I was going to stop at Starbucks today when I realized that I really don’t need to spend that $3.  I have an espresso machine at work AND soy milk.  I also didn’t pack a breakfast and thought that I should stop at Jamba. Guess what? We get cereal at work too.

Behold-the FREE breakfast!

A decaf English Breakfast soy latte and some Honey Nut Cheerios. 

The espresso machine always intimidates me but I think I did a pretty good job:

There’s no excuse!  I should NOT be going to Starbucks!

I wasn’t ravenous like I expected to be today.  Hooray for that!

I had some mandarins at about 2:30.  Look how small they are.

At about 4:30 I had some coconut yogurt with my Mom’s granola.

The quote today is awful:

What’s MCFA’s? The VUI designer in me is screaming “SPEAK the eaters language!!!”  I don’t even feel like looking it up I’m so bitter.

On my way home, I had a MAD craving for tomato soup and grilled “cheese”.  I have some goat cheese that I want to use up.  It’s having the same affect on me as regular cheese but I decided to eat it tonight 🙂 I decided to try and make roasted tomato soup.  It was so good.  Check out the recipe.

With my grilled goat cheese sandwich.

Seriously, YOM.

Lu loved it too.  She couldn’t get enough.

Now it’s time to go watch HIMYM with my honey. YIPPEE!!!

I’ve been craving tomato soup and grilled cheese like mad.  Almost all the tomato soup out there has dairy so I thought I’d try to make my own.  I’m so glad I did!

Ingredients:

-3 pounds of tomatoes (I used 2 pounds cherry tomatoes and 1 pound tomatoes on the vine, quartered)
-1 medium onion, chopped
-10 whole garlic cloves
-3 TBSP olive oil
-1 TBSP vegan spread (earth balance or smart balance)
-3-4 cups Chicken/Vegetable Stock
-1 cup roughly torn basil
-S+P to taste

Instructions:

-Preheat oven to 450*

-Place 2 pounds tomatoes, garlic, and onion on a cookie sheet and drizzle with olive oil.

-Cook for 30 minutes, stirring halfway though.

-After stirring mixture in the oven, melt vegan spread over medium high heat in a large saucepan and then place remaining tomatoes in the melted “butter”.

-Once the mixture in the oven is caramelized (after about 30 minutes), take it out of the oven and add it to the pot on the stove.

-In addition to the roasted tomatoes, add 3 cups of broth and cook for 20 minutes.

-After 20 minutes, add the basil. Stir.

-Blend with an immersion blender (I left some chunks in it).  Season with salt and pepper to taste. Add additional cup of stock, if needed.

-Enjoy!

I thought this was AH-MAZE-ING and I give it a 5. Lu did too-she LOVED it.  Shaun “declines to state”.  He is NOT a soup guy and says that the best soup in the world would still be a 2 in his eyes. I can’t wait to eat this for lunch tomorrow!!

This morning, instead of blogging, I went to the doctor. My old doctor is near work (and my old apartment) and isn’t very convenient for when I’m actually sick. Conversely there is a doctor that is 2 doors down from me that I thought I’d try.

In this picture, I’m standing at my door. That man in the blue jacket? He is walking right past the doctor’s office.

Dr. H is an OLD SCHOOL doctor.  I went in and sat at his desk and HE asked me about my medical history and my family’s medical history.  We talked for a good 15 minutes before he led me into his exam room which was right out of 1970 or so.  Everything was is perfect working order and extremely clean but OLD.  He did a full scale, banging on my knees, examination.  He’s sending me to a GI doctor for all the stomach issues I’ve been having.   He mentioned IBS as well.  He also gently told me to go on a diet and to walk during my lunch time.  It was kind of sweet and kind of not.  I talked to him about my eating and exercise habits and he thinks that the GI doctor will be able to help. We shall see.  Part of me REALLY liked this homey experience and the other part of me wonders if he’s up to date?  I don’t know.  As of right now, I think I’ll use him as my PCP and see how it goes.

Before the doctor, I woke up at 5:30 to go to spin.  I had half a Larabar before and half after.

