The more places you'll go..

"The more that you read, the more things you will know.

The more that you learn, the more places you'll go."    

 — Dr. Seuss (I Can Read with My Eyes Shut)

There's nothing better than curling up on the couch with a good book and a warm blanket.  Add in a hot cuppa tea and I'm set for hours.  I love nothing more than escaping into a book for a couple of hours.  Now that I have a toddler to chase, my hours of reading have changed.  Most often I catch a few chapters while drying dishes, or prepping dinner, or in bed just before I fall asleep. 

This might just be my easiest challenge on the list.  Maybe I should have tried to lose 14lbs, and read 30 books. :)

Deleted.

So, I'm a bit addicted to facebook.  It makes me happy to log on and check out people's pictures.  About half of the people on my fb are people that I've never even met.  I met most of the strangers on forums for both babies and weight loss.  They're amazing people, and fb is a great way to keep in touch.  I'm also a bit nosey, so fb helps with this.

I challenged myself to delete 16 people.  I was nervous.  Would I be able to survive without seeing precious baby pictures of a complete stranger?  Only time will tell.

I was on such a roll deleting that I actually cut 19 friends strangers.

2 Months Done.

Updated list. 

1. Take 1 big risk
2. Donate blood 2 times
3. Buy 3 strangers coffee/tea
4. Visit 4 new places 
5. Try 5 new foods - 3/5 done
6. Buy myself 6 things in one day
7. Try 7 new recipes - 5/7 done
8. Leave 8 gifts for 8 people
9. Take 9 unusually long bubble baths -  3/9 done
10. Leave 10 lucky quarters
11. Try 11 new cocktails - 2/11 done
12. Give 12 cupcakes to a neighbour
13. Give 13 flowers
14. Read 14 books - 11/14 done
15. Do 15 days straight of the "30 day Shred"
16. Delete 16 people from facebook
17. Kiss my husband 17 times in one day
18. Take my husband on a date on June 18th 19. Eatclean 19 days straight
20. Donate $2021. Find 21 new blogs to follow
22. Sell 22 items on kijiji
23. Take 23 bike rides - 2/23 done
24. Bake 24 cookies for a friend25. Finish 25 pages of my daughter's photo book
26. Donate 26 pieces of clothing
27. Send 27 letters to 27 strangers
28. Compliment 28 people - 3/28 done
29. Go chocolate free for 29 days straight
30. Lose 30lbs

Lots of work left to do. 

I can do it.

J

29 Days Chocolatefree?

You might think I'm crazy.  An entire month without chocolate?  Is it even possible? 

I once went an entire year without chocolate, a month is nothing!  I remember thinking when I did my year challenge of no chocolatey goodness that it was likely the hardest thing I could think of to give up.  I actually didn't think it was possible.  But I did it.  And one year later, I enjoyed the best tasting chocolate of my life at 6am.  It was better than I had remembered.

I've had a few challenging moments, but otherwise this has been an easy challenge.  It helps that I am cleaneating this month as well. 

Mmmm.  That picture looks good though eh?

Everyone loves cookies right?

I hope so.  I made a delicious double dozen this past weekend to take to our neighbours for an afternoon playdate.  It's a pretty simple oatmeal recipe that's filled with toffee bits, dark chocolate, white chocolate, candy coated chocolate balls and sprinkles.  Fulla sugar.

I didn't eat one.  More about that in the next post!

Vanilla swirl..

Or.  Vanilla swirl.

Both at the same time?  I wish.  I had a pretty amazing, super long, prune fingers kind of bath the other day.  But I couldn't help but notice how many of my smelly bath stuff was food scented.  Maybe that's a good clue as to why I'm overweight. 

So my bath started with a huge splash of vanilla swirl bubble bath.  I slathered on some avocado oatmeal face mask and layed back onto my pool noodle. 

Yeah, I'm crafty like that.  Pool noodle + knife + ducttape = awesome bath pillow.

So after an hour of soaking and reading a delicious trashy book, I washed off the mask and scrubbed my legs with some coconut seasalt scrub.  It was pretty amazing actually.  Then I used some lemon tart bathgel to lather up my legs and shave my chubaka legs.

I cranked the shower on and scrubbed my face with apricot facewash, and used coconut conditioner on my hair.  No shampoo.  I'm dirty like that.

Once out of the shower, I had to pick between pineapple body butter, or coconut sorbet body lotion.  I picked pineapple.  Yum.

It's no wonder that I was so hungry once I was done.

Me oh my!

Pie

oh

me

oh

my.

So a few months ago I came up with the brilliant idea to have my daycare host a mom to mom sale.  I had just been to one in a different city and I thought it was pretty amazing.  Oh, and I really just wanted to sell off more of my babycrap. 

How can such little beings require such a large amount of stuff?

Anyway.

