Such a busy weekend

Hello there!  Sorry about no post yesterday….I have had one very busy weekend!  I will give a little run down of my last two days.  Grab a cup of tea…it’s a long one!

Yesterday I started early.  I got up with J and made a us a hearty bowl of oats to start the day.

Banana oats topped with crunchy peanut butter and pumpkin butter.  So creamy and delicious!

This bowl did pretty good at keeping me full the whole morning.  After getting ready I left for a long day out of the house.  First up was an oil change on my van.  But before I did that I ran thru the Starbucks drive-thu for a Skinny Caramel Latte.  Had to have it for my oil change wait.

I am glad I had my coffee because my wait was long…45 minutes long before it was my turn.  I thought I would be smart and go really early but I was not the only one with that idea.  After my oil change I was off to my hair appointment.  I also forgot to mention it was SNOWING like crazy all morning…so that made driving a little bit interesting!

Luckily though by noon it had stopped snowing and all of it started to melt as fast as it came down.  I was at the hair salon for about 2 hours.  My hairdresser was running a little behind.  But I got it done and I love it!

The color is a chocolate brown with golden highlights.

I am looking a tad tired in this picture.

After the salon I headed to the grocery store to pick up what I needed to make J’s meals for the week.  I also was excited to see these little babies and picked one up!

A POM pomegranate!  Fun!  I tore into it pretty much right away!

They also had the instructions on how to best cut it open.  So I gave it a go.

First cut off the top and score the sections.

Then over a bowl of water take each section and tear the seeds away and let them fall into the bowl.  Easy and a little less messy than my old method.

Takes a little work…but it is so worth it!

In the end you have these beautiful arils to eat!

Nom..nom…nom..they were so good!  Sweet and juicy.  The hubs and I devoured them in minutes!

Since I had some time still before our friend was coming so I took the opportunity to bake up the Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins I had planned for J and cracked open one of these!

After my busy day I needed a little drink!  This beer was ice cold and tasted so good!  I sipped away at it while I baked.

The muffins came out lovely!

Of course had to do a little taste test!

I put a little smear of butter on it as well.  So yummy!  J is going to love them.

Not long after I was done baking our friend came over to watch UFC with hubs and I.  I made a big batch of nachos for all of us but I forgot to take a picture of it.  My mind was elsewhere I guess!

The evening ended at about 10:30pm and I was in bed by 11:30pm and pretty much fell asleep right away.

Today was my day to sleep in and I got up at about 8:30am.  Hubs and J were playing when I when I came downstairs.

Breakfast turned more into brunch which was just fine.  I made a very yummy spinach frittata this morning.

In the frittata I put 3 eggs, 1 cup egg whites, milk, spinach, sundried tomatoes, parm cheese and sprinkled on top before it went into the oven feta cheese.  It turned out golden and puffy!

We had it with some turkey breakfast sausage.

and a piece of toast.

Everything was so good!  I love breakfast!

I also had a warm cup of Spring Blend Green tea with it.

I thought before I started the big afternoon cook-off I would go for long walk.  It was just beautiful outside today…a perfect crisp and sunny Fall day.

I walked for an hour and covered a little over 4 miles.  It was great. I listen to my iPod while I walked.

When I got back I gulped back a vitamin water.  I was thirsty!

It was lunch time when I got back so I made myself a green monster for lunch.

I can’t remember everything I put in here but I think this was it.

1 scoop of Amazing Meal

1/3 cup blueberries

1 small banana

1 cup Chocolate Almond Breeze

2 good handfuls of spinach

and a little too much ice cubes…I had to add a little more liquid to thin it out.

It made an extra large smoothie…it was scrumptious!  I took it with me while I showered off.  Once I was feeling squeaky clean I started cooking,

First I made Chickpea Ratatouille from Viva Le Vegan.  It was a one pot dish that you put in the oven and took mere minutes to throw together.

It turned out wonderful and smelled so good while it was cooking.

I tasted it and OMG it was so very good!  I will be making this again for sure.  I will need some for myself!

Next up my spin on Sheppard’s pie.  Making it a little healthier for J.

I stared by cutting up some organic sweet potato and putting it in the steamer.

I like doing my potatoes this way when I am going to mash them.  They are not watery like when you boil them.  I think it makes them more fluffy!

While they were steaming I made the meat base.

This was super easy.  I just fried up some organic extra lean ground beef with garlic until cooked.  Then I added 2 tbs of flour to the meat and cooked it for about a minute and then added some beef broth, thawed mixed vegetables and a 2 tbs of ketchup.

When the potatoes were done steaming I mashed them with a little greek yogurt and salt and pepper.  I put them on top of the meat and sprinkled a little shredded cheese on top before putting into the oven.  I missed taking a picture of the finally product!  Too much going on I guess.

So with that done J has a good amount of supper’s for while we are gone and then some!

The freezer is full!

I was still in the cooking mood so I decided to make a pan of brownies for the hubs!  I have been looking for a good brownie recipe for awhile so I gave another one that I found a try.

When it came out of the oven it looked promising!

Chewy corner!

I think I hit the jackpot with this recipe…it was awesome!

Oooey…gooey…and perfectly chewy!  So very good.  The hubs and I had a few two many tastes I think! 

Before the brownies I did manage to sit down to supper.  A little warmed up out of the freezer chili.  So very tasty!

I had it along with some fresh brussel sprouts that I pan fried with EVOO, salt and pepper.

A Side of cornbread.

And some Winter Spice.

Yummy and filling Fall supper!

So if you managed to get through this whole post…thanks for sticking around!

I am pooped and still have to go to work tomorrow!  But we leave on Tuesday for our holiday and I CANNOT wait!

Tomorrow night after work the hubs and I are kicking off our holidays with supper out to a restaurant call the Livingroom.  We won a Tasting Menu Meal complete with wine at a silent auction a little while ago so we thought we would go and use our gift certificate.  So be on the look out for a recap of our meal.

Well, I am pooped time to call it a night, have a cup of tea and relax a bit before bed!

Good Night!