Chocolate Sugar Cookies…

I saw a recipe for chocolate sugar cookies a while back and decided to give them a try yesterday.  I needed to practice designs for some wedding shower party favors I will be making next week so I thought I’d give this recipe a try.

I think I’m going to mix the chocolate and regular sugar cookies, so this cookie will have a regular sugar cookie heart on it next time.

The cookie isn’t overly sweet so the frosting goes perfectly with it. I always love sprinkles.

This design isn’t what it will look like in the end, but I love how the B turned out this way.

My kiddos love the cookies and my other taste testers have had all positive reviews so far.  I love trying out a new recipe and having it turn out well the first time.  I will have more pictures of the finished packaged product once Kelsey puts that together for me.  It is nice to only worry about the baking and not having to worry about the other details.

Sixteen Years Later…

We celebrated our anniversary last week.  We got married on Memorial weekend so this year we got to celebrate it over a long weekend.  The girls went up to spend the weekend with the world’s greatest in-laws so we decided to stay the night at the Colcord Hotel downtown and go out to eat at The Melting Pot.

We headed downtown and got checked into the hotel.  I had scheduled a massage that I got for my birthday last year and our hotel was within walking distance.  I can’t believe I waited so long to use that gift certificate because it was pure heaven.  I upgraded to the sports massage and there were times I wanted to come out of my skin, it was worth every second. 

We walked over to The Melting Pot for dinner and the food was amazing.

I didn’t get a pic of the shrimp we split, but the cheese to start and the chocolate to end were amazing.

Gotta have a crappy phone picture to mark this anniversary.  After dinner we walked back to the hotel and hung out in the hotel bar for a little while.  The bad thing about being to add your bar tab onto your room is that you can end up with a $70 bar tab.  Oh well, you only celebrate your sixteenth anniversary once, right?

We got up on Sunday and decided to head back to Norman to have lunch at my new favorite Mexican restaurant Chuy’s.

Hello yummy.  That burrito was huge, it was enough for two meals.

In all it was a great weekend.  I wonder what this year has in store for us.

May Foodie Penpals...

So this is my third month participating in the Foodie Penpals, and I have just loved everything I've gotten so far.  This month I got a box from Rebecca @ Changing Us.

Hello there, box of yummy goodness.

These are a few of my favorite things.

I'm not sure how she knew about my chocolate addiction, but this box was full of the perfect amount of chocolate for me.  Note to self, stop opening the boxes in front of the children so I won't have so keep sharing the yummy stuff inside.  The milk chocolate truffles were amazing, I could have eaten the entire box in one sitting, but I did not.  The best part is they all came from my favorite store, Target, so I can pick these things up whenever I want.  Now that I think about it, that might not be a good thing.

I am so excited about this honey, and it's in a collectible glass.  I'd say that's a win-win situation.  I love honey, it use it to make my homemade granola, or as a part of my pre, post or during workout fuel. 

Peanut butter and honey on whole wheat toast to fuel the end of my super-sized Memorial Day workout.

I also got popcorn and instructions to make popcorn in a brown paper bag instead of buying the microwave popcorn.  Genius idea!  I think people already know about this, but I did not.  No pictures of the popcorn yet, but I'll have to post some soon.  Camy was a little jealous since she's not supposed to eat popcorn with her braces.  I told her she's only got about 28 months to go.  She didn't find any humor in that.

Thanks for the goodies Rebecca!

WIAW #6...

I can't believe it's Wednesday again already.  My WIAW post will be some pictures of the eats from the long weekend.  It was our 16th wedding anniversary so there was lots of eating out this weekend.

Have you tried this yogurt?  I really like it.  I have been eating Greek yogurt for a while so it's a nice change of pace going with just regular organic yogurt.

We had dinner at the Melting Pot on Saturday night.

I didn't get a shot of the shrimp we shared, but these are the appetizer and dessert.

The cheese was:
Wisconsin Trio Cheese Fondue
Rich Fontina and Butterkäse join buttermilk bleu cheese, white wine, scallions and a hint of sherry
 
The chocolate was:
Flaming Turtle
We consider it Fondue Candy. It’s an irresistible combination of milk chocolate, caramel and candied pecans flambéed tableside.
 
All I can say about this was yum.
 
Instead of brunch on Sunday we went to my new favorite Mexican restaurant, Chuy's.  I had the Bean and Cheese Burrito. 
“Big As Yo’Face”
They describe it as:
A homemade, 12” flour tortilla stuffed with refried beans,

cheese and your choice of the following. Served with
your choice of sauce & your choice of Mexican rice or
green chile rice.