 Somehow I convinced everyone that it was a great idea, and away we ran to organize it!  One of my big secrets is that I really wanted to introduce my delicious baking and sweet little pies to the world.  I wanted to know if I could pull it off.

And I did.  Oh I so did!

I made a total of 36 pies and 24 cakes and all but 5 sold.  I also made 36 massive chocolate chip cookies and candy kabobs and these were both sold out within two hours.  Best of all, I made my daycare over $200 simply by mixing a little sugar and love into mason jars.

Hint.  This post is related to #1 on my list. 

A new food!

I almost couldn't believe my luck when I found a bag of maple syrup flakes at BulkBarn!  I had read about them in my CleanEating magazine, and I even googled them to see if I could order them from somewhere!  It was crazy expensive to ship them, so I just gave up.

I've only tried them in my tea, which is pretty delicious but I'd love to try them in this new recipe.

Maple Flake Crusted Chicken

Ingredients:

• 6 ea 6 oz Chicken Breast
• ½ cup olive oil
• 2 ea shallots, chopped
• 1 ea fresh rosemary stalk
• 1 cup Japanese bread Crumb (Panko)
• ½ cup Medium Maple Flakes
• 1 tablespoon chopped herbs
• ½ teaspoon sea salt
• 1 pinch ground white pepper
• 3 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• 1 1/2 tablespoons clarified butter

Preparation:

• Marinate the chicken breast with olive oil, shallots and rosemary stalk for 4 hours
• Mix together the panko, maple flakes, chopped herbs, salt and pepper
• Pan sear the chicken breast on both side and let rest for 3 minutes
• Place the Dijon mustard on top of the chicken breast and cover with the panko/maple flake mixture
• Drizzle the clarified butter on the mixture and bake in a preheated oven at 350 degrees until done

Easy as..

So I decided to start with challenge 7.  I love to cook, so trying a new recipe isn't that far out of my comfort zone.  Making piecrust however is.

But I love my husband.  And he loves raspberry tarts, so I thought I'd take a swing at it.  That, and I forgot to buy the frozen tart shells yesterday.

Two pints of raspberries + zest of one lemon.



A heap of love, or a heap and a half if you prefer sweeter

I used the Pie crust 102 lesson at SmittenKitten and it was easy to follow.  Easy was important considering I didn't have much sleep last night.  Taking a toddler to the DriveIn sounds like a great idea, until she wakes you up at 7am.  And you went to bed at 3am.

I had my tools ready. 

I rolled some fabulous dough and used a glass to cut out the tart.

Then I laughed.  Um.  Use a much bigger circle to fit a regular sized muffin tin.  I was going to save this one for my daughter.  But then I ate it.

I used a super-mug to finish cutting out my tarts and tucked them all into place.

Then simply filled them with the delicious sugar coated raspberries.  Then I ate a few off the top of each one.  I mean, I didn't want them to run over and make a mess. 

After I put my daughter back to bed for her nap for a second time, I ran back to the kitchen to grab these.  I think they're a little overdone, but my husband still liked them.  And really, isn't that what my point was?

Welcome to my Adventure!

I'm not having a mid-life crisis, really I'm not.  I mean, I plan to live until at least 90 so I'm not where near mid-life.  But I need a little challenge in my life.  I need some purpose and fun.  These are the last 6 months of being 29 and so I'm going to enjoy them.  And I hope you'll come along on the ride and enjoy them with me.  Who knows, maybe it will even challenge YOU to treat yourself and those around you a little nicer.

Within the next 6 months I am going to accomplish 30 things. 

The List.

1. Take 1 big risk
2. Donate blood 2 times
3. Buy 3 strangers coffee/tea
4. Visit 4 new places
5. Try 5 new foods
6. Buy myself 6 things in one day
7. Try 7 new recipes
8. Leave 8 gifts for 8 people
9. Take 9 unusually long bubble baths
10. Leave 10 lucky quarters
11. Try 11 new cocktails
12. Give 12 cupcakes to a neighbour
13. Give 13 flowers
14. Read 14 books
15. Do 15 days straight of the "30 day Shred"
16. Delete 16 people from facebook
17. Kiss my husband 17 times in one day
18. Take my husband on a date on June 18th
19. Workout 19 times each month
20. Donate $20
21. Find 21 new blogs to follow
22. Sell 22 items on kijiji
23. Take 23 bike rides
24. Bake 24 cookies for a friend
25. Finish 25 pages of my daughter's photo book
26. Donate 26 pieces of clothing
27. Send 27 letters to 27 strangers
28. Compliment 28 people
29. Go chocolate free for 29 days straight
30. Lose 30lbs

So I hope you'll join me.  I hope I can survive this challenge.  And I hope that the saying "Life begins at 30" isn't true. 

I plan to begin now. 

Today.

xoJ