Operation Cupboard Raid: Week Two Review

I made it through another week! In fact, I only have four days left of Operation Cupboard Raid! If you have no idea what I am talking about, see this post where I explain why and how I am only eating food that I have on hand in my cupboards or fridge for three weeks (until I get to go visit Stud in beautiful California). If you're curious as to how I did during the first week, see this post.

I am SO excited to be leaving for San Diego this Friday! Most of my excitement is obviously wrapped up in seeing my hubby and spending time with him in CA, but it couldn't come at a better time because I am RUNNING OUT OF FOOD. At the beginning of this operation, I had three different kinds of milk on hand: 1% regular milk, soy milk (that Stud likes) and almond milk. There wasn't very much of the soy milk so I used that up in the beginning, but I've stretched the almond and regular milk pretty much as far as I'm willing to go. The regular milk expired a week ago and I was willing to go a couple days after the date but I am usually really squeamish about expiration dates so, unfortunately, I couldn't finish the milk before I gave up on it. And technically the almond milk has about a two month shelf life in the fridge but I was reading the details last night and saw that once it's opened, it "stays fresh" for only 7-10 days. I'm not really sure what "stays fresh" means but I am well past the 7-10 days (think double) so I gave up on that too. This has left me in a bit of a dilemma because I was kind of counting on instant mashed potatoes to be a go-to side dish for the rest of the week (which requires milk). I know I gave myself some leeway to purchase perishable food items if absolutely necessary but I haven't stepped foot in a grocery store in over two weeks and I really want to just finish out the next four days. And that's just one example of the little dilemmas I'm running into at this point in the operation.

However, I have managed to eat pretty well all week minus a couple awkward meals (see lunch for Thursday and Friday on the chart below). To be honest, those horrible excuses for meals are a result of my lack of planning. What happens when you're getting ready for work in the morning and didn't do anything to prepare a meal for lunch? You have a lame meal. I am seriously out of pretty much all "quick" foods. I definitely learned my lesson, though. This morning I had to grill chicken before work, which seemed like an odd getting-ready-for-work activity but I am looking forward to lunch!

I have a few more yummy meals planned for this week which I will include with the next review so I'm really not worried. In fact, it really works out perfectly because I won't have any food to spoil while I am gone for five days. I'm also anxious to share my thoughts about this project and how I plan to celebrate when it's completed but I'm going to wait and share that with my final review. HA! Better check back.

Without further ado, here's my meal log for last week:

*food that was provided by outside source

And here's a look at some of the food I made this week:

My one meal eating out this week was sushi! Honestly, there is hardly a better choice if you only get to eat out once a week. My friend and I went to a place we had never tried called Koyi Sushi Too. See their website here.

 

We went a little crazy and split the Problem Solver roll and, boy, did it do its job! I also got the Spider Roll and we split some Edamame and Jazz puffs (cream cheese wontons).

It was delicious!

Highlights from Week Two: 

1. This week I had some incredible fellowship and we all know how food and fellowship go together. 

-Wednesday I got sushi with a friend and it was her turn to buy Inta Juice (now Berry Blendz smoothies)

-Thursday another friend came over for a spontaneous craft night and brought frozen pizza and rapsberry iced tea

-Friday morning is our "Caribou Day" at work and a few co-workers and I take turns buying Caribou

-Friday my brother came over after work and tolerated my meal of turkey tacos (with nothing to go in the tacos but the meat and salsa) and mashed potatoes...he was, however, 100% for the ice cream with chocolate syrup that came after

-Saturday I went to my cousin's baby shower at my aunt's house and we had yummy punch, cake and snacks

-Saturday night I went out to bike with my MS 150 teammates/captains and got stormed out so they provided pizza and cookies and an, uh, adult beverage during a few games of Clue!

-Sunday my church had a fellowship luncheon after the service (my mentor and I took too long talking so we missed pretty much everything but the hot dogs/hamburgers and the BIG dessert table!)

By the way, if you have been longing for a church where the Word of God is preached with extreme love and compassion but without hesitation or apology, please come visit Twin City Fellowship.  More about this welcoming, Christ-centered congregation in another post...

2. I tried a "unconventional" cake...didn't work out. 

3. I made biscotti (see recipe here)!

4. Stud was able to teach me over the phone how to make cappuccino just in time to have with my last two biscotti. It is sooo much easier than I thought it would be: You put water in the reservoir and push a button to warm it up. Then you pack the little thingy with ground coffee and attach it to the machine (I don't know the proper terms from here on out). When the water light turns green, you push a button to start the brew. When that light turns red, you push the button to stop it. Whoa! Cappuccino! Well, to make it drinkable there are a few other steps. You gotta heat up some milk, froth it and add it to the coffee. Then you have to add a lot of sugar. Then to make it pretty and even tastier, sprinkle some nutmeg or cinnamon on top. 

