Whoops, I Did it Again… (and Apple Chip Recipe)

There are just some days when your brain just isn’t working properly and you end up doing stupid stuff… Come on, you all can admit it… I know I’m not the only one!! ;)  Things that just don’t make sense and it makes you think “Gee, what in the world was I thinking?”  The answer to that question is usually “Apparently, you weren’t” (At least that’s how the conversation goes in my head)  lol ;) If I’m being honest, I have to admit that I happen to have quite a bit of those days/moments!

Things like…

- making a special trip into town (20 minutes away) to buy gas and a specific item only to get there and realize you forgot your wallet

- coming home from the grocery store to make that special meal for your better half only to find out that you forgot the main ingredient

- finishing a really good book and getting all excited to start the next book in the series and dig through the pile of books you got from the library finding that you have every other book in the series except that one

Or, how about…

- Almost slicing off your fingers on a mandolin slicer because you’re too stubborn and think it works better without the hand protector/food grip?

Yep… we’ve all been there… and if you tell me you haven’t been, you’re lying!! OR you really are that good at thinking things through and I need you to bottle some of that up and send it to me!! ;) Your turn to be honest!! What stupid stuff have you done or “shoulda thought that one through” moments have you had lately?

So… the reason I sliced my finger was because I was baking apple chips!! These things are so good that I kept going after I got injured! lol.. not to mention they make your whole house smell like apple goodness… perfect for a fall day! :)

So for your benefit and a little snack to curb your sweet cravings… Here’s the recipe:

~ Set the oven to 200*

~ Slice your apple or apples… Using a mandolin slicer is the easiest way to get thin even slices. I’ve cut them with a knife by hand before and it doesn’t work as well.  (Just make sure you use the food grip on the mandolin slicer!)  ;)  I have an OXO good grip slicer and I put it on setting 3. I got about 20 slices per apple.

~ Line a pan with parchment paper and put your apple slices side-by-side on the pan.  Make sure you don’t overlap them or stack them on top of each other because they wont dry out evenly.

~ (Optional) Mix about 1 tsp sugar and 1/8 tsp cinnamon and sprinkle on top of your apple slices before putting the pan in the oven.  You could also skip this step if your apple is of the sweeter variety or only use cinnamon and no sugar for a little healthier version.

~ Bake at 200* for an hour then, using tongs, flip the apples over and bake for another hour.  Make sure to watch that they don’t burn!

~ Take them out of the oven and let them cool. They will crisp up a little more while they cool down.

~ (Optional) Repeat entire process for more apple chips.

~ Chow down and enjoy!!

 

Whoopsy Daisy, Sweat Pink Ambassador, and My Big 2-6! :)

Ok… a lot… A LOT has been going on in my life and I feel like I should share!! I think this is going to be done in list format… here we go!!!

NEW ADDITION TO THE BLOG

A couple days ago I got an exciting email!!  If you follow me on Instagram you may have already seen this news… You’re looking at a new SPA sister!!  That’s right… I am now a Sweat Pink Ambassador!!  (Pink Shoelaces are on their way with pics to follow!!) ;) I’m excited to be a part of this awesome community! :)

 

WHOOPS!!  #RRRLINKUP

One of my readers messaged me and told me that that they were trying to add their Race Report and couldn’t because the #linkup was closed!! Whoops!  Sorry about that!  We are now open for business and you can linkup as many Race Recaps/Reports as you want from the month of July!! #nolimits I will also leave up your links for all of August too because I feel bad! ;)  Get to linking up!! :)

WORK WORK WORK…

I went from feeling like a bum with no jobs after graduation in May and like I could blog several times a day if I wanted to because I had nothing else to do… to feeling like I had no time again because I am now employed and have 4 separate different jobs!  I posted about it here in a blog post that you can read if you want.  Currently I am only working 2 jobs but starting mid-August I will be working all 4!! Here are my 4 jobs and my fall schedule:

1. Restaurant Job (Nights and Weekends)
   [I asked for an old job back when I was jobless… read about it HERE]
2. ASL Interpreter (On Call 24/7)
   [I signed up with one agency… hopefully more in the future!!]
3. Preschool Educational Aide (Monday through Thursdays)
   [Job I was doing in May… now full-time tho!]
4. Substitute Teacher (Fridays)
   [I can now sub for any interpreters in the area as well as teachers!!]

