Dish 24 Hawaiian Chicken

I had to go look this one up because all I could remember about this dish was that "I think it had pineapples and chicken in it."  (In my defense I made this dish in mid-December).  It also has bbq sauce.  It goes well with rice.  Anyway, a friend of mine (who might be reading this now, shout out to you, you know who you are) gave me a crockpot cookbook for my birthday and told me that when she saw me the following weekend she expected me to have tried at least one of the recipes in the book and she wanted a full report.  Well, of course this happened on a particularly busy week, but the night before I saw her, I managed to find a recipe that sounded good (and one I had ingredients for) and make it.  I was pleased to report to her the next day that it was good.  According to the recipe, it goes well with broccoli.  I like broccoli, but my fiance doesn't (he was having some too) so I skipped the broccoli, but when I make it again, I'll probably throw in some broccoli--at least for my portion.

Potholes: Excuse 32 for not exercising

Let me preface this by saying I'm NOT an exercise nut nor am I someone who needs a ton of motivation to go to the gym and comes up with many excuses not to go (though I do think of some from time to time).  Usually I work out 5-6 times a week, on a good week, I get all 7 days.  I wouldn't say I like working out.  I mean it's more fun than cleaning the shower, driving in the snow, eating peas (I hate peas), doing my taxes, etc, but I'd certainly pick traveling, watching a movie, reading a book, going out with my friends, etc over exercise if I had the choice.  But alas I am not a fit size zero (nor even close) so I've made exercising a habit--it took a while, but it's there.  Usually if I don't exercise it's because a) there's a snowstorm and the roads are bad, though sometimes if that happens, I'll just workout at home; b) I'm out of town on vacation; c) I'm legit busy (like I had to work late or had to go to some meeting) or d) I'm sick--though truth be told there have been times I probably should have stayed home drinking oj and having cough drops instead of trying to burn calories.  But I'm getting carried away so let's get to the point of this blog.  Yesterday morning I drove to the gym.  Now it's bad enough that a row and a half of parking is gone because they put all the snow there; why they can't combine it into just a few parking spaces is beyond me.  Thankfully, I'm on vacation this week so I could go in the morning instead of during "peek time" because goodness knows if I'd find a space then.   Now before one get can to the limited parking one has to play "which pot hole do I want to eat my car today?"  I'm not kidding.  In this day and age where we can do so many wonderful things, why can we NOT find a way to fix pot holes and keep them fixed.  If you try to avoid one pot hole, you hit another because they take up the whole lane entering the gym parking lot.  So while I may be fit after this winter because I'm doing better with my exercising, my car may not be so "fit."  Too bad getting fit doesn't keep your car fit.  Speaking of being fit, in addition to my regular exercise routine, I'm trying this new week long work out plan.  Man, there are some tough moves out there.  I exercise my legs a lot, but my legs and shoulders are killing me.  I've decided I do not like burpees or mountain climbers.  I semi like the wall sit, but OUCH.  Oh, and  I still stink at push-ups.  Today's work-out involved yoga.  I can't wait to find out where I'll be sore tomorrow.  ay ay ay.  I believe tomorrow's focuses on abs...Stay fit and watch out for those pot holes everyone! 

A Successful Week

Be proud of me people, I made it through a WHOLE week (actually OVER a week) without chocolate.  Not bad for a girl with a HUGE sweet tooth.  That included Valentine's Day, a trip to the Cheesecake Factory, a peek in a bakery, M&Ms galore at work, delicious-looking brownies at a going away party this afternoon, and living with my fiance's chocolate chip cookies sitting on the kitchen table (and his Oreo cheesecake glaring at me every time I open the fridge).  I wish I could tell you I've been eating really healthy, but that would be a lie as I made cheesecake brownies last week and had some blondies this week.  Nonetheless, my calorie count has been better than during my "chocolate days."  We'll see how the next month goes...

