Treat Yourself Tuesday: Birthday Edition

This weekend was so wonderfully relaxing and family-filled; the perfect birthday weekend. There was a whole lot of tasty food, cozy time watching Breaking Bad, sweet treats, and more. Wanna hear about it?

I thought this would be the perfect time to take part in my blend Becky’s Treat Yourself Tuesday link up.  It only took me a good 11 weeks to get in on the fun, but better late than never, right?

Treat-Yourself-Tuesday-Badge

Becky’s Treat Yourself Tuesday…

“Between now and Tuesday, do something nice for yourself. Wake up a few minutes early and enjoy a nice, hot cup of coffee before your hectic day begins. Take a bubble bath when you get home from work Monday evening. Spend some extra time stretching after your workout this weekend. Treat yourself to a cookie or some froyo this afternoon. Or maybe head out on a girls’ night this weekend.

Do whatever feels best for you. Do something that will make you feel relaxed and loved and happy. Remember this is about treating YOURSELF – not your friends, not your family, not your spouse, not your dog – so make sure you really focus on you. Treat yourself well and treat yourself often so that you will become the best you possible and in turn be your best for others in your life!”   source

So here is my treat myself Tuesday, birthday edition.

Starting on Friday night….

I haven’t been feeling too well so Dana and I had a quiet night in complete with a snack platter—Havarti cheese (my fav), salami (not a fan), shrimp, hummus, olives, and some Byerly’s chicken pasta salad. We enjoyed these little nibbles while watching at least two more episodes of Breaking Bad.

cheese and snack tray

Dana made homemade chocolate chip cookies that evening as well. 🙂 K, really he made the dough. The cookies weren’t made until the next day. The dough is my favorite part!

Saturday was my actual birthday and it began with a free cup of Caribou Coffee—Lite Caramel Mocha. Yes.

caribou birthday coffee

The day was full of lots of sweet surprises…

flowers

XoXo to my blends Becky, Katie, and Caroline

care package

A bunch of birthday cards!

Lunch at Muffuletta Cafe in St. Paul. I got the mini muffuletta which is  New Orleans style sandwich of ham, spicy capicolla, pistacio mortadella, and genoa salami piled high with provolone, smothered in our olive relish and served warm on fresh focaccia. Sweet potato fries on the side. Holy moly this was delicious! I was a little too excited to sink my teeth into this bad boy–sorry for the blurry photo.

muffuletta

Lunch was finished off with a free bowl of Sebastian Joe’s salted caramel ice cream with two spoons. I shared. 🙂

After lunch we headed over to the Como conservatory which features amazing plants and flowers. It was the perfect thing to do on a rainy cool November day.

dana melanie como conservatory

After the conservatory we walked over to the Como Zoo and checked out the animals! I loved this part! I could watch the primates for hours.

como zoo

Later in the evening we went to my brother’s for my birthday dinner with the family. I requested mom’s baked ziti with spinach and meat sauce. She even used gluten-free brown rice noodles!

Dessert was per my request as well—-homemade banana cake with chocolate frosting. There were lots of sweet treats happening this weekend!

We spent the rest of the evening at Comedy Sportz, which is an improv comedy club in Minneapolis. It felt GREAT to laugh and to be with my amazing family.

dad and melanie

Of course I was spoiled with lots of presents too.

On Sunday Dana and I did our usual Sunday morning gig: newspaper, coupon cutting, and coffee.

For lunch we headed over to my in-law’s for a Greek dinner from Mediterranean Cruise Cafe.

greek food

And DQ ice cream cake!

birthday cake

And more presents. Seriously I am so spoiled!

I felt so much love this weekend and I thank you all for making my birthday so special. I don’t know what I would do without you all. You are my world.

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Anticipating Thanksgiving

Before I go into the planned post, I just have to say…we got snow last night!

first snow of the season

The reason I’m excited about this is because 1. It’s really pretty and 2. I know it isn’t going to stick around. I’m not really ready for permanent snow yet. It was kind of fun seeing that first thing this morning.

