I MADE PUMPKIN PUREE!

It seems that the awesome weather we've been having is moving out, but this morning was still beautiful. I was able to get in a great 2 mile run and see Jason & the girls before leaving for work. That's a great morning.

Once I got into work I really needed some coffee so I made myself a little treat. I mixed 1/2 c vanilla soymilk, 2 T chocolate syrup and 1 c of coffee together to make my own mocha.

YUM!

And I'm representin' in my St Louis mug...

:)

Then I made my Sunday oats. Today's mixture is tweaked (barely) with the usual almond butter, pumpkin butter, vanilla soymilk and dried cherries, but I chopped up half of a honey crisp apple into it as well. It was so filling and gave it layers of different textures that I like in a meal.

The PERFECT combo for breakfast.

The day went smooth. Nothing too unusual or exciting happened - surprisingly. When you deal with close to 200 kids all day something exciting almost always happens, but today was pretty calm - for me anyway.

Lunch time rolled around and I took my normal sandwich and added the other half of the honey crisp apple to it, warmed it up in the microwave and served it right next to a really sweet banana.

The tofurky causes people to do a double take when they see me eating it. I can tell they're asking themselves in their mind, "Isn't she a vegetarian?" YEP! I am, and this tofurky is soooo good.

Isn't that sandwich GINORMOUS?!

After lunch I got to work on the pumpkin puree I was talking about yesterday.

I cooked the pumpkins for about another half an hour this afternoon

(for a total of 1 1/2 hours at 350 degrees)

Then let them cool.

Once they were cool I used a spoon to scrape the meat away from the flesh.

(not a term you hear vegetarians say often - huh?)

I dumped it all into a food processor.

I added a couple tablespoons of vanilla, some cinnamon and brown sugar to taste and then a tad bit of water to thin it out for the pancakes. We have a number of kids who can't have cow's milk (mine being one) and other's who can't have soy milk so water was the best option.

Then just blend away!

It came out really smooth and creamy and the taste was so fall-y. I can't wait for the kids to try these pancakes.

After I was done and cleaning up I started to get the rest of the pumpkins out of the box because I'm going to cook the rest tomorrow and freeze the puree I get from them for later. I noticed a couple of the pumpkins on the bottom were getting soft and mushy and wanted them gone before they ruined what I had left and I found a friend lurking in the box...

So I put him on a paper towel and took him outside so that he didn't get killed.

One good deed for the day? Check.

I'm home now to get those dishes from last night done!

I'm going to eat my snack really quickly...

Then go pick up Regan from school. She was getting ready to go outside when I was leaving and I hated to take away what might end up being one of her last outdoor days for a while so I left her there. Linsey's at dance so we will have to pick her up after that and then come home, do homework and make dinner. Tuesday's are rough days ( I say that every week) so bed will follow very shortly.

Until we meet again...