A Letter to Coach On Our 2nd Anniversary

On May 21, 2013 Coach and I celebrated our TWO year anniversary. Although this was nearly a month ago, I didn’t want to pass up the opportunity to write a sweet love letter publicly on my little corner of the dot com. 

On our actual anniversary we were in Atlanta enjoying an evening in the big city and chowing down on an ahhhhmazing dinner feast at Fogo de Chao. 

We were also spending some much needed time with friends and family. I’ll have to post more about that… for now, here is a mushy letter to my one and only…

Dear Coach,

Can you believe we have been married for TWO years?! I mean, it seems like a few months ago we were sharing cheese dip at La Hacienda. Now look, that restaurant has already been four different establishments and we consider cheese dip a HUGE cheat meal! On the day we said our vows I was 100% positive that I would follow you anywhere your little football loving heart sent you. I love that we live in the perfect little small town, coach five sports between the both of us, and love every single minute of it! 

You are still the funniest man I know, you can make me laugh when I feel like I can’t make it another minute. When I am struggling with worrying, you know exactly what to say to make the worries seem insignificant. You are still the best person to go see any movie with, even the super girly vampire loving ones. Even two years later you still seem to be the absolute worst shopping partner around if it is in a store that doesn’t sell golf shirts or tennis shoes. I’m ok with knowing this now. It may or may not have taken me two years to learn to say, “Hey, you go to Hibbit’s and meet me back here when you are finished!” This seems to work best for us. It also took you two years, and a bigger DVR memory to understand the fact that I will constantly have 10 or more episodes of Y & R waiting to be watched. I’ve also learned that scheduling anything during the months of August-November (especially on a Saturday) comes with the possibility of me attending alone.  

Some things will never get old… no matter how many years we’ve been married! Your love for football and the desire to wear your ‘game day’ outfit which consists of khakis and your RED Ga shirt has become somewhat of a stability factor for me. 

It’ll never get old that you wake up every Friday with a smile and say, “It’s game day!” 

 It will also never get old hearing you talk back to umpires on the baseball field. (Always know I have your back, Coach.) Also, is it OK that I know all of your signs. I'll let you know if a kid misses one. (SFSS) I can't say enough how proud I am of you and the dreams that are coming true. Some say it is your speed and agility... I say it is just because I know you are that great of a Coach and leader. 

Hearing you pray each night for our students and players (some by name) will also never get old and also makes me fall in love with you all over again. Will the fact that you refer to me as you ‘smokin’ hot wife’ even after runs ever get old?! I hope not! Like I said, you are responsible for 90% of my smiles. (I’d like to think the other 10% comes from me just being that happy!) 

Even though I am guilty of not saying thanks enough…

Thanks for knowing I’m not a morning person. Thanks for packing the best cooler and always having this part under control. Thanks for knowing that I hate cooking on Fridays. Thanks for being at every race. Thanks for always reading my blogs and never talking about them! Thanks for loving Dub, even though you’ll never say it. Thanks for listening to all of my school stories no matter how silly they sound. Thanks for doing the dishes on the nights that I may be close to a meltdown for not having a dishwasher. Thanks for never mentioning the random and frequent charges from Barnes and Nobel. Thanks for understanding that shopping cures everything and that I can NEVER have too many clothes in my closet. Most of all, thanks for being the perfect man for me and always being the rock I seek. You da bomb, Coach! 

I pray we never lose our love for dancing to every song together. 

I pray we always remember... For Wins and for Losses!  

I love you,

Carley

A Few Meal Ideas &&& A Breakfast Muffin

*I am FAR from a professional and you should ALWAYS seek professional advice when changing your diet. This is a personal blog with my personal ideas! 

Since summer is here and it is the perfect opportunity to start buying “clean” groceries, I thought this would be the perfect time to share some of our favorite meals. Since joining the AdvoCare family, I see LOTS of folks purchasing the 24 Day Challenge and then post on social media asking for recipes. Well, these are just a FEW of some meals that we eat while on the challenge as well as every night. Summer produce is currently at the cheapest price, so take my advice, start now! You’ll fall in love with the results and see the many benefits of clean eating and realize the price is worth it! I also love visiting some local produce stands. They know me by name!  

