Friday… I worked then came home and then met Sarah at her house and we went to a pumpkin party. Uhh. So it’s a party with all sorts of pumpkin themed foods:
Dawn’s plate:
Pumpkin hummus??
Sarah:
Dawn (who will probably be very unhappy that I posted this picture):
The party was fun. It was pretty much a bunch of people that I don’t really know and then Sarah and Dawn. Social anxiety… FUN!
Saturday morning, I woke up sort of bright and early and Aaron and I went to North Park to run/bike together!
Driving:
Aaron wore tights:
It was raining…
I wore the same shirt I always wear…
I think this is post-run?? So we did one lap running together (Aaron ran FIVE miles without stopping!!!) How unfair huh?? It took me months to work my way up to five miles. Ah well. So we did the five miles with an average pace of about 9:30 then the second lap around the lake Aaron rode a bike (my future bike!) and I ran. I didn’t check my pace until the end but it was 10 minute miles. Sloooow but it was fun! We chatted most of the way. At one point Aaron started singing Earth Angel to me and a guy walked past laughing at us. Around mile 8.5-9, I was ready to be DONE. I didn’t feel like running anymore and I was cold, tired and it started raining more around then. I dragged myself along and we finished!
Total run time was 1 hour 38 minutes.
This truck is LITTLE. I’m not a giant.
Ford truck man.
It’s a Mazda.
We showered at our respective houses and then made pancakes and eggs.
Pancakes with blueberry sauce (frozen blueberries and sugar) plus eggs with Swiss chard, onion and cheese:
Aaron has mastered making pancakes.
Okay so that was Saturday up until party time. That’ll be a separate post. I also want to mention that there will soon be BIG changes to announce on the blog and I’m very excited. One of them will probably be discussed either tomorrow or Wednesday. Can’t wait!!!
It is Tuesday. I started writing this blog post about a half an hour ago and got completely sidetracked by looking at old pictures on the computer. I included a lovely one at the end of this post too…
First read about my boring meals!
Peanut butter oats with Kashi h2h + a pear for a morning snack. Pears are so good! Need to buy them more often. I think it’s currently pear season.
The morning went quickly at work then I went for a walk with a coworker to the Strip District. I changed into my sweet blue and pink pumas (with tights & work clothes) and we ventured out. We probably walked about 2 miles total. The weather was great outside today!
We got back into the office and I had lunch. BIG salad:
baby spinach (pretty much an entire bag)
1/2 apple
craisins
broccoli slaw
almond slivers
blue cheese
balsamic vinegar
olive oil
honey
black pepper
I don’t really have anything exciting to report to you today. I walked home from the bus stop with a bus riding friend who I’ve known for over a year now probably. He was dressed casually and I commented and he said he was laid off Friday. He works for a non-profit and was laid off due to budget cuts. I feel very sad for him. He seemed to have a positive attitude about it though! We discussed that there must be a reason for this and maybe him being laid off was just what needed to happen to force him into a change that he might not have made otherwise. Anyway, I hope it all works out for him.
Hello blog friends! It’s been a while. I finally uploaded pictures from my camera and I had 38! Let’s go over a few…
Not sure when I took these pictures. I think it might have been before my run with Aaron. I can’t tell by what I’m wearing because I’ve been wearing that black shirt pretty much EVERY time I run. I wash it… I just have a very limited cold weather running wardrobe.
Onnnn Wednesday I ran about a mile or so and met Aaron to run together for the first time. He’s just recently gotten into running and has been running maybe about a month now. His house is about 2 miles away from my apartment.
Psyching myself up for the run or something:
We ended up running almost 3 miles together! It was fun! Yep.
One of the nights last week I also finally decided to figure out what this thing was:
I got it at the farmer’s market a few weeks ago and it’s just been sitting in my refrigerator ever since. I suspected it was a kabocha squash. I Google imaged Kabocha and confirmed my suspicions. I cut it in half, scooped out the seeds and roasted with olive oil, salt and pepper:
It was AMAZING! Now I know what all of the HEAB hype was about. Delicious! It’s a little softer and creamier(?) then butternut or acorn squash. I tried to track down more at this week’s farmer’s market but couldn’t find any. hm. I saw them at the grocery store (also referred to as buttercup squash there) but even at 99 cents a pound, these things are EXPENSIVE. They’re cheap cheap cheap at the farmer’s market.