Wedding Stuff Again

Wedding plans are slowly coming along.  We haven't done a ton more since I last blogged about it.  The website is pretty much done.  I do want to get a few more pictures on it, but otherwise, it's good.  I can't believe how many hours I spent on it one recent weekend.  Trying to find pictures of some of the bridesmaids and groomsmen took a while.  I wanted a pic of me with each of my bridesmaids and one of my fiance with each of his groomsmen.  I had an easier time doing mine.  I'm only missing one.  He's missing 2 or 3, but I dig around quite a bit to get those so I'm not terribly optimistic I'm going to find more (nor our his friends likely to pose with him for a picture any time soon).  To go with our travel theme, we decided to put some of my old postcards to good use (I collected postcards as a kid).  I saw in some wedding book that instead of having guests sign a guest book, they write a little note on a postcard, sign it, and then put it in a small suitcase.  So I've been picking out good ones.  We've also been looking at djs and photographers on-line.  We think we know which dj we want to use.  We still haven't started playing the lottery (nor are we going to) so I'm not sure how we're going to win the lottery to pay for all of this stuff.  :-p  And what one of my co-workers calls, "shed to wed" is continuing.  This week went pretty well until today when I ate three blondies (NOT the ones with chocolate in them) and my fiance decided we should get a pizza tonight and the place where we got it sells good onion rings so of course I "had" to get some.  Sigh. 

Dish 23 A Fruity Christmas Tree

Okay so this dish required no cooking or baking, but still required a decent amount of prep work and it was GOOD.  In fact, I think I want to make it every Christmas (I made it three times this Christmas season).  I saw it on Pinterest and instantly wanted to make it (instead I waited a couple of weeks).  My friends seemed to enjoy it and one of them even requested it for a January gathering she hosted. 

Confessions of a Chocoholic Days 3-6

Desipte some temptations, I've managed to stay successful in my attempts not to eat chocolate.  Friday wasn't too bad, though someone did bring me a white cupcake with chocolate frosting (I offered it to the custodian who glady accepted it).  Saturday my fiance and I went to visit his parents.  His mom gave us peanut butter cups as part of a Valentine's Day gift.  I told my fiance he could have them all.  That night we went to The Cheesecake Factory for a belated Valentine's Day dinner.  Despite, going ridiculously early at 5:00 there was still an hour wait.  We figured if we went early we wouldn't have to wait long, apparently many other people had the same idea.  Is that restaurant ever NOT busy?  Anyway, since we had time to kill we wandered around the mall and where did my fiance decide to go?  To some new cupcake place.  I went in with him then walked out to wait across the aisle.  The cupcakes just looked too darn good.  Then it was back to the CF to wait for another 1/2 hour.  We ate dinner and ordered cheesecake to go.  My favorites have chocolate in them, but I was a good girl and ordered an apple one that was still unhealthy, but no chocolate.  It was quite good.  An in an attempt to be a little healthier I hate half on Saturday and half on Sunday. 

Dish 22 Five Minute Fudge

Don't let the name deceive you.  It did not take five minutes to make this fudge, it took longer.  (Maybe it's supposed to mean how long it takes to eat it???).  Despite thinking it would only take five minutes to make, which it didn't, I enjoyed this dish and would gladly make it again.  I gave many of my co-workers baked goodies for Christmas and I included this fudge in their packages of goodies.  I think next time I make it, I might try it without the nuts because some of my friends/family do not like nuts. 

