By The Sea

This feels so comfortable, sitting at my desk, blogging about my day’s food.  I didn’t realize how much I missed this! 

I have to say today was an excellent day, work just flew right by with no stress or anything.  After I got out Andrew and I went out to dinner, and then we spent some time with his family.  Can’t get a much better Thursday then that!

Since I wasn’t able to blog last week, I didn’t get to tell you I’m back to working Fridays now.  Last week was my first full week back since March! The weeks definitely feel a whole lot longer, but I’m happy my paychecks are back to normal. 

Breakfast today was a blueberry Chobani.  I meant to bring some things to mix-in but forgot.  I decided to check out the vending machines for some options.  I found a granola bar I used to eat when I was younger and decided to crush that up and mix it in.

And a much needed close up.

This was such a fun combination, it really reminded me of when I was younger.

Lunch was simple.  I was going to have a pb & j sandwich but decided to just have pb open faced on a sandwich thin.

So yummy!

Surprisingly I didn’t even have to dip into any snacks later on.  I had a nice normal appetite today, not a bottomless pit, or a lack of appetite.  Just Right.

For dinner Andrew and I had plans to cook but we had some errands to run, and want to spend some time with his family before they leave for vacation this weekend so we decided to just hit up the small restaurant on the bay by our apartment.  The weather was absolutely perfect for eating out on the patio.  It’s been so humid here, but the rain this morning balanced everything out.

You can’t beat a view like this while eating dinner.

 

Here are a couple of the fishing boats that run each day.

Such a fun night out!

I got a water to drink.

And for dinner I can’t stay away from breakfast at this place.  They do such a great job!  I got a  pepper, onion, and egg sandwich on whole wheat toast.

With a small side of home fries.

I wasn’t planning on eating all the home fries, but they are so darn good I definitely did.

Now I’m off to play some Wii Sports Resort with Andrew,  has anyone else played this new game yet?  It’s so much fun!

Oh before I go, did anyone else see Nigella Lawson’s new fridge?  I usually don’t swoon after an appliance but it’s actually really beautiful.  I found this on This Kitchn.

And here’s a shot of it open.

This fridge looks bigger then my entire kitchen, but I would love to have something like this one day.  I can dream can’t I?

 

Well I better go before Andrew beats all my high scores!

Advertisement

A Rushed Post

Good Morning!  Sorry I didn’t post last night I had a terrible sinus head ache and went right to sleep as soon as I got home from work!  I have to run out so this post is going to be a quick one.

For breakfast yesterday I had another Peach Chobani but remembered some Kashi Island Vanilla cereal to mix in.

I love the vanilla cereal in the peach yogurt, so good!

Between breakfast and lunch I snacked on some Cherry Semolina Dr. Krackers.  10 of them to be exact.

Lunch was Harborside leftovers.

And I even snuck a roll out from the restaurant in my to go bag.

So like I said I came home yesterday with a horrible sinus headache, it’s been so long since I’ve had one it hit me out of nowhere!  I came home got right into bed, and slept until 8, when I woke up my headache was still there so I jumped in a hot shower hoping the steam would help.  No such luck.  Finally I took some nighttime cold and cough medicine and that knocked the headache out and I was finally feeling well enough to eat at around 10.  I just had a sandwich thin with pb.

Well I have to run now, I’ll be back tonight!

Stress Non-Eater

<rant>I know there are people out there who eat when they are stressed.  I am the exact opposite.  When something is really bothering me I let it manifest itself in ways that prevent me from wanting to eat.  It’s probably just as unhealthy as someone who binges on a stressful occasion.  I will admit that sometimes when I’m just a little bit stressed and eat I make poor choices, I don’t overeat though.  I might just say screw it I’m eating that cookie(s).  But when I let myself get so worked up eating is the last thing I want to do.  Today was one of those days.  For the past year Andrew’s twin brother’s girlfriend and I haven’t gotten along.  Today I finally let everything build up and when I got angry with something she did today,  I let it eat me from the inside out.  We sent some not-so-nice emails back and forth, and finally spoke on the phone a little while ago.  I’m a people pleaser, I get upset when people don’t like me, it bothers me so much, that this really stung.  I should have just went about my day but unfortunately I wound up leaving work early, and stewing in my anger.  Nothing has been completely resolved she apologized for somethings and I accepted her apology and for Andrew and his brother’s sake we have decided to start over.  Is it the best option?  Probably not.  Will it make Andrew happy?  Absolutely.  Besides that his brother is now going to be my brother-in-law in a couple years, and who knows one day she might be my sister-in-law so I have to bite the bullet and work on this relationship no matter how badly I just want to hide my head in the sand.  I’m more of an “ignore it and it will go away” type of person, not a strong characteristic.  Maybe it’s time I grew up and just worked on things. </rant>