Anyway, I know Thanksgiving is still a few weeks away but if you’re anything like me, I go NUTS over Thanksgiving. We do the same thing almost every year. In the morning we participate in a 5K run/walk with a bunch of friends which is a blast, then we shower up and head over to either mine or Dana’s parents for a big Thanksgiving feast. Last year we actually hosted at our house and it went really well (minus the fact it took wayyyyyy too long to cook the turkey due to a fritzy oven), but I’m leaving it to the parents this year. 🙂

thanksgiving 2012

I love the intimacy of Thanksgiving; being with family, not stressing about presents, but just being together and enjoying each other’s company. It’s the best.

And don’t get me started on the food. Okay, get me started. I really want to talk about the food. Ever since I was little this has been on my top five of favorite meals. I only wish I could grow a second stomach just temporarily for the day so I could enjoy more of my favorite meal on the actual holiday. I know there’s always leftovers, but they aren’t the same.

My mom and I always discuss our Thanksgiving menu when the time rolls around and we joke about how I never want to deviate away from our standard spread. It’s just so darn good—why change a good thing?!

1. The turkey: my favorite part is the turkey breast.

thanksgiving turkey

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2. Mashed potatoes with gravy with some extra gravy over the turkey.

thanksgiving mashed potatoes

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3. Green bean casserole

thanksgiving green bean

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4. Stuffing

thanksgiving stuffing

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5. Whipped sweet potatoes

thanksgiving sweet potatoes

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6. Cranberries

thanksgiving cranberries

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7. Relish tray: pickles and olives (they are a must in our household!)

Thanksgiving olives

8. Some type of warm roll—I usually skip on this to save more room in my belly for other foods but the rolls are really good for leftover turkey sandwiches.

thanksgiving rolls

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9. Pie, usually pumpkin

thanksgiving pumpkin pie

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Don’t these lil babies look good?!

thanksgiving pumpkin

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For years, I would end Thanksgiving with a trip to my cousin Betsy’s house where we would get cozy in our sweats, eat leftover turkey sandwiches and watch White Christmas. It was always something I looked forward to to end out the wonderful loved one-filled day. This tradition still continues but I can’t always make it over there! I’m always there in spirit. 😉

The day after Thanksgiving Dana and I always go pick out our Christmas tree. I can’t believe in three weeks we will be putting a Christmas tree up in our house! Eeeeeee! I love this time of year.

My mouth is officially watering for some Thanksgiving food. Let the countdown begin to one of my favorite holidays!

Do you love Thanksgiving? Why?

What are your favorite Thanksgiving foods?

Do you have any Thanksgiving traditions?

Continue Reading Anticipating Thanksgiving

Weekend Favorites

So it’s for real Monday already? This weekend flew by! Mine was incredibly relaxing which I couldn’t have been more excited about. I was thinking, instead of doing a full recap of my weekend, how about I just breakdown some of my favorite moments from the weekend? Yea, I like that idea.

1. Watching an insane amount of New Girl with Dana while cozy in my sweatpants and snacking on some homemade caramel corn. What made it even better was that Dana made it!

homemade caramel corn

 

2. Meeting up with Katie for lunch at Panera! The excitement of getting together with Katie would have been enough but then you add Panera on top of that?! Man alive I was excited. And believe it or not, I actually branched out and instead of the usual French onion soup, I actually got broccoli cheese soup. It totally hit the spot! I was so happy to be with Katie for a while. Such a treat.

katie panera

 

panera broccoli cheese soup

 

3. Making some delicious food. For breakfast one day I made a two-ingredient pancake topped with peanut butter and real organic maple syrup. Not the prettiest photo I realize, but so tasty!

egg banana pancake

I also whipped up a batch of gluten-free pasta salad. I can’t remember if I used quinoa noodles or brown rice noodles (I had gotten them from the bulk bin at the co-op) but I do know it was one of the two. In the mix: peas, olives, celery, onions, chicken, mustard, mayo, salt and pepper, and a splash of lemon juice. This stuff was crazy good! homemade gluten free pasta salad

