recipe round-up, and a promise i'll try my darndest to keep...

last whole30 post, i swear.

here's what we ate and actually liked (there were a few flops; i'll just leave those out):

breakfasts:
we mostly ate eggs and bacon, or nuts and fruit and veggies.  once we made these frittata muffins, which were decent, but pretty coconutty.  coconut + eggs= weird.  this breakfast sausage was a big hit, too.

lunches:

hamburger soup from the pioneer woman

carne asada soup (using chuck roast, which i then pulled into small pieces to make it more soup-y.)

tuna salad made with paleo ranch (see mayo link below) on plantain chips

otherwise, we did a lot of 'fridge roulette'-style lunches:  some kind of combination of nuts, seeds, raw or leftover veggies, lettuce, fruit, sauerkraut, olives, etc. etc. etc.

dinner entrees:

i made these lemon chicken breasts like once a week.  so good.  (used chicken broth instead of wine.)
crackling chicken thighs

big salads with sauteed chicken on top

this one-skillet dish i made up with sauteed red onions, red peppers and sliced italian sausage links

chicken curry stir fry

hamburger patties with diced sweet peppers

pot roast (again from the pioneer woman - that lady can seriously do no wrong.)

roasted bell peppers stuffed with a mixture of ground beef, diced sweet potatoes, diced bell peppers (inception!), mushrooms, garlic, onions, and tomato sauce

seafood scampi (with ghee instead of butter, and broth instead of wine)

apple cider pulled pork

side dishes and other randoms:

roasted mushrooms

coleslaw

mayo (added dill, green onions, garlic, paprika and extra lemon juice to make ranch dressing)
collard greens with prosciutto and mushrooms sauteed in bacon grease (oh my word, SO GOOD.  don't add salt.)

that was our month of food, and now i'll shut up about it.  i think.

the whole9 yards.

WEEEE DIDDDDDDDDDD ITTTTTTTTTTTTTTT.

well, folks.  yesterday was day thirty of the whole30, and i have to brag:  we did it.  we got through it with grace and dignity and at least less-than-daily meltdowns.  

the kids and i had the easiest go of it at the beginning, i'd say.  the kids were more temperamental, slept a ton, and fought all the time, so it wasn't rainbows and daisies those first couple of weeks, but they rarely asked about pizza, or why we couldn't eat noodles.  after the novelty of the whole thing wore off, they genuinely seemed to feel better, but they were mentally pretty over it.  and, honestly, so was i, once i started PMSing and wanting to eat everything sugary and chocolaty and salty and fatty.  those were a rough couple of days.

but we all made it through.  and i successfully never gave into the urge to cheat.  there were a couple of days in which i discovered that the banana chips or the mustard that i'd been serving had added sugar or something, which was frustrating, but i never knowingly fudged.  (ooh, fudgggggge.)  i'm proud of my accomplishment, since i'm not an overly self-disciplined person, generally speaking.

apart from the iron will it required, it also necessitated a bunch of planning.  here are some things that i think made it easier for me.

i took a week or so before we began to sit down and plan out every. single. thing. we were going to eat over the next thirty days.  i usually meal plan for dinner entrees and that's it, but this month i kept a menu for every single thing served at every single meal.  toward the end i got a bit more lackadaisical about side dishes and stuff (throw a bunch of roasted veggies, a salad, some baby carrots, some sauerkraut, and a couple of olives on the plate next to whatever your entree is and you've got yourself a meal).

also, because there was SO MUCH PRODUCE involved, we grocery shopped weekly, so i planned each week's grocery trips at the beginning of the month as well.

