Despite my intentions, I don’t talk a lot on here about how much I enjoy working out and being active. It might have something to do with going to a fine arts school and dancing 4-5 hours a day from 7-12th grade. Maybe. But once I graduated high school, I traded in my dancing shoes for running shoes and found a passion for all things running. About two years ago I added a little lift, tone, burn from Pure Barre into my routine for my strength training and with that combo, I’ve never felt better or stronger !

Here’s the thing about running 30-40 miles per week with three to four Pure Barre classes put in the weekly mix, you find yourself hungry ALL. THE. TIME. That can be dangerous if you surround yourself with lots of processed, sugary, fried and/or fatty foods. So I always try to have healthy snacks on hand for those moments in the afternoon that I could eat an elephant! If I’m going to go with a packaged bar, LaraBars are my first choice! When you look at the ingredient list, you can pronounce everything, you can normally count the number of ingredients on one hand and they are all fruit and nuts. That’s it! So if the ingredient list is so simple, I figured that I should totally be able to make them myself at home! Same natural and nutritious ingredients but homemade and much cheaper than store bought. All you need is FIVE ingredients and FIVE minutes!

Ingredients

(Slightly adapted from MyWholeFoodLife. Makes 12 snack size bars.)

• 1 cup lightly salted peanuts
• 1 cup roasted, unsalted almonds
• 14 pitted dates
• 3 tablespoons water
• 1/4 mini semi-sweet chocolate chips

In a large food processor, pulse the peanuts and almonds until you have small to medium crumbs.

Add in the dates and three tablespoons of water. If your dates are very tough, you can soak them in water to soften them up a bit. I just put mine right in. Turn the food processor on again and put it to work! The blade really has to work hard to get through the dates and bind with the nuts. It might some funny noises and you might think it is going to jiggle off the counter. Don’t worry! It’s made for hard work like this.

Line an 8×8 baking dish with parchment paper and add the date, nut mixture. Press the mixture firmly and evenly down and be sure to reach all the corners.

Once you have the mixture evenly spread out in the pan, pour on your mini chocolate chips and press them firmly into the surface.

Place the pan in the fridge for a couple of hours to set. I let mine sit for three hours and was able to cut through them cleanly. It was snack time and I couldn’t wait any longer.

Pull the parchment paper up and cut the bars in your desired size and shape.

Super simple! Just a few ingredients and you have a great mid-afternoon snack to fuel you up for an evening workout or just fill your hunger pains after a long run or workout. No processed sugar but instead you use all natural sugar from the dates and you get a nice serving of protein from the nuts. We’re fans of both peanut butter and almond butter so the combination of the two nuts is perfect. But, feel free to change it up to whatever is your favorite. You can use 2 cups of all peanuts, all almonds or even cashews. The chocolate chips combined with the nut mixture makes you feel like you are indulging in something much more decadent than nuts and dates! It’s like sneaking a taste of chocolate chip cookie dough without feeling guilty or looking over your shoulder to see if anyone noticed. So go ahead, make these bars and enjoy away! For now, that’s homemade peanut almond chocolate chip larabars…in the shell of a nut!

Because the holiday parties are over and the New Year’s celebrations have come to close I figured this Friday might prove to be difficult. To top it off, it’s gloomy down here in the south today, making for a dreary Friday. Bummer unless your name is Jor and you love the rain. So I thought there was no better way to brighten up our day and spirits than sharing with you something that was at least a party for your mouth! Exciting, right?! Well, you should get excited about these burgers. First of all, there are tortilla chips in them! Who doesn’t love a good tortilla chip? The burgers are cooked in the oven, which honestly made my burger making evening 100% easier. Sometimes when making bean burgers you worry about them following apart during the flip action, but that’s not a problem with these. They are also what I would consider healthy! I know that’s a major plus for so many people that are trying to stick to those New Year’s resolutions or are at the very least trying to work off the pound of cookies they ate (pointing to myself!). These burgers are also the perfect partner for avocado salsa that sits nicely on top of the burger, or directly from your spoon to your mouth! Your choice!

Ingredients

(From Moosewood Restaurant Favorites. Makes four burgers.)

Burgers

• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 3/4 cup diced onion
• 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1 cup diced bell pepper
• 1 /2 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
• 3/4 cup crumbled corn tortilla chips
• 1 15-ounce can of black beens (drained and rinsed)
• 1/2 teaspoon orange zest
• 1/4 cup orange juice

Avocado Salsa

• 1 ripe avocado
• 1/2 cup diced fresh tomatoes
• 1/4 diced bell pepper
• 1/8 cup minced scallions (1 scallion)
• 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/8 cup fresh lime juice (half of one large lime)

Preheat the oven to 375 degree F and line a baking sheet with tinfoil. Start by putting together the burgers. Warm the oil in a large skillet over medium-low heat. Sauté the onions, red pepper flakes, and salt for about 10 minutes or the onions become soft. Add the garlic and let cook for another minute (I like to hold off on adding the garlic until the onions are almost cooked through so the garlic pieces don’t burn). Add the bell pepper pieces, give a quick stir and let the mixture cook for another 5 minutes and then finish it off with the cumin and oregano. Be sure to keep stirring throughout this time so things don’t start to stick.