We LOVE juicing. It is really the BEST way that we have found to get in all of our needed fruit and vegetable servings. However, we also LOVE eating. Plus, about 1.5 months ago, we made the decision to hit the gym at 5am each morning. We needed a ‘food’ to start our day! I searched on Pinterest for some clean recipes and found these little muffins. I could never get the link to work, but the recipe is in the Pinterest picture. I started using this exact recipe until I found out what I liked and didn’t like. Now I am confident enough to share the recipe that I have created with you. The secret is cinnamon!  I make a pan of 12 and eat 2 on the way to the gym each morning. I LOVE them! (I may also have one if I need a quick snack.) 

Here is what I use:

3 cups of oats (uncooked)

2 tsp. baking powder

4 egg whites

1 ¼ cup of vanilla almond milk

1-2 mashed banana

1 tsp. vanilla extract

Hand full of dark chocolate chips

1/3 cup of shredded coconut

A light coating of ground cinnamon

1/3 cup of honey

Mix all ingredients in a mixer. I found the mixer is easier to properly blend each ingredient. The mixture will look a bit soupy… no worries!

Then fill a muffin pan with batter. Bake at 350* for 15-18 minutes.

I just place all muffins in a storage container and leave them in the fridge. I heat 2 at a time in the good ole microwave. This is my pre-workout “meal.”

I drink a fresh breakfast juice after my workout. (All thanks to the best hubs in the world that gets up 30 minutes before me just to juice everything.) Or, if it was a killer... which some days are... I have a meal replacement shake. 

For a snack I will eat some of these ammmmaaaazing peanut butter energy bites. Here is the recipe from Pinterest. 

NOTE: Before you eat a ton of flax seed, you may want to check if you are allergic. I was sharing some of my “cookies” with a coworker and she had no clue she was allergic! It was not good. 

I like the small chicken tenders from the grill and like to grill about 15 on a Sunday to have as a snack. I just marinade them with lemon juice and lemon pepper. Delish. (Yeah, Coach and I are the folks eating cold chicken tenders at 10am.) 

For lunch we have a green juice or some leftovers from the night before. If I am starving… I will have some brown rice with black beans. (I LOVE black beans and sometimes eat them instead of meat for dinner.) 

Afternoon snacks are usually almonds, or some natural peanut butter, celery, or my current obsession: hummus and carrots. 

Dinner… ahhh… dinner. This is usually the meal that challengers struggle with. It is easier to stay on track with everything packed for you while you are away at work. When you get home you usually have the temptation of whatever is in your pantry. (For me right now it is chocolate ice cream that Dub must have bought the other day….) 

I could eat shrimp at every meal. Seriously. As well as mushrooms. So, you will find a pattern of meals consisting of shrimp and mushrooms. 

 This was probably the easiest meals! Baked fish, baked shrimp, and mushrooms. I placed everything on the pan and baked! I am sure I used fresh lemon juice over it all. I may have served this all over brown rice. Brown rice is a popular side as well. We usually eat every meal with a salad.

 I had some crab cakes that were delicious. I decided to bake them. We had a salad, and some quinoa.

 If I have any left over tenders, then I always have them with a salad. This is probably my favorite night for dinner. So quick, so easy, and no mess! LOVE!

 Coach was showing off with this meal! All clean, and all delicious. As you can tell, we don't like nasty food!

 This makes me want some rice! Brown rice, mushrooms, black beans, grilled lean porkchops, with a salad.

I have started marinading all meat in fruit juice that I juice myself. so far we haven't found one we don't like. I loved the chicken in pineapple juice! 

We also eat a TON of asparagus, avocados, cucumbers, and I will add a sliced tomato to any meal. During a hot summer night, you can't go wrong with fresh cool veggies! 

Let me know if any of this is helpful! I love feedback! 
Love love, 
C^2