Eat More Zucchini

Happy Halloween!!!

Days 20-31

Is anyone even keeping track anymore? Heck, is anyone actually reading this? Bueller... Bueller... yeah, that is what I thought.

Over the last week and a half I have enjoyed such treats at pumpkin beer, pumpkin pie cake, pumpkin cookies, pumpkin beer, and more pumpkin cookies (some made with oats and chocolate chips). It has been a healthy stretch of pumpkin, let me tell you. And you know what else we have done during this time? Kristina and I each ran a half marathon. Crazy right! If you have been paying attention, or you know me at all, you know that I have been drinking beer like it is my job the past month so running 13.1 miles at once was quite the feat. Kristina had been training and thus she ran like the wind. I had been beer training so I ran like... well, a keg. But I finished with a smile on my face. We are all winners here, my friends.

Stop eating my hand, Hendrix!

You know what else I have been doing? Spoiling my dog. Hendrix is a pretty dope dog (ask our vet who tried to steal him last week) so it is hard not to love him. I thought that he needed to be fully incorporated into the family so he got his own pumpkin treat. I made him homemade dog biscuits. I am that lady. You can be that lady (or gentleman), too - the recipe is from Simmer Till Done.

Rollin' with my homies...

I made them look like buttons.
I am judging myself.

This face says, "Lady, if you want me to heed your silly requests,

you better give me more pumpkin biscuits."

There are still more beers and more raviolis to try, so I will be doing my best to consume them all in the upcoming weeks. I make no guarantees about the rate of posting, however.

Thanks for stopping by.

Days 11-19

As it turns out, I am horrible about updating blogs. My bad. How about I give you another recap of what has been going down lately. Good? Good. I thought you might like that.

Just for poops and giggles, let's do this backwards.

Day 19: Kristina and I went to day Hops & Pie, our favorite neighborhood hangout, for a Upslope Pumpkin Ale. Not to brag, but it won a gold medal at the Great American Beer Fest. Basically it was like drinking gold.

Please ignore my extra chin, splotchy skin and awkward pose.

Day 18: Kristina and I did a little workout with my mom in her backyard while our puppies had a play date. Adorable. When we got home I whipped up a pumpkin shake. I used old frozen yogurt, pumpkin puree, rum, spices and some milk on the verge of expiring. It is a miracle that a) I am still alive and b) I am not constantly battling food poisoning.

There is a lot of Colorado love in this picture.

Day 16: After a short run around Sloan's Lake we picked up some pumpkin ravioli. It was delish! Seriously, I love that stuff. You know what I don't love? That there were only TEN (10) raviolis in the container. I was not impressed with their lame ideas on serving size, hence the half loaf of bread that we consumed with the raviolis.

That was only half of the bread that we ate. Don't judge.

Day 14: The Great American Beer Fest with Ben, Diane, Brian, and Tori. In short, we drank a lot of beer and some of it was pumpkin beer.

No, I am not holding a Miller High Life can that
I stole from the Miller table. Stop looking at me.

Day 13: I made some pumpkin cream cheese by mixing pumpkin puree in with some plain cream cheese and spices. Ben, Brian, and Tori will all confirm that it was quite tasty. I have had it a few more times since day 13.

Okay this picture was from Day 17.
And I need to improve my mixing skills.

Kristina's parents will be in town this weekend because Kristina, Kristina's Mom, and I are running the Denver Rock n' Roll half marathon. Kristina and her mom will be running quickly together and I will be "running" with our friend Colleen at a slower pace that is reserved for people who do not train because they are too busy drinking beer. I hope to report back on Monday (read: I hope I do not die on Sunday morning).

Days 7-10

Did you miss me? It has been a few days since I updated you on my pumpkin intake, for that I apologize.

I will tell you what I have been up to recently, but first I want to share last night's amazeballs pumpkin dish with you. I had to work late to give an information session but when I got home I found Kristina making me a pumpkinriffic meal. She is awesome, right. Ladies and Gents, do yourself a favor and make this dish.... Pumpkin Mac & Cheese!!! Holla! It is bananas how good it is.

That's just how my face looks.

So good, so good, I got you.

So this past weekend was fairly busy for Kristina and I... we ran a 10K on Saturday and a 10K on Sunday. Basically, we are crazy fools. The Saturday 10K was the Regis University Move Forward fun run and the Sunday 10K was the Fans on the Field run. Personally, I think they should rename the Fans on the Field run the CF Run, because it was a cluster f-bomb. But I am getting crotchety in my old age and I tend to hate events that are swarming with people that have no idea what they are doing or how to act in public. Anyhow. Saturday afternoon we took Hendrix to PetSmart (big day!) and then to my parents' house so our puppies could play together. (I had originally typed "so our dogs could play with each other" but that sounded a little dirty. Just thought you should know.) And my mom made us dinner! Sherry is dope like that. But I made the dessert, because I am dope like that. I whipped up some Pumpkin Cheesecake, no big deal.

Casey embraced the pumpkin!

Isaiah inhaled his cupcake. Boys.

Don't be scared, Kristina.

