The Good, The Bad and the Truly Ugly

I like to think of myself as a positive person, a “glass is half-full” kind of person.  If someone says there’s good news and bad news which do you want first, I’ll usually take the bad first because I like to be left with the good.  Well, I guess that’s the kind of day I had yesterday.

 I keep seeing so many blog posts regarding baking.  I used to be pretty good at baking but I haven’t done much in a long time.  Also in the continuing effort to clean out my pantry in preparation for the big pack up, I decided to do a little baking. 

It’s very simple.  It’s an old Weight Watchers recipe.  I’ve MADE it before with happy results..

One moist style Spice cake mix

One can of pumpkin

That’s all there is to it.  You mix it together, put it in a pan that’s been sprayed with cooking spray and cook according to the package directions.  I recently saw this recipe listed on Hungry Girl.  I just looked it up again and I didn’t do anything wrong.

It’s supposed to be kind of thick and doesn’t rise a whole lot.

However, when I cut it last night, this is how it looked…

Ralph thought it was fudge! It tasted odd too.  Well the yard birds will be getting a treat!

Now for the good, and this was REALLY good! 🙂

It all started with these goodies…

Leftover rice from the weekend

Spinach

The LAST of the Ancient Beans!

 1 can Ro*Tel diced tomatoes with green chilies

I’ve seen the Ro*Tel tomatoes all over in magazine recipes and on blogs.  It’s only recently that I’ve seen them in stores here and I bought some of them on sale the other day.  I am in Love!!

I sautéed garlic in olive oil and added the beans

Added the tomatoes

Looking good…added a little ground black pepper and Mrs. Dash…

Added the spinach…

Mixed it all together…

Only thing I would have done differently was to add more spinach.

It was SO good.  Ralph was laughing at me because I kept going “mmmmm” “yummmm” and talking with my mouth full about how wonderful it was.  He was enjoying the last of his turkey with a tear in his eye because there is no more. 😦

I like it when a day ends better than it started rather than the other way around.

I think I’ve finally won Ralph over regarding this whole blog thing.  While I was typing, he was making his breakfast…bacon and eggs (no comment)  He was so proud of his accomplishment, he asked if I wanted to take a picture of it.  He was kidding, but I figured this was my chance to get him on board.  So here it is, Ralph’s lovely breakfast!

Not what you’re used to seeing on BCDC but hey, if it gets him involved then that’s ok with me.  Maybe he’ll stop laughing when I pull out the camera. See the glass truly is half-full!

Rather Lazy Saturday

I got to my Weight Watchers meeting to find out good news…I lost 2 pounds! 🙂 I did try hard all week and I truly think that the extra exercise at night made a big difference.  I spoke with my friend Kristen and she told me she was going to my sister Ele’s house to learn to make scones…I decided to crash the party!

Kristen had been taking photos of the step by step process.

But then Ele made her dig right in there and actually get her hands dirty, so I took over the camera duties…

Mmmmm….scones with chocolate chips…

Almost there…

Unfortunately, I don’t have any photos of the finished product…Kristen had taken over by then but you can check her blog for the full story! Ele had taught me to make the scones during the holidays and I’m going to give them a try soon, so I’ll be sharing the recipe then.

Kristen and I shared one and it was delicious! Good Job, Kristen!  We hung out for a few more hours, then I went home to accomplish something for the day, but that just didn’t happen…the slug has returned.

We had planned to come back to Ele’s house in the evening, Patrick and Carrie our nephew and niece were coming to visit.  Ele had said we’d be ordering pizza and I have not had pizza in SO long, I had been thinking about it for days.  I think it may have been one of the reasons I stayed on track this week…I knew there was pizza in my future! 🙂

You know how sometimes you wait and look forward to something and it’s not as good as you expected?  Well, fortunately that did not happen this time.  We ordered from Picasso’s in National Park.  I had never had pizza from there and it was terrific!

They have lots of choices for toppings, but we just got one pepperoni for the meaty folks and a plain one.

I was so excited that I couldn’t wait to take a picture, I had to take a taste first!

I must confess that I ate 3 pieces there and then one more later that Ele had sent home with us.  It was SO good! 

I need to get the day started.  I just got a text from Ele, she wants me to go to Barnes & Noble with her…she’s always annoying me to do that, I don’t know why she’d think I’d want to go there!  😉 That’s a lame joke between us…if I ask her to go to B&N, she complains….if she asks me, I complain.  It’s fun…well, WE think it’s fun! 😉

Boy, B&N and the Screen Actors Guild Awards tonight…big day for me.  We’ll see what other fun I can squeeze in!