While the onions and bell peppers cook down, add you corn tortilla chips into the bowl of a food processor and pulse a few times until you have course crumbs. Alternatively, you could also pour the chips in a large ziplock bag and use a rolling pin to crush them into small pieces. Pour the chip crumbs into a large bowl and set aside. Once the beans are rinsed and drained, pulse them a few times in the food processor just until they are Mashed NOT puréed. You still want to recognize that those are beans in there! Again, an alternative to the food processor is using the back of a fork to mash the beans in a bowl. Add the mashed beans to you bowl with the chip crumbs.

Once the onion, red pepper mixture is complete, pour it into the bowl with your beans and chip crumbs. Stir in the orange zest and the orange juice. The orange might seem a little strange at first glance. But, the zest is what will give your burgers this fresh zing that won’t make you automatically say “orange” when you take your first bite but you’ll think “FRESH!” The juice will work with the chip crumbs and help bind the burger while reinforcing the fresh taste you get from the zest.

Using a 1/2 measuring cup, scoop out the bean mixture and form burger-shaped patties with your hands.

You don’t want paper thin burgers but you also don’t want miniature mountains. Aim for something in the middle.

Bake the burgers in the oven on the prepared baking sheet for approximately 30 minutes. There is no raw meat involved or uncooked egg so you are looking for the burgers to become firm.

While the burgers cook in the oven, you can prepare you avocado salsa. It’s super simple. Add all the ingredients to a small bowl and mix. See, simple!

After thirty minutes, take a peak at the burgers; they should be ready! Slightly crisp on the outside and warm all the way through.

Top each burger with avocado salsa and you are ready to go! To make it a complete meal, I served the burgers with some easy and nutritious brown rice (3/4 cup rice with 1 1/4 cups water, 1/4 cup homemade plain tomato sauce, chopped onion and bell pepper  baked in the oven for 45 minutes).

There are lots of options for these burgers. It didn’t make an appearance, but cheddar or Monterey Jack cheese would be fantastic melted on top of these burgers. Swap out the avocado salsa for regular tomato salsa. Add a dollop of sour cream or greek yogurt for a little tang! You can even serve them as normal burgers on a bun (that’s how Jor enjoyed it for lunch the following day.) I’m a huge fan of bean/veggie burgers but I can honestly say that after one bite this particular burger climbed to the top of my list! The little crunch from the tortilla chips was perfect, although I might be biased because when left alone with a bag of tortilla chips I could eat the whole bag (but usually don’t!), and the hint of orange is a little different than typical bean burgers but in the best way possible! And don’t even get me stared on the avocado salsa! I don’t even need a burger to put this stuff on and eat! Even if veggie/bean burgers aren’t your thing, you have to give these burgers a shot because I’d bet they will become your thing, and I’m usually not a betting lady! For now, that’s southwestern bean burgers and avocado salsa…in the shell of a nut!

I can’t believe that it’s New Years Eve!! Can you? Another year that has gone by so fast but has truly been filled with some of my favorite memories! My parents moved back from the west coast (HUGE YAY for that!), I set a new half marathon PR, I finished my course work for my PhD, I passed my specialty and core comp exams, had two papers published, I completed my first marathon and in under 4 hours, we got Engaged!! (my personal favorite!), we started planning a wedding, and we most recently moved into the home that we’ll come home to as Mr & Mrs next August!! As good as this past year has been both in my personal and professional life, I’m even more excited to start 2015! I’m ready to get knee deep in my dissertation research and move closer to the light at the end of my PhD tunnel; I’m ready to put all the finishing details on our wedding planning; I’m ready to reach new physical goals with my workouts, I’m ready to celebrate the next chapter of Jor and my story with our closest friends and family; I’m ready to become a Mrs!! and I’m ready to keep working on becoming the best version of myself!

To end up the year on the blog, I thought I’d do a round up of the posts that y’all made the most popular! Towards the end I might or might not have snuck one of my own personal favorites in there!

Not surprising, my Stitch Fix posts were the most visited! Personal stylists sending unique, cute clothes to your doorstep…that would be my favorite, too! My second Stitch Fix, although monochromatic, was the overall winner! I can tell you that I’ve worn each of these items multiple times even in the last few weeks!

The third Stitch Fix was runner up. This might have been one of my favorites simple because of all the color and patterns!

My first Stitch Fix rounded up the top three most popular posts. The Chevron top in this first Stitch Fix sold me!

The number one food post, you guessed it (or maybe you didn’t), chocolate chip bread! Chocolate chip cookie in the form of bread is going to win every time in my book! This is a staple in my family and should be in yours, too! If it’s not already, you should make it a new years resolution!

To go along with the BIG chocolate chip bread, there is also mini chocolate chip bread! Perfect for when you are giving away chocolate chip bread as a homemade gift. Hard to give away, I know, but just keep a mini loaf for yourself!