After the run with Aaron and showers in our respective houses, Aaron made pizza. TJ’s whole wheat pizza crust & pizza sauce & grape tomatoes & mozzarella/provolone & LOTS of red onion & spinach. This pizza was GREAT! I’m not sure why… We actually managed to cook the crust completely so that was good plus I think it was all the red onion and full-fat cheese.
Friday night I grocery shopped then got to bed early in preparation for my planned Saturday morning long run. Same shirt and more pictures of myself….
I got to North Park by about 9 AM. Fall is happening here in Pittsburgh!
I did two laps around the lake which is supposed to be 5 miles each but really it’s like 4.75. I didn’t bring the Garmin and did a nice, slow pace. I set the stop watch on my ipod though and it ended up being 1 hour 38 minutes. The weather was perfect! I love running outside of the city. It’s worth driving 25 minutes or whatever. Suburb running!
Aaron was out of town doing some shows — blog article here and interview here and got back into town really early Saturday morning. He slept for a while then came over and made pumpkin pancakes after my run! TJ’s pancake mix + pumpkin and maple syrup. Also, coffee with coffee grounds. Oops.
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After breakfast (at noon), we planned to go to the craft store and try to work on Halloween costumes. That didn’t happen and we ended up lying around until dinner time…
I had frozen an extra pan of enchiladas back in August so we pulled them out and baked them with extra enchilada sauce:
Enchiladas and sweet potato/butternut squash fries. Yes. YES. mmm.
Aaron looked at this picture and said “muscular arm….”
After dinner, I wanted frozen yogurt. We thought about it for a long time and ended up driving to Squirrel Hill and getting soft serve ice cream. I had vanilla with rainbow sprinkles.
Sunday was church in the morning and then cooking and cleaning the WHOLE afternoon. Two friends and their two year old daughter came over for dinner. I made lasagna rolls (Giada recipe here ), dinner rolls using Ted’s dough function and a King Arthur Flour recipe here with a few tweaks — I replaced the sugar with honey and cut back on the butter to about 3 tablespoons. I also made a spinachsalad with bosc pear, craisins, almond slivers and blue cheese. The dressing was balsamic vinegar, olive oil, yellow mustard, honey, black pepper and salt. It was good! Our guests also brought over a great cake! It was white cake with a jelly filling and covered in white chocolate flakes. I am a BIG white chocolate fan. Dark chocolate is lame and bitter. I like sugar.
Unfortunately I didn’t take any pictures of our dinner party. I was embarrassed about it because I don’t really know them too well and I guess not everyone takes pictures of their food… Ah well. It turned out great with the exception of me overcooking the dinner rolls a tad. It was okay though!
We also discussed all doing a run together on Thanksgiving!!! There is a race called the Harry Holland Gutbuster Race (something like that). There is a 2, 4 and 8 mile route. Two of us are planning to do the 8 mile and the other two are going to the 4 mile. I’m excited for it!! Run 8 miles then eat TWO Thanksgiving dinners. Yes, looks like I’ll be hitting up dinner with Aaron’s family then Aunt Isabel and Uncle Ed’s after. Lot’s of pie!
Anyway.. back on track now.
That brings us to today. I brought the leftover salad in for lunch today:
Work went quickly today then I got home after waiting for the bus for TWENTY minutes and decided to go for a run. I almost napped instead but it was 60 degrees and sunny soooo I drank cold coffee…ate a cold, plain pumpkin pancake and ventured out. Very surprisingly, it was a great run! I ran a little faster than normal and it was just great. I’m not sure why? I’m going to attribute it to the pumpkin pancake. Maybe I need to work more refined carbs into my pre-run eating. I really think it helps.
5 miles in 44 minutes!
SWEATY (and wearing the same shirt again…)
I showered and then made a big bowl of steamed spinach/egg whites/cheese and tomato sauce. Then I had a bowl of oatmeal with wheat bran and PUMPKIN! It’s been so long since I’ve had pumpkin oatmeal. It wasn’t as good as I remember… Definitely prefer peanut butter.
