I’m frustrated with myself and the whole get-fit-lose-weight-be-healthy campaign. It happens. It sucks. I’m working on it.
I’ve started cooking again more.
I have a new favorite oatmeal concoction – oatmeal+milk+apple cider+smashed banana+Trader Joe’s apple cranberry butter. It’s amazing.
I’m working on getting a treadmill for the house so I can pick up running again after dropping it for various reasons.
Rob and I are starting our Black Friday attack plan.
I got sucked into the Twilight saga and am practically twitching in anticipation of getting my hands on the next book on Thursday.
I’m 90 percent sure I’m going to have brown hair this winter. There’s a Nov. 22 appointment, now I just have to not chicken out. I’ve only had brown hair once, in the third grade. I’m not sure how it happened, but it was definitely brown. Weird.
It took a lot of strength to not switch to a Christmas theme for this here blog, but I recognize that not everyone is as obsessed with all things Christmasy like me.
The end.
The caffeinated lifestye is not for me. Today: (double-strength coffee+hot chocolate packet) + no breakfast + coke with lunch + afternoon latte = Jittery Jenny.
I felt the need to peel off my skin on my drive home, so I opted out of my usual Monday-evening stop at Trader Joe’s. Once in the safety of my own home, I indeed peeled my skin off my body. OK, maybe not. But I did strip down to my skivvies and donned my fuzzy, roomy, deliciously soft bath robe and gulped down a glass of water and waited out the jitters.
Note to self: Lay off the caffeine. You go days without a caffeinated beverage. What made you think it was smart to drink three gold mines in one day? Dumbass.
Side note to self: You know better than to go grocery shopping on anything but a freshly fed stomach. The bag o’ salad you threw in at the last minute didn’t exactly redeem the rest of your snacky, not-real-meal purchases. Nice try, though. Dumbass.
Do you know my vocab well enough to figure out those letters?
Back to what’s important, this chicken pot pie. I saw the recipe (and delicious-looking photos – I’ll explain why I’m not providing my own) on a tasty little blog, Brown Eyed Baker. The recipes are rarely McSkinny, but they always look McTasty. And so I was sucked into making a definitely McFatty but totally McTasty meal for dinner last night.
I set out on my grocery expedition yesterday after making a detailed list of what I needed. Halfway to the store, I realized I left the list at home. Awesome. The rest of my drive was spent (probably not paying attention to driving) trying to remember everything I had written down. Once I got to the store, I was on a Supermarket-Sweep-like mission to get what I had remembered (which turned out to be the whole list – go me!) before it escaped my memory. Unfortunately, SuperTarget didn’t agree with my plans, even though I had gathered all my needed ingredients up to the very last and very crucial ingerdiant – the “pie” in my chicken pot pie. I planned to make one big pot pie instead of the four little ones the recipe calls for. Unfortunately, Target was totally out of puff pastry sheets, but they did have puff pastry rounds (6 in a box). Faced with the decision to hope the six rounds would somehow merge together in the baking process and become one blob of puffed pastry or taking my chances that a) another grocery store would have puff pastry sheets and b) I wouldn’t have to spend a fortune because their prices are higher, I opted to take my chances with the six individual pastry pieces.
Yeah, it didn’t work so well. The tops of the pastries browned, but the bottoms remained doughy. So that’s why there are no pictures. The “pie” didn’t really work. However, the “chicken pot” turned out famously, and even Rob, who was super wary of chicken pot pie (I’m sure he was picturing some sort of school cafeteria slop), absolutely loved it. I think I counted him making three trips back to the stove for more.
The recipe was wonderfully simple, and I can’t wait to try it again with a full sheet of puff pastry. Don’t worry. I plan to buy it the next time I see it, even if I don’t have everything else to make the chicken pot pie right then.
Oh, yeah. I think I over-eyeballed what would amount to 1/2 cup of all the veggies and ended up with about a full cup of each veggie. It worked out well, though, and I think it was better with the extra veggies.
Chicken Pot Pie
(Source: Williams Sonoma)8 Tbs. (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch cubes
½ cup all-purpose flour
4 cups chicken stock
½ tsp. chopped fresh thyme (I used 1/8 tsp dried thyme)
1 bay leaf
½ cup chopped yellow onions
½ cup chopped celery
½ cup peeled and chopped carrots
½ cup chopped white button mushrooms (blech – I “just say no” to fungus)
½ cup chopped red-skinned potatoes
1 cup chopped cooked chicken
½ cup cooked fresh or frozen peas
Salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
Four 6-inch squares frozen puff pastry
1 egg, beaten with 1 tsp. water
Preheat an oven to 400ºF.In a large saucepan over medium heat, melt the butter. Add the flour and cook, stirring constantly, until the mixture smells fragrant and nutty, 1 to 2 minutes. Slowly add the stock, whisking until smooth, and bring to a boil. Add the thyme, bay leaf, onions, celery, carrots and mushrooms and cook until the vegetables are tender, about 5 minutes. Add the potatoes, chicken, peas, salt and pepper and cook until the potatoes are tender, about 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and let cool for 5 minutes. Remove the bay leaf and discard.
