Enjoying a Meal or Three

So here we are at Monday again, huh?  The weeks seem to be flying by so fast; I can hardly believe we’re into the second week of February!  My day to day schedule has pretty much remained the same….hockey, dance, Pilates, hockey, soccer, hockey….you know the drill, right?  But this past week I have made, eaten and enjoyed many a delicious meal.  I’ll be focusing on these goodies in today’s post.
Tuesday night I tried a recipe for Mu Shu Chicken that I found in Prevention magazine.     This meal came together WAY faster than I expected so dinner ended up being a little earlier than usual, but I’ve definitely filed that information away for a day when we need something fast, nutritious and tasty!  
I had no coleslaw mix or scallions so I used Swiss chard and an orange bell pepper instead.  We enjoyed the mixture nestled in WW wraps:  Even my picky-as-sin son gobbled this meal up!  LOL  The next day I mixed the bit of leftovers with a quarter cup cooked WW couscous.  Yummy!
We had some pretty blustery, winter weather Wednesday which resulted in my office and the schools being shut down for the day (YAY!!) so I got to stay home with my kiddie’s.  Unfortunately my hubby’s workplace never closes so he had to go in for the day.  Boo!  I did not get out of my PJ’s, but did make a fabulous pot of chilli for dinner. 
I found 4 bison burger patties in the freezer so I broke them up and  combined them with some diced onion and garlic, then added a can of black beans, chickpeas, diced Italian style tomatoes, tomato sauce, corn and loads of spices.  
As you can see in the photo we topped our bowls off with grated havarti cheese and fresh cilantro.  The perfect cold day meal!  Friday night was kept simple because we had to head out of town after dinner.  I grilled a chicken breast then topped it with mango chutney and havarti cheese.  I used roasted asparagus as a side: And tonight was good ole pasta! Lunches have also been grand affairs lately.  I scored this gem of a bagel at lunch last Thursday: 
It was SO GOOD!!!  I was inspired to make a similar version at home on Saturday.  On a crusty ciabatta bun I layered whipped cream cheese, grilled chicken breast, tomato, roasted red pepper and avocado.  Then I pressed the sandwich in my George Foreman grill (I had to hold the lid down) for about 5 minutes.  I was rewarded with this amazing creation!
Breakfast around here for me rarely stray’s from some form of oats, but seeing as I had time on Wednesday I made us some waffles with dark chocolate chips and homemade strawberry sauce, I’ve had a few tasty snacks along the way, too…
Tell me what foods/meals you’ve been enjoying lately!!  I’ll sign off with a few pictures of the kids enjoying all the snow we’ve gotten!
Bye for now!!

Hodge Podge

Hi all!  I hope everyone has had a good start to the week!  I have and it’s looking like another busy one, but that’s OK.  You know what they say about keeping idle hands busy and all…LOL  I just wish I had a little more free time to enable me to get back to blogging with a little more frequency.  In time, in time, right?

I started back to Pilate’s last Tuesday which was pretty much awesome.  They had a mini session over the holidays which I was unable to sign up for and I didn’t realize how much I missed it.  Now I’m good to go until mid May.  Wednesday DS had a hockey game which they won 1-0……with 2.6 seconds left in the game.  What a rush!  Us parents were all freaking out and the boys were so excited that they nearly jumped out of their skates!  :)

Something not so fun happened to me on Thursday at the gym.  Since July a group of us have been knocking out Jillian Michael DVD’s on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  We made our way through levels 1, 2 & 3 of the 30 Day Shred (10 times at each level) and through level 1 of Shred It With Weights (again, 10x). 
Last Thursday we moved on to level 2 of SIWW which is significantly harder than level one.  Lots of swinging through the legs with the kettle bells and such.  Within the first 5 minutes I smashed my knee with the weight doing “figure 8’s”.  Grr…but the worst was that by the end I knew I‘d screwed my back up.  Right across my lower back was numb for a few hours and when I woke up Friday morning I could barely walk.  Exercise FAIL!  I’ve been nursing it with heat and A535 and it’s feeling much better today, but still too tender to consider hitting the gym.
 