Wow okay sorry for all that, it feels good to vent though.  And I’m sure at least one of you will have a similar story, or be able to share advice.

Enough about that, this is a food blog after all.  For breakfast I once again had a sandwich thin with pb.  I actually have pictures though!  And Homegirl, the key to the perfect pb spreading is to spread it on thick in the middle and then work it towards the outside.  No I’m kidding, there is no secret,.  I do admit I have a little more then a serving perhaps 2.5-3 tablespoons I’m willing to get the extra calories though.  I’m still losing weight so perhaps I’m doing something right. 

Then the trouble began.  Andrew came to take me out to lunch since I was so upset.  We wound up going to my favorite salad bar.

I ate some but not all of this salad.  If i had to guess I would say between 1/3 and a 1/2. It was:

• mixed greens
• carrots
• onions
• chicken
• cucumbers
• and light balsamic vinaigrette.

And this is where my pictures from the day end.  I came home early and began screaming about the whole thing to poor Andrew.  I was so worked up!  I give myself this nauseous feeling when I get upset, and eating seems impossible.  I feel better now but not well enough to eat something, I did stop by my mom’s house though and picked up her left over chicken parm, so get ready to see it for lunch tomorrow!

I’m off to watch the New Jersey Housewives reunion, and then get some much needed rest. 

Italian Food Overload

Monday is over! Thank goodness!  I have a lot to look forward to so it’s making this week drag.  I’m just ready for it to be over already!  Starting Thursday at 5 I’m on vacation for 10 days!  Unfortunately it’s a mandatory furlough where I won’t be getting paid for the 4 working days but hopefully I’ll be able to claim unemployment.  As luck would have it Andrew has all those days off except 2 with me.  He’s on vacation from school for 2 weeks and the summer program starts next Wednesday so he’ll work Wednesday and Thursday and then have off for one of my favorite holidays, the 4th of July.  Let’s just hope it feels like summer!  This weekend I also have a very exciting camping trip planned with my 2 girlfriends and their boyfriends.  It should be a great time!

This weekend flew by, and I had a lot of family things to do for Father’s Day, plus looking at more wedding locations.  I think we found one that we both absolutely love and we’re taking our moms there on Friday for their opinion.  I have a feeling they are going to love it, once we make our final decision I’ll be sure to share it with you.

So if you’ve been reading my blog for a while you’ll know I’m not a fan of sweets, you’ll hardly see chocolate or cake, but I’m a big fan of Italian food.  It’s my weakness, a nice big dish of pasta, or a slice of pizza are my weaknesses.  And in today’s post your going to see a lot of Italian food.

First off let me start with last night’s fabulous Father’s Day dinner that my dad selected and my mother cooked.  She was a little upset I hadn’t posted it last night so here you go Mom.  Happy now?

My mother makes THE best chicken parm.  It was so tender you didn’t even need a knife and it was overall perfect. 

With Andrew’s favorite pasta on the side.

Wagon Wheels!

This was absolutely perfect, thank God it’s not Father’s Day everyday though because I would seriously gain all the weight I’ve lost this year plus some, if this was an everyday option.

Now on to today.  My breakfast of choice lately has been pb on a sandwich thin.  I have no idea why, I’ve just been craving that peanut butter a lot lately.  It seems to be the only thing I want in the morning.  Unfortunately I didn’t take have my camera today, but here’s the same picture from last week. 

For lunch today I leftovers from the weekend.  I had gotten an eggplant, fresh mozzarella, and roasted red pepper sandwich.  I had a 1/4 left and brought that in for lunch today.  These pictures are from the first time I ate it over the weekend.