4. Watching Home Alone while walking on the treadmill in my warm home. Doesn’t that just sound cozy?!

 

home alone

 

5. Sleeping in and waking up with no alarm clock. And sleeping a lot. And getting an extra hour of sleep.

No-Alarm-Clock

 

6. Dinner with my family on Sunday night. I should really say feast and not dinner. My mom and dad went all out with steaks, potatoes, broccoli, salad, and fresh fruit! So good! I think my body was really screaming for some iron from the red meat because it tasted really good to me last night. Our bodies know best after all. It was so nice hanging out with family as always!

 

steak dinner mom and dads

 

As you can see it was an incredibly relaxing weekend. Ahhhhh….

How was your weekend? What were your favorite moments of the weekend?

Continue Reading Weekend Favorites

Wicked and What I’ve Been Eating Lately

Well, hello there! How are you doing my friends? I am just fine over here. I had an incredibly relaxing weekend full of family and friends.

Oh, I suppose I haven’t filled you in on my Thursday evening yet either.

On Thursday, I went to the Orpheum in Minneapolis to see Wicked!! It was Dana and me, mom and dad, and Kevin. Please excuse the blurry photo–it was raining and people were pouring out behind me so I had to take a walking photo.

wcked

 

wicked with family

dana melanie wicked orpheum

 

This was my first time going to see Wicked and holy cow….I get what all of the hype is about! It was funny, the story was great, the music was phenomenal, and the acting was wonderful. It was amazing! So now I can say to you, if you haven’t seen Wicked yet you MUST go see it at some point! You won’t regret it!

Moving on to some food photos. I have a whole slew of random photos of food I have been eating over the last week or so. When I say random, I mean random.

PB and J on regular whole wheat bread (I just had to have it although I’m still trying to mostly stay clear of gluten), carrots, and a pickle.

pb and jelly

Homemade veggie soup. I decided not to share this recipe with you all because the soup is just ok to me. I’m really hoping I get creative in the kitchen this week so I have something nummy to share with you all. I have been slacking!

veggie soup

I’ve really been into the cottage cheese lately. I found that I really like Organic Valley’s 4% cottage cheese. I love it on salads, with veggies, by itself, and with crackers.

cottage cheese

IMG_4251

 

One weeknight I made a big batch of stir-fry veggies over quinoa.

stir fry with quinoa

The next day I used the leftover veggies in a southwestern stye dish with veggies, black beans, avocado, cheddar cheese, and salsa. I really enjoyed this one!

black beans veggies salsa

On Friday night after work, Dana built us a fire in our fireplace. It was a chilly night and it felt so nice and cozy to sit in front of the fire and take care of bills, Halloween costumes, etc. FYI Moose is not a fan of the fires, especially when the logs fall and make crashing noises. He is so ready to bolt in this photo below.

fireplace dana moose

Neither of us really felt like cooking on Friday night, so we cheated and picked up a ready-made meatloaf from Costco. All we had to do was reheat it in the oven. It was good, but not as good as homemade. It was nice to not cook though!

mashed potatoes and meatloaf

 

I’m missing a bunch of food photos. On Sunday our friends had us over for French onion soup (my fav) and chopped salads and they were both SO good. We finished lunch off with homemade apple bars. I felt so spoiled!

Throughout the weekend I think I watched at least 10 episodes of New Girl Season One on Netflix. I can’t believe it took me so long to get into this show. Thanks Luke! 🙂 I also slept a lot and got some walks in on the treadmill (it was a pretty rainy weekend here).

It was perfectly relaxing. I actually feel well-rested after this weekend which feels nice.

How was your weekend? What was your favorite thing you did?

 

Continue Reading Wicked and What I’ve Been Eating Lately

Weekend Happenings: Soups, Weddings, Family Time

Hello, hello! How was your weekend? Mine was FANTASTIC!

It started on Friday. I made myself a super nummy smoothie in my new Ninja Ultima.

