Needle-less

So as I sit down to write, I think I can safely say that all the cactus needles are now out of my face.  So even if the rest of my day had sucked, it was still a win.

The rest of my day did NOT suck however.  I started out with cereal again, but this time I put walnuts on top so it would stick with me a bit longer.

Shredded wheat squares, strawberries, bananas, cinnamon, xylitol, skim milk, walnuts

I did errands with Charlotte all morning, and I tried to make it fun for her.  With Emily in preschool in the mornings I get some Charlotte alone time but I usually use it to go to the gym or do errands which makes me feel guilty.  I think she had a pretty good time today though.  She greeted everyone who came into the post office while I was sending off packages, rode the merry-go-round outside of K-Mart, and got to visit with the fish and birds at Ricks Fish and Pet Supply while I tried to buy a new snail for Will's frog cube.  Apparently there is a snail shortage going on because they didn't have a single one in any of their aquariums.  I blame the snakehead fish invasion.

Since Remy ate Charlotte's egg off the table this morning and Emily consumed most of her egg white, I was forced to have a hard boiled egg as my mid-morning snack.

It was one of the pink ones

Lunch was another salad almost exactly like yesterday's except I used a blob of hummus instead of chickpeas.

Fatteh salad

 See the article about chia seeds in the newspaper below it?  I'm so excited that some of the things we eat that used to be considered "weird" are becoming more mainstream, like chia seeds and smoothies with spinach and roasted nori.  When you can buy something at Costco, it's officially mainstream.  Except that you can't buy roasted nori at Costco anymore which SUCKS because my kids eat several packages a day.  My friend Carolyn sometimes goes to a magic Costco that still carries it, so I'm holding out hope that my Costco is just out of stock for awhile and it will come back.  I'm sorry that I just spent longer talking about roasted nori than I really needed to.

I made another attempt at my piña colada smoothie today using coconut milk yogurt and almond milk, which made it practically protein-less :-(  So I threw in 12 almonds to help out in that department.  It was very good but a little watery...since the ingredients I was using are a bit less rich than my normal greek yogurt and cow's milk I think I over-iced it.

Coconut milk yogurt, almond milk, coconut butter, pineapple, vanilla extract, ice

 Dinner is all wonky on Wednesdays since I pack the girls up and go to a Bodypump class at 5:30.  We return too late to start making anything afterward, but 4:30 is kinda too early for dinner.  Today I just made it all up at 4:30 anyway and served it, then I ate half before class and half after.  It worked well for me, and I knew that way that the girls had full tummies in daycare without filling them up with snacks right before dinner time.

Based on this recipe, although I realize now upon looking at it that I forgot to add the ginger tonight!  Shoot!

Bodypump tonight was great!  Lauren was the teacher, and my friend Kim and cousin Maddie took the class too.  It's so much fun when you work out with people you know, it reminds me of the days when all my friends used to go to the gym together and exercising was like a party.  I also noticed that after 2.5 weeks of staying for the last 3 tracks of Bodypump I am making measurable improvements, like being able to lunge deeper more easily and doing more of the pushups on my toes before I collapse to my knees so I left the gym feeling pretty happy.  Plus I had  more dinner waiting for me when I got home!

I told Emily a bedtime story featuring a creepy black unicorn who it turned out was cursed and was really a sparkling golden boy unicorn who ended up falling in love with and marrying princess Emily the unicorn, and once I came downstairs I had a pear and stevia-chocolate dessert.

So yay for a day that would've been good even without the added bonus of me being in much less pain by the end than I was at the outset!