I love that little "A" cup but it didn't realize that it wouldn't leave a lot of space for milk and I need A LOT of milk in my cappuccino. The other pretty cup is almost like a soup cup...and the same lovely friend gave me both! Also, the milk in the frother is almond milk and it seems to not froth up as much as regular milk.

 And here is my morning company...as close to the table as she is allowed to get.

In closing, I have to share a difficult moment...passing this up at Michael's!

That's practically why I go to Michael's. Well, and the fact that I can't go more than two days without crafting.

Butter-free Butterscotch Almond Biscotti

Who says you need butter to bake? Since I'm about halfway through my current mission (see details here), I'm bound to start running out of a few basics...like butter. Trust me, I carefully evaluated my options when using up my last stick the other day and I'm glad I did. Check out what I made here. Yuuuuum.

So from here on out it's butter-free baking for me. And what a great opportunity to learn about baking a little more health-consciously, huh? Oh, the benefits of this project. They just keep stacking up!

I was researching some alternatives to butter online when I stumbled across a recipe that was linked to an article about baking with (and without) butter. Here's the link. Did you get to it, see the title and think I attached the wrong link? Nah, I copied all the basics; just had to make it my own, partly because I'm just like that (see About Me), but mostly because, do you think I have "candied ginger" lying around? Psh. I wish I were that fancy. 


In case you didn't go to the link and that whole last sentence doesn't mean anything to you (come on!), here's the recipe:

2 ½ cups flour
1 cup white sugar
¼ cup packed dark brown sugar
1/3 cup ground almonds
1 t. baking powder
pinch of salt
½ t .nutmeg
3 large eggs
2 egg yolks
1 t . lemon juice
1/3 cups candied ginger, chopped into tiny pieces
1/3 cups dairy-free chocolate chips

For better or worse, I almost never exactly follow a recipe so below are my alterations. A lot of the changes are just cutting the ingredients in half. There's no way I could eat 32 biscotti and still like them no matter how good they turned out...and, let's face it, I never know how it's going to turn out when I try something for the first time (and change the heck out of the recipe) so I don't like there to be a full recipe's worth of evidence wasted ingredients lying around if it flops.

Ingredients:
1 1/4 cups flour
1/2 cup Stevia (white sugar alternative)
1/8 cup packed brown sugar
1/3 cup crushed almonds - I didn't halve this because I wanted it to be a more dominant flavor and I also didn't use ground almonds but slivered almonds slightly crushed
1/2 t. baking powder
pinch of salt (whatever that means...I have no idea if I halved it properly)
1/4 t. nutmeg - I actually did a little bit more than this keeping it closer to the original amount because I like nutmeg
3 large eggs (this was tricky - I researched egg equivalents and decided on two whole eggs to cut this recipe in half since it called for both whole eggs and egg yolks but the dough didn't have enough moisture after trying to mix it together so I added one more whole egg)
1/2 t. lemon juice
1/2 cup butterscotch chips


Procedure:
Note: These are baked twice giving them the firm texture that biscotti are known for.  
Mix everything but the eggs, lemon juice and butterscotch chips together in a medium bowl
In a separate, small bowl whisk the eggs and lemon juice
Combine the eggs with the dry ingredients, then add the butterscotch chips and mix until it becomes a sticky dough
On a well-floured surface form into a log with rounded edges (if making the whole batch instead of halving it, form into two logs)
Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper

It's not a very big loaf as you can see. This made about 10 biscotti.

Bake at 350 for about 25 minutes, until golden brown
Remove from pan and let cool for 15 minutes
Reset your oven to 300 now to give it time to adjust while the biscotti cool

 Here is is, golden brown. 

And here's a close up. Look at how the butterscotch chips are all gooey! 

Line your baking sheet again with parchment paper
Cut the log diagonally into slices that are about 1/2" -1" wide

I didn't read that part of the instructions so I just cut them straight.

Lay the slices on their side on the baking sheet

Bake about 20-25 minutes, flipping them over half way through
They should be slightly colored by not browned and will get too hard if over-baked

According to the recipe, they will keep about 2 weeks if kept in an airtight container.

I'm not a huge butterscotch fan but those chips really are yummy in this biscotti. I like the way they turned out...they are not as hard and crunchy as the ones I've had at coffee shops though (you don't even need to dunk it in coffee to loosen it up). I'm not sure if I didn't cook them long enough or if is partly due to this recipe being listed as a "dairy-free" recipe; perhaps it would be better different if it were a "regular" recipe. Either way, I really like the flavor and am happy that I was able to use up some of my butterscotch chips. Did you notice how I actually doubled the amount of butterscotch chips instead of halving it from the amount of chocolate chips in the original recipe? Probably that's why it's good, but I don't care. Also, a lot of the biscotti I've seen are longer, narrower pieces like the picture below. I'm not sure if I should have shaped the loaf to be wider and thinner or what.