i printed out every single recipe i'd need over the course of the month, and kept them all in a binder with my menu plan and my grocery lists, so i had it all right on hand whenever i needed it.  (i personally hate getting to meal prep time and having to squirrel my way through my pinterest boards or whatever, looking for some recipe i buried, and then clicking the link, and then scrolling past the WAY TOO MANY PHOTOS that are always on food blogs.  it takes FORRRRRRRR. EVVVVVVVVV. ERRRRRRRR.  i'd rather just have it immediately in tangible black and white and times new roman, thankyouverymuch.)  i'd show you a photo of my binder, but i realize this post has already crossed the border into WhoCaresVille and is not coming back anytime soon, so i'll spare you.

and, just because i'm going to use whole30 as an excuse to act like an incessant dirtbag for another week yet, i'm planning on doing a recipe roundup next week of some of the genuinely yummy stuff we ate this month.  hold your breath for it, it'll be worth it.

now.  please excuse me while i go eat those chocolate covered caramels i've been lucid-dreaming about for the last three weeks.  ahem.

weekly 'what's up.'

here's what went down this week:

.. we went to a wedding in des moines, and actually made it on time!  not being late to just one out of the last four is a terrible record, but i guess the silver lining is that we seem to be on the upswing?

.. we went to trader joe's, which is always the very very best, but i was wearing four-inch heeled boots at the time and also dying of hunger, which kind of put a damper on things and also made the whole ordeal more expensive.  (because of the hunger, not the heels.  i'm pretty sure the heels didn't have anything to do with the cost.)

.. i got my ankle dry-needled, which is a thing.  i sprained my ankle (twice, actually) over the summer, and it is still giving me serious issues.  (probably not at all helped by the above mentioned boots.)  there's a girl in our connection group who is a physical therapist, and she was willing to help me out.  it was super crazy - it's kind of like acupuncture, but instead of being based on energy points, it's based on nerve locations (or so i think... i'm actually not really sure).  so there i was at church with all these crazy needles sticking out of my foot, and all of a sudden my whole foot got really hot and tingly, and it has felt a ton better for much of this week.  voodoo.

.. atticus spent all of yesterday totally flattened by some upper respiratory virus.  no fun.  but he's been a trooper and has spent his time sleeping or reading books quietly, like the magic miracle child that he is.

.. in whole30 news, we're still going.  it really hasn't been nearly as bad as i had anticipated, for me at least.  i've had a couple of grouchy days, and a couple of really crave-y days, but nothing unbearable.  the kids have been powering through, though i think they were really feeling it there for a while.  lots of meltdowns and fighting, and they've been heavier sleepers than normal.  but they're on the upswing, and finneas especially seems to be feeling really good.  and i've been proud of them:  they once turned down ice cream on the basis that 'it has sugar, and we're not eating sugar right now,' and atticus was so confused when he saw todd eating frozen pizza because 'there are grains in that.'  we've had a lot of good discussions about food groups, and the effects of food on our bodies and our feelings.

as for meals, breakfasts still consist of rando fruits, veggies, nuts, nut butters, bacon, etc.  (also? these prosciutto-wrapped fritatta muffins, which are pretty good but a bit too coconutty for my taste.)

lunches have consisted of this lime chicken soup, which makes a double batch and is not good.

dinners have included a sausage/onion/red pepper skillet meal i threw together, this scampi recipe using ghee instead of butter and served over broccoli and mushrooms, this paleo chicken curry stir fry, and burgers.  somewhat less exciting than last week's meals, but not horrible.

aaaaaaaand... that was our week. huzzah!

what's up bi-weekly.

ahhh, christmas.  christmas is a given.  but other stuff happened over the last couple of weeks as well.

finneas went to the emergency room.

todd took atticus on a daddy date to pizza ranch, and then to the farm and fleet store to look at toy construction vehicles.

we stayed up late a couple of nights for movie nights with the big kids, and watched despicable me for the first time.  i know, i know.

the kids got personalized breastplates, made by the loving hands of todd himself.

my sister and her boyfriend, austin, stayed the weekend with us, and austin kindly offered to take some family photos for us.  it was so great- the last official family photo shoot we had was done when finneas was under a year.  i think that, prior to this weekend, we had a total of three photos that contained all six of us.  i'm basically going all rabies-foam just thinking about seeing the finished product.

