Weekend Adventures . . .

So we did it, we did something fun this weekend! And you know what? It was easy and fun and we really enjoyed spending some quality time together as a family!

This morning we met some friends at the Coyote Cafe in Old Town San Diego for breakfast. Phil and Lindsey had just returned to San Diego from a cruise and were flying out later today, but we were able to catch up with them for a couple hours over some yummy breakfast. It is always fun to see Salt Lake friends!

After breakfast we headed over to the Zoo. We've been to the Wild Animal Park about two or three times, but we have only been to the Zoo once before. We have annual passes to both, so it is great to just be able to pop in for a few hours.

After the Zoo we hit up the Del Mar Farmer's Market. Gary bought me some beautiful flowers and we picked up some produce and sampled some of the other tasty offerings. It is a tiny farmer's market, but they have a lot of good vendors. There is a guy there that sells all kinds of fresh fish, there are a lot of produce vendors, and just a few concession people. It is in a beautiful area, right up the hill from the ocean.

Riley was wonderful and smiley all day too, which always makes any excursion better!

Now, we have to decide what to do next weekend . . .

Soup Experiments . . .

So last night I made Caribbean Curry Soup for dinner. Sunnie bought me a huge soup cookbook with 900 soup recipes which I peruse it nightly.

Last nights dinner was really yummy, and when asked Gary said he wouldn't mind if I made it again.

It has a coconut milk base and also contains halibut (I substituted cod, because they didn't have any halibut at my grocery store), shrimp, yellow pepper, scallions, and tomatoes. One of the best parts of this soup though are all of the great "Caribbean" spices; fresh ginger, allspice, curry, cilantro, lime juice, and a little cayenne.

The things I would have changed about how I made this soup is that I would have had everything cut up and ready to go before I started. It is a little involved and you have to move quickly through the steps with lots of stirring, so no time to prep in between steps. For example, the first step involves sauteing the scallions, yellow peppers, and ginger over high heat. I just dumped them all in the pot together and stirred them occasionally while I cut up the other ingredients and the ginger seemed to burn a little and stick to the bottom of the pan. It didn't taste burnt, but I would have liked to cook it over medium heat and pay closer attention to it.

The other thing I would have changed was I would have either used fresh shrimp or put my pre-cooked shrimp in for the last two minutes instead of the last six. It was a little tough.

Not bad for a first try though. And I thought it was super good. We will definitely be adding this to the repertoire.

My Chalean workout did get accomplished yesterday. Apparently Thursdays are the toughest because you have a long, 45 minute, Interval workout followed by a 10 minute ab workout. The Interval workout was KILLER! I am considering carb-loading next Wednesday in order to accomplish it. By the time I was 30 minutes into it I was pretty spent. I admit I definitely started slacking off and not pushing myself very hard. I feel kind of bad that I didn't give it my all and have committed to working a lot harder next week. Cozy gave me a bit of encouragement here, telling me that I will only get better at it. Thanks Coz!

The ab workout was hard, but I think mostly because I was already exhausted. I have heard that Cozy splits this day up and does part in the morning and part when she gets home from work. I think I will try this next week too.

I am playing with the idea of holding off in the running until after I complete Chalean. This will mean postponing Ragnar until next year. I don't feel like I am giving into the lame-ness though because Chalean is super intense and I feel like I am really gaining some real success by working on this. Besides, if I hold off until I complete Chalean then I will begin my running career weighing less (better on my joints), stronger, and later in the year (longer days, more sunlight, more opportunities to run). I'm not feeling too bad about this. However, in order to keep me moving forward I am going to work on finding myself a "running-buddy" and a 5 or 10K to work towards.

So we are supposed to go see Graceland, my friend's Elvis Tribute band, tonight. There is a small chance this might not happen because my past life's lame-ness is still trying to wield it's power over me. See this is the usual scenario: I find something interesting to do on the weekend and then my inner voice starts telling me that I don't really want to drive that far, or I won't be able to find a babysitter, or I don't want to have to deal with Riley having a possible melt-down, or possibly it won't be worth the money spent. All of these excuses are, of course, LAME but I used to let them hold sway. NOT ANY MORE! I will call around to see if I can get a babysitter, even though they will have to be on-duty until 11:30, it is possible that someone really won't mind that much. We shall see! I will at least try, and if no babysitter can be found then at least I didn't fail without even trying, right!

I did it . . .

I did it! I completed Chalean Extreme today! Hooray for me!!

It was pretty hard, but not as hard as I had thought it up to be. Hard enough to get results, but not so hard that you dread doing it. Cool! Hopefully running will be the same way.

I am still holding myself back a bit on the running. Yes, I did go out and purchase running shoes, so that the excuse of my shoes being in storage was no longer an issue, but I still don't feel ready to take the plunge.

What is holding me back??

My internal monologue has been coming up with the following hesitations:

-I don't really have a good place to run. I live on a busy street that I would rather not run on, or perhaps I am just saying that because I am intimidated. I will ask my runner friends tonight.

