Touchy Feely

Will had to head to work a bit early today, so I mixed up some berry overnight oats for everyone for breakfast.

These weren't quite as yummy as last time...maybe it was because I was using a different brand of greek yogurt?

Nobody barfed last night(!) and everyone slept pretty well so after observing appetites and attitudes for awhile this morning I decided it was time to GET OUT OF THE HOUSE and get started on some of the fun things I had wanted to check out with the girls over spring break.  I got some free coffee at Baltimore Tea and Coffee (which is now in the 2nd round of Coffee Madness!), mailed 3 packages of diapers off to their new homes and then we headed down to Virginia to visit the Leesburg Animal Park.  It blew Emily's mind when we drove over the Potomac into Virginia that we were in a DIFFERENT STATE, HOW COULD WE HAVE GONE SO FAR???  I guess she was remembering when we drove to Virginia Beach which IS in fact far from our house, but we only live about 15 minutes away from the state line.

I really liked the animal park.  It was a good size for little kids to be able to explore in about 2 hours and it wasn't crowded despite the fact that it's spring break.  At least I think it's spring break in Virginia.

There were chickens running EVERYWHERE, which the girls loved to chase, and having grown up around chickens myself I was quite nervous about their temperaments (mostly the roosters) (Oh my God I never knew that word was spelled "temperament", I've been writing "temperment" my whole life) but every animal there was super-nice, even the giant Tom turkeys.

Dun dun DUNNNNN

Quite an agreeable chap

Some of the animals weren't very hungry but you can always count on the sheep

A peacock!

They're not quite so pretty from the back (they're basically just a lot of arrows pointing to an anus from this direction)

Friendly chicken who let us pet and hold him (he was probably too weak to run away because he had avian flu or something)

Super-friendly llama

Camels are totally huge

The monkey swung over, assumed this position right in front of us, and emptied his bladder

 You want to know what the girls' favorite part was though?

 Yep.  The moon bounce.  Which was pretty much exactly like the one in our basement.

Glad I drove 40 minutes and paid $11.50 per kid to do something we can do for free by walking downstairs.

While they were hopping, I pulled out my lunch.  I hadn't felt like taking the time to pack a salad while I was trying to get everyone out the door this morning, but I did toss some portable salad-toppers in my cooler and was able to pick up a nice salad base at Baltimore Tea and Coffee.

Veggie salad, single-serving brie from TJ's, 12 tamari almonds and half a pack of Newman's Own balsamic vinegar

I was really excited to try this little guy!

Adorable AND delicious

As a brie-lover in a family full of non brie-eaters these are fantastic for me!  Plus the rind was thin and not too bitter.

Perfect

 I put half the packet of balsamic vinegarette on my salad, then threw the rest away so I wouldn't be tempted to use the rest.  And then do you want to know what happened?

The wind blew my salad onto the ground.

Luckily the clamshell clapped shut when it hit the ground so I still got SOME of the greens, but I lost all the tomatoes, cucumber, carrots and balsamic vinegarette.  You know, all the stuff that made the salad worth eating.

I consoled myself with some grapes.

Not this many, though

I couldn't get on the moon bounce though, it specifically said no fatties.

We all did enjoy ourselves though.  After the moon bounce we did some...

Water-befouling

Simultaneous camera-looking!

Pony riding

x2

Rabbit-poking

Turkey-chasing

Pigeon-chasing

Woah-dang

"He flapped me!"

Tiny rabbit-poking

After our full morning we drove home, where I had to figure out how to make myself a tasty smoothie without a banana because we were out.  I was going to use dates to sweeten it, but I couldn't find any dates either.  I unearthed this packet of Vega performance protein though, so I decided to use that instead.

Protein packet, spinach, ice, almond milk, 1 orange, soda water, TJs fiber cereal (aka crunchy sticks, aka pretzel legs)

Oh God.  This was such a nasty smoothie.  I just have not liked any of the Vega packets I've tried.  It was tongue-stabbingly stevia-ish and so grainy!  I had put in the soda water to dilute it a little bit and to try to replicate the 1/2 vanilla shake 1/2 sprite drinks I used to make for myself at McDonalds as a teenager.  It sure didn't work.  It just made A LOT of smoothie (2 of these glasses full!), and I had to drink every sip like medicine.  I've heard such good things about Vega powder from Lauren, I must be trying the wrong kind.

And speaking of Lauren, I finally met up with her at her Bodypump class tonight!  My friend Kim took it with me too (and was nice enough to reserve me a bench while I was walking around the outside of the gym a hundred times to check myself in and check the kids into daycare because the gym is refinishing the floor and everyone had to go through the back door but you had to go into the daycare by the FRONT door but there was no sign to tell you that before you were already all the way in the gym AAAAAAARGH) and it was great!  I love working out with friends because it counts as exercise AND socializing so it's multitasking and therefore efficient.  It was also my first workout since Friday, it was mostly tracks from release 79 which is widely considered (by my mother and myself) to be the toughest release to date, AND I had to go up on weight for a couple tracks due to the fact that the new gym doesn't have 1.25lb weights, just 2.5lb weights and I refuse to go backwards.  All of these factors made it TOUGH, but it felt really good to be moving and lifting again after laying around being sick for days and I thought I did pretty well.

Back home again I ate a fajita salad, but I didn't want raw spinach as my base so I wilted it a bit first.

Wilted spinach, tomatoes, salsa, sautéed bell peppers and onions, corn kernels, refried beans, chopped flank steak, plain greek yogurt, avocado hummus, cilantro

It looks all pretty once it's assembled, but then I mix it up before I eat it so that every tasty bite has a mix of flavors and it looks not-so-nice.

I actually ate half of the salad before Bodypump, then scarfed the rest when I got home.  I also ate an entire champagne mango because they are PERFECTLY ripe right now and sooooo good.

 I can't believe I lived over half of my life without knowing what a mango was.  The first time I remember hearing about mangoes was when Will's aunt came to visit when we were in high school and took us to Rita's (real italian ices).  She got a mango-flavored Misto shake, and I asked her what it tasted like because I had no idea what a mango was.  I don't know if I had a mango between then and my honeymoon, but the first mango I REALLY remember eating was consumed on the porch of our room overlooking the ocean in St. Lucia.  I thought it was one of the best fruits I've ever tasted, and even now after years of mango-eating I still think it might've been.  The setting didn't hurt either :-)  These little champagne mangoes are close though.

I was hungry and needed a bit of sustenance before putting Emily to bed, so I had a couple dates (we DID have some!) dipped in peanut butter.

After putting Emily to bed I was STILL hungry, so I gave up and had my dessert mix.  It wasn't great though actually, because the only chocolate chips we had were the Sunspire 43% chocolate chips I accidentally bought.  They just tasted super-sweet and after awhile bitter at the same time.  I will be picking up more of the grain-sweetened dark chocolate chips ASAP.

Now it's time for some grapefruit, Star Trek, and picking up for the maids before bed.  I have another adventure planned for tomorrow!