Dirty Hippy Brownies!!

So. I slacked for a little while... I'm going to go with around 3 weeks. I had a project at work due and an immense amount of work and very little timeline- welcome to consulting- that found me at the office till 1am on weeknights and bringing kiddo, laptop, and movies in on a Sunday. But now that that's over I can get back to focusing on my life. Ha.

Today I sat down and was perusing the lululemon website after a 30 min cold run in the ravine- and saw some pants I want to eventually fit in... But I got sad because I love desserts and unless I can enjoy food I just can't diet so I might end up a 1-tonne mom. So i was googling healthy recipes that looked really good- and I remembered I had Michael Pollan's book Food Rules somewhere (bear with me this timeline ends up at brownies haha). So I dug into that and it inspired me to see how creative I could get on improving food... One of the rules Italians and French people follow are ENJOY your food- and what's more enjoyable than a brownie? Nothing my friends. Nothing.

So I just took a brownie recipe from the internets and I made it my way-

1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup organic cocoa powder
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 cup coconut sugar*
1/4 cup ground flax
2 tbsp wheat germ
1/4 cup hemp hearts
3 egg whites
1/2 cup pureed mixture of prunes and spinach**
1/2 cup canned pumpkin
1/3 cup almond milk
2 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup strong brewed coffee
1/2 cup chopped unsalted almonds to sprinkle on top

*it's supposed to be unrefined so it contains all it's minerals still and it has a really low glycemic index so your blood sugar doesn't freak out.
**4 dried prunes, tbsp of water, and 1 & 1/2 cup fresh spinach in a blender

Mix the dry stuff except the sugar.
In a separate bowl mix the wet stuff and sugar.
Add together mixing as little as possible to blend.
Sprinkle with chopped almonds
Butter or Pam 8x8 pan and bake at 350 for 40 min.

It was perfect. The hemp hearts helped with the nuttiness and the prunes and pumpkin kept them moist. Not exactly your mom's brownies and not too sweet or dense but chocolatey enough to make everyone happy, especially my insatiable sweet tooth and I could let H have a sizable piece and not have visions of him being a 1 tonne teenager. We all loved them! Bingo!! Score one for dirty hippy brownies! I guess the next logical step is to move us all unto a commune.

Here's hoping the salesgirls don't laugh me out of the store...

I got paid today. And after I pay all my normal boring bills, I am heading straight to Lululemon to buy myself some workout worthy clothes. I am tired of Shawn's old tshirts and ratty old pants. I ran stairs last weekend on Sunday with a friend of mine who I used to do stairs with pre-leg break quite regularly. It was tough and I wasn't nearly as fast as I used to be. But I did it. And it was fun and totally worth it. However, I couldn't walk for this whole week. My calves were so tight that I couldn't get up or down the stairs without desperately gripping the bar and sort of doing an old lady shimmy to the side down them. And forget what torture it was when Huxley needed me to "I carwwy you momma" (he's got it backwards but I know what he means) down the stairs. Ugh. I actually made plans every time I went up and down for throwing him over my head so he would land on me when I fell. You see I have fallen down stairs before. About 8 months after I broke my leg, I decided to run some stairs in Medicine Hat and my ankle actually just gave out halfway down. I went flying and had huge scrapes on my tummy and face from hitting the stairs on the way down and landing in a huge pile of red dirt. So I have a bit of a fear of stairs and so Sunday was a good accomplishment for me. However, it hurt so bad I couldn't even get off of the couch to get the remote so I kept watching Honey Boo Boo run all week and I've noticed I didn't mind... Well F that. I clearly need a kick in the ever increasingly baggy pants. So I am going to pick myself up a couple fall/winter running shirts, some pants with reflective strips, and maybe an ear band to get me motivated and out the door again. Barring the door doesn't accidentally open while H is running in circles picking his nose and I'm trying to stuff myself into the sausage casings and traumatize every tight svelte 20something girl in there into spontaneously committing suicide while looking at their inevitable future staring them in the face while I scream "I USED TO BE JUST LIKE YOU".....

Fingers crossed!!!

People in real life have started to notice I'm losing weight. Today, my dayhome lady, asked me if I'd been losing weight. I was so happy. My pants are so lose right now I don't even half to undo the buttons or zipper to take them off. YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!

I also need some more running music for my ipod. Anyone got any good song recommendations????