Y’all showed my Pure Barre post lots of love! I still find my way to the barre 3-4 times a week and I know my running wouldn’t be nearly as strong without it! Gotta love the Lift, Tone, Burn!

The one pot tilapia meal with fennel and tomatoes was another food favorite. You can’t beat this meal. Get your rice started in the oven and then combine tomatoes, fennel, onion and tilapia in one pot that finishes up in the oven and you have one of the easiest but tastiest meals in about 30 minutes!

I can’t agree more with the next one: baked shoe string french fries! Perfect for the start of new year resolutions! Get rid of the fried, get rid of the frozen french fries, and replace them with these guys! Addictive!

One of the more recent posts but one of my personal favorites is our engagement story. You knew I had to do it! No explanation needed with this one!

I hope that each of you can look back on 2014 with a smile! I know that all days of the year aren’t perfect, easy or happy but I hope that the year ends on a high note and gets 2015 off to a wonderful start! There is so much I have to be thankful for during 2014 and I can’t wait to see what 2015 has to offer! Have a fantastic and safe New Year and see y’all in 2015!! For now, those are the most popular posts of 2014…in the shell of a nut!

I took a little break from the blog last week to enjoy some fun and relaxing time with my family. I hope that you all had a wonderful holiday and very merry Christmas if you celebrated! My parents are back from living a year on the west coast and are about a 10 minute drive from us. Traveling down the road in a car for 10 minutes certainly beats flying on a plane for 5 hours to get to them! Having them back alone has been one of the best Christmas gifts! Our Christmas celebrations are pretty laid back, just the way I like them. We celebrate with my older sister and her family on Christmas Eve and end the evening at the Atlanta Botanical Gardens festival of lights. No better way to truly get in the holiday spirit than being surrounded by thousands of twinkle lights!

We received so many thoughtful gifts this year and many that were wedding related with our wedding date and last name initial included! Among the gifts, my mom also got me a new apron that I swear is so cute that I could wear it all day long as an outfit accessory! Doughnut apron for the win!

Wearing a doughnut muffin apron means that it’s inevitable that you’ll have doughnuts on the mind all day, every day! While I could probably eat the icing, sprinkled covered doughnuts on my apron all day long, when I make doughnuts at home I do a baked doughnut muffin instead. It’s a healthier version simply because it’s baked not fried but with a generous serving of nutmeg in the batter, you have all the wonderful flavor of a doughnut without all the calories. You get to feel like you’re indulging without all the guilt! Perfect start to the new year!

Ingredients

(Adapted from King Arthur Flour. Makes 12 standard size muffins.)

• 1/4 cup plain greek yogurt
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1/3 cup granulated sugar
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg (where the doughnut magic is at!)
• 3/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 2 2/3 cup all purpose flour
• 1 cup milk (I use skim or buttermilk)

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F and lightly spray your muffin pay with cooking spray.

In the bowl of your stand mixer (or you can easily do this by hand) combine the greek yogurt, oil, granulated sugar and brown sugar. Mix until the batter is smooth. Add the eggs and vanilla and mix until the eggs are completely combined. Then add the baking powder, baking soda, salt and nutmeg. Give it another quick mix. It’s once you add the nutmeg that you’ll really feel like you’re making doughnuts just from the smell! I like to alternate between adding the flour and the milk. Start by adding 1 cup of flour, 1/2 cup of the milk, another cup of flour, the last 1/2 cup of milk and finish by adding the last 2/3 cup of flour. If the mixture seems too stiff, add just a tad bit more milk until you have a smooth, creamy consistency.

To help make uniform muffins, I like to use my ice cream/cookie dough scoop. If I’m being completely honest, more than just having uniform muffins, the scooper helps me in the “being quick” department. I think one of the last words anyone would describe me as is quick or fast, so this just helps me speed up the process!

Fill each muffin cup about 3/4 of the way full.

Let the muffins bake for 15-18 minutes. They will start to get gold on the top and around the edges and a toothpick should come out of the center clean or with dry crumbs. 

When you take the muffins out of the oven, the smell alone will be tempting you to dive right in! But if you can, it’s best to let them cool for at least a few minutes!

Jor likes plain doughnuts best, and I have no complaints with that. There is something so comforting about a good ole fashioned plain doughnut where you can fully taste the nutmeg. But if you want to jazz up your doughnut muffin go for it! While they are cooling, melt some butter (a couple tablespoons) and sprinkle on a cinnamon sugar combo or fun sprinkles or roll the muffins around in some powdered sugar and go for the giant snow ball effect. From plain to fancy, bottom line is that these muffins are GOOD!

Just like my mini baked donut holes, these big baked doughnut muffins are a hit every time! Many people, myself included can’t say no to a chocolate chip cookie for a sweet treat. I think the doughnut fills that role when it comes to morning treats. Whether it’s the full fried and glazed doughnut, the 100 year recipe doughnut from the bakery around the corner, or these baked doughnut muffins straight from your oven, it’s hard to say “no thank you” when someone offers you a doughnut! But, let’s be honest, if I ate the real deal fried doughnut every morning you’d have to roll me around like a roly poly! So instead, when I get a craving for a dozen doughnuts, I go straight to the kitchen and whip a batch of these up! This is the perfect type of recipe to have on hand as we all start the new year and try to put our “fat pants” from the holidays away but don’t want to skimp out on the good stuff! For now, that’s baked doughnut muffins…in the shell of a nut!

