat cottage cheese, 1/2 cup pineapple, 1 small banana, splash milk, squeeze honey.  Topped with nutmeg.

My mom also reheated me a slice of pizza from the freezer, Adam ate all of my half from the other day so it was just plain cheese.

We went out for drinks with some friends but I was the driver so I stuck to diet coke.  We stayed out past 1 though, so we were a little sleepy the next day! 😉

Wednesday…

Our plan was to go study at our favorite coffee shop, but due to our late start and some unexpected traffic it just didn’t work out.  I was planning on blogging too, but I forgot my camera cord, doh!  We did get tasty sandwiches to eat in the car while we ran errands with my mom though!

I got a whole wheat wrap with sweet potato, goat cheese, spinach, and spicy hummus, YUM.

I was feeling really sick later in the afternoon (NOT because of the sandwich, spicy food does NOT seem to affect my stomach) so Adam made me this yummy tasting plate.

Thankfully I rallied in time for dinner.  Adam and I cooked for my parents and grandparents, who are down visiting as well.

Adam made a Real Simple recipe for roasted red pepper turkey meatloaf,

and I roasted up some okra and green beans.

My mom provided dessert –

A teensy sliver of rum cake a parent brought her,

and a peppermint chocolate cookie.

I ate a snowball a little later too.

And a cup of Eggnog’n Tea.

And then we went out drinking way too late for the second night!  Good times were had by all, but I did stick to diet coke again.

Thursday Morning….

I think the no-booze rule saved me last night because I was able to get up this morning and go for a run!  I did ~ 45minutes/490 calories, and ~3miles.  I did my pt when I got home before I dove into this –

holy food am I glad I can find the pineapple Chiobani down here!

Although I was probably most excited about this Carebear spoon I dug up!

Now as soon as we leave the library we are heading home to prep for the party.  There won’t really be dinner or lunch today, more like lots of snacking on really tasty things.  🙂

I probably won’t be posting again until after this weekend, so to all my readers who celebrate – Merry Christmas!

Buffalo Chicken Breakfast

Thank goodness last night was a success!  The food and drinks were all super tasty and we had a great time.  Most of our friends stayed past 1 as we did totally cool things like play pictionary and scattegories 🙂  Adam said it was the best birthday he’s ever had!

This morning I couldn’t get the party food out of my head; breakfast traditions be damned I wanted buffalo chicken dip and garlic bread!  So that’s what I had.

Two small slices of garlic bread topped with buffalo chicken dip and stuck under the broiler for 10minutes.  Delicious.

I dropped Adam off at school, went to Fed-Ex and then hit up the grocery store.  We are going home for Christmas so I don’t have to feed us much longer, we had a nice $25 grocery bill!

When I got home I inhaled the rest of the dip (about 3servings?) which kind of killed lunch.  I knew I needed something more – and some greens – so I drank this Odwalla Original Superfood drink.

Yums, green looks good on more people than Kermit.

I’m not sure what the rest of the day will bring; I have a few tentative plans but we’ll see.  I should be studying.  I may not go to the gym because I’m still limping from my doctor’s appointment.

What should you do today?

Last Lab and Leftovers

I just got back from my last Chem lab ever!  Until next semester that is 😉  Actually, I have to go back next week to officially check out, but that won’t be bad at all.  Nevermind that I did end up failing my quiz, let’s focus on the positives!

I ate some sour cream and onion PopChips before I left for class.

Without a formal lunch though I was starving before I even got to campus.  I tried to trick myself into fullness my eating far too much gum and my body got its revenge by giving me a wicked stomach ache.  😦

And I think it’s good that I’m mentioning the stomach ache before dinner, before I show you what I actually ate for dinner.  The rest of the Annie’s shells leftovers +

I mixed some greens into the mac before microwaving and then doused the whole thing with Taco Bell hot sauce packets.

I know it looks a little swampy, but it ended up being tasty.

I’d like to say I’m going to bed soon, but I’ve said that the past three nights and then stayed up past 1, so let’s just not pretend.  🙂

Do you take home packets from dining establishments?  I’m not so lacking in class that I go out of my way to steal them, but I always squirrel away any leftovers.  The Arby’s packets that are always lying around – Adam eats way too much roast beef – make for the best sandwiches ever!

P.S. Please please don’t enter this; I NEED to win.

The Blind Side

It was a grand, grand Sunday!  No schoolwork ever made it into the picture, but that would have just mucked up the fun anyways 🙂

At 4:20 we finally made it in to see “The Blind Side.”  Love, love, love.  It was a true story about a Southern white family that took in a struggling, homeless black boy.  There were lots of y’alls, football, laughs, and touching moments.  Sandra Bulluck is one of my favorite actors, particularly for how well she does in roles like this.  I highly recommend seeing this movie.

I had a lick of Adam’s Maple Bacon Lollipop (brought back from Foodbuzz),

and we ate some of these Milkata candies.

When we got home at 7 I was so hungry!  I ate a delicious spoonful of Justin’s Maple Almond Butter.

Then we made the quickest-tastiest dinner of all time.

4 ingredients, 3 minutes of prep, 20minutes in the stove, 1 very very happy housewife!  I linked to the recipe here.

I was so so pleased with this idea.  Thanks for the pesto, Foodbuzz!  The crunchy bits of pasta were my favorite.

After dinner we walked over to Walgreens to pick up a few things.  And you know I made a big bowl of ‘corn when I got home!

I’m going to snuggle up with Adam and do some munching and tv watching, have a good night!

What 5 ingredient or less recipes have you had success with lately?

