Category Archives: kitty

Banana puff and kitties

November almost over!  I was in the mood for a warm and toasty breakfast today.  Someone had asked me in the comments if subbing almond flour for coconut flour would work in the banana breakfast bread pudding.  I wasn’t totally sure, but figured today was a good day to find out.

I shall dub this the Almond Banana Puff

Using these ingredients:

  • 1 medium banana
  • 60 grams of egg whites (probably 3 or 4?)
  • 2 tablespoons (14 grams) almond flour
  • cinnamon to taste
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

First off, I put the banana and egg whites in my mini blender and whizzed them up.  You probably don’t have to do this, but the end product won’t be so puffy.  This banana was firm, so that’s why I did it.  Then I baked for 20 minutes at 350 degrees.  The result?  Basically a banana souffle.

The almond meal is not as absorbent as the coconut flour, so this let it puff up like a souffle as the batter was liquidy. I didn’t double the almond flour because it is pretty caloric compared to coconut flour.

See how fluffy this is?

Good deal.  Calories on this (without toppings) are about 220.

So on to some randomness now:

Funny, when I wrote the blog title about ‘book update’ the other day, I didn’t think that people might interpret that as a book I was writing.  I am not writing a book and have no plans on writing a book. At least a nonfiction one at any rate.  I just stick to reviewing ones I have read  😀

I have noticed that quite a few people who lost a lot of weight and then wrote books have regained a good amount of weight back.  It is just tough to put yourself in the public eye like that – especially if you struggle.  Sometimes it is hard enough having a blog and never having made it to goal :ahem:

More doin’s:

Update on Billy.  Aka Big Bill the Pill.  Isn’t it funny how we call our pets every other name but the one we gave them?

Anyhoo, Billy goes tomorrow for his neutering (don’t tell him!!) and he will be officially up for adoption at that point, although we are fostering him until then or they have another foster home that opens up to take him.  He has turned out to be quite the nice cat. Super, super friendly and kind of silly (hence the nickname).   I really hope he has a new home by Christmas.  He’s filled out nicely with all the food.

I think it looks like he has a Mickey Mouse head on his back. Does anyone else see it?

Not to be outdone in the cuteness area, here is Pixie sucking her toes in my lap today. It is so effing cute when she does this!

And if you are wondering, one of Pixie’s alternative names is P-diddly.  John christened her with that one.  I guess some cross between Bo Diddly and P Diddy :mrgreen:

 

I think I need a donut tonight.  Ever have times like that?

Thanksgiving blogger 5K and stray kitty progress

Bye-bye warm weather!  It was so warm the last few days and today it was rainy and cold in the low 40s.  I was telling John that I wanted to go lower carb or grain free today, but I really wanted cream of wheat for breakfast.  He told me just to have the cream of wheat – and so I did.  One of the few times I actually did something John told me to do  😈  I made pumpkin cream of wheat with egg whites stirred in, topped with pecans and a tablespoon of maple syrup.

That hit the spot!

I hit the ground running with work today.  Busy, busy, busy.  Which is good.  I was glad because I didn’t want to go out for a run until after it stopped raining, so I was glad there was work to do.  Speaking of running, anyone who is interested can sign up for Alissa’s Thanksgiving virtual 5K. She is offering a lot of prizes as well for doing a 5K  (run, walk,  elliptical, etc) on Turkey Day!

I had the munchies big time today.  I broke for lunch a little early so I wouldn’t keep munching.

After lunch, the mail came and my paycheck arrived a day early! Yay!  One of the few companies left that does not direct deposit.   The weather cleared up this afternoon.

That meant I would go to the bank for my run today.  It’s about 1.25 miles each way, so a good run – and functional.  My legs felt so heavy, though. Definitely was not feeling this run at.all.  One of those “why do I bother with running?” types of run.  Ugh?

Looks nice out, but it was pretty chilly.  John made me one of these when I got back.

Anyway, temps tonight are  going to be 18 degrees.  Now that I have fed Billy and he likes me, that means I have shouldered some responsibility for him. So, he comes in to the shop tonight.  Not sure how he will take it.  He followed me in there today and looked around, so I think he will take it much better than Boo did at first, but who knows?

Here is Billy in the shop tonight.  He came right in, but wasn’t too happy about the door closing behind him, although he got over it pretty fast.

This cat hated people this summer.

He is a very friendly guy now and quite a loud purrer.  I had no idea how friendly and lovey he would be.  He is quite mouthy, though.  He meows a lot. Anyone who wants a kitty, let me know!  :mrgreen:

We will see if he tries to get out tomorrow when John is out there.  At least tonight the kitty won’t be making any little Billies that will find their way to me…

Riding, cupcakes and kitties

What a gorgeous weekend!  So glad my bike isn’t inside on the trainer just yet 😀  It has been a while since we rode, though.  I really wanted to ride to breakfast on Sunday, even though we also wanted to ride later.   When I saw the temps were in the low 40s, I said I was riding to breakfast!  Funny how warm becomes relative the closer it gets to winter.