Disappointingly the normal teacher wasn’t there and it was the teacher who can’t shut up. I tried to not let it affect me but it totally did.  Oh well.  I think I may start bringing my running shoes just in case this happens.  I can duck out of spin and get on the treadmill.

After the doctor, I got a “tall” soy vanilla roobios tea latte.  Different Starbucks, same phenomena-they filled my 16 oz cup to the brim.

When I got to work I was really hungry.  I had been up for 4.5 hours at that point and had had about 300 calories-it made sense that I was hungry.  I decided to eat one of my pieces of pizza.  I had 5 pieces left last night so one package got 3 and one got 2.  I grabbed the 3-er today and it worked out perfectly.

While in the kitchen at work, I saw this gem on the espresso machine:

This follows numerous emails that have been sent out over the last week.  I work with such engineers.

For lunch?

Not as pretty the next day.

Question: What do you like about your doctor?

Every 26 days I feel down and out and kind of blue.  I get really frustrated and overwhelmed with life and I get all sad and morose.  Today was that day.  I hate day 26.  So does my husband.  I went for a walk this afternoon though and I’ve been in a better mood since then.  Thank goodness!

Lucy dancing around with my underwear on her head helped too:

Don’t worry-it was clean!

For lunch I made a big salad with the leftovers from Friday night.  A bed of spinach with steak, brussel sprouts, mushrooms, quinoa, pear, and goat cheese.  Dressed with Annie’s Goddess dressing with some balsamic.

After lunch I went to Trader’s to shop for the week.  I normally go to Whole Foods but I knew that I wanted pizza tonight and I didn’t feel like making my own dough.  Trader’s has great dough so I decided to do my shopping there. I hate that all the produce and meat is from so far away.  Their products are too.  I ended up spending about $60 MORE than I normally spend at Whole Foods and it was for food that left a HUGE carbon footprint.  If that’s not a fail, I don’t know what is.  I was feeling pretty sorry for myself and I ate an entire Trader Joe’s dark chocolate bar.  A smaller 290 calorie one but still.  I woofed it down before I could take it’s picture.

Before my walk I had some yogurt with Galaxy Granola-love this stuff!

After my walk I normally eat a Larabar but decided to skip it because of the chocolate mishap 🙂

When we got home, I made pizza. Vegan for me.

A more traditional pepperoni (turkey), cheese, pepper, and mushroom for Shaun and Lu:

I ate this:

Plus one more piece.  It was really good.

While I was preparing it Lu munched on garbanzo beans (she LOVED those), peppers, and tomatoes.  At dinner, she didn’t like the mushrooms or pepperoni but liked everything else.  After dinner I gave her her first Oreo.  We have some leftover from Shaun’s Oreo Pie at Thanksgiving and this book I’m reading says to not make any food taboo.  So I gave her an Oreo. She HATED it.  She took one bite, spit it out and asked for her normal cookie.  Which is so healthy many say it’s not a cookie 😉 No refined sugars, all organic, no milk or soy, and whole wheat.  We’ll see if this sticks.

Before bed every night we spell her name to her.  It’s on her wall and we say “L-U-C-Y Lucy!” We do it 2-3 times before she gets rocked.  Tonight she was saying “SUE SEE!” when we were saying Lucy. 

I’ve been craving pizza but I HATE fake cheese.  I had a thought today to try mushed up beans instead of cheese-it turned out really well.

Ingredients:

–Whole Wheat Dough
-Can of drained garbanzo beans, rinsed
-10-15 leaves of basil
-2 tsp Braggs Amino
-2 tsp olive oil
-pizza sauce
-whatever toppings you desire-I did eggplant, orange peppers, mushrooms, and capers

Instructions: 

-Place garbanzo beans, basil, Braggs, and olive oil in a food processor and process until smooth.

-Roll out pizza dough, cover with sauce, and place quarter size dollops of the garbanzo mixture on top of the sauce.

-Cover with rest of veggies.

-Bake at 450* for 10-15 minutes or until crust is done and veggies are crisp tender.

-Enjoy! 

Makes 10 slices.

