Friday Night

Saturday Morning

Saturday Afternoon/Evening

Sunday

Question: What did you do with your time this weekend?

1. Does anyone else feel bad for birds during the winter? On my way home from school today, it was freezing rain and I looked up in the sky (perfect idea while driving 75 mph on a highway by the way) and said out loud “those poor birdies”. I’m a freak. Oh – PS, I did look back at the road too.

2. Speaking of birds, I kept hearing one last night over and over again while sitting on the couch. I asked the Husband if he saw a bird out the window, and he laughed. Apparently the sounds of birds was coming from his iPad – and they were very very angry.

3. SNOOOOOOOWWWWW!!! I thought we were in the clear for snow this winter. Whatever, I don’t care. It snowed.

4. I get to meet this lady tomorrow. We’re going for yoga and brunch. I am so so excited, and I can’t wait to talk for hours with her.

5. I’m convinced that Charlie understands every word that comes out of my mouth. He probably only wags his tail because I pet him, but I swear he knows what I’m saying. I always wonder what he is thinking in that brain of his. Probably something like – “maybe if I wag my tail for long enough she will give me more food?”

6. My next movie obsession is going to be The Hunger Games – oh my gosh I can’t wait until that movie comes out. I devoured those books last year and have been waiting for the movie to come out ever since then. It was all the rage in fifth grade last year.

7. Yesterday, my doctor gave me Chinese herbs to begin taking 3x a day – they taste gross. I don’t care.

8. Today marks the end of my second trimester of the school year. Where in the world did the first two of them go? For real – I can’t get over this.

9. I ate this for dinner last night. It’s something even the Husband will eat (with a side of chicken for him of course).

10. Sometimes when you have no more money for groceries, you can still bribe your husband to go to the store to get a few things and go over your budget. And then you can go to your mom’s house and she’ll give you food to bring home. Good things, too – like almonds, hummus, eggs, brussels sprouts, granola bars. I heart her.

11. I’m reading this book to the fifth grade during our bike safety unit. I usually teach science to all three classes (we switch for a half an hour of the day to prepare them for middle school), but since it’s the end of the trimester, we are switching it up for a few weeks. Reading this book once is sad enough, but reading it THREE times out loud is absolutely heart wrenching. I had to do everything in my power today not to cry while reading it.

12. It’s Friday!! (duh!) Have a great weekend!

I’ll have you know that I bought a bag of sweet potatoes from Trader Joe’s on Saturday, and there are only two left.

I like my sweet potatoes a lot of ways – with cinnamon and sugar. with a spoonful of nut butter (duh). shmeared with hummus and nutritional yeast. dipped in ketchup (I swear it’s delicious). or plain! Plain is good as well. Basically, give me a sweet potato, and I’ll eat it regardless of what is piled on top of it.

Anyway, these smashed sweet potatoes are literally the easiest thing to make – ever. And you don’t even need too many ingredients. Sweet potatoes. Milk (whatever kind tickles your fancy). Spices. Done and done.

Don’t even peel the potatoes – that takes too long. And potato skins are the best part of a potato (duh!).

With the spices, I went a more "southwestern" route. Mainly because I love it when my mouth is on fire, but even more so because I am going to spend the next few months of my life making every meal into a Mexican fiesta to try and convince the Husband we need to go to Mexico this summer with his brother and sister in law. He says we should be responsible and pay off loans. I say – VIVA LA MEXICO!!!! This is why I don’t run our finances, people.

In reality what I am doing by making Mexican food is manipulating my husband – but it’s okay because at least we’ll have delicious food to eat while I talk him into a summer vacation.

Aaaand that’s all I’m going to say about that because I want the last thing the Husband to read on this post to be something about going on vacation.

       print this recipe!    

I said it once and I’ll say it again – going on a vacation would definitely help me to relax, unwind, and solve my life’s problems. Right!??! RIGHT!?!?!?

That’s what I thought.

Viva la Mexico Husband – just think about all the chips and salsa awaiting you at your paradise.