We did have to bundle up this morning.  Three layers here.

My eyes were watering a bit when we first started out and my nose was running like a sieve, but I was so happy to be biking again!  We were also happy to get to breakfast and get our hands around some warm mugs of coffee at Coffee Planet

It was such  a nice relaxing breakfast.  I love my Sunday morning relaxing.  We biked home and decided to go back out riding again after lunch.  12 miles done.

Meanwhile, remember Boo’s sibling stray that I called Lily?  Turns out Lily is Billy.  This cat was not like Boo and I hadn’t fed him or anything, although he did see me feeding Boo before.  He was not coming around at all, and then he showed up yesterday. I don’t know what changed, but I went out with food today and crouched down and he came right over, shaking like a leaf (I cried a little over that).  He wolfed down the food.  I also noted at this time he is an intact male.

He was outside as we were just getting ready to leave on the next ride of the day.  I made John wait while I got some food.

He’s in rough shape.  He has scabs and cuts on his face, so either fighting or possibly rolled by a car. After eating food, he let me pet him and rubbed on my legs.  This is 180 degree turnaround from not wanting anything to do with me.  It’s amazing what hunger and cold do.  Here he is a little content after eating.

You can see some of the wounds on his face.

Gotta love my patient husband, too, all ready to ride while I took care of the kitty.  We headed south on Route 4 down to Schuylerville to get some coffee.  There was quite a headwind on the way there – whew!  I didn’t complain, though.  Usually I whine about the wind, but I was so happy to be biking that I didn’t.  It had warmed up into the 50s, too, and was nice and sunny.  John wanted to stop and take off his jacket.

Happy!

Route 4 goes through rural Washington County and along the canal.  We stopped at our usual rest stop, which is 8 miles from home.

John stretching.

I guess that is stretching.  Or the cycling version of Stayin’ Alive.

At mile 14 (or 26 on the day), we arrived in Schuylerville.  This is another small town, but actually more bike friendly.  They have cute bike racks:

It’s also close to Saratoga, so there is some horse influence here as well.

Nice vacant building in the background there, too.  There are 2 coffee places and one bakery here. Both coffee shops were closed (Sunday), so we headed to the bakery cafe called Over the Moon.  I had some coffee and what was probably the last cupcake ride of the season (wahhhh!!!)

This was a carrot cake cupcake. John had a slice of chocolate cake with cream cheese icing.  All baked on the premises and delicious!

The best thing about riding someplace in a strong headwind?  Going home is super fast! Even though it is gradually uphill to home over the 14 miles, we were much, much faster on the way home.  It’s scary how fast the sun goes down now.  We stopped for a bit of a break.  My sit bones were a little tired from riding this much after not riding much lately.

All the leaves are gone now and things are turning brown.

Still pretty, though.

We rolled on home the rest of the way.  Definitely felt this ride.  Still got the hill legs though, just barely.  That last hill home, tough, but we both made it groaning all the way!

Total day stats (breakfast and afternoon rides)

Total distance: 38.7 miles

Average speed:  12.8 mph

Calories burned:  1144

Very good ride.  Each one we take I wonder if it is the last outdoor ride for the year.

Paying up the football dinner

*Don’t forget the Sahale Snackers Give Away if you haven’t entered yet!*

Thursday already.  Time just zooms by with all the things we are cramming in and doing.  Kind of a mish mash post today.

Last night I visited with Mr.  Boo in his new home!

Look how happy he is 😀  Such a nice kitty.  I think he still loves me!

 

Hooray for rescued kitties!

John won the football picks last weekend, so it was out to dinner tonight.  His choice:

Gloating much??

I drowned my sorrow in a half pint of Guinness.

I know it is weird to see beer on the blog, isn’t it?  There will be another one later this month when we finish the floors, too LOL!  I actually really enjoy beer, but just don’t drink very often anymore.

I chose to have Shepherd’s Pie for my entree.

This was tasty, too.  We had a groupon to use, so I thought I was going to get off easy for the football dinner, but turns out it could only be used for lunch and not dinner.  Booo….  At least the groupon is good until March of 2013,  so we will have to come back.

Today’s pink item?  Pixie’s toy.  Looks a little orange in this lighting, but it is neon pink.

Moving the furniture around because of putting in the floors has been a gold mine of lost kitty toys (among other things).

 

The Breast Cancer Site

Flooring start

Working on the floor this weekend.  It was windy on Saturday, but we took a 10 mile ride in the morning before rain was supposed to set in.  We biked around town looking at houses for sale just for fun and went through the town park.  It was a sunny day, but very windy.

As I have mentioned before, we live in a very historical area.  There are tons of little blue signs all around with markers of what happened.  Here is one in the park:

Kind of like historical graffiti – “Washington wuz here ”

Then it was time to work on the floor!

