Whew.

All done. I can't believe how hard it is to be a student again! So much sitting. At least I learned some new stuff.  Not so much today, but the other classes have been great. Let's see if I can even remember what I had to eat yesterday.

Breakfast was more fresh pineapple and oatmeal with dried blueberries.  Also slipped in a handful of fresh ones when I first woke up.

Lunch at the expo was kind of weird. Had a brown rice and beans dish with cut up sweet potatoes. I suppose that was the vegetarian option. Then they had sandwiches. With yucky bread. I had an open-faced turkey sandwich.  They also had some salads, not sure what kind but one was just a letttuce salad with avocado as a dressing. That is easy enough to do at home.  Dessert was a piece of cheesecake, which I normally don't like, but this one was yummy. It wasn't super rich, which was nice.

Supper was at Buffalo Wild Wings. Split a pepper jack wrap with chips and salsa with Audrey, and had 7 boneless wings. And 2 Bud Light Limes.  That was a poor decision because I was already dehydrated since I forgot to grab a water in the later sessions. Felt yucky this morning. 

Today we stopped at Panera's for breakfast- power breakfast sandwich and a mocha icy drink to keep me awake. Sorry no pic.

Lunch was pretty crappy, sandwiches, chips, salads and rice krispie bars. Hope they'll make up for it tonight at the big dinner!

Hope everyone is having a happy healthy weekend... enjoy the last weekend before the kiddos go back to school!

Greek style

Day 1 of homecoming. Actually had 2 pretty good classes, and I'm excited to get back and start implementing some of the protocols. Now about the food.

I'm not sure how the pictures are showing up, on my phone they're just tacked on the end. So the first picture is of breakfast. Had oatmeal with dried cranberries and dried blueberries, with a side of fresh pineapple. I also grabbed a handful of fresh blueberries before we left for the day.

Lunch was Greek-themed. Piece of flatbread with chicken, lettuce, tomatoes and feta. Had some pita bread and hummus on the side, along with some Mediterranean couscous.  I also had 2 pieces of baklava.  I should have stopped at 1 but it was so good.  That was the first experience with it, and I think I'll try it again someday. 

Oh and all I had to drink today was water. Lots of it.

When we got back to grandma's, I went for a quick run. Go me!  Then we had Harris pizza (quad cities style) and chocolate cake.  Good thing I went on that run.

We are off to bed since I only got about 4 hours of sleep last night.  Sorry patients, won't be in the office tomorrow, so don't get hurt or sleep wrong!

Let's try this blogger app

Here's the first phone post. We'll see how this goes.

I don't really have any new pics for today because everything was a repeat. Soupy yogurt with blueberries and a banana for breakfast. Chicken drummie for lunch with a pasta side. Harvest chicken salad and chipotle turkey sammie fromm Quiznos! So good.

Since I don't have any new pictures, I'll give you an old one. Here's what I found in Target one day.

Has a special place in my heart...takes me back to senior year at Luther. Ah the memories. What this really reminds me of is my horrible eating habits. I was probably 15-20 lbs heavier then, due to poor eating habits and lots of beer drinking. I've learned so much over the years- it's never too late to change! One cheeseball never hurt anyone though...

Smoker time!

The hubby got himself a birthday present, since I didn't get him anything.  He got one of these bad boys: 

That space pod/R2D2 looking object is the Weber Smokey Mountain 22.5" smoker.  His new pride and joy.

His first meal was bacon (apparently that helps season it) and chicken drummies.  I have a feeling we'll be eating lots of meat in the near future.

Before the picture for supper, here's the salad I made for lunch.  Pretty much same as yesterday but smaller.  The poor little spinach leaves that were left in the container were starting to wilt- finished off the package today.  Added chicken, grapes, feta, sliced almonds and poppy seed dressing. 

I realized I always post a picture of my salad before adding the dressing because it's prettier, but the poppy seed isn't bad, so here's an after shot.

Now for the meat.  Didn't get a picture of all the drummies, just the one I ate for supper.  Accompanied by some honey glazed carrots.  Which were amazing.

