Cruise Catch Up

So as some of you know, and many of you don’t, I was on a cruise last week to South America. It was SOOOO much fun! So many adventures and all the different countries we went to! Here’s some of the highlights from the trip! Enjoy!

Our cruise boat - the Carnival Dream

THE FOOD (always seems to be a part of my blogs, hee hee):

I know how much some of you readers like my food post, so this one is for you! This was our first night on the cruise, a bit of tofu seered in steak sauce with some veggies! It was delicious!

Another dinner on the cruise. Stuffed pepper with rice, beans, and veggies. Didn't like the pepper part too much or the hint of spicyness (i guess is the word) that it put on the rice inside, but all together it was pretty good.

My BFF's shark she had as an appetizer one night for dinner. She said it tasted a bit like chicken... I took her word for it.

Rice & bean enchillada's I had one night for dinner. These were so good as well!

Eggplant Parmisian. Wasn't my favorite dish of the week but it was decent.

COZUMEL, MEXICO!!

Stop One: Cozumel, Mexico!

There was a little garden in the middle of all the shops that we were roaming around in for awhile. It was really pretty!

Mexican Dancers

This restuarnt had swings at the bar that were facing the ocean!! What a great way to spend our afternoon!

BELIZE CITY, BELIZE!!

Belize!

Cave Tubing in Belize!! May have been my favorite part of the whole trip! Even got to see bats at the end of the second cave we floated through!

Different wines we tried at the wine tasting right before lunch. (Mango wine, pineapple wine, sorrel wine, cashew wine --yes, cashew like the nut--, and one other that I seem to have forgotten.)

Our lunch we got after tubing. Rice & beans mixed together with cole slaw and plantains. Others also had chicken too (weather it was two-legged chicken or four-legged chicken --iguanna-- they didn't tell us...haha).

ROATAN, HONDORUS!!

Mahogany Bay, Roatan, Hondorus

In the middle of all the shops in the port. I like this photo because you can see our cruise boat in the background.

On the chair lift on the way to a private-ish beach

COSTA MAYA, MEXICO!!

Costa Maya, Mexico

Funny chaires!

In the swim up bar pool! Very cool!

Mexican Dancers in the courtyard

Dolphins up close!!!

 

That’s pretty much the highlights of my trip. It was so much fun! Now to sit down and scrapbook all these photos

Five Things Friday

Not really sure what my obsession is with food lately, but here’s another food entry for you food lovers. : P

1. My Shoes

I think I need new running shoes… already! I just paid $100 for this nice saucony pair and they are ALREADY getting holes in the toe area. I brought them back to where I got them and they couldn’t take them back or exchange them! (huge bummer!) All they did was put a piece of fabric in the shoe to cover the hole… hopefully this will work.

Those black parts are the holes. So sad!

2. Tuesday Nights Dinner

Tuesday night I tried my hand at cooking a decent meal for dinner and was VERY impressed with the results! Than again this is probably one of the easiest things I’ve made since I’ve been home! I took refridgerated pizza dough, rolled it out, and heated it up a bit. Once it got golden brown I added BBQ sauce (instead of tomato sauce) and corn, beans, and diced tomato on the top. It was DELICIOUS!! You can check out the recipe HERE.

3. Speaking of Cooking…

   Tonight for dinner I tried to make Beef Stroginoff with vege meat and in the minst of heating up my vege meat my Dad pointed out that the sauce contained beef stock in it. Oops. I’m glad he caught me before I mixed it all in together!!

Didn’t see it in big bold letters right there under the ingredients list. 

My Dad helped me make our own stroginoff sauce (with no beef stock) and it turned out better than I thought! I also made vege’s as a side dish. A very yummy, and filling, dinner!

Vege stroginoff & Vege’s 

4. Shopping

Instead of going to the gym yesterday I went shopping with my sister and her co-worker. We went to the mall where I found a new bathing suit that I pretty much fell in love with as soon as I saw it! Plus it was 50% off… WHO CAN BEAT THAT!!!

Not really sure what kind of face that is but that’s my new bathing suit! 

I also got a new tank top at old navy with gift card money from Christmas. That was also 50% off!! What a day to find great deals!! Tomorrow I’m planning to go to the outlet mall around here with my sister, and the 40% off coupons we got in the mail. Not really looking for anything perticular but it will be a good day with my sister! 

Oh, we also went to Moonberries for frozen yogurt! YUM!

My cake batter & cheesecake froyo with cheesecake squares, strawberries, and a few cookie dough pieces. Deliciousness!!

5. GO KENTUCKY!!

Since UK won the Alma Mater’s Chapionship my Dad made cupcakes with the logo on it. They were super yummy!!

After all these sugary snacks this week I’m going to have to get my bum back into shape this weekend and get running! Nothing like a good run after eating froyo and cupcakes!!

 

What kind of snack food to you go to when you have that sugary craving?

Lemon Bars: Round 2

Came out MUCH better this time around! (Probably because I actually used flour instead of two rounds of sugar.)