-I don't have enough time to "train" before the Ragnar race in April. Again, probably just saying that out of intimidation, but it is a bit more pressure when you have a whole team counting on you to be up to the challenge. I am going to try anyway, better to fail a little than to not try at all.

-I don't know when to run. I would rather not run at night because there aren't a whole lot of sidewalks out there and I would prefer not get run over. I don't want to run in the morning because I can use all the sleep I can get and I feel like I get up early enough to get to work by 7:00 am. I could run during the day, but I need someone to watch Riley for me. I think I will work on finding someone to watch him for an hour a few days a week.

I don't know why running outside is so intimidating for me. In a few weeks when I am getting out there on a regular basis I will probably look back on this and laugh at how silly it is.

RAGNAR, HERE I COME!!

Now I didn't end up going to the Farmer's Market last night, so dinner consisted of Salmon w/ my favorite Paprika Rub and roasted red potatoes. It was tasty, but not very inventive. Tonight we are going to be making pizzas at our Mutual activity. It is our last one before they split our ward this Sunday. Sad, but I'm sure we are going to have a rockin' party!! Pizza, Rock Band, fun friends. Who could ask for anything more?

Our big activity for this weekend is probably going to be seeing our friend's band play. Todd is in an Elvis tribute band called Graceland. They are playing this Friday with a Johnny Cash tribute band called Cash'd Out at the Casbah in downtown San Diego. Should be Fantastic!!

New Year . . .

The end of "Lameness" and "Non-Success" is upon us. This is the end of "floating through life", as my sister Ivy put it. I am pretty much done {funny how I can't bring myself to say "through"} with boring, do-nothing, be-nothing-ness.

Currently I am working on the following items:

Joining in the Chelean Extreme awesome-ness with my sisters {I will NOT be the fat sister this summer!!} http://www.beachbody.com/product/fitness_programs/chalean_extreme.do?code=CHALEANEXTREMEDOTCOM

Cooking up a storm with my new Calphalon pots and pans and blogging about my kitchen escapades

Working on becoming a runner {outside too, not just on the treadmill in front of a movie} instead of wishing I were a runner. Step one, join a team and conquer the Ragnar Race {http://www.ragnarrelay.com/losangeles/index.php}

Doing SOMETHING every weekend! It could be small and boring, like organizing a closet, or fun and exciting, like exploring a new niche of Southern California {hey, we might as well explore the heck out of it while we are here, right?} NO MORE DO-NOTHING WEEKENDS!!

So to begin:

I talked to Sunnie today {visit her blog "Livin' Lite, and read about her goal to do a different kind of work-out every week for a year, so fun!} and she encouraged me to jump right in to Chelean and join the rest of my hottie-sisters instead of trying to catch up. They are only a week into the program, so I won't miss out on much skipping the first week. Tonight I am going to print off the calendars and program checklists and review the DVDs and start on Burn 2 tomorrow.

I would like to keep a journal about the dinners that I make, along with the recipes and things that I changed or will change next time I make that item again. Because I always get into those ruts where you make the same four things every week and you think, "I used to make other things that I really liked and I can't remember what they were!!" To start I am just going to list what I have made this year and will start adding recipes from today forward.

1/1 - Black Bean soup from my current Eating Well magazine

1/2 - Lentil Soup

1/3 - Breaded Baked Chicken tenders w/ steamed Broccoli

1/4 - Salmon, Steamed Snap Peas, & Roasted Red Potatoes w/ mustard vinaigrette

1/5 - Awesome fish tacos and chowder from a little "Fishette" in downtown San Diego

1/6 - Sunnie's yummy Carrot Coconut Soup

1/7 - Chili Verde Burritos w/ homemade Guac

1/8 - Roasted chicken and potatoes w/ BBQ sauce

1/9 - Cheesecake Factory for my Birthday

1/10 - Breaded Baked Chicken Tenders w/ Roasted Sweet Potato

1/11 - Sausage and Potato Soup

1/12 - Salmon and roasted whatever-vegi-I-pick-up-at-the-Farmers-Market today

I have always had the desire to be a runner, but never got further than my treadmill. Not that I think treadmill running is bad, just that it isn't what I consider REAL running. Some things that hold me back are:

-My good running shoes are buried somewhere in our huge storage unit

-I am afraid I won't succeed, so instead of being disappointed I just don't do anything {LAME!!}

-I don't really know any good, safe places to run

So to counter these ridiculous things that are holding me back I am going to do the following:

-I bought a cheap, but nice pair of Adidas running shoes at Costco today

-I am going to take a cue from Nike and JUST DO IT!

-I am going to ask around because I know a few runners that live in my area and I'm sure they could tell me where they run

Okay! It feels better to have written it down and formulated a plan. I will report on my progress shortly . . .

Well, I guess the last item on my list is to do something, ANYTHING, with the weekend, besides sit around at home. We are signed up to take Flying Trapeze classes that begin February 13th, so I only have to plan 4 weekends worth of activities before those six weeks come with all their circus-fun! We have an annual pass to the Zoo and Wild Animal Park. I have always wanted to see the seals at the Children's Pool. Sea World is always a fun destination. Riley would be entertained if we went to the Aquarium. We are less than two hours from LA {including Venice Beach, a popular Roller Skating spot}, and Disneyland. There is always Catalina Island too. We live in a popular vacation destination, it should be really easy to find something to do. Any other suggestions?

