Since Hannah and I had a lunch date with my bosses Dad for lunch yesterday, I didn’t give my meal plan a thought.  Until I got have way to work and realized “I never brought anything for breakfast!”

I had an apple at my desk, and I borrowed an instant pack of oatmeal from someone in my office – a quick breakfast and only 4 points!

So Hannah met me at noon, and my bosses Dad got at the office at the same time.  I was wrong, our lunch date is 80 years old, not 82!  He was interesting to talk to and at some points he was talking about his grandchildren, then he’d start talking about trips he took with his wife, and then would go back to 1938 and talk about a golf course his father belonged to.  I guess when you make it to 80 you have so many memories that it would be easy to jump around the decades of your life.

He talked about how his wife had CLL for 15 years, who passed away five years ago, but they still enjoyed trips to Seattle and to Sante Fe where they watched the huge balloon festival.  He described his bout with prostate cancer 15 years earlier and “knock on wood I haven’t been in the hospital since!”

At one point there while we were eating, he just shouted “I love Bubbies pickles!  I haven’t been able to find them anywhere up here though.”

I think he had a nice time – Hannah and I were fresh meat so he could tell any story and we hadn’t heard it yet!  And he paid for lunch against our wishes since we invited him out.   He said “it’s not very often I have lunch with two young ladies.”  He looked at Hannah and said “you are too young for me and your Mom is already taken!”

I ended up getting a spinach goat cheese frittata with hashbrowns on the side.  The frittata was huge – I only ate half of the eggs and half of the potatoes – my guess is that lunch comes in around 12 points.

I really had no idea what I was going to make for dinner.  I looked on last weeks menu and saw that I never made Danica’s lasagna cups.  But then I realized I didn’t want to make a whole batch (hers made 12) and I wanted to use some ground beef in mine.  So here’s a version of hers, scaled down for 1 serving at 11 WW points.

Lasagna Cups, makes 6 at 11 WW points

• 6 wonton wrappers
• 3 ounces 90% lean beef
• 1 garlic clove
•  1 small zucchini, chopped
• 2 tablespoons chopped red pepper
• 1/8 cup ricotta cheese
• 1/2 cup tomato sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon Italian seasoning
• 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper
• salt and pepper
• 1 slice provolone cheese (cut into 6 squares)

Heat oven to 375.  Put wonton cups in a regular size muffin tin, making sure the bottom of the wonton is pressed down – I sprayed mine with Pam first just in case they stuck.

In a skillet saute the beef, zucchini and garlic, until the meat is cooked through.  Add remaining ingredients except provolone, and cook for a couple minutes and the ricotta is melted through.

Divide mixture between the wonton cups, putting a slice of provolone on top, then bake for 18-20 minutes.  Mine took 20 minutes.  Let cool about 3-5 minutes.

These were delicious!  I was worried that the bottom of the wonton wouldn’t be crispy, but they were.  And if I had stuff to make a salad, 3 of these would have been plenty with a side salad.  Thanks for the idea Danica!

Hooray for Friday!  Got any fun plans this weekend?  Make it a great day!

 

Hannah was up early yesterday, creating another lovely breakfast before her long day at school.  Monday and Wednesdays are her long days, and as much as she doesn’t like eating first thing (try two hours!) she realizes that she has to have a good breakfast the way her schedule is laid out.

I contemplated jumping in and getting Bizzy in my Kitchen (I have a ricotta cheese lemon pancake recipe with blueberry sauce coming soon!) I realized it’s Wednesday.  And I haven’t had bagel Wednesday forever!  This giant jalapeno cheddar with egg whites in the middle comes in at a delicious 11 points.

I was so stuffed from the bagel that I didn’t have anything before picking up Tony for his doctor appointment.  It dawned on me as we were driving there that because this doctor first saw Tony in the hospital, we would have to fill out new patient forms, do the family history stuff, etc.

We really like this doctor, he’s the kidney doctor.  While Tony will probably always have mild kidney disease, hopefully things will never get worse than that.  He goes back in a few weeks to have blood work done to see where his numbers are at, then back again in April.

While we were in with the doctor the car dealership called.  I called them back.  The truck was ready, “but you have a few more issues going on with the truck.”  My first thought was “fuck.”  You know, because it rhymes with truck.

He started talking about shackles and my first thought is “where the hell do shackles fit on a truck?”