This totally satisfied my craving for pizza.  The bean mixture didn’t taste like cheese nor did it have the consistency BUT it was damn good! I give it 3.5 stars 🙂

To tell the truth, I don’t feel like this week went so hot.  I was very tempted to just skip this check-in BUT that’s not what this is about, right?  There are good weeks and bad weeks.  So let’s see.

1. Stop putting myself down.  Treat me like I would want others to treat Lucy. This has been going well.

2. Eat something green every day. Check!

3. Eat 2 servings of fruit every day. Check!

4. Completely cut out dairy. Check!

5. Get back on my bike. Not yet.

6. Do something only for me 1 hour each week. Not so much.

7. Do something with Shaun that doesn’t include me sitting on the computer and him on the XBox or us watching TV for 1 hour each week. Not just the 2 of us this week.

8. Dress nicely, including putting on make-up, at least 3 times a week. Check!

9. Clean out Lucy’s drawers. Nope.

10. Clean out and organize the filing cabinet. Nope.

11. Complete Lucy’s birth book. Nope.

12. Become a faster walker. If you can speed train for running, you can sure as hell do it for walking.  I went on 2 walks this weekend and both were markedly faster.

13. Send out thank you notes in a more timely fashion and to everyone that deserves one. I’m caught up to Christmas now.  I need to get my Christmas ones out and then I’ll be golden. Yes I had some from before Christmas.

14. Feed myself healthy food and exercise, trust myself. I could have done better this week.

15. Save my personal money for a new wardrobe. The phone kind of derailed this one.  I’m down to about $300. Not bad-not great.

16. Be on top of my budget and update Quicken every 2 weeks. I need to do this by tomorrow.

17. Severely limit my computer and phone time when I’m with Lucy.  On weekdays, I should never use them when she’s awake and on weekends, I should use them sparingly when she’s awake. Check!

18. Get the bird out 4 times a week. Twice this week.

19. To appease my husband, never let the gas tank get below 1/2 a tank. Check!

20. Improve on my photography. Still working on it.

And, the original 10 in 2010:

1. Take time out every day to simply enjoy my daughter. Check!

2. Try not to look too far forward or lament the past.  Check!

3. Drink more water-at least 70 ounces per day. Check!

4. Use my juicer A LOT. I only used it twice this week, I’d like to step that up this week.

5. Go to the gym more often than not. Check!

6. Eat healthfully-don’t put anything in my mouth that I wouldn’t feed Lucy. This one is so similar to 14 from above now that I’m changing it to: Floss EVERY day.

8. Run to the top of Waterdog Lake Road, while pushing Lucy, without stopping and back. Check! Walked it today-nice and fast.

9. Post at least 365 times in 2010.  I can post 3 times a day or skip a day but I want my average to be 1 post per day. Working on it.

10. Fold my laundry by Sunday night. Big fail.  I did 2 weeks worth of laundry today 🙁

How’s it going for you?  We’re at the end of January now, are your resolutions sticking with you?

Growing up my Dad always made a big breakfast on either Saturday or Sunday or we’d go get donuts and chocolate milk.  Some of my best childhood memories are from those mornings helping my Dad cook or eagerly awaiting the biscuits and gravy (among other things) to be done.  It’s a tradition that I want to carry on with Lucy. 

This morning was my morning to get up early with Lu-we trade off.  She woke up around 7:30 and we headed straight to the kitchen to make pancakes. 

Lu even helped out-she stirred the batter. 🙂

When they started cooking, I had to put her down-much to her chagrin.

Life is really hard, isn’t it?

No worries, she perked right up when she got to eat them.

BED HEAD!

She decided that Bear needed to eat too.

Lu out ate Mommy today.  She was HONGRY.  She had half a pear and 4 pancakes!

I had 3 pancakes with some PB and syrup.

Just the right amount 🙂

Let’s rewind to last night, shall we?  We had some killer margaritas. Salt for Shaun.

On the rocks, no salt, for me.

Josh and Parish made us chicken and veggies over rice.

It was delish!

