Red Loster and Applebee's

Last week continued like the previous several weeks with work an school. Sunday was exciting because we had friends over from church for dinner. Here's what I made:

pepperoni pizza

Hawaiian pizza

cheesy breadsticks

chocolate white chocolate chip cookies

I made the dough for the pizza and breadsticks with half white and half wheat flour with no seasoning. It's a work in progress. Next time I'll be sure to look up some tastier healthy pizza dough recipes.

Overall Dan and I had a great time Sunday night with the Eriksons. Their kids are so adorable and fun! Although, it made me realize that I need more practice with interacting and handling toddlers. Dan and I are going to offer to babysit for families in our ward so that I get the whole "kid" thing down a little bit better. Maybe after Thanksgiving when I can afford to work less hours we'll start babysitting then.

The rest of our week went pretty well. I'm working about 28 hours/week with school and Dan's working 40+ hours on top of grading and planning lessons...let's just say we really cherish Sundays.

On a better note I'm greatly improving in my running times. Saturday I ran 3.44 miles in 32 minutes (9:18 min/mile) and today I ran 2.7 miles in 24:25 (9:41 min/mile). I'm hoping to keep an average pace of a 9:15 minute/mile for my 5 mile race next month. If things stay the way they are (no injuries, no skipping work outs) I'm pretty sure I can achieve that goal.

Monday after my run I had this for breakfast:

Oats in a jar

For those of you who have never heard of "oats in a jar" it's pretty self-explanatory. I put my oatmeal in my empty almond butter jar. It's delicious because you get to combine the last few bites of the almond butter with your oatmeal....YUMMY!

Since Red Lobster is having their "Endless Shrimp" promotion Dan and I HAD to go to Red Lobster. Dan got the endless shrimp while I opted for the half salmon and grilled shrimp with broccoli. My salmon was delicious. If we could afford it I would make salmon every week!

Enjoying endless shrimp!

Wednesday night was really nice for me because it was my only night off from work (outside of Sundays). I loved relaxing with Dan and watching reruns of the office :-)

Thursday rolled by pretty quickly. Friday I only worked 12-5pm. Unfortunately I didn't make much since it's so slow during the lunch hour. Friday night Dan and I went out to Applebees. We met up with 2 girls from my internship, Amy and Anna. It was great to hang out with them outside of dietetics and not constantly be talking about patients, charts, and hw.

Saturday I went on the longest run I've done since being in Ohio. 3.44 MILES. It's sad that to me it doesn't sound like much given the fact that I was running 3-5 miles 3-4 times/week last year but with starting over in a new environment I feel like I've done pretty well. I felt so proud of myself on Saturday that I treated myself with 2 doughnuts. There's a doughnut place here that makes the doughnuts while you wait. They have "create your own" and themed doughnuts. I went with a themed one that had maple glaze and cinnamon sugar on it. I also created one with maple glaze and mini chocolate chips. Dan went with the peppermint patty and bavarian creme. They were really more like desserts but I guess all doughnuts technically are desserts.

yummy doughnut

Saturday I worked a double (12pm-10:30pm). It was a lonnnggg day. In the evening I ran into a lot of trouble. I got double-seated (2 of my tables got seated at the same time with 4 people at each table). Double-seating isn't that bad if you're experienced and it isn't hectic already.... but when you're not experienced and you're already crazy-busy it's NOT FUN. Let's just say I had a few (3 tables to be exact) disgruntled customers. In one situation, a husband and wife arrived before 2 of their friends who were joining them. So I rang in the appetizer for the first couple (before the other couple arrived). When the second couple arrived they all ordered their entrees. The second couple also ordered an appetizer. Since I wanted to make sure their food arrived at the same time I rang in the second appetizer and waited until it went out to the couple before ringing in all of the entrees. BIG MISTAKE. See the rule in my restaurant is that you're supposed to WAIT until the appetizer goes out before ringing in the entrees. That way the appetizer doesn't go out with the entrees. But since it was busy and the kitchen was backed up their food took FOREVER to get out. I felt bad but it was a good learning experience for me.

Anyway, Sunday was a great day. Mainly because I went to church, felt the Spirit, and did NOT have to work. Sunday was definitely a comfort food day. For dinner I made grilled cheese and pepperoni sandwiches. They tasted great.

ingredients for grilled cheese

Today I worked a double and it was extremely slow. The good thing about it being slow was that I got home by 7:30 (30 minutes before I was scheduled to be off). I hope everyone's Monday went well!