I told him basically to stop talking, that I had my husband with me and he could explain it to him.  I just don’t do car parts.  It’s never a good sign when your truck is still on the lift so they can “show you everything that is wrong” with the car.

Long story short, the alternator and new battery were installed, but there were a few things that need to be done “in the near future” but aren’t things that have to be done to it now.  Whew.

So by the time that was all done and I got back to work, I had taken a 3 hour lunch.  Just so you know the afternoon goes by really fast when you take a 3 hour lunch!

I was still full from the bagel so I had an apple and a cafe mocha – 2 points!   My afternoon cafe mochas are so good – I’ve got my boss hooked on them.  It’s a 25 calorie pack of diet swiss miss cocoa, half hot water, half coffee and then whip cream on top.  It’s like 50 calories, but I count it as 2 points.  I stole this picture.  I figured after taking a 3 hour lunch I should do some work!

I had defrosted some chicken wings, not really knowing what I was going to do with them.  When I came in the house to get Tony I saw that he marinated my wings – in spicy hot shit.  Tony is a fly by the seat of his pants kinda cook, tossing things in willy nilly.  Me?  I would have written it down as I went along, so that if it turned out good I could make it again.

I baked my wings at 400 degrees for 35 minutes, then finished them off under the broiler for a couple minutes.  I like my wings well done.   On the side I made a broccoli/cole slaw stir fry.  Now I might get some slack here, but after I took the chicken out of the marinade, I cooked it down for 30 minutes.

I know some people will think “you had raw chicken in that marinade!”  But I made sure I boiled it above 160 degrees, so it’s all good.  In fact it reduced down to an amazing sauce.  I told Tony “I am not joking, these are the best wings I’ve ever had.”

So I said “what did you put in the sauce??!!”  He said he knew he had to start out with vinegar, so he added apple cider vinegar, then Frank’s sweet and sour sauce, soy sauce, garlic, olive oil and crushed red peppers.  They marinated for about six hours.  After I reduced the sauce, I stirfried broccoli slaw and broccoli in about a tablespoon of the sauce.

Oh my oh my.  These wings were spicy and delicious!  It had the perfect balance of sweet, sour and heat.  Thanks Tony!  And thanks for your help with the truck – I have no idea how I would have handled it happened last week when you were in the hospital.

Hannah and I have a special lunch planned today.  My bosses father has been spending the winter with them.  He’s 82 years old and originally from New York, but retired to Georgia.  He helps out at the food pantry Monday through Wednesday, but Thursday and Friday’s he doesn’t have a whole lot going on.

So Hannah and I decided to take him out to lunch today – I love hearing people’s stories!

I am on my way home from work last night when all of a sudden I see my battery light flicker on and off.  Then my ABS light comes on.  Then the air bag light comes on.  Then the radio turns off, the lights shut off and I have absolutely no controls.  Even though the car is moving, it said I was going zero miles an hour.

I knew there was a Jiffy Lube about a mile away and I prayed that I could just get it there.  I made it!  I explain what’s happened and three guys look at it and they say “we don’t do batteries, so you’ll have to take it somewhere else.”  They advised that the car would still run just as long as I didn’t turn it off.

So every time I am at a stop light and it’s time for me to go, it took a couple minutes for me to get going, and then I would either only be able to go ten miles an hour, or it would speed up for no reason.  I was terrified!  I called Tony and I was about a mile from our car dealership that has a service center.  He said he would meet me there.

Just then there is a cop car with a siren on behind me!  I pull into a side street.  I open my car door a bit because I have can’t use the power windows.  I wasn’t even able to put my hazards on.

So as the cop comes to my door I open it up to get out and she shouts “Get back in the car ma’am!”  I shut the door, then she comes to my window and says “roll down your window.”  I told her I had no power, so she let me open the door.  The next sentence is classic.  “Ma’am, did you know you were only driving ten miles an hour with no lights on?”

Why yes I did!  She ran my license and then escorted me the last mile to the car dealership.  Whew!  While we would have rather taken the car to our mechanic, our mechanic, while super reasonable, sometimes takes days to make the repair, which would have meant renting a car, etc.

This dealership is fancy too – in the waiting room they have six apple computers for customers to use while waiting for their cars!

Turns out it was an alternator.  But our battery was nearly dead too, but we knew we could get a cheaper one at Sam’s.  So after leaving the dealership, Tony and I went to Sam’s Club, picked up a new battery and I will drop it off this morning on my way to work.