Ah well. Now my stomach is full though I bet I’ll get hungry again pretty soon.
I’m getting a little excited for Halloween and a few other EXCITING things happening.
Embracing change!
Most people can look back over the years and identify a time and place at which their lives changed significantly. Whether by accident or design, these are the moments when, because of a readiness within us and a collaboration with events occurring around us, we are forced to seriously reappraise ourselves and the conditions under which we live and to make certain choices that will affect the rest of our lives. — Frederick F. Flack
Saturday morning, Aaron and I drank coffee and ate oatmeal really quickly and then headed over to Heinz Field for the American Heart Association Heart Walk. It was supposed to be a 5K walk but I’m told that they shortened it because of the weather… It was like 40 degrees and rainy.
9 AM on a Saturday! Poor Aaron. I keep dragging him to these things.
My company gave us t-shirts that we were supposed to wear… but I forgot mine in the office. Blue shirt to the left would have been me too if I wasn’t forgetful.
Blurry:
Better:
The walk lasted about an hour and then we drove over to Colangelo’s in the Strip District to say hello to Aaron’s brother who was working there. Aaron sampled some kind of cheesy/bacon/pizza thing.
PIZZAS! This place was packed on Saturday. I’m going to have to go back and try something. It is connected to La Prima coffee which I’ve never had…but I hear good things. I am no coffee connoisseur friends but I like coffee A LOT.
We wandered the Strip for about two minutes then came back to my apartment, hung out for a bit then parted ways. I had plans of going to the gym but napped instead. It was the most restful nap. I guess I was feeling pretty exhausted from not sleeping too much the past couple of days.
Saturday night we went to see the new Michael Moore movie, Capitalism. We went to the Southside theatre. Haaate the Southside on Saturday nights but this wasn’t too bad actually. Probably because we didn’t wander from college-kid infested bar to college-kid infested bar… Comments about Capitalism — It was entertaining. It made me think. It did not make me hate Capitalism. It did not make me hate Michael Moore. These are good things. It’s worth seeing though maybe it’s not worth $9.25. I’d recommend renting/redboxing/netflixing.
Sunday… Church in the morning, then group then grocery shopping then Aaron coming over! I baked another loaf of bread with Ted (glorious bread machine). This time I used the following:
4 1/2 cups TJ’s white whole wheat flour
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 tsp salt
2 1/2 tsp rapid rise yeast (ENOUGH with the impatience Pamela)
2 Tbsp flaxseed meal (omega 3s!)
1/4 cup milk
2 Tbsp vital wheat gluten
Check it out:
That bread is HEARTY. I think it weighs four pounds. Yep so Sunday evening consisted of chatting with sister-in-law Sam, baking with Ted, listening to Aaron practice songs on his guitar and laundry. Exciting!
Monday morning = WORK
It was a coworker’s last day so he made us eggs benedict for breakfast.
Office egg station:
Eggs Benedict (minus the ham for me) + potatoes:
I really like that picture. Hm. Compliments myself.
After work Monday, we went to August Henry’s for happy hour to celebrate coworker’s last day. I had a beer — Big Hop. Brewed in Pittsburgh! So I haven’t been drinking much AT ALL lately and got a slight buzz from one beer. Fun!
I stayed there until about 630, waited for a bus for FORTY minutes and finally got home at 730.
Of course I baked another loaf of bread when I got home…
4 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour
1 cup white whole wheat flour
2 1/4 tsp REGULAR yeast
2 tsp salt
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 Tbsp flaxseed meal
1/4 cup milk
This loaf was for Andy. He said he liked it! Though I don’t think he would tell me if he didn’t like it.
We met up and exchanged my loaf of bread for some of his pumpkin bread! It was good!
I had some with lunch:
I also had a piece of my whole wheat loaf with lunch.
Okayyyy, I wrote this on Tuesday. It’s Thursday now! I’m lying on my couch and I may have just watched Gossip Girl on my laptop. Yeah. I did that. HA.
Okay! Time to publish this before I let it sit on the computer for another two days. ALMOST THE WEEKEND!
