in with the new :)

♥hey lovelies :):)

how have you all been lately??? i hope you had a nice weekend, and were able to get outside a bit :) summer is here, officially, which seems crazy. i feel like it was winter not too long ago.

this morning's breakfast was a mixture of oats and cereal :) i went for a run, and enjoyed this later on, with black coffee, and some reading afterward.

plain oats, with banana, cinnamon&ginger, almonds, sunflower seeds, multigrain squares and granola, plus non-fat soymilk. there were more multigrain squares as well :P

until yesterday i was up north at my cottage for just a short time, but it was nice :)

itty bitty fresh ontario strawberries

on monday evening i saw my very good friend, she lives there normally (apart from when at uni) and we've known each other since like age 5 i think. library club meetings :P and i used to live in a small town there. her parents are close friends with mine, so our families have been getting together but not lately at all. honestly i don't know how long its been :/ so it was sort of a bit, not like scary but just new, having people for dinner, not my own family so i couldn't just be 'me' with regards to like all the stuff that i like to control.

we had salmon and, instead of brown rice, mashed potatoes, which sounded odd but apparently they pair well together in restaurants? i just had mine plain before my mom added milk and butter. but wait it's not for ed reasons, maybe a tad but i also have a messed up stomach, and that contributes to a great deal of my food fears and intolerances and what not. oh and zucchini :) love love love. i made the dessert with my mom that day, from a gorgeous photograph cookbook my mom owns, it was an apple oat square type thing. it was a bit buttery, like shortbread on the bottom and not a ton of apples. i had hoped it would be similar to this apple/fruit square they sold at starbucks a while ago on their 'under 3 gfat', which is much less sweet, i don't think it has butter and more fruit. but...this was fine, and honestly if we had served something like what i had preferred i don't think it would have been a hit :P it was with ice cream, but i haven't had much of that in a while. i put a tiny bit so my plate didn't look too odd but i've had issues having dairy at times. and if not having a bunch (to please others) will possibly reduce some physical symptoms then i will go that way, because i don't want to get ill because i want to please others or something. but the small bit i had was nice, natural vanilla bean :)

i was able to take breakfast photos though, which was nice :)

the first morning i woke up later than usual which was nice, i had not slept pretty much at all the night before :/ i had asked my mom, if she got up earlier, to not turn on the coffee until 8:30 and i didn't think she'd actually do this but aparantly, in order to have her coffee asap she actually had instant for her first mug. and the stuff we have is not nice at all. i was so surprised she did that! but i wanted to run first so by the time i showered and ate and had coffee it was a bit old. but still yummy :)

i started off with a nice cold cereal mix, a very ripe banana though! with multigrain squares, honey-nut o's, almonds, skim milk...

the next morning, we left essentially after breakfast. but i made oatmeal for us, and tried some of the square/bar from last night while at the stovetop :P

banana walnut oats (banana-bread) :)

has anyone ever had rice hot cereal, or brown rice, creamy rice cereal? i have bob's red mill 'brown rice farina' and its been in my cupboard unopened for at least a few months...and i really want to make it. it says 2012 for the sell by, so would that be fine if its unopened? anywho i just am scared to try it, i've had brown rice of course, and as a hot cereal it sounds a bit like cream of wheat. but i don't quite know :P

anyway... that's really all :) oh and i just baked some oatmeal-marmalade (though i put some with rasp-jam and others with...ohhh i just realised i wanted to put sunflower seeds and i totally forgot...gahhh fail :/)...anyway, they were made with wwflour, oats, soy milk, spices and a few other things :P some with raisins and others with a tiny bit of jam (raspberry or apricot) in the middle. not too sweet but i like that. i don't like baking much at my place as i have to wash everything by hand, and theres a dishwasher at my family place so that's nice :P and i don't have too many ingredients there. but i must use the spelt flour. and my frozen nanners.

xoxoxox love jen