power muffins

As I'm learning to be a grow up, one of the big changes is buying, preparing and cooking my own food. I really don't like grocery shopping and routinely struggle to buy the right amount of breakfast, lunch and dinner plans without food going bad or having to go back to the store within 1-2 days.

I keep telling my student athletes... life is easier when can just do what people tell you to do. Being on an athletic team helps tremendously with forcing you to manage your time. Practice and game schedules determine when you work out, when & where to eat, and the rest of time is allotted to sleep and getting work done. You don't really need to schedule time to hang out with your friends because your teammates are your friends. Therefore, any team time equals hanging out with friends. 

During the collegiate athletics time of my life, eating was easy. I could pretty much eat anything I wanted and I didn't have to buy the ingredients, cook it or clean up after it. Now, as I'm learning to be an adult, I have to do it all. (And I have to design my own work outs and actually do them... but that's another topic for another day). 

These power muffins are a great snack or breakfast. Greek yogurt and oats with a small serving of fruit in them fills me up. Eating 2 muffins with my coffee in the morning (about 9:00am) has been a GREAT way to start my day and holds me until lunch at about 2:00pm. 

Yes, they still have some butter and regular sugar in them, but not as much as a cake or regular muffin recipe. Enjoy: 

Ingredients: 

cooking spray or muffin liner papers

2 cups all purpose flour

1 cup quick oats, plain

2/3 cup sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1.5 cups nonfat greek yogurt

2 large eggs or 1/2 cup egg beaters

4 tablespoons, unsalted butter, mostly melted

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1.5 cups of fresh blueberries, or 4 bananas cut up into small pieces

Directions:
Preheat oven 365 degrees. Coat muffin tin with cooking spray or liners. Combine flour, sugar, oats, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl. Combine yogurt, eggs, butter and vanilla in a second bowl until consistent texture. Fold yogurt mixture into dry mixture, stir until combined completely. Fold in fruit. Spoon into muffin tins. Bake 20-25 minutes. Let them cool on a cooling rack. Makes one dozen. 

Store in a plastic bag in refrigerator (after cooling entirely). Reheat in the microwave for 30-45 seconds.  

Blueberry

Choc chip & Banana

Improvements for next time: 

1. I also did them with chocolate chip. Amazing. 

2. I also did this recipe making 6 chocolate chip muffins and 6 bananas. I split the mixture before adding fruit/chocolate. 

3. Try combinations of fruit. blueberry + banana? apple + cinnamon? 

4. Try a recipe with more oats and less flour. I couldn't even tell the muffins had oats in them. 

my dog whisperer

I love when dogs can do the 'roll over' trick. Wrigley learned to 'sit' and 'lay down' fairly easily as a young pup. Over time she's learned to 'stay' and wait until we say 'ok' before eating a treat or running outside when we open the door. Ryan also taught her to play dead with 'bang-bang.' Although it's still a slow death of laying down on her side, she's gotten a lot better at it. The next trick on my list was always to teach her to 'roll over'.

My attempt at this probably started last fall. From the playing dead position, I would have a treat in my hand while helping her to physically roll over. Dog books say to use a treat to help them with the motion. Rolling over provides a unique challenge to give your dog a treat in motion, as they're on their back. Needless to say, after a couple of coughing fits from Wrigley (from choking on a treat), she still didn't have coordination to make her body roll over.

Sometime in early March, I let Wrigley out of her crate when I got home. She has a bad habit of jumping to lick my hand when she's really excited to see me. We're working on breaking the bad habit by making her 'sit and stay' until we say 'ok' and chase her into the other room.

Her ears are back, she's fidgeting like crazy as I tell her to 'sit, stayyyy, lay downnn....' AND THEN SHE ROLLED OVER. I could NOT believe it! I responded, "Wrigley, what WAS that??" We went crazy, running around, jumping on the couch, I was so excited! I couldn't get her to do it again, but I had hope that I could teach her!

Later I found out that my dog whisperer, Ryan, had been working with her earlier that morning to learn 'roll over'. I guess since she'd been practicing it earlier, she knew the sequence 'stay and lay down' should naturally progress to 'roll over'!!