In the smoothie (all frozen fruits and veggies):

  • Kale
  • Blueberries
  • Pineapple
  • Bananas
  • almond milk
  • peanut butter
  • flax-seed
  • cocoa powder

ninja smoothie

 

I gave it a whirl in the Ninja…

ninja

 

So far I have used the Ninja for smoothies and I also used it last night when I made a batch of soup! I love it. It is so efficient! I can’t wait to make nut butters in it. I am hoping the clean up is a lot easier than when I make nut butter in the food processor!

Friday morning I met up with my mom or our annual girl’s day. This year we decided to go to Whole Foods to do some shopping, have lunch at Panera, go for a walk with Abbie around the neighborhood, and just veg out together. It was so nice and so relaxing! I can’t wait for our next one!

Oh, and don’t act surprised when you hear I got the French Onion Soup once again at Panera. It is just my fav! Next time though I might have to try that squash soup, right Katie?

IMG_4199

On Saturday we attended my cousin’s wedding. It was fun getting all dolled up and hanging out with my family for the day.

carolyns wedding collage

On Sunday…more family time! We met up with Dana’s parents in the morning for a while and then went to my parent’s house to hang out with Scott and Nicole before they headed back home. No wonder my weekend was so fabulous, it was full of family time!

In the afternoon I whipped up a batch of veggie soup to eat throughout the week. It’s packed with bone broth, broccoli, green beans, zucchini, onion, carrots, celery and more. I am hoping it turned out well! If so, I will share the recipe!

soup

While the soup cooked, I heated up myself a bowl of four bean quinoa chili from the freezer and added some cheddar cheese to the top. Mmmmm mmmmm! The perfect meal on a cozy Sunday evening.

chili

I have been all about the soups lately. The fall weather has finally nestled in and the forecast is looking like 50’s this week! Bring out the sweaters, slippers, soup, pumpkin scented candles, and let’s get a fire going in the fireplace! Cozy city! LOVE.

What did you do this weekend? Have you been enjoying any soups yet this fall?

Continue Reading Weekend Happenings: Soups, Weddings, Family Time

Project Freezer Clean Out

Did this weekend even exist? It went by so fast!

I had a fabulous weekend really, packed with family, beautiful walks, great food, and home projects. Here’s a quick little recap of what was happening around mi casa this weekend.

Friday

I was feeling exhausted after work but brought myself to walk for 35 minutes. Dinner was simple but tasted SO good! It was sautéed broccoli, zucchini, onions, and green beans with diced chicken, apple, and gouda sausage! The dish was very flavorful thanks to the snausage sausage.

chicken sausage veggie saute

Saturday

I met my cousin Betsy out at Target Field in Minneapolis for the Walk to End Alzheimer’s. Our local news anchor Diana Pierce kicked off the event. Senator Amy Klobuchar also spoke, and I saw local sports reporter Eric Perkins on the walk and said “hi”! To any locals, you might know some of these folks. 🙂

walk for alzheimers walk for alzheimers

The weather was beautiful and the walk was so much fun. We were led through the streets of downtown Minneapolis and into Loring Park (which is where I was last weekend!)

walk for alzheimers

Bets and I made a pit stop at Caribou on the way back of course. Because of this, we didn’t win the race. 😉

There are so many people affected by Alzheimer’s, my grandma being one of them. It is a horrible disease that needs to end! They are researching like crazy to find the cure, and I pray they do. I can’t wait to do the walk again next year to support the research and end Alzheimer’s.

