Every year when we go to Sunset Beach we have a tradition of walking down to the ice cream shop to get ice cream after dinner.  We don’t go every night, but usually every other.  The ice cream shop is part of Julie’s Rentals.  Julie’s serves Hershey’s Ice Cream. 

The kids love the anticipation of walking down, choosing their flavor & then taking their first lick of their ice cream. 

The adults love the fact that the walk to & from the ice cream store helps keep some of that ice cream off of their hips. 😉

Is it less expensive to buy ice cream & just serve everyone at home?  Yes.  However, then you lose out on the exercise, the bonding, the choice of flavor & creating memories & traditions.  Not worth it in my book.  😉

And now, I present, my new found love, Coconut Almond Chocolate Chip Ice Cream:

This is probably my new favorite flavor.  Of course, there is the peach yogurt that has huge chunks of peaches in it, but they are out of that right now. 🙁  They saved the last scoop for this little old man that was leaving the beach.  I can’t fault them for that.  Another excellent choice is the cappuccino crunch (it has big chunks of Heath Bar!).  Then there are a dozen or so other flavors….rainbow sherbet, White house cherry, moose tracks, chocolate moose tracks, superman, cotton candy, vanilla, chocolate, chocolate chip, coconut, orange cream, mint chocolate chip, butter pecan. 

The last & final (and probably most important) fact about the ice cream at Julie’s Rentals is the fact that they “get” gluten-free.  The sweet girls that work there see us walk in & grab the  scoops & walk to the sink to wash them for us.  The ice cream is gluten-free (except for the obvious no-nos….anything with cookies or brownies or graham crackers in it).  You really can’t beat this place or this tradition.  I look forward to it every year. 

I was so excited to fine these Organic Gluten-Free Buckwheat Wildberry waffles at the store the other day, I almost danced in the aisle.  Okay, I did dance in the aisle.  I typically eat Van’s Blueberry Waffles (the plain seem to crumble too much on me), but haven’t found these Nature’s Path waffles before.  Guess I had to come to North Carolina, all the way from Ohio, to get them!  Not only did I find them, they were on sale for $2.50 down from $3.69!  Score!   I had first heard about these from Erin at Gluten-Free with a Purpose.  I was thrilled to have these for breakfast this morning after 60 minutes on the elliptical machine!  I was starving! 

These toasted up quick & easily.  They didn’t fall apart, even when spreading my beloved Barney Butter on them.  The taste & texture were amazing…so much closer to the real thing than the Van’s Waffles.  Not that I don’t like the Van’s, I do, but when you are missing old favorites, it is nice to get as close as you can to the original.

After toasting, pre-topping:

After spreading with Barney Butter & Strawberry Simply Fruit & Hannah suggested I add some blueberries, too:

I hope that I can find these when I get back to Ohio!  5 stars from me!!!

So, if you have been thinking about trying these, and haven’t, pick some up!!  Be careful, though, the Buckwheat Wildberry are the only ones that Nature’s Path makes that are gluten-free. 

Erin over at Gluten Free with a Purpose did a cool post on 7 things about her & asked if anyone wanted to participate & to their own.  I think this is cool, so here is my “7 Things”.

First, a picture of me. 

Now, onto my stuff.  Things you may not know about me.

1.  I was a gymnast growing up.  I started gymnastics at 5 and continued in it until I was 14 or so.  I wanted to be just like Nadia & Mary Lou Retton.  Obviously, that didn’t happen. 😉

2.  I was born in Newport, Rhode Island.  My Dad was in the Navy, so that is where we lived the 1st 2 years of my life.

3.  My 2nd toe is longer than my big toe.  This was all fine & good until I started running and now seems to be causing some issues.  Stupid feet!

4.  I love to read.  We are on vacation right now & I brought no less than 10 books.  Aaron laughed at me.  I am already done with one & half way through the 2nd book and we have only been here 3.5 days.  Plus, I like choices.

5.  I never used to be a morning person, but am now.  I am up at 4:25 AM to hit the gym by 5 AM on weekdays.  What a difference from 10 – 15 years ago!

6.  I took violin lessons as a child.  When in middle school, I was 2nd chair in the orchestra/band.

7.  I never sang in front of people (well, except when forced in church choir as a child) until about 6 or 7 years ago.  Now I won’t stop!  LOL!  And, I really can’t sing! 

Well, there you have it.  7 things that you didn’t know about me before and may not care that you know now!  LOL! 

As Erin said, I am not going to tag anyone, but I would love it if you would participate & then let me know so I can check out your 7 things. 