From here. 

Oh, man. I could have melted the butterscotch chips and done that drizzle on top. I think I might just do that on my remaining pieces! Check back for an update!

I didn't know anything about making biscotti, nor had I ever really been interested, but this was pretty easy and it's a pretty versatile recipe...just swap out the "flavoring" ingredients and add in your own and you have a whole new biscotti. I'll probably try this again.

Now I just gotta get Stud to try to explain to me over the phone how to make cappuccino so I can enjoy this with coffee. He is the master of homemade cappuccino, complete with frothed milk and a sprinkling of cinnamon or nutmeg or whatever. Lately he hasn't been able to call until I'm already in bed and unwilling to get up and go look at the machine that makes the coffee drinks to see what he's talking about as he explains. Maybe I'll learn tonight...

Operation Cupboard Raid: Week One Review

It's practically a miracle! Guess how much money I spent on food last week Monday through Friday. ZERO DOLLARS! Maybe you don't realize how big of a deal this is, so let me explain.

I started adding up the cost of how often I pull out my check card throughout the week for various food-related purchases and I've seen the staggering list of transactions online for restaurants and the like. It was depressing how much money was being spent on something that doesn't even last. I had gotten into the mindset that it was more convenient to stop at Starbucks before work for a nonfat Chai and a croissant (costing $5.04) than it was to sit at the table with a bowl of cereal. And I always felt that I just didn't have time to make a lunch in the morning so I would get lunch at the cafeteria at work or go to Subway (costing between $5-7). One at a time these purchases wouldn't seem to break the bank, but once you look at how much per day, per week, per month you are spending on "convenient food," you might want to re-evaluate your choices. Let's do the math.

Typical weekday: Starbucks @ $5 + Subway @ $6 = $11

Five days a week = $55, 4 weeks a month $220, 12 months a year $2640...what?! Yeah.

That's not even including whatever is going on in the evening or on the weekend. That's just ROUTINE spending on food. Now I know that we do have to spend money on food. But I also know that I can buy food at the grocery store, make it at home, put it in little Tupperware containers and bring it to work all for a lot less than $11 a day. And I also don't need to purchase something edible every time I go to a movie or am in the mall or am out with friends or whatever. It's pretty ridiculous. Food has become entertainment in and of itself when its main purpose is nourishment and energy.

So, as you know if you read one of my previous posts, I decided to dig in my heels and break some bad habits by committing to eat only what it is my cupboards, without grocery shopping, for 3 weeks (until I go visit Stud in California) and after completing Week One I am pretty excited about the results.

It's been a great week! I've been able to stick to my committment and I am loving this project. If you recall, I did give myself an allowance of $10/week for perishable foods like milk and produce or for eating out when it's absolutely necessary. I didn't use any of the money for extra groceries but I was out of the house for about 7 hours with a friend on Saturday so it was necessary to eat out (as ambitious as I am about this project, I was half-tempted to make a lunch but I didn't want my friend to be in an awkward spot or have to eat whatever I could make for us for lunch). I did spend a little more than $10 but it was just on one meal and I made a health choice. In fact, I have to tell you about this restaurant because it is sooooooo good.

It's called Lakes Tavern and Grill in Woodbury.
Check out their website.

I went there several months ago with some of my college buddies and it was delicious so when my girlfriend and I were in Woodbury I was eager to try it again.

I order the Ponzu Glazed Salmon Salad and it was DELICIOUS.

Seriously. I almost never try "weird salads," you know, the ones that have fruit and "wonton crisps" and stuff like that, but this salad wasn't weird at all...just totally awesome. The mango almost scared me off because I think mangos taste like carrots and therefore I don't get too excited about them. No one seems to agree with me on this point but when we were first dating, Stud got a mango and cut it up for me and all I could think about was how it tasted like a carrot. Bummer! However, the mango in this salad tasted like candy. I even asked if they marinate it in something and the sweet server actually went and asked for me...turns out it was just mango in mango syrup (A.K.A sugar). Yum!

So, anyway, I'm not even bummed that the meal was a little over the $10 because it was delicious and I've been so good all week. Right? Say "right."

Ok, back to the Week One Review. I didn't starve! In fact, the more I explore the cupboards, the more I'm kind of afraid I will still have stuff leftover after the three weeks is up.

I've been keeping a food diary just to prove that I am eating and that I'm eating all kinds of good stuff. By the way, keeping a food diary is a great way to be more conscious of what you eat and can really help keep you motivated if you are trying to either cut back or eat healthier foods.

Here's a look at the past seven days:

Or maybe you'd like a more visual representation:

Now that doesn't look like I'm suffering too much, does it? 