So delicious.  A perfect combination of flavors.

Later on I snacked on an orange.

So juicy!

Dinner tonight carried on my theme of Italian food.  I had made a very lean meat sauce over the weekend and had some leftovers for dinner.  I’ll be posting the recipe for the sauce this weekend, so stay tuned, it’s really very good and actually super simple.

I actually had dessert tonight as well.  I had a container of Fro Yo in the freezer that was about to expire.  Never one to waste food I happily ate  a small serving with some chocolate syrup.

It’s hard to tell the size but that’s just a small ramekin. 

Well I’m off to get ready for bed.  Good night everyone, hope you are having a great night!

Uh Oh…

This is my first experience with drogging, is that what we’re calling it? Caitlin? Maybe you can answer, because my hiccups might be preventing me from looking up the proper verbage. That’s not a word? Oh well.

For breakfast today in order to keep myself on schedule I had 2 waffles.  They were good but the syrup was better.  I had whatever I had left of the sugar free syrup on my whole grain Van’s waffles.

Yum yum yum, sideways and all it was fantastic.

For lunch I had a pb and raspberry jam sandwich.  I apparently did not take a picture, although I swore I did.  Here’s what Google Image Search turned up.  Enjoy!

Hiccup Hiccup.  For some reason this picture cracks me up . 

Dinner was a salad from SaladWorks.

It was some kind of Fiesta,   Of that I’m sure, but I’m not sure the name of it.

I ate half of that salad without any of the dressing, I”m saving the rest for tomorrow.  I totally ate the rest of that roll though.

 

And that’s about it, I didn’t eat anything else.  But I did enjoy a finely aged box of wine from my dad.  Yikes.

Andrew totally edited this post, he said it didn’t even make sense to him, at first.  Whoops.

Good Night Everybody, hope you have a great Saturday!

180 Degrees

I don’t know if it was the whole “fake it until you make it” from yesterday, or if  I’m finally back to my normal eating routine, or if it’s the fact that it’s my Friday, but I am in a much better mood today.  I don’t know if I come across this way on the blog, but I am usually a very happy-go-lucky person, especially around friends and families.  It’s kind of impossible to have a serious conversation with me because I’m always joking around, and today I finally feel like I’m getting back to that.  Again I have to credit you guys because of your kind words.  Andrew was reading through my comments from the past few posts today and kept saying how nice everyone was, and how supportive you guys really are.  He didn’t have to tell me that though I’ve known that since day one.

I had another successful eating day!  Planning ahead has definitely helped, tomorrow will be the real test though because I’ll be home all day.  I feel like when I am forced to eat at work on schedule I do much better, it’s definitely something I need to work on for the weekends.  For the most part my choices are healthy but my eating is sporadic, my goal for the weekend is to eat on my normal schedule from during the week and see how that works for me.

For breakfast I relied on my favorite go-to food.  Chobani of course.  I had a vanilla chobani with Kashi Vanilla mini wheats.

Such a delicious combo.  I’m absolutely in love with this cereal.

Lunch was a pretty great, and I was looking forward to one component of it pretty much right after I finished my breakfast.  While shopping the other night I bought some sliced deli chicken, I put 2 slices (it’s pretty thick) and spicy brown mustard on a “Deli Flat”.

See the slight green in the upper right corner.  That was the part I was looking forward to, it was of course another one of my favorite pickles.

I will never get tired of those pickles. Oh and Laura that pen is totally the swag (stuff we all get) from the bridal show last week, new favorite pen, peace out purple advair pen.

Such a simple but perfect lunch.

And for a snack around 3 I had a braeburn apple.  God I missed these, and they were on sale the other day so you know I picked up a few.

Ok for all of you in the Northeast, what is up with this weather?  I’m so sick of fog, rain, and cold.  It’s almost the middle of June where’s my sunshine and 80 degree temps?  Ugh.  This weather is making me crave some serious comfort food, so I decided to have a quick bowl of angel hair pasta. 

I was going to make a salad but really wasn’t feeling it, so instead I just chopped up a green pepper and some cucumber on the side for some crunch and green.

Yum yum yum.

All together:

This looks like I ate around 9:30 because of the lighting but it’s just so dark here, I ate around 6:30 but you’d never guess.

