Super Foods....Smoothies and Spinach Salads

After running this weekend, I decided to make some healthy lunch/snack items to eat so I will get strong and awesome.

Ever since my first job as a smoothie maker at Creative Juices when I was 16, I have been obsessed with smoothies.  There is an art to it.  I recently decided that buying frozen fruit is expensive.  So instead I have been buying a can of crushed pineapple and then freezing it in individual sandwich bags to use in my smoothies.  It works very well and since the pineapple is crushed, you don't get big chunks in your smoothie.  The key to smoothie making is making sure you have blended everything together perfectly.  Feel free to take the blender cup off the blender and shake it around if things aren't blending properly.  Chunks are bad.  Your smoothie is done blending when your smoothie spins around in a circle that dips into the middle (while the blender is still going).  Like the bottom of the blender is sucking down your smoothie in a circular motion.  You will know it when you see it.  Trust me.  OK onward.

Women's Health Smoothie....
-1 small container of vanilla yogurt (6-8 oz)
-a splash of cranberry juice (or any juice really)
-1/3 of a frozen banana
-1/5 of a can of crushed pineapple (frozen in little plastic baggies, throw away bag though, don't blend)

Blend it up until it's smooth (see above) and drink it out of a beer glass (if you want to and you have a bunch of beer glasses).  Good stuff.

Then I decided to make a spinach quinoa salad.  Spinach is a super food and all.  The key to this salad is this......

Jarred grilled veggies.  You can get these at Harris Teeter (in a smaller jar, near the canned vegetables, might be roasted instead of grilled) or at Costco in this giant jar that I have.  This jar has zucchini, red peppers, eggplant and artichokes in a vinegar and oil mix.

Power Salad

-cooked quinoa

-jarred grilled veggies

-balsamic vinaigrette (whisk canola or olive oil, a spoonful of mustard, a spoonful of honey, and some balsamic vinegar together-just add stuff until you like the taste and consistency or just mix any oil and vinegar together to get some sort of dressing to mix in)

-bag of baby spinach

Mix the cooked quinoa with some of the chopped veggies (add in some of the oil from the jar of vegetables for extra flavor) and then add some vinaigrette.  Then get a large bowl of baby spinach and add some of the quinoa mixture to the top.  Mix it so that the spinach gets coated with the quinoa vinaigrette mix.  Good stuff.

If you make and eat these two recipes you will grow up to be healthy and strong.  Probably.  Maybe. 

Do you like spinach salads and smoothies?

What do you eat that makes you feel healthy?

Pinteresting-The Craft Version and The Pinterest Challenge

Update-I originally posted this a few weeks ago but I'm re-posting it today for the Young House Love/Bower Power Pinterest Challenge. 

A few weeks ago I decided to 'pinter' some art work.  I made this picture one night while my husband was watching some sort of sport downstairs.  He never even saw me in action.

I got the idea for this from here.  Here is where I pinned it.  Essentially you just paint or draw branches with brown marker or paint and then paint circles on the branches as leaves.  I used some old acrylic paint I had lying around.

I was not 100% happy with this when I finished.  Once I put it in the frame, I liked it better (fun fact-you can make most bad art look decent by framing it).  I like how it looks from far away but not so much from up close.  Fortunately, I usually only look at it from far away.  So for now, it's a keeper.  I can always re-frame something else when I get sick of it.

The second thing I made didn't come from a specific pin.  I had seen a lot of people use paint sample chips (cards from Lowe's, Home Depot) to make art work.  So I thought I'd give it a try.  After some trial and error I went with these hearts in varying shades of blue which I taped onto a piece of white paper.  Then I framed them in this dollar store frame. 

So if I end up hating it in a few weeks there will be no big monetary loss.  (Free paint chips+ $1 frame=$1).

Here's how it looks all together.

Have you pintered any art for your house?

UPDATE 2-So I'm actually still liking my tree painting.  It's growing on me, so I think it will stay up there for awhile.  Now I need to re-pinter some art for the basement since my first attempt was a failure.  You can check that one out here.

Weekendin'...

I have had a couple busy weekends and I kept forgetting to upload the photos so my blogging has been slack lately.  I will give you a recap in pictures.

What happens when someone randomly asks you if you have read the Harry Potter books?  In some cases it means you get volunteered to dress up as a Wizard to teach spells at a kid's birthday party.  That is what happened to B a few weeks ago.  I was extremely nervous about this but B ended up being amazing and the kids really like him.  He was quick on his feet and a great improviser.  I am now his booking agent if anyone is in the market for some children's bday party entertainment.

It was Shanzles big 31st birthday a week ago so I made her these cupcakes in the shape of an 'S' (sort of).

Cupcakes are cool.  But you know what people are really in to?  Ice cream sundae bars.  For real.  Put out some ice cream, chocolate sauce, cherries and of course whipped cream and people get excited.

See that excitement.

My friend Rachel flew in from New York to meet Beezus5's new baby.  KMU actually met a lot of new people at Shanzles' birthday party.

I'm thinking of writing the pilot for a new buddy sitcom...'2 Men, a Poodle and a Baby'.  Yeah?  Would you watch?

This past weekend I spent a lot of time making these guys and listening to some hot pop music on my iPad.

So that was my past few weekends. 

Did you do anything exciting?