And here are some highlights from the week:

1. I discovered I actually do have time in the morning to make a lunch for the day.
2. I even had "movie night" food for my dad and me on Saturday (chips and salsa and sundaes don't really make a good dinner though).
3. I was able to make a brand new kind of oatmeal cookie that I will definitely make again -- see this post for the recipe.
4. Dinner on Sunday was provided for me by a very nice lady from church that I hope to spend a lot more time with and it was delicious!
5. I stuck to my guns out bowling with friends and didn't spend any money on food because I had dinner at home first.
6. I learned how to make homemade iced tea with any kind of tea bag and having fun things to drink on hand makes it easier to pass up the smoothie shops and coffee houses.
7. Being more conscious of what I eat has no doubt contributed to some weight loss this week!

So far this operation is a success! I'm looking forward to the next two weeks.

My first cookie: Coconut Cherry Almond Oatmeal Cookie

Over the past few years cooking has become a great hobby for me. Thinking about it now I realized that it wasn’t a love of food that drew me to love cooking but a love of being creative and resourceful with a never-ending list of ingredients.

I first started having fun with cooking and baking when, a few years ago, I realized that I needed to pay much more attention to the food I was putting in my body. Not all food is created equal and I was amazed at the almost instant impact that food has on your body. Since that time, I’ve read a lot about people who try to live healthy lifestyles and what they eat and I’ve noticed a lot of the same ingredients come up again and again. I knew, though, that I can’t (and don’t want to) commit to eating the same thing day in and day out so it became a game to make tasty meals and snacks with healthy ingredients. Since I also really enjoy having friends and family over and cooking for them and my husband, I need to be able to make meals that are healthy AND delicious. I’m eager to proof that those two qualities can go together like peas and carrots (only figuratively…literally I hate the combination of peas and carrots).

One of my favorite things about cooking is being able to make something from scratch, or take a recipe and alter it to meet your needs whether it’s to make it more healthy, to change the flavor a little or to make up for missing ingredients.

With almost a week under my belt of Operation Cupboard Raid (see post here), I decided I was really going to put my creativity and my cupboard to the test and see what I could bake with only what I have on hand.

I knew that I wouldn’t be able to stand having oatmeal for breakfast for the next two weeks so my first priority was to use up some of those oats and make oatmeal cookies…but not your ordinary oatmeal cookies. I’ve had two bags of dried cherries in my cupboard for months ever since I was going to use them for a different recipe but and didn't so I decided those has to be worked into my cookie somehow as well. And what goes great with cherries? Almonds! Is it just me or have you ever noticed that anything with an almond flavor has kind of a cherry flavor or scent? And what about Jergen’s Cherry Almond hand lotion? Cherries and almonds need to be together.


Can you tell which is the cherry and which is the almond tree? Further evidence of their sisterhood. Photo credits here and here.

So, so far I was working with a Cherry Almond Oatmeal cookie but it needed...something. I've been on kind of a coconut kick lately and I think I'm making up for lost time (I used to believe that I hated coconut and have recently discovered that I, in fact, love it) so that was my no-brainer final ingredient for:

Yum!

Ok, so here’s the recipe, drastically adapted (and halved) from an oatmeal cookie recipe from a Taste of Home cookbook. I halved the recipe for two reasons: A. with Stud gone it would take forever to go through 3-4 dozen cookies by myself and B. I only had 1/2 cup of butter on hand. I know there are little tricks about halving and doubling recipes but I don’t know them and I’ve gotten along fine so far with just straight numbers.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 sugar (or alternate like Stevia)
1 egg
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp almond extract
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/8 tsp salt
1 cup oats
1/4 cup dried cherries
1/4 cup flaked coconut (plus about 1/c up for garnish)
1/8 cup crushed almonds

Procedure
Combine butter and sugars in a mixing bowl
Add in egg, vanilla and almond extract

*That mixer is one of my favorite wedding gifts...and proof that we will always have a yellow kitchen.

Separately combine flour, baking soda and salt; gradually stir the dry mixture into the wet mixture of egg, butter and sugar mixing well
Separately combine oats, dried cherries, coconut and almonds and stir until evenly combined then add into your dough (I just had slivered almonds and wanted smaller chunks so I put some in a Ziploc bag and crushed them up with a rolling pin)

Spoon mixture onto cookie sheet and sprinkle with coconut flakes

Bake at 350 for 12-15 minutes until golden brown (depending on your oven and the size of your cookies)
Let stand 1 minute before removing to cool on wire racks

*I happened to have some previously toasted coconut so for the first batch I omitted the coconut garnish before baking and sprinkled the cookies with the toasted flakes after removing them from the oven. I found with the second batch that it’s better to sprinkle the untoasted coconut on the cookies before baking because it adheres better and the coconut is beautifully toasted while the cookies are baking.