It’s Monday night. I haven’t blogged in like 5 days! I need to get into more of a routine with this. Let’s talk about the last few days…
Wednesday night, I met up with friend Sarah. It’s been too long! Sarah likes when I don’t tell her I’m taking a picture.
We got some coffee/tea at Crazy Mocha and chatted for a bit. I had some kind of mango something tea. It was GOOD. Then we proceeded to tear apart our coffee sleeves like we were on a nervous date. Weird.
I’ve also been drinking a lot of this tea at work. I found it in the cupboard. I LOVE it and should probably buy my own and stop stealing someone elses. It’s weird though because I’ve NEVER seen anyone else drink tea in the office. Invisible, tea drinking coworker is stocking the cupboards with my favorite tea. I love you invisible, tea drinking coworker.
Thursday night (after a bit of difficulty) I made it to the WYEP studio for boyfriend’s bands show. I need to look up some apostrophe rules because I’m pretty sure the previous sentence was not correct.
So the show was pretty entertaining because I was standing behind a girl taking pictures. That’s not funny. The funny thing is she was taking pictures the WHOLE time. Like click, click, click, click. I’m pretty sure she took about 20 pictures of Aaron in a row. Hilarious. Who wants that many pictures??? Sorry Aaron but come on. hahaha. I thought it was funny anyway…
Moving on… Friday work was work then I got home and found a package at my door.
Behold Ted the Bread Machine:
Grandparents, who I affectionately refer to as Tutu and Papap bought me this for an early Christmas gift. Hello glorious homemade bread!
Thank you Tutu and Papap!!!
Aaron came over around 630 and we got to making a loaf of bread:
We went with plain white bread for a first attempt but used rapid raise yeast instead of regular so we wouldn’t be eating dinner at midnight. Flour, water, sugar, butter, salt and yeast went in then we hit start and set off for Dick’s Sporting Goods for Aaron to look at running shoes(!) He’s recently taken up running…
He looks funny with athletic shoes:
We got back from shoe shopping and playing on exercise equipment and it smelled like bread in the apartment. Look what Ted made!!!
We tested it out:
BREAD!! We had vegetable soup and bread for dinner. It was a great and simple meal.
Alright I have to end this blogging right now because my laptop is about to die. I only have 4% left!
Have a nice night! The rest of the weekend to come tomorrow!
First of all, TWO blog posts in one day??! Who am I?
Annnyway
It’s Wednesday night. I woke up kind of tired this morning and had like three cups of coffee throughout the morning…. Plus oats with peanut butter and Barbara’s Multi-Grain cereal.
When did I start thinking it was cool to take pictures of myself sitting at my desk at 8 AM?
Today.
I had a couple of carrots in the morning for a snack:
No I did not eat lunch from a styrofoam plate. Oh my. I’m sorry environment.
I had steamed spinach with broccoli slaw and a leftover piece of pizza for lunch today. I actually had the EXACT same thing yesterday. That’s all of the leftover pizza. I’m pretty sure it was even better cold and a couple days old. Really.
After work yesterday, I decided it would be a good idea to go for a run. Um well I shouldn’t have because I caused my brush burn to start bleeding again and now it’s not looking so hot. I just wanted to go for a run so much because today… it’s like 42 degrees and raining. My running outdoor days are getting quite limited. Thumbs down to Pittsburgh weather.
So the Garmin wouldn’t pick up and keep a satellite signal so I have no distance stat and the pace is WAY incorrect. I ran a total of 45 minutes so I’m going to estimate it was about 4.5 miles. It was a great run! I took it easy and my legs felt fine. I guess two days of rest was enough for my muscles…not enough for my brush burned skin though.
I got home and made an egg wrap and roasted kale with pasta sauce on top. There was also mustard, spinach and broccoli slaw in the wrap.
That wrap is an Ezekiel Sprouted Grain wrap. As I was roasting my kale, I was reading the back of the wrap package. It said this:
We discovered when six grains and legumes are sprouted and combined, an amazing thing happens: a complete protein is created that closely parallels the protein found in milk and eggs. There are 18 amino acids present in Ezekiel 4:9® Organic Sprouted Whole Grain bread.
