Adventures in Zucchini- challenge 3

I've been getting really creative with my round zucchini and it was only a matter of time before I hollowed a few out and made them into bowls!

This just came out of the oven!

It would have been vegan had I not found myself compelled to toss a piece of swiss cheese onto the top of each zucchini.

Step One:  Hollow your zucchini!

Step Two: Saute your zucchini guts in a pan with veggies of your choice.  I used onion, yellow squash, red pepper and tomato.  You can use whatever you'd like.

Step Three: Add vegetable broth and let it simmer!

Step Four: Add cooked pasta of your choice.

Step Five: Stuff your zucchini and stick them in the oven at 350 for a half an hour.

And maybe even put a little bit of cheese on there for good measure.

And then pick it off when it's time for Bunny to eat hers!  :)

All in all this was a huge success. Both of the girls loved it and I feel like it was pretty healthy.

I have to say, I've been pretty blessed with kids who love vegetables.  Lila hates meat and Bunny won't eat the bread on anything, but both of them are pretty great when it comes to vegetables.

Heart Dropper

IMG_2489 a video by mamahollerz on Flickr.

Lila wrote this song the other day. For once I was smart enough to punch down all the lyrics and get a video clip of her singing it. She only makes it through a few seconds of the song, but it's enough to present the tune.

I don't know about you, but I think this is a hit.

Here are the lyrics:

HEART DROPPER

Baby you're a heart dropper
Droppin' hearts from the sky
Bay you're a heart dropper
Ooh Ooh Ooh

Blood is squirting on the way down
Your heart is getting smaller
and my heart pounds
Ooh Ooooh Oooh

When the sky is becoming clear
You know that I"m right here
Oooh Oooh Oooh.

Adventures in Zucchini - Challenge 2

FRIED ZUCCHINI

I'm trying to use a lot of round zucchini in creative ways.  We are eating it steamed and grilled for dinner every night, but I need ways to incorporate it into our diets in other ways.  No zucchini will go to waste.  Mark my words.  

I served this fried zucchini up with homemade pink sauce.  

Weight Update- Week 10

I've had a difficult week in respect to my weight and my efforts to lose weight.  After my big drop last week I had this bizarre inner struggle.  First, I know that it's not healthy to lose 8 pounds in a week.  And last Thursday I tried to make peace with the fact that the number on the scale must not even be real, it must be some sort of fluke.  But I wasn't able to accept it and I got on the scale every day this week, not so much to be sure that the number went down, but more to be certain that it didn't go back up.  It's difficult to have a good relationship with a scale, and though weighing in once a week is a useful tool, over-weighing can become an obsession of mine.  The number on the scale can really make or break the way I feel about myself, which is very unhealthy and disordered thinking.

This week, in conjunction with over weighing, I also developed a terrible amount of guilt after eating anything at all.  Mostly, I hate myself for overeating.  There were several times this week when we sat down to eat and I felt like I overdid it a bit, particularly when we went out to dinner for father's day.  I really love guacamole and we went to a South American restaurant and the guacamole was to die for.  I didn't eat any of the chips that went with it, but I found myself eating forkful after forkful of guacamole.  And then I hated myself for it later. Lately it seems that instead of looking forward to a meal, dreading it and worrying about the way I will feel after I eat it.  The girls and I are going into San Francisco this evening to a fun event at the new Twitter building and I am already worrying about all the food and drinks that will be present.  Jay does a lot of bragging about how delicious their every-day food is, but today is a special day, so I am sure that it will be more and better.

I honestly wish that I could just quit food altogether so that I wouldn't have to have all of these negative feelings about it.  I wish that it wasn't something that I had such a hard time controlling and had such a direct effect on the way I feel about myself.  It's so horrible that food is a thing that's purpose is to nourish me and to keep me alive and healthy, and yet every time I take a bite of something I feel like I'm poisoning myself.

I feel really emotionally drained from my stupid diet.

