Vegan-ish

First things first....  We have a family membership to the Indianola Country Club and John is very good about taking the girls out to the driving range or to golf some holes. They are avid watchers of Big Break and it appears that John is successfully passing on his love of golf.... at least to Ava. More than anything I think they love the time with him and learning a sport he cares about. 

Friday afternoon John took Ava out for her first complete 9 hole round. She came back beaming, clutching her scorecard so proud of what she had done.  While John and Ava were golfing the club pro encouraged her to enter the Club Junior Tournament on Monday.  There will be four girls her age, supervised by one of the girls mothers...  They play 9 holes and when they get to 9 shots they pick up their ball and move on to the next hole.  Ava is so excited to participate! This morning she is already asking John to go to the driving range to practice.

Her first scorecard....

For the past few months John and I have been making passing references to each other about incorporating more vegetarian meals into our weekly menus. We both like to cook, we both love to eat... and even though we generally eat pretty healthy there's still plenty of not-so-healthy food that is part of our weekly menus. 

After I fractured my elbow I sort of used the injury and subsequent pity party as an excuse to eat whatever struck my fancy. Not only have I gained a few pounds, but I am feeling sluggish.  There's been a lot of news in the last few years about Bill Clinton's diet/lifestyle change.  I've done some reading and there's no doubt a plant based diet has significant health benefits.  By no stretch do I think we are going to eliminate meat or indulgent meals from our diet, but we are going to lean in to it a bit and to prepare plant based meals more frequently. 

Last night we had a tomato and chickpea salad from a vegan cooking blog... (we used canned chickpeas instead of soaking and cooking dried beans)

Well, Amelia had leftover pizza and some oranges after a few requisite bites of chickpeas....

And Ava had leftover BBQ Chicken and a banana after her bites of salad....

This was my dinner - it was tasty and filing and I felt great when I was done eating it...

I did enjoy a couple of pieces of bacon with some toast for breakfast this morning, but plan to eat last night's leftovers for lunch.  I think it is an experiment worth trying...