Spinach and Skittles {and everything in between}

Have you checked your facebook feed today? Yeah, it is Valentine’s Day. It always cracks me up to see married couples wishing each other a happy v-day via fb wall posts.

*quick check to make sure Timmah didn’t do that* phew, we’re in the clear.

I guess my body was excited about the ol Hallmark holiday, I woke up at 5:03 a.m., one minute before my alarm went off. Crazy, right? Here’s hoping I can make this a week long winning mini-goal streak. However, with all this extra time on my hands I didn’t actually get to the gym any earlier than normal. Well, I mean I got there one time (on a machine at 5:55 a.m.).

After 50 minutes filled with Katy Perry, Usher and CNN on the Adaptive Motion Trainer I did a little arm action. I haven’t worked my arms in ages, and I am thinking I may be rather sore tomorrow.

Brekkie was a less pretty version of yesterday’s creamy buckwheat with chia seeds, pecans, raisins, brown sugga and half a nanner.

With a side of bright pink sparkly heart nails…

Fun, right? I felt very, very girlie.

Lunch was oh, so good. A turkey sammie with avocado, laughing cow, lettuce, tomato and onion on a whole wheat english muffin, with a side salad.

Plus a side of operation beautiful. I thought the other teachers, aids and support staff needed a little love aside from the raging tween/early teen hormones that were wreaking havoc on our Monday. :)

Perhaps I snacked on a heart shaped sugar cookie. Perhaps.

Pretty soon I’ll be throwing two pizza’s in the oven. I know I promised a meatless Monday dish, but I really didn’t feel like cooking. Meh. Take’n’bake pizza is only half cooking, so I feel like I kinda made my man a home cooked treat.

A heart shaped pie no less.

And I baked brownies!

Oh wait, they came from a box.

Oh well, it’s the thought that counts, right?

I almost forgot I promised you a peak at what I got the hubs for v-day…

‘Cause nothing says I love you like fried food.

His gift to me was a tad more appropriate for the day’o’love.

A fabu paper flower arrangement from anemone. These will look very lovely in my office at work.

Happy Valentine’s Day, or National Singles Appreciation Day, whichever you fancy.

Happy Birthday to my mother-in-law, Gayle!

Sorry for the lack of posting yesterday, I spent the day very lazily recuperating after my food poisoning/severe soy attack Thursday night.

Seriously lazy.

Friday morning I woke up at 6:45 a.m., passed out in the shower, called a sub, and went back to bed around 7:30 a.m. I woke up at 11:33 a.m., watched a movie, wrote a blog post and went back to bed at 2:00 p.m. Woke up at 4 p.m., called the clinic, spoke to a triage nurse, who said I didn’t need to come in unless my temp rose too much, (what is too much? I was at 100.4, so is 101 too much? 102? 103?), and to continue drinking gatorade & eating saltines and to get plenty of sleep.

Sleep I can do.

I hit the sack at 7:30 p.m. and didn’t wake up until 10:30 a.m. on Saturday. In case you aren’t feeling up to doing math on a Sunday, that would be 15 hours straight sleep. I still couldn’t eat much, so I drank some peppermint tea, nibbled on some saltines and by 2 p.m. I was ready for a nap. Pretty pathetic, eh?

After starting and finishing 78% of my new kindle book, (Can You Keep a Secret? by Sophie Kinsella - Bridget Jonesy, super fluffy chick-lit, predictable and all I had the energy to focus on), and hitting the sack around 11 p.m. last night, I awoke at 9:06 a.m. feeling refreshed. Not my normal gym-going self, but no more body chills, aches, etc.

Enter a cure for the blah oatmeal blues: Bob’s Red Mill Creamy Buckwheat Cereal.

Perfect!

I topped my bowl with pecans, raisins, chia seeds and some brown sugga. It was a tad dry so I added some almond milk. Mmmmm, just what this girl needed.

Plus coffee, of course.

Then a little sunshine called us out for a midday stroll with the pup.

Vitamin D? Don’t mind if I do.

I also browsed chic camera purses online, after reading Elise’s post on the subject. I found some super cute purses at Kelly Moore and Epiphanie, but they are so expensive! No more expensive than my favorite B. Makowsky bag (cheaper actually), but still more than this girl is willing to spend at this moment in time. Especially since I am still learning how to use our nice Canon Rebel T1i. Maybe instead I will make my own, using Allie’s wonderful tutorial. Cute no?

Menu planning also took over my Sunday, and I am pretty excited about tomorrow’s Meatless Monday meal. We planned to have dinner for V-day over at Downriver Grill, (which really needs a website), but they aren’t normally open on Monday’s and are only taking reservations during a short 3 hour window. By the time I called to make the reservation it was too late and we could have only gotten a table at 8. Meh, no thanks. On a Friday or Saturday, sure, but on a work night? Not my thang. Then we planned to hit up ValenWine weekend and stay at The Davenport, leaving the kid, aka Libb, at home. But my food poisoning sitch kinda put a damper on those plans, so we’re having a lazy no frills V-day celebration. Wait til you see what I got the hubs.

The rest of my Sunday was equally lazy, doing the usual work-week prep, lounging, and curling up with my kindle. Rikka and Rilo were equally lazy.

They say hello.

Oh, and this broke.

You know how I feel about my hair, so obviously this needs to be remedied right away.

After sipping on more peppermint tea (good for the stummy, in case you didn’t know), and nibbling on more saltines, I decided a real meal might cheer me up. Enter a LaaLoosh recipe. Well, a modified one at least.

We made the “fried fish” sammie, but subbed panko for Fiber One cereal, and pan seared it before putting it in the oven.

Pretty tasty.

Plus a side of (overdone) kale chips.

I’m planning to scuttle off to bed shortly, nurses orders after all. Maybe I’ll be 100% tomorrow, as I would really like to enjoy a little dark chocolate + sea salt action.

What are your plans for Valentine’s Day?

There are entire blogs dedicated to fashion, my friend Lindsay has one. Mine is not. I don’t consider myself to be fashionable. However, over the years I’ve worked in quite a few places where I was the “cute dresser.” Me? *snort* oooookaaaay.

I’ve noticed more and more healthy living bloggers, like Laura and Megan who also work in education, are including Fashion Friday on their blogs. A post dedicated to what they wore to work that week. I love looking through these posts! I’ve also noticed a lot of “teacher clothes?” posts on a chat board I frequent. I figured why not join the Fashion Friday bandwagon? Plus it will be a fun way to look back on my progress over time. Libb thinks I should take a picture of just my face every single day until I’m 80 and see the progressive change. Is it weird that I think that sounds like a really good idea?

So this week I’m kicking off Fashion Friday on my blog, but you don’t get today’s outfit. Sorry. Yesterday I spent my evening at our school’s Literacy Night, manning the “bring one, take one” table, where the kids could exchange books.

Since the event lasted until 8 pm, I swung by Starbucks for a soy chai pick me up. I was very disappointed to discover they had not made the drink correctly. I think I got half a pump of chia? It tasted like hot water and soy. I still kept drinking this terrible mess, and regretted it later. I’m not sure if I had food poisoning, developed a severe allergy to soy in the past 24 hours, or something else, but I am very sick. After passing out in the shower this morning I called a sub and went back to bed. You don’t want to see pictures of my meals (ummm saltines + gatoraid), or my outfit (gray pj bottoms + baseball style The OC swag shirt from when I worked at FOX). So I may as well share what I wore the rest of the week instead.

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Tada!