Confessions of a Chocoholic Day 2

I'm a little embarrassesd to admit this, but I have no idea why Easter falls when it does.  Christmas is always Dec. 25th, Thanksgiving is always the 4th Thursday in November, Valentine's Day is always Feb. 14th, St Pat's Feb. 17th, I could keep going, but I think you get the point, well, one more...even Election Day is always the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November (in other words it can never be Nov. 1st).  So how does Easter work?  Why it is in mid March some years and late April others?  Actually, I think Hanukkah changes dates and I'm not sure why for that one either, but moving on to my point.  This year Valentine's Day fell during Lent.  At my job, Valentine's Day means lots of treats.  And many of those treats contain chocolate.  But be proud, people, I did not have any!  I even scraped the M&Ms off the small Rice Kripie treat I ate so as not to consume any chocolate.  In retrospect, it's probably for the best that I am giving up chocolate because I ate well over my recommended calories BEFORE dinner.  Anyway, first thing this morning someone brought me a box of chocolates. (They are now in my freezer).  Later on, someone tried to give me one of those pretzels with an M&Ms on top.  I really wanted one, but I passed.  When I got home, I found out someone else had given me two of those (they are in the freezer too) as are several other chocolates I received on Valentine's Day.  Fortunately or unfortunately, the cupcake I received contained NO chocolate as did the sugar cookie I received.  And let's not even discuss the large quantities of crackers and cheese I ate.  (Some of the crackers were whole wheat and I ate a lot of strawberries too, at least those are healthy.)  So as hard as it was to NOT eat the chocolate I guess it might before the best, otherwise I'd probably be 1000s of calories above my goal instead of a couple hundred.  :(  Let's see if my will power lasts at The Cheesecake Factory this weekend. Here's hoping...

Dish 21 Gift Wrapped Cake

Oh boy am I behind on the recipe list.  I made this one before Christmas.  It probably only semi counts because it's a cake (and let's face it, I've made cake many times), but it's more the decorating that makes this one "new."  You make a square cake (okay so I usually make rectangular cakes so that's a little different), then you frost it, decorate it with M&Ms, and then put something on it to look like a bow.  The recipe asked for ribbon candy or something like that, which looked like ribbon, but since I didn't have any of that, I just bought and used Twizzlers.  I made this again a couple of weeks later and remembered to take a picture then.  It was cuter the first time because I used red and green M&Ms, but this time I didn't have enough green left so I had to use all red. 

Confessions of a Chocoholic Day -1 and Day 1

So I'm not the most religious person in the world, but I decided to TRY to give something up for Lent this year.  I make no promises because I have unsuccessfully tried to give things up before, but this time I'm attempting to give up chocolate (with perhaps some exceptions i.e. wedding cake).  So Tuesday night (or what I'm referring to as Day -1) I decided to treat myself to something delicious that contained chocolate.  I went to the grocery store and found some mini chocolate chip cookie sandwiches.  Sounded good to me.  I bought a package and I was so excited to eat them when I got home.  I ate one and it wasn't that good so I ate another one thinking maybe that was just a bad one, no luck, had a 3rd one.  Guess what?  Still not good.  Boo!  I went to my dance class and later on that night after dinner tried another one and well, they didn't magically start tasting better.  Double boo!  So I had a half a cup of hot chocolate and got mad at myself for not picking a better treat. 
Ash Wednesday began and breakfast was not a problem.  Before lunch, someone offered me a chocolate cupcake.  I said no thank you and managed to avoid chocolate for the first time during Lent.  At lunch, one of my co-workers offered me a piece of chocolate candy.  I told her I couldn't have one and explained why and managed to not eat the candy.  I offered my co-workers some chocolate candies I had at home so I wouldn't eat them during Lent.  So all went well UNTIL Wed night.  My best friend, her husband, and their two daughters came over.  I made dinner (and a non-chocolate desesrt).  After dinner and clean up, I put out my dessert and my friend put out her...wait for it...chocolate cupcakes (with chocolate frosting).  They looked so good, but alas I did not eat one.  I ate my cheesecake bar (which was quite good and one of the dishes I made earlier in the year for the 52 recipes in 52 weeks) instead.  1 day down, how many more to go? 

Bye Bye Chocolate???