We’ll see how long I can keep this schedule up come fall, but I’d rather work as much as possible now while my family consists of two people instead of working and being gone all the time when we start having little additions join our family…
if you know what I mean! ;)

FROGFUEL PROTEIN SHOT GIVEAWAY (11 HRS LEFT)

You have 11 hours left to enter my FrogFuel giveaway!! Entries are really low so you have a really good chance of winning so ENTER NOW!!

DONE WITH REST… BRING ON THE WORKOUTS!

I have been really… I mean REALLY resting it up these days… the only working out I’ve done in July is being on my feet and walking back and forth really fast making food at work! lol… and bicep curls with the ice buckets when I fill the pop machines… does that count?? :-P
Really tho… I feel like I’ve given my knee a fair amount of rest time and it’s time to get legit and start working out again!  I’m not talking straight up running 10 miles tomorrow!! Calm down people… ;)  I want to be smart about this so my knee pain doesn’t come back…
which means I’ll start slow with walking for warmups and cooldowns and working on building up and balancing out the muscles that are heavily relied on while running… among other muscles too… and heavily foam rolling/sticking/ and stretching!  Also… making use of the elliptical and bike!
Hopefully after starting out slow, it won’t be long before I get back to running!! :)  I truly miss it and can’t wait to get back out there and hit the pavement pain free!!

MY 26th BIRTHDAY!

Last but not least… I turned 26 on July 14th!  Crazy how time flies!!  It was a great day filled with fun, laughter, and love! :)  My day started out with presents and then church:

After church… we went to my favorite restaurant… Red Lobster… of course my husband told them it was my birthday when we ordered dessert so they put a candle on top and a group of about 8 employees came out to sing to me… half way through the song, the whole room was singing to me and my face was bright red!! lol… people were paying their tabs and leaving and saying happy birthday when they walked by for the next 15 minutes! I felt like a celebrity!!

Then typically my mom makes me a hoho cake (recipe here) which is chocolate cake with vanilla cream filling and chocolate icing on top!!  Delicious!!  But alas, this year it was just my husband and I on my birthday and he decided to make me a ho ho cake… recipe pending! ;)

Gotta love him!! It was a fantastic birthday!!

 

 

Do you have any “Randoms” to share?

What kind of cake do you usually have on your birthday?

Are you recovering from an injury or still going strong?

Friday Food: Hot Fudge-Peanut Butter Pie

I decided to start a Friday Food!  I’ll be posting recipes on Fridays AND you all can link up your recipes/blogs at the bottom! :)

**WARNING:  I never claimed this was a health food blog!  Just sayin’ ;)

I LOVE peanut butter and chocolate together!!  My favorite candy is Reese Cups, I LOVE dipping Oreos in peanut butter and I mix melted peanut butter into chocolate pudding… so when I found this recipe In the coupons/ads, I knew it was going to be absolutely delicious!! I actually found a very similar recipe online for you all here.

Ingredients

- 1 cup Jif Creamy Peanut Butter (plus 2 tbsp divided)
- 1 (8 oz.) package cream cheese, softened
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1 (12 oz.) container (4 1/2 cups) frozen whipped topping, thawed and divided
- 1 prepared chocolate pie crust
- 1 (11.75 oz.) jar Smucker’s Hot Fudge Spoonable Ice Cream Topping, divided

1. BEAT together 1 cup peanut butter, cream cheese and sugar in large bowl with an electric mixer on medium until well combined. Gently mix in 3 cups whipped topping until thoroughly combined. Spoon mixture into pie crust. Using spatula, smooth mixture to edges of pie.

2. RESERVE 2 tablespoons of hot fudge topping in the corner of a resealable food storage bag; set aside.  Microwave remaining topping on HIGH (100% power) for 1 minute. Stir. Spread topping over pie, covering entire peanut butter layer.  Refrigerate until set.  Spread remaining whipped topping (1 1/2 cups) over hot fudge layer, being careful not to mix the two layers.

3. CUT a small corner from bag containing topping. Squeeze bag to drizzle topping over pie. Place remaining 2 tablespoons peanut butter in a resealable food storage bag; cut bag corner and squeeze to drizzle in opposite direction from topping.  Refrigerate until ready to serve.

To me, the 3rd direction is OPTIONAL I’ve made this pie 3 times now and have never done the 3rd step!  It makes it look pretty if you’re taking the pie somewhere or giving it to someone, but if you’re like me, you don’t care and just want to eat it!! ;)

**What’s your favorite dessert?

**Check out the Question of the Day HERE!!

**Don’t forget to enter my giveaway for My Memories Scrapbooking Software HERE.  (only 1 person has entered and it ends on Monday!)