This weekend I solidified my obsession for these Blue Diamond Salt n’ Vinegar Almonds that I got from the Summit last weekend. I’ve looked in CVS and Target so far and I haven’t been able to find this flavor anywhere yet. I should have grabbed ten bags at the Summit. Seriously these things are awesome! They are tangy and salty. MMM…mmmm!

blue diamond salt n vinegar almonds

 

I dragged the Fall decorations up on Saturday. Our house is looking mighty festive!

mantle fall autumn

 

In the evening we had a bunch of family over for dinner at our house. I finally got to wear my ZeeBee Threads t-shirt dress! I paired it with a zebra print scarf, grey leggings, and actually had to wear a long black cardigan too because it was CHILLY! This dress is so incredibly comfortable. I was so happy to be comfy yet still be wearing a cute outfit at the same time. Ya’ll know I’m all about comfort.

zeebee threads dress

I was overly excited for dinner because we were getting pizza. I should really look back on the blog to determine the last time I actually ate real, not gluten-free, not cauliflower pizza crust… just real original legit pizza. My system has been cooling down quite a bit and I wanted to try this one treat to see how I held up.

pizza

The results: I think I felt fine—I didn’t feel any different really! Not that I will make this a common meal but it’s good to know I can handle it every once and a while. It tasted just as good as I remembered too!

Sunday

I am beginning a project freezer clean out and dug this up from the freezer: gluten-free lemon blueberry bread. I topped it with some almond butter and called it breakfast.

blueberry lemon bread

After breakfast we ran our errands and got a few groceries but not too many because we are going on VACATION at the end of the week! I am realizing I haven’t said much about this yet. More to come on the vaca 411.

This week I plan to eat food from the freezer primarily. We have loads of frozen veggies, frozen meats, leftover soups, chili, etc. It will feel good to begin cleaning out the freezer! PROJECT FREEZER (and fridge) CLEAN OUT!

For dinner I made a batch of yellow quinoa and topped it with sautéed broccoli, zucchini, onions, chicken, and fresh tomatoes, olives, and hummus. A Mediterranean-inspired dish! My fav.

 

mediterranean inspired meal

 

It tasted as good as it looked!

We tackled a few projects around the house, relaxed a bit, watched some of the Emmy’s, and called it an early night on Sunday. It was another fabulous weekend for the books!

How was YOUR weekend? What did you do?

Are you in need of a project freezer clean out?

Continue Reading Project Freezer Clean Out

I Am Grateful: August Recap

We are now three days into September which completely blows my mind. What happened to August, July, and June? Did they even happen?! I adore summer but I equally adore fall so I am so looking forward to slightly cooler weather, sweatshirts, and long cool walks but even still, I just can’t believe how time flies.

I wanted to do some type of recap from August. At first I thought about my favorite posts from August, or my favorite meals from August, but instead I wanted to put together a list of things I was grateful for in August. In fact, I hope to do this a lot more often because it makes me feel SO incredibly happy and lucky to see my blessings written out in front of me.

Without further ado, here is a short list (it could be a million pages long but I kept it short) of things I was grateful for in August and am always grateful for.

I Am Grateful For…

I am grateful for medical advancements and having the option to choose. I am taking the complementary approach to my health care right now by following with both Eastern and Western Medical doctors. I am grateful I have the options to choose.

be grateful

I am grateful for my legs that keep walking each day. That get me through miles of walks around the neighborhood, errands, and every day tasks.

I am grateful for my husband, family and friends. They are my #1 priority.

grateful for people

I am grateful for delicious food. I am so lucky to be able to eat healthy and delicious food everyday. I know many people struggle to find food on a daily basis.

grateful for everything

During the heat wave of August, I was very thankful for air conditioning.

ac puppy

I am grateful for the opportunities to fly out and visit friends in other parts of the country.

kate and melanie

I am grateful for the opportunities I have to meet amazing people through Beautifully Nutty. I have made incredibly strong connections to many other bloggers and can’t believe how close we have gotten. Also, In August I had the opportunity to meet Bethenny Frankel. Without the blog I don’t think this would have happened.

Bethenny

I am grateful for my dog. He makes me laugh everyday, he is always up for a walk, and he is always good company.

IMG_3303

This is only a small list of things I am grateful for! I will continue to be thankful and grateful for each day! Life is short; be grateful for each day.

What are you grateful for?

gratitude inhale love

Continue Reading I Am Grateful: August Recap

My Beautifully Relaxing Weekend

Although Labor Day weekend isn’t technically over for me yet, I am still going to give you a quick little recap of my wonderfully relaxing weekend so far.

