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Sweet Anticipation

March 11, 2010 by Katie

I love Thursdays – the anticipation of the weekend is so sweet. Made even sweeter by the fact that tomorrow is a grading day for me – which means no students and the extra bonus is that I already finished all my grading, so I can spend the day organizing and be out by lunchtime. Wheeee! I’m a happy camper.

Breakfast – savory oats


½ cup oats, hummus, egg, cheddar cheese, avocado, siracha

Lunch – Bird Seed chia seed pudding and trail mix


  • ¼ cup + 2 tbs. chia seeds
  • ¾ cup almond milk
  • Drizzle of agave

I combined these ingredients last night, stirred for a while and then refrigerated it over night. This was my first time making this recipe, and it was kind of meh. The texture skeeved me out. The next item was as yummy as it looks.


pepitas, raw trail mix, yogurt pretzels

Afternoon snack – apple


Pretty colored apple on a very messy desk

Dinner – roasted veggie salad


Lettuce topped with carrots and cauliflower drizzled with evoo, seasoned with salt, garlic powder and roasted for about 35 minutes at 450*

Dessert – Elvis Banana


One banana sliced and topped with a mix of 1 tbs. peanut butter + 1 tbs. almond milk and sprinkled with dark chocolate

Now I’m catching up on my DVR with some LOST and The Biggest Loser, and with an easy work day ahead of me, I may just go crazy and stay up past 9:30!

Posted in Uncategorized | 9 Comments »

List

March 10, 2010 by Katie

I like lists, so here is a list of the fantastic things about my day. No surprise that most of them are food.

1. Green Purple Monster

    Banana, blueberries, spinach, protein powder, almond milk, peanut butter, chia seeds, 2 clementines, water

    2. Leftovers for lunch

    Baked tofu and broccoli slaw

    3. Snacks that involve peanut butter and coconut

    ½ cup plain yogurt, 1 spoonful peanut butter, coconut granola

    4. Exercise. I started to take Punky for a walk, but it felt so dang good to be alive and outside that I ended up         running sprints on a nearby field in the dark. It felt phenomenal. It was snowy and blowy, which leads me to #5

    5. This hat

    6. Roasted Veggie Dinner. This one wins as THE favorite. Hands down.

    Sweet potatoes, zucchini, red onion, eggplant. Topped with a yogurt/spicy mustard/bbq sauce mix and walnuts and pepitas.

    7. Cookies. I haven’t had one yet, but I’m sure it will make the list in about 5 minutes.

    I made these cookies last night, but substituted the chocolate chips for chopped up chocolate truffles.

    8. Straight from the 3rd grade world…puzzles!

    The teamwork with which my kiddos have been working on this puzzle all week makes my heart smile.

    Posted in Breakfast, Delish Dinners, Mid-Day Yummies | Tagged , , , , , , , | 31 Comments »

    Bulky

    March 9, 2010 by Katie

    Hello, hello! I hope your Tuesdays were fantastic! My lunch was the same as yesterday + the addition of a Morningstar burger

    Still delicious. However, what was MORE delicious was the cake that Costco gave to our school today.

    Yes, I want cake.

    After school, I went for a nice (cold!) run with Punky, and then to the best grocery store ever for their BULK SALE. Every single bulk item was 25% off!! I kind of went wild.

    I like to save all my old jars (pickles, pasta sauce, etc.) and use them for my bulk items because I hate having bags clutter up my pantry.

    Nutritional yeast, oats x2, coconut granola, yogurt covered pretzels, trail mix, pepitas (in the bag), and wheatberries

    I had my fair share of snacks and bites while jarring these goodies, so my hunger wasn’t full fledged come dinnertime.

    More broccoli slaw with bbq sauce and spicy mustard, plus baked tofu dippers with the same sauce.

    Cut and baked at 375* for about 40 minutes – flipped ½ way through. Yum, yum, yum.

    And that does it! I’m hitting the sack early tonight because I stayed up late last night booking a FUN trip for my spring break which is in 2 weeks. You’ll have to wait to see where I’m off to! The countdown is ON…seven school days left!

    Posted in Delish Dinners, Mid-Day Yummies | Tagged , , , , , , | 28 Comments »

    Yes, I want pancakes.

    March 9, 2010 by Katie

    Is there anything better than pancakes on a mid-week morning?

