Afterthoughts was a Claire's-like store and one of my favorite stores as a tween. Since I was tall for my age (yeah, I was the tallest girl in my 5th grade class...hard to believe seeing me stand an even 5 feet now...I know), I didn't like shopping for clothes with my friends who were still little and "dainty". But I loved shopping for accessories. I guess that hasn't changed much in 15 years.
I was recently reminded of how, many times, things we think hold of a lot of importance to us come as an after thought. In reality, we put our own desires, or our own agenda ahead of the people/things we claim take priority in our lives.
This week, I've been given the opportunity of time. Jason works into each evening this week, and I've set a goal to make things that are usually "after thoughts" happen. For example, last night I went to the gym. So many nights I say that I'm going to go, I might even pack a bag to go straight from work, but at the end of the work day, I am tired and I head home for some quality time with my husband. If I do make it to the gym, I take it easy, tell myself that I'm tired and just a short, easy workout will do. But not last night. Last night I went to my first spin class since college...and let me tell you...I felt the two year long break.
Another thing that has been an after thought in my life, is seeking out time with people. I'm good as spending quality time with people who are built into my everyday life, but I'm admittedly bad at keep up with people that it takes effort to see. I realize that this has to change for those friendships to function. So this week, I'm trying my hardest to reach out to people I haven't spent quality time with in a while; people I miss.
Who, or what, are the after thoughts in your life? Is it reading the bible, spending time in prayer, or taking care of yourself by exercising or eating well? I've made all of those after thoughts at some point in my life, and it's tough to face the reality that we put such important things on the back burner. But our lives are complex, and we cannot ignore or overlook such things are relationships, time in the word, time in prayer, and keeping ourselves healthy. At some point, we're going to realize the missing link(s).
In other news, I had a dinner fail last night. Since we've been married, I've only made 2 big dinner whoopsies, including last night. Thankfully, I was only cooking for myself last night...so Mr. Picky (a.k.a my husband) didn't have to relive the vanilla yogurt fail of 2012.
Actually, the recipe was really good. But as you'll see in the recipe below, after everything is done cooking, you're supposed to put everything in the blender or food processor. Well, when I got home from spinning, I was SO HUNGRY, so I didn't want to spend a lot of time on this step. I poured everything into the blender and turned it on (I should have just used the "pulse" mode a few times). After about 20 seconds of going through the blender, the recipe was the consistency of baby food. I don't usually get caught up on the texture of food, but this was just more than I can handle. I may try it again in the future and figure out a way to not turn the soup into baby food.
Fortunately, the flavor of the soup was really good...and it even had some kick to it.
Roasted Red Pepper & Sweet Potato Soup
(Recipe from this blog)
Ingredients
2 huge sweet potatoes, peeled and cubed. Measured this is about 6 cups of cubes
One 12 oz. jar of roasted red peppers in water (drained)
One 14 oz. can of coconut milk
1 c. of chicken stock.
1 small red onion, large diced
2 cloves of garlic
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
Directions
You dump everything into your slow cooker.
You let it cook for 4 to 6 hours.
You blend it with an immersion blender, food processor, or blender (this is where I went wrong).
Garnish it with red pepper flakes or chipotle flakes if you are fancy.
So you can see, it's really an easy recipe. Maybe I'll try it again this fall.
I hope you all have a terrific Tuesday!