These carrots look way better than before- wish I would have thought to take a before and after picture.  You know when you let carrots sit in the fridge too long and they get all white and gross looking because of the chemicals they use to package them?  Well I said screw that I'm using them up.  

So I steamed them for about 7 minutes in my microwave Pampered Chef steamer, and then threw them in a medium sized frying pan.  Added a scoop of yogurt spread (you can use butter if you want), about 3 T of honey, and a sprinkle of sea salt, pepper and parsley flakes.  Stir them around for about 5 minutes.  They look so pretty now.

That's all folks... 2 posts in a day! Woo hooo!  Oh yeah, forgot to mention we lost our softball game tonight.  : (  It's ok though because they are a pretty good team and we fought back from a pretty bad first inning.  Sad that it's all over though, see ya next year team Lifetime Chiropractic!  

Just to warn you, my posts are going to be pretty sporadic this week.  We take off tomorrow after work to go get some continuing ed hours.  I'll see if I can get Blogger to work on my phone, but if I don't, you're out of luck and will have to find something else more interesting to do than read my blog for a couple days.  GooooD Luck!

Happy birthday to my hubby!

Happy almost 30th birthday to my hubby!  That's right, he's only 29 today and never lets me forget that I am older.

Sorry about not posting last night, my schedule is all over the place this week.  I forgot we play softball on Monday and Tuesday night this week, then tomorrow we take off for seminars from Thursday to Saturday.

I also apologize for a couple repeats of meals.  I'm sure I'm not the only one who gets in ruts, but we really get stuck eating the same things over and over.  At least they're somewhat healthy meals.

Breakfast yesterday was one of my fav Chobani's- lemon with blueberries, organic coconut and chia seeds.  Didn't bother with a picture since you've seen it before.

Lunch was a tasty salad.  I'm not just saying that because I was starving either.  Spinach, leftover chicken, slivered almonds, banana peppers, cucumbers, grapes!, and Newman's poppyseed dressing.  Oh, and feta cheese.

After a super busy afternoon in the office, I had a quick grilled turkey and sharp cheddar sandwich on Ezekial because we had to play ball at 8:15.  Used some yogurt spread on both pieces, put 2 pieces of turkey and one of cheddar in between them, and grilled it up.

Remember the raspberry sorbet I worked on over the weekend?  It was pretty good.  Don't forget to set it out for about 10 minutes before serving so it scrapes easily.  Next time I will definitely use some extra effort and strain out the seeds.  A little gritty.

After sleeping through the whole night (thanks little buddy), woke up and felt like using my Organic Valley yogurt.  I wrote about this a couple days ago, about how I love using it in smoothies because it's almost a liquid.  You can actually drink it, so it's great for kids that don't like yogurt.  And not only is it organic, but it's local.  This company outsources to different farms across America and on the website you can actually look up the local farms that contribute to the company.  It's like a huge co-op.  Check it out.

Today I just dumped it over some blueberries and a banana.  Soupy but good.

I'll try to get back on track and get another post going tonight.  Have a wonderful day and enjoy this BEAUTIFUL weather!!

Ate the whole pan!

So that granola I was talking about?  It was pretty awesome.  No baking involved, which is great during the summer.  I put it in the freezer last night to firm it up, but had a little sample before bed.  Then this morning I had another sample.... and another... and then before you know it I ate it all.  Oopsie!  It was just so good, and I guess I had been craving a little chocolate.

Here's the recipe I used, which I adapted from here.  You can pretty much add whatever you want, be creative!

No Bake Granola

1 1/2 c oats (I used gluten-free)
1/2 c peanut butter (I used natural crunchy)
1/2 c coconut (sweetened or unsweetened- I used sweetened)
1/4 c honey
1/4 c agave nectar
2 T ground flax seed
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 c dark chocolate chips
1/4 c dried cherries

Mix together, press into wax-lined tupperware and put it in freezer.  Enjoy!

It was a little crumbly, you'll probably have to add more sugary stuff or peanut butter if you want it to be more of a formed bar.

So that was my breakfast.