    I know the pancake girl would agree. I like to make a big batch of pancakes on Saturday or Sunday, eat a few, and then freeze the rest. Then when breakfast options are low (as they are now) – I just have to pop a couple of frozen pancakes into the toaster! Nothing could be easier. I topped these with walnut butter, cinnamon and agave. With these yummy cakes feeling wonderful in my belly, I’m off to the new gas station that just opened by my school because they are giving away FREE COFFEE for the entire month of March. Happy Tuesday to me!

    Posted in Breakfast | Tagged , | 25 Comments »

    A Teeny Tahini

    March 8, 2010 by Katie

    Thanks for all the well wishes about my breakfast mishap this morning! The kicker is that I should have already learned my lesson, because I’ve done the exact same thing with jalapeños before. Ick – that one was waaaay worse. Rest assured, my wasabi eye is just fine.

    Lunch was a monster of a salad.

    lettuce, bell pepper, broccoli slaw, almonds, shredded carrots, tortilla chips, spicy mustard, bbq sauce

    There were three birthdays in third grade today! I had one bite of one cupcake, that’s my birthday policy. Otherwise I’d be eating upwards of 100 cupcakes a year.

    My real snack was better, actually…ww tortilla, walnut butter, cinnamon, cayenne pepper

    For dinner, something I saw Heather eat today…it totally peaked my interest, I had to try it – and was so glad I did! I started with this teeny tahini sample

    Slathered it on a ww tortilla, added bacon and a drizzle of agave…

    Holy yum!

    I also had a broccoli slaw salad with my favorite dressing as of late.

    spicy mustard and bbq sauce

    In the 3rd grade world…

    I’m not sure how this conversation came up, but some kids in my class were talking about how they had tried beer/wine before. Most kids agreed that both were disgusting. I agreed with them – I have no taste for any kind of adult beverages. When I told them this, one little boy said…

    “When you grow up and have kids, you’ll probably need beer and like it”

    Posted in Delish Dinners, Mid-Day Yummies | Tagged , , , , , , , | 26 Comments »

    Wasabi Monday

    March 8, 2010 by Katie

    I just got wasabi in my eye. Why I thought it was smart to grab a handful of wasabi peas at 5am before putting in my contacts is a mystery to me – but lesson learned.

    After flushing my eye with water, I cooked up a nice breakfast for this rainy Monday morning. First, I sautéed dried onion, spinach, and peas.

    Then, I added one egg and two egg whites.

    Once the egg had set around the edges, I sprinkled it with nutritional yeast, and popped it in a 375* oven for 8 minutes and drank my coffee while it cooked.

    Voilà! Served up with a little nub of homemade French bread.

    I hope it’s not rainy/snowy where you are and that you have a happy Monday!

    Posted in Breakfast | Tagged , , , , | 16 Comments »

    Spontaneous Saturday

    March 7, 2010 by Katie

    First, I have to thank you all for your incredibly kind comments regarding the crazy mom. After a few days to reflect on the situation, I realized that I shouldn’t have been so judgmental. It felt good to vent, but as a teacher, it’s not really my place to criticize her parenting – whether I agree with it or not. All I can do is care for and teach her child while she is under my care. Whew…I feel better.

    So yesterday, after a long run and a lot of coffee drinking (that’s what Saturdays are made for, in case you didn’t know) – Meeker and I made a spontaneous trip to Breckenridge, CO to visit a friend of mine who was there skiing with her family. We didn’t ski (lift tickets prices have jumped to $90!!) but it was fun to get away, eat dinner with she and her family, and just catch up! I forgot my camera…boo…but trust me there was good food and a lot of fun.

    With my belly full of the above fruit and coffee, I’m off to church! I hope you all have spectacular Sundays.

    Posted in Uncategorized | 17 Comments »

    Exercise Eraser

    March 4, 2010 by Katie

    I love exercise. Meeker and I just finished an old crossfit workout: 8×400s – 90 seconds rest between each. It totally erased the terrible afternoon I had – more on that later.

    We were so out of food this morning, I had this x2

    ww pita with walnut butter and agave

    Then, an apple for snack, and a green monster for lunch

    applesauce, banana, peanut butter, water, milk, protein powder, spinach

    I drank out of a flower vase. It was too cute to pass up. Don’t worry, it had been through the dishwasher. I filled this up x3.I snacked on some pretzels and sunbutter before my run, and a nice fat salad afterwards

    Romaine lettuce, 2 celery ribs, 3 carrots – shredded, cucumber, black beans, salsa, balsamic vinegar + spicy mustard

    In the 3rd grade world…

    I usually gush about the perks of my job (and there are a lot!), but today I was reminded of a significant downside to my profession: crazy parents.