Tony has a doctor appointment this afternoon, so I will take a later lunch, pick him up, go to the doctor and then drop him off at the dealership and he’ll wait for it to be finshed.  Oh, and then we’ll have about $562 dollars less than we had yesterday.

Yep, still haven’t gone grocery shopping and I seriously think that I can make it till the weekend with what we have on hand.  I still have to see what I threw in the freezer from last week, but I was going through the fridge with Hannah (like a good momma I made her my ham mac and cheese using shells – she feels that “shaped” pasta has more flavor than elbow macaroni!).

I showed her that there was still some pizza dough in the fridge, and she said “want breakfast pizza tomorrow?”  Um, when have I ever been known to turn down pizza?  I tried to eyeball how she was making it so I could estimate the points.  I didn’t want to get in her business by pulling out the food scale – it looked like about 4 ounces of dough, sauce on my side, olive oil (and onions!) on her side, about 2 ounces of reduced fat Jimmy Dean sausage, baby spinach, colby cheese and 1 egg mixed with 1/4 cup egg white on top.

I am estimating the whole pizza to be 24 points, so half is 12.  Super filling and delicious – too bad Hannah had to scoot to school and we weren’t able to eat it together – thanks Hanners!

The sun was shining, and I was determined to get out and run/walk yesterday.  It said the temperature was 31, but felt like 21.  I was prepared.  The last time I was at Goodwill I bought a pair of under armour leggings.  They are super thin, and are tapered at the ankle, there was absolutely no wind getting to my legs.   These were a score for me – I paid $5.00 for them, and they retail for $69!

The only part about running/walking in January is the ice – I almost took a face plant when I ran over what looked like just water – turns out it was a thin sheet of ice for about 5 feet!

I also had to use the median because both the sidewalks on either side had too much snow or ice.  The ground was super hard an unstable, but I think it made for a tougher workout!

And about 10 minutes in I had to use my scarf to cover my ears.  Hey, I never said I was fashionable.

It felt wonderful to get moving.  I hadn’t worked out in almost a week, so it was a bit slow going, but it was awesome.  Since Hannah was Bizzy in My Kitchen this morning, I didn’t have time to put anything together for lunch, but I realized I had $$ left on a Subway gift card.

I ended up getting the turkey and ham on the oat grain bread – sammie was 7 points with the light Lay’s chips – lunch came in at 9 points.

Have you ever made ham salad?  Before Tony got sick I had cooked a 7 pound ham just to have on hand.  I added some to Hannah’s mac n cheese, and when I mentioned to Tony that there was still a lot left he said “mmmmm…..ham salad.”  I’ve never made ham salad, but it couldn’t have been easier!

In the food processor:

• 2 cups cooked ham
• 1/4 cup mayo
• 2 tablespoons mustard
• 3 stalks of celery
• 8 baby gerkin pickles (or I guess you could throw in a couple tablespoons of sweet relish)
• good pinch of salt
• good turn of some fresh cracked pepper

Just pulse until you don’t have huge chunks of anything.  Since I made it at night, and my lighting sucks ass, I think google images for this picture:

I left some assorted crackers on the counter for when Tony wanted to have some ham salad and crackers for lunch.  Another favorite of Tony’s?  Egg salad!

So by the time we got home from Sam’s Club, it was nearly 7:00.  I had defrosted a bottom round steak but wasn’t really sure what to do with it, until I saw I had this:

I sliced up the round steak really thin and while I had egg noodles cooking and the gravy cooking, cooked it up for just a couple minutes.  Most people think you have to cook this cut low and slow, but it was super tender.  And doesn’t gravy make everything better?

As a side note, I am going to be participating in Lori’s Healthy Heart Weekend.  Just click on the previous link to get the info.  I think my goal will be to run/walk 5 miles in 55 minutes or less.

Are you going to play?  Make it a great day!

I knew that the temps were going to be decent yesterday, so I decided to forego my morning workout and sleep in a bit.  With the thunderstorms and rain, it washed away most of the snow on our drive – love it because I hate how icky days old snow looks, just dirty.

Last time I was at the grocery store I found these buffalo chicken sausages on the sale rack – not sure what they normally sell for, but my package was only $1.99.

Hello spicy!  And the stats?  3 WW points each!

Lunch was leftover beef and bean salsa soup that I had frozen – 8 WW points.