Enjoy! I think the cherries are the best part, they are a burst of flavor. The oatmeal and coconut provide a lot of great texture and flavor and the coconut is so pretty on top. The almonds get a little lost in the mix but make a subtle appearance now and then. I would consider adding equal parts vanilla and almond extract next time and possibly leaving the almonds in bigger chunks.

What are your ideas to spice up an oatmeal cookie?

Hail-o Kitty

One of my biggest anxieties when we found out that Stud would be deploying again was the fact that I would be living alone. When he first deployed, I was in my last semester of college and after that I lived at home. I never felt scared or anxious about my safety. If something happened, I was surrounded by people who could help or at least communicate the situation to get help.

Living alone is one of the many factors that make this deployment to Afghanistan a totally different situation for us than his first deployment.

1. We're married. When Stud went to Iraq we had gotten engaged right before he left so not only was I not recognized legally by the USMC as his dependent or family but more importantly I was planning a wedding mostly alone!

2. I have a full-time job. My last semester of college only took up about two months of my time while was he gone last time. After that I spent months looking for a job...which I finally landed about two weeks before he came home. All of that downtime really seemed to make things worse.

3. We have our own place. A blessing and a source of anxiety at the same time. It's awesome to have my own place while he's gone but I also worry about having to handle emergencies and bad guys criminals if they were to come up.

4. Experience is a great teacher. Not only have we already been through a deployment but we've been married for a little over a year and have been able to learn more about each other and the way the military works in that time.

All things considered, we are in a better position this time around and we know that no matter what, God will sustain us. Even if we were somehow in a worse position heading into this deployment, trusting God and leaning on His truth is the only surefire way to succeed at anything. Even in the suckiest of situations, we are better off if we know God than we are not knowing God in the best of situations. Fact.

That being said, I still get a little freaked out a times and as much comfort and companionship as I get from our two lovely lady cats, Analie (Ana) and Derby, even they can be a source of anxiety. They're living "situation gauges." You can always tell how they feel because their emotion is written all over their fury little bodies. They purr and close their eyes when they're happy, they meow and rub against your legs when they want love food, and their hair rises and they arch their back when they're trying to intimidate one another -- you've gotta know that Ana has a nub for a tail so it turns into a pom pom when she's riled up. It's usually pretty easy to tell what's going on with the girls...especially since the expression I see most often is unconcerned languidness. In fact, here is a snapshot of the lounging ladies from last night:

They're fine. They're happy. They're mellow. Even though I know they're just cats, their attitude draws me in and I feel more relaxed when they're relaxed. Humans are cue-readers. We scan each other looking for information. Just try standing in the middle of the mall and looking up at the ceiling for a few minutes and see how many people walking by will look up to see what you're looking at. We all seek information and reading peoples reactions to situations can be a bigger source of information than the physical cues of the situation itself. We got to watch a video in my college Social Psych course of an experiment of the power of situational cues. The subject was asked to wait in a room with several other people who were in on the experiment. After waiting for a short time, smoke started entering the room from under a door across the room from the door the subject entered. The subject sees the smoke but looks around to see how the other people in the room react. The other people remain seated, acting totally indifferent and unmoved by the now-increasing smoke entering the room. What does the subject do? Does he run from the room yelling fire? Does he inform the other people that he sees smoke or ask what's going on? In several different trials, the subject remained seated being so over-powered by the "information" he was receiving from the others in the room, the cues telling him that there was nothing to worry about, that he ignored his own common sense. We saw that video and thought those subjects were crazy! But we all put more stock in the actions and reactions of others than we care to admit.

Now I hate to relate that all back to my silly cats but cats have expression too! So this is what happened. We three ladies were having a quite evening. I was working on my laptop in the living room and they were chillin'. All of a sudden I look out our sliding glass door to the porch and see a curtain of rain fall almost instantly. The cats were fine with that but when the thumping of hail hitting the roof followed, this is what I saw:

The poor girls didn't know what to think. Derby put on her detective hat and cautiously explored the porch with me but Ana retreated under the bed. Luckily in this situation I didn't have to rely on the cues of my cats alone to tell me if I should be worried, knowing so much more about weather than they do. Ha! But imagine what I might have felt if I hadn't known what was going on. When the living things around you show signs of fear, it can be hard to not feel a little fear yourself.

Come on. Look at that face:

You might think something were up too if you saw that.

Anyway, the tornado sirens went off and I locked us all in the bathroom (which didn't go over well with the cats) but it passed and we were all fine. So back to the point, I can't say I wasn't thinking about the outer wall of our apartment being torn off and not having my hubby home to help me deal with it. This living alone thing will have its ups and downs for sure. I am confident, though, that this isn't a novel anxiety. God's in control of this too and I figure as long as we're commanded to "Cast all your anxiety on Him for he cares for you," it's probably a good plan of action. Even if there is some hail sometimes.

