pain in my neck!

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My appetite was ravenous today!!  We were supposed to go to the mountains, however I woke up with a crazy pain in my neck!  Not the dogs or Chris ;)  I’ve woken up with a stiff neck before but this was pain.  If I turned my head to the right or down it hurt really bad.  It wasn’t just a “sore” feeling but kind of like someone twisting a pencil in your neck?  Yah, weird…I’ve had the heating pad on it all day and it’s let up like 20%.  Hopefully I’ll wake up feeling better tomorrow!

On to my day!  I received an awesome opportunity to create my own custom gluten-free cereal with the great people over at Custom Choice Cereal.  It is similar to a lot of the custom cereal companies you have seen, except all of their ingredients are gluten-free!  While I do not stick to a GF diet, I do feel eating GF can help with digestion.  I’ve had many other delicious GF cereals, so I was excited to get to make a combination of my own!

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I chose the Good Morning Flakes as a base and added:

  • apricots
  • goji berries
  • coconut
  • walnuts
  • almonds

I was really happy with the amount of fruit + nuts that was in the mix.   Their site is easy to navigate and the nutrition facts add up as you add each ingredient.  It’s always fun getting to name your mix too :)  I topped my oats with this today but am excited to get my CRUNCH on with some milk.  Downsides?  Well, custom cereals are expensive, but this doesn’t seem more expensive than the other similar companies out there.  The apricots may have been coated with sugar…which is probably used to help prevent sticking.  The sugar content was still really low, but I prefer my dried fruit au naturel ;) 

Look, only 5g sugar for 2/3c.  That is pretty impressive!  And for only 129 calories per serving it is pretty dense with fiber + protein.  Woop!

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Bonus side of baking with peanut butter is that yield more empty peanut butter jars at a much very fast rate :)  I have another one waiting in my cupboard..muahaha..AND my favorite pnut butter ever [organic PB unsweetened] from Whole Foods has a $1 off coupon in their “whole deal” booklet.  Check it out!

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Oh yeah!! I tried something new with my oats that I have been meaning to try but always forget.  I added applesauce!  However, I also added egg whites and I DON’T think the two should be combined :)  It was good but not my fav.  The applesauce fluffed up the oats even more.  I’m excited to give it another go!

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I wrote my 2nd article for Natural Food List today and wasn’t getting up for lunch until I finished!  I was starrrrving!  [there were snacks bt/n bfast + lunch] 

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  • Leftover quinoa topped with black beans
  • 1/2 avocado
  • 1/2 red pepper
  • 1/2 head of kale salt + vinegar style

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With a side of…pumpkin yogurt + cinnamon + 1t chia seeds

THICK.

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The other day I got a package from Bertolli!  I had no idea this was coming my way…fun!  The flavors sounded awesome.

Four Cheese Rosa + Arrabbiata

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Before dinner I found a hiding cupcake in the fridge from Natalie’s bday.  The huz and I split it…I love section cuts through food..which is the Architect in me speaking, hehe.

See how the pnut butter ball sank inside?  It was still delicious though :)

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I wanted to incorporate the Arrabbiata sauce in dinner.  Time for a pasta bake!  WF had these cute organic sweet mini peppers on sale.  I sauteed them with 1, 1/2 bulb of fennel and 1 shallot.

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Veg-tastic

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  • I cooked about 3/4lb of pasta for about 5min [very al dente]
  • Drained the pasta and put in a 9x9 baking dish
  • Mixed in the veggies and the whole jar of sauce
  • Covered and baked for 30min at 350*
  • Uncovered + topped with fresh mozz and cranked the oven up to 500* for a few minutes

An example of something that tastes delicious but photographs terribly.  I mean, daylight would help…but the mozzarella looks like melted marshmallows…hehee

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I steamed a HUGE pot of broccoli that we ate along side this. 

Thanks again for everyone that participated in the Amazing Grass giveaway.  I wish I could have entered myself!  I wanted to give all of you AG fans a heads up that the Whole Foods in my area has a HUGE sale on AG products.  I have no idea if sales are the same in every state [I’m doubting they are] but it’s worth checking!!  The 8.5oz jars of GreenSuperFood were on sale for $17.99 which is over a $10 savings!!  Their plain wheatgrass was on sale and at least one jar of their supplements.  Check it out!!

Also..I didn’t mean to come off demanding that you all comment more [from the last post].  The BOLD CAPS were intense, haha.  But you all had some great ideas and lots of hilarious comments…so keep ‘em comin ;)

I also got a slew of comments in yesterday’s post about my “guns” LOL!!  I honestly didn’t even notice…I’ll discuss my arms in another post? I feel weird about that, hahaha..in an embarrassed kind of way.  We really only have 2 small mirrors and I haven’t had tank tops on at the gym with lots of mirrors so I really didn’t even notice the Whittle My Middle was not only whittling my middle but my ARMS…whoa!  They have always been toned but I think WMM did a number on them!  Anyway..more on my workouts later ;)

ONE more thing..can you stand it?  I’m playing with the blog and changing a few things around…like my header images..and I moved “ota.bars” and “food + architecture” under MY STORY.  If there are any major changes I’ll let you know.  If something seems weird, I’m probably just testing things out.

Okay..night!

~Ashley

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Check out my article on Chia Seeds!! 

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