I have never tried this but I think it would be better cooked the night before and refrigerated. I would experiment when to add the fruits and nuts until you get the right formula.

I was thinking that you could make a muffin out of the oatmeal, adding in the flaxseed and nuts, possibly even banana or apple. Bake up a batch and eat one each morning. You can grind up plain rolled oats to make oat flour rather than using regular flour.

I do the muffin thing, as Allison has described.

The base is a cup and a half of rolled oats, one cup of whole wheat flour and a half cup of ground flaxseed.

Leavening is a teaspoon of baking soda and a teaspoon of baking powder.

Wet stuff is three bananas, mashed and stirred until they are pretty much liquid; three tablespoons of unsweetened apple sauce; two egg whites; and about a cup and a half of sugarfree syrup, the kind you put into coffee. Torani or DaVinci by preference. It can be any flavor.

Then the mix-ins. Any kind of nuts you want, any kind of dried fruit you want or any kind of fresh fruit. I favor walnuts and pecans, and have also tried sunflower seeds with coconut shavings.

Bake till they get brown. The flaxseed makes this happen fairly quickly.

I also split these at breakfast and spread almond butter or peanut butter on each half.

I freeze these in large batches and thaw as needed, warming up in the microwave if necessary. As you might imagine, these muffins require refrigeration.

These are my carry-with-me, portable breakfast for trips. Like at that horrible Travelodge this past weekend with its "Continental breakfast." Yeah, right. Nope. I had my muffin, I had a handful of almonds, I had a cup of plain nonfat Fage and I got some blueberries at the grocery store.

I'd give credit for the recipe but cannot remember its origins. Maybe it dates back to the American Low-Fat Period, when everyone replaced oil with mashed bananas and applesauce? But the flaxseed makes it sound a little more recent.

Hi APHIL...good to see you.

Love the veggie beds SHANNON...Angie and I are just about ready to start our summer garden....if we find time with these 2 GRANDdaughters....

Have you all seen my new pictures of them?

We love zucchini here! We eat it alot....

and I mean, some years, A LOT

Maintain your

DH got the "written" formal job offer via email yesterday. His first "big boy" job - at 50. Better late than never. And hopefully the "big boy" salary will follow.

I hope this lightens the mood at our house a bit. I would like to have some enjoyment of the coming of spring, the summer season, and my vacation! The last 2 years have been pretty tense and depressing.

Going to book my plane ticket now - been waiting for DH's job confirmation - as it's non-refundable. Going on vacation for me means organizing 20 or so people, 14 dogs, and DH! I am SO ready for a break.

He is too broke to go with me. That's a good thing. This is an exploratory vacation to see if Kelowna BC is suitable for restarting my dog walking business and for eventual retirement (Freedom 85?). I don't want to have to argue with DH and schlep him around my first time there.

If he's going to retire there with me he does have to come along on the second look.

Good hump day all!

Dagmar

Dagmar, congrats to your DH!

I tried soaking my oats overnight muesli-style. Not bad, but I think putting the 1C water + 1C milk was overkill on the liquid side. Perhaps I will just soak it in 1C milk tonight and see what happens, then drink some water with it in the morning. Alternative proposal is to soak the oats in some yogurt. In the past I've made "muesli" where I just mix up the dry oats with various other things and pour milk on it in the morning like cold cereal, but I don't really like the raw oat kind of texture.

The problem with making oatmeal muffins is that muffins are one of those foods that I have trouble not overeating. It's like they are too easy to eat and have less volume than my regular oatmeal, so I feel like I'm more likely to eat like five of them instead of one, or not feel satisfied after only one.

Dagmar, good news all around. I hope your plans all work out for you. Seems like you have been so patient, time for good news for you.

Jessica, I would have the same problems with muffins as you, freezing them makes no differance, defrosting them in the microwave takes only seconds.

I don't have an issue with the muffins, probably because I eat them as frequently as I do oatmeal. For me, daily familiarization and feeling absolutely assured of access at nearly all times seems to drive away temptation. Thankfully, since my bout with binge eating disorder many years ago was pretty horrible, and this time around, when I decided to lose weight, avoidance of heading in that direction determined about 70% of my actions, including settling for a higher healthy weight.

This weather is making me fantastically restless. I am going to have to drag out the lawn furniture onto the back deck and sit there sunning myself while working wirelessly on the laptop. It feels as if we're already well into May. The bird songs are getting more & more varied every morning. In the evenings, and even very early this morning, around 4:30 AM, the spring peepers are louder and more insistent than I can ever remember. It's like an orchestral crescendo in a movie soundtrack: What is this all leading to? Not just another sunny day. Some kind of breakthrough? What?

Dagmar, congrats to your DH! And I hope you get to enjoy your vacation, it definitely sounds like a needed break for you.

Jessica, I would have the same problem with muffins, unless I could just grab one on the way out the door and remove the issue of the rest of the batch there in my freezer/fridge.