Divide the filling among 4 ovenproof bowls and place on a baking sheet. Brush the puff pastry squares with the egg mixture. Brush the rims of the bowls with water. Place 1 pastry square on top of each bowl, pressing lightly on the edges. Bake until the pastry is puffed and golden brown, about 20 minutes. Let rest for 5 minutes before serving. Serves 4.
During my trip to BGSU’s homecoming, I was fortunate to have the opportunity to attend Cedar Creek Church, where I first truly developed my faith as a Christian. The message Pastor Lee Powell spoke on Sunday has been weighing on my mind since hearing it, especially since it followed a related conversation I had just days before.
There’s no point in me trying to elaborate or even help explain the message, so here are the notes Cedar Creek has provided on it, broken down into three lessons to learn from the message:
Lesson 1
“The Good News of the Gospel is not that God will provide a way to make life easier and better. We will, however, be empowered to draw close to God and love others well, and do both for one central purpose, to glorify God, to make him look good to any who watch us live.
‘…that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.’ John 17:3
Lesson 2
When God seems most absent from us, he is doing his most important work in us.
‘And I am sure that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on that day when Jesus Christ comes back again.’ Philippians 1:6
‘I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.’ John 16:33
Lesson 3
It isn’t always good to be blessed with the good things of life. Bad times provide an opportunity to know God, which blessings can never provide.
‘…whenever trouble comes your way, let it be an opportunity for joy.’ James 1:2
‘Sorrow is better than laughter, for sadness has a refining influence on us.’ Ecclesiastes 7:3
Credit to Dr. Larry Crabb, author of Shattered Dreams, for this outline and much of the material contained in today’s message.”
Watch the full message from Pastor Lee Powell here. Under the video viewer, click on Week 3 My Broken Dreams.
I finally have a chance to stop and process last week(end)’s events. The end of the week was so crammed with activity that it left my head spinning.
I left off with big plans for a crazy Wednesday full of seemingly random errands and visits. It turned out, though, that all I had to do was in one general area, so I crammed it into one day to save on sanity and gas.
Haircut: check
New running shoes: check
Penzeys visit: check
Family visit: check
I don’t really have much to say about the haircut. I mean, I was able to see my favorite NE Ohio stylist and catch up with her, but my haircut is pretty much the same as I’ve had it. It’s nice that it’s manageable again. You can’t let short hair grow out too much. That’s just irritating.
As for the running shoes, I spent $102 on them. No sale. Full price. For shoes. To be athletic in. Me 10 years ago (Hell, me a year ago) would snarl at that and demand why I didn’t go to TJ Maxx. Well, friends (and past me), I have a feeling my shin/knee pain has something to do with running in the wrong shoes. Or so they say. And since I’m determined to get better at running and am not so much into pain, I handed over my debit card for some $102 shoes. They’re not the prettiest shoes, either. Whatevs.
Penzeys. Ahhh, Penzeys. If you have a store near you and like food, get there ASAP. They sell amazing herbs, spices, vanilla and other such ingredients. I got a ginormous bottle of their vanilla since I use it nearly every morning. It should last me at least a year. I could have spent a good amount of time and money in that store, but thankfully I was on a time and money budget. Next time, though!
For the family visits, I was so happy to get to spend a solid four hours with my cousin Jared, his amazing wife, Beth, and their baby that’s still cooking inside Beth. I tried to convince Baby to make his/her appearance before Sunday when I left NE Ohio, but no dice. Sad. I did get to see Baby roll around Beth’s tummy like crazy. It was fascinating and freakish all at the same time. I couldn’t stop staring, though!
Friday was the big NKOTB concert. So. Fun.
I admit. I had my doubts. I didn’t think a bunch of 35+year-old men could repeat what they did 20 years ago. But like my cousin pointed out – the Rolling Stones are still going strong.
Anyhow, the “Kids” did an awesome job. Not only did they bust out their old dance moves (and didn’t look completely ridiculous), but Jordan totally rocked the high notes on “I’ll Be Loving You.” Totally.
All in all, I was impressed and thankfully didn’t regret the $70 I spent on my ticket. And Joey Joe still makes me swoon. Sigh.
Oh, and the title of this blog post is in honor of Natasha Bedingfield, who opened for New Kids. “Unwritten” was the only song I knew of hers before Friday, but I think I’m now a fan. She sounded great live, and the songs she performed were pretty catchy little tunes.
Saturday, I set out for the cornfields of Bowling Green. It was a gorgeous drive, and the scenery made me feel all gooey and warm inside.
There I met up with some really cool girls and spent the day walking around campus and sharing stories of our time there. It was a low-key day, but it was a perfect compliment to my relatively calm and low-key time at BGSU.
The highlight of the day was definitely the Pollyeyes breadsticks. Oh. So. Good. Yes, that is cheese strung all the way from my mouth to the plate. Awesome.
