More time in Boca

Our south Florida vacation continued with...more food!  Ok, not all food.  There was food and relaxation and shopping.

The next we headed to Blue Moon Fish Co. Apparently they offer a great lunch special.  I have to agree with my grandparents, this is a great deal.  As long as you buy a drink, the lunch entrees are buy one, get one.  

My grandfather and I ended up splitting two things.  This was the lobster roll, which my grandmother also ordered.

Then we also split the langostino and spinach salad with goat cheese.  Both were awesome!

Ryan had the blackened mahi sandwich.

The restaurant sits on the intercoastal so we got to watch the boats go by.  The restaurant is near a bridge so we got to watch it open and watch the bigger boats come through.

Here we all are at lunch.

And let's not forget dessert.  I believe there was a special deal on this too- could be BOGO.  I couldn't leave Florida without having a slice of key lime pie.  Yum!

Later that day I had a super special treat.  While Ryan did some school work, my friend Aleina came to pick me up.  Aleina and I worked together for a few years in Las Vegas when I waited tables at the Olive Garden.  She was the first friend I made in Las Vegas.  I had no idea she lived in this area.  I knew she was in Florida, I just didn't know how close.  She was nice enough to come pick me up, take me for a coffee and then swing by her house so I could see her kids.

Here I am with all four kids.  I knew her oldest daughter from Vegas.  Boy has she grown!  I was there the day she brought her middle daughter home from the hospital, but I never really got to see her grown up.  As for her son, he is just precious, but I think I only "saw" him when she was pregnant.  It was so awesome that she was able to come get me and we could catch up.  It was really a special treat.

Well, dinner that night was uneventful because as I was leaving Aleina's house, it started to pour.  By pour I mean, inches of water on the ground in just minutes.  This really restricted our plans for dinner since we were looking to eat outside.  Instead, we opted to go to the mall and eat at CPK.

We shared some spinach dip to get us started.

Dinner was the pear and gorgonzola pizza.  We split this and my grandparents even tried some out.

The next day it was back to the mall.  Since I rarely shop for clothing in Japan, most gets ordered online or I just don't buy clothes.  I was obviously overexcited to have the chance to try on all kinds of clothes at Nordstroms.  Yeah, I did some damage!

My grandfather and Ryan golfed in the morning while my grandma and I shopped.  Of course!  We ended up eating at the restaurant in Nordstroms, and my grandpa and Ryan showed up just as our food came.  The timing was amazing perfect as my grandmother had just said to the waiter as he dropped of her food, "I hope my husband comes because I can't eat this all by myself".  Perfect timing grandpa!  I didn't get a picture of their huge sandwich, but I did get a picture of my crab mac and cheese with a a little side salad.  It was so good!

Later that day, Ryan and I opened up the fudge we bought at a candy store the day before.  We got some vanilla caramel.

But the real reason I took pictures of this was to share this red velvet fudge.  Handmade and extremely delicious.  We spoke with the candy maker herself (Jan...and there is no website otherwise I would link to it) and she was super nice.  She even let us sample some to make sure we got exactly what we wanted and didn't buy something we didn't like.

For our last night in Boca we headed to the club in my grandparents community.  All dinner specials came with the salad bar so I loaded up on veggies.

Dinner was glazed salmon with string beans and a sweet potato.  Yum!  Way to much food, but definitely yummy.

For our last morning in Boca, before getting on the road to go see Ryan's mom further north, we took one more trip down to the beach.  What a gorgeous day!

We ate breakfast at the same place.  This time I had a veggie packed omelet.

Here I am sitting with my grandpa at the beach.

Here we all are, just before heading out for a nice walk along the beach.

One more ocean view.

Well, that was it for our time in Boca.  I had a great time with my grandparents.  This peanut butter filled chocolate frog was too cute to resist taking a picture of.  Thought I would leave you with some cuteness as well as sweet thoughts!

