1. NEW PROJECTS

A few weeks ago I made candles for the first time!

I have been slowly getting into various DIY food/home-related hobbies which I am realizing more and more that I enjoy. Last year the main “projects” I learned were making homemade sourdough and sauerkraut, which I now do regularly. Next up I decided I wanted to try making my own candles. This idea originated mainly because I am really sensitive to artificial scents and, while I love candles, it is hard to find candles that don’t have a smell that gives me a headache and aren’t full of ingredients I don’t want circulating in the air at home. SO… I bought these glass jars, this set of candle-making tools, and this organic beeswax. Creating this basic candle in the photo was surprisingly easy! I want to get a bit fancier with adding dried flowers, herbs, essential oils, etc. Other upcoming ideas I have for new projects I want to gradually incorporate in the future include making homemade soap, cider, and yogurt.

2. AN IMPROMPTU HIKE

Over MLK weekend we were in Scottsdale, AZ, with Alec’s family. The resort we were at is right near Camelback Mountain, so I thought it would be fun to look into any short hikes on/near the mountain. There are two popular hikes, the Echo Canyon and Cholla Trails. Alec and I decided spur of the moment to hike the Echo Canyon Trail (the Cholla Trail is currently closed for maintenance as a 300 lb boulder fell on a hiker…). I didn’t look into too many details and figured it would be a relatively easy hike since it is only 1.23 miles to the top. While it is rated “Difficult” on All Trails, in a classic Libby mistake I figured it would still be a walk in the park.

The hike was phenomenal with stunning sunrise and desert views. It was very crowded since this is a very popular hike and it was a Sunday morning (we started at 6:45am and it got a lot more crowded as the morning went on; the parking lot was totally full when we were back to the trailhead). While completely manageable, the hike was an excellent workout! More of an anaerobic rock scramble pretty much all of the way up, on all fours at times.

I would NOT recommend the hike if you have any knee or joint problems as it was constant bending and lunging all the way up and down. Next time I would come more prepared with an extra snack and more water!

The views at the top of the surrounding Phoenix area were absolutely amazing!

I find that impromptu hikes or adventures while traveling are pretty much always a good idea!

3. ALMOST DONE WITH MY INTERNSHIP

Let’s just say I am VERY ready to be done with my internship… It’s not that I majorly dislike it overall (some of the rotations I have loved such as my eating disorder rotation), it is more that it has been going on for quite some time (I started it in July) and it is difficult not making any money for that long (you have to pay $8000 just to do the internship) especially when I am coming off of two years of grad school that was also quite expensive. SO… thankfully I am done on March 24th!!!! Not too far away, but feels like time is sort of dragging at this point since I feel so ready to be done. I have three more rotations – Food Gatherers, clinical inpatient with Michigan Medicine, and a diabetes education rotation with Michigan Medicine. I have some thoughts/plans as to what I will be up to after I take my RD exam, so will share more on that later!

4. SWITCHING UP MY BREAKFASTS MORE

As you probably know if you read my blog, I pretty much have the same breakfast every day – some kind of oatmeal, almond butter, and fruit combo. While I do love this breakfast and like the ease of having the same thing each day on autopilot, I am realizing it is also getting a little boring and that I would like to switch things up more often. I don’t like to spend time in the morning thinking about what I’m going to have for breakfast, so I’m thinking I will try planning out at the start of the week two different breakfasts to have that week and get the ingredients on hand for those. Similar to the oatmeal combo, I like sweeter breakfasts with some sort of grain/fat/fruit combo. So, thinking of simple yet tasty options like different kinds of oatmeal (usual steel-cut oats, overnight oats, baked oats), smoothies, granola and yogurt parfaits, and chia pudding parfaits. All options that appeal to me in the morning, yet I don’t often have! Thinking this will be good to get some more flavor and nutritional variety. We have also been doing pancakes or something a little more time-consuming on Sundays which has been nice to switch things up even more.

This has been my go-to delicious smoothie lately – into the Vitamix goes half an avocado, a scoop of whole-milk yogurt, a spoonful of chia seeds, two dates, one scoop of vanilla protein powder, one cup of frozen blueberries/strawberries, and enough almond milk to get it blending. Very similar to my blueberry cacao breakfast smoothie! Topped with some granola as I find it more satisfying to have some crunch/texture differences!

Looking forward to trying gingerbread crockpot oatmeal, pumpkin oatmeal pancakes, and some different chia pudding combos!

5. BOOKS I WOULD RECOMMEND

Lately I have been reading a lot which has been nice! Whenever I have time… before dinner… while dinner is cooking… before bed… at lunch… lots of random time throughout the day I might end up using by reading. I like Christian author Sally Clarkson and recently read The Life-Giving Table and am now reading Awaking Wonder. Also recently read the first Alex Rider book, Stormbreaker, as we have been watching the TV series (which is excellent and very entertaining, coming from someone who hardly watches TV series) – I read all of these books back in middle school but have forgotten most of the plot – still great to read and interesting to compare to the show! Lastly, I just started The Book of Lost Names which is a historical fiction WWII novel – this is very interesting so far as well!

If you have any book recommendations, leave them in the comments!