Joys of Grocery Shopping and Cooking/Baking

Over this break I’ve loved going to the grocery store with mom. I love the atmosphere there and all the choices you can make btwn foods. I like to pick the healthiest food I can at the stores. It’s fun looking at the labels and choosing the one with the best price, lowest calories, and healthiest ingredients.

I’ve also loved cooking! I’ve baked so much this break! Snickerdoodles, Pear & Apple Crisp that I brought over to Vanessa’s house and shared with my friends. Banana bread & banana muffins & Cranberry Orange Muffins and cranberry orange bread that I gave to my CPS friends for Christmas gifts and to Uncle Paul and Lao-Lao & Lao-Yeh & Chanelle and Auntie Vicky. Pumpkin pie & Apple crisp, and fresh orange juice for Christmas Eve dinner. I also made Apple Cinnamon Muffins for Lao-yeh. We had so much fruit that we had to use up before going to Wyoming or else it’d go to waste, so I made all these desserts. I also made Strawberry, blueberry, blackberry, banana crepes as a surprise Christmas breakfast for mom and dad and Mason on Christmas! They loved the thin crepes! I’m so happy it worked out. All of these dishes, I've never created before so i'm really relieved that they turned out well! I also created an zucchini egg bake for my parents where I added broccoli, tomatoes, and mushrooms to give it variety. It was so much fun. I’ve never made these dishes but I love to experiment and make people happy with my dishes. In Wyoming, I made a zucchini egg bake again with all the diff ingredients again for us and the McKays and the apple crisp. They really liked it! I love baking and cooking. I forgot how much fun it was. 

 Cranberry Orange Muffins

Variety of Desserts: 

Pumpkin pie, Apple Crisp, Banana Muffins & Cranberry Orange Muffins

Vegetable Egg Bake 

(broccoli, mushrooms, onions, tomatoes, zucchini)

Strawberry, Blackberry, Blueberry, Banana Crepes

Other random thought, or as mom calls it, "Big Lesson #1 for the year." I was debating whether to write about this in the blog, but I think that it's honestly what I think, so I should put it in for integrity. Sometimes I eat things in the fridge because I hate to waste, but dad says that’s a habit I should break, and I know he’s right. I should only eat what I want, and not feel obligated to eat what it in the fridge just b/c I feel bad that it'll be wasted. I can do that with food that is on my plate, but not what other people left. That’ll be bad for me in the future. In Wyoming, dad didn’t finish his burger so part of me wanted to eat it but part of me just wanted to eat it because I didn't want it to go to waste. My stomach’s expandable--I would have been just fine and satisfied with my own yummy roasted veggie panini (mozzarella and bell pepper with tomato tapenade), but I ate ¼ of his burger (the rest of what was left except for the bun) because it was there. I need to stop doing that. It’s not good. You are what you eat, so you should eat foods that you love and want to eat!