Thursday, July 5, 2007

Where in the world have you been?

Well, I'm back. Hopefully. Thank you to those of you who inquired about my health. My ear infection seems to have cleared up and I'm working through the last couple of days of antibiotics and trying to kick this cough.

My goal as of late is to continue to be a healthy balanced person. Eating as little processed (or at least not processed by me) food as possible. June was a busy month and I did lots of yummy at least partially local eating and baking. I do hope to get up some recipe specific entries. I found a local source for flour and the farmer has whole wheat and spelt bread flour. He also said he grows soft wheat on a rotation, but I wasn't quite sure what that rotation is. I also have a local source for organic (though not certified) non-homogenized milk and butter. I haven't tried the butter yet. It's hard for me to go from paying $2/lb for butter to $4/lb. Especially since I've been baking a lot.

Yesterday, I did my third 5K of the year. I'm pretty proud of the results. This was my first outing where I was on my own for the whole race. My brother and I both did the race, but as he is an actual serious runner, we don't run together. I finished in just over 42 minutes, which sliced about 3 minutes off my time. The Garmin (the gps running gadget that gives me my time and pace) and my ipod really helped me keep my time in check. It seemed like my pace was always sub-15 min miles which is good for me. I know I'm not going to be winning any awards just yet, but this was a big victory for me. Plus I was about to run for about 3 minutes at a time which is also pretty great especially considering I've not done any training for this at all.

My friend Laura and I have been doing 3 mile walks together, but definitely not at any particular pace. And I'm still struggling with that last mile. Miles 1 and 2, no problem, mile 3, omigod, when is it going to be over? My brother's suggestion for that was to start doing longer walks so 3 doesn't feel like so long. I'll have to start walking another mile or so. I'm also hoping to be able to get a heart-rate monitor soon. I think it will help. I've also been meditating and doing breathing exercises some in hopes of helping the asthma. It did seem to help yesterday when even though it was humid, my lungs didn't feel like they were going to explode.

In other news, my husband and awesome mother-in-law (and mother-in-law's "best guy" as she calls him) have gotten me a new bike for my birthday. I'm very excited to be able to ride more often (my other bike has become uncomfortable and well, is 14 years old which my husband points out is a long time ago) and hopefully to be able to bike commute at least one day a week (the issue being that there's no where to shower once I get to work. So I have to do it on days I don't care so much about being a little sweaty at work. Luckily my office is very casual). Plus, I definitely want a basket so I can bike to the farmer's market and to the grocery store for those short trips. Oh and the library. I love biking to the library.

I'm now out of battery, but I hope to get some more posts up this week about all the baking I've been doing.

2 comments:

The Baklava Queen said...

Hey Alyssa! Glad you are feeling better and keeping fit! Wow!

One thing to look for with Hartzler's butter: if all you can find is the country-style butter, I would recommend NOT getting it for baking unless you are making savory baked goods. The country-style butter has a different taste from "regular" butter... to me, a vegetarian, it seems like a meaty taste, and it comes out too strongly in sweet baked goods.

On the other hand, if you're lucky enough to find their unsalted butter (I can only find it at their ice cream shop in town, and it's not within walking distance, so I can't get it often), then DO get that and stock up for special baking. It comes in the two-pound rolls, so you can cut it into chunks the equivalent of sticks, wrap them individually, and even freeze them for later use.

I don't usually splurge on their butter due to the expense and the fact that I can usually only find the country-style, but sometimes the unsalted is worthwhile. Otherwise, I just get organic unsalted and try to limit my intake. It ain't easy... ;-)

Alyssa said...

Thanks for the note on the butter. I'm not a vegetarian, so I'm not sure I'd notice the "meaty" taste. My brother was kind enough to bring me a roll of the unsalted butter from the shop this weekend. I think I'm going to try it in my zucchini bread recipe this week; however it calls for oil not butter, so I have to figure out the conversion on that. :)