My first detox diet....

After a few friends did this detox diet I thought I would give it a shot. It is one day of drinking a combination of a juice diet and water, then two days of a structured meals. It sounded easy and I have been looking for a way to jump start me getting back in shape, so here we go! I'll post the detox diet guidlines in the next post, but for now here is how my first day went....



Hour 1: This morning isn't starting good... it is taking longer than I thought to make my juice concoction and I'm running a little late and a little frazzled. After making my batch of liquid to drink for the day I had to drink 1 cup of the liquid as well as 2 tablespoons of ground flax seed. I mixed them together while the liquid was still warm hoping that it would make it a little easier. I finished about half of it during a few gulps... I choked a little because the ground flax seed felt a little like sand. I imagine that it is much like Metamucil. One glass down, 11 more to go.....



Hour 2: My first glass of water. I'm not hungry,,, yet.




Hour 3: 1st glass of the juice mixture.... not bad. The only thing that stinks is that I had to dump in the cinnamon and ginger in the mixture. I didn't have a tea ball or any cheese cloth to strain it so it is a little lumpy at the bottom of the glass. Otherwise it is tasty.




Hour 4: Seriously... another glass already!?!? It feels as if I just finished my last glass... oh well... bottoms up! I'm surprised I haven't had to pee yet




Hour 5: Finally peed and now I am slightly hungry. It is lunch time now, and I have people in the office heating up food.... smelling it isn't helping. I'm still cool with drinking the juice but if only I could have a side of McDonald's french fries I would be a happy lady :o)



Hour 6: Woohooo another glass of water. It is me or am I more tired than normal... probably form the LACK OF FOOD




Hour 7: I am being tempted by the hot sauce packet on my desk... it is calling to me telling me it is okay to have a little snack. Damn you food! Another glass of the juice... I'm trying to convince my stomach that the juice is actually a nice juicy steak It's not working.



Hour 8: I had some major hunger pains about 30 minutes ago, but they passed. At least I am halfway through but I'm sick of drinking water. In case you are curious, I have peed 4 times today.




Hour 9: Another juice hour... this hasn't been as hard as I thought it might. However, going home is going to be hard, since there is a ton of good food just waiting to be eaten. I will be strong! Sarah did something evil to me at work... she got a salad from Bill Millers... I asked if she wanted to trade my glass of juice for her salad, but she just laughed at me :( THEN, then left her fluffly little roll in the break room with a little post it saying to "Eat Me" (she is doing a low carb diet). That was torture to think of that little roll just waiting to be eaten.


Hour 10: I drank the water a little later than I was supposed to, hope that is okay. I made the trek to the grocery store after work, and I was only temped a bit by all of the food in there. Surprising. After I came home, I took the dogs on a walk. It was probably a 1.5 mile walk and it felt good. However, after coming home and sitting for a bit, I realized that I FREAKIN hungry. Good think juice hour is almost here....




Hour 11: The juice went down okay.... my hunger pains went away. Now I'm curious as to how long I can go without eating :o)



Hour 12: This was my last drink of the day. I had to add in another 2 Tablespoons of the ground flax seed. I know it is supposed to be water for this hour, but I went with the juice that I had left over. I heated it up a bit in the microwave then added the ground flax seed. It wasn't terrible... but not great.



WOW! I finished the whole day of not eating, and it really wasn't that terrible. Sure I thought lovingly of the coffee that I didn't have today and the sandwich I normally have for lunch but I was determined to do this detox diet correctly.

Chris Cornell-- yeah that's right


Last night was the Chris Cornell concert at Stubbs. The tickets were a b-day present to Jim, who loves Chris Cornell. Chris Cornell has played in the bands Soundgarden, Temple of the Dog, and Audioslave as well as having an extensive solo career. He has an amazing voice that has a 4 octave vocal range and is powerful. He played songs from all bands that he has played in.... it brought back so many memories! :) Stubbs was packed, so for a short gal that meant that I got stuck behind tall people. I saw most of the concert but there were times I couldn't see past the dude's head in front of me.

My little camera doesn't do well in low light so my pictures are a little fuzzy but of course I took a ton. I also used the record button on the camera to record a couple of songs. I'll try to post those later.

Before the concert we ate at Ruby's BBQ... not to be mixed up with Rudy's BBQ. We both ordered the mix plate with St. Louis ribs and brisket. I was really disappointed with the ribs.. they were so damn dry that they were borderline jerkey. The sides were good and the brisket was good as well. But when we eat BBQ we love our ribs, so I doubt that we will be back after this experience. Plus we paid almost $40 for two plates of food and two beers.... if the BBQ was lick your fingers and plate good, then it would be worth it.