Then I broke out my Bible, turned to Ezekiel 4:9 and it says this:
“Take also unto thee wheat, and barley, and beans, and lentils, and millet, and spelt, and put them in one vessel, and make bread of it.” — Ezekial 4:9
Hello! It’s almost 6 PM right now. I’m feeling kind of sleepy but trying to stay awake without caffeine.
Just a few things about the weekend…
Saturday after the race, pancakes, and nap, Aaron came back over and we made some pizza.
I roasted some Brussels sprouts and onions with some olive oil, salt and redpepper at 400 degrees for about 17 minutes. Then we used a Trader Joe’s whole wheat pizzacrust, pasta sauce/crushed tomatoes/tomato paste, mozzarella & feta cheese and then the roasted veggies on top. We cooked the pizzacrust for about 10 minutes without the toppings first and then cooked the whole pizza for probably 15 minutes. The crust STILL wasn’t done!! Those whole wheat pizza crusts are almost impossible to cook completely I’ve decided. Next time I’m leaving it in there until it starts to smell burnt. Clearly, this is an excellent idea…
Not my hairy arm.
Pizza.
PIZZA!
After pizza and tea, we watched Twilight! I’m pretty sure I fell asleep off and on throughout the movie. Twilight viewing #4 for me.
EDWARD!
Sunday…I can’t remember what happened really. I went to church and then grocery shopped then napped. That’s all I can remember! This is why I shouldn’t wait until Wednesday to blog about Sunday…
Monday I was off work!! Yay bank holidays! I slept until 10 AM(!) then went to Whole Foods to get lunch and take it to Aaron because I am a nice girlfriend.
Normal companies don’t celebrate Columbus Day…
I brought him a grilled chicken pesto sandwich and made myself a salad at the salad bar. The best part of the salad was barbecue tofu! Plus Honest teas & fruit:
Indoor picnic:
On Mt. Washington!
hmmmm. After lunch, I watched Bones on my laptop and sat around the house for a while. It was a nice, lazy day. No running was attempted because my brush burn is still pretty painful. Bleeding…not good.
It’s Monday. It’s Columbus Day. I’m off work today!
I guess I had kind of a busy weekend but I have LOTS to blog about including my half marathon race recap finally! First of all, I was NERVOUS Friday at work:
Taking pictures of myself in my cubicle is not weird…
Friday night I went out and bought a new long-sleeve shirt for the race then got home and ate a big egg sandwich plus some other carby things then got everything together for the race. I bought that black shirt below:
I made a new running playlist (that definitely had a Miley Cyrus song on it). I get the feeling that image is going to be rather small. Hopefully you can read it. Who knew macs had a selection grabber tool like print screen? Anyway, when the Mest song (ohhh high school) and then the Queen song came on, I just about started skipping. It was about that point during the race that I started to die but I’ll get into more details about that in a bit.
So I went to bed around 10 PM Friday night with my alarm set for 5:45 AM Saturday morning (race day). My alarm went off and I immediately …got on my laptop and updated Twitter and Facebook statuses. Haha. I am … a loser. At 6, I got out of bed and made oatmeal with cinnamon, peanut butter, wheat bran, a banana, and fake Life. Everything except for the cereal went into the food processor. Easy digestion. It’s pre-chewed ..sort of. I also had two cups of coffee and a couple of glasses of water.
Aaron came over a little before 7 AM. We took some video of the morning.
Aaron and my cat:
And me putting on shoes!
After the video excitement, we packed up my car with everything that I could possibly imagine needing and set off for North Park. After some minor car problems, (my car spinning in the mud while trying to park in the grass, me abandoning the car and Aaron parking it for me so that I didn’t freak out), we made it to the starting line. Check it out, my new shirt has thumb holes!
Aaron trying to master my camera:
Still trying… it wasn’t dark, he just had the flash on.
Aaron also took a video of me retying my shoes:
That’s me with the green shorts/black shirt walking to the starting line. IT WAS RAINING. Just a bit though.