QUESTIONS:  What is your favorite kind of fudge?  Have you recently got to catch up with a friend you haven't seen in years?

R is for Random

From time to time the random pictures just pile up.  Then there comes a point when you have to just post them or hit the delete button.  I decided today that I just need to post these pictures.  So today's post is brought to you by the letter R, which on most days stands for Rachel (my sister) but today stands for Random!

I took this picture just before Easter.  I am Jewish, so this might just be an Easter thing, but I have never seen hard boiled eggs baked in to a loaf of bread.  They were selling these at the local grocery store.

I also took a picture of their bakery area.  I love the abundance of good, fresh baked bread.

The other weekend, Ryan and I were getting ready to go out.  But, we were met with some resistance.  There was a marching band passing by out front.  Instead, we watched the parade of band members stream by.  Then we were free to go since we were going to be heading in the opposite direction.

My favorite combo, well minus the chocolate, which I usually like to have with my banana and PB.  Sometimes, for an afternoon snack, I will grab a banana and stick some PB on it.  So good!

This was an interesting frozen dessert I found in the commissary.  There was 160 calories in this cup and it was a decent size (I think 6 oz when an actual portion of ice cream is a 4 oz scoop)

I would have to say this product was only so-so.  I think it may have been better with vanilla ice cream and strawberries instead of strawberry on strawberry, which after a while tasted too artificial.  I think I will stick to my vanilla fro-yo with my frozen berries added or PB.

I picked up some potabellas recently and decided to make some pita sandwiches with them.

I added some peppers.

A little oil and then balsamic, with a little olive mustard for additional flavor.

Then I had myself a nice veggie sandwich for lunch.  I used a whole wheat pita.  These are great.  One half of the pita contains 4 grams of fiber.

Well, I liked it so much, that the next day I made this again, but I added some Morningstar Farms soy crumbles to it for some additional protein.

Again, I stuffed this into the pita.  Whatever did not fit, I ate by itself.  No way this was going to waste.

Some days if I am at work all day, I will stop by the commissary to pick up lunch.  If I know i am working all day, I usually pack, but on occasion, I find myself needing to buy lunch.  They never have any lower fat options for dressing, so instead, I opted for this.  I had cucumbers, carrots and tomatoes, which I planned to eat plain, like a raw veggie platter.  At the last minute, I changed my mind and added some shredded cheese, which became my dressing.  Ok, not low fat, but better than some of those dressings.

Another day I needed lunch, so I went to the club on base and visited the buffet.  the reason I like this buffet is because it is the only place with a self-serve salad bar (other than the commissary) and they also have a baked potato bar.  Here was my salad.

Here was my entree.  It was Asian food day, so I had some rice and mixed veggies.  I also had a very tasty roll.  As usual, I put more food on my plate than I can eat.  I think that is why I like buffets.  i never have to really make a choice and I can put all kinds of foods there and decide as I go.

One night for dinner Ryan and I had a craving for breakfast.  He was on pancake duty and I made some scrambled eggs.  I brought back this target brand pancake mix from the States.  It was pretty good.

I whipped up some eggs.

Ryan is the master griddler.

Perfect looking pancakes!

Not too bad on the eggs either.

This was a super treat for us.  My mom was down at the shore and bought us some fudge.  I do not know how she did it, but this package took 6 days to get to us.  That is amazing as the average is about 10 days.  Normally it is 10-14 days because packages only come on the weekends.

Here is our pound of fudge.  It was so good, and such as treat.  I think we avoid fudge because we know we will over do it.

Last up, my replacement Chocbite bar came in the mail.  This time it is pistachios and sprinkles, which is not excatly what we ordered, but as this was a replacement bar for the last one, I can't complain and I am sure it will taste good.  That is the nice thing about chocbite, it all tastes good.  they have some many toppings and you can mix and match.  Because we had the fudge, we have not yet broken into this bar, but I am sure we will this week.

Thanks everyone for reading my randoms.

QUESTION:  What does the letter R stand for for you today?