I saved that piece in my freezer. Is that weird? I told myself it's so that I could show Stud when he comes home for his ten-day leave between training and deploying...I think I just secretly wanted to keep it for no good reason.

Operation Cupboard Raid

It's been less than a week since I started and while my blog is all new and fresh I'm going to undertake my first mission: Operation Cupboard Raid.

If you read my previous post you learned a little about OSMEAC - the mission strategy that the Marine Corps follows. It's a great way to structure your own personal mission and it feels kind of exciting to follow in the footsteps of my hubby and his fellow Marines in some small way (like a little girl wearing her mom's high heels, although I feel like I need a more manly analogy if I'm going to be talking about Marines). Anyway, all of the missions I will be pursuing from here on out will follow the OSMEAC format so here it goes.

Operation Cupboard Raid

O Here's where I am: I've been through about 6 kitchens since the time that I went off to college and living in each place I can remember longing for my own. I used to think, "Why on earth do people have so much food in their cupboards that just sits there month after month?" I assured myself that when I had my own kitchen I would only stock what I would use in the near future. Maybe I'd have some baking supplies that would last a long time but I wasn't going to end up with a cupboard full of food and nothing to eat. Imagine my surprise, then, when after almost a year of living in our own apartment, with our own kitchen that no one is responsible for but me, I open the cupboards to find all kinds of non-perishables and nothing of interest to eat.

S Here's what's happening: This whole kitchen blunder is taking its toll in many areas. A. My grocery shopping procedure is failing me miserably. Not only do I not go consistently, but when I do buy food I don't eat it! I may be a little weird but I get all inspired by grocery shopping and I'm usually pretty good about only buying healthy food. However, at home I don't always want to prepare or eat the healthy food so it just sits there. B. Our current practice is extremely financially irresponsible. Even if you don't include all the money that is wasted by food that goes bad before we eat it, the money that is spent on eating out because there seems to be nothing to eat or because I don't want to take the time to prepare my own food is really shocking and depressing. C. While I may be losing a lot of money, I'm gaining a lot of something else. I've watched my weight increase for the past several months knowing that the biggest culprit is an almost-refusal to commit to eating healthily. The food in my cupboards is healthy and wholesome and standing by. Keeping a diary of what you eat, like I plan to do during this mission, can also be a great tool in being mindful of what you're consuming. D. Living in an apartment, we simply do not have enough space to continue to buy things and store them indefinitely. E. Creative cooking is something I've been cultivating for a couple years now and seeing all of those odds and ends foods in the cupboard makes me want to get inventive.

M Here's what I'm going to do: My mission is to eat only what I currently have stocked in my apartment from now (I started yesterday) until Memorial Weekend when I go out to California to visit Stud. That's almost three weeks and the sad truth is, I'm almost positive that I actually have enough food at home to prepare healthy AND delicious meals that entire time. I'm setting aside $10 a week for fresh produce, milk and/or eating out if I'm with friends. I am not allowed to eat out by myself which includes my beloved Starbucks visits.

E Here's how I'm going to do it: The "Grab and Go" mentality has been terrorizing my budget and my health so this mission will take a lot of planning ahead. It's hard to have food to pack for lunch if nothing is made in advance. Luckily, I still have some food that is a little quicker to have ready but once that runs out I will spend time on the evenings or weekends preparing healthy meals that I can divide into lunch portions. I will get creative with different resources for recipes stay determined when I look for a quick fix.

A Here's what will help: Recipes, recipes, recipes. This part of the challenge will be pretty fun. I LOVE looking at recipes. Along with the food in my cupboards, another semi-untapped resource in my kitchen is the abundance of cookbooks shelved in a corner. I get recipes online, from magazines and, of course, from books but now is the time to see how creative I can get with the ingredients because the the majority of the recipes that I come across will probably call for things I do not have. Marine Corps motto to the rescue: Adapt and Overcome!

C Here's the accountability: With my husband gone, I have no one to report to but myself (and everyone who reads this blog). This mission is important to me because I see benefits for so many areas with its successful completion. I am committed to this operation and will be reporting my progress here on the blog.

That's it! My first mission. My first OSMEAC.

Here's a look at my fridge:

And my freezer...I already threw away two of those ice creams!

Finally, the cupboards

Let the raid begin!

Intro to O-SMEAC: My Mission is a Better Life

Don't you love the word "mission?" I do. You tell me which sounds more exciting: "Your job is to deliver the mail" OR "your mission is to ensure that your people receive the materials they are sent by outside sources in a timely manner?" Ok. I may have embellished a little bit on the second one, but can you blame me? Once you use the word mission you almost have to get serious.

