You Should See The Other Guy!

Sooo...the other guy is a mountain...and he's still standing :( We went snowboarding again on Crystal Mountain. I started out with a lesson at the end of which I was doing pretty darn well! After the lesson we took a snack break and headed up again for my last ride for a while. I hadn't even made it very far down the slope (which was starting to get a little icey) when I wiped out pretty badly. I am very thankful for my helmet purchase which saved my little round head, but my wrist was not so lucky. I was already in a lot of pain and still had to get up and ride down the rest of the mountain...at this point I was freaked out about falling again and making it worse, so it took a looooong time.  After going to the doctor on Monday and again on Tuesday, they determined that I had a small fracture and fit me with an oh so fashionable blue cast. I was going to go for pink but decided that blue was probably more appropriate for a naval officer. It has been a challenge trying to do everything with one hand and be a lefty! But I am learning quickly. I can't wait to get it off though! I have a check up in 3 weeks to see if I still need the hard cast or switch to something a little less cumbersome.

[my arm]

[get well flowers from Ryan!]

Pretty In Pink

So much for making healthy treats, but I just made some fabulously delectable and oh so adorable pink lemonade cupcakes! I made some regular size and some mini size for those of us who 'just want a taste' (MOM!). They turned out amazingly good. I'm planning to pawn them off on my coworkers tomorrow and people at bible study tomorrow night. That way I shouldn't be eating too many more of them! I'm sure all the guys will love the pretty pinkness of them too! I found the recipe here.

I was going to make some peanut butter fudge ones tonight too, but I think that might have to wait till next week. Get excited!

Safety First!

This weekend was attempt number 2 for snowboarding! Before we went this time we stopped by REI to shop for some helmets. Although I'm pretty sure I won't be going fast enough to have any serious injuries anytime soon, I suppose you can never be too carefull. After seeing the prices of most of the helmets, I was about to decide that it wasn't worth it when the sales lady came over and suggested that I check out the childres' helmets because I look like a have a very round head. I tried one on and to my suprise it actually felt like it fit better than the adult ones...aaaaand it was about a third of the price of them! Yay for being thrifty! On a side note, this is the second time that someone has told me that I have a very round head when first meeting me. I was not aware that that was such a noticable feature of my appearance!

Sunday we went down to Crystal Mountain again. The snow was waaaaaay better this time. The last time we went it was a little warm so the snow was pretty slushy. This time there was a nice layer of fresh snow and it actually started snowing a lot more as the day went on. Although I still had plenty of wipe outs, I felt a lot better about this snowboarding trip. It was a lot of fun, and I can't wait to give it another try soon :)

Healthy Goodies!

Sooo...I like to bake a lot, but I have a tendency to lean towards recipes that satisfy my sweet tooth without satisfying my daily health requirements. So this weekend was a little attempt to rectify that! First were some fabulous whole wheat strawberry banana mini muffins. They are so cute in their little bite sized forms! They're also guilt free and super delicious. Later that day I also made some low fat peach frozen yogurt in my new ice cream maker. I am a big fan of this little device and am thrilled at how easy it is to make fabulous low fat treats with it! I can't wait to try out some more fun recipes.

Whole Wheat Strawberry Banana Muffins:

Ingredients

• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup low fat vanilla yogurt
• 1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
• 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 bananas, mashed
• 2 cups whole wheat flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
• 1 cup frozen sliced strawberries

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Grease 12 large muffin cups (I used mini muffin tins), or line with paper liners.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, applesauce, oil, brown sugar, vanilla and bananas. Combine the flour, baking soda and cinnamon; Stir into the banana mixture until moistened. Stir in the strawberries until evenly distributed. Spoon batter into muffin cups until completely filled.
3. Bake for 20 minutes in the preheated oven, or until the tops of the muffins spring back when pressed lightly. (I did it a little shorter since they were mini muffins)  Cool before removing from the muffin tins.

First Snowboarding of the Season!

So this snowboarding season started out a little choppy. I guess it is just the third time I've ever been snowboarding, but it was a rough day. We went down to Crystal Mt. for an afternoon of snowboarding. It's been a little warm in Seattle, so the slopes were pretty icey/slushy in some parts. I decided that I'm going to need a little refresher lesson again before I get back to practicing. It was still fun to get out on the mountain though!

This took me forever to figure out how to post a video on here. Turns out the new, updated blogger doesn't have the ability to upload videos so I had to switch back to the old editor. That seems a little silly. Either way, Ryan got me a Flip Video camera for Christmas, so here's a little clip of the mountain from that! More videos to come now that I have this fancy little gadget!

Happy Birthday Me!

I turned 26 on January 3rd. On to the next exciting year of my life. So far it's been quite a ride and i can't wait to see what being 26 gets me into! My birthday was my last official day of vacation, so it was nice and relaxing starting out with a surprise afternoon at the spa getting a massage and ending with a great dinner out on the town.

[birthday decorations...even the dog was decorated!]

[birthday cupcakes from cupcake royale!]

Key Lime Cookies

A few weeks ago, my roommate had some frozen dough for key lime white chocolate chip cookies. They were really good. I may have had a few of them so I thought I'd replace them with some home made ones. I looked up a few recipes online and made a nice blend of them all based on what I had available. They turned out really well. Just another key lime option to take place of the pie!

Ingredients

• 1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup butter, softened
• 3/4 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 egg
• 1 1/2 teaspoons lime zest
• 1 tablespoon lime juice
• 14 ounces good quality white chocolate, coarsely chopped or a 12 oz. bag white chocolate chips
• 
  

Directions

1. 
   

   1

   Preheat oven to 375 F (180C).
   
2. 
   

   2

   In a small bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, salt and baking soda.
   
3. 
   

   3

   In a large bowl, beat the butter, sugars and vanilla extract at high speed until well combined.
   
4. 
   

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   Add the egg, lime juice and lime zest and beat for 1 additional minute.
   
5. 
   

   5

   Gradually add in the flour mixture.
   
6. 
   

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   Stir in the white chocolate chips by hand.
   
7. 
   

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   Drop the dough by rounded tablespoonful onto ungreased cookie sheets.
   
8. 
   

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   Bake for 8-11 minutes or until edges are slightly brown.