Stitch Fix…it’s been awhile! Four long months to be exact. I decided that I needed to take a break because, well, to be honest I just had too many clothes! I used past tense there because I recently did a major clean-out of my closet before we moved, but if we asked Jor, I should keep that present tense and say I still HAVE too many clothes. But it’s really not my fault that I found myself logging back on and scheduling my next fix. It’s the Pomelo Ivy Tulip Print Sleeve Blouse from a previous Fix whose at fault (see below)! I was wearing it a few weeks ago and got compliments all day long, which of course reminded me of how much I love Stitch Fix and how much I missed seeing that box at my door! So see, not my fault at all. If Stitch Fix didn’t send such cute clothes I wouldn’t have to keep buying new hangers!

If you haven’t heard of Stitch Fix, let me introduce to your new best shopping friend! You can read about all the details from my first Stitch Fix, but the gist of it is you get to shopping without leaving your home and without having to battle the malls and stores. Sounds pretty good right about now, when you’re having to fight for the parking spot at the holiday filled malls, right?! After answering a detailed style survey and linking to your Pinterest page if you like, your very own personal stylist will send you five handpicked items right to your doorstep. Try them on in the comfort of your own home, mix and match with things you already own and then send back (for free) what you don’t want to keep within three business days.

So here’s what I got in Fix #8! It was a good one!

Given this time of year, I asked for a chunky winter sweater or jacket and my stylist sent me this really cute navy blazer. It’s not exactly a “jacket”, and it’s obviously not a sweater, so I’m not gonna lie, I was a bit disappointed. But if there is one thing I’ve learned with Stitch Fix, it’s that you can’t judge until you put it on! The blazer is a jersey material, so I like how it can be dressed up or down. I have a dark grey one like this and I get a lot of use out of it during the fall/winter, especially down here in the south. But, this blazer fits a bit snug and I really can’t comfortably fit a shirt with any kind of sleeve under it without feeling like I need to pull on things. I love the look of the blazer in the photo but I just don’t think I’ll get enough wear out of it before it starts to warm up again. PS: Wally just went to the doggie spaw and felt the need to show off his new hairdo!  (41Hawthorn Benson 3/4 Ruched Sleeve Blazer: $78.00)

The moment I took this dress out of the box, I think I was sold! It had me at polka dots! The material is so comfortable and great for traveling (no wrinkles!) and there’s a bonus with this dress: It’s reversible! I loved the boat line neck in the front and the lower scoop in the back but it totally works either way. There was a matching fabric belt that came with it that looked just fine, but I love adding this bow belt to anything that I can, especially when polka dots are involved! This dress had to stay; it was a definite keeper! (Leota Ilana 3/4 Sleeve Reversible Neckline Dress: $98.00)

Can you tell I was indecisive about this one? This was a dolman top, which I usually love but there is something that kept throwing me off with this top. I’m not sure if it was the geometric print, or the colors, but I just wasn’t sold right away. I think if I received this top in March, I would have been all about it, but I requested more fall colors in this fix, like emerald, golden yellows and maroon. These colors are so far off from that and so for the price, I just couldn’t justify keeping it. Back to Stitch Fix it goes. (41Hawthorn Berneen Printed Dolman Sleeve Top: $58.00)

Like the polka dot dress, I fell in love with this top before I could even put it on. Stripes and floral are a weak spot for me, just as my stylist put in her little note to me! If it’s not all in one shirt, I’m quick to add a floral scarf with a striped shirt/dress any day of the week! There are little pleats in the sleeves that give just enough shape and I love how I can pair it with jeans and boots or dress it up a little with this blazer and ankle dress pants! And even though the shirt is short-sleeved, the colors are still very wintery. Plus, you can’t beat the price! Sold and already in my closet! (Skies are Blue Hanzel Stripes & Floral Print Blouse: $28.00)

Those that know me well, know that my ultimate winter weak spot is a scarf! I literally wear one every day from fall until early spring and I truly believe you can’t have too many scarves! During the really “cold” months, yes the south can actually get cold, I’m in total love with the larger chunky scarves. It’s like wearing a blanket around your neck! Who wouldn’t like that all day?! It’s the ultimate comfy accessory to me. So, when I found this at the bottom of the box, I don’t think I even took a second to think whether or not I would keep it. Scarf=DEFINITE KEEP! It didn’t hurt that the colors were a combination of neutrals that would match with lots of things I already owned, that it was chunky knit, AND that it was an infinity scarf. No Brainer! (Look by M Shasta Striped Knit Infinity Scarf: $34.00)

All in all, this was a great first Stitch Fix back! Although I’m sending two items back, the three that I added to my closet are things that I absolutely love and couldn’t wait to try on! That’s a good sign. If the blazer had been a tad bit larger I think I would have kept it and maybe if the dolman top had been a sweater material or different colors I would have felt differently about it. Even so, Stitch Fix didn’t disappoint and it was a really fun treat for myself amidst all the Christmas shopping! If you haven’t treated yourself this holiday season, schedule your first or next Fix today! You can always use my referral link if you’d like; I get $25 Stitch Fix credit but you get the best piece of mail in return! You can also check out my first, second, third and fourth Fixes to see more examples of what you might receive! I myself won’t wait so long next time, Stitch Fix! For now, that’s my December Stitch Fix…in the shell of a nut!