The race started promptly at 8 AM…I think. It started up a long, fairly steep hill. AH. I guess I started out maybe in the middle of the pack. The race wasn’t that big. I would estimate about 100-150 runners. I have no clue though because I can’t track down official results. I guess that goes along with smaller races. So I started jogging along up the hill then down the hill I realized my ipod was too loud so started messing with it and accidentally started playing CONOR OBERST. lol. I had to take the ipod off of my arm and put the playlist back on around mile 1.5. I did this while going down a hill. At mile 3, I passed Aaron for the first time. I was happy to see him! I was feeling great at this point. I think my pace was about 9 min/mile which was faster than I was planning… but oh well.
Also, at mile 2ish, I passed one of my coworkers!!! He is a runner also and came to cheer me on! It was so great to see him. He jogged with me for a minute and tried to take a picture on his cell phone. He took a picture and then I continued along.
Continuing along, I stopped at a water stop around mile 5 and had a few gulps of gatorade and continued. I passed Aaron again at mile 8. I was still feeling good at this point. I stopped to say hello and drink a little bit of Vitamin Water. My pace was 9:22 at this point! I think I ate a few Luna Moons before passing him. They kept moving around in my shorts and were chafing a bit. Annoying. I’ll know better next time and wear a shirt with a pocket.
Okay so I passed Aaron at mile 8 and felt good, I think I finished my Luna Moons by mile 10. BAD MOVE! I stopped at another water stop and had some water at maybe mile 9. I should have had Gatorade. One packet of Luna Moons is only 100 calories and not enough for a two hour race. By mile 11, I was dying. I was freezing and going really slow and just felt weak and empty. I was praying for a water stop where I could get some Gatorade. I FINALLY came across one and drank an entire cup of Gatorade. That helped until about mile 12. Okay one more mile. You would think I wouldn’t have wanted to stop at this point but I did for about 10 seconds. I figured I’d rest for 10 seconds and that would give me enough energy to finish. Oh also, I had to pee from about mile FIVE on. I just couldn’t bring myself to stop.
Around mile 10, I passed a car that was driving really slowly and realized it was my coworker again. haha. He said the picture didn’t take and then said keep running. I kept running and then realized he drove his car up a bit on the route and was standing there trying to take my picture again! haha. It was so nice to see a familiar face at this point because I was looking and feeling a little rough. I said goodbye to Tom and continued along.
So at this point (mile 11-12) I started chanting to myself, you can do this, you can do this. I think I even said, I am a machine. haha. I also knew by about mile 9 that there was no way I was going to finish in under 2 hours. I thought I might be able to about halfway through but my pace had slowed considerably. I really never had the goal of finishing in under two hours but I just thought it might be nice if I somehow managed to do that… My Garmin also lost the satellite signal at mile 10.76 and stayed there until the very end. I had no clue of my pace! Lame.
It lost the satellite signal one other time at mile 9.62 I think and I kept looking at it and looking at it and didn’t realize it wasn’t changing and was like THIS IS THE LONGEST MILE OF MY LIFE and then it jumped to 10.76 or whatever. haha.
Anyway, I finally made it around the bend and the finish line was in sight!
I can’t believe I was smiling. I tried to run a little faster toward the finish but just couldn’t. Then I saw Aaron and his bandmate (who randomly came to cheer me on!) and crossed the finish line!!!
There I am:
I got a medal for finishing! I immediately grabbed a banana and water, realized that I had some MAJOR chafing pain, and then took the best picture with Aaron.
Our first picture together!! Our relationship explained in one photo:
Aaron was the best during the race! He woke up ridiculously early on a Saturday morning and stood out in the rain for TWO hours while I ran.
I stretched a bit, FINALLY PEED and then we went home. I had like two bottles of water and a Vitamin Water in the car plus a Luna bar then my stomach was upset. It continued to be upset for a few hours after the race. We got back to my apartment, I took the longest, hottest shower ever and just laid in bed not moving much for hours. Eventually my stomach felt better and I got hungry.
Aaron made us pancakes!
While he made the pancakes, I made coffee and my own version of syrup. I just put a bag of TJ’s frozen mixed berries in a pot, added a bit of sugar and let it simmer on medium for about 15 minutes.
I had three pancakes plus that little one:
I’ll post the rest of the day in a separate post but that concludes my race recap. I guess I went into a TON of detail but I hope you enjoyed it! It’s now two days after the race and I am itching to run again. My legs are still a little sore (they were REALLY sore yesterday) and my leg chafing started to bleed today so I’m taking today off from running also. So now I’ve run a 5K, 10K and half marathon. The half marathon distance is definitely my favorite distance of the three and I can’t wait to do another one! It was a GREAT day!