Wednesday was my hubby’s birthday and we had planned for the 4 of us to do a nice dinner out Saturday night to celebrate.  DD ended up getting invited to a sleepover birthday party so I asked my parents if DS could spend the night at their place and they agreed.  So for the first time in at least 12 years my hubby and I had a night completely to ourselves.  Heck ya! We continued on with dinner plans at Einstein’s Café (yes, we love it there, plus my friend owns it with her husband and we like to support them!!)  First, we enjoyed some bruschetta which is made using their signature homemade bread:
For our mains hubby had the portabello brie stuffed chicken breast,
And I enjoyed snapper with a light sun dried tomato cream sauce:
For dessert we shared a piece of Southern Bourbon pecan pie:
The food was outstanding, the atmosphere cozy, but the best part was that we didn’t feel at all rushed to get home to the babes.  After dinner we went to see The Fighter.  GREAT movie.  If you’ve seen it too, let me know what you thought, K?!  After the show we bumped into another couple and decided to go out for a few drinks.  I felt 20 years younger rolling (not literally!) through the front door at 2am.  LOL  Usually I’ve been asleep for at least 3hrs at that point.
I’ve been busy in the kitchen, too!  After soccer Thursday night I made a batch of blueberry bran muffins: Friday night was homemade turkey soup: Tonight was homemade macaroni and cheese: My hubby and I had Thai again for lunch last Friday:
I didn’t eat it all so the rest turned into Saturday’s lunch: We decided yesterday to make our own Pad Thai at home.  So with the help of this recipe we got to it!
DS liked it so much that he declared tofu his new favourite food.  LOL It did turn out pretty amazing…
I also made a quick stir fry for lunch today seeing as I was home instead of the gym.  I cooked some chicken breast, mixed veg and bean sprouts then added some Caribbean stir fry sauce.  Delicioso!! 
Oats have made their regular morning appearance:
And some, but not enough, fruit:
So I’ve been drinking lots of water…
And getting my greens in the form of juice!
And I can’t forget about this lovely sandwich, Something that made me very excited on Saturday was finding these gems while browsing through the grocery store! Cocoa roast almonds have made it to Canada!!!  They’re dear, though, at $6.99 a container.  Ugh…we bought them anyways!!  :)

Time to wrap this post up because we’re heading out to price new living room furniture and I want to check out some modern dining room furniture.  This is the year that we rid ourselves of the “garage sale” type furniture we have and invest in some new pieces.  After all, most of our furniture is pushing 15yrs old.  YIKES! 
Bye for now!!