I have to tell you that taking pictures of all my food yesterday totally threw me off. Since I didn’t have school on Monday, I was totally out of my “Tuesday routine” of taking all my pictures before school. Shortened weeks are kind of bittersweet. While I enjoy the long weekends, the shortened weeks are always so hectic and crazy because you have to try and cram a week’s worth of material into just for days, not to mention the kids are always a little bit crazed. They all must have slept the entire day on Monday or something because they sure had a lot of energy yesterday!

Believe it or not, it’s already Wednesday – time for some WIAW love for Jenn!

Breakfast – 6:00

After a good night’s sleep, I sat down to breakfast and enjoyed my entire bowl of oatmeal (and a cup of coffee!!!! (my one of two cups per week)) and realized I didn’t take any pictures. Which was definitely okay since I have about ten thousand pictures of the same bowl anyways. I’ve got a recycled picture going on, but you better believe it was topped with some of my almond flax butter instead of the peanut butter.

Snack – 9:30 AM

During my plan time this morning, I ate the other half of my banana from my oatmeal and had a cup of kombucha green tea that I got from Alex last week. I wasn’t really hungry (as I never really am when I eat a snack in the morning), but I always get famished around 10:30 right before lunch. I try to fend off the hunger pangs because if not, I get a horrible stomachache later on in the day.

Lunch 11:30 AM

Eeeek – overexposed horrible picture ahead! Lunch today was so good – and really filling! I have a hard time making sure I have a filling lunch that will hold me over until my afternoon snack, but yesterday’s really did the trick.

I had a large green salad that was filled with organic sprouted tofu and avocado (healthy fats and protein!) – it was topped with nutritional yeast, balsamic vinegar, and Sabra roasted pine nut hummus. On the side, I had a piece of my gluten free bread with a shmear of Earth Balance.

I also had a mango Chobani for a little sweetness and a little more protein.

Snack – 3:45 PM

After an insanely looong day at school, I stayed for a little while to organize my life a little bit (my classroom was a disaster by the end of the day). Once it was cleaned and set up for tomorrow morning, I hit the road instead of grading papers (they’ll still be there tomorrow) and ate my usual snack on the way home.

Dinner – 6:00 PM

When I got home from work, I took Charlie on a 30 minute walk and tidied up the house a little bit before (seriously) collapsing on the couch for about a half an hour before I got dinner ready. Yesterday I made a total of four recipes for this week’s posts, so I had a lot of food waiting for me in the fridge. I ate a fried egg on top of kale (sautéed with olive oil and liquid aminos), and I also had about a cup of some smashed sweet potatoes that will get a recipe for very very soon.

All was topped with a generous heaping of nutritional yeast and ketchup (of course).

Snack – 8:00 PM

I ended the day like any day should – with a protein muffin, a bit of Greek yogurt, half of a chopped apple, and an almond butter spoon.

 
Another typical day of eats over here (oh + the two squares of dark chocolate I ate right after dinner – can’t forget those!!). Just like that, half of the week is over!

Question: How do you make sure to stay full through the afternoon? Do you have a hard time staying full after lunch?

For the longest time, I was afraid of kale. Weird, right? I just thought it was incredibly intimidating to use since I had not grown up using kale as one of my “go to” greens. I grew up eating romaine and spinach, but that was about as far as my green comfort zone went.

I don’t think I even ate kale until last year, and I have to tell you – it was love at first taste. Kale is one of those greens that is hearty and so versatile, even more so than any other green I eat!

The nutritional stats of kale are incredible. Just one cup of cooked kale provides over 1000% of your daily Vitamin K needs, as well as 350% of Vitamin A and 88% of your Vitamin C needs (source). Kale is also rich in antioxidants that have been shown to have anti-cancer health benefits – not to mention kale is low in calories and is full of fiber with 5 grams per serving.

There are a few types of kale, each one delicious with the same types of nutritional value.

Kale (most common variety)
Dino Kale
Russian Kale (slight pink hue)

source of pictures

It wasn’t that I never wanted to try kale – it’s that I was scared to use it! Whenever I saw kale salads, the words “massage your kale” had me dumbfounded, so I usually just skipped over those recipes all together. I have discovered that kale is just as easy to cook with and make delicious dishes with as any other green out there!

