this is nutty, yo*

*Alternative title: Eat My Nuts. (I kept it classy. You're welcome.)

A couple of weeks ago, Jess and I started a pact where we text each other in the evenings to hold each other accountable for the things we eat. Because I can go all day long and be a good little hippie and only eat healthy foods, and talk to my kids all day about the importance of choosing healthy foods. And then when the kids go to bed, I'm all, "CANDEHHHHH! GET IN MY FACEHOLE, CANDEHHHHH!!!" So having a friend I can be accountable to really is helping me not eat filth at night, which is in turn going to help my pants fit better. 

I make this shake a lot for lunch because during the day, it's just Audrey and me hanging around at home. And on the days that we're not shoveling piles of leftover brussels sprouts in our faces, (I'm not even making a joke there. We seriously plowed through some brussels sprouts today, my tiny lady and I.) I make this smoothie for us and we love it. So now I'm going to share.

First, I mix this bad mofo up in a Vitamix. It is the most magical piece of kitchen equipment I own, and by that, I mean I use it all the freaking time and can do loads of stuff with it. My Gram gave it to me because she bought it and wasn't using it, so I understand that it's crazy expensive and not everybody can go that route. I wouldn't have been able to, if it hadn't been for The Gram-ster. 

Ingredients:

- 1 cup almond milk

- 1 handful raw almonds

- 4 or 5 dates (pitted)

- 1 banana

- 1 tablespoon chia seeds

- 1 tablespoon flax (you could use meal or seeds. whatever)

- a few ice cubes, at the very end because the Vitamix puts off a ton of heat and warm smoothies are about as appealing as making out with Richard Simmons. Another thought would be to start with frozen ingredients, but I never have that kind of brilliant foresight.

I have also been changing it up recently because I'm a total rogue and you never know what kind of badass things I'm going to do. Watch out! I might switch out smoothie ingredients on you! Living on the edge! So, yeah. I sometimes put in some plain Greek yogurt, and some Whole Foods brand chocolate whey protein powder. If you are avoiding dairy, use coconut yogurt and a vegan protein powder. Or just use cocoa powder. I did that one day and it was what the candy commercials would refer to as, "sinful" and "decadent."

The finished product. I'm trying really hard not to caption this with, "guzzle my nuts!"

So this texting for accountability is helping me a lot. I have already noticed that my crazy urge to eat All Of The Candies at 9:00 every night is mostly gone. We had some friends over for dinner this weekend and ate some really bitchin' gluten-free cupcakes that I made - and I honestly didn't even really enjoy it. I mean, it was a good cupcake. But it was not as satisfying as I had hoped it would be. It was just meh. 

And I don't weigh myself normally because for me, that just leads straight to Crazyville. I know it works really well for some people, but it makes me obsess in unhealthy ways about getting to a number. But. I was just at the doctor 2 weeks ago, and when I checked myself today, I was 5 pounds lighter than that doctor weight. So maybe not eating candy is working for me. But my main gauge is that my pants fit normally and that's good. 

This concludes a long and rambly post about my eating habits and random dirty nut jokes tossed in. Thank you, and good day.