It looks like this:

Well it looks like this sideways.  It was enough for two big meals.

I broke out my bike on Monday, I've got a 5K bike sprint on Sunday for the Corporate Challenge and I hadn't ridden my bike since the Tie Dye Tri last September.  (My number from the race was still on my bike.)  So I got it down and headed out for 12 hilly miles and then rode the 3.5 miles to the Y for weights and lunges and sauna and then 3.5 miles home.  Between the 12 mile ride and the Y I had this:

Crunchy peanut butter and honey on whole wheat toast.  I also drank both water bottles full of NUUN as I was in re-hydration mode after the weekend's festivities.  More on that later.

WIAW #5...

My WIAW post this week will be What I Ate Monday.

Sunday was a glorious day.  I had no plans.  I went to the grocery store on Saturday (that hasn't happened in weeks!), I got my work out in Saturday morning (yoga, spin and a trip around the gym lunge-style) so on Sunday I could barely move. 

Josh and Carson headed up to Edmond to get some work done on the damaged car, and Camy decided to stay and hang out with me.  I think she thought it was going to be exciting.  What I got done on Sunday contributed to What I Ate Monday.

Breakfast:

I made a fresh batch of English muffins, and I really think I am getting the hand of them.  You know, if you grease the English muffin rounds it works much better.  Next time will be awesome!  I also made a batch of spinach and mushroom individual fritatas.  So my breakfast sandwich had that, a fake sausage patty and some Laughing Cow cheese.

I also had a glass of this yumminess I found at Target on Saturday, Silk Fruit & Protein.  I love Silk Almond Milk.  The Dark Chocolate is amazing, and I use the unsweetened instead of milk in everything.  Camy and I spotted this Saturday and just had to give it a try.  It was so good!  Tastes like a smoothie, kinda creamy and kinda fruity.  I will definitely keep this in my fridge.  I think it could be a great after workout beverage too.

Lunch:

Leftover orzo with veggies that I made the end of last week.  I also had an apple and a piece of cheese and one of my new White Chocolate Chip Nutella cookies.  I did this experimental cookie baking on Sunday as well and the white chocolate chips really cut through some of the richness of all that chocolate in a good way.

Afternoon Snack:

Of course I had pistachios.  I can't say anything more about it.  I also had a Luna Bar before spin class.  I am glad I did, I don't think I could have made it through that class without it.

Dinner: 

I started with a salad.  I even made one to have in my lunch today, in case you were wondering what I was eating on Tuesday.  I bought this Archer Farms Raspberry Acai Vinaigrette Salad Dressing a while back and have been having it on all salads ever since.  It's really good.

Camy requested mac and cheese for dinner so instead of leftover spaghetti from Sunday I decided to make some from scratch.  I almost forgot to take a picture of it.

In all it was a pretty yummy day.  Clearly I was carb loading for some unknown race I must be doing. 



My Leg Hurts…

Here's a funny story for you. When I saw my doctor last week he discussed the reasons for me to not run for four more weeks. Apart from giving my body more time to heal he was concerned that my right quad had atrophied a little spending most of the previous 7 weeks in the boot or on the dreaded crutches.

{Do you know what I hate more than the treadmill? That damn boot. It's the single most expensive shoe I own now and it doesn't go with anything.}

Did I mention before that Dr. Hines is the doctor that has done both of my knee surgeries? He is also the team physician for the OU Wrestling team AND he's the team doc for the US Olympic Wrestling Team. How cool is that. Sure wish he'd give me some good news once in a while when I go in to see him.

Anyway, he even measured my quads and he said there was about a 1 cm difference in the right and the left. I bet you can guess which one was skinnier. I almost asked him to measure my calf, but I figured I could do that on my own. I swear my right one looks skinnier. Might just be the angle. I don't think my ankle could get any skinnier.

So, I have to say that I didn't believe him. I thought he was trying to make me feel better about not running. For. Four. More. Weeks. Well, I believe him now. I have been working out like a mad woman. I have been so set on not losing my fitness level I have been spending major time at the gym, on the spin bike mostly. I thought I was keeping my legs in pretty darn good shape. Clearly it's only because Donna B. hasn't had her "friends" in her Wednesday afternoon Pilates class recently.