Sometimes you need a sweet treat that doesn’t skimp on the butter and sugar (i.e. the good stuff!). Sometimes you need to indulge a little and one of those times is birthday time! While having your own birthday cake is always something special, the great thing about birthdays is that even when it’s not yours you usually get to partake in the cake eating, which let’s be honest, is one of the best parts of a birthday! A dear friend came to visit a week before her birthday and so I thought it was the perfect excuse to whip up a birthday treat for her to celebrate a little early! Not surprisingly, she didn’t complain! Instead of a full cake, I made cupcakes for her so that the leftovers were easy to travel with. As much as I love me some cake I’m not the type to make you a cake and not give you the leftovers! Bad cake making etiquette!

Ingredients

(Adapted from Eat, Live, Run. Makes 12 standard size cupcakes.)

• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1 stick butter, softened to room temp
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups all-purpose flour (can also use whole wheat)
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 3 tablespoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1 cup unsweetened applesauce

Cinnamon Cream Cheese Icing

• 8 ounces cream cheese at room temp
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F. You can either spray your cupcake pan with cooking spray or you can use cupcake liners. Because these were party cupcakes, they needed party liners!

In the bowl of your stand-mixer (you can also do this by hand), beat together the sugar and butter until you have a light and fluffy consistency. Add in the egg and vanilla extract and mix until fully combined. Add the salt, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and nutmeg, give it a quick mix and then slowly start to add your flour. I have the baby mixer so I like to add the flour 1/2 cup at a time so more flour stays in the bowl than on my counter top. The mixture will start to get a little dry as you continue to add the flour but once you add the applesauce, it should smooth right out.

Fill each muffin cup with batter and if you have some batter leftover just go back and add to some of the skimpy cupcakes. I like to use a large ice cream scoop to divide the batter evenly. I actually don’t think I’ve ever used the scoop for actual ice cream but only for cakes, muffins and cookies. Tells you how much cake trumps ice cream in this house hold!

Bake the cupcakes for 18-20 minutes, give or take a few minutes. You can always check if they’re done with the toothpick test by inserting a toothpick in the center of one of the larger cupcakes and once it comes out clean and/or with dry crumbs they are done.

Take the cupcakes out of the tin and let them cool on a wire rack.

While the cupcakes cool you can make your icing. It’s super simple and I’ll argue all day long for homemade over store bought! You can taste the difference and homemade will win every time! Using a stand mixer or hand mixer, beat the cream cheese for a minute or two so that it really softens up. Slowly add in the cinnamon and powdered sugar until you reach the thickness you want. This recipe doesn’t include butter in the icing and there is considerably less sugar than normal recipes. (Ok, I admit, I went a tad bit to the healthy side with the icing but healthy and icing don’t really go in the same sentence so it won’t disappoint with flavor!) You can either store the icing in the fridge until you are ready to serve or ice the cupcakes and then store the cakes in the fridge until you are ready to eat.

By all means, feel free to get fancy smancy with your icing technique. I went for plan jane here and just used my mini icing knife to spread the icing on top of each cupcake with a little swirl action. I left the fanciness to my birthday topping decorations!

Sparkle party hat, anyone!?

Wally certainly had a close eye on those party hats! Well, who am I kidding his eye is totally on the cupcake, not the party hat! Although, he’s worn a party hat before and can totally rock it!

When it comes to birthday cake baking, I usually stick to our family’s classic birthday cake: vanilla cake with chocolate icing. But it was less than a week till Thanksgiving and all I had on the mind was all things fall! Pumpkin, apples, spices and more! And I just thought these apple spice cupcakes would be the perfect nod to fall while still being a birthday cake crowd pleaser! The applesauce does double duty here and while it adds flavor it really helps keep the cakes soft and moist. Then of course there is cream cheese icing and I think cream cheese icing can take any cake to the next level, especially when you add some cinnamon action! If you can’t eat all the cupcakes in one sitting (which, if it’s just you, I don’t recommend), store them in the fridge to help keep the icing cold. It won’t dry out the cupcakes themselves so long as you eat them within a few days, which after you try them I think you’d agree won’t be a problem! For now, that’s apple spice cupcakes with cinnamon cream cheese icing…in the shell of a nut!

