Busy week

This week has been very busy. Monday and Tuesday I made sure to go to the gym, Wednesday I went out for lunch with my dad and brother, and Thursday night I was invited to go to Sunset Ceremonies. My hubby is very allergic to horses, so I invited my dad to come with me.

We had a very good time!  The show was amazing and after we were able to go into the stables and got to see and pet a lot of horses. They are so beautiful!

Friday night we had our baseball game, and it was our tournament weekend so we played 2 more games yesterday, which the weather was really nice. We all got invited to a party at night, we all pitched in and ordered pizza for supper and sat outside most of the night. Today we had another game and it rained the whole time and it was cold, so it wasn't very fun. Now we both plan to just relax, we are pretty tired, and muscle sore.

This morning before our game I took the time to go downtown so I can get some vegetables and fruit, then I picked up my meat order from Aubrey's (Your corner butcher).

Not everything is in the picture, I got more peppers, tomatoes, apples and nectarines, but as you can see I got more strawberries, cucumbers, peas, kale, romaine, basil and green onions. I also got some carrots which I forgot to add in there. In meat, I got some steaks, peppered steaks, beef tenderloin, chicken, double smoked bacon, and pork chops.

I didn't have time to bake, and didn't make anything new, but hopefully this coming week I'll have more time. We do have Wednesday off, since it's Canada Day. We have a friend coming over Tuesday night, and she's bringing sausages that she got. She ended up buying many different flavors, and not sure which ones she's bringing but I'm looking forward to it. We are covering the rest of the food and not sure what we will have but I'll figure something out.

Tomorrow will be 2 years since my mom passed away. Can't believe how fast time is going by. I miss her so very much!!

Hope everyone is having a good weekend, and Happy Canada Day!!

Strawberry season is here!!

I'm so very happy that strawberries are out!!  I got two baskets today and they are absolutely delicious!!!

They are beautifully red and they are very juicy. Not quite sure what I will do with them yet, but we might end up eating them just like that for this batch, which we already have eaten a few so far. You can do so much with strawberries. You can create your own jam, make a compote to poor over ice cream, yogurt, pancakes and so much more. You can make a pie or a crumble, add them to any sort of dessert, or even to some oatmeal. There's lots of options, and they really are good!

Last weekend I did end up making the American as apple pie muffins as well as chocolate pixie cookies from the chocolate covered Katie cookbook. They both turned out really good.

It is father's day tomorrow so tonight my hubby and I are going with my dad and brother to Yuk Yuk's, which is a comedy club right downtown. Should be a lot of fun, and I'm really looking forward to it. Tomorrow my brother and I are taking our dad out for brunch, and I already have a card and gift for him. Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend and to all the dads out there, have a wonderful Father's day!!

Back to running

Since recovering from my knee injury at the beginning of the year, I have slowly been getting back into running. I have been taking baby steps to not re-injure my knee, and now I'm up to 5 km of running, but I do take a few walking breaks in between, but I know soon I'll be able to run the whole 5 km. This past Tuesday I went for a run after work, I only did 3 km and had to stop once to walk for a bit. I then did squats, lunges and leg lifts, and made sure to stretch at the end.

The above picture is an old one, it was taken in 2013 for the run or dye, which was a lot of fun! Yesterday was a beautiful day so I went for a run in the morning and did 5 km. For the first half I was able to run the whole way, but I did have to stop at the lights before I could continue. On the way back I again got stuck at the light and had to stop a few times before and after to walk a bit. It took me 34 minutes which is not bad timing. I again did exercises after and made sure to do my stretching.

Stretching at the end of a run or any exercise is so important, it helps prevent injuries and muscle soreness. So far so good with my knee, I haven't had any pain. I'm still going to the gym during my lunch hour at work, most days of the week as well as biking to work, when it's not raining. With a very cold and harsh winter, I did gain some weight, since I wasn't exercise as much either because of my knee injury. Well it's been a while since spring, and I have been doing a lot more exercise, and hitting markets for some fresh vegetables and fruit and going to my kitchen to make healthy meals, snacks and desserts. I thought the scale would go back down but so far it hasn't budged, but I know I'm being healthy and hopefully in time the scale will go back down.

