weekend of sun and chores

Nothing like a beautiful day to get the windows wide open and the mundane chores done in a flash. This was an incredibly gorgeous weekend. Saturday Ted played his 1st soccer game of the season in 70 degree sunny weather. We had a date night that night (went to the symphony and had dinner at a local pub, Mountain Sun .... all courtesy of Horizons' auction last week.) I spent most of today cooking (when we weren't d-r-a-g-g-i-n-g the kids outside to get some fresh air!) They were really into their Star Wars Lego game that they had concocted in the family room and they weren't budging! Geesh! But we got them out for a few hours, despite MANY complaints, so we feel victorious. Let me name my culinary successes today, because it was a good day!

• 3 batches of GF pancakes this morning, gobbled up by the mob almost instantly
• my 1st successful loaf of GF sandwich bread ... finally! YUM! Recipe here.
• a batch of GF chocolate chip cookies ... not as great but ok. I miss spelt and barley. Recipe here.
• my first ever whole chicken ... baked in the crockpot! Recipe here. It cooked completely through in 3 hours on high (it was a small roaster, and it even had the farmer's name on it! I am trusting very strongly that this free-range chicken had a happy life!!!)
• tuna steaks on the grill. Paul had to turn it on for me, but I did the marinating, basting and grilling. This is the 2nd time we have used this marinade and it's really yummy. Next time, I'm going to sub ginger for the garlic. The original is the juice of 2 limes, 2 garlic cloves and some marjoram. But I didn't have that so I used rosemary. Mmmm.

I am still recovering from the trauma of carving the chicken (Rosa is going to visit in May and while planning her visit she talked me through the carving, including saving the bones for stock and the leftover juices for gravy.) but I think I will live. Not so, poor chicken. I am on Day 8 of the diet and while I'm officially "done," I'm still trying to do the basic idea of eating every 2-3 hours. Lean protein and lots of veggies are high on the charts. Tomorrow I'm going to do a batch of black beans and rice to get me through the week (two 1/2c servings of that per day are recommended). I lost a total of 4 pounds in 6 days and while it may not seem like much, the difference in my stomach alone is THRILLING. I plan to be as diligent as possible and I bet by the summer, I might actually be ok in a bathing suit! I was happy the summers of 2005 & 2006, but then got out of control again.

Tomorrow begins the week of Spring Break. Ted and I are going to Breckenridge on Thursday night to ski with Wendy & Alex. So we have most of the week to laze around and maybe do some fun things like a pool or zoo. Maybe a movie. But the weather is so amazing! I hope it lasts for a few more days. Now that cooking is done, I need to get going on folding! It was really nice to hang the sheets and blankets out on the line today. They smelled sooooo good! Hooray for Spring!