Yes, we are on vacation, but I still menu plan.  It is in my blood!  I do it a little differently though, at least I am this week.  I am only planning out 2-3 days at a time, then going to the store for the items a few times during the week.  I do this mainly so that I don’t end up having a bunch of leftovers to cart home with me or go to waste.   Next week, the 2nd week we will be here, I have already planned out the whole week because our families will be joining us and we needed to see who wanted to participate in what meals so that we can be prepared with groceries. 

Sunday ~ Shrimp Scampi (Aaron’s recipe), steamed green beans & salad.

Monday ~ Chicken Bouldy (again, Aaron’s amazing recipe), brown rice, steamed broccoli & salad

Tuesday ~ Turkey burgers, baked sweet potatoes, snow peas & salad

I know that we will do some fresh seafood a couple more times this week.  I love salmon, so that is a definite.  I also love sea scallops, lobster tail, grouper, flounder, etc.  I would like to try mahi mahi, as I have never had it, but have no idea how to prepare it.  May be time to give it a try!

No baking here this week.  I did enough last week preparing for the trip!!

Be sure to check back Tuesday or Wednesday for my mid-week menu plan!

I also wanted to share that the kids & I walked for our ice cream last night and I had the coconut.  It was amazing!!  There were pieces of toasted coconut in the ice cream!  YUM!!  I think peach yogurt is next on my agenda to sample. 

We are currently on vacation at the beach for 2 weeks! This is one of my favorite times of the year. Getting here is a little stressful, preparing all the stuff we bring along and food that I make sure that Jon & I have with us so that we don’t go without. I bake extra bread, buy extra goodies and pack toasters & coffee makers.

The stores in the area are usually well stocked, but I hate to be unprepared. It is not in my nature. I am a planner at heart. We don’t eat out for the most part, maybe one or 2 meals, tops. It is much less expensive to cook at home and you don’t have to try to get a group of 10+ people sat down at one time in a busy restaurant. Not to mention trying to get a safe, gluten-free meal after that. I will update on the local stores once I hit them tomorrow. We just arrived today, so we just have the necessities right now. I am on the hunt for Chocolate Chex & the Betty Crocker GF Mixes. I won’t stop until I find them!

Tonight we will go for a nice walk along the beach and then stop for ice cream on the way home. I love this place…you can walk everywhere and that means that you work off your dessert or at least feel better about indulging. 😉 The great thing about this ice cream place is that since we have been coming here for so many years, the women that work there know that Jon & I have to eat GF and know to grab clean ice cream scoops as they see us walk in the door, even if it is the first time of the year! Love that!!!

As I sign off tonight, I am sitting on our porch looking out over the ocean with a nice glass of cabernet. Ahhhhh!!

That would be me. A freak. I can’t get enough of my nut butters. I really haven’t met one that I haven’t liked…yet. My favorite is Barney Butter, as I have said before. But, then you have peanut butters & the flavored peanut butters. My favorite plain peanut butter is Skippy Natural….creamy & super spreadable. My favorite flavored peanut butter is PB & Co’s Dark Chocolate Dreams, though the Smooth Operator is a great “normal” creamy PB. I have also tried the While Chocolate Wonderful (YUM) & Mighty Maple (another YUM). I think what sparked me to write this post was the fact that I actually deviated from my nut butter filled breakfast! GASP! What was I thinking? I was thinking that I have this yogurt & open cereal that I need to finish before we leave for 2 weeks. So, breakfast was a yogurt mess bowl made up of vanillia Oikos, Mesa Sunrise & Barbara’s Honey Puffins. Yummy, no doubt, but not nut butter. Guess what I will be needing for lunch or afternoon snack? LOL!

Speaking of peanut butter, Gliding Calm is holding her first ever giveaway and it involves peanut butter! WOOHOOO!! You can get the info needed to enter here. So, if you are a PB fan, like me, head on over & sign up! 🙂

Thank you to every man and woman who has ever served this country, in peace time and in war.  Also, thank you to your families for the sacrifice. 

A picture of a “Field of Flags” that I saw the other day in Westerville, Ohio. 