Today is my hubby's birthday, so this morning I made some blueberry pancakes. We were suppose to have steak oscar last night for supper and crack open a more expensive wine to celebrate, but he's been sick since Wednesday and he's not back to 100% health yet, so we will have to do that another night. Tonight I plan to make some pasta for supper, and I also want to surprise him with a blueberry pie. It's his favorite, and I have store bough dough on hand, and plenty of blueberries. I'm just going to create my own pie by mixing lots of blueberries, with a bit of maple syrup to sweeten it up a bit more, and also with 2 tbsp of arrowroot (or you can use cornstarch), to help thicken it. I haven't perfected pie crust or even pizza crust, but would like to create a healthier crust at some point. Going to keep trying out different recipes, or try to do my own to figure out a healthy but delicious crust. I'm not sure what else yet I'll be doing in the kitchen today, I haven't really planned anything, but I'll look through my books and see what recipe I can put together with what I have on hand.

Hope your all having a great weekend!

Weekend

My last post I mentioned how I was going to try a new recipe; some green beans, portobello mushrooms, green onions, feta with balsamic vinegar. I did make it, we had peppered steaks and potato salad along with it, and it was delicious!

I will make this again, we both really liked it. I had a lot of potatoes on hand from my market shopping, so I thought it was a good opportunity to make a potato salad. This past weekend I didn't do a whole lot in the kitchen but I did make a banana bread since I had some old bananas on hand, and I prepared salads for my lunch for today and tomorrow. I also made a jambalaya on Saturday with some spicy saussage, green pepper, red onion, stewed tomatoes and some rice.

Also a few posts back I mentioned how I went to a baby shower, well yesterday morning my cousin had her baby girl. I really can't wait to see her!  Other then that, it was a quiet weekend at home, other then Friday night, which we went to play baseball, then met up with most of our team after to sit outside and enjoy a live band, but we also did do some dancing.

This week so far they are announcing a lot of rain. This morning I couldn't bike to work because it was raining to much. I hope it changes and we get some sunny weather, but so far this morning, it's a gloomy day. Next weekend we will be celebrating my hubby's birthday, not quite sure of the plans yet, but hopefully I have time to get into the kitchen.

Markets and Zumba

Before the weekend even started, I went for a walk with 2 friends to check out a new trail I found near work. This trail was so beautiful!

The weather was perfect, so I really didn't want to go back to work. After work I spent more time outside, I played baseball and we unfortunately didn't win.

Saturday morning a friend of mine came over and we went out for breakfast, then went to check out a market in Manotick.

They had a lot of asparagus available, so I of course had to by a bunch, but other then that, they mostly had flowers and plants that they started so you can have your own garden. Inside they were selling a variety of things, as well as jams, sauces and maple syrup. They even had frozen pies, from a variety of meat/vegetables, and fruit pies. The only other thing I bought was maple syrup. As per their sign above, they will have more things available starting next month, which we plan to go there again.

My friend hasn't been to the market in Masson (Quebec), so we decided to take a drive up there. We were able to get a lot of vegetables and fruits. I bought some cucumbers, stawberries, blueberries, radishes, green beans, potatoes and peppers. We then stopped downtown for some lunch, she has never been to Mamma Grazzie's, which they make their own bread and pasta. She really liked it and wants to go there again. We then went to a cafe and got dessert. Not long after I got home, I stepped back out to get a few more things I needed at the grocery store. I want to try out a new recipe, it's a green bean with portobello mushrooms, green onion, feta and with some balsamic vinegar. You roast the vegetables on the BBQ or in the oven, and then add the cheese and drizzle with balsamic vinegar, it looks delicious so I'm looking forward to trying it.

Sunday I went with a friend to a Zumba party. They were collecting donations for diabetes, and it was a 2 hour class. I had a lot of fun, but only lasted about an hour and 45 minutes, I just couldn't dance anymore, I was low on energy. They had pizza, vegetables, and fruit to snack on, so I went for the vegetables and some oranges. It was getting close to supper time so I didn't want to eat to much, and thought I would keep it healthy to.

It was a very good turn out, and they had prizes as well. For supper I cooked up London broil with sweet potatoes and we also had a salad. I thought my legs would be sore because he had us doing many forms of squats, but it was my back that was really sore. Just not use to twisting so much so my back got a good workout. The only other thing I did over the weekend is make two batches of cookies. I went for something simple and quick since the weekend was busy but I did also take time to relax.  Hope everyone had a good weekend!