I think one of the reasons the word mission has such a psychological impact on me is that it really conveys a sense of purpose. The word itself refers to "a specific task with which a person or a group is charged," so it's clear that a mission is intentional. It anticipates an end goal and it's been dedicated to a person or group of people who are assumed to have the resources to accomplish it. A mission is organized. It has an impact. And, best of all, a mission is exciting! Maybe the word reminds me of crawling around in the ditch in the dark at summer camp trying not to get caught in our night games or maybe I've seen too many war movies, but missions always seem so risky and mysterious. It's quite a big deal to be involved in a mission. And if you complete the mission successfully? Well, that's pretty exciting too.

So what better way to trick myself into accomplishing some goals than by using some fancy lingo? It's all about the presentation. Do I want to have chips or ice cream while I watch Law and Order: SVU before I got to bed? Of course. Will the knowledge that A. those things are not healthy, B. it's not good to eat late at night and C. eating while watching TV tends to be mindless and therefore pointless be enough to compel me to forgo the temporal desires for the greater good of my body? Highly unlikely. However, I'm going to put my own claim to the test that presenting my goals in the form of missions will create enough influence to tip the scales to my benefit (um, literally and figuratively where the aforementioned goal is concerned). Of course, the benefit of engaging in a mission isn't just about the wording. Missions involve planning and accountability and those things can go a real long way in achieving goals too.

Being, as you know, a goal-oriented person, I have goals a-plenty. Some of the goals are personally imperative and some of the goals are simply novel. My goal -- yeah, I have a goal for how to accomplish my goals -- is to "mission-ize" them and take full advantage of the psychological repercussions.

Knowing very little about actual mission planning (a high school night mission to ransack our youth pastors' office as payback for their prank which ultimately resulted in the cops being called because our cars where "suspiciously" parked on a side road and having to explain ourselves in the church parking lot at night doesn't really make me an expert), I am going to borrow from the Few and the Proud. Believe it or not, I've picked up a lot from the military in the few looooooong years that Stud has been in.

The Marines follow a Five Paragraph Order entitled O-SMEAC when engaging in a mission. Here's the break down:

O- Orientation: the background information leading up to the situation

S- Situation: what's going on

M- Mission: the outline of the desired outcomes (who, what, where, when and why)

E- Execution: the most significant part- HOW the mission is to be completed

A- Administration and logistics: the support and resources for the mission

C- Command and signal: who's in charge and how will things be communicated

Check out this link for a more detailed explanation of O-SMEAC.

So that's the plan. I'm going to O-SMEAC my way to a better life. Do you get excited about missions? What do you want to "mission-ize" in your life?

Married to the Military

It was about three years ago that my best friend informed me out of the blue that he was considering enlisting in the Marine Corps. We were both going to school at the University of Wisconsin - River Falls and the news kind of shocked me. I didn't know what to say or even think. The opportunities, the danger, the pride, the limits. Joining the military can be one of the most significant decisions of your life and I had no idea what it could mean for him. Over the next couple of weeks the idea became reality and he took the plunge and signed his life away. Once the wheels were in motion, events unfolded at full speed. The Marine Corps offers a delayed entry program so after finishing out the semester he was off to boot camp. He was gone less than a week after school got out.

You may have inferred from the title that my best friend would turn out to be much more. At the time, Stud (as he is affectionately known) and I were not dating. We had started dating a couple years before but broke up, somehow successfully navigating the "friend" territory for about a year and a half. I didn't know what his commitment to the USMC would mean for me, if anything. Friend or not, I was still in love with this man. Sending him off to boot camp with a letter written in green ink and a few photos was one of the hardest goodbyes I had ever experienced. There was no way to know what three months away would do to our relationship. Would he even miss me? Little did I know that harder "goodbyes" would come.

Over the course of the three-month boot camp, letters flew back and forth from Minnesota to California and my heart held out the hope that my love would not return void, that something would change between us and the relationship that had been brewing for about three years would turn romantic again. I was surprised at how eager he was for me to write him and I, of course, was just as anxious to receive word from him, scouring each letter that came for indications of his sentiment.

When the final letter came, the three months were finally almost up and I read with an excitement that I can remember to this day that he wanted me to come to California to see him graduate. I packed my bags with carefully selected outfits for each day and boarded a plane for CA to see one of the coolest events of a military career: boot camp graduation ceremonies. I spent three days in CA being awed by the thick air of pride and history on base and happily enjoying this time together. Best of all, Stud got to come home with us for a ten-day leave.

As the days of his leave flew by I knew that there was one important conversation that I needed to have with this Marine before he went back to complete his training. He was oblivious that sitting through a movie next to him at the theater was almost torture thinking about "the talk" that was looming. It was pretty simple. All I had to say was, "I still love you. Do you, will you ever, love me too...again?" I didn't want to ask him, though. In all the time that we had been friends after we broke up, my feelings for him never dissolved. I did not relish the thought of being rejected and I was so convinced that his answer would be no that I dreaded even asking.