 

Want to Participate in Friday Food by linking up a recipe you have on your blog or a recipe somewhere online? Click the ‘add your link’ button and link away! ;)

Baby Food OR Ice cream?!

So, many of you said that my 2-ingredient ice cream looked “DELISH” or “yummy”  (direct quotes)  ;)  and Wells L even asked for the recipe, although you do not suck for not having pinterest…. I rarely get on mine… ok, I get on it when I want to procrastinate…. which may or may not be always ;) haha…

Anyways… the link for the recipe can be found HERE. 

These pictures are my own documentation of the process, I did not steal them from anybody!

Some notes on the recipe:

- You don’t have to add peanut butter, you can eat it plain, or you can add whatever you like.  Some suggestions from the blog I found it on are chocolate chips, cocoa powder, fresh fruit, or whatever you have a craving for at the moment… maybe Swedish fish for Hungry Runner Girl ;)

- I do not have a food processor, so I had to use a blender.  I suggest definitely using a processor if you have one!  The blades on the blender are so short that I was constantly trying to rearrange the bananas so that they would all get equally mashed into baby food  ice cream.

 

My brother said it looked like banana baby food, but both him and my mom put on their brave faces and taste tested my peanut butter-banana ice cream with me.  We all liked it!  It’s a great healthy snack for these hot summer days AND… I was pleasantly surprised that the banana taste wasn’t overwhelming!!  I hope you all enjoy this recipe and if you make it, let me know how you liked it! :)

Triple Chocolate Peppermint Cookie Recipe

Recipe can be found HERE

 

Ingredients:
1 cup butter, softened
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup baking cocoa (I used Ghirardelli)
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup (6 ounces) semisweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup 60% cacao bittersweet chocolate baking chips

White Chocolate Frosting:
     1/2 cup white baking chips
     4 ounces cream cheese, softened
     3 cups confectioners’ sugar
     1/3 to 1/2 cup crushed peppermint candies

 

Directions:

1. In a large bowl, cream butter and sugars until light and fluffy.  Beat in eggs and vanilla.  Combine the flour, cocoa, salt and baking soda; gradually add to creamed mixture and mix well.  Stir in the chocolate chips.

2. Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls 2 in. apart onto ungreased baking sheets. Bake at 375 degrees for 8-10 minutes or until set.  Cool for 2 minutes before removing to wire racks to cool completely.

3. In a microwave, melt baking chips; stir until smooth.  Cool.

4. In a small bowl, beat cream cheese and confectioners’ sugar until smooth.  Beat in melted chips.  Frost cookies; sprinkle with peppermint candies. 
(note:  I just put the round peppermint candies in a blender and set to chop for a couple seconds to get them sprinkle-like)

Yield: About 6-1/2 dozen

 

Peanut Butter Cornflake Cookie Recipe

 

You can find this recipe HERE

Ingredients:
      1 cup – White Sugar
      1 cup – Corn Syrup
      1/4 cup – Butter
      1 cup – Peanut Butter
      6 cups – Cornflakes

 

Directions:

Bring sugar & corn syrup to a boil. 

Remove from heat & add butter & peanut butter.

Melt, pour over cornflakes.

Mix together and spoon onto wax paper.

Makes 50 cookies

          

Happy Birthday to my Mom!

Today is my mom's birthday! To start out the day, my parents and aunt and uncle and cousin came to watch my 5k race this morning (I'll do a RR early next week!) and then walked around the festival for a little bit... it was a blast! It was so much fun! I laughed so hard all day! It was rather chilly though with the wind! I think the high temperature was 68!

After we got home, my mom decided that she could do whatever she wanted on her birthday and took a nap for a couple hours, and then got up and started making dinner because my youngest sister is home this weekend from college so my mom made her favorite dinner and my boyfriend came out to eat with us. After dinner, I got out the peach cobbler I tried to make last night for my mom's birthday! I think I shall name it "Fail Cobbler" ... Disclaimer: I have never made cobbler in my life and am just discovering that being in the kitchen can kind of be fun if you're not a kid being made to do the dishes and actually want to be there! Here's the recipe I used just in case you guys dont know how to make cobbler either!! So, here's the story in mostly pictures:

I found a recipe and got the ingredients



Skinned and sliced the peaches (I only used 6 out of the 10 I bought) and combined them with sugar and water to boil for 10 minutes





Made the dough with sugar, flour, and milk





Melted the butter in the pan



Combined them in the pan as the directions said and put it in the oven with cinnimon sprinkled on top



**Here's where I realized that I failed miserably!! I noticed that the dough wasn't rising like it should and looked at the recipe again because I was pretty sure I did everything I was supposed to. "Self-rising flour" WHOOPS!! I used all purpose flour and didn't add any baking powder!! MAJOR FAIL! Well I guess it wasn't quite a major fail because everyone really liked it still, especially my mom which is what really counts since it was her birthday afterall!

