Step counts and crafts

I know that step counts alone don't determine your ability to gain or lose weight, but it is nice to hit those goals every now and again.  Of course, if you also eat two donuts for breakfast, Wendy's for lunch, and ? for dinner, obviously the step count means nothing, but that's how it goes sometimes.  Do I always eat two donuts for breakfast? Of course not. Do I always hit my step count? Most definitely not anymore.  I used too, once upon a time.  Then I lowered it.  And still, I don't hit it.  But, do I hit my 150 minutes of activity/week? Yes.  So, at least I still have that going for me!  All that will change soon though, my step count will be going back up to 12,000, and my workout activity minutes will be doubling again.   Sometimes you just have to take it easy and wait it out, without letting it get to you.  Although, I probably could give up the donuts in the meantime!
So tomorrow is the first day of August.  I feel like it's been July forever, but also, I mean, really, August already?!  Not that I have anything against August, except that it means back to school season picks up and soon enough it's actually time to go back.  In fact, I had a dream the other day that I went back and met one of my new classes for the year, and they were terrible! None of them wanted to follow the rules, sit in their assigned seats, or participate in class at all.  Ok, that's not crazy out of the ordinary, but generally speaking, for the first few weeks of school even the seniors are a least a little bit well behaved.  Usually, the freshman are the unruly ones and that dies down pretty quickly too if you get a handle on it fast enough.  Perhaps it's because I'm not going back in September, but rather after Thanksgiving break, which is making it worse.  They're going to spend their first quarter with a substitute, and then I have to come in and take over, resetting everything, even if the sub did follow the entire 3-inch binder of plans I left him/her at the end of the year.  I haven't heard yet who my sub is, so that's all up in the air, but I'm really hoping it's someone who at least wants to be a teacher, or has some experience, and not just someone who is looking to kill some time.  Generally speaking, subs who want to be teachers are more likely to follow the plans and enforce the rules, whereas those who are just looking to kill time are more likely to be friends with the class.  Really though, I probably shouldn't worry about that at all, since it's not my problem until November, and I really can't do much about it!
Enough about school though.  Today I had to remake a craft from earlier this month because Ryan and I decided that it looked too much like a scene from Blair Witch Project the way it was.  Before, it was five crocheted dolls hung on crossed sticks, hanging from the ceiling.  So we agreed that maybe it would look better as a round hanging, instead of crossed sticks.  Which meant I needed to go get hoops to decorate.  That part was easy enough though.  I just got floral hoops from Michael's, threw some paint and glitter on them, and sprayed them with Mod Podge acrylic sealer.  Hopefully, that prevents the glitter from falling off because no one wants to be constantly sprinkled in glitter!  I haven't transferred the dolls over yet, but the hoops look awesome.  They're supposed to resemble a galaxy and I think they really do.  In fact, I'd go so far as to say I really nailed the galaxy paint look.  Go me!  I can't wait to see what it looks like when everything is attached and it is rehung.  As long as it doesn't look like the Blair Witch anymore though, I'm good with that.

See.  So cool!  

A pinteresting week

Warning: This has absolutely nothing to do with running.

This week has been full of projects that I decided to do.  Couldn't tell you why this week became the craft week, but here we are.  Monday night I decided to try a new recipe I found on Pinterest two years ago....the person who wrote it called it armadillo eggs. I call them reverse stuffed peppers.  Anyways, the basic concept/way to make it is this.  Get some peppers, chili are recommended, by since RyGuy doesn't love spicy, I also used some regular small assorted peppers. You'll also need some cheese and some ground beef.  For cheese, I used a block of Cabot Vermont Cheddar, but you can switch that up to your liking.  Cut the top off the pepper, scrape out the seeds, and stuff in some cubes of cheese.  Then, take your ground beef, which should probably be mixed up like you're making meatloaf or meatballs.  (Eggs and bread crumbs recommended, but I never use that stuff in my regular meatballs, so I skipped it here too.) Wrap your pepper so that it covered in ground beef, like a giant pepper meatball, and stick it in a pan.  I made nine of them, using a little more than a pound of beef.  Bake at 300 degrees for 45 - 60 minutes.  The end product, while a little hard to eat as one, is delicious.  Totally worth it.

These are the after they came out of the oven.  Be warned, there is a lot of grease, but some of that is cheese mixing in.

Tuesday, I found a delicious dessert that I also wanted to try, so that was my next project.  This is called the blooming baked apple, but I feel like that name is also kind of ridiculous, so I'm going with just plain old baked caramel apple.  This one is also super easy, all you need is an apple, some caramels, brown sugar, butter, and cinnamon.  (But I use apple pie spice in place of the cinnamon.) As far as apple variety goes, I don't think it matters what kind you use, it depends on your preference.  Generally I love Granny Smith apples, but since the original post called for honeycrisp, I went for something more similar to that.  So I've been using Gala apples, because I like to do things my own way.  To make, cut the top 1/3 off the apple.  Find a way to scoop out the core, if you don't have a corer.  I use a paring knife and a spoon, because I definitely do not have a corer.  Once the core is out,  take your paring knife and cut two circles around the inside of the apple.  That is actually not as easy as it sounds, because without the core, the inside gets a lot smaller.  Basically though, you just want to slice down and around, like you're carving the top off a pumpkin.  Then flip the apple over and make narrow slices around the outside of the apple.  I didn't take pictures of all this, so if you want to see the steps, you'll have to find the original recipe.  (SORRY!) Once you have everything cut, stuff two unwrapped caramels into the center of the apple.  Melt 1 tbsp of butter with 1.5 tbsp of brown sugar in the microwave for 30 seconds.  Stir, and then microwave for another 30 seconds.  Once that's done, add in one tbsp of flour, and as much apple pie spice, or cinnamon, as you want. Pour that little mixture over the top of the apple, put the apple in a pan and bake in a preheated 350 oven for 25 - 30 minutes.  

Note: I've been making them one at a time, so all the ingredients that you need to mix to make the sauce are halved.  You need to double it if you're going to be making two. 

If you look at the picture, you might be able to get an idea of how your cuts are supposed to be made.

This is pre-bake, after everything is ready.  It was too delicious to take a post-bake picture.  But definitely add vanilla ice cream to the side.  

Finally, today, I decided to try out our pizza stone, which worked great.  I also made a costume for school tomorrow, because I didn't want to be the buzzkill that didn't dress up for Halloween.  Even though I have no face make-up, I think the costume came out fairly well for a last minute effort.  All in all it took me about two hours.  In hindsight, I probably could have used fabric paint instead of regular acrylic paint, but too late.  So I made a skeleton costume using an old pair of black running pants, a black short sleeve t-shirt, black gloves, and black nylons that I cut up into arm sleeves.  Not bad overall. 

It kind of bugs me that everything looks super wide, but I think it's just the camera.  Plus the shirt is crooked.  On the plus side, it's covered in glow in the dark paint, so that's exciting!

I still have one more project that I started this week.  It's about half way done, but it's going to be a gift for someone, so I don't want to put out any details until after it's been finished, packed up, and sent off.  So don't worry, next time I write, it's back to running!