But I lost 5 more pounds this week, which bring my total to 31 pounds in 10 weeks.

I also added a multi-vitamin for women because my online food journal gives me a breakdown of the nutrients I eat and I have been consistently coming up short on several vitamins.

Sorry this is such a depressing post.  I realize that I should be celebrating because I lost 5 lbs, after all.  I am extremely happy to lose the weight, believe me.  I just wish that I felt better about myself and I wish that my relationship with food and my weight were easier and healthier.

I wish I was a person who liked myself just as much when I'm fat as I do when I'm not.  That is the kind of person I want to be, but it's not who I am right now.

Zucchini Challenge #1

When given an abundance of zucchini, get creative!

I used one giant zucchini this afternoon to make my girls a crustless quiche for lunch!

They loved it!

I used purple onion, zucchini and broccoli!  As a bonus, Lila discovered SNAILS eating my F#$kI$! corn plants, so I can sprinkle the egg shells around to send my warning.

;'[lp

Zucchini Confession

I have to admit that I am getting sick of grilled and steamed summer squash every night with dinner, but they are growing faster than we can eat them.  I read that round zucchini are supposed to be around the size of pool balls, but I swear to god that some of mine are the size of pool balls in the morning and grow to be small watermelons by sun down!  My zucchini might be magical, the jury is still out.

My point:  recipes are welcome.  

Put them in the comments or email me: annapholler@gmail.com

Drive-In

I don't know that I had ever been to a drive-in before last night.  If I had, it was probably in the late 70's.  Chances are that they've changed since then.

It's no surprise that the awesome town we live in (that has pretty much everything, also ) has a big drive-in movie theater.  I pass it every time I go to Lowe's, which is about as often as I brush my teeth these days.  I've always been curious about it.

A few days ago I decided to check it out online and was super-excited to see that on Tuesday night I could take my kids there and pay a grand total of $7 for a movie.  Adults are $5 and kids are $1.  The thing about me is that for $7 I will buy pretty much anything.  I will buy pants in a size 2.  I will buy a gift certificate for body builders protein powder.  I will buy a maternity belt if it is made from the sort of material that I could just poke holes in to adjust.  I will buy a book about travel inside the walls of the Vatican.  I will buy Groovy-James snow boots and an Eskimo coat.  My point, even when I have no use for it, I can not resist a good deal!

Truth be told, I had no idea what the drive in would be like.  All I knew what that they were playing Madagascar 3 at 8:55 pm and that when I mentioned it to my kids they flew over the moon with joy.

So, we got there are around 8:40, just before sundown.  There was a quick moving line of cars at the gate and I didn't even need to get out of my car to pay.  When paying I told the woman that I'd never been there before and she explained where to go for Madagascar and when radio station to put on in my car to hear the movie.  She said that I should turn the engine off and that if the car dies they have complimentary jumps.  Thankfully, my car didn't die.

When we got to our spot we noticed a playground near a concession building.   The girls and I decided to walk over and check things out.  Though we brought snacks, there is just nothing better than movie theater popcorn.  I was blown away by the amazing prices.  I got the kids a huge drink and gigantic popcorn in a collectors bucket for $10.  So, my total spent is $17.  As a point of reference, when I took the kids to see Beauty and the Beast it was about $80 (and maybe more) with snacks.

A little trivia:  did you know that the #1 place that people in the suburbs pick up bed bugs is at the movie theater?

I'll just let you think about that for a second.

So, we turned on the radio in our car without putting the engine on, tuned in and as the sun sank the movie began.  Our sound was excellent and I loved the fact that I could turn it up or down.  The girls  brought pillows and blankets and loved the trill of sitting on the hood of the car with their popcorn and watching a movie.  When it got a little bit later they curled up in the car.  We didn't get home until nearly 11, which is an insanely late night for us, but it was well worth it.

All in all, we had a great time and I can't wait to do it again!