WIAW: Rocking Out to the 90's

Happy Wednesday and Happy first day of August!

Thanks to Jenn for this wonderful party and a new challenge for the month!

I'll start with the challenge for the month; during the summer I don't usually go out of my way to eat summer produce or summery foods, I just tend to eat whatever. But since joining the blog world I've become more conscious of what I eat. This summer I've been eating blueberries a whole lot, mostly in my Greek yogurts for breakfast. I'm going to try and get some watermelon soon because if there is one fruit I could eat for the rest of my life, it would be watermelon. Yum!

Now on to my normal eats from Tuesday and one treat from a different day.

Breakfast: Chocolate chip protein pancakes by Kammie at Sensual Appeal

It was so damn delicious!

Lunch: Grilled cheese with homemade sweet potato fries

It was the first time I've ever made sweet potato fries and they came out really well

Cody and I watched Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone until my mom came home and we had to head to San Jose for a family emergency. 

Snack: (unpictured) Fudgesicle

It was so hot in San Jose!

I was really excited to find a Popeyes and since Cody had recommended Popeyes I had to try some for a quick dinner. 

Dinner & Dessert: Peach sweet tea, chicken tenders, biscuit & mashed potatoes. For dessert I had a mini peach pie.

On the drive home my mom and I rocked out to songs from the 90's while driving over a huge mountain. Eventually we drove into the huge fog bank that is Santa Cruz

 I promise there is a city under all that fog

Rocking out to Cher--we're that awesome

Now the one dessert I had recently I got from Kammie at Sensual Appeal

Chocolate peanut butter cake for one

It was super fluffy and delicious!

Have a great week!

MIMM: Thankful for Family

I don't ever usually like Mondays, but Marvelous in my Monday always perks me up. Granted it doesn't necessarily make my day bump-free or anything, but I always get to start my mornings by thinking of something that is really marvelous. It helps me start my Monday off in a more positive light and allows me to brag about something :)

I've always taken my parents for granted. They've always been there for me no matter what and it hasn't been until recently that I've realized how truly marvelous they are. I had to give up a year of college to keep a roof over my ex-fiance's and my head. I mainly paid for everything and college and a full-time job just weren't mixing. When I broke things off with him and was left with an apartment I couldn't afford, my parents stepped up and offered to move out of the apartment they were living in to move into a new place with me. I was so frazzled by bills and living on my own that I almost broke into tears by the generosity of my parents. We talked college and they worked a deal out with me to go to college and they would let me live there rent free. I was relieved to be able to go back to school with my parents' support and I wouldn't be where I am without them.

They really are marvelous people and the best parent's anyone could ever ask for. I may have my problems with them once in awhile, but I've really come to realize they always have my back no matter what and they'll always be there for me. I always want to do my best to make them proud and to be told by my stepdad that I make him so proud got me choked up.

With school starting in a few weeks and my parents doing whatever they can to help me succeed really just made me realize what marvelous parents they are and just really drove home how much I love them and how thankful I am to have them in my life.

Have a marvelous week!

Watching the Olympics

As all of you (hopefully) know the Olympics have started and I'm finally organized enough to find out when the events I want to watch are actually happening. Usually I just get the recaps on the news on the next morning and am always bummed I didn't get to watch it happen. Not this year! Cody and I got dinner to enjoy at home so I could watch the opening ceremonies for the first time.

 Good ol' pizza and garlic breadsticks

Unfortunately I wasn't very impressed. In all honesty, the only part I really enjoyed was the comedic relief of Rowan Atkinson.

Once the countries started to file out, my eyes began to droop and I passed out on Cody's shoulder waiting for USA to come out. Cody woke me up just in time to see them walk out and I forced myself to stay awake until I saw who was lighting the cauldron at the end. I kept hearing it was this amazing surprise and it was very anticlimatic when I didn't know who the hell the person was. I went right back to sleep afterwards and didn't actually see the cauldron lit up. All in all I was unimpressed by my first opening ceremonies.

So far I've caught swimming and gymnastics which are my favorite events to watch. I'm so impressed by the gymnastics and have always wished I could do what they do. Watching the swimming events always makes me miss my days of competitive swimming and I always get a rush remembering how I felt when I dove off the board. I have to say I was bummed that Michael Phelps didn't make the podium for his first race, but hopefully he'll start getting those gold medals now. And hey, at least Ryan Lochte won gold so we kept it in USA anyway.

Watching the Olympics always motivates me to start working out and being healthy. How can I not when there are so many commercials promoting a healthy lifestyle like the Olympians (I'm looking at you Subway who's been advertising for months already). Today I was so busy grocery shopping and making food that I started to put off doing a workout. I didn't want to go to the gym and was just feeling lazy. Fortunately for me I have this handy-dandy notebook app from Nike that has workouts for you. I did a 15 minute cardio workout to at least get myself moving. Unfortunately I didn't even finish it. I was sucking in air like a fish out of water and was just crazy weak. I have no idea if it was because it was the end of the day and I was too full from dinner or what, but I'm at least proud of myself for getting some movement in, even if it wasn't a full 15 minutes. 

