Foodie penpal!

Do you like food? Do you like trying new foods? Do you like getting a package in the mail? Now how about receiving a box of foods personalized to what you like? BAM! Here you go. Foodie Penpals sets the whole thing up for you. You sign up, you're assigned someone to send a package to, and someone is assigned to send you a package. You email each other, find out what each others likes/dislikes, and then ship a box of goodies to them based on what you think they would enjoy. This is what I got from my Foodie Penpal and, man oh man, she hooked me up.

Kiva

I came across 366 Random Acts which is a blog about a guy who is performing acts of kindness every day this year (366 days this year!) and recording the acts of kindness on his blog to share with others. Wow. This blog is super awesome to follow because EVERY SINGLE DAY he is doing something, small or big, to make a difference in someone's life.

Here's his post on the Kiva organization which brought me to make a donation myself. Also, if you follow THIS LINK, you can receive $25 free to donate to a person or group of your choice. But why stop there? If you're able to do more, donate more, and if not,  $25 will make a difference for someone. AND, you can also share this site with others and that will be helpful as well. :) Below is the woman I donated to and her story via Kiva.

Lourdes is 43 years old and is a hard-working and, above-all, enthusiastic woman. She lives with her 17-year-old son who she loves very much and who is her happiness and purpose in life. She also lives with her husband who is her right hand and above all supports her in all that she undertakes to do. He works on his farm where he harvests corn. Together with Lourdes they contribute to the household expenses. Their house is located in the city of Pisco, which is characterised by beautiful beaches, and is also near the Ballestas Islands, which receive an infinite number of tourists all-year-round to see their fauna and amazing landscapes.

With a lot of hard work, and saving a lot, she works in her business selling chicken soup and other dishes on her menu. She works around 8 hours a day and receives up to 20 customers a day. She has been working in her business for 2 years. It was a bit difficult for her at first, but as the days passed it improved.

She believes her business is going well because she is very friendly with the customers and above all because she is a good cook.

Lourdes is very grateful to the Kiva lenders since thanks to their help she will be able to buy tables, chairs and a freezer. In this way she will be able to provide a better service to her customers and maintain better food supplies for the preparation of her dishes. This will improve her income and allow her to continue fighting each day to make her biggest dream come true: to give her son a good education.        

class of 2012

 We've had a lot of attention go to this guy here. In the past few weeks he's had his senior prom, received his Eagle Scout, graduated from church seminary, and yesterday, graduated from high school. It's been an exciting month for him and we couldn't be more proud of him. I LOVE YOU ZACH, you are so AWESOME!!!!

Newport Beach

The Girls.

We're working on starting a Wives Club since all of our husbands work together. Official Wives Club name T.B.A.

Me, Dina, Britt

The Boys.

Trevor (the one in the middle) was pretty much in the ocean the entire time. I finally snapped a shot of the boys as we were leaving to head back to AZ and he finally decided to come in to say good bye. Which explains why David and Ryan aren't standing any closer to Trevor who is cold and soaking wet. And I guess it's not "cool" to stand closer like us girls do. :) And does Ryan look black? Or is it because he's standing next to Trevor who applied SPF 50 every hour on the hour? Ha.

David, Trevor, Ryan

 One of the couples (David and Britt) asked Ryan if he would get a few pictures of them out on the beach. Trevor thought Ryan looked funny taking pictures of the couple so Trev got a picture of Ryan taking a picture of David and Britt. I saw Trevor, taking a picture of Ryan, who was taking a picture of David and Britt, and had to take a picture of the WHOLE thing. Hilarious. For anybody who didn't know we all knew each other, I can see how extremely CREEPY that must have looked. HA!

newport temple

We made a trip to the Newport L.D.S. Temple this weekend and oh gosh, how beautiful. Here are a few snapshots we took before leaving. :)

Memorial weekend

Happy memorial weekend. We will be off to Newport with friends, our body boards, beach towels & umbrella, and of course our cooler of food.

First and foremost though, I'm grateful for our veterans and those who serve this country today. I was listening to a talk show radio this morning and they had a retired seal on. One thing he hoped for was that while enjoying our 3 day weekend (whether we are bbq-ing or going to the beach) that we truly stop and reflect those heroes. While we are going about our day-to-day, know that someone is fighting for our country that very moment...
Saying thank you doesn't seem like enough for the sacrifices they make, but I am grateful. God bless you all.

my EAGLE

Last night was my little brother's Eagle Court of Honor.