Well tomorrow is Friday. I actually didn’t want this week to end. Seriously. I’m a bit nervous about the 1/2 marathon Saturday so I’ve been appreciating each day this week. TIME TO PREPARE. Well, I’m done preparing now. I had my last run yesterday. Two days of rest and then run in the rain Saturday morning. It may not rain actually but we’ll see. I’ve been checking the weather 10 times a day each day this whole week… It said no rain up until yesterday I think.
So moving on, I didn’t post any of my meals yesterday so I figured I’d post lunch from yesterday. I made a little tuna salad with 1/2 can of albacore tuna (because clearly I haven’t been getting enough mercury lately), broccoli slaw, a few remaining survivors from my grape tomato plant, mustard and hot sauce. It was pretty delicious. I put it on Nature’s Pride Whole Wheat bread that I got from FoodBuzz. I also received a loaf of the 12 Grain bread which I finished and never blogged about! It was delicious! It was dense, chewy and there were nuts in it. It was very filling. I have to say I’m a little disappointed with the whole wheat after the 12 grain. The whole wheat just seems a bit dry and flavorless. It’s not bad but I don’t know if I’d go out and buy it. The nutrition stats are good though. 110 calories per slice, 3 grams of fiber and 5 grams of protein.
I also microwaved some kale with more broccoli slaw and red pepper flakes for a little veggie side.
After work, I REALLY didn’t feel like running. During the day I moaned and complained to my coworker about it and she said, “just put on your running clothes and shoes, go out there for 5 minutes and if you still don’t want to run, then don’t.” Soooo I did that and I told myself, it’s only 3 miles, I’ll be done in half an hour. Well I went out there and ran 3 miles faster than I’ve probably ever run. AMAZING. Uhhh normally, my legs would be laughing at me. Every once in a well (like very, VERY rarely) my legs are okay with running fast. Normally they balk at anything under 9:30/minute.
Long-sleeve running weather!
I got home, went to Trader Joe’s for a few things and then ate EIGHT CUPS of spinach. Haha. Yes, that’s a whole bag of microwaved spinach with broccoli slaw and egg whites. I’m weird.
I added every high sodium condiment in my fridge.
I’m supposed to be getting extra sodium in preparation for my run right?? Check that off the list.
Sooo that was last night.
I got a new cereal at TJ’s yesterday. It tastes like Life! On the cubicle window sill at work. Because everyone carries a box of cereal into work with them. And then photographs it.
Nutrition info for you:
And the ingredients. All natural Life pretty much.
Close-up with the last of my Kashi Honey Sunshine also:
Work was okay today. I pretty much stared at spreadsheets for about 8 hours. Typical day in the office. I did have a discussion with a coworker about sewing little wings on my socks for the race and shaving lightning bolts into my hair. I run like LIGHTNING.
Farmer’s market Thursday!!! Brussels sprouts and a big onion. I’m looking forward to some fresh Brussels sprouts in my life for part of tomorrow evening’s dinner.
So I got home from work and checked my email. GUESS WHAT??? I got my first hate comment on the blog! Exciting right? I feel like the real deal now. I won’t tell you exactly what it said but it did include pamcakesandSTUPIDeggs. lol. Of course they pointed out typos too. Please friend, continue to proofread my blog posts for me because clearly I do not.
Dinner tonight was random as always. 1/2 a giant acorn squash (with brown sugar, cinnamon and crushed fake Life) plus a piece of bread with Greek yogurt and strawberry preserves on top. I also ate two carrots and a banana. Now I’m drinking some decaf Earl Grey tea and waiting for Aaron to come over and potentially get me sick. He said he has a tickle in his throat. I threatened him yet he’s still coming to visit. Must not get sick before the race! I’m taking a vitamin C supplement right now.
Okay let’s bring this blog post to an end. I’m SO nervous about the race. I hope I don’t embarrass myself.
I’ve been meaning to post this recipe for like a week now. I actually started writing it last Friday and then never got to finish it. Tonight’s the night though. I’m getting it DONE.
