So...whats for dinner?

Michelle - All the best wishes coming your way for your tests tomorrow.  Think dinner will be an apple with caramel dipping sauce.

Michelle,



My thoughts and prayers added to all those expressed here for nothing short of spectacular news tomorrow!!! You are in my thoughts tonight and will be thinking of you tomorrow!

That's hysterical, Deb! I couldn't make this stuff up....and you find it!



Caring thoughts going along with you tomorrow, Michelle. And have a great late lunch!



Was baking cookies all day, so we ordered pizza and Greek salad for dinner to avoid having to shift gears and cook serious food in the midst of cookie dough everywhere.

Hi everyone - 

I'm salivating over susan's ravioli photo!  

I haven't been reading/posting much since Friday so I just spent the last few moments catching up on the thread.  

Michelle - thoughts and prayers from here as well!

My Moisturel came in the mail yesterday.  Tried it on my hands but haven't tried it on my face yet.  And re: popcorn . . . I am a popcorn addict.  My latest favorite way to make it is to pop it in a paper sack in the microwave (no oil) and then sprinkle on extra virgin olive oil and pink Himalayan salt AND my very latest favorite addition:  fresh lemon juice.  And then, I eat it with a spoon!  

The other day hubby brought home four treats from the office that his former assistant had grabbed for him (he only goes into the main office one day a week).  Four popcorn packages shaped like ice cream cones filled with four different popcorn flavors.  (1) chocolate covered (it was REALLY good (2) caramel (pretty good) (3) kettle corn (hubby ate that one (4) cheese flavored (hubby ate that one as well).  

This is the website - Popcornopolis in El Segundo, CA. 

http://www.popcornopolis.com/?irsrc=adwords_search&gclid=CJCS-K_upbQCFUxxQgodpkcARw

The one I liked so much is called Zebra chocolate.  

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Tonight's dinner for us was Panda fast-food Chinese.  I had the Firecracker Chicken - only 240 calories - with vegetables and a teeny bit of rice.  Pretty good!  Lots of hot peppers and yellow peppers.  

We made homemade soup yesterday.  Vegetable with brussel sprouts, kale, cauliflower, broccoli, onions, carrots, garlic, basil, salt, pepper.  I had made up a large pan of quinoa the day before so for leftovers, we stir in a big spoonful of quinoa with the soup and it really makes for a nice flavor/texture.  

The other night we went to California Pizza Kitchen for dinner and we both ordered a new salad on their menu:

Arugula

Quinoa

Sun Dried tomatoes

Feta Cheese

Asparagus

Red onions

Champagne vinaigrette (hubby went with that - I chose my favorite CPK dressing instead - dijon vinaigrette). 

It was a very good salad.  VERY filling.  They had run out of bread and the minute we saw it we were skeptical.  As it turns out - they had run over to BJ's (another chain - not sure if it's exclusive to California or not) and bought bread from them.  Weirdest bread ever.  It was like eating slices of angel food cake!  Other than that, it was a good meal and one of the rare times when I deviated from my all-time favorite CPK menu item/craving which is the Tri-Colore Pizza Salad.  

Wishing you all the best for the holidays and beyond.  I love coming to this thread and reading about the food and moreover, your lives and thoughts... 

Deb that picture is hysterical  Someone is very creative.

WOW on all that popcorn LeeA  My hubby is the popcorn fanatic in this house, although I like it too.  He of course can only do the traditional and wont try anything different. Anything with caramel or chocolate is ok with me!

Michelle Good luck with your scans today.

Last night wanted to use up the ham so made a wine sauce with te diced up ham, onions, mushrooms and a can of diced tomatos and lots of garlic and mixed with penne pasta...very yummy and easy.

Grocery store trip today and probably a big taco salad for dinner tonight.

Laurie, I also hope,you can get some to wrap gifts, unassisted! I agree with Michelle, that even if you have to pare down, you have provided some very nice holiday events for your boys already!



I actually went to the mall today....my only shopping trip of this season....only got there b/c I was picking up some borrowed baby paraphernalia for the upcoming visit, and that friend lived really close to the mall. It worked out well, since I was able to get DH a gift that I had totally forgotten he asked for. Whew! I will not be rushing back anytime soon...hope there are no returns.