In Salads: Yes, you’re going to have to “massage” your kale. Once you get past the lingo, it’s really quite easy, and yes – you really do massage it. Kale tends to be a fairly bitter green, so by massaging your salad dressing into the leaves, it takes away some of the bitterness. My favorite way to dress up some raw kale greens is with olive oil, bragg’s liquid aminos, balsamic, Dijon mustard, and salt and pepper – it’s delicious! All I do is pour on the dressing and using my hands, rub the dressing into the greens for 3-4 minutes. It allows the dressing to absorb a little bit into the leaves – and no, it won’t get soggy if you pack it in the morning!

Chips: Kale chips are one of life’s greatest gifts. I’ve made kale chips multiple ways – in the dehydrator and in the oven on a low temperature. Either way is equally delicious – just use whatever appliance you have available! I have a recipe I love using for oven baked kale chips. If you have a dehydrator, use the same marinade/spices and just dehydrate until crisp!

Simple Oven Baked Kale

Sautéed: I have been obsessed with sautéed kale lately – totally obsessed. I have been going through the pre-cut and washed bags of kale from Trader Joe’s like it’s my job. Sautéing kale is pretty comparable to cooking spinach. To do so, just heat oil in a skillet, add the kale (and perhaps a few tablespoons of water) and spices, stir frequently, cover, and cook until wilted. It takes a few more minutes to sauté kale than spinach since it’s a little heartier.

A few of my favorite kale recipes include the following:

Over Easy Savory Oatmeal with Kale

Butternut Squash and Kale Hash

Chickpea Rice Soup

For more Back to the Basics posts, visit the following links:

• Back to the Basics: Roasted Vegetables
• Back to the Basics: Cooking with Grains
• Back to the Basics: Beans, Beans, Beans

Question: What is your favorite way to use kale?

It’s no shocker I’m obsessed with nuts.

Stop giggling like a ten year old and hear me out – almonds, peanuts, cashews, walnuts.

So when I went through my peanut detox (um, yes I had to detox), I had to switch over to almond butter. You know all of this. What you don’t know is that I did not enjoy the almond butter so much at first.

Okay, maybe you knew that too.

What you really don’t know is that I went through two jars of almond butter in the last two weeks. Let’s do the math on that – that means I have eaten one jar of almond butter per week. That’s a lot of almond butter. Over the course of the last 56 tablespoons, I have actually come to like almond butter – a lot! In fact, one day I “had to” finish up my last jar of peanut butter by eating oats in a jar one morning for breakfast… and I actually missed the almond butter. I never thought that day would come.

Okay, here’s the thing about almond butter though – it’s stinkin’ expensive. Especially since there are eight more days left of the month, and I have zero dollars left to my grocery shopping budget name. That means I can’t spend $5.00 on a new jar of almond butter. I almost freaked out hardcore this morning when I realized I wouldn’t have any more nut butter to carry me through the rest of the month until I opened one of my cupboard doors and realized that I had an economy sized bag of almonds from Costco staring me in the face.

Then I looked at my counter and realized I have a high powered food processor at my very fingertips.

Uhhh – duh, make almond butter Chelsey.

It’s the best of both worlds, really. I got to choose how drippy I wanted the almond butter to be, and I got to lick the spatula. Win, win.

       print this recipe!    

In case you’re unaware, making nut butters requires patience – something I lack in. But, I forged through and the end result made me undeniably blissful. I’m going to have to stretch this jar over 8 days, not 7. It’ll be rough, but someone’s got to do it.

Last week was downright exhausting. I don’t know if it was because it was the first week of phase two or what, but by the time I went to bed every night, I felt like I had been up for two straight days – not to mention, I could have slept in every single morning as well!

 my fur-baby is always ready to go back to bed!

I was really excited to start with phase two this past week, mainly because I love getting a new routine every few weeks with this program. I have yet to be bored with any of the workouts, which makes getting up to get my workout in not quite as bad. This week was a little different than all the last. Instead of a five day rotation, phase two has six workouts with the addition of cardio, like I talked about last week.