Would you like a little cheese with your wine?


Sunday was one of those weird eating days when you eat at different times than you normally do. We didn't eat lunch until around 3:30 so when it was time for dinner we weren't super hungry. While surfing on the Internet, an idea for a cheese plate came into mind.. and you know what is good with cheese... wine! Perfect! I went to Central Market in search of cheese for our light dinner. According to the cheese aficionado's online you should have odd numbers of cheese (3,5,7)... why you ask they say that it is more visually pleasing to the eye.... whateva, we went with 4 cheeses. I did remember that the Barefoot Contessa said when picking cheeses you wanted to pick a type of blue cheese, a hard cheese (like Parmesan), and a soft cheese (like a goat cheese or a brie) so you have a good combination of flavors and textures. I picked an aged cheddar, a chipotle chevre, Gorgonzola (which is in the blue family), and a smoked Gouda. I also added a sliced apple, green olives, sliced hard salami, strawberries, and crackers. OH. MY. GAWD. YUM. We enjoyed a bottle of a Gewurtztraminer wine, which is a white wine that is slightly sweet.

So yummy!

Jim was in charge of washing and slicing the strawberries.

Minestrone Soup

This soup came out so damn good and it is pretty easy to make. I think I used 3 total pots but in reality probably only used one if I cooked the pasta and ground beef first. There are plenty of veggies in this soup and not a lot of fat. I wasn't as happy with the canned tomatoes so I also chopped up a fresh tomato and added it in the soup. I know summer is around the corner and a hot steaming bowl of soup might not sound good, but it is worth it!! We had this for dinner with a grilled cheese sandwich! YUM!!

Ingredients:

4 slices bacon
1 cup chopped onion
4 cloves garlic, minced
1/3 pound ground beef
1 cup minced celery
1 cup cubed carrots
1 cup tomato puree
1 (14.5 ounce) cans stewed tomatoes - I used whole tomatos instead
1 (14 ounce) can beef broth- used Beef Consume
1 (10.5 ounce) can condensed French onion - couldn't find this used regular French Onion soup
soup
4-5 cups water
1/4 cup red wine
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon dried basil
salt and pepper to taste
1 cup chopped zucchini
2 cups spinach, rinsed and sliced
1 cup uncooked spinach pasta
1 (15 ounce) can garbanzo beans, drained - didn't use these
1/4 cup chopped parsley
Directions:
1. In a large stock pot, cook bacon and drain off fat. Add onion, garlic, celery, and carrots. After a about 5 minutes, add in the zucchini and spinach. When onions are translucent, add pureed tomatoes, whole tomatoes, broth, condensed soup, 4 cups of water, wine, oregano, basil, salt and pepper. Cook for 15 minutes (I cooked it for about 25 minutes).

2. You can do the beef two different ways.... You can cook it with the onion/celery/carrot mixture and crumble it up. Or you can make mini-meatballs (an inch in size), cook them in a separate pan, and add them when you add the liquids. I like the meatball idea better because it looks a little nicer in the soup and it makes it easier to have a balanced bowl of soup (equal amounts of meat/veggies/liquid). Normally when you add ground beef in soups, it settles in the bottom of the soup.

2.
Stir in pasta, garbanzo beans and parsley. Cook for 15 minutes and serve with fresh Parmesan cheese.

I didn't add all of the water at once because I wanted to contol how watery my soup was. I probaby used 4 1/2 cups of water.

Tunneling my way out from the Gazillion To-Do lists


This past week has kind of sucked. I don’t know if it has to do with constantly running from one event to another of if it has to do with my lack of energy when it comes to cleaning the house. Let me explain my crappy mood…. I couldn’t find my keys this morning so I had to walk to work. I am SUPER lucky that I live within a 25 minute walk to work and it saved my ass this morning. And I got SUPER ASS lucky that it didn’t start raining until I got to work. Because if it started to pour on me while I was walking to work, I think I would have turned around, went home and back into bed. I have no idea where my keys are. I spent 30 minutes looking for them this morning… thankfully I was planning on getting to work early so I had some extra time to look for them before I made the decision to walk.

