Blueberry Lemon Scones with Orange Zest Glaze

As I am in my LAST WEEK OF WORK I’ve decided to bring in a few of my favorite dishes I’ve made into the office over the years.  Last week I brought a few people my chicken tikka masala, and I brought in a batch of blueberry scones.

But most of my scone recipes call for a minimum of six tablespoons of butter, and most recipes can have a stick or two in the recipe.  No wonder those taste so good!  But I wanted to make these a bit more WW friendly so I could incorporate it into an actual breakfast.  The results?  Amazing.  I reduced the butter all the way down to only TWO tablespoons for 16 mini scones – just a tad bit bigger than the vanilla scones at Starbucks.  I bake them on my Baking Steel (still trying to get an invite to their test kitchens!) so the crust has just a hint of crispness to it, but the inside is light and fluffy.  Best part?  These freeze well too.  I took the leftovers and put them on a cookie sheet and froze them for 15 minutes, then added them to a ziploc bag – that way I can just pull one out and pop it in the microwave or toaster oven for later.

You can see how much easier it is to cut once it’s frozen for 15 minutes or so.  I could never get Tony to try a scone because he felt it would just dry his mouth out – but in all my years of convincing him, I couldn’t sway him to try one – I think anyone who says they don’t like scones, just hasn’t had a good one!

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So with my new beginnings with my work ending, I realized it made no sense to continue my gym membership by my office.  First, it’s a 40 minute drive – no thanks!  And second, it’s pricey, even though I get the resident rate because my office is in the town.  Tony surprised me with that membership four years ago this coming summer.   I even told him at the time that it was too much money, but he insisted I was worth it.  Truth be told, I think he was just nervous about me walking around the roads by my office in 90 degree weather and was always worried that my blood sugars would start dropping and I’d be a mile and a half away from the office.

So it will be bittersweet to say goodbye to that gym for the sentimental reasons alone.  I joined the local Y on Saturday though!  Tony and I actually looked at the gym membership 14 years ago, and it was as if we had walked right back into 1955.  The basketball hoops were rusty and hardly had any nets.  The gym “locker room” for lack of a better word was also lined with old, rusty lockers that I didn’t even want to put my shoes into.

Well, fast forward and see what a newly remodeled YMCA looks like:

They have two pools actually.  The one pool above is for swim meets, but during the week it is open to any member for lap swim.  But Hannah tells me that they keep that pool about 15 or 20 degrees colder than the family pool.  I’ll have to check it out – can’t be any worse than swimming in the outdoor pool at my old gym the first day of summer when it’s open!  They have this gorgeous floor to ceiling fire place, plenty of work space areas with outlets, and a Tropical Smoothie café.  Nice!  I had to take a picture of the Aquatic Center sign – my maiden name is Hills, I thought my family would get a kick out of seeing that!

Then my Mom came over.  I had gotten us tickets to see all the Academy Award nominated short films at a local theater.  From noon until 4:00 (with only a 20 minute intermission) we saw 10+ short films – ranging in length from 7 to 30 minutes.  I’ve always wondered how people would see any of those movies and when I hear those categories announced that night of the Oscar’s I don’t even really pay attention to it.  But my Mom and I both picked our favorite from the animated and live action categories, and we said if either of those don’t win we could yell at the t.v. and say “what movies were you watching?!  that should have won!”

We then met up the kadults and hit up our local Italian restaurant for dinner.  We started in the bar area and it was a bit noisy with the live music, so we were happy to have a table in the dining room and talked about their school, politics, etc.  Thanks for hanging out with me Momma!   Mom and I each got the teriyaki steak kabobs – with fresh veggies, and a baked potato.  Neither of us came close to finishing and when I got home I weighed my box and it weighed 1 pound 6 ounces! Insane.  So I have the leftover beef and veggies and made a stir fry for lunch today.

So now the countdown begins!!!  I’ve actually gotten a couple of leads in the past few days, and even had to rush to put together a “foodie” resume.  My sister has set me up on Linked In.  I was on there, but up until last week I’d really only been linked with my father in law – hi Carl!   It doesn’t matter if either of those leads even work out, all I know is that it is a giant step in the right direction on where I want to be.

And that makes me very happy!

Oh, and before I forget!  It’s my weekly WI!   Last week I was 168.7.  Today I am . . .

Down another 1.4!  That makes a total of 10.6 pounds so far this year.  I do think the new WW program is helping me make better food choices.  It was interesting because I took some of my old calorie count points for the day – I’d been eating around 1500 calories a day, and if I did the points calculator, some of those days had 40-50 points in a day, and I am allotted only 30 points in a day.  I do use all my 35 flex points for the week, but I don’t eat the exercise points.  I am very happy with my progress so far.

And don’t worry, Hannah and I have plans for a mani/pedi on Friday before we go to Austin – we couldn’t think of a better way to celebrate the first day of the rest of my life on Friday!

Make it a great day!