She can do ALL of these tricks and my dog whisperer taught her all of them! I'm good at reinforcing, but I can only take credit for a small percentage of actually teaching Wrigley tricks. Below is a list of all the tricks, commands and terms she knows:
-sit
-lay down
-bang bang
-roll over
-shake and other paw
-stay
-ok
-bring it/find it
-come (she knows this command, but doesn't like to come... so instead I say 'want some?' ...and then she comes)
-bed
-crate
-up
-go potty
-outside/walk

I thought I would upload an iphone video of some of Wrigley's new tricks..

The beginning of the end of the year

Sunday marked the end of the spring season 2013.... hurray! I made it! a l m o s t. 

Plans for the summer are getting set, my focus at work has changed, no more practices or games, everything is blooming around us, my swimsuits are ready for a beach, river or lake.... hurray! I made it! so close.

As a college student, it's hard to stay focused. I get it. As a college professor/athletic trainer, it's just as hard to stay focused. I have a glimpse of what summer will be like in a little over a month. yet so far away.

During college, as I get close to finals week, I always made a to do list, on post-it notes, that listed everything that had to be done before I could leave school. A final finals list. One side was for all my classes, the other side was everything else. I tell you, everything was on the list..... meetings, papers, exams, tests, practicals, banquets, housing for next year, future class plans, summer jobs/plans, laundry, car inspections, packing, storage. I taped it down to my desk to make it the "official" to do list.

I have a chronic problem of rewriting my to do lists a hundred times. (Hence the need for an "official" list.) It needs to be clearly written, so the end point is in sight. I need a clear path to getting it all done.

Timing is the key when attempting to make my final finals list. If it's written too far out from the end of finals week, it will be re-written due to being overwhelming. It's a problem when each bullet point has too many variables missing to actually complete the task. There's nothing more frustrating than having a to do list in which I feel like I can't complete anything on the list. (In this case, I try to "save" the list by adding to list just so I can check it off. This trick can only help so much. Eventually, the list needs to be re-written because it's too messy.)

Right now, I'm only at the beginning of the end of the year. Yes, spring season is over, but it's not the end of the year yet. There is still A LOT to do before hitting the beach. I tried making a final final list today. And I already re-wrote it twice. Clearly, it's too early.

Hopefully with more normal hours over the next several weeks I can really get back into working out, puppy time, soccer, tennis, biking, cooking some Pinterest meals, clean the apartment more often and catch up with some friends.

The summer is near, I can smell it, but I can't see it yet.

this is really happening - wrigley part 1

As you read part one about Wrigley's story keep in mind that we had no intentions of getting a dog.

Two hard working athletic trainers, early in our careers, we don't have a lot of extra time. Last winter and spring when we'd have a little time to drive around Lynchburg, we'd hit a couple of shopping errand with visiting pet shops to see the animals. There are three pet shops: Petopia, Pet & Aquatic Warehouse and PetSmart. Our favorite was Pet & Aquatic Warehouse on Wards Rd because they have a huge selection of saltwater and freshwater fish, plus lots of puppies, bunnies, and kittens! Our rule is that we won't ever ask to hold a puppy, which we never did!

After a few trips over several months, we'd narrowed down what type of dog that would fit us as our first dog... some sort of poodle mix that was smaller and hypoallergenic, but we were not getting a dog anytime soon.

In April, our friends asked us to babysit their 11-week-old cockapoo puppy! Since Ryan was working, I ended up hanging out with about 7 pounds of cute, fluffy, floppy, bundle of joy for the day while Ryan stayed with her overnight. They have a crazy story about getting their puppy, involving craigslist and a scary area of Lynchburg... the bottom line is craigslist for cute puppies..? What a great way to save money (compared to $500-600 at a pet store or $800-1500 from a breeder). Still, with NO plans of getting a puppy for at least a couple of years, I began inquiring on craigslist for cute puppies.