    I had a meeting with a parent this afternoon that did not go well. To start things off, she waltzed in wearing her pajamas. Not a cute matching track suit or workout clothes, I’m talking pink pajama bottoms, slippers and a ripped up Guinness shirt. She then proceeded to attack me and a fellow teacher for failing to care about her child. She SCREAMED at us for a solid 15 minutes before my principal (who thankfully was present) told her to calm down. The problem: she doesn’t send her child to school, and her child is failing to learn things. End of story. The mom is so delusional; she thinks her child is too sick to come to school, and too sick to do her work – although she has no doctor’s notes, no documentation (I’ve never even seen the student sniffle) to back up any of the thirty-three absences – that’s a quarter of the school year!. How are the teachers supposed to teach the child if she’s not at school?

    The meeting ended with the crazy mom crying, calling my co-worker a “sassy ass”, storming out of the room and slamming the classroom door behind her. The wonderful kicker is that she forgot her keys, and had to come back into the room two minutes later – nullifying her dramatic exit. I deal with that kind of behavior daily – but it’s from 8 year olds, not 40 year olds. It was so crazy it was comical. But it never feels good to be yelled at – especially when you’re being accused of not caring about a child’s well being/education. Does she think we do this job for the money??

    Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , | 36 Comments »

    Sun and Shamrocks

    March 3, 2010 by Katie

    I just can’t get enough of that morning sun!

    • 1/3 cup oats (cooked in 2/3 cup water)
    • Drizzle of agave
    • Almonds
    • Walnut butter
    • Coconut

    Then at snacktime, I was presented with two lovely apples

    My students are so sweet. I get an apple almost daily – and I fail to blog about it because I usually eat it immediately. I had the green one this morning.

    Then for lunch, my most recent obsession:

    I brought a huge waterbottle with this already made, and it filled this glass x3. It’s the perfect lunch. It fills me up better than anything I ever bring. This morning I blended:

    • 1.5 banana
    • ½ cup unsweetened applesauce
    • Handfuls of spinach
    • Orange
    • Peanut butter
    • 2 scoops chocolate protein powder
    • Milk
    • Water

    This pretty much held me allllll afternoon – that’s 7 hours. Crazy. Another factor in that fullness is that I’ve transitioned to working out at night – for several reasons, one of which is that my daily hunger pangs are significantly less. Because of the nature of my job – I can’t really eat when I’m hungry, but rather at my lunch time – which is early and short, and leaves me starving all afternoon. I really miss running in the morning, so we’ll see if this schedule sticks.

    I was starving when I got home, so I first grabbed something a little unusual (at least for me)…

    Leftover sauerkraut and buffalo sausage. Meeker’s dad killed a buffalo a few weeks ago – so we have a freezer full. It’s pretty good actually. Then I had a sweet potato with mustard and bbq sauce


    So flavorful.

    Now I’m off to do some pilates before I settle in for the night.

    In the 3rd grade world…


    Every month, we make and hang seasonal things from the ceiling. It makes my classroom feel cozy. March is my favorite hanging craft, so I have to share.


    Colorful shamrocks! One side vibrantly colored, and one side green. Big smiles.

    Posted in Breakfast, Delish Dinners, Mid-Day Yummies | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 27 Comments »

    Garage Gym

    March 2, 2010 by Katie

    When we moved into our house a year and a half ago, we set up a gym in the garage


    Well, in the 1.5 years we’ve lived here, it’s gotten a little junky. We still used it, but there was crap everywhere, making the workout space pretty tight. Tonight, after I got home from work and went for a nice hour long run, Meeker and I cleaned out the entire garage. Completely. We also moved the gym from the left side of the garage to the right…for no real reason. It just needed to be cleaned. It was a heavy job.


    I love organization. I’m not showing the gym side yet because it’s not quite finished, but I will, I promise.


    If only I had taken a before picture of these shelves, your jaw would be dropped in awe right now.

    Hope you all are having a lovely night. I know I am. Anything that turns from chaos to order within a few hours makes me giddy with excitement.

    Posted in Uncategorized | 25 Comments »

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