These lemon bars are super good! My parents really enjoyed them, as did I though I found them a bit too sweet for my taste. (Is that possible? Something TOO sweet for me?? haha)

If you want the recipe just go HERE. This blogger is REALLY great about showing you the directions STEP-BY-STEP… which is great for me since I’m more of a photographic person. It’s embarressing that I still got the recipe wrong the first time around. :/ At least I finally got it right and found these bars to be yummy!

If Only I Could Bake…

I decided to challenge myself today and make some lemon bars that I found online.

This is what they are SUPPOSE to look like:

This is what mine looked like when it got out of the oven:

Not exactly what I had in mind when I planned to make these. This was only after five minutes in the oven… imagine if I HAD put them in for a full 25 minutes!!

I’m thinking I used the wrong kind of sugar. (Yes, there are different types of sugar. Weird, right? I had no idea either!.. or else I’m the only one who didn’t know this.) Who can really tell the difference between flour and super fine sugar and granulated sugar and cooking sugar… I bet I’m not the ONLY one who would make this mistake.

Blueberry Slushies

While in Maine afew years ago I discovered a soda that we don’t have here in the south. Captian Eli’s Blueberry Soda. (So delicious!) You may recall reading about my birthday in August when I asked my parents to order me a case of this soda. Not long after my birthday, I returned home from a long day in class and found a box from Maine sitting at my front door. I knew exactly what it was and opened it right away to find 12 beautiful bottles of Blueberry Soda waiting for me to drink! I figured since I got 12 bottles I would drink one a month until my next birthday and than ask for me. Silly me thought 12 would last a whole year! I’ve been doing pretty good actually. It’s now March and I have five bottle left. yay!

I also got a blender for my birthday which has been great is making smoothies and milkshakes, but one day I thought, “what about a slushie?? a BLUEBERRY slushie!!!” I tried it and this is what it looked like.

The before...

... and the after!

To be honest, I think I’ll stick to just drinking this as soda and not a slushie. I think I added too much ice, or else let it sit too long and it melted into a very watery slushie. It was a good attempt for me though!

Anyone have any other ideas of what I can make with my new blender??

What the… ???

Bought a bag of five everything bagels last week. Here’s what the bag says…

"Always Everything Bagel (5 Count)"

Here’s what was in the bag…

 <— FOUR everything bagels…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ONE what looks like asiago cheese bagel. —>

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was a nice surprise when I got down to the bottom of the bag and found this, but REALLY bagel packaging people… who DOESN’T see the difference here!

Question About Lent

There are three things I tend not to talk too much about in my blogs; 1) Politics, 2) Money, and 3) Religion. I’ve made a bit of an exception today though because today starts the 40 days of Lent. Typically for Catholics this means giving up something in their life for the next forty days (until Easter Sunday) so we can focus more on God.

As a kid I always tried to come up with something to give up. I would be lying if I said I made it all forty days without eating that ice cream I gave up, or drinking that soda I vowed not to drink, or reading my Bible everyday like I promised. Sometimes I make it forty days and sometimes I didn’t. What can I say, I’m only human, right?

Last week I was pondering what was going to be my goal for this years Lent. I thought I had a really good plan of giving up all junk food (i.e. chips, candy, ice cream, cookies… yes, even GIRL SCOUT COOKIES) and focusing on eating more healthy food. I’m not a huge candy eater, or ice cream for that matter, but chips are my worst enemy! I could seriously down a big bag of chips in three days!! Embarressing, but true. I really just want to become a healthier person in general, which has been going really well since I made that goal for the new year.

So last week I had my Lent goal all worked out and was determined to go 40 days without junk food… and than we went to mass on Sunday. The Father was talking about Lent and telling everyone what it meant to him and talked a bit about his own experience.

“When I was little,” he said, “all us students would line up while the Sister walked to each one of us and asked what we were giving up for Lent. Candy was the majority of the answers from my elementary classmates. When she got to me I answered, ‘I’m giving up going to the movies’… we never went to the movies so it wouldn’t be a huge sacrifice for me.”

The congregation got a kick out of that. Than he went into the fact that lots of people give up candy and sugary snacks without looking at the real meaning of Lent, which is focusing more of God than ourselves. And I thought I had my goal ALL figured out…

Coming out of church I thought, “Well there goes my brilliant goal of giving up sweets for Lent…”

THAN I figured it out. I can still give up candy, and ice cream, and chips! By giving up all this junk food and focusing more on eating healthy and excersising I am taking care of the body that God gave me!

So HERE’S MY QUESTION… remember the blog I posted afew weeks ago about those creamy, caramelly wafers I found at Fresh Market?

<— Yeah, those delicious treats. I went to reach for one this morning and caught myself thinking, “Are these considered cookies? Are they a dessert? Sure they’re sweet, but are they sweet enough to be considered ‘junk food’?”

What do you think? If you practice Lent, what are you giving up or focusing more on?

Happy Wednesday!!