Sad news this morning. DD did not get into CGU--which was her #1 choice for grad schools. So far she's only gotten accepted to UTAustin. I think there are a couple school back east that are still up in the air. But it means she'll be moving. Far away moving, and that makes me sad.

My in-laws were having some work done on their coach on Monday--a day that was incredibly cold (for us). I had the space heater in my office fired up all day (usually I only use it in the morning). The worker had the door to the coach open all day while MIL was there supervising the work. Tuesday, when they showed up for the dinner and show, she had caught a cold and was saying that it really hurt her chest. Yesterday she decided that she needed to be seen in the ER and she was diagnosed with pneumonia. She'll be ok. She's on meds now and she's in good health otherwise, so no worries.

Allison-- I'm sorry to hear that. While UT is my rival (dh and I met at Texas A&M), it is a great school, and Austin is a very interesting and fun place to live.

Allison, sorry about your MIL but she sounds like she knows how to take care of herself.
Sorry about DD news, but thats all part of growing up and moms and pops have to learn to let go.HARD !
Funny you had a cold day yesterday, here in No Ca it was beautiful, usually you get all the nice weather when it is cold and windy here.

Hi all,

I've enjoyed my spring break very much! My parents left this morning and of course I've got a zillion things to catch up on at work. I decided food-wise that their visit would be a maintenance week for me, and I think I did alright, though since it's also TOM I've been afraid to step on the scale. Since my parents are both on diets that certainly helped food-wise as they didn't want to get a bunch of desserts or drink a lot of caloric beach drinks. Mom and I got up every morning and took the dogs on long walks, and I kept up my NRLW workout schedule. Other than that I was a little bit lazy. I slept, read a lot (so did they), and did a few things around the house, and we just enjoyed visiting with each other. Emma was much better with their dog this year. Their dog doesn't like when other dogs get in his face, and last year puppy Emma didn't understand why he wouldn't play with her. She will be 2 tomorrow and is finally growing up. I love spring break!

I was happy to see my parents exercising and trying to eat well again. They're both yo-yo dieters, but the past several years have both regained weight and stopped exercising due to other stressors in their lives, new jobs, moving etc. Hopefully now that some of that stress is gone they will keep this up. I especially worry about my dad bc heart disease runs in his family, and he is on BP and cholesterol meds already (he's 58). My mom told me she is sure she'll get dimensia, since so many people in her family have it. I tried to encourage her to keep active and eat healthily as a preventative. It's hard not to worry about them sometimes.

Shannon, one zucchini plant is all you need. Also, one cucumber vine is all you need also. You will also be giving away cucumbers like crazy, even with one vine. But they are really delicious. I have so many each year I get too lazy to slice one up for work each day. I just stick the whole cucumber in the cooler with my lunch, and eat it apple style cold from the cooler in the afternoon heat. Very refreshing. I didn't get my garden bed cleared out during my "spring break" but hope to this weekend!

Allison, sorry your DD didn't get into her first choice but I've heard great things about UT and Austin from friends from there. Living far from my family I've learned it's not necessarily the map distance that matters, it is proximity to major airport hubs that is most important factor in travel. Bigger airports = cheaper flights & more frequent visits. I think Austin's got a pretty big one! I hope your MIL gets over her illness quickly. Scary how suddenly it came on.

Jessica, I make "overnight oats" in the summer. The basic recipe is one part oatmeal, one part milk, one part yogurt. I do 1/2 cup of each and use plain yogurt, but fruit varieties might be good too. I like to add cinnamon, chia seeds, 1/2 packet sweetener, and then chopped up fruit (banana, blueberries, or apple are my favorites), sometimes walnuts, etc etc. I do it assembly line style and add all the ingredients to 2-3 tupperware containers, stir, and refrigerate. I've made them as many as 3 nights in advance and it's always kept well for me. Very easy to grab and take to work with me when I have early field work.

Michele, your neighbor tried to kill his mother?! Yes, put that fence back up immediately!!!

Dagmar, when will your vacation be? Have a great time exploring a new place!

Gary, cute granddaughters!!! Thanks for sharing your pictures. My niece is almost 2 and she will be a big sister at the end of September. We're all very excited.

Nice to see you here Aphil! It sounds like your recovery is going smoothly. It's nice you got a doctor who is so understanding about your need to exercise.

Hi everyone else!

Thank you MEGAN being a GRANDparent is so cool.....

ya know I am 58 just like your dad....

and you fit right in with my son '81 and daughter '83....

Megan, sounds like a great spring break! It's nice that your mom went for walks with you, that's such a help in keeping with routine.

Allison, my sympathies to your DD, but glad to hear she's got at least one acceptance to fall on even though it's not her first choice. I'm in limbo right now with further school applications, so I really feel her pain.

Spring has definitely sprung in AZ, and my allergies are ruthless this season. It's so frustrating for me since I LOVE opening the windows, sitting outside, etc.

Tomorrow bf and I are planning to go to the Arizona Renn Faire, which I'm pretty excited about.