Lunch was another turkey, spinach, Laughing Cow cheese on Ezekial bread.  It was good fuel for a productive afternoon.  Ran almost 4 miles!, cleaned up the dining room and organized my new desk, folded clothes and vacuumed.

 I also pureed some frozen raspberries that I have had in the freezer forever, added 1/3 c sugar and 2 T of lemon juice and put it in the freezer for some sorbet later.

My zucchini pickles are coming along- they definitely have a kick to them, since I added more crushed red pepper than the recipe called for.  I transferred them to jars, but couldn't find a lid for the third one. Why do some of the slices have big hard seeds in them?  Is that normal for zucchini?

Supper was grilled smart chicken marinated in vidalia onion marinade, and some broccoli alfredo pasta.  I made sure there was left-over chicken for some spinach salads this week!

Oh, and someone got a bath tonight.

Hope everyone had a good weekend... ready for a brand new week!

Project Zucchini Part One

I'm sure you were just on the edge of your seat waiting for a post last night... and then probably threw something at the computer screen when you found out there wasn't one!  I couldn't seem to squeeze one in since I was either feeding a child or working on charts while pumping.  Yes, that is when I write this, when I'm pumping.  4 1/2 months going strong.

Recap of yesterday:

Breakfast was another delicious smoothie.  Same exact one as Wednesday.

Lunch was this delicious salad.  I was super pumped about it because a patient brought in some cucumbers.  Nothing says summer salad like fresh cucumbers.  Also added some chicken, sliced almonds, feta cheese and dressing.

Supper was a treat of Casey's pizza.  I was thinking, I should probably call this blog Small Town Sometimes Healthy Living.  Last night was definitely not healthy, but it was easy and quick.  We brought the pizza over to some friends' house since they watched Tyler for us.  No picture, since I inhaled it.  Think I had 2 pieces of taco and 2 pieces of canadian bacon and pineapple.  I tell myself they were small pieces.



Now on to today.  Started my day off with some pineapple Chobani with shredded organic unsweetened coconut and chia seeds.

Lunch was an open faced turkey sandwich.  I used some mesquite Hormel no preservative turkey, a piece of Ezekial bread, a wedge of garlic and herb Laughing Cow cheese, and some spinach.  The cheese helps the sandwich feel a little more creamy- and not so dry.

I threw in a handful of these goodies- gluten free crackers.  Love the crunch.  I usually get the cheddar kind, but these are good as well.

So why the title of this post?  Besides catching up with this week's Project Runway- make it work!- this is what I've received from some of my favorite patients this week.  Lots of fresh zucchini!

Lots.  Now what the heck am I going to do with it all?  I've got some ideas... this is how I used up 3 of them today.  Stay tuned for part two.

2 of them I sliced up thin and made zucchini pickles.  Here's the recipe (courtesy of Cooking Light), but I won't have the verdict until tomorrow.

Zucchini Pickles

4 c 1/8 in slices of zucchini
1 c slivered sweet onion
3 thinly sliced garlic cloves

Combine in a glass bowl.  Bring 1 c white vinegar, 1/2 c sugar, 3/4 tsp crushed red pepper, 1 tsp mustard seed, and 3/4 tsp kosher salt to a boil.  Pour over zucchini, onion and garlic.  Cover and chill for 24 hours.

Notice a glass of my cooking juice in the background... it helps, it really does.


The other zucchini I cut up and used for supper.  I bought a couple sirloin steaks today and threw them on the grill for supper, made a quick brown and wild rice side, and a yummy veggie basket on the grill.  I learned my lesson this time, I steamed the carrots, zucchini and broccoli for 3/4 minutes before putting them in the grill basket.  I added some green pepper, grape tomatoes, onion and salt and pepper and threw it on the grill.  I stuffed my face, but only took about 1/3 of the smaller steak and filled up on veggies and rice.  Hubby ate the other steak- the whole thing.  What a guy.

I did try another new recipe tonight for some homemade granola bars which may or may not be vegan?  Like that matters to me... although it might scare people away if they are.  They are in the freezer firming up, so I'll let you know how they turn out.

Just a walk today, no major cardio.  Saving that for tomorrow!