Anyone else disappointed with the opening ceremonies?

Do you find the Olympics motivating to be healthy?

Let's Get Real Here

I'm going to be honest here and just say I've been having some big troubles with food lately.

I've talked before about the ED I have called orthorexia and it's been giving me a bunch of trouble lately.

I got into a funk and just started eating food that I treat myself to. One day of treat foods ended up into a few days with fried foods, sugar up the wazoo, and just plain crap food. I didn’t want to eat anything but those foods and then my ED kicked in and I started hating myself for eating what I was. I constantly berated myself for choosing “bad” food instead of sticking to my meal plan. I would get frustrated with myself for knowing I was eating unhealthy food and continuing to keep eating it. There were times I would get so frustrated I would be in tears. I didn’t know how to kick myself out of this food funk and start eating better foods. And in feeling bad about how I was eating I would feel bad about my body as well. I pictured myself blowing up like a balloon from the food I was eating and because I was having these horrible thoughts about my body, I turned to food to comfort myself. I was caught in this vicious circle and couldn’t figure out how to get out.

I go grocery shopping tomorrow and I’m hoping I’ll be able to get some yummy, nutritious food for myself and in turn feel better about what I’m eating. I’m seeing Sunday as a reset button and just take a deep breath and calm all my chaotic, self-deprecating thoughts.

This post doesn’t really have any entertaining material or really have a purpose, but I needed to let all of my thoughts flow and I want to be honest on my blog.

WIAW: Vet Visits & Cuddles

Happy Wednesday everyone!

It's been a pretty cray-cray day around here so my eats are very all over the place.

Thanks again to the lovely Jenn for hosting this awesome party!

Before I made it out to the kitchen for breakfast my little baby decided the only way he was going to sleep this morning was on my chest or cradled in my arms

Really, look at that, who would want to disturb that.

He hurt his lip somehow and it's crazy swollen and infected so he's been super cuddly with me, more than likely cause he's not feeling great. But alas, my tummy growled super loudly and I decided it was time to get some food.

Breakfast:

1 egg and 1 egg white scrambled with salt and pepper. 2 slices of whole wheat toast with bread.

After breakfast I headed over to my zumba class to shake my stuff. Zumba always makes me smile and I just love knowing I'm getting an hour of cardio in just by dancing. Granted my arms always feel like lead afterward, but it's just a lot of fun.

Post-workout fuel:

Chocolate and peanut butter almond milk protein shake

I went to Cody's afterward and we went to the mall to run some errands and I bought my backpack for school next month. *Gulp* next month! Holy crap. Eventually I started getting cranky and really fatigued by lack of food so we ran over to my favorite taqueria to grab me a baby-sized burrito.

Lunch/Linner:

Bean, cheese, and sour cream burrito

I was so hungry that I ate this whole thing minus a few bites thanks to Cody

After I dropped Cody off at work I took Link to the vet's office to check out his lip and make sure everything is okay.

This was pretty much the only time I could get a picture of him freely walking the room, otherwise he curled himself up in my lap to cuddle. Poor little guy. The vet has absolutely no idea what is wrong exactly so she gave me some antibiotics for the infection and just to keep an eye on him. I hope he gets better soon, though I don't mind in the increase in snuggle time.

After the vet's it was time for cheer practice for I dropped Link off and headed over for practice. By the time practice finished I was exhausted, thirsty, and hungry. So naturally I drank a huge amount of water and had a nutritious dinner

A bowl of Life cereal with almond milk.

Nutritional, oh yeah, go me.

As for my workout, obviously I went to Zumba today. I've been trying to get to the gym more often and Saturday I even made it to the gym for a leg workout. I haven't been making it much and I keep kicking myself for not going. I always hate motivating myself to get there when I'm exhausted, but whenever I don't go I berate myself afterwards for not making the effort.

Now I'm off to relax my poor knee from all the stuff I've been doing and snuggling with my cat. Have a great week!

"It's An Adventure!"

Cody and I went hiking the other day and I convinced him to try this park that I'm absolutely in love with. It's a big forest with a big creek that runs through it. He was up for it so I packed us a yummy lunch of turkey and avocado sandwiches and broccoli slaw (recipe coming soon) and laced up my hiking shoes. We planned out our hike on the park trail map and got lost many many times, but it was gorgeous nonetheless.

Just starting out on the trail before we got lost

It was so gorgeous I didn't mind getting lost. Just being in the forest was beautiful. And everytime I'd mention us being lost Cody would throw out "it's an adventure!" and keep walking on. This man makes me smile.

Eventually we took a break to much on the broccoli slaw I made, but unfortunately it didn't have as much of a kick as Cody and I would have liked, so we didn't end up eating more than a couple bites before we packed up again and kept getting lost hiking.

We found this random stacked rocks in the creek

Eventually we found our way out of the forest, but ended up in a neighborhood. I pulled out my handy iPhone which hadn't been any help the entire time and located where the hell we were. I found us a route back around the forest onto the road we originally came in on, which ended up leading up through some random driveways, but Cody and I kept reminding each other it was an adventure whenever the other expressed doubt of finding civilization again (kidding....sort of). When we finally got down this mammoth driveway onto the road we needed we parked ourselves on the side of the road to eat inhale the sandwiches I made for us. We made it back to our car after an extremely long walk with sore legs and tired feet.