After dinner I drank some unpictured coffee, and watched some trash tv.  I have a lot to catch up on.  Who else watched this week’s Real Housewives of NJ?  Ok for real, how is next week already the finale?  I’m sad but at the same time I’m so looking forward to the episode!  I also watched Kathy Griffin’s Life on the D List, am I the only maniac in blogland who absolutely loves this show?  I laugh until I cry and rewind parts over and over again, that Kathy is a very funny lady.  If I could fly out to LA and be her assistant I’d be the happiest girl in the world. 

What is your guilty pleasure tv show?

Well I’m off to watch other shows I have DVRed and haven’t had time to watch, I hope you all have a great night, and I’m hoping all your Friday’s go by quickly.

Positive Spin

I decided to take a couple more days to regroup and think about everything.  After reading Tina’s post this morning about having a positive attitude, and “fake it until you make it”  I realized that it’s something I need to give a try.  My life is fabulous, I have an amazing family, and a fantastic fiancé (that feels so weird to type, and even weirder to say, after 4 and ½ years of calling him my boyfriend it feels weird calling Andrew anything else), and such a great group of friends.   So what if I skipped some meals last week, like so many of you said in the comments, it’s okay to mess up, as long as you realize it and move on.  I beat myself up and you guys helped me move past it.
Yesterday  Rose left a comment and invited me to email her to chat more about everything.  After just a couple emails back and forth I felt better.  She gave me such obvious advice I felt stupid for not thinking of it on my own.  It’s still amazes me that the blogging community is so supportive, I get comments that make me smile, and make me think.  Rose did not have to offer to talk to me through email but she did, and put a lot of things into perspective for me.  So thank you Rose for all your help yesterday and this morning!
I finally restocked my fridge and pantry, also thanks to Rose.  I won her contest a little over a month ago and she sent me $50 dollars in gift cards to Shop Rite.  I bought so much fresh produce and other essentials and wound up only spending $17 of my own money!!

For breakfast today I had a vanilla Chobani with a crushed up Luna bar.  I am going to try to refrain from eating to many bars for now, because I’m eating them way to much.  But I have to say this combo was fantastic, like a cookies and cream Ice cream cup.  Yum.

Here’s the bar all crumbled in:
 

And all Mixed up:
 

For lunch I had an easy but favorite meal.  I was looking for my Arnold’s sandwich thins last night at the store, but they didn’t have any instead I found Pepperidge Farms “Deli Flats”  pretty much the same thing, and dare I say I liked them a little better?  I’ll need to do a side by side comparison in the future.  I had an open faced pb sandwich with apple slices on top.  This might taste better to me then a banana and pb sandwich. 

Around 3 my tummy started to growl so I had a peach.  My first one of the season!  It wasn’t quite ripe enough yet but it definitely was delicious!

I came home from work and got changed to go out to dinner with my family and Andrew.  My sister graduated yesterday!!!!  I’m so happy and excited for her, and I definitely shed a few tears at the graduation yesterday, I’m so proud of my little sister!  Before I left I just had to break out the pickles I bought yesterday.  They’re Baaaack!

My mom wanted us all to go out to dinner and I offered to pay since my parents have taken us out so much lately.  We decided to hit up Applebees.  I got the Fiesta Lime Chicken but apparently I had a little trouble reading the menu.  It said:

Grilled chicken drizzled with zesty lime sauce, topped with Mexi-ranch and Jack-cheddar, and served with crisp tortilla strips, seasoned rice, and pico de gallo.

For some reason I completely didn’t see the Mexi-Ranch in the description and thought it was just going to have fresh squeezed lime juice on it.  It tasted pretty good, although I am not at all a fan of ranch dressing of any kind.  This totally skewed what I would have estimated the calorie count at.  I ate just a few of the tortilla strips, ate about 1/2 the chicken and 1/2 the rice.  It was tasty but definitely something I would completely modify if I got again, sub in some steamed broccoli for the rice, and tell them to leave off the mexi-ranch and cheese.

Thanks again for all the support these past few weeks!  I hope you all have a fabulous night!

I’m Back!

