Did you say PB & J?

Can we just take a moment to appreciate the goodness that is the peanut butter and jelly sandwich? I mean just look at this creation. If you don’t enjoy peanut butter and jelly, a child hood staple, you’re not human.

I made Paleo bread for Thanksgiving and kinda burned it so I just left it out of Thanksgiving dinner. I couldn’t waste the loaf sooooo I made a PB & J sandwich with Sunflower seed butter, sugar free strawberry jelly (not paleo but a nice little treat.) It was yum-tastic!

When I first started the paleo lifestyle I never thought I would ever be able to eat one of mans’ greatest creations ever again. But, we tend to think like that when starting any diet plan don’t we? Our minds automatically go to all the things we can’t eat. I’m guilty of doing this. When I started a low-carb diet it was UGH! no bread, no pasta! When I started Weight Watchers it was Man! I don’t have enough points for that! Even on my Paleo journey, day one my mind went to all the foods I was going to miss out on. But, all the foods I thought I was going to miss so much were the same foods that were causing me to gain weight and just made me not feel good. I feel like if we took a more positive approach to life style changes it would make it that much easier. It’s hard in the beginning, but continually reminding yourself why you started the journey, whether it’s to lose weight, look better or feel better, whatever the initial intent is, hold onto it.

While we’re on the topic, STOP calling it a diet! A diet seems so temporary. When I think of a diet I think of something people use to lose weight and then once they lose the weight they can go back to eating however they want. But that isn’t the case at all. You must make a conscious effort to change your life style permanently. If not you’ll just get into a vicious cycle of dieting, gaining, dieting gaining etc. This not only messes with your mental health, seeing your body fluctuate so much, but your physical health as well.

I remember my mom calling this dieting cycle, yo-yo dieting. Not so fun fact, Yo-Yo dieting can cause higher levels of body fat and cause you to have less energy. Don’t we start “diets” to obtain the opposite effect? It can also be a contributing factor to heart disease and muscle wasting. No one wants muscle wasting…we want all the GAINS!

Moving on…….

So, I had a four-day weekend for the holiday. Friday, we cleaned the house and put up our Christmas decorations.

Saturday, we got out of the house and went to this really cool place in Tarpon Springs. Shout out to Replay Amusement Museum. It’s an arcade and it was $13 all we could play! It was so awesome! It was rows of old pin ball machines and rows of old arcade games such as centipede, Pac man, Frogger, Super Mario bros. etc. The hubs and I played bowling together. Someone took it a little too seriously.

If you haven’t been I highly recommend it.

Then Sunday……NEWS FLASH…Sunday is Jennifer wears girl shorts to the gym day!! Yes, it’s true. Weird, I know. I mean, just look at those gams.

Sunday is just cardio day for me. It’s supposed to be rest day but I don’t know how to do that so I do an active rest and just do cardio. I wear girl shorts on Sundays and no other day because:

1.       It’s cardio day and boy shorts kinda get in the way

2.       No one I normally interact with is at the gym when I go on Sunday mornings. Sunday is my one day to sleep in so my early morning peeps aren’t there to see all that I’m working with.

3.       I feel, for some reason, wearing boy shorts when I lift gets me a little more respect and I am taken more seriously than if I was wearing girl shorts or leggings. I’m not lifting on Sundays, so I can just be freeeeeeee to be a big old girl.

4.       It’s not only cardio day, its Jennifer working on her self-confidence day. I’m not big on showing my legs or my body in general. I stay pretty covered up most of the time. Even during the summer, I only wear my bathing suit around my husband. Rarely do I wear my bathing suit even around my own family because it causes such anxiety for me.

So Sundays….yah. That’s what Sunday’s are for.

It’s important to look anxiety in the face and stick your tongue out sometimes.

What can I say…I’m a work in progress. All I can say is anyone who thinks bullying isn’t a thing and doesn’t damage people……lets have coffee sometime so I can tell you just how real it is. Bullying can F@*% you up for life! #Truth

Phew….shit just got real!

So what did we learn today? Stop dieting, arcade games are fun, on Sundays I pull inspiration from Beyoncé and I like to list things. I mean this is my second blog post and I made another list for you. I promise no list next time.

Hmmm….do bullet points count as a list?

Would you like to make your own PB & J? Here’s my tweaked version of the recipe I used from the delicious cookbook by Brittney Angell, Every Last Crumb
You can check her out and more of her yummy recipes at brittneyangell.com

Paleo “Whole Wheat” Bread

Ingredients:

4 Large eggs

1 ½ Cups Almond Butter (Using Cashew Butter will give you more of a white bread)

¼ Cup Raw Honey

2 Tablespoons Lemon Juice (I prefer to use Apple Cider Vinegar because I think it makes it taste more “bready.”)

2 Teaspoons Vanilla Extract

1 Teaspoon ground cinnamon (Omit it making white bread)

¾ Teaspoon baking soda

¼ Teaspoon kosher salt

Directions:

1.    Preheat oven to 370 degrees. Line an 8 ½ by 4 ½ inch loaf pan with parchment paper.

2.     In the bowl of a stand mixer, using the whisk attachment, mix the eggs on medium speed until they are whipped and fluffy, about 3 minutes. (Note: If you do not have a stand mixer you can place the eggs in a large bowl and use a hand mixer on medium oooorrrrr if you’re feeling really old school you can use a hand whisk)

3.       Add the remaining ingredients and mix on medium speed for another 2-3 minutes, until smooth and fully blended.

4.     Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan and bake for 48-50 minutes, until firm to the touch and a deep, golden brown color. Halfway through baking, cover loosely with foil to avoid over browning. (Note: Gage the baking time by your oven. I baked my loaf for 45 minutes and still burnt it……it was a brick. Next attempt I will drop the baking time down to 35 minutes and adjust from there)

5.     Store the cooled bread in a sealed plastic bag at room temperature ( not in the fridge,) or freeze for later use.