Baking

After months of sickness and staying away from the kitchen, I am baking again. Not that I'm posting about it.

Before Halloween we did Bakerella's Mummy cake pops. They turned out cute, but I was too busy to get any pics.

Also I finally made the Pumpkin Chocolate Chip bars posted on bakeat350. Absolutely loved the texture but a whole bag of chocolate chips took away the pumpkin essence and next time I'll only put in half a bag. I definitely recommend them so click on her blog and search that recipe. If you are as addicted to pumpkin goodies as I am you'll be glad you did.

Speaking of pumpkin addictions, I am so glad the Pumpkin Smash is back at Jamba Juice. I've been getting my weekly fix and I will be so sad when they take it away again. Why can't pumpkin be a year round flavor?

And, back to bakeat 350, did you see the picture of the chocolate chip cookie dough fudge? I just saw it, and since my new routine is to bake a goodie every Sunday, I was so excited. Until I realized I don't have the brown sugar (or a candy thermometer-- that's been on my to-buy list for years and I just never remember to buy one and always just try winging it). Someday I will make the fudge. I am still trying to make her chocolate chip cookie dough cupcakes too. I'll just have to have a chocolate chip cookie dough treat day. And maybe for today I'll just make chocolate chip cookie dough.

And I have a new favorite blog that I will talk about soon. Not nearly as fun as chocolate chip cookie dough sweeties, but still awesome.

The Bad Fish

You know how food can be really scary? How we never really know what's inside and what it's been exposed to in all of those factories? How every year or so a bad batch of something goes out to the public?

Well, even with all that, I still think it's much scarier to eat out all the time. I think the potential for food poisoning is much greater.

So, after two months of almost solid eating out, I really shouldn't be surprised that I spent last night sick.

After exercising and being out in the hot sunny weather yesterday, I was fighting a major headache. Two doses of tylenol later and I was worried it was turning into a migraine. So I thought I'd eat a light dinner and go to bed early. And how's fish for a light dinner? Sounds perfect, right? Except it went terribly wrong and prevented me from getting that early bed time (the silver lining is that my headache seemed to go away, so at least I wasn't up sick all night with a migraine on top of it).

 I just had some apple juice, and if nothing terrible happens, I will be heading out to the market to get more food. The kind you have to prepare and cook and clean up after yourself.

I feel like my poor stomach needs a break and I am too scared to eat out again right now, so I guess I am going to have to get over my laziness and plan meals again (or, we'll just survive by eating pb&j's and grilled cheeses for a few weeks). I really have no idea how I came up with 20-25 meals a month. What did I used to cook? My mind is completely blank. I mentioned this week that I was going to start weaning myself off the eating out gradually. You know, starting with taking out one meal a day. Well Wednesday I went to lunch with a friend, so that meant no going out for dinner. What did I do? Did I cook a delicious gourmet meal? No. I cut up a cantaloupe and put out some rolls and cheese. While I actually found the meal delicious and satisfying (nice and light after all the eating out), I don't think that type of "meal" would work 6 days a week.

I guess I'll see what happens at the store. And maybe tonight we can have rolls and grapes, you know, to mix it up. I definitely won't be buying fish.

What to say?

For the past couple of weeks I have logged on to update my blog and then gotten completely sidetracked by the catastrophe in Japan. And how could I proceed to my blog to post such meaningless junk? You know, after reading about the death and destruction and the ongoing despair? And I know it's not over (not even close to being worked out, I'm sure) but now that it no longer takes up all the main story slots on my home page, I can click over here without feeling as lame.

So, before I begin, I am glad that for now I can be consumed with such unimportant thoughts and I don't have to worry about getting food and shelter for me and my family. What a blessing. Those poor people who have had their lives turned upside down.
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What I have been worrying over is my exercise. I am back on track with my walking (okay, mostly, like last week the rainy weather got to me and I couldn't drag myself out of the house to go exercise for a solid three days- whoops). And, I am completely dedicated to starting my yoga back up next week. I know what you're thinking, why wait? Why not today? Well, I have my reasons. Next week, here I come. I am going to start with just two or three thirty minute sessions a week and work up from there. Because this walking alone just isn't doing it for me. I need to build my muscles back up. Regain some strength and definition.

And, I need to tackle my healthy eating. Sweets haven't been too much of a problem (at least to the extent they normally are). My problem is while I was sick I got into the habit of eating out for lunch and dinner and it's been a very hard habit to break. The idea of grocery shopping and planning meals and actually cooking and cleaning them up just sounds so unappealing. So, to start out, I decided just today to cut one of those meals out every day. That way I am only eating out once a day (still so much I know) and then I can work on getting that down to just once or twice a week. And, I am very excited that summer is just around the corner now so I can start buying fresh, cheap, and delicious produce. (It's much harder for me to hit my produce numbers when I am eating out so much).