Thanks for all the comments about my mom.  She came home Sunday and is healing and recovering perfectly.  Her appendix hadn’t ruptured so the surgery was pretty simple and not really invasive, here’s a little blurb I found online about the type of surgery she got:

The laparoscopic (minimally invasive) surgical technique involves making several tiny cuts in the abdomen and inserting a miniature camera and surgical instruments. As many as three or four incisions are made. The surgeon then removes the appendix with the instruments, so there is usually no need to make a large incision in the abdomen. The camera projects a magnified image of the area onto a television monitor which helps guide the surgeons as they remove the appendix.

They actually sent her home with pictures of her appendix before they removed it.  It’s so weird.  She’s happy to be home and was touched by your comments, thoughts, and prayers.  

I really missed blogging but to be honest my meals were far from “blog worthy”, too much convenience food for sure.  I stepped on the scale positive I gained a pound but luckily I stayed the same.  Time to kick my butt into gear.  I feel like I’m stuck in a rut, and plan to correct that soon.  I am pulling out some cookbooks and looking for some fun new recipes to try out because I feel like every week I’m eating the same thing and I’m getting bored with it.  I really need to refocus on eating better and exercising more often, the weather has been nice in the mornings when I’m leaving for work and I think I need to get out of bed early and get a run or walk in bright and early so I don’t have any excuses, I just need to make myself a morning person.

For breakfast this morning I had the usual Chobani and a Heart Thrive Energy Bar. 

I picked that package up (the flavor was Raisin Spice) when I was at the hospital Sunday afternoon and absolutely loved it, unfortunately that’s the only place I’ve ever seen them so I might be sneaking into the hospital coffee shop to pick them up every so often.  The flavor was perfect and they are very dense.

The nutrition facts are pretty great!

 

INGREDIENTS

OATS, BROWN RICE SYRUP, RAISINS, BROWN RICE FLOUR, SOY PROTEIN CONCENTRATE, SOY FLOUR, RICE BRAN, INULIN (CHICORY ROOT EXTRACT), NATURAL FRUIT JUICE, DRIED PLUMS, DRIED APPLES, DRIED PEARS, CALCIUM CITRATE, CINNAMON, NUTMEG.

Lunch today was pretty boring I had a sandwich Thin, this is a recycled picture, I forgot to take a picture of my lunch, I did not have an orange but a Mcintosh apple that a co-worker gave to me.  He brought a whole bag in and put it in our fridge and told us to help ourselves, so I of course did, I wound up cutting a few slices of apple and placing it one of the halves.  I wish I had some granola to sprinkle on, but I’m all out.

This did not stick with me long by 2 I was hungry luckily I started to put bars in my purse for those more snacky days.  Something I should have been doing all along but oh well.

Favorite bar ever!  I need to restock because I’m pretty sure that was my last one.

Dinner tonight was an easy one, I had plans to go on a walk with my friend Jessica, so I wanted something fast.  I used my last piece of ww naan and made a pineapple, meatless meatball pizza.  A flavor combo I’ll never get sick of.

 

Naan bread is the perfect size for a personal pizza.

In fun news I just bought a new phone Sunday night.  I’m officially addicted to my blackberry.

I couldn’t get a good picture of it, but this is the exact one I got.  Look familiar?  Rose just got the same one as well. I don’t know how I ever functioned without it. 

Well I’m off to snuggle and watch tv, see you tomorrow! 

Soft and Squishy

Those are pretty much the only things I can eat, anything that gives any resistance when chewing makes my jaw scream in pain from the ear infection.  Although almost everything I had tasted better it seems fruit and veggies are the major offenders in the taste category.  Wonderful I’m craving a salad but the crunch factor and the taste factor have kept me away.

For breakfast today I stuck with another soft bar.

So good, and I could actually taste it, of course the flavor was not as strong as it normally would be but it was still better then no taste at all.

For lunch I had some pb on an Arnold Sandwich Thin and an orange.  The orange tasted gross and I could barely taste the pb, I hope this infection clears up soon.

For dinner I didn’t know I wanted, I really need to go food shopping but don’t want to waste money on fresh produce when I know I’m going to be reluctant to eat it.  I’m planning on going Friday no matter what because I can’t go this long with out a nice big summer salad.  We decided to go to a local restaurant where they served breakfast so I could enjoy the french toast.