Three Days Worth

The weekend is here, boys and girls!!  Are we all excited?  I am even though I don’t have a whole lot planned.  The past few days have been the usual…read “not exciting”.  LOL  I have to relish the quiet of my days right now because hockey for DS starts up Sept 1 and DD’s dance starts on Sept 13 so I’ll be hitting the ground running from then until the end of June.  Sheesh…before I know it Christmas will be here!  OUCH!
WEDNESDAY
Breakfast was a pack of Nature’s Path Maple Nut oatmeal which I’m happy to report had lots of nuts in it!  That didn’t stop me from adding more along with a splash of coconut milk:
A 100% enjoyable, easy to prepare breakfast! 
I noshed on a PB Mojo bar before hoofing it to the gym:
This one is great, but not as great as the mountain man bar.  That one I buy by the boxful!  :)
I hopped on the treadmill at lunch for a great ½ hour, incline speed walk.  I haven’t done that since before my vacation and it felt great to get on there and huff some.  And better yet that I woke up pain free unlike the morning after my run last week when my hip bothered me.  Getting old sucks!  LOL
In my quest to get back into eating loads upon loads of veggies again I chopped 2 tomatoes and a cucumber from the garden and topped them with ½ a can of tuna and some fig balsamic dressing for lunch.
WHOA baby!  I packed the veggies and tuna in separate containers so I didn’t realize how much was there until I combined the 2.  I loved the simplicity of it, though and it filled me up.  May have been mostly water, but I digress!
Just before I left work for the day I snacked on a packet of cocoa roast almonds:
Yum in my tum!
I made the fam pasta for dinner because I needed something quick.  Just as eggs and toast are my go to meals, pasta is my go to meal for the fam.  Why did I need something quick?  Well, DD had plans to go to the movies with a friend for 6:30.  After dropping her off we had to attend a meeting for DS’s hockey team across town.  Did I start this post by saying that my evenings were still calm? HA!  Anywho, they ate pasta and I ate a big salad made with kale (from the garden), a hard boiled egg, ½ an avocado, carrots and some freshly grated parm cheese.  The dressing was a mix of white balsamic vinegar, olive oil, honey chilli powder, salt & pepper.
I think I filled my veggie quota for the day with this one.  Delicious!  We made it home just after 9pm and the first thing I did was tune into SYTYCD Canada.  Then I sipped on a vanilla chai and snacked on a chocolate chip All Bran bar.  Unfortunately, the lighting was poor and the photo was awful.  Boo to the nights getting dark faster!!
THURSDAY
I lounged in bed a bit too long and started the day off in a rush as the result!  I’ll never learn.  With 10 minutes to go before I had to leave for work I slammed back a bowl of Wildroots cereal.
Insert work, work, enjoy a Nature’s Path sunny hemp granola bar, work, work:
Thursday was our last day at level 1 of the 30 Day Shred.  Some of the ladies are a little freaked out about moving to level 2, but I just told them to do what they can and if it’s too much to just do some exercises from level 1 till they catch their breath.  I think they’ll be just fine!
I made a big salad fro lunch with some odds and ends thrown in; a hard boiled egg, ½ an avocado and carrots.  I used Renee’s pear & blue cheese dressing to spice it up:
It was another busy night with it being DS’s last house league soccer game of the season.  The kids wanted leftover pasta so while I got that going I made some quinoa for myself which was topped with tuna, feta, roasted red pepper and freshly grated parm:
Simple and easy on the taste buds.  I also had some beat up orange segments.
My neighbour injured her knee so when we got home from soccer the kids went to make sure she was OK and to help her put the garbage out.  We chatted for a bit and before long it was after 9pm.  I crashed on the couch for a bit then crashed in bed.  The nights have been cooler and sleeping has been marvellous!
TODAY!
Had some great oats!
-1/2 each water and coconut milk
-1/2 Quaker oats
-cinnamon
-pecan pieces & mocha flavoured agave
The consistency was just right today.  I got side tracked and they sat a bit on the counter.  I think that’s the key to getting the texture the way I like it.  Pre gym snack was a strawberry pomegranate Odwalla bar:
I LOVE these bars!  They’re my new best friend.  I haven’t met a flavour I don’t like.
I climbed on the elliptical at lunch today for 30 minutes.  The perfect ending to a work out week, if you ask me!   I grabbed a quick yogurt and container of granola for lunch today which went down perfectly.  For some reason it was just what I wanted!
Following my usual routine throughout the work week, I ate a snack before punching out for the day.  Today’s snack was carrots and almond butter:
I really don’t know why I don’t snack on this combo more often.  It really is fantastic! 
Dinner tonight was a dinner for champions!  ;)
The fam was having juicy jumbos and mac n cheese so I decided to eat “junky” too!  LOL  I sautéed some green bell pepper to use as a topper on the “sausage”.  AND, I served it in a fluffy white bun!  It’s been a long time since I rocked the white bread!
I’ve never had a Tofurkey product before and I really enjoyed these sausages.  The bun was great until the halfway point.  I’d had enough by then.    This was a great Friday night meal!
My hubby did some yard work for the neighbour after dinner so I visited while he worked.  I also shared my bounty of tomatoes and zucchini!  It’s getting to the point where I’m being overwhelmed by produce from the garden.  While typing this out I’ve been sipping on a tea and enjoying the last few squares of my dark chocolate bar.
So tell me, what are you doing this weekend??
Bye for now!!