Last week I had a crazy craving for some homemade granola. Honey granola, peanut butter and jelly granola, regular homemade granola, I didn’t care what kind, I just needed some granola in my life and on my cheerios! There was only one problem…my whole kitchen was packed away in boxes minus a few forks, spoons, salt, pepper and a few other essentials. Homemade granola is simple but not that simple! I think our first set of boxes were in the new place for about four hours before I started unpacking the mountain of kitchen boxes. I’ve tripled my cabinet space but bought nothing new between the move from the old kitchen to the new one yet I filled every single cabinet. Now I have no idea how I packed everything in my old closet sized kitchen! But with everything unpacked, the first thing I decided to bake was the granola I had been craving. I had seen gingerbread granola from Minimalist Baker recently and couldn’t get it out of my head. And because of the move, we’ve had to delay getting our Christmas tree and we needed to add some holiday cheer in our new home. So when you can’t get the smell of Christmas tree, make this gingerbread granola! It might not light up your living room but I promise it’ll light up your taste buds!

Ingredients

(Slightly adapted from Minimalist Baker. Makes one large batch of granola. Servings TBD depending on how and if you can refrain from eating large amounts in one sitting!)

• 3 1/4 cup rolled oats
• 1/4 cup chopped almonds
• 1/4 cup chopped walnuts
• 1/4 cup chopped pecans
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2-3/4 teaspoon cinnamon
• 3/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• pinch of cloves (really, JUST a pinch)
• 1/4 cup coconut oil
• 1/3 cup maple syrup
• 2 tablespoon molasses

Start by preheating the oven to 325 degrees F and spray a large baking sheet with cooking spray. In a large bowl, combine the oats, chopped nuts, salt, cinnamon, ginger and cloves. In a smaller bowl or a glass measuring cup, mix together the coconut oil, syrup, and molasses. Pour the wet ingredients into the bowl with your dry ingredients and give everything a good mix. Make sure that everything is evenly coated. Pour the mixture out on the prepared baking sheet and pop it in the oven. Let it bake for about 20 minutes. The scent coming from your oven might make you think that a gingerbread house is in the making inside!

Be sure to start checking the granola after 20 minutes. When the oats start getting golden brown, go ahead and take it out of the oven and let it sit for a few minutes. It will immediately start to crisp up and give you the granola crunch you expect.

This granola can be eaten on cereal, yogurt, fruit, with milk, or simply by the handful. It’s the perfect solution for a gingerbread cookie craving but avoiding all of the butter and sugar that comes along with the cookie. You miss out on the fun gingerbread man shape but at the same time at least you can now avoid the guilt of eating off the arms, legs, etc. of the little men! I know gingerbread is normally a “holiday” flavor but this granola has convinced me that gingerbread needs to become an all-year-round flavor. They do Christmas in July, so why not gingerbread, too! This is too good to only have during one month out of the year.

Quick side note: if you haven’t tried siggi’s yogurt you need to get on this! It’s not actually greek yogurt but tastes like greek yogurt because of the straining process they use. There is very little sugar compared to other big brands (and believe me, you don’t need or miss the extra sugar that others add) but you still get all the protein that you love from greek yogurt. My favorite is by far the vanilla! They fly off the shelf at my local Whole Foods and I fill my bag with all the vanilla flavors I can get my hands on during each visit to the store. The cashier told me recently that I could get a discount if I bought a case and I actually found myself pausing and seriously thinking about that. But then I decided Jor might not be thrilled with half our fridge being yogurt when he is lactose sensitive! So make this granola, find siggi’s yogurt and your week will be made! For now, that’s gingerbread granola…in the shell of a nut!

I’m SO excited to finally share my “Will you be my bridesmaid gifts” that I made for my girls! I knew immediately that I wanted to do something special for my special ladies but I wasn’t sure what exactly that should be. So like any other new bride-to-be I went to Pinterest! I swear that thing can answer any DIY, craft, food, fashion, etc question! There were lots of cute cards and package ideas and after just a bit of searching and a combination of things I decided on doing a personalized bridesmaid box for each girl that included some information about the day, their roles and their dresses. I thought this would be much more fun than opening an email with all the details (and plus, I had the BEST time putting these together and definitely better than writing an email!).

Here are the supplies you need:

Supplies

(Inspired by Wedding Chicks. Makes 7 Bridesmaid Boxes. All materials bought from local craft store with an exception for the Hankie.)

• Small cardboard boxes
• Stencil
• Foam stencil brush
• Wood cut-out shapes for 4 piece garland
• Wood cut-out shapes for top of box (I used a rectangle with a heart on top)
• Thick lace ribbon (for outside of box)
• Thin ribbon (for garland and tying together photos, color swatches, etc.)
• Colored sharpie pens that work on wood surface
• Felt (for felt flowers)
• Hot glue gun and glue sticks
• Patterned scissors
• Hard stock printer paper (resume paper worked great)

There are a lot of components involved here but if you take them one by one it’s much easier and even better, seeing/hearing everyone’s reactions has been completely worth every minute! I started with the painting. I used a stencil for the top of the boxes and decided on a coral color to match one of our wedding colors that I talked about last week. You can hold the stencil in place or tape the stencil to the top of the box and then blot away with your foam stencil brush.

If your stencil doesn’t cover the top surface of your box completely, no problem! Do one section,  move the stencil over, realign and finish blotting.

Don’t mind some of my air bubbles. You can always go back and smooth those out or leave them.

