b l o g s y

So I have a few topics that are blogsy to blog about. In other words, there are like whole blogs on these singular topics. They're sort of the "in" things or perhaps the "usual" things to have blogs about: Food, Home improvement/DIY, and Creative gifting. My friend Lelia at www.alexandlelia.blogspot.com often blogs on these things as well as adorable party ideas, holiday festivities & fashion. I L O V E reading blogs like hers when I have the time. It's the sort of blog posts that you "pin" on pinterest. Okay you get it.

So here are my blogsy brags:

1) Yesterday was Kyle's 24th birthday. Last week I asked him to pick a # between 1 and 10 and he chose 5... so 5 days of gifting it was. He likened it to my love of Ellen Degeneres' "12 days of giveaways" at Christmas. And so off to the store Hayley & I went... boots on, dashing over icy streets and dodging the melting, dirty snow that she now likes to reach for a put directly in her mouth! Oh happy spring in Canada. {I only thought I'd escaped the sand-in-mouth escapades when we left Senegal... but oh isn't the grass "always greener."}

I had a growing list of things he'd mentioned that he'd like to have, so we wrote a few we could afford and get easily in Spruce Grove, then came up with 5 themes that could go with a gift card or date and went from there. The themes turned out to be: "Baby its cold outside" which included new mittens and a Starbucks gift card; "Family night- Sweet & Fun" With candy and a new movie; "I'd rather be at the beach" with one of Kyle's favourite drinks & a Kobo gift card for new reads; "You make me wanna' roll my windows down" (those are lyrics to a country song) with a CD & itunes gift card; and "Smokin' Hot" with grill tools and a gift certificate to a steakhouse for a date.

It was a lot of fun, unique and its do-able on a budget.

 This picture is a sneak peek from gift #2 Kyle received Friday night from miss Hayley... I set it up while they were upstairs and had snacks and chocolate milk ready for them while i made the promised pizza to go along with the movie!

2) Our anniversary is coming up {the 18th... yes February is BUSY BUSY} and Kyle has built me the MOST AMAZING gift: A new bed! This man of mine is a talented carpenter and so so smart!

Here is is... I cried.

Our list of DIYs in the future includes: New front closet, Built-in shelves in our bedroom with a bench, Valences over our curtains, A swing for the backyard, More landscaping this summer, Develop basement, bedside tables to match the bed, & art in our room.

3) One of our new year's "resolutions" along with probably millions of other people was to eat more healthy! Back in the fall our pastor did 2 sermons on eating for your body: the temple of God... for God's glory, out of worship... eating what you NEED, for nourishment not what you WANT, simply for pleasure. Here's a link to the sermons if you're interested:Food, Part 1, Food, Part 2. A mentor also encouraged us that eating right makes a big difference in your life along with physical fitness, emotional fitness and spirituality. Since I had already been eyeing some diets to try and beat the baby fat, we were sold. We started out with the Paleo diet... in a nutshell...more natural, a lot of stright meat and vegetables with less grains and dairy. Here are some of our successes:

 Asian Lettuce wraps. Chicken is boiled & then stir-fried in honey, garlic, red pepper flakes, gluten-free soy sauce (less salty, more flavour), a dash of balsamic vinegar, rice vinegar & I've added mushrooms once, waterchestnuts, celery and/or bamboo. Featured here with iceburg lettuce and chives.

 Asparagus-basil salad with a balsamic/basil-y dressing, tomatos, avocado & (obviously) asparagus.

My VERY FAVOURITE so far: Califlower-crust pizzas!

Sweet Potato Fries- always a pleaser! This recipe was simple: Toss your chopped taters in Olive oil (I did 1/8 cup olive oil, 1/8 cup coconut oil), salt, pepper and your favourite fresh herb- I chose rosemary!

And a lot of stir-fry is always healthy, quick and affordable! This is a peanut butter aka Thai stir fry sauce (easy to find when googled).

There you go, Maggie's blogsy-blog. :) Hope you enjoyed!