So, there you have it! I have some goals and some ideas of how to tackle said goals. I guess this is where the fun begins! Don't chicken out now darling, our new life of non-lameness and success starts here!!

WOOHOO!!

4th day of Christmas . . .

4th day of Christmas . . .

Giving Back

This has been a crazy year. You know that list that they show you in psycholgy class that shows certain life events and how stressful they are supposed to be? Well, I think we went through about 6 of the large events. In the last 15 months we have remodeled our house, moved out of state, sold our house, tried to buy a new house (this one is ongoing, argh!!), I have changed jobs, Gary is doing the same job in a new state, become pregnant and had a baby. Throughout all of these changes the reoccuring theme for me is SERVICE. It seems that this is a really importnt lesson that I need to be taught, learning to care for my friends and neighbors. I thought I was pretty good at it, but this year the service that has been given to me has blown me away!

I've learned that every extra set of willing hands is a huge help, no matter how big or small the project. I've learned that instead of saying, "If you need anything, just call me.", you should say, "I'll be right over!" and give of yourself for an hour or two. Seemingly simple service, like doing the dishes, folding laundry, or vacuuming can mean the world to someone. And lastly, really listening and trying to understand what people really need can go really far in making someone feel welcomed and loved.

It sounds simple, but it is a fine art worth perfecting over a lifetime

Second & Third days of Christmas . . .

Of course I made a big commitment to do a 12 Days of Christmas blog and I forget to follow through on the SECOND day!

Second Day of Christmas Post . . .

Advent

I went to the library last night and found The Encyclopedia of Christmas. It wasn't hard to find since the librarians had a large display of Christmas books set up for everyone to see. In it are all kinds of interesting Christmas facts, like how Christmas is celebrated in Greece to the significance of Greenery to Christmas. There is even an interesting section on the English holiday Boxing Day, which, until now, I had never quite understood. But for my post today I want to concentrate on the first entry in the Encyclopedia, which is Advent.

I don't have many Advent memories from childhood Christmases. Mostly the Advent calendars that I remember belonged to other families. Don't get me wrong, my family has plenty of other fantastic Christmas traditions (look for these in future posts), but the Advent calendar is not among them.

According to the Encyclopedia, the Advent was started by Christian churches as a way to prepare for the spiritual significance of the holiday. Ever since Gary and I got married, and especially since Riley was born I have been thinking about what Christmas traditions I would like to carry on in my own family. I wanted to be able to enjoy the excitement of Santa and gifts, while also emphasizing service and the real reason for the season, Christ's birth. Looking back I think that almost all of the Advent calendars that I remember were more of a count down to Christmas, rather than a preparation or teaching of the day's significance. I think that I would like to find or create an Advent calender that teaches scriptures, presents opportunities to give service within the home or for the community, and endeavors to help you reflect on the true meaning of Christmas in the days leading up to it.

Does anyone have memories of an Advent calendar that they would like to share, or examples of family traditions that could lend themselves to this idea of Advent?

Third day of December post . . .

Neighbor Gifts

I have not settled on an idea for Neighbor Gifts for this year. Two years ago we gave everyone little jars of honey from our beehive and a container of our favorite spice rub that we use on Salmon along with the recipe. The year before that I made 5 or 6 different cookies and combined them into tins. That was pretty fun, but making all those cookies was pretty ridiculous! I have been thinking about doing cookies again this year, but maybe I don't have to go so crazy, just do 2 or 3 different kinds instead. Other ideas (most of which have been inspired by the latest Trader Joe's ad) are Pumpkin bread, a collection of a few of our favorite family recipes, Eggnog cake, or Yule Log cake. Yule Log cake might be fun, since I have never had it before (and the TJ's ad makes it sound SO yummy) and I could include a little note describing the story of this holiday tradition, which I can find in my helpful library book Encyclopedia of Christmas!

What are your good ideas for Neighbor Gifts, and what gifts have you given out or seen in the past?

First day of Christmas . . .

I was inspired by an email newsletter that I get to do a Twelve Days of Christmas post starting today, December 1st. Especially since my last post was on November 4th. Apparently I have been very busy! I don't have any new pictures to post today, but since I am going to be doing 12 posts I guess I will have plenty of time to post them later.

Tonight we are going to the library. Gary, Riley and I love the library! I just went onto the library's website and put 18 books on hold. 18! I guess everything I looked at today just seemed really interesting. What was I thinking? How much time do I think I am going to have in the few weeks before Christmas to sit and peruse all those books anyway? We shall see. I guess I could always renew them to enjoy in January.

Last night we slept on our new 800 thread count sheets, bought from Kohl's during the last hour of their Black Friday sale. I usually don't participate in Black Friday, but we needed new sheets and these were $50 off! I am starting to see why people get so excited about it.

Well this post had nothing to do with Christmas, but better to have something than no post at all. Until tomorrow . . .