While the paint dries on the top of the boxes, paint the wood cut-out shapes. I used circles for my garland and a rectangle with a heart on top for the top of the boxes.

The heart was glued to the rectangle and then square letters were glued onto the heart with each girl’s initials. Or in the case of my mom, I used “mom”! My mom and I are incredibly close, like we talk every day on the phone close, and it was an automatic decision for me to ask her to be my maid of honor! Thankfully, she also had an automatic answer of YES!

On the outside border of the bottom half of the boxes, I glued thick lace ribbon.

When each girl opened their box they were greeted with a big felt flower that I made. I used white felt that had some sparkle and shimmer to it. You can make the felt flowers by just cutting out 4-5 big flowers of different shapes and sizes and gluing them one on top of the other to make a layered, full effect. Hot glue a button in the center to make the center of your flower.

The flowers are glued with skinny coral ribbon to the circular wood shapes to create a garland. As you pull up on the flower, the garland reads:

• “We’re Getting Married!”
• “It’s going to be the BEST day ever!”
• “Only if it includes…”
• “YOU”

On the back of each shape I added our initials J+H with the wedding date.

After the garland is pulled up, you get to my FAVORITE part! The “Will you be my” Hankie! I found these on Wedding Chicks and they just had to be included. They were the official way that I asked each girl to be my bridesmaid after the garland said that the day had to include them. The colors in the flowers happened to match perfectly with our wedding colors and they were too sweet to not use. In the box they went!

Under the Hankies I included all the information that I had for my girls at this point. I printed a few pictures of the dress styles I am leaning towards, a few pictures of our venue, paint swatches of our wedding colors and then a short little packet of more detailed information.

I included a little write up on our big day, the role of my girls, a little sentence on how special each girl is to me and then a little more on their dresses. I used the patterned scissors to scallop the top of the pages and more ribbon to secure them all together.

Putting the boxes together was so much fun. But the best part was watching everyone open their box and/or hearing their reactions! Climbs the “favorite moment” list!

Right after we got engaged we went full speed into wedding planning and booking all of the main vendors: venue, food, photographer, day of coordinator, etc. Things and people were booking so fast we knew we just had to power through. It was after the crazy planning phase that I finally got to sit down and put these together and really think about the day and what it would mean to have all of these ladies by my side. I’ve known some of them since seventh grade! I can still remember passing notes and giggling about boys like it was just a few years ago, not 14! I grew up with these ladies, they can say they knew me when, and they are each a part of so many wonderful childhood memories that I wouldn’t change for the world. Now, we get to add getting married to the memory list! For now, those are my Will you by my bridesmaid DIY gifts…in the shell of a nut!

After a long four days, I can say that we are officially moved in! We started with about 50 boxes and are down to about three! We tried to make “speed” our middle name! As tiring and somewhat annoying that moving can be, the positive is that it gives you a chance to go through all your things, and clean out the junk or things that you just don’t need or use anymore. Our place certainly got a cleanse and it made moving just a tad bit easier!

To go along with our “clean” new place, I have another clean food recipe for you. I can’t say that 100% of our meals could be considered clean eating, but we’re slowly working our way to it. My biggest downfall is sweets! But, I’m also working on trying more clean food sweet recipes and it certainly makes me feel better when I don’t need to buy a bag of granulated sugar every other week or excessive boxes of butter! Once you realize how much you use of some of these ingredients, you quickly find yourself trying to find alternatives. But tasty alternative is a MUST for me and I’m happy to say that they are out there! A few weeks ago I shared this chocolate pecan pie…and oh that pie! I didn’t miss the butter or sugar one bit but definitely found myself craving another piece. (Note: just because you are eating “clean food” you have to remember that it doesn’t mean you can eat double..although when you have a piece of chocolate pecan pie in front of you, it can be difficult to fight off temptation!)

This cranberry applesauce could not be easier to make and is the perfect combination of sweet and tart. Clean food that’s also fast food and delicious. Sold!

Ingredients

(Adapted from Terry Walters Clean Food. Makes 4-6 servings depending on portions.)

• 6 apples peeled, cored and cubed (I used honey crisp)
• 1 cup water
• 1/3 cup unsweetened cranberry juice
• 1 tablespoon maple syrup

The steps for putting this together are super simple. Place the chopped apples in a pot with the water and cranberry juice. Cover the pot and bring the mixture to a boil. Once boiling, reduce the heat and bring to a simmer. Make sure to give things a stir from time to time. Let the apples cook down until they are soft and then remove the pot from the heat. Stir in the maple syrup. You can use a handheld blender to make smooth, lump-free applesauce, or you can do as I did, and just use a potato masher for a more textured applesauce. When we buy applesauce from the store, I’m a smooth applesauce kind of girl all the way. But when we make it homemade, I all the sudden love the fresh bites of apple! You can serve this applesauce warm or pop it in a container and let it cool in the fridge.

