Essentials: Trader Joe's Buttermilk Protein Pancake Mix (Review)

I love Sunday mornings. Especially summer mornings. A short stack of buttermilk pancakes with fresh June strawberries and I'm a happy girl. When I was at Trader Joe's Saturday night picking up ingredients for Caprese sandwiches, I was excited to see that they were carrying a new protein pancakes mix. I picked up a box of Trader Joe's Buttermilk Protein Pancakes Mix (just add water!) along with a container of organic strawberries for breakfast on Sunday mornings.

I was setting the bar low on these. I've tried protein pancakes in the past, and typically the chalky taste and texture make it hard for me to get past the first bite. As I whipped up a batch of these pancakes yesterday morning, I actually had a back-up plan of scrambled eggs ready to roll if these were inedible.

The instructions called to mix the pancakes with just water. Instead, I added half water/half fresh squeezed orange juice and orange zest. With ingredients that included whole wheat flour and whole grain oat flour, the wet mixture was brown and had the look of high fiber bread. I sliced the strawberries and put them aside.

In a nonstick pan on low-medium heat, I added a little butter for taste and then the mixture in small puddles. As they bubbled, I added strawberries to the little mounds. (If you don't want your pancakes to turn blue when adding blueberries or pink when adding other berries,  add the berries to the top of each bubbling pancake while the first side cooks.)  I flipped them over and they were surprisingly golden and fluffy. Just a couple of minutes more and the pancakes were ready.  I had Trader Joe's maple syrup on the table but we didn't even need it.  The strawberries added the perfect sweetness.One bite and we were hooked. There was no chalky/protein aftertaste. They were the best pancakes I've ever made. They even passed the husband and toddler test.

Our house pancakes mix used to be Snoqualmie Falls Lodge Pancake & Waffle Mix but it's now this one from Trader Joe's. Not only are these pancakes restaurant quality but each serving has 1 gram of fat, 0 cholesterol, 3 grams of fiber, less than 1 gram of sugar and 10 grams of protein.

I'm looking forward to trying these with lemon zest + fresh blueberries and in the fall, substituting the water with spiced apple cider.

Trader Joe's Buttermilk Protein Pancake Mix is $3.49 a box.

Sunrise Yoga at Walt Disney World

Today is International Yoga Day and at Walt Disney World, 2000 lucky cast members got their meditation on at Be Well Sunrise Yoga in the Magic Kingdom (in total, 21 Disney locations in all participated!) If you've wondered what it would be like to do heaven and earth pose in front of Cinderella Castle, get your yoga mat and pose along. (I just did it along with them and the combination of yoga + sunrise in the Magic Kingdom is pretty magical.)

In the future, if you want to skip the introductions, and join in, yoga poses begin at 22:00.

Have a happy weekend and namaste!

you light up

I was talking with someone recently and she was so into the subject that she was talking about, it was like she was radiating joy. I could feel it bouncing off of her. I love that. I love when someone is so passionate about what they love that they glow. It's one of my favorite things.

The Summer of '19 Playlist

Summer is my favorite season. I think of the scent of Bain de Soleil, the sun warm on my skin, playing with my friends in the pool or the ocean and nights wearing a cool, white linen dress walking in a beach town somewhere. Music is such a visceral part of my life that when a song plays that reminds me of summer, I can't help but get in a good mood.

Here's my playlist for this summer. These songs just make me happy. I hope you enjoy it too. What songs remind you of summer?

Why forgiveness is essential to happiness

Last week I was so angry with someone who let me down that I stayed awake all night stewing about it. I couldn't fall asleep because in my mind I kept having various conversations with them about why I was upset. Somewhere around 4:30am, as I stared at the clock and listened to the birds start stirring outside our window, I had a realization. I don't think you can move forward into joy while you still harbor resentment. It's a like a shade blocking out light.