So happy birthday to the best mother ever and I'm glad your day wasn't a fail like my cobbler!

I'M OFFICIALLY GRADUATED!!!

I did it!! I turned in my last big internship paper today and now I am officially graduated with a Bachelor's degree in Organizational Communications!! :D My plan is to go back to a different school in the spring to finish up my sign language interpreting degree which will take 2 years or less! I am so excited to move on to what I actually want to do with my life, but for now I am content with just relaxing, working, and enjoying my next 2 quarters off! :D This is a picture from the spring commencement that I got to walk in even though I wasn't going to graduate til this summer:

WOOHOO!! Anyways... on to my long run recap! I got all my stuff out the night before because yes, meeting someone at 7:45am is early for me, especially since I was up past midnight working on my paper!

And yes... that envelope is a race registration, thanks for asking! ;) I sent in my registration for the Sweetcorn Festival 5k today. The race is on September 4th at 9am... races always make me nervous, but a good nervous.

I woke up this morning at 6:30am and ate 1 1/2 pieces of peanut butter toast and got dressed and checked the weather.. 59 degrees?!! I wore long sleeves for the first time running today! It felt so nice though! I headed out the door around 7:30 and met Jess at her place at 7:45am... right on time! As soon as I walked in, she was beaming and told me she just got of the phone and got the job she's been wanting!! Congrats Jess!! God knew you are perfect for that job!! After saying congrats and smiling ALOT, we headed out the door and she asked me "do you want to do a flat course, or hills?" Well, not being one to back down from a challenge I said "hills for sure!" We started out at a nice crisp pace, I really didn't pay attention because I was having too much fun talking to her... she's such a lovely person!! We did about a mile and then comes the "hill" part... I'm telling you, this was not a hill, it was a mountain!!! seriously... it was the steepest, longest hill I have run to date!! I felt like walking or crying, or both! Jess just kept saying "you can do it!" "you're almost there" "its downhill once we reach the top" Thank you Jess for encouraging me because I'm pretty sure thats the only thing that got me up that crazy hill! lol Well, that and my legs were completely numb by the time we hit 1.4 miles of our 7 mile run!

After that our run felt really good... I felt like she was pushing me, and she felt like I was pushing her... and pretty soon we were back to where we started 7.03 miles and 1 hr and 9 minutes earlier! Let me tell you, I am so proud of that run!! Our average pace was 9:48 min/mile and it felt great!! Jess had to go to work, but I left with promises on both ends that we would definitely run together more often! We both had a blast! I headed over to the park to continue my run... I didn't really tighten up yet because its less than a minute from her house. I did a couple loops around the park for a total of 2.26 miles in an average pace of 10:37 min/mile which is still faster than i had expected!! TOTALLY AWESOME!! Today was one of those days where everything goes well and the run is fun and better than you had hoped and everything just clicks!!

Long Run Total: 9.29 miles (longest run to date)

I then went and stretched beside the pond and believe me, my legs were dead!! (still are) I finished stretching and headed to kroger on my way home to pick up some chocolate milk and ice and when I got home I had me one of these:

First one in about 1 1/2 years (since college basketball training) it felt so good to submerge my dead tired screaming legs into the frigid water!! Then after soaking a bit I got a shower and pulled on my Sigvaris recovery socks!! I love these socks!! Thanks to Erica at I Run Because I Can for having the giveaway that I won!! These socks ROCK!! **Review to come in the next week**

And yes, my dog likes the Sigvaris socks too! :D Speaking of giveaways there are quite a few going on out there right now... check out my sidebar!

Countdown til my first half marathon: 28 days 7 hours and some odd minutes and seconds... less than a month!!

What are some great recipes for runners? Carb loading recipes, pre race recipes, post race recipes... I'm wanting to try some new recipes out so if you have any good ones please share!