Monday, back at it

It’s already Monday again? My weekend was so full of fun activities that it feels like I haven’t been to work in a week!

Thursday night, I was incredibly happy to eat a very summery meal of a half of a BLT with fruit, veggies and a few chips. See that sweet corn? It was my last ear from a batch I received from Iowa. Possibly the best sweet corn of my life. So sweet and tender it made my heart sing.

Friday night we picked up our wedding invitations and envelopes. Eeek! It’s coming so soon. I’m so excited! Brian and I grabbed dinner at Native Foods. He had a curry bowl and I had the indo salad. Both were amazing. We loved our own choices and each other’s so much that we switched bowls half way through. Sharing is caring. After running some more errands, I got home and collapsed on the couch for the night.

Saturday I got up early, did laundry, worked out and watered the garden before heading to a bridal shower in the burbs.  I had a surprise strawberry waiting for me when I got there to water:

Brian and I had a nice breakfast together before I left for the day. I made him cinnamon streusel French toast with caramelized bananas for breakfast. I had eggs and toast.

I got to hang out with some fun Hawkeyes at Sarah’s beautiful shower:

The rest of the day was full of bachelorette fun.

Sunday morning I slept in and headed to water aerobics. Only one more weekend left of getting to be in an outdoor pool and get exercise. Booo! I wish I could have this weather and schedule all year round. The rest of Sunday was filled with making food for the week and folding and putting away laundry. As much as I hate laundry, I love starting out the week with a full and clean closet.

I made another round of macro bowls(spinach, kale, zucchini, quinoa, lentils, beans and sweet potato) for us to have for lunches this week:

Took a break to have a lunch of leftover pizza, salad, tomatoes and chips.

 

 

I felt like I haven’t made us a proper dinner in a few weeks. When I said this, Brian gave me a strange look like I was a crazy person. I just felt like I hadn’t put a lot of time or effort into a meal lately. Which is the direct result of it being summer and using a lot more fresh food that doesn’t need as much preparation. Anyway, I having a strong yearning to do a little more cooking and use our early wedding gift. Look at her. She’s a beauty. I named her Camille, because she’s French, you know. And she can make honey, almond, rosemary roasted carrots with the best of them.

I also made a simple and quick tomato sauce, which had tons of great flavor:

With some seasoned green beans, the meal came together kind of like this:

Brian gave the carrots two thumbs up. I really like the almond carrot combo. Delightful. It would probably be a recipe better reserved for cooler temperatures, but those are probably right around the corner. And the tomato sauce on the chicken really jazzed it up.

 

Weekend recap: It’s August?

With temperatures in the 70s all weekend and a tan that is starting to fade, it’s hard to believe that it is August. Aren’t we supposed to be in the dog days of summer?

Knowing that we had back to back to back activities lined up for Saturday, I took advantage of Friday night by doing some grocery shopping and spending time at the garden. I picked a bunch of kale, fennel, carrots and cherry tomatoes. My cherry tomatoes are growing like crazy. They are all over the plant in giant clusters like I am growing grapes.

The fennel smells wonderful. I can’t wait to cook it up and possibly use the fronds in a savory bread.

Saturday started bright and early with a double yolk egg(those are good luck, right?) then off to help a friend with a yard sale.

The weather was  perfect and it nice to sit outside for a few hours. When the yard sale wrapped up, we high-tailed it across the city to do the cake tasting for our wedding.

So many design options.

We felt the presentation of the cake flavor options was a little odd, but that didn’t stop us from eating cake. In the end, we decided on a non-traditional flavor combination that we are both very excited about.

We needed a mid-afternoon boost and stopped at Starbucks before heading to try on wedding bands for Brian. He tried the new Valencia Orange refresher. I thought it tasted just like Tang!(gross)

After that we headed to a party at Challenger’s Comics to celebrate it winning an Eisner award. We had a ton of fun.

Sunday morning came far too quickly after Saturday’s busy day and late night. Despite the chilly 70 degree weather, I headed to water aerobics with a friend for some much-needed exercise. The water felt frigid at first but we forgot all about it once we started moving and chatting. I continued the outdoor theme for the day as I walked to the grocery store to pick up the last few things I needed to get food ready for the week. The weather was just too gorgeous to be inside. Then I piddled around in the back yard trimming my potted plants. I had a red bell pepper and a tiny San Marzano tomato ready for picking!

After putting away the groceries, I used up some zucchini to make a batch of delicious chocolate zucchini muffins.

It was a lazy Sunday dinner of salad, fruit and a take and bake pizza.

Fests, food, fun and crafts

This was one jam-packed weekend full of pure goodness.

After work on Friday, I headed straight to Maifest(my favorite summer fest) where Brian and I were able to meet up with several friends from different circles. It was one big fun time filled with German food and beer.

I spent some time at the garden on Saturday. We are continuing to get strawberries and kale. Everything else is growing nicely with all the recent rain. This picture makes it look like my garden is full of weeds, but those are just onions growing in the spaces between the other plants. I really tried to maximize my space this year.

I made a big pitcher of iced tea to sip on all of Saturday afternoon and evening. Brian and worked hard on finishing up some details for the wedding and getting the Save the Dates ready to send out.

Our hard work was rewarded with some teriyaki chicken with pineapple and cilantro rice(so good!) and a batch of flourless almond butter cookies. They looked a little wonky when I took them out of the oven, but they still tasted pretty good.

Sunday was another fun-filled day. My friend, Katie had a trunk show at her condo showing off some of her crafting talents. She makes adorable hand-made cards and invitations at a great price. Check out some of her great designs:

Are you dying to get your hands on some of these? Thowing a party and need top-notch invites? Check out more designs on her Pinterest page: Katie*did Cards. Or email her at katiedidcards@hotmail.com

Afterwards a few of us fun-loving girls headed over to Falafill to get our fill(so delicious):

With a full belly and good night’s sleep, the Save the Dates went out in the mail this morning! Yay!