Her "friends", AKA ankle weights, showed up this week, and we did lots of leg lifts and all other kind of insanity that I think she just makes up on the fly. I am convinced she just does it to see if she can get us all to do it. For some crazy reason we always do.

Even without the "friends" when it comes to leg lifts it is almost impossible for me to stretch out my insanely tight hamstrings to hold my leg out perfectly straight and perform any lifting movements at the same time. I am a runner, after all, and my hamstrings hate me. The class was pretty darn hard this week and I was glad to have an excuse to skip out of spin afterwards and not feel guilty about it.

Yesterday morning when I got up to meet Ro at the pool my leg (just one) felt a little angry. I just chalked it up to the hard class. I got in the pool and this was my workout:

200 yard freestyle

200 yard freestyle with fins (trying to get the old heart rate up.)

200 yard with the kick board

200 yard freestyle

200 yard freestyle with the pull buoy

5x50 yard freestyle sprints with fins

50 yard cool down

It was a pretty good workout. My shoulders had been pretty sore from Tuesday's weight room workout brought to us by Ross. They were screaming at me at the start of the workout but they loosened up, and then were pretty mad about the 200 yards with the pull buoy. You can't make everyone happy 100% of the time. I rewarded myself with a little sauna time afterwards.

I ended up taking Camy to swim practice last night and decided to hop on the elliptical so I could sleep in this morning. After 35 minutes the walk to the sauna was hard. My quad was not happy with all of it. Today it's still pretty angry with me. It's weird to have only one leg be really sore, so I guess I'll have to believe what Dr. Hines told me and know that not walking like a normal person for 8 weeks will have negative effects on my muscles. I might have to break out the poor man's stick, the rolling pin and roll it out a bit when I get home.

I've got cupcakes to make tonight and tomorrow morning I'm planning on yoga and spin, or swim and spin. I can't decide. I am training for a Sprint Tri so I maybe should do the two parts of the race I am allowed to do right now. Yoga sounds so nice though.

BTW, anyone know how to convert my 500 yard swim time to a 500 meter swim time? I am gonna have to do that.

Can We Talk About What You Are Wearing?

Or more importantly what I am wearing? 

It's springtime in Oklahoma, which in Oklahoma terms means it's similar to summer in other regions of the country.  Can I be straight with you?  I hate wearing shorts.  I'm not sure when this happened, but I do.

Don't get me wrong.  I am a runner.  {Although, I feel less and less like one lately, but I have issues.}  The issue here today is my issue with shorts.  But I am a runner, and in Oklahoma heat of spring, summer, and even fall, I wear shorts to run in.  All.  The.  Time. 



Fall Classic Duathlon 2009

I love this picture, and I am wearing shorts.  Although this is a duathlon and I would never wear shorts like these for a race like that again.  Tri shorts are the way to go. 
***Side Note: I have said this before but the best way to finish a race is to have someone hand you a beer in a souvenir glass.  I believe the beer I am holding here is the best beer I've ever had. ***

 Two pictures of me and my 2011 Partner In Crime, Abby.  After the Rock N Roll, I was sure wishing I weren't wearing shorts.  It was was a long cold walk to the train that day.  But we sure looked cute that day.

And then there was the OKC Memorial Marathon last year.  Yep, I wore shorts, what I really could have used was a wet suit.  My legs were so frozen after that race.  Don't get me started on how far you have to walk at the end of a marathon to get your food, beverage and finisher shirt; I think there should be a fleet of wheelchairs to wheel the marathoners through the finisher's area and back to your car.  A girl can dream, can't she?

Anyway, back to my original topic of shorts.  I don't understand how I can wear shorts whenever I'm going to go out to pound the pavement, but I shy away from them in my regular life.  Maybe running is my regular life.  I can wear my running shorts in my non-running life and feel perfectly comfortable in them, but other types of shorts make me uncomfortable and self conscious. 

When I wear non-running shorts I am always worried they are too short, or my legs are too white, or too skinny, or too whatever.  Maybe the real issue is that it can be such a bother to shave my legs?  I'm not even gonna go there.  Maybe I just feel like when I'm running my legs are moving too fast {in my mind they feel fast} to be judged. 

We bought Carson a pair of jean shorts last weekend.  The length of them scares the hell out of me.  I guess I need to be glad that she wants to wear them, and hope that she will grow up not having issues with her body that would prevent her from wearing something that looks really cute on her.

Women can be so hard on ourselves.  How do we get these altered images of ourselves in our heads?  How do we get them out?