September 03, 2012

Yummy tea

Today was my kids' last "real" day of summer vacation. Tomorrow they have open house, where we'll go chat with their teachers and check out their classrooms. Then schools starts on Wednesday!

As I mentioned yesterday, I took today off of running--my legs are pretty sore from the race still (must be those hills!). Jerry was off work, so together, we tackled my "miscellaneous" goal for the week: clean out our bedroom closet.

I didn't get rid of as much as I'd hoped to, but it was nice to organize everything. I went through all my sewing stuff and fabric, and now I'm kind of itching to start a new sewing project. I have a TON of old sweatshirts and sweatpants that I cut up in order to make into a quilt--not because it would look cute, but just think how comfortable a sweatshirt quilt would be!

I have also been meaning to make a denim purse out of my old jeans, similar to my quilt. I have all the stuff to make it, I just haven't taken the time to plan out a pattern. For the next couple of months, I'm going to be working on my memoir every spare moment I get, but after that, I can't wait to work on some crafty projects.

Ever since I went to Teavana at the Mall of America on Friday, I have not stopped thinking about the tea I had there! Finally, this morning, I couldn't take it anymore and I went online to their website to order some. It's a blend called Youthberry and Wild Orange Blossom. The only reason I chose that one to sample at the store was because the other one they had was "highly caffeinated", and you know I don't do well with caffeine. But this Youthberry tea was AH-MAZING. 
source

The tea at the store was sweetened with their German Rock Sugar, so naturally I had to get that as well. I also bought a small amount of a white chai to try. The grand total almost made me faint at $62, but I found a coupon code for $10 off. Very pricey, but this tea was so good that I could drink it as a dessert, and be perfectly happy. In fact, that is going to be my food goal for next week--to have tea at night instead of a snack/dessert.

I already completed my three goals for this week:
Food--Not go totally food-crazy in Minnesota. I did good with this one, probably because I was with Renee, who is a very healthy eater. I didn't gain a single pound over the weekend!
Fitness--TRY for a sub-2:00 half-marathon. I feel I put in about 85% effort on this one. I let myself get defeated too early, and I wished I had pushed a little harder at the beginning to stay with the pacer. But I didn't totally throw all goals out the window, I just refigured them as needed, and I think I did well.
Misc--Clean out my closet. Did this today with Jerry.

Speaking of my fitness goal, I figured out why my Garmin time and my official results were so different--I was looking at the gun time, not the chip time. So the results I posted were a little off. I fixed them now, not that it makes a huge difference. My time was 2:08:43 (not the 2:09:13 that I had posted before). Thirty seconds isn't much, but every second counts ;)

I got a fun package in the mail from a Twitter buddy, Kendall Marie. She had posted a picture a few weeks ago of pumpkin seed butter, and I thought it looked fantastic--I'd never seen pumpkin seed butter before. She offered to send me some (from Canada!)--so she sent me the pumpkin butter and included a surprise jar of almond hazelnut butter as well. Yum!


I tasted them right out of the jar. I loved the almond hazelnut butter! Surprisingly, I wasn't too crazy about the pumpkin seed butter. After tasting it, I added a big pinch of salt to the jar and stirred it up, and it was much better with salt in it (the only ingredient was the seeds). These will both make perfect toppings for my Ezekiel toast.

It's so crazy to me that summer has come to an end (at least in MY sense of the word). Jeans and hoodies are right around the corner!

13 comments:

  1. I have a sweatshirt blanket that I got 11 years ago in college and it's still one of my favorites. That sounds like a pretty fun project!

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  2. Memoir?! What did I miss? What's that about?

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  3. My sister bought me the youthberry tea with the rock sugar for Christmas last year. SOOO good!! Thank goodness there's a teavana in Troy @ Somerset ... it's close enough to my house that I can go there easily :)

    I bought sunflower butter yesterday and am excited to try it, but haven't had a chance to yet. :)

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  4. After reading your post about the tea, I went there today (I've always just passed by it in the mall) and dropped $84 on frickin tea! It's sooo good though- I've had 3 cups tonight.

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  5. 30 seconds is a lot in my book! That's more than 2 seconds off per mile!

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  6. I haven't tried pumpkin seed butter yet - I keep meaning to make some.

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  7. Katie- I am SO ready for fall weather!!!! Good job on your race!!!!
    Did I miss something?!?!? You are doing a memoir? Yay!!!!!!!
    ~Laura

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  8. Teavana... oh boy!!! I was actually slightly annoyed to find out they added sugar to their samples, no wonder they were so sweet! I jokingly asked an employee how many calories per sample (expecting him to say zero) and he said five!

    Anyway, after MANY samples, on many different occasions (there are several stores in the area) we finally snagged a few bags of tea! I really had to talk myself into it, because it is pretty pricey for tea. Plus we needed a loose tea infuser?! Teavana tried to sell me one- but I found one at Walmart for $2!!

    Looong story short, we are really loving the tea and it was worth the price! Blueberry is my favorite decaf & mint cocoa is an amazing alternative to morning coffee.

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  9. That tea sounds good, and what a great idea--to have it for dessert. I should do something like that. I'm a big Diet Squirt drinker, you'd think I could consider that my dessert, but I never do! So the pounds are coming back on. After working hard to get back down to 150 a week ago, this morning I'm back up to 154. WOW--those pounds sure come back on fast. So this week it's back to walking every morning and cutting back on the snacks (AGAIN)! I was getting home from work and cutting up a honey crisp apple and dipping it in the cookie butter jar. Not measuring out a tablespoon of cookie butter either, but putting about a teaspoon of it on each slice--that adds up! YIKES! And you know what, I didn't really taste the apple, just the cookie butter, which was delicious, but I'm glad that jar is about empty. TOO TEMPTING!

    Fall weather means long sleeves again--hallelujah! I can find so many pretty things to buy again! It's really hard to find stuff to wear for hot weather, that isn't sleeveless or even short sleeved! I can't do anything less than 3/4 length sleeve with my horrendous batwing upper arms. I've been going crazy on Pinterest. I didn't know there was so many great ideas and so many pretty clothes out there! I'm wasting way too much time on Pinterest.

    I'm working on my memoir too--just a shortened version. A guy who lost half of himself (Sean Anderson), is writing a book with chapters devoted to people who've lost at least 100 lbs. and some of their recipes. Right up your alley! I'm going to struggle with the recipes. I'm not very creative like you are.

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  10. Can you tell us where we can try that Pumpkin seed butter? I'm Canadian and I haven't seen it anywhere!

    On another note, a sweatshirt quilt sounds simply heavenly!

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  11. Kendall said she got it at Save On Foods (which is only in BC and Alberta). Hope that helps!

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    1. Thanks, I have a Save On Foods right beside my work! I'll check it tomorrow!

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  12. I want to learn to quilt! My grandma used to make quilts all the time.

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