Quick Update

Thanks to those of you that contacted me regarding my last post. I was really feeling down and your words of encouragement really helped. Good news is that I contacted my professor and spoke with her about the trouble I'm having in class. Turns out that the other students who did their undergrad at YSU had 3 semesters of medical nutrition therapy. I only had one quarter! So today I'm going to sit-in on the medical nutrition therapy lecture. The professor that teaches it allowed me to listen to her lectures without registering for them. Also, my professor was very understanding of my situation and complimented me for putting so much effort into making sure I succeed in this program.

Dan reports that his classes have been going well the past couple days. As long as he keeps them busy there are less distractions and interruptions in class.

I have work off today so Dan and I are spending the evening together. We WERE going to watch the new episode of Smallville but sadly it's not playing until Friday. For dinner we're going out to Red Lobster. They have the "Endless Shrimp" special going and Dan LOVES it. I haven't decided what I'm going to get yet, maybe Salmon and broccoli?

In other news I forgot to tell you that I registered for a 5 mile race! It's the day before Halloween and there are awards for best costume. Another girl from the program is doing the race with me and we're dressing up as 80's aerobic instructors! I'm so excited. I've been running about 2.5 miles a few days each week for the past few weeks. For some reason I've had a hard time getting back up to where I used to be. Not only am I running less mileage, but I'm running it a lot slower. By a lot I mean about 1 min and 30 seconds slower. But I found a training program that will help me build up to running 5 miles comfortably over the next 6 weeks.

Sorry no pictures today!

Weekend Getaway

Wow what an AMAZING weekend Dan and I just had. But first things first: last week. It was pretty rough for the both of us. Dan is having a rough time connecting with his students. They just don't listen and don't care about getting into trouble. He gives them a detention. They act like it doesn't matter. There's just nothing to motivate them.

In regards to me. I'm having a tough time in school. I think it's mainly because I LOATHE clinical nutrition. I talk with patients (mainly 60+ years old) who are in the hospital and have at least one if not all of the following: diabetes, hypertension, and coronary artery disease. Nutrition is the LAST thing on their minds. They don't care about eating a low-sodium diet or limiting added sugar. It's quite frustrating. The most irritating thing is that if these individuals put their diet FIRST and paid attention to only that, their other problems would become less serious and eventually disappear. But no, they just keep eating bad food and expect the pills they take to ease the damage they do to their bodies. To those of you who have diabetes, hypertension, or both PLEASE take of yourself. Eat what you like but in moderation. Go out once a month instead of every week. That way it's more special to you and actually becomes a "treat". It also saves you $$.

In addition to disliking clinical nutrition, I am also struggling with my professor. She is strict, hardcore, and easily intimidating. I know it's because she wants us to succeed and be the best in our field but I feel like I'm on her "naughty" list and don't know how to get on her "nice" list. This week after visiting with patients we were doing calculations and I forgot my calculator in the car (I didn't have one last week either). She asked me why I didn't have a calculator. Being intimidated, I managed to mumble out some sort of jibberish that finally came out to"I forgot." Her eyes narrowed and with a dark edge in her voice she replied, "you're scoring low today." AHHHHHHHHHHH....I basically felt like I FAILED AT LIFE. Ever since that day I've been second guessing my decision to be in this program. I traveled across country and made my husband make huge sacrifices to live in a town he's unfamiliar with and work a difficult job all so I be in this program so I can be a dietitian (even though I'll probably work for about a year, have kids, and never use my degree again). Was it worth it? I have yet to find that out... This post is starting out really depressing sorry. Don't worry I'm not giving up. I'm just complaining a bit. Words of encouragement would really help me out right now.

To continue on with our week. My work went by fast. Tuesday I got off early because it was really slow. I fell asleep at 8pm because I was so exhausted from always being on the go and not sleeping adequately. Wednesday I started to get a sore throat so after work I took some of this:

 It worked really well because I was feeling great the next morning. Friday was spent in preparation for the weekend. I cleaned and ran errands. Dan and I left for Cleveland Friday afternoon and stayed until today. We LOVED everything about this bed & breakfast and plan on going back. Here are a lot of pictures from our trip:

On our way to Cleveland (1 hour drive)

 The bed and breakfast itself has three bedrooms. The bed and breakfast also owns another house called "the Loft" one block away that is divided into two separate apartments. The front apartment (where we stayed) has a full kitchen, living room, and two bedrooms. Fortunately no one else was staying in the other bedroom so we had the entire house to ourselves! The back apartment has a kitchen, living room, and one bedroom. A nice couple from Indiana was staying there over the weekend and let us tour their apartment.