So since I didn’t work out I made doctor appointments – three of Tony’s doctors wanted to follow up with him within a week of getting out of the hospital.  Two of them only have office hours near our house one day a week, so I did those first.  One nurse said “the earliest I can get you in is January 31st.”  I said “wow, you don’t have anything open before then?”

I looked at my calendar and realized January 31st is a week from today!  I can’t believe how fast this month has gone by already!

Tony picked up all his prescriptions yesterday, he’ll be taking two oral antibiotics the next week.  He’s still super tired, and he was a bit sore from walking after being sedentary for a week.  He’s catching up on sleep too!

I still haven’t gone to the grocery store, so I told Tony “I have stuff to make burgers, pasta, chicken. . .”  He stopped me at burgers, but then I had no hamburger buns, only bread, so he had a patty melt.

I decided to have an Italian burger over zucchini.  I sauteed some zucchini in 1 tsp. olive oil (1), then cooked a 4 ounce 93% lean burger (4), topped it with 3/4 ounce slice of provolone cheese (2) and put some of my pasta sauce overtop (2) – a delicious 9 WW point dinner.

When I was downloading my pictures I realized something.  The chili I had eaten about 5 times at the hospital?  It was 9 points a serving based on their nutrition label.  What I didn’t realize was that the serving size was 8 ounces.

Um, guess what the soup cups were next to the soups and chili?

16 ounces!!  So what I thought was an 11 points cup of chili with the cheese and sour cream was more likely 20 points.  Isn’t that crazy?!  When I entered “16 ounces chili with beans” into WW eTools, I got a range between 14 points and 29 points, so I think 20 points seems right in the middle.

I am off to do my morning abs on Exercise TV, while Hannah is making us breakfast pizza.  Make it a great day!

 

We’ve been through this drill so many times we know exactly how to handle the possible discharge from the hospital.  What made this discharge massively tricky was that we had to have five doctors sign off that he was well enough to come home.

Before I left for the hospital I made a quick oatmeal with sauteed apples and a few toasted pecans – so delicious and this bowl is 7 points.

As I was walking into the hospital, I looked up and saw a helicopter and thought to myself ”my gosh that’s flying really low!”

Um, I am a dork.  Because I realized the entrance I was going in was right next to the helicopter pad where critical patients are brought in.  Duh!

I got to the hospital around 9:30, and around 10:30 there were rumblings that he might get discharged.  We sluffed it off and said “if it’s today, great.  If it’s tomorrow?  That’s okay too.”  If either one of us had called or talked to anyone saying “he’s coming home!” it most definitely wouldn’t have happened.

When Tony got his sandwich for lunch, I went down and got probably my fourth or fifth bowl of chili for the week.  With a bit of cheese and a dollup of sour cream and 4 saltines, lunch comes in at 11 points.

And around two I had some kiwi and pears that I brought from home.

We passed the time by laying together in his hospital bed watching t.v., and he’d fall asleep every so often.  It was super warm in his room, so my cheeks were really rosy, so I made this pic in black and white.

I have to say though that the snotty nurse from the day before yesterday turned out to be fabulous – we just both got off on the wrong foot and she ended up taking excellent care of Tony.  In fact, when she came in to bring us his discharge papers she said “I am not even going to put a gown on - how about that?!”

When so many doctors are stirring the pot, it took until 4:45 in the afternoon before we were able to come home.  Our dog who has spent the last five days hidden in our bedroom closet, or laying on our bedroom floor, only to come out to go to the bathroom?  As soon as Tony walked in, he saw him, then went to get his toy and was back to his old self.

I obviously haven’t grocery shopped, and I really can’t remember what I had on tap for last week that night reappear this week.  Tony asked from some plain pasta with a bit of butter and Parmesan cheese, so I just made a quick red sauce with canned plum tomatoes, garlic, oregano, crushed red pepper, salt and pepper.  I tossed in some fresh chopped spinach at the end for some color.

Tony is still so tired.  I am hoping now that he’s home and not in pain he will be able to catch up this week.  So glad he’s home!

I am looking forward to getting to the gym this week, as well as getting on a more normal eating schedule.  Tony has follow up appointments with three of his doctors in the next week or so.   I want to thank you again for all the virtual hugs – it made this week a lot better for me!

Our weather is so crazy – I was woken up last night to a thunder storm!  Right now its 44 degrees, yet tonight its getting down to 17 with snow flurries.  I really hate January weather in Chicago.

How was your weekend??  Make it a great day!