Bowled Over

Hello, hello!  I’m up pretty late for a sick kid so I’ll try to keep this quick.  The movies didn’t really work out – we went to the mall and missed not one, but two! showings.  We ended up being at the mall for two fruitless hours, we walked around a bit and had a long chat on a bench.

I was actually glad we missed the second show because on the ride home I got a killer migraine that would have hit mid-movie.  After some Excedrin and a quick nap I was ready to make a fancy shmancy dinner.  I love brie, and was so excited to see some in my Foodbuzz swag.  And actually the inspiring recipe can from a magazine I read on my California trip!

We loosely followed this recipe from Real Simple, Pasta with Brie, Mushroom and Arugula.  Our changes –

  • we used ziti instead of penne
  • we used white mushrooms instead of button mushrooms
  • we used a cooking onion rather than a red onion
  • we subbed 1T butter substitute (Promise) for the evoo

It was pretty tasty!  But I guess it’s a good thing I’m sick or I’m not sure one meal for the whole day would have covered it 🙂

After dinner we headed out to meet some friends at a local bowling alley.  We called and found out games are $3 after 9 so it seemed like a good idea, even though I’m not a very good bowler.  We played (and drank) with three other couples and it was a lot of fun!

I managed to finagle it with the snack bar and the bartender to get a chocolate milkshake with a double shot of Jack Daniels.

Perfection.

And later on I had a diet coke with amaretto.

None of my games were great, but the second was the worst (I was playing under Benji’s name) –

Embarrassing!  I had a great time though, I definitely want to go back.

Now the goal is sleep before 1am.  My workload tomorrow is pretty light, I only have class one day before Thanksgiving some I’m hoping to get lots of pre-work done next week.  Sweet dreams folks!

Do you like ‘couples sports’ like bowling and mini golf?

Doing It With Friends

Today was pretty darn successful!  My shameful laundry has to wait until tomorrow but I completed all my planned studying.

I ended up skipping errands with Adam (he can really go to the post office alone) in order to stay home and make an early dinner.  I whipped up a tasty veggie frittata while he was gone.

unfortunately I can’t share the recipe because I’m entering it in a contest, but I can tell you it was tasty (if not photogenic).

Each serving has 112calories, 12grams of protein, and 60%+ of your daily requirement of vitamin A, so I think I did a pretty good job recipe writing.

During cooking time, I ate two slices of white bread with Smart Balance Light while I did some kitchen organizing.

After dinner was finished we headed over to a friend’s house for a study session.  Listening to Adam and his friends identify body parts puts me in the perfect study zone and I got lots of reading done.  Plus I stole some Halloween leftovers.

It’s almost 11 and I still have to shower and look at my schedule so I’ve got to scadaddle.  Sweet dreams folks!

How do you like eggs other than as eggs?  I like frittatas a lot but my favorite rendition is definitely french toast.

Mish Mash Meal

Fabulous day alert!  After so many weeks of being a lazy blob I am seriously relishing my productivity.  Post office, studying, dinner; check, check, check!  Plus I rocked two of my grandma’s old necklaces which always makes me happy.

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The line at the post office was redonculous, but a very sweet package from my mommy was a nice reward at the end.  Lots of excitement ensued; I got a  bunch of magazines, new book,

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a baggie of my favorite candy of all time ever (I ate one of these without photographing), fruit gels,

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and a P.E. T-shirt from my old high school!

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After my not ‘rain nor snow’ing I met up with a friend from Chemistry to study.  We got in a solid 5 hours!  As much as we accomplished, I didn’t do so hot on the practice tests so I know I have my work cut out for me this week.

I got home around 8:30 and got right to dinner.  My goal was to use up leftovers, frozen food, and my Annie Chun’s sample.

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The end result was seriously socks rocking!  I was in absolute heaven eating this plate.

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I heated chipotle pepper oil over medium high heat.  Added 2 chopped Apple Maple Sausages (I froze these a few months ago) and 2 big handfuls spinach/arugula and a small handful shredded carrot.  Next I added leftover roasted butternut squash from yesterday and 1/2 of the black pearl rice.  Then I stirred in a splash each of soy sauce, rice vinegar, and sesame seeds.  Finally I broke in 1egg and stirred.

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I couldn’t get over how good this was!  What a mix of flavors and textures, lots of sweet/savory which I love.

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For dessert I tried some of my new candies.

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They were good, but the Sunkist ones are the best.

We started watching “Glory Road” while we ate and I’m enjoying it.  See you tomorrow!

Have you made any good mish-mash meals lately?

Tuna Lasagna and 3.14

Howdy there!  I left the apartment and made it to the pharmacy (across many many a highway) unscathed 🙂  I was so proud of myself I bought a fountain diet coke from Subway as a reward!  I reached school around 4:30, which meant I had 2ish hours to study before class.  I still understand everything but I did stay for a while after class to ask a question.

When I got home I made some Chocolate Amazing Grass with skim milk.

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Adam put the dinner I prepared this afternoon into the oven and it was ready when I got home.

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(That’s a small plate portion) Tuna Salad Lasagna Stacks from Rachel Ray magazine.  Here’ s a link to the recipe.

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It was pretty good, but I saved room for dessert.

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Tyler Pie was a success, the husband has been enjoying it.  It is nice and custard-like.

I’m hoping to shower and get to bed pretty quickly because I have tons of schoolwork to do tomorrow.  I’m going to head to a coffee shop to study so I won’t be posting until lunch.  Please keep your fingers crossed for me that I can go to the gym tomorrow.

Do you ever use food as a reward?  I don’t use “food” per se (and I am strongly against doing this with children), but a diet coke?  Hells yeah!  P.S. Whenever I get a fountain soda I always add a shot of cherry coke for funsies.