Asking for it

I guess I was really just jinxing myself over the weekend. You know that whole- "look at me, I haven't exercised in 5 weeks but at least I haven't gained weight."

It turns out I gained myself a solid pound over the weekend. I guess I shouldn't have bought that box of Girl Scout Cookies on my way into the grocery store on Saturday. But how could I live without my yearly box of Samoas? Not happily.

I did head out for a 50 minute walk yesterday and a 30 minute walk today, so at least I am getting somewhat back on track. And I'll have to get all my shopping done before the weekend so there are no cookie booths set up to lure me in.

A Little Sharing

Here's the thing. You probably can't tell by looking, but I really do love to exercise ( I just Love sugar soooo much).  And with all the sickness, I haven't so much been exercising.

January went okay. I felt a little out of shape after the holidays and it was hard to work through my back to back colds. But I did. And then February came around. At the beginning of the month my back felt like it was about to go out, and since someone else's back was out at the time, I decided to take it very easy. I gave up Zumba, yoga, stair and hill climbing, and didn't even think of running. So what did I do? Just easy walks. Until I got that flu thing. That literally put me out for two weeks. I think I managed one walk, and then had to come home and go straight to bed.

Well, last week I happened to pay attention to what I saw in the mirror. And it seems my butt has disappeared. Now if that was my belly disappearing that would be great, but my butt? It's not so great. I haven't gained any weight in my month off exercise, but my body has changed so much that I think I look like I've gained 15 pounds. Aah.

This past Monday I decided it was time to get my butt back to exercising. So I did a nice big 50 minute walk with a great big hill in the middle. And it didn't go well. I spent the first 30 minutes coughing up a lung. And I'm not going to lie. I was so exhausted from it that I ended up taking a 2+ hour nap that day.

So Tuesday, I decided to try again. I thought I'd do better. Well, 20 minutes in I gave up. I decided it was too much. The coughing was just so terrible. And then I didn't even try anything on Wednesday and Thursday.

Yesterday, I figured I'd better try again. Because I assume it's not going to get any easier until I just do it. I figure there's no reason my body can't handle 30 minutes a day, right? And hopefully if I can hack that for a week or two then I can add 15 minutes. And then 15 more, until I get back to 60. I just feel so weak. I have had my bouts of no exercise before and getting back into it is usually hard. But I have never been exhausted from this flu like I am now. I did do 30 minutes yesterday. Minimal coughing. I was tired, but nothing like the exhaustion after my earlier attempts.

Also for the last two weeks I've decided that I am ready to start yoga again. I say it every day. But I have yet to do it. I highly doubt I can even hold a plank these days.

One of the saddest things to me is that I am losing my walking partner. I have pretty much cancelled for three straight weeks. And the couple of walks I have been on I have been lagging like crazy. She's ready for running, and I can barely handle walking. Please keep walking with me (if you're reading this), even if it's just once a week for the social aspect.

I am planning on getting thirty minutes in today. Even if I have to break it up (but I don't think I will because yesterday worked). So wish me luck that by the end of March I'll be back up to 60 minutes and even doing a handful of yoga sessions a week (but it might be too ambitious to say I'll be running or going to Zumba).

Blogging Again

I haven't blogged in two months. Here's the deal. I had back to back colds in January. Then in February, I came down with this horrendous flu thing. Which still seems to be lingering.

I want to be done being sick. Last year I also got very sick in the first two months of the year. I know lots of people get sick this time of year and there's a lot of crap going around, but I think I am a little to blame. Like maybe if I spent December eating anything with any nutrition in it at all instead of filling my body full of holiday junk for the month, then I would have better health going into my sick season. (Maybe next year I'll also get a flu shot- I have never done that before).

Anyway. So I feel like I am trying to emerge from this sick funk that has been fogging me. We'll see how it goes. It could be months (or never) until I really get back into this. We'll see. I know the idea of baking up something new sounds like the last thing in the world I want to do right now.

I spent the morning scrubbing dishes and folding laundry. Let's just say with how lousy I've been feeling, housework has not been my top priority. And, with spring cleaning around the corner here, I need to get the basics done first. So after I tackle that, we'll see if I have energy left over to cook or blog, or do anything worth blogging about.

Where did December go?

I just realized that I haven't posted here since November (and not even the last week on November). I even did mad baking and cooking the last week and a half in December and so many times thought, I need to sit down to a post. Not just about cooking but lots of things. And now, here it is the first week in January.

I just read some new recipes and got a new cook book for Christmas, so hopefully at the very least I can describe those here.