I can’t say that I completed this last week with fidelity though. I talked last week about my decision not to complete the cardio portion and to continue to walk Charlie most days after school. Another thing was that I skipped out on the last workout of the week, which was a leg workout. Seems blasphemous since I love leg days, but I really wanted to go to hot yoga instead on Saturday morning. I thought about doing a leg workout after yoga, but that thought was quickly squashed by the fact that I had a really busy day and I didn’t want to over do it. I think what I am going to do is continue to go to yoga on Saturdays and just rotate which leg workout I do on the designated leg day since both of the leg workouts are different.

source

Other than that, I’m starting to feel a bit bulky, especially in my legs. I’m sure that’s normal since I’m building muscle up, and I’m hoping my decision not to do the cardio doesn’t hurt me in phase three. I don’t enjoy the bulky feeling – and neither do my pants, that’s for sure!

My workouts have been the following:

Monday: Back & 3 mile walk with Charlie
Tuesday: Chest, Abs, and 1.5 mile walk
Wednesday: Legs & 2 mile walk with Charlie
Thursday: Arms & Abs
Friday: Shoulders & 2 mile walk with Charlie
Saturday: Hot Vinyasa class

Overall, the workouts have not really taken any longer in the mornings than the workouts in phase one. This, of course, is because I am not completing the cardio. The workouts have been a little more challenging, but not much so. There were a lot of new exercises to get used to, and I have upped the weight on the exercises that have lower repetitions. Other than that, I have felt a little more out of breath on some of the moves, which could be due to increasing my weights.

Week six is a repeat of week five, so I’m planning on doing the back workout as well as taking Charlie for a long leisurely walk since I have today off – got to love President’s Day!

Question: How have your energy levels been this past week? Only 4 more weeks until spring!

The winner of the Rudi’s Gluten Free giveaway is #158 – Micah! Please email me to claim your prize. Congratulations!

Well, it was never my intention to leave you since Friday, but this weekend has been jam packed! Last night after I got home, all I wanted to do was curl up on the couch in my sweat pants – the computer was barely opened.

Yesterday, I stayed true to my Saturday morning tradition by having a leisurely breakfast, going to hot yoga, and going to Trader Joe’s. Of course, only the first of the three things were done at a leisurely pace since I had to be back at school by noon to help out with our annual Winter Carnival (which every year I swear it’s at least 50 degrees for).

In between my shuffling around, however, I found a few extra seconds to snap some photos of the groceries I got this week from Trader Joe’s. Usually at this point in the month, I am reeealllly running low on grocery money, and this month is no different. Earlier this month, I spent about $40 out of our $300 on meat for the Husband from Costco – like 5 pounds of each chicken and beef. I sectioned it out into freezer bags for meals to come – it will last him months, but definitely put a damper on my grocery budget this month.

Needless to say, I only got essentials and what we absolutely needed to make it through next week until I get to spend more money. Side note: I could spend more money if I wanted to – but I’m all about sticking to the budget!

Please excuse the blurry photo – I was in a rush!

• sweet potatoes
• avocadoes
• celery
• carrots
• kale
• romaine
• onions
• graham crackers (the Husband loves to heat them up with warm milk for a snack)
• gluten free oats

• organic pink lady apples
• 3 d’anjou pears
• ketchup (yes, this is a necessity)
• balsamic vinegar
• liquid egg whites

I also stopped at a different store later in the day to pick up some things for the Husband – cereal, orange juice, and lunch meat. My father in law was also over at the time helping the Husband replace our water heater (ugh!) so I picked up some sausages to make for the two of them for dinner.

In total, I spent about $65 on this week’s trip, and well – I’m out of cash. Does anyone else feel like grocery prices have increased a LOT in the last six months or so? I feel like I can never stretch my dollar out quite as much as I used to be able to. I have also been buying more eggs (cage free, organic) since I am eating them now as well, but I don’t think that $10 worth of eggs a month really would make that much more of a difference. I could go on an on about how the price of living is increasing though the economy is still at an all time low, but that’s a discussion for another day. I fear getting political on you- ha!