On a Thursday, while eating lunch, I saw an ad for an "adorable puppy" with a picture of a puppy who could barely stand. There was a picture of it's mom (black & tan cocker spaniel) and it's dad, (a white medium sized poodle). Within minutes, and I mean minutes, I had texted Ryan... "Guess what I found on craigslist, what do I do...?" and had replied to the email, "Will you take $200? Male or female? When can I pick him/her up?" Ryan was by his phone and responded, "Why not? Let's go for it." Wait what? This morning we had no plans of getting a puppy. By 3:00, I had a email confirming... the puppy was ours. W H A T ? 

As a side hiccup, that I don't want to forget, at 3:30 or so, I called the lady to set up a time to pick up the puppy. When she answered, she told me, "Sorry, there's someone on the way to get her right now, I'm taking the ad down because I'm getting so many inquires and she's already taken." I got really sad and couldn't find the ad on craigslist anymore. I thought what she'd said was true.

About 10 minutes later, she called me to apologize. When I called, she didn't know who I was, so she thought I was someone else inquiring. Since I was the first to respond to the ad, (I literally must have seen the ad seconds after she posted it), the puppy was mine! "And when are you going to come pick her up?" 

....I texted Ryan... the puppy is ours, we need to go get puppy supplies tonight and pick her up at 8:00 tomorrow morning. This is really happening.

second best quesadilla he's ever had

I don't know what #1 is.... but this is the second best quesadilla Ryan's ever had. I loved it too!!

Ingredients for GREEK QUESADILLAS:

flour tortillas
fresh spinach, finely chopped
1/2 red onion, chopped
2 red peppers, roasted and chopped
black olives
feta cheese
mozzarella cheese
parmesan cheese
oregano


Butter 1 tortilla, place in sauce pan, buttered side down. Load with thin layer of mozzarella cheese, spinach, black olives, roasted red peppers, feta, onions (not too much), and sprinkle oregano and parmesan cheese. (Ryan doesn't like feta, so I wanted the flavor without the texture. By only putting a little feta and adding parmesean there was more cheese flavors without him even realizing there was feta! Success!) Top with a good layer mozzarella cheese. Melty mozzarella is necessary to hold the quesadilla together. Finish with a buttered tortilla on top. Turn on medium heat. Flip over when cheese is melted on the bottom layer and getting soft near the top tortilla. It's done with you lift up one tortilla and the bottom lifts up too (hince the good layer of melty cheese).

Instructions to successfully roasting red peppers. It worked again, and I'm glad I documented my success the first time because I couldn't remember how I did it!

Improvements for next time:
1. This also worked with one tortilla, layer ingredients on half, fold over. I think I was able to put more topping on because it was easier to flip in the pan.
2. Don't drop the feta cheese ALL over the stove, counter, floor, kitchen rug.

thursday thanks on friday

Trying to get back into wrigley and company... even though there's no real news lately.

Here we go. Lots to be thankful for this week:

community bible study

love

my valentine

practices outside

exam in class feels like a day off from teaching

dad's quick visit

injured athletes getting better

indoor plant growing new leaves

cooking with my valentine

creative homemade cards

waking up without an alarm... at 7:30am not feeling tired (this IS not me but I'll take it)

packages in the mail

sweet valentine notes

we love because he first loved us

Happy Valentine's Day!

Valentine's day doesn't have to be about having a significant other. Growing up, my mom always put together a red spread for each of us to show her love. A red shirt, or socks, or candy. Yes, a hallmark style example of showing love, but from a better more heart-felt family, caring, motherly love. Which is MUCH better. Valentine's day is an excuse to tell those we care about, that we love them. And it's not cheesy. Yes, valentine's day can turn into being cheesy fairly easily, but it doesn't have to.

"...For love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love." (1 John 4:7-9)

Love  comes  from  God.
God  is  love.  

How remarkable?

If we think we know what love means... that feeling we get... those thoughts we have... it stems from the one who created love Himself. There's no way around it. God shows us perfect love, just and merciful love. He created it, and it's beautiful.

It's everlasting.

It's unconditional.

Express the love you feel. For without God, we wouldn't know what real love is.


"We love because he first loved us" (1 John 4:19)