I'm sitting her looking over pictures and I still have this warm feeling of happiness and pride in my little brother and the gentleman he has become. He stood up to speak and share his thoughts on the scouting program and I was in complete awe. He said through scouting, he's developed skills and characteristics that have brought true happiness into his life and has provided, and will continue to provide, an example of values he aims to have in his life.

 Gosh, my little brother is freakin awesome!!!!!I'm so proud of him and love him so much! Congratulations little bro.

almost oatmeal

I don't know why I think anyone would care to see what I ate for breakfast. But if there's one person who's looking for a simple breakfast recipe, Paleo approved might I add, then here's what I had this morning and this post is specifically made for you. :) If you could care less, well.....don't read on. Ha. 

1 1/2 c unsweetened applesauce

4 tbs raw chunky almond butter

2-3 tbs unsweetened coconut milk

cinnamon & vanilla to taste

stir over medium heat.

I ate it all up before I thought of topping it with some fresh blueberries or something. Doh! Next time.

Battered bruised and i have the evidence!

This is my third week with crossfit. I'm loving these classes because crossfit pushes me and accomplishing these workouts are super duper rewarding. I never thought I would picking up a barbell and doing clean and jerks, back squats, kettle ball swings, double unders, dead lifts....well, you catch my drift and yeah, i'm throwing some CrossFit lingo at you. You really need to try it! Now! Do it!

Yesterday when i threw my purse over my shoulder I had some pain on my shoulder. Turns out, as you can see by the evidence, the barbell has caused some bruising on both shoulders and collar bones.  

At first I thought, "What the heck is this class doing to me?" But then when I answered that question seriously, the answer was "it's making me do something I never thought I could" and that is an excellent feeling my friends. And now I look at these bruises as war paint. :) No pain, No gain.

Andrea my dear

 Happy Birthday to this girl here. Not me, the one on the left silly. My dear friend Andrea who I met back in the early years of high school. We talked about how old we are.... being graduated from high school for 6 years now. Sheesh! Both of our little brothers are graduating this Thursday too so DOUBLE whammy. We really are getting old.

Anyway, she's the best and I'm glad I get to be her friend. I sent her a text this morning at 630 and apparently she couldn't fall back asleep. Oops. Oh well, more time for her to celeberate HER DAY!!!!!

Dinner at Postinos. (Wish I would have started this whole Paleo thing AFTER her birthday dinner. But it's ok.) My dinner was still delicious and filling. Turkey breast with tomato and spinach. Chicken and cranberry salad. Dressings on the side because more than likely they aren't "paleo approved" :)  See? It's possible to eat out on Paleo. :)

babysitter

I watched these two lovely angels this afternoon and of course,

we had a photoshoot with my ipad. They probably will refer to me as the

"crazy lady who wanted to take a bunch of pictures of us" but each picture

i was thinking... you guys are so cute!!!!! Okay, now pose like this, act really happy,

act scared, now hug each other. They were greats sports and should

look into modeling for Gap because they have some raw talent, dontchya think?

Paleo nut granola

It's just about 11pm. Ryan's sleeping and I would/should be too but like I mentioned in my embarrassing post earlier today, our Internet is now working and I'm too busy looking up recipes to sleep. Here's what I made for Ryan when he gets the munchies, which is always.

1/2 cup almond meal
1/2 cup pumpkin seeds
1/2 cup walnuts/pecans
1/4 cup unsweetened shredded coconut
1 cup slivered almonds
2 tbs coconut oil
2 tbs raw honey
1/4 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp vanilla

350•
Mix it all together and spread on cookie sheet (coated with coconut oil or lined with parchment).
Bake 5-7 minutes. Let cool and add dried fruit.
One of the many perks with granola is the versatility (that's probably the 3rd time in my entire life using that word so you know I only say it if I mean it). Change the nuts up if you want, I added raw sunflower seeds, dried apple chips and raisins. :)

Blueberry banana frozen yogurt

Confession: a lot of my paleo recipes starting out will include bananas and if you don't like bananas tough luck. They just so happened to be on sale 4lb/99cents and this girl wasn't about leave without filling my cart to the brim with them.... So some are frozen, some are being eaten plain, and others are ripening up to be baked with. So bear with me with my paleo banana craze recipes this week. Which leads me to my first dessert! This recipe is found in pretty much every single paleo recipe blog. Don't believe me? Check for yourself. But the point is, it's super simple, fast, and easy- just how I like it... My food that is.