laurelai got to wear her first official ponytail, and also moved on up in the world, out of the high chair and up to the table.  it is so funny - she's already holding hands to pray and saying 'amen' at the end.  she takes her table-sitting responsibilities very seriously.  and adorably. 

and in whole30 news (hey, i didn't say i wouldn't talk about it at all; i'll keep it brief and contained to friday posts only): todd has gracefully bowed out of the endeavor.  the kids and i are still going strong, and it really hasn't been too bad.  for breakfasts, we've mainly been doing bacon, nuts, fruits and veggies.  for lunches, we've been having this new hamburger soup from ree drummond, with some sweet potatoes thrown in - it's actually really delicious, although you wouldn't know it from talking to my obstinately soup-hating children.  for dinner, we've really enjoyed these go-to lemon chicken breasts from ina garten (white wine replaced with chicken broth) and these new crackling chicken thighs from nom nom paleo.  we even ate the chicken thighs after todd decided to decline all the whole30 restrictions, and he really really liked them, so i know they're not just 'good for whole30.'  

and... here's what i thought my counter would look like this month:

and here's what it actually looks like most of the time:

i'm making kombucha, perpetual chicken broth, homemade mayo, and all kinds of other hands-on, mess-intense concoctions.  not the most pleasant, but not as bad as i expected.  i tried to do most of the prep for the week on monday, so i didn't have to do much else throughout the rest of the week, and i think that has helped me keep my sanity.

except for when i look inside my disaster of a fridge.  then i kind of want to scream.

that opened-before-this-all-began bottle of moscato mocks me from the fridge door.

anyway.  there is our two weeks, and an intimate look into my utter failure to keep my whole30 antics to myself.  forgive me, and also have a great weekend!

whole30, riding dirty.

if you follow me on pinterest, you may have seen that lately i've been pinning a bunch of mediocre-looking food in the name of whole30 intentions.  well, friends, today is the day we start the actual follow through on those pins.  so if i'm a complete jerkwad for the next couple of weeks, you'll know it's because i'm going through cheese withdrawal.

(for the zero of you out there who haven't already been informed and completely annoyed by all of the whole30 info/testimonies/photos/churches out there on facebook, it's thirty days of no grains, no dairy, no legumes, no alcohol, no sugar, no fun.  it's going to be a blast.  todd is reluctantly coming on board the whole30 boat with me, but it's only because he loves me so and also because i cried when he tried to say no.)

i went grocery shopping last night.  i bought fennel.  i bought beets.  i held it together at aldi and passed up the three-pack of imported cheddars.  i felt so primal and strong.  and then i grabbed mcdonald's on the way home because, hello, one last hurrah and also, grocery shopping is exhausting and takes forever, so i didn't have time or ambition to cook dinner.  then i topped off my night with a margarita.  because what's a hurrah without a margarita?  it's just a hur-, that's what, and that seems a bit anticlimactic.  so i drank a margarita for the sake of the -rah, and i'd do it again without shame.

anyway.  i'm telling you all of this for two reasons:  one, because we're best friends, and friends tell each other stuff.  we share what's going on in our lives.  we emote.  we connect.  that's what i'm doing here.  and two, because i need to reassure you that this is not all you'll be hearing about for the next thirty days.  what is it about people who go on a specialty diet that makes them think you want to hear about, take notes on, and admire every bite of food that goes in their mouths from here on out?  i won't be that girl.  i promise you this.  because again, like i already stated, we're friends.  and friends don't bore friends with whole30 details all the livelong day.

well, there you have it.  i'm about to become a real peach.  sarcastically and figuratively speaking, of course, from the lack of most of the things that sustain me.  and maybe also literally speaking, once i eat enough produce that i start violet beauregarding it.  let's see what comes of this, shall we?