 Despite how pained my legs were I enjoyed every second of being lost with Cody. I guess it's who you're with that can make getting extremely lost into a very long adventure.

After our long trip we relaxed until I went off to cheer practice. Obviously we were going crazy from exhaustion.

At cheer practice I got to fly again and all the girls wanted pictures of me up in the air so I actually got a picture of me stunting with my awesome cheerleaders.

Ignore my jeans and not so happy face, I wasn't expecting to haul my butt into the air after the day I had.

After cheer practice Cody and I went to Betty's Burgers after talking about how yummy that sounded on our hike. I got an unpictured veggie burger with bacon and cheese and we split a Cubano milkshake. This milkshake was the shit, excuse my language.

Rum, thin mint ice cream, and creme de menthe. Holy crap it was delicious!

Cody and I have both agreed to take a break from hiking and do some not so strenuous activities on our day off.

Any fun hiking/adventure stories? 

MIMM: Pumpkin Pie Muffins

Fall is coming up soon (at least I'm willing it to get here faster) and I think it perfect timing to write about these muffins I made. I also just happened upon the pictures in my camera that I completely forgot about, bad Brittany bad!
I also thought this would be perfect for Marvelous in my Monday because this muffins are absolutely marvelous (and so is pumpkin for that matter)

Pumpkin Pie Muffins

Yields 12 muffins

From The Food You Crave by Ellie Krieger

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup whole-grain pastry flour or whole-wheat flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg

3/4 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar

3 tablespoons unsulfured molasses 

1/4 cup canola oil

2 large eggs

1 cup canned solid-packed pumpkin

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3/4 cup lowfat buttermilk

1/4 cup unsalted raw pumpkin seeds

I snuck in some wheat germ as well for some more nutrition

Preheat the oven to 400F. Coat a 12-cup muffin pan with cooking spray.

In a medium bowl, whisk together both flours, the baking soda, salt, and spices.

In a large bowl, whisk together the sugar, molasses, oil and one of the eggs until combined.

Add the other egg and whisk well. Whisk in the pumpkin and vanilla. 

Stir in the flour mixture in two batches, alternating with the buttermilk, just until combined. 

Pour the batter into the prepared muffin pan, filling each about two-thirds full, and sprinkle the tops with the pumpkin seeds. Tap the pan on the counter a few times to remove any air bubbles. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 20 minutes.

Let cool on a wire rack for 15 minutes. Run a knife around the muffins to loosen them and unmold. Enjoy warm or let cool completely before storing in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3 days or in the freezer for up to 3 months.

How were they?

 Super delicious and moist! They were super pumpkin-y and I couldn't help but eat more than one at a time. Definitely a good breakfast during the fall...or any time you want pumpkin.

Anyone else getting excited for fall coming up (in 2 months, ha!)?

Getting a Facelift

I haven't gotten a facelift, my blog has!

I realized recently that when I started my blog, I didn't make a page about myself. I figured it was about time I introduced myself to the blog world.

Though I feel so incredibly awkward just writing about myself, but hey, a blogger has to do what a blogger has to do.

If you also haven't noticed I have a recipe tab at the top as well that lists all of the recipes I've posted about. Hopefully I'll be adding to that a bunch.

Now back to normal blogging!

Walnut Cherry Bars

I promised this recipe a couple times since I posted about it last week

So I'm finally getting around to posting the recipe!

Walnut and Dried Cherry Bars

Yields 12 bars

From So Easy by Ellie Krieger

1 cup quick-cooking rolled oats

3/4 cup whole-wheat pastry flour or regular whole-wheat flour

1/4 cup toasted wheat germ

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup honey

1/3 cup unsweetened applesauce

1/4 cup canola oil

1 large egg, beaten to blend

1 large egg white

3/4 cup chopped dried tart cherries

1/2 cup finely chopped walnuts

1/4 cup "fruit only" apricot preserves

  Preheat oven to 350F. In a medium bowl, whisk together the oats, flour, wheat germ, cinnamon, and salt.

In another bowl, whisk together the honey, applesauce, oil, egg, and egg white until well combined.

Stir in the oat mixture until well combined. Add the dried cherries and walnuts.

Coat an 8-inch square baking pan with cooking spray. Spread the mixture in the prepared pan and bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, 30 to 35 minutes. When the bars are nearly done, put the preserves in a small saucepan and bring to a boil. As soon as the bars come out of the oven, brush with the preserves. Cool completely and cut into 12 bars, about 4x1.5 inches each.

Calories: 230

Total Fat: 9g

Sat fat: 1g

Mono fat: 3g

Poly fat: 4g

Protein: 4g

Carb: 34g

Fiber: 2g

Cholesterol: 20 mg

Sodium: 60 mg

How were they?

Super delicious! They're really dense, but they have a good chewyness and crunch from the walnuts. I personally didn't add the preserves on top at the end because I felt they were sweet enough and they tasted just fine. They're a good little power snack.