My Darling Skylar

I just wanted to post that I will miss my Skylar, otherwise known as Pie-Pie. She was the best cat that anyone could have ever asked for. I love her and miss her so much already.

Please do not post comments to this. Thank you.

New Kids on The Block are coming to town!

And YES I am going to see them for the 4th time! 3 of those times were in my much, much younger days.

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I am going to have to dig out my Jonathan t-shirt and florescent pink hat with my huge "I love Jonathan" sign. I wonder if I should pin my pants!

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I have such fond memories of being an over the top obsessive NKOTB fan. I can still remember the feel of losing my voice for a week after the concerts. All that crazy screaming was a blast.

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We had no fear. We tried to sneak onto their hotel floor at the Four Seasons Hotel, we followed their tour bus in TO and tons of other crazy stuff.

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Oh to be a teenager and thinking you are truly in love.....

My Health Scare

Some of you may know that I recently had a serious health scare. I was for the first time in my life faced with the idea that one day I could get terminally ill just like anyone else. I cannot believe how scary it actually is. Of course I had thought about it before but until I was actually being tested I never really thought about it. I had so many thoughts pass before me over a two week period it was terrifying.

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I am not sure how long I felt an itch because I just itched and itched. Then one day it occurred to me that I was so itchy and nothing was satisfying this itch. I also noticed that the itchy spot low on my breast was now an itchy patch of reddish raised skin. I still didn't think much of it. But the itch persisted. Slowly something in my subconscious began nagging me. I couldn't quite place my finger on it. It then started to surface as a memory of an email I had received ages ago. Still I left the thought and didn't really think about it.

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At my son's Doctor's appt I asked the Doctor to look at it. She did and thought nothing of it. A week later at my daughter's appt I told her I felt a lump in my armpit as well. She still didn't think much of it and said we'd look at it again at my January appt.

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My itching still persisted and it hit me - the email was about an itchy breast and breast cancer! My heart started to pound as I pieced together what I thought I remembered from the email. It was a warning to women about this exact symptom. I got on the computer and looked it up. Sure enough it was there. Inflammatory Breast Cancer. And the number one problem is that Doctor's tend to misdiagnosis.

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I called the Doctors office that morning, December 24th and asked to schedule an appointment. I thought I'd get one in January. They asked if I'd like to see a different Doctor that day. I was at my appointment in less than an hour. I still thought I'd just get transferred to a specialist in January. But this Doctor was great. he did not mind that I was self diagnosing and asked to read the information I had brought along. He said that he felt there was enough here to do a skin biopsy. Most surprising was that he did it right then! It did hurt but nothing major.

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Now the wait for the results started. I was extremely nervous and reading about the disease did everything to fuel my panic. To make matters worse the lump under my armpit got quite a bit bigger. Finally the first week of January I received the call. Seeing the number on my phone just about gave me a heart attack. Thankfully the results were good. It was likely just eczema. I still do have a worrisome lump under my armpit but I think it has shrunk of the last few days.

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I wanted to blog about this as a warning to other women. I got tested and yes I'll have a tiny scar and the results were negative - thank god. But this taught me to be my own advocate and ask for what I wanted. Although I was wrong I could have been right too.

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For more information on Inflammatory Breast Cancer visit this site and many others. This was the site that made me call my Doctor that day and demand an appointment.

http://www.networkofstrength.org/information/diagnosis/types/inflammatory.php

My Puree-ing Journey - Tasting

Well I have tried a few different recipes with the purees. Here they are with their ratings from 1-5 stars

Banana Bread with Cauliflower *****

I would have never noticed the cauliflower nor did anyone else. My only issue was with my baking. When I usually make banana bread I take the bananas from freezer to bowl and use a mixer. This called for pureed bananas (of course!) so I was lazy and just mashed them. The result=a little under cooked.

French Toast with Sweet Potato *****+

This was a hit with everyone. The french toast tasted exactly them same. Next time I may try to add a tad more;)

Boxed Kraft Dinner with Cauliflower ~ no star

This did not go over well. I even knew as I put it together that I would have a tough time. I still tried to pass it off. Since this was Drey's 3rd time having Kraft Dinner I thought he might not really know it was different. Well, his tongue barely touched it and he said yuck! I am not sure if my puree wasn't pureed enough because the consistency was not a good fit. It made the Kraft Dinner thick and bunchy.

I will keep trying and let you know which ones are hits and which ones are misses with my family.

My Puree-ing Journey - Starting the process

So, now that I have decided to make a commitment to this cookbook I have pureed carrots, cauliflower, butternut squash and sweet potato. What Ii noticed while puree-ing is that I don't really know what pureed is! Even though I have baby food in the house. I have a feeling that I should have added more water to some of them. I moved up to a bigger blender which was a good idea since my tiny one would have taken ages to do.

I steamed the cauliflower and carrots and used that water to add to the puree. I roasted the squash and potato - wow - did the house ever smell good.

One thing that I think I will enjoy is that fact that we are trying foods we generally would not. Even Paul thought the house smelled wonderful.

I measured out all of the purees into 1/2 cups in plastic bags. I also wrote on each what it is and how much. I did do a couple of different measurements knowing what recipe I was going to use them for. I tried not to worry too much since Katie can have any extras.

Now my freezer is stuffed with purees which has made my menu planning much easier since I want to be able to use up the purees.

Now it is time to put them to the test!

My Puree-ing Journey - Why

WHY I am puree-ing

Anyone that knows me knows that I am not someone who has ever been particularly concerned about organic foods and natural products and so on.

Well this year I have decided to take a closer look at small ways to make my family healthier. I had a health scare (more to come on that in another post) which really brought our lifestyle into focus. One aspect is that we are not eating enough fruit and vegetables.

Drey (4yrs old) will eat most raw vegetables and most fruit. I will also eat raw veggies along with cooked. I am not so great with fruit. Paul barely eats any fruit or veggies at all. He considered his like of red and green peppers along with onions a lot of veggies!!?? So since we could all stand to be healthier I have decided to take a look at puree-ing.

I started with a small blender from Wal-mart ($9) and made some food for Katie our baby. I actually enjoyed the feeling that I got from doing it. Not only did I feel a sense of accomplishment but it was easy! Once I realized that it was easy - steam or cook the food, toss it in the blender (I had a big one that I had never even opened that I use now - thanks Mom:) blend and bag. So easy - and not a lot of clean up.

After one try of doing Katie's foods with the small blender I started thinking about the Deceptively Delicious Cookbook. I figured if this was easy why not do both at the same time. Now, not only will Katie have fresh food but so will the family (without knowing it). I bought the book for $8.49 + tax at Costco and away I went.

I'll post more on what I have pureed, what I have cooked/baked with and what the results were.

Welcome

Thank you for visiting my blog. I am going to give this a try and see how it goes.

http://whatarethemassonsuptotoday.blogspot.com/