I’m a HUGE fan of cranberries and I love homemade applesauce so this was the perfect marriage of the two. It’s almost like the flavor of cranberry sauce meets the texture of applesauce but with all natural ingredients. I completely agree that sometimes it’s easier to just go to the store and pick a staple, like applesauce, off the shelf. But there is an added comfort in making your own version, knowing what you put in it, and also controlling how much of each ingredient you put in. Perhaps you want a really tangy applesauce and want more of the cranberry, pour a little more than 1/3 cup juice in. Perhaps you would like it a tad bit sweeter, add another tablespoon or so of maple syrup. Maybe half of your family likes smooth applesauce and the other chunky, blend half and mash the other. You have so much more control over your food when you make it and in this case you just need to simmer some apples to get to the good stuff! Eat it as a sweet treat after lunch, a healthy snack, or as a side to a poultry dish. Ours was gone in about three days so I guess the only downfall to homemade is that you might notice it disappears faster than the store bought! I’m going to take that as a compliment. For now, that’s cranberry applesauce…in the shell of a nut!

It’s Wedding Wednesday! I’m not sure if this is actually going to become a “thing” on intheshellofanut but we’re going to try it! We went for our cake tasting today (OMG! So Delicious!) and so of course today my mind has been filled with all things wedding related! When I started thinking a few weeks back about some wedding posts I might do, one thing that came to mind right away was wedding colors. How do you even begin to narrow colors down?! At least that is the question we were asking. Do you go with your favorite color? If that is the case, I could say my favorite color is like five different colors so that didn’t help. Do you go with two colors? or three? or more? If you go with more, how do you pick colors that don’t make it look like a rainbow just exploded all over your wedding?! Do you go with colors that just look pretty for weddings and picture nicely? See, the list just goes on!

The first piece of advice I can give is to go with what YOU love! There are no single answers to the questions above. It’s completely dependent on the couple and what you think is YOU! It’s going to be your day and you want your guests to look around and see y’all, the couple, in everything.

My second tip is to use the color inspiration boards from The Sweetest Occasion. I can’t say enough wonderful things about this website and I’m pretty sure it made picking wedding colors hours shorter than it could have been for us! They create mini color inspiration boards with different objects to give you ideas of how to use the different complimentary colors. It’s one thing to pick colors that look good together and a whole other thing to figure out how to use the colors throughout the decorations. We started by looking through all of the boards and pinning the ones that we loved for our wedding look. We wanted to collect all of our favorites and then start to narrow it down. Here are some examples of color boards that made it to our pinterest board.

With our wedding being at the very beginning of August and in the south, we’re a summer wedding. These colors just said “summer” fun to us!

These colors are similar but a little softer. (Side note: that bouquet!)

We ultimately went with the colors below. A nice combination of the first two color boards. But by looking through everything and pinning any and all color boards we were drawn to, it helped us automatically see a theme. We were clearly drawn to the corals, orange and sage green combo. There is no way that I could have come up with that combo by myself and if I could have, there is definitely no way I could have landed on that so quickly!

I think this whole process took about thirty minutes of Jor and me sitting at the computer, pointing at things we liked, oh-ing and ah-ing at different color combinations, and finally deciding on our color palette. Thank you to the sweetest occasion for making our lives SO much easier!

My next tip comes from my good friend who I like to refer to as my party planning/decorating guru! She’s seriously my go-to resource for all things entertaining-related and this particular suggestion from her was priceless! Literally! It cost $0! She told me to go the paint store and get paint swatches to look at the colors in person. Genius, right?! We took the colors from our color inspiration board that we had decided on and found matching paint swatches. It was so helpful to make our final decision on colors and it has also helped with making our planning that much easier with vendors. I can just pull out our swatches and they can see our colors exactly as we envision them!

It’s also been helpful to start deciding how to use all of the colors. I knew right away, that while I love the pop of orange I wasn’t necessarily thinking that would be such a great bridesmaid dress color. My bridesmaids have so far agreed with that thought! Instead, I’m thinking either the sage, coral, or light blush. So helpful to have these to compare with fabric swatches and/or dresses.

In addition to our colors we picked out, I decided that everything is better with a little sparkle and gold seemed the most fitting! Notice I said “I thought”…I’m not sure hints of gold accents and sparkle here and there were the first thing that Jor thought about!

I’ll be sharing my DIY “will you be my bridesmaid” gifts very soon, but you can see that having the paint swatches is also handy when wanting to share them with your bridal party, mom, florist, cake baker, etc. I should warn you, when you have to walk out of the store with over 60 paint swatches tucked away in your purse, you will kind of feel as though you owe them something. I got my swatches from Ace Hardware and got over the guilt by buying kitchen drawer liners. Guilt averted!

I have learned through the wedding planning process that the world of wedding colors is enormous! But I am convinced that you can have a beautiful wedding with one color theme or five! Completely up to you! Play around with colors you normally wouldn’t think about, Google, search on Pinterest, stuff your bag with lots of paint swatches to play around with and just have fun with it all! This day is supposed to be all about you and your other half and honestly, I don’t think you can really go wrong with your color choices! No one else is going to remember the colors and all the little details quite like you will, so pick what you love best and it’s sure to be perfect! For now, that’s how to pick your wedding colors…in the shell of a nut!