I am now officially only 1 Chex cereal away from trying all of the gluten-free ones out there now.  🙂  I have a great friend, Lisa, to thank for the Cinnamon Chex.  She & I did an exchange.  We were both having issues finding certain flavors, so I sent her a box of Strawberry Chex and she, in turn, sent me a box of Cinnamon Chex.  The Cinnamon Chex are amazing.  I think that they are in first place right now, as far as flavor goes, with Strawberry in second place.  Now, I have yet to track down the super-elusive Chocolate Chex yet, so that could bump Cinnamon right out of first place, because we all know how I feel about my chocolate.  When I do find the Chocolate Chex, I plan on making the following Chex Mix recipe that I found on the Chex site:

Snickerdoodle Chex® Mix

Start to Finish: 15 Minutes

1/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 cups Cinnamon Chex® cereal

2 cups Chocolate Chex® cereal

4 cups popped popcorn

1/4 cup butter or margarine

1. In small bowl, mix sugar and cinnamon; set aside. In large microwavable bowl, mix cereals and popcorn.

2. In 1-cup microwavable measuring cup, microwave butter uncovered on High about 40 seconds or until melted. Pour over cereal mixture, stirring until evenly coated.

3. Microwave uncovered on High 2 minutes, stirring after 1 minute. Sprinkle half of the sugar mixture evenly over cereal mixture; stir. Sprinkle with remaining sugar mixture; stir. Microwave 1 minute longer. Spread on waxed paper or paper towels to cool. Store in airtight container.

16 servings (1/2 cup each)

1 Serving: Calories 100 (Calories from Fat 35); Total Fat 3.5g (Saturated Fat 2g); Cholesterol 10mg; Sodium 80mg; Potassium 20mg; Total Carbohydrate 15g (Dietary Fiber 0g); Protein 1g

% Daily Value: Vitamin A 6%; Vitamin C 0%; Calcium 4%; Iron 15%; Vitamin D 0%; Folic Acid 15%

Exchanges: 1/2 Starch, 1/2 Other Carbohydrate, 1/2 Fat

Carbohydrate Choices: 1

I don’t think that you could go wrong with this Chex Mix.  Maybe, just maybe, when we are on vacation I will happen upon the long lost Chocolate Chex.  Wish me luck! 😉

Summer has arrived!  WOOHOO!!!  The heat is on…the heat is onnnnnnnnn!  Okay, no more of that.  I broke down & bought a death slide Slip & Slide yesterday for Hannah.  Darn Wal-Mart & their $5 deals.  I am sure that says something about how long this “toy” will last.  I was a little reassured that they have improved the “safety” of crashing your body into the hard ground by adding a blow-up “boogie board” to the set.  What a deal!  Hannah was thrilled & picked out the pink one, only to be disappointed when we opened the box & the boogie board was green.  That didn’t keep her down for long, though.  She is chomping at the bit to get out there again, however, grocery shopping & consignment store shopping is going to have to bump her Slip & Slide session to later this afternoon.

If the menu last week was designed to use up my freezer & fridge stash, this week’s is much more so.  We are leaving at the butt crack of dawn on Saturday for our 2-week beach vacation, so we need to use up what we have. 

Sunday ~ Kim (salmon..one piece in the freezer & baked sweet potato); Jon’s friends over pizza? plus salad

Monday ~ grilled chicken, baked potato/sweet potato, steamed green beans & salad

Tuesday ~ Mexican Pizza/tacos, refried or black beans, corn & salad

Wednesday ~ Homemade mac & cheese, baked beans & salad

Thursday~ Spaghetti & Meat Sauce, veggies & salad

Friday~ Finish off fridge stuff or homemade pizza…take leftovers!

Saturday~ Beach!!

Baked Goods

3 loaves of Pamela’s bread to freeze & take with us

Brownies (to take on the road)

I had the pleasure of winning a free chocolate bar from Dagoba a week or so ago.  They send me the Dagoba Seeds Bar.  I was very excited to try & savor this bar.  The list of ingredients:

Ingredients – Organic dark chocolate* (OG cacao beans, OG evaporated cane juice, OG cacao butter, OG soy lecithin), OG pumpkin seeds*, OG Manitoba Harvest™ hemp seeds*, OG sunflower seeds, Big Tree Farms Balinese sea salt.

KOSHER KSA-D

I broke into this bar the other night after dinner and wow…….A.M.A.Z.I.N.G!!  The perfect combo of sweet & salty.  The nuts were prominent enough, but didn’t take over the bar.  Went wonderfully with a great glass of cabernet. 

Along with my bar, Dagoba kindly sent me a $1.00 off coupon for another chocolate bar.  I was at Whole Foods last night and looked for another Seeds Bar, but didn’t find any.  🙁  I settled (haha….any bar from Dagoba is not settling) on a New Moon Bar, which as it stands, is tied in first for my fav from Dagoba.  I am on a quest to try them all (hint, hint).  😉