I have been thinking of upping the budget for the month to $350 – it’s just getting really hard to make it all work for $300. In fact, it isn’t lately!

I’d love to hear your thoughts on the grocery bit – do you feel like grocery prices keep continuing to rise?

1. Have you entered my “Cooking Creations” contest yet? In case you missed it, it’s a blog recipe contest! All you have to do is read the directions on this post, link up, and wait to see if you’re the $100 winner!

2. Have you ever wondered if you have ever been pinned on Pinterest? Ever since Pinterest has taken the internet by storm, I’ve wondered myself. I forget whose blog I read this on (so if it was you, I would love to give you credit for telling me!), but all you need to do it type in the URL http://www.pinterest.com/source/YOURurlHERE. For example, for my pins, I would type in http://www.pinterest.com/source/cleaneatingchelsey.com – it’s basically awesome.

3. I have decided I really love almond butter. It only took me a few weeks of mourning my peanut butter to realize how good it is.

4. I participated in a Valentine’s Day Blog Swap that Christina put together last month. I received my present from Alex on Wednesday, and I can say that I absolutely adore my gifts. If you’ve never had this tea, it’s the best. It’s slightly sweet and perfect in the morning or right before bed.

And I obviously hate the chocolate.

5. I missed running for the first time in like a month today. It was a sad moment actually. I opened up my freezer, and the bag of peas staring back at me made me super disappointed. Weird connection, right? Well, I used to ice my legs with that bag of peas (and the Husband said we are never allowed to eat them since they’ve been defrosted so many times – really, I think he just hates peas). I thought about how accomplished I always felt after a long run when I would need those peas. I keep telling myself I will run again someday, and that it is not a big deal.

6. Have I mentioned I have a three day weekend starting today at 3:00? Thank God for President’s Day – I need another day to sleep in.

7. My mom went to Disney again this week (I know, right!??!?!), but this time for business. She brought me home cupcakes from BabyCakes, and the Husband forgot to pick them up from her house yesterday. I neeeeeed my cupcakes. Don’t you forget them again Husband!!!!

8. I think one of the main reasons I love acupuncture so much is because I get to sleep for 45 minutes on a Thursday afternoon when I would otherwise be at home working, cleaning, or making dinner. It’s a beautiful thing.

9. Our house smells, no reeks, of paint. The Husband has been working hard at repainting our bay window that had to be replaced in the fall – paint SMELLLLSSSS. And I’m pretty sure the Husband has been high from fumes for the last 4 days. It means he swoons over my cooking – I’ll take it.

10. Oh! I also have a giveaway going on for Rudi’s Gluten Free Bread!! Go enter here.

11. I really want savory oats for dinner tonight. It’s official. I’m counting down to dinner time.

12. Happy Friday!!!!!

I had absolutely no intention of blogging my dinner from last night and almost didn’t take a picture of it. That would have been a sad day for you – because this was ab-suh-loot-ley freakin’ fantastic.

Whenever I make Mexican food, I always make the same thing – rice, beans, and fajita vegetables for me and tacos for the Husband. Seeing as we eat Mexican at least once per week, it gets old after a while. Last night I switched things up by making the Husband a Mexican Taco Lasagna (he was a fan), so I though I should get creative for myself as well.

When I was younger, we ate fast food – a lot. Trips to Burger King, McDonald’s, and Wendy’s was never something that was thought twice about. Once in a blue moon, we would go to Taco Bell for dinner. Seeing as my mom was (and still is) a vegetarian, there wasn’t much she could eat there. Her favorite item to get, however, was a Vegetarian Mexican Pizza – a crispy crust topped with refried beans, cheese and tomatoes. Seeing as my mom and I have always been the same person, I would order the same. The pizza would come in an awesome personal pan box and I would never be disappointed in its greasiness (or its ability to not make my stomach hurt – seriously, when did my stomach problems even start?) – but, then again – I was 10.

My own version was on my table in less than ten minutes, filled me up (a hard task to do), and was insanely delicious. I am foreseeing this socca based crust in my future for many  more meals to come.

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Don’t be afraid to lick your fingers and pray to God your husband still finds you just a little bit attractive.