Always Knew I Was Special…

If you are a lefty, like me, you can relate to this picture. I am surprised that all of my years of writing notes in school didn’t leave a permanent pencil and pen smudge on my hand.

Not only am I a part of the left handed 10% of the population, I am also part of the fewer than 1% that can be considered ambidextrous.

I always knew I was special.

This special ability of mine has come in quite handy this week with my left arm and shoulder under the weather.

I mean, how else would I be able to write down the sales for the upcoming week?

I like to think that my right-handed penmanship is neater than most people’s dominant hand penmanship.

Do people still use the word penmanship? I feel like it is an obsolete term these days given the use of computers. I mean, they don’t even focus on handwriting skills in the schools. But that is a conversation for another day.

Anyway, I really thought I was better yesterday.

I was able to run a few miles, not fast  (it’s a taper week anyway) but I could run without pain which was a good sign to me.

I didn’t sleep well at all last night from the pain in my arm and shoulder.

Maybe I tried to do too much yesterday after the run.

I know I was supposed to be resting but I needed to restock my apple supply.

Do you see the size of these apples? Probably not the best thing to be lifting.

Truth is, your world can’t just grind to a halt when you are under the weather. Especially as a single mother.

Someone has to get the boy ready for school, home from school. cook and feed him dinner, yell until the homework is done, shuffle him off to baseball practice and then home to finish yelling about taking a shower and going to bed.

That was my view for 2 hours from my car. Welcome to little league season.

Confession: I didn’t pay much attention to what was taking place on the field. I was busy perusing emails and surfing the web on my phone.

You are in luck though – I am going to share with you some links that I found interesting.

It is already time to register for the Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend. It is a full series of races and I would really like to register for the half marathon. Anyone want to join me?

Do you follow Hungry Girl? I get a newsletter every morning and I love reading them each day. I don’t always follow her recipes (obviously, we all know I hate following exact recipes) but I like to get ideas and then create my own meals and snacks.

If you click on the picture above, it will take you to a recent newsletter which mentions calorie counts in restaurants and their accuracy.

Question: How do you feel about seeing calorie counts on menus? Are you for or against it?

On the Mend and a Recipe

My unplanned taper plan isn’t going as expected.

I was expecting bananas and sweet potatoes as my go to items this week. Not Motrin around the clock and my new found best friend – BIOFREEZE.

I hope you never need to use this product. However, if you do stumble upon a random injury, such as an upset rotator cuff (injured from running no less), I must recommend you get your hands on this roll-on lifesaver.

My selfless great friend/neighbor, you know her, the friend that kindly shares her Edible Arrangements with me, saved my life the other night when she ran on over here to help me roll this on my shoulder.

Yes, I needed the help rolling it on. 

I don’t care what the ingredients are in this BIOFREEZE, how many parabens or forbidden toxins might be lurking in the vapors it gives off. It made me feel better. And when you are in serious muscle cramping radiating pain, that is all that matters.

Thankfully, I am starting to feel better. I actually slept last night without the muscle cramping pain that puts you in a state where nothing you do is right, comfortable or working.

I have been trying to rest this week in order to run the half on Sunday. I had accepted right away that no race was worth trying to run through pain but I am pretty sure I will be fine.

Rest is not something I do easily. I am always on the run, always cooking something, cleaning something or organizing something.

I am a lot like Rosie the robot. Except we don’t have a dog. Which the boy reminds me every single day. Add it to the list of the things he DOESN’T have.

That would be my closet. The pile of sweatshirts are still on the floor of the closet because I have been unable to raise my arm high enough to put them away.

 I have had to let myself slide this week and not attempt to keep the house as neat, organized and as clean as usual.

I made this executive decision to stop cleaning after I broke a dish attempting to get it out of the kitchen cabinet.

You would think the little boy would have sympathy for his mommy. Especially after watching the dish fly out of the cabinet and break all over the floor.

Instead, he wanted to know if we had some cake for dessert. Which we didn’t.

He then said, “So whip one up. You do that easily.”

I already have sympathy for his wife.

Luckily for both of us, I remembered a dessert I could throw together quickly and easily.

It looks like your typical smores. But it is not.

Please note the featured ingredient: Trader Joe’s House Whip.

Ever had a COLD SMORES? 

I used to teach a cooking class for kids and this was a perfect recipe for children because it requires no oven, no cutting and minimal (yet tasty!) ingredients.

It is a great recipe because you don’t need to follow measurements (which we know I like). You can make one, two or twelve smores and store the extras in your freezer.

You can use more chocolate chips and/or more marshmallows depending upon your taste.

Sometimes I spread peanut butter on the graham cracker or mashing some banana into the mix. Remember, get creative!

COLD SMORES

Ingredients:

**THERE IS NO RIGHT OR WRONG INGREDIENT AMOUNT FOR THIS RECIPE

• Trader Joe’s House Whip (or any form of Cool Whip)
• Chocolate Chips (dark chocolate, semi-sweet, milk – doesn’t really matter)
• Mini Marshmallows
• Graham Crackers

**I only made two smores so I used a few spoonfuls of each ingredient and two graham cracker sheets. 

Directions:

In a bowl, mix whipped topping, marshmallows, chocolate chips. Spoon on top of graham crackers to form sandwich.

*Please note that I wasn’t able to fully mix the ingredients so that is why you notice the marshmallows and chocolate chips so well in the photo. 

Have I mentioned it is my left shoulder that is injured and I am a lefty?

Place in freezer until frozen or until you lose patience and just want to eat it.

Simple, right?

Delicious….

Since I am feeling slightly better, I may test out a jog this morning. Hopefully it goes well.

Have a great day!

I need to know:

Are you always on the go? Do you have a hard time resting when you are being forced to?

Have you ever had a cold smores?

Did you used to watch the Jetsons?