Last week was super busy! Here's the highlights:
On Tuesday I hosted my monthly book club at our house. We discussed The Persian Pickle Club by Sandra Dallas, a light-hearted novel about a group of women who band together during the Depression to quilt and cope. There are some late breaking surprises in the book and a final twist at the end regarding a secret the group has been keeping. A huge thank you to the Book Club crew, who always surprise me with their thoughtful insights. This book in particular reminded me how important it can be to take some time out for some purely female bonding. Who doesn't need a good excuse to clean their whole house, rewarded by a relaxing night chatting with friends?
On Thursday I taught a Nutrition Class as part of our Ward's Enrichment night (I know, I know . . . you can stop laughing now). This was interesting because anyone who has eaten my food (dinner group ladies?!) knows that I'm no health nut. But, in the end I think it might have been a good thing because I was able to give some practical tips of how people can make realistic changes in their diets to be more healthy. Surprisingly, out of the three food items I made for people to sample, the roasted vegetables got the most feedback. Here's the super SIMPLE recipe:
Roasted Veggies
equal amounts of:
zucchini
yellow crookneck squash
red bell pepper
asparagus
extra virgin olive oil
kosher salt
ground black pepper
Chop veggies into similar-sized pieces and place on a foil lined jelly roll pan. Drizzle with olive oil. Sprinkle with kosher salt and pepper to taste. Toss veggies with hands to coat and spread in a single layer. Set oven to the broiler setting and roast vegetables approx. 11 minutes (time will vary depending on your oven), or until tender and just starting to brown.
On Friday we went with some friends to the Dodger Game in LA. We had AMAZING seats--literally 15 feet from the first base umpire in the front row. It was fun to be close enough to see the player's facial expressions as they either made it safely to 1st or were tagged out. Disappointingly, we were also close enough to here an
LDS player drop an F-bomb during a play--uh, oh!
The rest of my weekend was consumed with reading
Khaled Hosseini's follow-up novel to his debut, The Kite Runner. To put it simply, he did not disappoint. Like the Kite Runner, this book is haunting and utterly heart-breaking, but also an amazing testament to the human spirit and its ability to endure and love. I cried several times throughout it and will be thinking about this book for some time to come.
8 comments:
Great job teaching the Nutrition class-I would really have nothing to contribute to something like that!! What were your other two recipes? Zak just finished Kite Runner and loved it-then we had to take it back to the library, so I didn't have a chance to read it. I'll have to put it on hold again....
I realized just now that I'm signed in as Zak-if I change it now, I'll lose what I wrote, so I'm not changing it :)
i'm glad your nutrition night went well. I consider you a healthy eater anyway....
It sounds like you have been busy, and getting some time for yourself. Yeah! Every mom deserves those kind of breaks. Even though I can't attend your book clubs, I would love to know what the club is reading to follow along. I love to read!
Dang Girl, you read too!?! How did you have time for that? You did do a great job at enrichment. Most of us had not heard about that sugary stuff. What was that called again?
Beth - The other two things I made were strawberry banana smoothies and some breakfast bran muffins (flavored only with a little bit of maple syrup and a shredded pear for sweetening--so that could be why the veggies were popular!).
Candace - I'll e-mail you a list of all the books our group has done.
Kelly - The sweetener in the Smoothies is called Stevia. You can buy the powder form at Trader Joe's or the liquid form at Whole Foods.
Wow, you have been busy! Sounds like fun though. I read Persian Pickle Club and thought it was a good read. I have the other book in my queue to read, I can't wait to read it now!! Your recipe sounds great, you have always been a wonderful cook.
I am glad to see you trying to keep yourself busy! GEESH! I was wondering about that book, always love to hear about a good one, THANKS!
You are awesome! I didn't make it to book club, but it was a great pick and your nutrition class was informative and inspiring. I bought protein powder and Stevia at Trader Joe's and have been "grilling" vegetables in the oven.
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