When I got home I learned from my DS2 that he arranged for his company's charitable fund to donate a nice large sum of $$$ to Breast Cancer.org. He had asked me for suggestions of non-profits that I thought would benefit, since he has been on this committee for a couple of years now and he was running out of new ideas of orgs that he knows well. So he pitched it to me and I offered him some ideas with this great org being at the top of the list. Always happy to see big business being socially responsible.



Meanwhile, DS1 and DDIL let us know this week about a death in her extended family. We will all be going to the funeral services in RI on Fri and Sat, then they will be coming up for a few days from there. This is an especially tough week for families to experience a loss....for so many reasons.



I am a bit crazed about prep for the "meet the baby" open house we're having on Sunday given that a lot more people are planning to come than I had guessed would. I'm sure it will all work out. Off to the food store.....

Dodging snowflakes to travel to the city for our casino overnight today. I'm glad the world is due to end tomorrow and not today. I'm due for a prime rib dinner this evening with a piece of red velvet cake for dessert that I don't want to miss.



Anybody else have special meal plans for today, our last day together ;-)

Lol Nancy!! DH and I were thinking about going out to dinner on Sunday as kind of a 'calm before the chaos' kind of thing.... Maybe we should go tonight instead.

So here is the email exchange between my oncologist and me today:

Me:   had the scan earlier this afternoon.  I have a copy of the CD - looks like I
lit it up like a Christmas tree.  I guess I'm not entirely surprised with the
27.29 results.  Sure hope the carboplatin performs some magic!

Dr. Walsh: Just looked at the scan. Ugh! Hopefully Carbo will be the Grinch to your unwelcome Christmas tree.  See you next week.

I guess that says it all.  At least she has a sense of humor!

Got the new wig today and the folks were fantastic.  They processed all the paperwork so it will be an insurance claim and I left there without having to cough up a dime.  It's a little darker but it has that "razor-cut" look.  And bless their hearts, they know how to fix the wigs I have so they will fit better.  They can actually take a couple rows of hair and webbing out of the cap!  Who knew?  They had more than 300 wigs in stock!  I could have gotten a free one from the ACS supply that they had, but nothing floated my boat.

Michelle, I strongly second your dr.'s hope that your treatment douses those Christmas lights. 

DH took advantage of my absence this afternoon and baked dozens and dozens of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.  This is an annual Christmas ritual with him.  We'll bag up cookies for the neighbors and have cookies left for Christmas day.  Now if I can just resist eating them. 

My mother wasn't feeling well enough for me to take her to have her hair done today so I cooked some chicken pasta soup and took to her.  I had a bowl with her and it was pretty good. 

Michelle, your onc is probably so glad to have such a well-informed patient who can maintain her own sense of humor, at a serious time.



Susan, you are really doing a lot for someone who is going through energy draining treatment. Any way you can cut back on the holiday food prep expectations?



DH helped me (a lot!) wrap gifts today since we needed to get the place cleared out a bit....for the housecleaner...and for Daryan, the tornado, who arrives tomorrow night, a day early due to funeral arrangements which DS1 and DDIL will attend Saturday while we babysit him. Talk about feeling like we need our ducks lined up! At least with some non-rainy weather on Sat we can spend active time outdoors. I had asked DDIL about any of his favorite toys she was going to bring, and she said that " he really doesn't need anything since when he goes to new places he just gets involved with everything that is there. LOL! DH and I looked around and roared! So I kept several gifts unwrapped to keep his attention on those. We'll see if we need to dismantle everything on our many shelves before he does. Kid proofing has been so long ago for us...

Michelle - Is that you Jane??  It does look like a cute wig, you say only a little darker. Great they can modify your others. Here's hoping for kicking the c*** out of those lit up lights.

Susan - I made white chicken chili for a party last week. It's not gourmet but it went down GOOD. Off of Cooks.com. I vote for Mexican food. But I second Lacey who says can't you beg off of some of the heavy duty cooking. DB sent us a honey baked ham so guess what we're having???  DD is coming out BUT (and that's a big one) weather is talking tiniest chance of snow. She won't come if any chance. So no thawing of that frozen baby till I know for sure. DH and I couldn't begin to eat it and probably not even close with the 3 of us.