1. Peel, chop, and freeze the bananas.
2. Put the frozen banana in blender, add vanilla, blueberries (or whatevertheheck else you want) and blend!

So simple right? I found it was better to put back into freezer for like 10-15 minutes again after blending in case it gets too mushy. Although I would guzzle it down regardless.

i've been.....

...........completely EMBARRASSED and I wish I could call Ryan this second and tell him what I just faced by my lonesome self, but I can't. So I will share my embarrassment here so I can laugh out loud.... AGAIN.... and maybe make you laugh too. :) I'm sure he will be very pleased with me for sharing this as well.

We  set up internet in our apartment this weekend. For the past few months we haven't had internet, which is a HUGE PAIN IN MY BUTT! Especially when I need to look up a little something and have to wait till Ryan gets home to use his smart phone. (first world problems I know). Well, you know how you set up your internet name? Let's just say we were in a goofy mood when we made ours up and never NEVER NEVER thought it would come back and completely slap us in the face, and about 20 minutes ago, I got slapped.... HARRRD.

This is where it gets interesting: the internet guys came over to fix our connection. One of the guys (there were two) pulled out his phone and was looking at the list of connections and said, "Man, people name their internet really weird things!!!!" and proceeded to name off a few of them. I was beginning to feel a little warm in the face and let out a nervous laugh and agreed with him. But I'm pretty sure I gave it away when he read ours aloud because my face turned BRIGHT RED and I ended up walking out of the room shortly after, trying to slow my pace so it didn't appear I was bolting out the front door and never coming back.

Background on internet name:  I don't know why or how this got started, but sometimes when Ryan would surprise me with flowers or chocolate or some treat, he would come home and ask me, "Have you been good today?" I knew if I said yes and held out my hand, he would have a surprise to give me. Which led us to joking with each other saying, "No, I've been bad!" Which then leads us to our internet name.......... IveBeenBad.

There's nothing I can say to make our internet name sound decent and I won't dare tell you the password either. I thought the guys would be able to leave without knowing the truth about how twisted we are, but they needed to know our internet name to help them diagnose the problem. AND THEN, as if they couldn't leave this poor embarrassed girl alone, they needed the password too!!!!!!! NO WAY!!!!!WHAT DO I SAY???? I told them I didn't know the password and I would text my husband to get it. Luckily, they got it fixed before the password issue came up again.

Lesson learned: Don't have your internet named something you don't feel comfortable sharing with others. And the password too. :) This one is going in the books. And yes, we will be changing our internet name and password tonight.

Paleo Challenge

Fit Bomb Why I Eat Paleo

So here's a website I found that gives basics on Paleo if you're interested in knowing. :)

Paleo Banana Almond Bread

For those of you who don't follow my moms fb page with her frequent posts of how much she LOVES crossfit, well, here's an update on what her and I have been up to.

We joined a crossfit gym 2 weeks ago and are both in love!!!!!....... I'm talking about the gym here but we love each other too of course. This next month they gym is doing a Paleo diet challenge. I'm not one to go on a "diet" and I DESPISE that word because the word diet makes me think of.... "i can't eat that, I can't eat this, I can't eat there blah blah blah."

My philosphy is to just eat as simple as possible and enjoy food in it's most basic form. But, I'm always up for a new challenge and so is my mom so we signed up for the month long Paleo challenge. I won't even get in to what it entails but the basics are this: lean meats and fish, fruits, vegetables, and nuts. Yep. there's the basics. This next month I'll be dreaming of cereal and frozen yogurt. HOWEVER, in the mean time I'll be sharing some Paleo recipes. If you're interested, here are some blogs and sites on the Paleo diet. And here's my first recipe that I made last night for breakfast today with some fresh berries. :) What is the Paleo Diet?

Banana Almond Bread

3 eggs, separated

5 tbs raw honey

4 tbs olive oil

2 mashed bananas

1 tsp vanilla

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp cinnamon

2 c. almond flour

Heat oven 350 degrees.

Cream eggs yolks and honey in large bowl until light and fluffy. Add oil, vanilla, banana, cinnamon, baking powder, and flour.

In separate bowl, beat egg whites till stiff peaks. Fold egg whites into banana mixture to pull it away from sides before gradually folding the rest of the whites into the mix.