So I'm contemplating giving up chocolate for Lent.  It's been a while since I've successfully given anything up for lent, but as I'm TRYING to eat healthier, I think this might be a good one to try.  That way I can still have a few sweets, but it will drastically reduce how many I can have.  There's a catch or two though.  I have a wedding to attend at the end of March and if they have wedding cake, I'll want some.  Maybe it won't be chocolate, but if it is, I'm not sure I can pass it up.  I also have the food tasting for our wedding during Lent.  I don't know if there'll be dessert at the food tasting or not, but I kind of want to sample all the stuff so I know what we want, though honestly, I'd pick a white cake over chocolate any day.  I love chocolate, but for some reason, I much prefer white cake to chocolate cake.  So do you think it's awful if I mostly give up chocolate, but allow myself:  wedding chocolates--my friend's cake and the food tasting (and maybe one St. Patrick's Day chocolate ball?).  If the wedding and food tasting don't offer chocolate cake, then I really would only be cheating once.  And I don't really HAVE to have a St. Patrick's Day chocolate.  I just know I'll want one since I'm making them for my annual St. Patrick's Day party.  I'm sure there'll be a blog on here at some point about whether or not I actually go through with this chocolate business.  Wish me good luck if I do!   

Dish 20 Cream Cheese Chocolate Chip Cookies

These were delicious.  I like chocolate chip cookies anyway, but something about adding cream cheese to them just adds to the deliciousness.  I found the recipe on-line while looking for something else, go figure.  I would definitely make them again.  I made them for some of my co-workers and they told me they really liked them too.  Yay! 

Dish 19 Ritzy Chicken Bake

This dish was kind of a last minute decision. We were going away the next day so we had lots to do and we didn't end up eating 'til around 9:30 so we were HUNGRY and at that point probably most anything would have tasted good, but desipte that I think that was still decent.  The ingredients included:  chicken (duh), Ranch dressing, Ritz crackers.  There were more than that, but that's all I can remember at the moment.  Anyway, it was easy to make and good to eat.  I would make it again. 

More Wedding Stuff

I don't really have a ton of news to report in wedding land, but I needed a break from recipes.  :-)  My fiance and I went to a bridal show in early January and got some information about photographers, but we haven't booked one yet.  We did look at some on-line.  I also FINALLY started looking at dresses on-line--for me and for my bridesmaids.  Oh my goodness there are so many choices.  There are also a lot of ugly dresses out there.  I saw a bunch of bridesmaid dresses that I liked for me, but I had to remind myself that I am not wearing them.  I did show them to my maid of honor and she liked some of them too.  I plan to start looking for dresses for me this summer.  :)  I found a few I liked on-line though so we'll see if that leads to anything.  I also started making a wedding website.  That has been kind of fun.  In fact, that reminds me, I should go do some more work on that so I'm off. 

Dish 18 Pumpkin Strikes Again (and it's delicious)

Are you sensing a theme with all these pumpkin dishes?  Yes, it was way back in October/November when I made all this stuff.  I don't usually crave pumpkin stuff in mid-winter, but after writing all these posts, I kind of want some.  So dish 18 was pumpkin dip.  It was delicious, but I made way too much.  I followed the recipe, but it made a LOT of dip.  I made it for a dinner I hosted for some friends and I also made it for Thanksgiving.  If you ever decide to make it, it goes well with apples and those nilla wafter things.  My mom has made it before and she said Teddy Grams go well with the pumpkin dip too.  Anyway, this dish was fairly easy to make and tasted good so I rate is as a success. 

Dish 17=Delicious

Dish 17 was a successful delight or should I say a delightful success.  Either way, it was GOOD.  I made pumpkin whoopie pies.  They were good.  The filling was quite different from my apple whoopie pies, but still good.  I made them two more times after making them for this project and my friends seemed to enjoy them.  I definitely plan to make them again in October. 

Dish 16

Due to 30 Pictures in 30 Days, I'm a bit behind on my 52 Dishes in 52 Weeks.  Perhaps I should have written this blog post in October when I actually made this dish as it feels weird to be writing about jack-o'-lantern cake in the middle of winter, but such is life.  Anyway, dish 16 was a bit of an accidental dish.  While shopping at Target one day in October, on a whim, I bought a cake pan shaped like a jack-o-lantern.  The pan came with a recipe for, you guessed it, jack-o-lantern cake so I made it and brought it to a friend's house for Game Night.  The cake was all right, but not as moist as I'm used to.  It looked cute though since it was shaped like a jack-o-lantern.  I put orange frosting on it to add to the cuteness.  :-)