Busy and Fun

Hi!

I have had such a jam packed day but, boy, was it ever FUN! Like I said earlier, I met up with Gina and her friend, Megan, at Whole Foods and we enjoyed an amazing lunch and some fun shopping as well!

I knew we would be eating a later lunch (around 1:30), so before I left the house this morning I snacked on a yummy yogurt:

And then I pigged out to my heart’s delight at the Whole Foods salad bar! I know we have a Whole Foods in Tampa, but its just not the same. The one in O-town is seriously state of the art. No wonder I was broke all the time when I lived only three miles from it! I picked all my favorites—quinoa salad, yuca, 3 fried plantains, black bean salad, spinach and gorganzola salad, cumin lime tempeh, whole grain tabbouli and a glob of hummus:

Of course my eyes were bigger than my tummy, which they usually are at mega salad bars such as this, and I couldn’t finish everything. I probably ate about 3/4 of it and then felt stuffed. With my lunch, I drank a yummy grape kombucha!

I brought the girls some homemade vegan spelt chocolate chip oatmeal cookies that I baked this morning out of Eat, Drink and Be Vegan. Hopefully they enjoyed them! =)

And we wandered around the aisles for a little while, buying “necessities” before they hit the mall and I hit the road. I actually didn’t go crazy…getting only a couple things that Greenwise doesn’t carry.

Well Greenwise does carry cashews but those just looked good so it was an impulse buy! And yall know I can’t live without the infamous crunchy almond butter…!

I ran some errands in Tampa, including the bookstore, since I had a 40% coupon that expired today. I finally broke down and bought the new Wally Lamb book…...I’ve been on the waiting list at the library for months now for it and still no word. I couldn’t wait any longer!!

And then my mom made an awesome dinner! She made my favorite mountain bbq shrimp with a spicy dipping sauce (out of the Greenbrier Cookbook), RED rice with almonds and apples, roasted brussels and toasted homemade kalamata olive bread:

(I also had a nice glass of red wine!)

The red rice was amazing. The recipe was out of this cookbook:

Ahhhh Miravel. Take me back. My mom and I went for my high school graduation/18th birthday and it was the best weekend of my life. We still talk about it all the time and how amazing it was…..the food, the spa treatments………………..sigh.

After dinner I watched The Changeling with my parents because they never saw it in the theaters and it was on demand. I had half of this blondie that I couldn’t resist from Whole Foods today—

Sadly, it was just meh. I had super high hopes for it and was SO excited to eat it but it wasn’t chewy like I expected and had sort of that grainy sugar taste to it. I’m not gonna lie; I totally washed it down with one of my mom’s twizzlers that she was snacking on during the movie. It somehow escaped the camera though!!  My dad ate the other half of the blondie….I think I need one of Miss VeggieGirl’s blondies to put it to shame!

I have to say, it is WAY past this girl’s bedtime. I don’t even know the last time I stayed up til 10…how sad is that?!! I feel like I should be more tired right now, seeing as I have been up since 4:45, went running and drove across the state and back, but surprisingly I’m doing okay. I think I’m just getting used to less sleep. Not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing! Tomorrow is church with Sarah at 8:30, YOGA, and the baking of tons of super charge me cookies for a special project! See you in the a.m.!