After the Fans on the Field run on Sunday, Kristina, Diane and I went to Billy's to watch the Broncos game. We had a bloody mary, some beer and then a nice couple bought us a round of shots... this was all before 2pm. And then I went with a friend to a "Learn to Crochet" class at 4pm. Let's just say that I still have no idea how to crochet.

Sunday and Monday I ate leftover pumpkin cheesecake. I could not let it go to waste, could I? I need to diversify my pumpkin recipes before I am forced to wear stretch pants on a daily basis because I no longer fit in my normal clothes. (Stretch pants don't sound that bad...)

Day 5 & 6

If we are being honest here, I have been phoning in the last few days of this pumpkin adventure. My apologies. I promise to try to try to amp it up in the upcoming weeks. (Do you like my non-committal attempt at a promise?)

So last night Kristina and I had dinner with our friend and her two adorable children. The little dude is a dinosaur aficionado; almost every conversation I have with him makes me feel dumb. My dinosaur knowledge revolves around The Land Before Time (the first one, not the 87 additional movies they continued to make), and apparently Long Neck is not an actual dinosaur. Weird, right. On the bright side, he loves to say "potty words," and I just so happen enjoy laughing at children when they say such words. We make a great team. The little lady is a gal of few words, but she loves food. And I love her for that. The company was great but I was sadly disappointed to find no pumpkin items on the menu last night... no pumpkin shakes, beers, or even puree to eat by the spoonful. Disappointment City, population 1. However, I did manage to eat about three potatoes worth of french fries. I then moved from Disappointment City to Bloated Township (still population 1) and could barely muster the energy and belly space to drink half a pumpkin beer when I got home. So day five ended with half a pumpkin beer and an episode of Project Runway Season 4. Talk about phoning it in.

This morning I awoke refreshed, with a renewed love and determination to eat pumpkin. I popped into the local bakery on my way to work with an eager, "Good morning! Do you have any pumpkin items today?" "Um, no... not today." With a sad face I responded with, "okay, have a good day." I then got back in my car and drove to Starbucks for a latte and a piece of pumpkin bread. See what they did to me! They drove me into the arms of the corporate monster. Small business that I want to support, you have no one to blame but yourself.

I was forced to do this.

It is my goal to make some homemade pumpkin treats this weekend. Wish me luck (because you know I will need it)...

Day 3 & 4 - Round Deux

Today's double feature is brought to you the kind people at The Elysian and Quaker Oats. So without further ado...

VICTORIOUS! (I hope you said it in the same cadence

as you would rap Notorious, because that is how I said it.)

Oh, look what we have here... Kristina is suddenly all on board for the pumpkin goodness. Interesting, very interesting.

I need to work on the angle of the glass so the 'stache is not on my nose. I am sure we will have plenty of opportunities to practice since we stocked up on pumpkin beer bombers last night.

Since Kristina was such a trooper last night and "suffered" through delicious pumpkin beer I decided to give her a break today. Folks, I had my pumpkin for breakfast. No, it was not a leftover beer from last night (I know, boo). And no, it was not pumpkin bread (several of you may recall that I ate my weight in pumpkin bread and cookies in 2009). I added a spoonful of pumpkin to oatmeal this morning. We are mixing things up here at 44 Days of Pumpkin!

Fiber overload!

There are several recipes out there for pumpkin oatmeal that sound delicious, and I plan to try one or two, but I am typically pretty lazy so today's breakfast went something like this...

1. Fill coffee mug with coffee and take a swig.
2. Pour random amount of Quick Oats into a bowl.
3. Add some hot water from coffee machine.
4. Microwave for a minute.
5. Add some pumpkin, a little more water and stir.
6. Microwave for a few more seconds.
7. Take my coffee and oatmeal back to my desk to enjoy while I answer emails.

Yeah, Food Network will not be asking me to host my own show anytime soon. Good news for you because that means I will continue to ramble on here.

You're welcome.

Day 2 Round 2

Since Kristina was out of town this past weekend visiting her family in New Mexico she missed the official start to 44 Days of Pumpkin Round 2. (Yes, I am playing with the title and I change it daily.) Sad Panda for her, right. To bring her into the fold (seriously, that is a weird saying) I decided to make a pumpkin pizza because I know my better half likes homemade pizza; I am really quite accommodating ( I just lied on my own blog). Okay, the real reason we made pizza is so we could have two varieties - one with pumpkin and one without. Kristina humors this pumpkin adventure, but she has no interest in being a full fledged participant. Long story longer, we had Pumpkin Pizza and a regular pizza.

Open wide!

You can find the recipe for the pizza here. I left off the shallots because I don't really like them and I have no interest in cooking something that I don't care about for 30 minutes. I am a lazy chef. That aside, doesn't the pizza look almost identical to the picture on the website. When does that ever happen?!

Pizza, you so pretty!

Y'all, I think it is time for some pumpkin beer. Tonight I plan to go on the great pumpkin beer search - I am hoping to track down some Elysian Night Owl, but if I stumble upon the Elysian Great Pumpkin I will probably start crying in the liquor store. Hell, I might hug a liquor store employee. People, it is that good. Wish me luck!