On Friday, when we went to SXSW, I forgot my camera battery at home. I loaded up my SLR with all appropriate lenses but no battery. I left it charging at home. I was soooo pissed once we got to the music venue downtown, pulled out my camera when it hit me…. I left my battery at home. DAMN. Luckily I had my little point and shoot camera, but I was really hoping to get some cool shots with my big camera. Oh well…. I still had a great time, so I can’t complain to much.

BUT on Saturday when I left my battery to my point and shoot camera at home for the wedding I nearly lost it. WTF!?!?!?!? Granted, I had 3 other ladies at the house that were getting ready for the wedding so it was hectic to make sure we got out of the house on time, but still. I can’t remember the last time I left my camera battery at home, and to do it twice in two days is upsetting. I don’t know why I am having this issue of forgetting/losing things but I need to correct it.

I know that my desire to be lazy once I get home from work is not helping my quest to be more organized. I come home, make dinner, then want to veg for the rest of the night. Ugh. I’ve been ignoring the things I have to do with my dad’s estate; I know I need to be training for the Muddy Buddy, I need to actually go through the mail and get rid of stuff that we don’t need, and deal with stuff that is in there.

So blog world… I’m here to say that I need to be less lazy and get my life in order. No more leaving camera batteries, losing car keys, or wondering where my black slacks are…. Time to get my shit together! And it's time to actually do the stuff on my god damn To Do Lists!!

John and Tammy's Wedding

I did something very un-Dana like at the wedding.... I left the my camera battery at the house. I had the camera, but the battery was still charging. I was so pissed at myself for forgetting that. I never do that, but I guess since I was in a hurry to get ready and meet up with the girls, I overlooked that very important aspect of my daily life. Oh well... So no wedding photos, but I have plenty of reception photos.

The sunset was beautiful that day! (taken on the top floor of the parking garage at the Radisson, downtown)

Jason, Chris and Jimmy.... some of the groomsmen

The Wife and Groom

Lindsey, me, Ashley and Vanessa
Our sweet ass legs, and Jason's kind of sexy white leg with the black socks

Jim and I

We clean up nice!!

I love this photo!

The big joke was that Chris kept doing this while at the rehearsal because he didn't know what to do with hands while standing in the groomsman line

Oh yea.... that's right.... we are DAMN SEXY with our spanx on. I hope to ditch my spanx over the next few months
Chris, Whitney, Vanessa, Jen and Joe

HILARIOUS!! Poor Ashley was just reaching on the floor for her purse when Jason took the opportunity to make a simple gesture look like a dirty act... especially at a wedding. One of the older guests watched Jason do this then shook his head... we couldn't stop laughing. We are inappropriate,,, and I LOVE IT

Chris, Lindsey, Chris and Jason


John's wedding cake... the Lone Star beers were real, but we weren't sure what the ice is made of.. we are guessing plastic. Unique idea for a cake

Vanessa and I

Nick and Chris
After the wedding at the hotel bar... unfortunately the picture didn't get everybody... there is another 8 or so people to the right of this photo
Me, Jim and Chris

John and Tammy's Rehearsal Dinner

Our Friday was jammed packed with stuff to do..... started with SXSW, then off to the rehearsal dinner, then off to Sarah's party. Whew... I was muy tired after Friday. The girls met up at the house before the dinner while the boys were off at the church being told how to walk in the church and what to do their hands.

Chewie wasn't sure what to do with Jackson... he kept walking up and sniffing him. I think he really wanted to play with him but didn't understand that Jackson is still 6 months away from walking around

Man... Jackson is starting early... wanted a nip from mom's margarita

Note to self... when wearing a flowing shirt,,, stand straight so you don't look 7 months pregnant.

Me, Lindsey, Vanessa holding Jackson, Tammy and Ashley

The boys were just given their groomsmen presents... a backpack that is a cooler... they all jumped around like little girls that were just given A Barbie doll

Vanessa and Jen

Mike (or Charlie), John, Nick, and Charlie (or Mike). Sorry guys... I still can't tell you apart in pictures. I'm a bad friend.John and Tammy giving a speech

Jen, me and Jackson, and Vanessa. Can you tell that Jackson kept the attention of most of the women at the party? That little guy gave my arms a work out.. he is 22 pounds!

Sarahs 30th B-day

Last Friday night we celebrated Sarah's 30th birthday. She wasn't to excited to be leaving her 20's, but really, who is excited about getting older?? Not me! Sarah and Orly parties are always a lot of fun, and this night did not dissapoint!

Sarah enjoying (or not enjoying) a birthday shot

Matt the master drink maker

Dawn and I

Sarah, Orly, Dawn and Matt

Sarah and Orly