I realized that forgiveness was something that I needed to do for myself. It doesn't matter how well we know someone, we don't know exactly why someone does the things that he or she does. Whatever happened, happened in the past and what you or I can control is what is happening right now. You may have been wronged. It could be something minor or something that seems unforgivable. The thing is, that forgiveness doesn't mean that you have forgotten what happened. What is means is that you are letting go of the way that the hurt felt. When you are angry with someone it permeates your life. You run conversations in your head. Your other relationships suffer because you're either in such a bad mood or you are protecting your heart in case someone hurts you like that again.

Forgiving doesn't make you weak. It doesn't mean that you are accepting of someone's actions or that you don't expect more of them. When you forgive, you shake your heart out of all of those little bits of anger/sadness/frustration/disappointment that stick in your soul like angry little poppyseeds.

If someone asks for your forgiveness, if they seem sincere, give it to them. Chances are, they are embarrassed or humiliated that they caused you angst. Yes, yes, there is the chance that they either have no idea that they upset you or the did the action on purpose and they have no regret for hurting you. In this case, still forgive. You can forgive without telling someone. Forgiveness happens in your heart and radiates outward.

Mr. Rogers said "Forgiveness is a strange thing. It can sometimes be easier to forgive our enemies that our friends. It can be hardest of all to forgive people we love. Like all of life's important coping skills, the ability to forgive and the capacity to let go of resentments most likely take root very early I our lives." (This is one of what seems like a million things I am teaching Waverly.)

I am making the decision to forgive my friend who hurt me because I don't want to carry this hurt in my heart. I don't want this anger to keep chafing the inside of my soul like the back of a shoe on a blister.  Forgiveness is a salve. Forgive and heal. There is no downside. There is no price to forgiveness. If you think that staying angry is an answer, it isn't. Who does the anger help? Do you feel better when you're angry? No and while you may not want to continue a relationship with the person who acted thoughtlessly (maybe not now, maybe not ever),  forgiveness cleans out the negative clutter that stops you from moving forward. In the best case scenario, you and there other person move past what happened and you're stronger for it. In some cases, you move forward alone. You still have a soul/heart/mind that no longer carrying the albatross of hate.

I hope whatever or whoever you need to forgive, happens this week. I hope you have a happy week.

xo

How to get the things done you don't want to do

Last week I finally crossed some things off my to-do list that had been on there so long that I automatically just looked past them to get to the other tasks. I realized, though, that these things that weren't getting done were like a heavy weight on my shoulders. I kept telling myself that I had to get them done but because they took too much mental or physical energy, I just kept putting them off.

I decided that I needed to revisit my list and decide if I actually really needed to get these things done. So, I took them one by one. Would it be a bad thing if I didn't do it or pushed it off? In the things that I had on my list,  the answer was that ALL of them needed my attention. I needed to book travel to the east coast. I needed to revisit graduate school and decide if I wanted to continue. I needed to sell or give away the things that no longer suited Waverly who is fast approaching two years-old!

I gave myself one week to take action on every single one of these. I booked travel. I decided that I wouldn't continue graduate school while Waverly is still so young. I made a phone call that I didn't want to make (but am glad I did.) I sold some of Waverly's baby things and have set aside every Monday to go through more of her things until I am caught up and our guest room no longer looks like a baby shower exploded in there.

I found that the key to getting things done that I have been putting off was to schedule time in my calendar to focus completely on this task. When the alarm went off, I shut off my phone, closed my email and focused solely on the task at hand. I gave myself a finite amount of time to make a decision or to at least begin the process that I had been putting off.

Once I had checked off everything on my list, I felt this sense of lightness. It was like my desk was piled with messy files and it was now clean and organized. I was proud of the progress that I made and that after several months of staring at the Reminders app on my phone, I was finally able to delete the tasks. I don't know how to even describe how good it feels to accomplish the things that I have been putting off. I feel so light and happy. I think when your head is somewhere else, it's hard for happiness to find its way to you.

I hope that this month  you make room for light in your life too.