Week 32: Day 1 ~ I LOVE MONDAYS!!!

I feel so good today ~ I just love Mondays! Most people go to work and dread Mondays, but this Mommy sure loves her job. =) Part of it is the two older ones go back to school after two days of having all the children home, and that makes for a quieter home and things are more peaceful. Also we usually get way out of routine on the weekends and are typically gone for part of it so we usually greet Monday's schedule with a certain amount of relief.

And yes, the house is usually pretty messy by Monday but that's part of what I love: a new week in front of me to clean my home and make it sparkle for my family. I also usually end up going to the grocery store/farmer's market on Mondays...to prepare for food for the week. That makes it even better because I LOVE eating the way I do, and all the delicious food I'm going to eat in the next few days makes me just want to sing!

The farmer's market we go to makes fresh donuts every morning and they put out a big platter of cut up donuts for people to taste. My kids are allowed one piece of donut when we go in the store, and then if they're good I let them have another as we leave. It works really well! All the grocery stores also give kids a free cookie so we do that too - it makes it really fun for them and keeps them occupied while I get the essentials. (I rarely do big grocery shopping with them)

My newfound love is fresh-squeezed orange juice. I have this really annoying juicer that I bought at a garage sale for like $2 and it works okay - it's electrical and I find that the pulp usually still has quite a bit of liquid so I know it doesn't work that great. And it's really, REALLY a pain to clean.

So this morning I bought some Valencia oranges at the farmer's market, and used my wheatgrass juicer, which is a manual juicer but oh so lovely to clean! Very very easy, quite a bit like tupperware, actually. I juiced about 8 oranges and got enough for a nice tall glass for myself, and about a cup's worth for both of my kiddos who helped me juice them. DS who is 5 took a few sips and then dumped his in the sink (!!!) yes, for which he got reprimanded a bit. =) That stuff is like liquid gold, like liquid sunshine - not to be wasted, I explained to him. Turns out he didn't like the pulp - so next time I'll strain it for him and add the pulp to mine. It was so cute to see DD 3 yr, drink hers down rather quickly, then hand me the glass and say in her sweet babyish voice, "More, please!". How nice it is to have her asking for fresh squeezed orange juice rather than candy!

I'm going to see if they'll sell me a case at a discount and see how much it sets me back. I doubt I'll be able to afford drinking 4-5 tall ice cold glasses per day like I would LOVE to, because each glass represents about 4-6 oranges. But it sure is delicious and you can do so much with it - I like to put the glass in the freezer for about 15 min. and when I take it out, it's formed an icy covering that is easily broken and turns into kind of a slushy. Yum!

This morning I juiced my wheatgrass, then didn't have anything else to eat until I got back from the Farmer's Market. Bananas just aren't that exciting to me anymore and the thought of making a green smoothie was just...it's more like a "necessary" addition to my diet especially because of the baby - and I really wanted to eat something delicious for breakfast. Usually it's not a good thing to go to the grocery store when you're hungry, but going to the Farmer's Market when you're hungry is like a kid in a candy store - only it's ALL healthy so it's all okay to buy!

I found some Concord grapes that are straight from the vine, the black ones that grow in clusters and are usually pretty small. That's what I ate for breakfast as we went on our way to the different errands I had to run: bank, Asian market for coconuts, and grocery store. I bought 8 big thai coconuts which I can't wait to eat this week - or make some kind of delicious recipe out of. I couldn't resist the gorgeous, big red & orange swirled sweet peppers that were just 39 cents each - I've seen them up to 2/$5 before in the winter! I got six of them and plan to make some kind of bread with them.

I also bought a big container of local raspberries, probably the last of the season - and green grapes for the kids & me. Also bananas, they have the "going bad" bananas for 25 cent lb and they're actually perfect - I usually freeze them & add them to my smoothies. The others are 59 cents lb so I usually try to grab all the 25 cent ones they have. Of course I got more avocadoes ~ I'm still eating one big one per day with my superfood chocolate pudding. It's funny though how I go in circles with what I eat - I don't make guacamole or chocolate shakes anymore, or eat watermelon - although that's entirely because they're not available anymore. Lately it's been banana & celery shakes (although I mostly just make those because I need the energy) and the chocolate pudding along with my faithful green drinks every day.

Here are a couple of things I'm going to make in the next few days (all raw):

Pumpkin Bread
Mediterranean Almond Bread
Butterscotch Mousse
Deviled Egg Spread
Applesauce Cobbler

I got everything I need to make all of those, plus I'll probably also make some kind of other bread with the red peppers. I love being pregnant because all food tastes SOOOOO good - like when you're hungry, you're really really hungry and everything is just delicious! As long as I make sure it's raw, it's OK.

Oh yes! See - I totally forgot which means it's not forefront on my mind, that's a good thing! My weight for today. Here's the stats, and I'm "officially" 8 months pregnant now, at 32 weeks. Hurray!!

Weeks 1-10: 134 to 141Weeks 11-20: 141 to 141Weeks 21-25: 141 to 144Weeks 26-29: 144 to 149Week 30: 151Week 31: 151
Week 32: 151Weight gain so far: 17 lbs.