After dinner, we headed to our house to put Lu down and to play some games. We stopped off and got some Yogurtouille on the way and got some unpictured frozen yogurt-non-dairy lemon with fresh strawberries, graham cracker dust, and raspberry syrup for me, chocolate yogurt with fresh strawberries and chocolate sauce for Shaun.  We finished off the night playing Bananagrams.  We had a GREAT night 🙂

I just got up from a Family Nap.  Shaun and Lu are still sleeping.  We haven’t had a Family Nap in months. It was pretty glorious 🙂

The day started with some juice:

Apple, Beet, Carrot, Lemon, and Ginger

Lu decided she loved it:

You can see the juice all the way up on her forehead:

A circle of juice:

I also had some toast that I shared with Lu.  There’s nothing better than sourdough toast.  I put some Earth Balance vegan spread on it:

It was such a nice day (after having MANY not nice days) that we decided to walk to a local museum.  On the way we stopped and got Shaun breakfast (a blueberry muffin and a chocolate muffin) and got Lu a banana.  This may or may not have snuck into our bag.  If it did? I had half.

My phone takes pretty good pictures, eh?

We walked to the Coyote Point Museum-it’s an Environmental Museum that Shaun took Lu to last weekend.  They liked it so much that they wanted to take me.  We got a membership so we’ll be going back!

Out front is a Inka Biospheric System.

It uses solar power, plants, and water to run this fish tank.

The plants naturally clean the water!

Lu LOVED the magnet gears.

They also had a water bottle wall that she thought was pretty cool.

She’s pretty shy around other little kids/unfamiliar situations and only wanted to play on the toys that were pretty unpopular.

We saw owls:

A badger:

Some fighting otters:

A tame hawk:

And a little sleeping fox:

We also saw frogs, snakes, a coyote, a ferret, eagles, and other interesting animals that I didn’t get a picture of.

It was COOL.  It’s about a 3.5 mile walk roundtrip and was a great way to spend our morning.

Lu was so tuckered she fell asleep in the stroller on the way home.

For lunch, I had some Mexican Pasta:

I’m Mexican Pasta’d out. I’m also over the vegan cheese I’ve been using.  I should have known not to buy it.  One of it’s selling points is that “It Melts!”.  *sigh*

Lastly, I’ve been craving sweets (donut anyone?). It seems it’s that time of the month or something.  Anyway, I had some dark chocolate:

Tonight, we’re off to our friends house for dinner.  I’m excited to be hanging out with them!

I had a nice day.  Lu let me work (no working this weekend-YAY!) and we still got to hang out and have fun.  We had a playdate later in the afternoon but before that, I had some vanilla coconut yogurt with Ezekiel cinnamon raisin cereal on top:

My Mom’s granola is WAY better.

We met up with Lucy’s friend Avi.  Lu and Avi have been hanging out since Lu was 6 weeks old.  Here they are in December 2008-she’s in the middle, he’s the one on the end with one eye closed:

Here they are today:

Wow :(  They were so active, it was hard to get a good picture. But you can tell-they’ve GROWN!

When we got home, I had a piece of toast with peanut butter, pumpkin butter, and cranberry jam.

The pumpkin butter was kind of lost 🙁

Tonight’s dinner was artichokes:

I did eat some mayo but mostly had mine with balsamic vinegar.

I also made steak, roasted brussel sprouts and mushrooms (with EVOO and balsamic) and quinoa.

I cooked the quinoa with chicken broth and that’s it-it was delish!  I gave this dinner a 5.  It was SOOO good.  Shaun gave it a 4 and said it would have been a 5 if I had made mashed potatoes and cauliflower instead of “fake rice”.  He said the “fake rice” wasn’t bad but it wasn’t as good as mashed tater and cauliflower.  I told him it was called “quinoa” and he said, “to me, it is fake rice”. “Fake rice” it is buddy.

I almost broke one of my own rules tonight!  Lu asked for some artichoke and I almost said “You won’t like this.” BUT! I stopped myself and gave her a leaf.

As you can see, she knew exactly how to eat it (she just copied us) and she LOVED it.  She ate 5 leaves.  She wanted to dip hers in balsamic vinegar (like Mommy) and I let her, expecting a sour face, but I got a “YUMMY” face and she asked for more.  My kid is a total foodie.