It has involved lots of great food…nummy BBQ food spread

 

cereal bowl

 

lunch at dangerfields

 

dessert at dangerfields

 

Puppies and babies…

 

 

 

emmy leo

 

Lots of time with family and friends…

mom dad melanie

Shopping…(no I didn’t buy this dress but after seeing this photo, I kinda wish I would have. It’s cute!)

melanie dress shopping

 

Walks and some light jogging!

I actually went for a light and slow jog yesterday for about two miles. I cannot even begin to explain how good it felt. I am still needing to take it slow in the name of healing, but my jog was only slightly faster than walking pace so I am still taking it easy. I know better than to push myself at this point in the game.

Now that the weather has cooled off a bit and we are in the 70’s versus the 90’s, it makes outdoor running a lot more enjoyable. I may even get out for a jog this morning again!

I plan to finish off the long weekend with some more shopping. I have a super amazing event coming up so I am shopping for an outfit. More to come on that soon!

Also, I may work on a little bit of food prep. I have big plans for dinner with my lovely lady friend Kalley tomorrow. Get excited!

How was your weekend?! Any good eats I should know about?

Continue Reading My Beautifully Relaxing Weekend

My Weekend: Birthday Celebrations and Jimmy Buffett

It’s time to talk about my weekend. Holy moly was it a good one!

It started off with a birthday celebration on Friday night for my brother, Kevin. He requested steak and chicken fajitas and strawberry cheesecake for dessert. I was stoked about this menu! I LOVE fajitas!

First let me show you my dad’s beautiful plate:

dads fajita plate

He always makes such a gorgeous presentation of his food. Me on the other hand, I just make one big pile in the middle of my plate…

fajitas

His is way more visually appealing. I should probably start taking some notes!

After dinner, we hung outside for a while before heading in to open presents. As always we were highly entertained by the dogs attempting to get along. For whatever reason they just don’t like each other a whole lot. We’re still hoping this changes in the future!

moose abbie

Of course after presents comes birthday cake! kevin birthday

Strawberry Cheesecake from Costco. It was pretty darn good!

strawberry cheesecake

 

Happy Birthday, Kevi!

Moving on to Saturday

On Saturday morning we piled our stuff in the car and headed to Alpine Valley which is in Elkhorn, Wisconsin (45 minutes outside of Milwaukee). We were going to see the one, the only, Jimmy Buffett!

We broke up the five hour car ride with some rest stop breaks, and lunch at Subway. I ordered their turkey chopped salad and was super impressed by how good it was!

subway salad

Once we arrived at our hotel we freshened up before heading out to the concert. Dana’s mom had brought a few extra fun hats to wear so I borrowed one for the evening. They were so cute!

melanie jimmy buffett

Part of our crew: Grant, Rachel, and Mason

grant rachel mason jimmy buffett

Dana and me…

melanie dana jimmy buffett

Not pictured were Dana’s parents as well as a couple family friends, Denise and Jim.

Before heading into the concert, we took in the craziness that were the tailgating lots. These people had been there since noon or so just drinking and playing games, so you can imagine what kind of shape they were in when we were walking through at 8:00 pm! Needless to say, a lot of them didn’t even make it to the concert.

jimmy buffett jimmy buffett

Jackson Browne opened for Jimmy Buffett, but half of our group didn’t actually go into the concert until Jimmy took the stage. Once we got inside the concert area we were absolutely blown away at how many people were there! I tried capturing it on camera but it was too dark.

What is nice about Alpine Valley is that for one, it is outside, and two, the majority of the seats are lawn seats so you could pretty much sit stand wherever! We started in one spot but made our way closer and closer as the night progressed.

jimmy buffett

This is where we watched the end of the concert. We were fairly close!

jimmy buffett

Although I only knew about half of the songs he sang, I still had an AMAZING time. This guy puts on one heck of a performance. I got especially pumped when I heard “Margaritaville” and “Cheeseburger in Paradise!”

