Today I am celebrating Tony’s birthday for the 11th year!  We met in May of 2000, and in September of that year we celebrated Tony’s 40th birthday. . . now fast forward 11 years  . . . HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

What a crazy year we had – we’ve made it through his colon cancer, and he’s cancer free.  SO happy he didn’t need chemo or radiation, and while he still isn’t 100%, it’s so much better than the alternative.

We have become quite the grill masters over the years:

Sadly we had so many mosquitos this year, we hardly spent much time under the gazebo, and hope to change that with the cooler weather this fall.

And super young Tony!

We plan on going out for Italian where I am going to try mussels for the first time – wish me luck!  And I made a pecan pie for his “cake.”  He loves pecan pie!

Super Easy Pecan Pie  (pretty sure there are not a lot of calories in this pie – ha!)

  • 1 cup corn syrup
  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 1/3 teaspoon salt
  • 1/3 cup melted butter
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 3 eggs
  • 1 cup pecan halves
  • 1/2 cup pecan chips (or super finely chopped pecans)
  • 1 pie crust (I used Pillsbury)

Mix all the ingredients together except for the pecan halves.  Line pie plate with pie crust, pour mixture into pie crust and then gently arrange the pecan halves on top in a pretty pattern.  Bake for 30 minutes at 350 – at this point I had to put foil around the edges of the crust so they didn’t get too dark, then baked an additional 15 minutes.

You have to let cool completely before slicing, as hard as we wanted to just dig in when it came out of the oven last night!

Yesterday’s breakfast was a repeat – my sweet potato pancakes, this time with some sauteed apples on top – 8 delicious points.

It’s been absolutely gorgeous – yesterdat when I left to work out it was 65 degrees and sunny.  My blood sugar was not cooperating – it only got up to 183, so all I could do was walk for 50 minutes.  Some more pics from my walk – I’ve never taken the path on this subdivision before near my office – there is a covered bridge!

When I got back to my office I put together ground beef and spinach tacos with broccoli slaw and cilantro.  I only had time to take one picture and while the picture sucks ass, the tacos were delicious!  Each taco was 5 points. 😀

I had to run some errands after work and decided to pick up Chinese for dinner – Hannah and I split a chicken and broccoli and on the side, unpictured, bbq pork which was really good.  Dinner comes in at 15 points.

Stats for the Day:

  • 33 WW points
  • 1513 calories, 51 fat, 169 carbs, 14 fiber and 95 protein
  • 31% of calories from fat
  • 39 points according to www.fatsecret.com.
  • 50 minute walk

Q of the Day:  Cake or Pie for your birthday celebration?

Happy Birthday Tony! Looking forward to dinner out with you tonight!