The Loft

Our front door

Pathway to the courtyard

Courtyard

Kitchen

Living room view from upstairs balcony

Looking downstairs from our bedroom door

The Retreat (our room)

View from the door

Our comfy huge bed with high quality sheets

Jetted tub for two :-)

Shower with "rainfall" shower head

We arrived Friday afternoon to chocolate-covered strawberries in our fridge, bath soaps and lufas in our bathroom, and these in our room:

There was also champagne flutes and champagne on ice next to our bed. We opted to give the champagne to the innkeeper and purchased some apple cranberry martinelli's cider. 

Friday night we went out to a really nice, upscale Mexican restaurant called Momocho. It was featured on one of the travel channel's TV shows. It was AMAZING. Really pricey but worth it. They had really good guacamole. Dan and I both ordered make-it-yourself taquitos. I got the shrimp and garlic with a side of dumplings. He ordered steak with a side of black beans.

Dan outside Momocho

  Saturday morning we walked over to the bed and breakfast for breakfast at 9am. We had mixed fruit, a delicious pastry, and french toast. Everything was high quality and yummy! After breakfast Dan took a much-needed nap while I relaxed in the courtyard with 2 of my favorites:

A good book and diet coke

After about an hour Dan and I walked to the West Side market. It's basically like a huge in-door Saturday market with tons of different food vendors. Dan and I got some treats from a bakery.

We also stopped at a book store and Family Dollar (Dan worked at a Family Dollar while he was at BYU-I).

I almost bought this cookbook!

Walking home from the market

Cute house I fell in love with

We arrived back home from the market to these goodies in our kitchen:

Saturday evening before dinner we enjoyed some football.

Dan enjoying a HUGE eclair

Reading

For dinner Saturday night we went to Heck's cafe, a place known for their burgers. We had shrimp as an appetizer. We both got delicious burgers for our entrees. Each entree came with a baby ketchup:

"mini me" ketchup

In front of Heck's cafe

Saturday night we celebrated our anniversary with some sparkling cider. Note: the candles in the picture are fake:

Please ignore the frizzy hair (this is OHIO after all)

Overall we had a wonderful stay. This morning's breakfast consisted of mixed fruit, muffins, cheddar and ham quiche and a cranberry mango salad. We highly recommend staying here and plan on going back as soon as we can!

Pics of the bed and breakfast interior:

Us in front of the Palen House Bed and Breakfast

The City

 Progressive Field

Have a great week!

One Year Anniversary

One year ago today, Dan and I were sealed for eternity at the Portland, OR temple. It's amazing how one year has flown by so fast! I am so happy and I have been blessed with the most wonderful husband. I look forward to plenty more anniversaries together.
Here are some pictures from our wedding and honeymoon:

Funny engagement pic

in front of the Laie, Oahu temple (sadly it was closed)

Beautiful view of Waikiki behind us

watching the Hawaiian sunset

What an amazing year it has been! Dan and I both graduated with degrees. I received a B.S. in Nutrition and he received a Masters in Teaching. I got an internship that led us to Ohio. Dan got a job teaching high school English and I'm working as a server at Lone Star Steakhouse. We have truly been blessed since embarking on our journey to Ohio!

In other news this week: Dan went to a Scrappers baseball game Friday night while I was working. Here are some pics he took:

Dan was picked as the "fan of the game." If the Scrappers scored in the third then he would have won a $20 gift certificate to Dick's Sporting goods. Unfortunately they did not score. Overall, Dan had a good time. The weather was perfect and his over-priced hot dog was delicious. I look forward to going to a future game with him.

Not much else happened this week. I skinned my knee Friday morning after my run:

It's turned into a huge purple bruise. Saturday morning before my shift I made blueberry waffles. They were YUMMY!

YUMMMMM....

This upcoming week is super busy for me (again). Tomorrow I'm doing lunch with a friend who's also interning at my program. I'm also making fruit pizza for a neighborhood BBQ that's tomorrow afternoon and I work tom 4-8pm. I also work Tues-Thurs night GAH! But all of this leads up to our romantic getaway weekend in CLEVELAND!!!! I can't wait. Every day I remind Dan how many days we have left until Friday. As of now we have: 4 days, 6 hours, and 27 minutes YAY!

Have a good night!