Nice and soft, it didn’t hurt at all to eat and I swear I could taste some cinnamon.  I also got 3 pieces of bacon on the side and since bacon is such a strong flavor I could totally taste it, again not as strong as if I was completely healthy but better then most things.  The bacon did hurt to chew a little,  because of my ears but it wasn’t too bad. 

After that we went to Andrew’s parents house to visit, and the to Petsmart to pick up some things for Geoffrey.  I’ll take some pictures tomorrow of his new home because we just finished setting it up.

Well tomorrow is my Friday already!  I love 3 day weeks!  Have a great night everyone!

Rainy Day Giveaway

I’m so excited to have my first giveaway! Let’s get the eats out of the way first.

After blogging yesterday I had a banana with pb.

You probably didn’t notice but the house we’re renting has the same plates my mom has at her house.  Weird.

Then Andrew and I did some more shopping.  The rain never really slowed down yesterday so we watched Little Miss Sunshine after returning until dinner time.

For dinner we were going to have grilled chicken but with the rain my dad didn’t feel like going outside to cook, so we baked it in the oven, it was marinated in Italian dressing.

On the side we had broccoli and Near East Wild Rice in the Garlic and Herb flavor.

Perfect dinner!

And to drink with dinner I had:

Last night we went to bed nice and early, when I woke up this morning it was raining again.  The good news is the weather is supposed to be really nice the rest of the week, so we used today to do some more shopping.  Before we left I had a Peach Chobani with cereal.

I love cereal/yogurt messes.

We went to do some more shopping today at the outlets.  In addition to some clothes that I purchased, my SUPER wonderful mom bought me a gorgeous new Coach bag!

I love the blue color!  I have the best mom!

Between stores I had a Clif Chocolate Chip Z bar.

On top of my Coach bag from last year.

Andrew and I also made a special purchase today.  I’d like to introduce you to our new pet, Geoffrey.

He is a Hermit Crab with a Giraffe painted shell.  Giraffes are by far my favorite animal and if I can’t have one of those as a pet, a hermit crab with a giraffe shell will have to do.  Apparently he is tired from an exciting day he was climbing on the side of his cage for a while on the way home but now he’s sleeping, I’m sure you’ll see plenty of pictures of Geoffrey in the future.

For lunch we stopped at Sonic.  We don’t have any Sonic’s near us so everyone wanted to try it, I was going to wait until we got home to eat but we still had more shopping to do.  So I got a grilled chicken sandwich with no mayo.

It looks like a whole wheat bun but I can’t be sure.  It was pretty good.

Now that I have caught you all up on the past few meals it’s time for…

My First Giveaway!

One of my favorite things about vacation is buying my friends souvenirs.  It’s always so fun to come home from vacation and share something from your time away with your friends.  You girls have all been really good friends to me since I started this blog back in January so although I can’t buy something for everyone I’d like to give you each the chance to have some great souvenirs from The Outer Banks!  I bought a few things to give to one lucky reader.

Here’s each item in the giveaway.

First up is a T-Shirt.  It’s a size small but it looks like it would fit most people, if you win and you require a different size I will gladly exchange it before sending it to you.  It looks pink but it is tan with green writing.

The next thing is a magnet clip.

The next item is a coffee mug.

And the last 2 items are some local treats.

I love salt water taffy and I found a cute little tote bag stuffed with some salt water taffy.

Last part of the package is a can of nuts from a local shop that’s called Try My Nuts.  I picked out a can of peanuts called Dirty Nuts.  They are seasoned with salt, paprika, black pepper, garlic, onion, and chipotle.  I was able to sample them while at the store yesterday and I can tell you they are really delicious.

Here’s the package all together.

I am on the lookout for a nice big tote bag for the winner as well so I’ll be adding that to the prize as well, and will share it with you as soon as I find and buy it.

I’m giving you a couple ways to win:

1. Leave a comment (on this post!) telling me your favorite vacation spot.
2. Link back to this on your blog, if you don’t have a blog send me an email at 365healthyeats@gmail.com, be sure to let me know if you linked it in the comment section.

So there you go! I’ll announce the winner Friday afternoon so you have plenty of time to enter!