The confidence to ask came from God himself in what I now call faithful interaction. God's love never fails and his tangible and ethereal interactions with us are sweet evidence.

"It's like a shooting star," I told my mom during the week that he was home. "There's no way of knowing if it will come, when it will come. But when it does, you can't deny it. It's suddenly there." I don't know why I related his love to a shooting star but the analogy made sense to me. Would Stud one day, or over the course of weeks or months, see me as more than a friend? I didn't know. I couldn't know. Maybe even he couldn't know. But if it was going to happen, when it did happen, it would be clear. Like a shooting star.

I knew on one of the last nights of his leave that I needed to ask the question, for myself, and for him. I needed to know the answer and I needed him to know that I didn't see him as just a friend no matter how much I tried to behave that way to preserve our friendship. I had known him and be best friends with him for three years but I was really nervous. A big part of me still wanted to drop it and just watch and hope for an indefinite amount of time. In the moment, the idea of months of uncertainty and disappointment seemed more bearable than flat out rejection.

It had been a long, good day, but standing around outside his house that evening with some friends I was mentally preparing for when they would leave and we would be alone. Rehearsing what I would say and imagining how it would go had my stomach in knots. And then it happened. In the dark night sky, while everyone was talking and not paying attention, I saw it. A shooting star. Faithful interaction. I knew then that whatever the answer would be, I could handle it. No matter the outcome, I would be okay. I had the confidence I needed and, later that evening sitting on the couch, I learned to my surprise and delight that I was not alone in my love.

I guess you could say the rest is history. Stud had to leave right away for more training and through the distance our relationship grew. By the time he came home three months later, we were talking of marriage and I didn't want to leave his side for a second. It was within a week of his homecoming that we learned that we would be deployed. His training would start almost immediately. It was during that time that I began to realize how much a part of OUR lives the military would be. The tearful goodbyes, the giddy hellos, getting engaged on leave, planning a wedding during a deployment and living under the cloud of military schedules and regulations.

I still remember first hearing about the Marine Corps. Before that first conversation about the possibility of enlisting it used to be just a vague impression of valor and discipline, the "hardcore" branch. I never would have imagined back then that there would be a picture of my husband from his boot camp graduation sitting on my desk at work, dress blues hanging in our bedroom closet or that I'd be holding down the fort with our two cats as we head into a second deployment a little over a year after our wedding.

I think sometimes it's the things we never pictured for ourselves that fulfill us the most and it's often the struggles that we endure that bring the most joy and growth. Being married to the military has its ups and downs, victories and defeats, but it's all worth it for the love of one Marine.

"Commence to Start!"

I tried to think of a great first post title for this new blog of mine and was reminded of a line from a movie that's a family favorite, Father of the Bride. I don't know how many times I've grinned and rolled my eyes when it comes to the part in the movie where the seedy contractor yells out this redundant phrase to begin a construction project but somehow it's stuck with me.

At first it just sounds like silly slip of the tongue but sometimes it's not that far from how I think about projects, or missions, or challenges. I think sometimes I'm better at the "commencing to start" than I am at actually starting. COMMENCING to start just feels so good! I write lists of goals, create fun reminders and motivational posters, get all the supplies ready and make elaborate schedules and commitments...and sometimes they work! Really. I do effectively function this way. I've got to give a lot of credit to all the preparation and excitement that "commencing to start" has provided. Just the boost in motivation alone that I get from writing down goals demonstrates that, at least for me, it's a worthy activity. 

Lately, though, I've noticed that I haven't really been actually starting any of the projects and challenges that I've been "commencing to start." I get all into the idea and the planning and that's all the further it gets. 

To be honest, the idea of starting a blog has been nagging at me for quite a while. I've been inspired by the women (and men) out there that share their lives, their work, their insights and talents with readers like me. I'm eager to have my own outlet. A place where I can diffuse MY ideas, accomplishments, struggles, questions, and beliefs. A place that is mine, entirely of my design. I'm also a little bit daunted by the idea of the whole wide world having access to this personal outlet. I've decided, though, that the desire to share and have a say will only be complimented by the accountability that comes with knowing anyone could stumble across my space. 

I may have shouted, "Commence to start!" long ago but I'm  finally taking this first step, with many more to follow.  At first I wanted to be able to narrow the scope of this blog to one topic: crafts, cooking, theology, life as a Marine wife, psychology or any other but that just won't do. This slice of media is dedicated to the fulfillment of a multitude of my heart's desires and a testament to who I am -- as a whole.

I commit this space to creativity and honesty. To personal development and fellowship. To encouragement, humility, and humor. And most of all, to the glory of God, without whom I wouldn't have the faintest hope of any good thing. 

Andrea 

"But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit."