La Vie En Rose True Crime

Innocence Lost

Yesterday, I was strolling down Holly Street just minding my own business. Suddenly, someone wearing dark clothing and smelling like cake, grabbed me from behind. I was shoved into La Vie En Rose and forced to eat a chocolate cupcake! I pleaded and pleaded that I was trying not to eat goodies, that I was just a good citizen out doing errands. The attacker said it did not matter that I was going to eat the chocolate cupcake regardless. I started to cry--- well just a little. The perpetrator began to feel guilty and said..." Ok, ok lady, you still have to eat the cupcake but I will let you choose the one you want!" After a couple of sniffles, I pointed to the mocha buttercream topped cupcake in the case. I also quickly photographed the cupcake for the blog, so you could see the evidence. As you may have discerned, the photograph is the only remnant of the mocha buttercream cupcake. So sorry!!


Ok, Ok, Ok....I confess this is a fake crime retold without horrific details. I was feeling guilty about sweets and in order to save my reputation, I made up the whole sordid thing. It reminds me of several years ago, when an intern at our school didn't want to come to work and told an ridiculous tale. She spoke on the phone in a groggy voice saying that the front and back license plates had been stolen from her car. She felt it was best to stay home and not drive the car. The next day, she appeared at school without ever a mention of her crime. The plates were back on the car too! She too...for her own reasons... needed to invent a fake crime.


My apologies to La Vie En Rose for involving them in this tale of sugar passion, crime and true lies.

Two Sugar Free Days---how boring!

"I need a haircut Mom...the other dogs are laughing at me."

COOKIES

Where are you dear cookies? I can't eat you everyday, so you must stay away---even though I want to see you. I miss your perfectness... and you go so well with Diet Coke. Dear cookies.. you bring smiles to everyone and then we GOBBLE you up ( oh, how rude!).

Let's face it, the cookie is made with love and gives love. Okay, okay, I am waxing sentimental now, but cookies are my little dollops of joy.

• So, if you aren't eating a cookie today---at least walk by a bakery and salute it!
  
• If you aren't eating cookies today, open your fridge and give the butter a little pat, just to let the butter know you still care.
  
• No cookies today---well, dump a pack of chocolate chips on the counter and then line them up in rows for torture. No morsels in your mouth now, this is SERIOUS!!

YOGA

4:15pm class yesterday was really full. Big crowd usually means that it ends up really humid in there and that makes it feels extra hot. Very sweaty but it felt so good! I had good balance and was able to put my head down on my knee during Standing Head to Knee pose. On the negative side, the "airplane" pose (on belly with arms extended out to the sides and legs raised) felt like I literally was trying to lift a Boeing 747. My body did not want to rise to my commands!
(photo from abc-of-yoga.com)

CHLOE

Chloe and I went for a walk yesterday near Big Rock Garden. The sun was shining and she was happy to roam and sniff around. Chloe is getting a haircut tonight---her dreds are gettin' in her way.

Texas Sheet Cake Bars vs. Triangle Pose---the ugly truth!

Texas Sheet Cake Bars

What happens when you wake up wanting chocolate---not milk chocolate---not semi-sweet chocolate BUT that pure cocoa taste? My mind was telling me to forget it, but my sugar heart was saying "DO IT!!" I knew I wasn't going to yoga class until late afternoon---so I had time.

Still, I left the house and walked the Toad Lake Loop with my neighbor Jeanne. She is very sweet---we like to talk about everything and anything. Eventually our conversation turned to baking---she had just made a blackberry pie and we talked about pectin vs. cornstarch!! Imagine that???

When I returned from the walk I was feeling smug---I had just gotten some exercise and that is when I got out the recipe for Texas Sheet Cake. I have had this recipe for a really LONG time---a classic. I hope you like my stylized Texas Sheet Cake bars photo. Those pink petals are from the peonies in my yard. Why does exercise make you think you deserve a reward??

Oh my, the baking was fun---the house smelled great---the bars looked delicioso! I put half in the freezer and took a big bar to my yoga instructor Karin. She got a big grin when I put the foil covered plate on the counter for her. She likes sweets but it is obvious by her petite body that she doesn't indulge often....and of course, she has a great TRIANGLE POSE.


TRIANGLE POSE

Triangle pose is the one pose that people just starting Bikram yoga really hate. I remember, when I first started, it just seemed like the instructors made you hold the pose F-O-R-E-V-E-R. It is a pose that just takes time to build the stamina to hold. A person can usually get into the pose pretty easily but you quickly run out of energy to hold it. It is a very physical pose---the mantra is that it works every muscle, cell and organ in your body! I believe it.

Over time I have been able to get pretty good at TRIANGLE POSE. I incorporate more and more of the specific instructions for this pose into my daily practice. There are about 10 tweaks the instructors encourage you to work on with TRIANGLE POSE. At this point it is about 10% physical and 90% mental. Hey---Sting is on my Shuffle playing Hearts of Gold....love it!!

THE UGLY TRUTH!

Well even though I put half the bars in the freezer, gave a big chunk away and Jon ate some---those bars ruined my good exercise efforts yesterday! Walking, Bikram class with a very good TRIANGLE POSE weren't enough to reverse the damage. Oh well---today is a new day for exercise. 9:15am class is on the schedule!

Ok, Ok, Ok...here is a Healthy Cookie....well sort of!

COOKIES!!!


In our house, we call these HEALTHY COOKIES...only because they are cholesterol free. So....healthy is just a mind set because these cookies are calorie laden for sure. On the other hand...they are protein packed and have complex carbohydrates to keep you going.

I created the recipe by experimenting, after my husband Jon went on a very low cholesterol diet, a few years back. Try these out---you will enjoy them, I promise! Once I substituted dried cranberries for the chocolate when I needed to take a goodie to a morning meeting. Everyone loved the new breakfast cookies.

Healthy Cookies
1 c. peanut butter
1 c. brown sugar
1 large egg white
1 tsp. vanilla
1/4 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
1 c. old fashioned oats
semi sweet chocolate chips
Mix first 4 ingredients together. Add salt,soda and oats and stir. Add choc. chips to your liking. Place by on a baking sheet sprayed with PAM. Bake for 6-10 minutes, depending on your oven. Cool on a wire rack.

YOGA!!!

I have been in a bit of a slump the last few days. Two days ago when I went to yoga, I was so drained at the end of class that I just laid there for a bit. My body became one with the floor and I FELL ASLEEP stretched out on my mat!! It was a short 10 minute nap, but I woke up all alone in the yoga room.

One of my favorite children's authors is William Steig...the famous New Yorker cartoonist and author of Shrek, Doctor DeSoto, Sylvester and the Magic Pebble, Spinky Sulks, The Toy Brother and the list goes on and on. At the end of DoctorDeSoto, there is a line which reads..." And they stumbled down the stairs in a daze." That would definetely classify me the other day after my post yoga class NAP! The Bellingham Bikram studio is a long 15 step flight up in an old building and I stumbled down those stairs in a daze. However, some healthy cookies soon helped me recover.

This morning class was better! So...when you have a down day at anything, you just got to get right back and try it again. The yoga studio owner, FRED, always reminds us that....."Nobody can do for you... what you can do for yourself!" It is so true. Have a great day and BE HAPPY!

Day 6 -- Curly Dog, Straight Leg and Sugar Needed!

Standing Head to Knee Pose

Standing Bow Pulling Pose


DAY 6 YOGA POSES I STILL CAN'T MASTER!!

The top image is called standing head to knee pose. You do this pose in three stages, as shown. First stage: straight standing leg, with a locked knee. The tricky part here is to keep your knee locked and also raise the other leg high enough and then turn your foot back towards your face. Middle Stage: Same as first stage, but you also pull your elbows down and try to get them past your calves on the extended leg! Pretty "do-able". Stage Three: Here is my problem---I can only bend my head down and touch my knee about 40% of the time. I almost always lose my balance!! It is a very pretty pose though, don't you think?? (photo from:acyuta-adney.blogservice.in)


Standing Bow Pulling Pose: Now, honestly...this person must be a former dancer---to be able to get the back leg arched up like that is really hard. I can balance and stay in this pose (it is a longer pose) comfortably with concentration. I can get my foot to point up over the back of my head BUT , trust me, I don't have a beautiful back leg extension like this photo. I am going to keep trying. Also tricky in this pose is to keep your free arm and hand extended straight and hovering around your eyebrow. Most people tend to dip the arm down. (photo from Google images)


COOKIES!!

No cookies today...it is sunny and warm, so too nice to bake! This afternoon, we gave Chloe a bath and now she is nice and fuzzy! She looks as if we just took a million little pin curls out !


We grilled halibut tonight and ate outside on the deck. Lots of birds---saw a hummingbird buzzing near a tree while we were dining. After dinner we took a walk with Chloe around the neighborhood. Great summery evening here in Bellingham.

DAY 5---9:15am YOGA CLASS

What I like about the instructors at Bellingham's Bikram studio is that they motivate you to keep trying, keep coming and to keep your yoga moving forward! It has turned out to be a great form of exercise and stress reliever for ME!

Instruction I hear daily that keeps me moving:

• "Don't give up on me now!"

• "Do your best. If you try to do the pose as it is instructed, if you try your best and you don't give up.... you will receive 100 % of the benefits !"

• "Make it look easy. You might not feel so good on the inside but don't show it on the outside. You can do this!"

• "No monster faces here. It is only yoga, so don't look like you have your finger smashed in a drawer. You have your whole life time to work on this yoga!"

COOKIES!!

Hey guess what? Butter is on sale somewhere this week. I plan to drive by the groceries real S-L-O-W and ponder the possibilities. Then I will continue on past Avenue Bread during their early morning baking hours. No, I am not buying, but just enjoying the wafting scents of butter, butter, butter and yum-- cinnamon and sugar too! This is known as a drive by, full calorie, high sniff moment! After that I plan to wash it all down with the scents coming from Starbucks. I probably will have gained a pound, so I will be continuing on to yoga.

Tomorrow is going to be a real baking day! Do you have a cookie suggestion?

From the Forest Park Days!

DAY 4----YOGA at 4:15pm TODAY
Hi everyone! My summer walking partners, Jeanne, Mary and Dan are all out of town, so Chloe and I journeyed alone this morning. Chloe is happy to walk and sniff no matter who is around. I was wearing a fleece today, on June 21st, and it is really getting ridiculous! We are desperate for warm, sunny summer weather.





COOKIES!!
When we were teeny boppers, my sister Patti and I loved our family set of Better Homes and Garden's Cookbooks. During those long summers, we would swim all day at Sequoia Pool and then come home and make recipes from our new cookbooks. Mom didn't really like to bake, so she was willing to be the clean-up gal during our batch baking days. Can you imagine how sloppy-doppy two girls could be baking? Mom never complained and always encouraged our recipe work! One summer my brother Matt had knee surgery. During his recovery, Patti and I told him he could pick out any recipe from the Cookies and Candies book and we would make it for him. "ANY RECIPE...ANYTHING?" he clamored. With glee, he chose CHOCOLATE YUMMIES. The thing about baking for Matt was that he was always appreciative and gobbled up anything! I remember Matt eating those CHOCOLATE YUMMIES while sitting on the couch with his leg propped up. We all loved those cookies and made them many times. I bet you could substitute flour for the "biscuit mix"and add leavening.

Chocolate Yummies

1-- 4 oz. package chocolate pudding
2 cups Bisquick type mix
1/2 cup gran. sugar
1 slightly beaten egg
1/4 cup. milk
1/4 cup. butter, melted
1 tsp. vanilla
1 --1/3 cups. flaked coconut
chocolate frosting
walnut halves

Combine dry pudding mix, Bisquick mix, and sugar. Beat in next four ingredients. Stir in coconut. Drop from teaspoon onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 11-13 minutes. Remove to cooling rack. Spread frosting on cooled cookies and top with walnut halves. Makes about 3 dozen cookies.