Line loaf pan with olive or coconut oil.

Cook 40-45 minutes.

wheatfreeandglutenfreebreadrecipe.blogspot.com

www.paleomg.com

www.thefoodee.com

www.fastpaleo.com

So how's the bread? Heavenly. I didn't know what to expect with almond flour but I like the taste and texture it adds. My biff, Karn, came over and tried some. She hates raw bananas but doesn't mind bananas when theyre used in baking goods so this was the real test. She took a bite and what seemed like on over exaggerated liking at first, was actually a sincere genuine love. She only wanted a small bite at first because we were leaving for lunch, but she went over and cut herself some more. She then told me about a friend who claims to have the best banana bread recipe, but clearly this banana almond bread was a gazillion times better. Ok, she didn't say a gazillion but that's what I took from it. I love when I make something and people really enjoy it. SUCCESS with first paleo recipe!

Also, I gave some to the hubby for breakfast as he was walking out the door. I did smear some butter on his because, although he's trying to eat healthier, I try to ease him into it slowly so there isn't a relapse involving sugar babies and Heath bars. Last night he old me he liked the bread but if he were to change one thing it would be... (I'm holding back tears and bracing myself to take constructive criticism I'm not really wanting to hear).... To NOT put butter on it. He preferred it without butter? Double success!

professional-amateur

I know, this scenery shot looks professional right? Ha. Ok. It's from a small digital camera we have. This ain't no DSLR camera, but I like to act like it is. And FYI, the only touch-up I did was sharpen the image. The colors are all natural, baby.

 Yesterday on our drive home from Mesa, there was a beautiful sunset. You can never really capture what they look like in real life but I tried. I was telling Ryan, can we just pull over on the shoulder of the freeway so I can take a picture?????!!!!!

Just then, Ryan noticed a guy pulled over on the shoulder of the highway poking his tire with one of his clutches. He pulled over right away to help the guy out and that, my friends, is why my husband is so awesome. He always stops to help people. This guy had a broken leg and had some tire trouble that would have been difficult to have taken care of by himself. I was told to wait by our car for safety purposes so I was able to get my freeway shot of the sunset and Ryan was able to do some service!

And another professional-amateur shot of a "good samaritan"- a claim made from the guy Ryan helped and I totally agree. :)

mirror mirror on the floor

This is bad. Really bad. I'm starting to get an itch... An itch for yard sales. This morning I came to my parents house bright and early to work on my armoire project. On my drive, out of the corner of my eye, i spied a yard sale. Really, it was literally out of the corner of my eye because there wasn't even a sign up yet and they were in the process of setting things up still. (Subconciously I must have seen a pile of junk in a drive-way and became instantly intrigued to dig through and see what I would find in that pile. Ha!)             

And this was my find: A floor mirror and I got it for $15. My weekend started off pretty stellar. Last weekend I dragged Ryan with me to a few yard sales and I saw the cutest high-chair. I was going to buy it (no we don't have a baby and no we aren't expecting) but I finally came to my senses and realized a high-chair was not practical for our little apartment with no babies to fill the seat. All I know is we need to get into a house ASAP so I can start having a place to store my finds...baby or no baby I will be prepared. :)

Project update

Ok. Slowly this is getting completed. It's been like two weeks and I'm still not at the point to start painting the cabinet. In my defense, the dresser is at my parents house so it's not like I have time to work on it every day and be like "Bam! Done!" I'm just saying, ...slowly.....but.....surely.......I....will..... Finish!" Oh yah, another excuse is I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the cabinet. Maybe pinterest will help this girl.

And thanks to Pinterest, I happend to find some inspiration for the final "Ta-Da" finish.

Mojo fro-yo

This was my dinner last night. Perfect. You only see one bowl but I had two. It was buy one get one half off and Ryan wasn't wanting any. He's crazy! More for me! And I had a smile on my face just like the print on the bowl :)

joe's crab da' bomb

See the picture of me before I ate? So nice and clean looking? I should have had an after because you would think I took a bath in our pot of seafood. Yes they gave us bibs, but really... I needed a hair net, goggles, and a full on gown. And when some juice did squirt on my dress, of course it landed either above, below, or next to the bib. Then again, the mess is all part of the fun. :) And after cosuming our plethera of seafood, we both agreed crab is DA' BOMB delicious. Yes, i said DA' BOMB!