Let’s talk about Cake Pops.
Cake Pops! Not my idea kids. The original idea came from a blog that I read regularly, Bakerella. Check out that site for lots of creative variations to this basic idea. The only difference between mine and Bakerella’s is I made my cake and buttercream from scratch. I seriously considered using a boxed cake mix but just couldn’t bring myself to do.
So here we go:
Step 1
Find a cake recipe that you like. I used this one from one of my very favorite cookbooks, Williams-Sonoma Cakes, Cupcakes & Cheesecakes. Everything I’ve made from this cookbook has come out perfectly.
I made the Golden Cake minus the Tangerine Fudge Frosting
Basic Golden Cake
Yield: 13×9 inch cake (enough for about 40 cake pops)
Ingredients
2 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 cup sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
4 large eggs plus 2 large egg yolks, at room temperature
1 cup buttermilk
Position a rack in the middle of an oven and preheat to 350 degrees. Butter and flour a 13×9x2 inch metal baking pan.
In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer set to medium-high speed (I used my KitchenAid Stand Mixer w/ paddle attachment), beat the butter until light. Gradually add the sugar, beating until well blended (a good 2-3 minutes). Beat in the vanilla extract. Add the eggs and egg yolks, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Reduce the speed to low and, dividing the flour mixture into 3 batches, beat the flour mixture into the butter mixture alternately with the buttermilk, beginning and ending with the flour mixture. Once the mixtures are combined, continue to beat for 30 seconds. Transfer the batter to the prepared pan.
Bake until the top is a deep golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, 28-30 minutes. (The recipe said 35-40 minutes but mine was done in 30!). Transfer to a rack and lack coolcompletelyin the pan.
Make a mess in your kitchen like so:
Batter into the pan:
Anddd done:
Step 2
Crumble the cooled cake into a BIG mixing bowl. Crumble, yes, completely. Then stir in about 1 1/2 cups frosting. I started out mixing everything with a wooden spoon but quickly gave up and used my hands. Really mix the frosting and cake together until they are completely integrated into each other. (I didn’t really do that as well as I should have). It’s important to mix them together thoroughly otherwise your cake balls might fall apart like some of mine did.
After the frosting and cake are completely blended together, form into firm balls (haha I tried to come up with another word instead of firm but couldn’t)(I am …like 14 years old apparently). Mine were ping pong ball sized I would say. Place the balls on a wax paper or parchment lined baking sheet and refrigerator for 10 minutes. Once cooled, melt a small amount of chocolate to use as an adhesive for the lollipop sticks. Dip the sticks (purchased at a craft store, Michael’s in my case) in the chocolate and then push into the cake balls, about 2/3 of the way down. Refrigerate these for a good four hours or put them in the freezer to speed up the process.
Cake on a stick. Naked.
Step 3
Melt your chocolate or candy melts and dip the cake balls, coat completely with chocolate and then sprinkle or dip them in whatever decorations you’d like. Let cool on wax paper or stick them in styrofoam if you don’t want a flat side. I used one bag each of chocolate and vanilla candy melts.
Annnnd done:
I took these to a dinner party and they went over really well. Even with their two year old daughter (who kept trying to lick it like a lollipop. haha). The cake was moist and ridiculously rich because of the frosting. I was wondering how the cake would hold up because all of blog posts of people that made them that I read had used a boxed cake mix. Luckily this recipe seemed to work really well so I’d recommend it to you. It’s a basic yellow cake. It’s not too sweet which works out since you mix it with frosting and cover it in sugar….
And also, if you were reading the blog, FOREVER ago, you may have seen when I made cheesecake pops, here. I almost made the cheesecake pops for this dinner party but I didn’t want it to need to be refrigerated. Plus not everyone likes cheesecake.
The pictures seemed to have disappeared from that post so here are a couple:
I hope you enjoyed the recipe! Let me know if you try it!
He works for a non-profit and was laid off due to budget cuts. I feel very sad for him. He seemed to have a positive attitude about it though! We discussed that there must be a reason for this and maybe him being laid off was just what needed to happen to force him into a change that he might not have made otherwise. Anyway, I hope it all works out for him.
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