This is a click-and-lock system.  First you lay the underlayment down, then you put the boards down and lock them into place.  No nails, no glue. Then tap them with a block to close the gap.

For the edges against the wall, there is a tapping bar, as you obviously can’t use the block

Love that ugly paneling.  Our walls underneath are lathe and plaster and I think there was a reason why the paneling was put up.  I don’t want to take it down and have to replaster or drywall all the walls.  Nightmare!  So it stays up and is painted.

Anyway, these are tools the come in The Kit (how original).

We had this kit from when we did our upstairs flooring.  This time we bought the flooring at Lowes.

Pixie was helping…

We are doing a lot of things not quite like the directions state. Sometimes that happens with older houses that aren’t square and just because of the layout of the house and all of our stuff!  We can’t just clear out the whole downstairs, which would be ideal, but not practical.

By Sunday evening, we are just about done with the dining room!

I need to paint the baseboards before they go back up as they are scuffed and dirty.   The floor isn’t perfect, but I am really loving it so far!

Good news on the Mr. Casper Boo front.  I think we have him a foster home through a rescue! He might actually be going to Vermont where there is foster care available until he is adopted out.  Right now he is residing in our shop and seems quite happy there.  He is getting friendlier and friendlier, too.  Such a sweetie.

We brought him in the shop to keep him safe now that we have a plan for him to go somewhere.  He’s eating and sleeping and purring  :mrgreen:

Saturday bike ride and my first bonk

I was a busy bee last night scrubbing the bathroom floor and doing some weeding and driveway cleanup.  My back actually was hurting, so I took a Tylenol PM in the hopes that I would sleep later (plus help my back).  We woke up about 8:30 –  which is really, really late for me!  Cooler weather for sleeping, too – we were in the upper 40s (Last I checked it was still August, right?)  John wanted to bike to breakfast before he went out of town, so I snarfed 2 dates with cashew butter before we left.  I should have had more, as it was a very long time in between those dates and the last thing I ate the night before (by about 15 hours).  The bike ride was 8 miles each way.  Felt fine for the first 7 miles and then  zoomed really fast up a hill.  Smarty me thought it would be a challenge to not change gears and just power up the hill.  Came down on the other side and I felt pretty sweaty, so I unzipped my jacket, but realized that I wasn’t really hot, but starting to feel hypoglycemic.  I thought “Uh, oh, my first bonk.”  Good thing we were pretty much at Panera Bread.  Unfortunately – they didn’t have any samples out like they usually do, and I was starting to get the shakes.  I grabbed my coffee cup and went over to the coffee area to get a bit of milk and coffee in me ASAP.  I started to feel a bit better.  Decided on a white, sweet bagel for the carbs:

bagel3

Looks like raisins, but it’s not!  Chocolate chips 😀  After about 1/2 the bagel I felt sooooo much better.  Lesson learned.

For whatever reason, I am super productive when John goes out of town.  I managed to mow the lawn, do laundry, roast coffee, vacuum, sweep and mop, play a computer game 😀

I made lunch and was quite hungry.  This wrap has my favorite curry chicken salad in it.   And yes, that is a liter bottle of seltzer.  It was half empty, and being the bachelorette today, I drank right out of the bottle!  Bwhaaa!

lunch4

It was stuffed full, and I tried to close it with toothpicks.  Didn’t work, so I ended up wrapping it in a paper towel after I dropped some on my lap.  Note to self: remove toothpicks before wrapping.

Plus a raspberry pluot.  Juiciest thing ever!  I actually had to stand over the sink to eat it.  It was very good, the skin was very tart and the inside was very sweet – amazing combo.

pluot

Proceeded to get through the above list and walked to the feed store to pick up food for some lazy cat:

pix

Then put my feet up with a latte!

relax

And some of these:

blues

I have a confession to make.  As much as I love to tell everyone to eat real food, I have some secret love for instant potatoes.  I don’t know why, but I like the taste of them for whatever reason.  At the store the other day, these were on clearance, so I got a couple:

taters

Made for an interesting dinner.

dinner3

I probably wouldn’t buy them again (unless there is a sale 🙂  ), but it was fast, easy and pretty tasty.

Because it’s is so gorgeous out, I went out for an easy 2 mile jog post dinner.  Tonight is Netflix movie night and some more relaxing!

Have a great one!

Yummy chicken recipe

Today I ate nutrisystem food for breakfast and lunch – did dinner on my own.
Marinated chicken in some fat free yogurt with Bangkok blend spices mixed in (from Penzeys). Broiled it in the oven, delicious! Served with roasted broccoli and cauliflower, and brown rice.

Tomorrow is weigh in day!!

On a happy/sad note – I think I found a home for the stray kitty. Got a call from a woman who has several pets, but said she has a quiet home, and a large house for Moxie to be an indoor cat only. Not sure why this makes me cry – I have grown very attached to Moxie, but do want a good home for her! Will see if it really goes through.