I highly suggest that if you ever get a chance to see him in concert, that you do. You won’t regret it. Plus, the people watching was some of the best I have ever seen. There were lots of floral shirts and flip flops going on. Everyone was super nice and very laid back too!

The majority of my day on Sunday was spent in the car driving home, then going to pick up Moose. I was exhausted from not getting enough sleep and from being in the car all day, but it was SO worth it!

Are you a Jimmy Buffett fan? 

Dana grew up listening to it so he is a big fan and over the years has exposed me to quite a bit of Jimmy. I like him a lot now too!

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Hey locals! Don’t forget to enter to win a chance to meet Olympian Dara Torres! Check out the details here!

Continue Reading My Weekend: Birthday Celebrations and Jimmy Buffett

Childhood Joys

Happy Thursday!

The other day I enjoyed a piece of Dove Dark Chocolate. Not only do I love the smell, taste, and smoothness of the chocolate, but I really appreciate the sweet little sayings that are printed on the inside of the Dove candy wrappers.

The one I ate yesterday said, “Enjoy the Childhood Joys in Life.” So often we take for granted the simple joys in life. I took this opportunity to reminisce about some my favorite childhood joys. Guess what? You’re invited to flashback with me!

dove chocolate

Childhood Joys

  • Recess: playing 4-square, tag, kickball, dominating the monkey bars. Adults should really be given recess breaks. It could help with the obesity epidemic in our country, right?

foursquare

  • Going to the Park: walking to the park, running around, playing on the jungle gym, throwing a frisbee, flying a kite.
  • Playing with Toys: Barbies anyone ? That isn’t my collection in the photo btw. Dolls, games, books, stuffed animals…

barbie

  • Favorite Foods: Ever since I was little I have always gotten excited about good food. I did a post a while back about typical family meals growing up. I really loved taco night. I also loved cookie dough (and still do!) and would help my mom make cookies, sampling the dough along the way, and then would leave her in the dust when it came to actually baking the cookies! My poor mom! I’ve eaten a lot of cookie dough in my day (CDC wouldn’t appreciate that statement).

Cookie-Dough1

  • Playing Basketball in the Driveway: I used to spend hours with friends and family playing basketball in the driveway. It is such great exercise but at the time I didn’t think twice about basketball in regards to exercise, it was just plain old fun. The other weekend when I was at my aunt and uncle’s cabin, I played in a game of 3 on 3 and holy cow, I was huffing and puffing by the end of the game! I don’t know how I used to do that for an hour or more during full out games!

basketabll

  • Dancing: I started dance class when I was three years old. My mom and dad have some irreplaceable footage of me dancing in the house to a DIsney soundtrack record in a pink skirt of course, with my brother dancing around me making fun of me. It’s hilarious!
  • Singing: I was in choir at school, choir with my church, and always loved singing with mom as dad played guitar. My mom and I would even sing on our walks together! I would dance down the sidewalks too. 🙂
  • Going for walks: Again, we would sing, dance, recite state capitals, and practice multiplcation on our walks. We’ve always been good at multi-tasking. We still love going on our walks together!

mom and melanie race for the cure

  • Watching Disney Movies: Some of my favorites were Beauty and Beast, Little Mermaid, and Cinderella. I want to collect all of the Disney movies when they are re-released.
  • Laughing at America’s Funniest Home Videos: Bob Saget was so cheesy but AFV was always funny to me!

afv

  • Building Forts
  • Finding a Penny on the ground: If I find a penny on the ground now it is rare that I pick it up. What ever happened to enjoying the simple things?!
  • Lisa Frank Folders and brand new school supplies: new markers, crayons, lunch box…I loved buying back to school supplies!

LF 2

  • Plastic Jewelry

I could seriously go on and on! Let’s make an effort to remember to enjoy the simple childhood joys. Laugh at yourself, dance like no one’s watching, and don’t take yourself too seriously. Life is short, enjoy it!

What are some of your favorite childhood joys?

Continue Reading Childhood Joys