Brunch.

For background, my sister lives in Atlanta and my parents live in Columbus. That means, my parents are about 3+ hours from me but only an hour and a half from my sister. Periodically, they meet in the middle and get together for lunch or brunch and I am always really jealous. I truly love living in Chattanooga - my life, my job, my home, my husband - but I seriously and deeply miss being close to my parents. As I get older, I realize how much I treasure them so I am a little sad when my sister tells me that she is going to get to spend a couple hours hanging out with them.

So, my sister texted me yesterday and told me that she was going to get to have lunch with them today and it made me superbly jealous. I checked my calendar, thought about it for a while, and decided that what-the-heck, 4 hours round trip wasn't too far for lunch with my parents! I got up this morning at 5:20, threw on the clothes that I laid out last night, and headed towards Atlanta. I am so glad that I don't have to make that commute every day because the traffic was so terrible and made me cranky. I got to my sisters around 8am and we headed farther south together. Mind you, my parents don't know that I decided to come with her - fun surprise!

We got to Newnan and waited a few minutes for their arrival and I was pretty darn excited to see them. It was actually pretty entertaining because it seemed like they couldn't figure out why I was there for a second...you know, that look on your face when your brain is processing....processing...OH...HAPPY FACE! I am glad that my can't-keep-a-secret sister was able to keep my secret and that I got to hang out with them for a while today. I love those 3 folks...

Once I got on the road back to Chattanooga I was pretty tired so I pulled the music up too loud/windows rolled down bit to get me to the office (yep - still had to go to work). Thankfully, my flex scheduled allowed me to NOT feel guilty about taking most of the day off but I had a meeting that I couldn't miss this afternoon. I worked a little late then headed to the gym where I had a super sweaty/rear kicking workout. I hope to sleep really well tonight. :)

Came home and made myself dinner - trying to get protein sources without eating much meat - and not really any red meat (lots of reasons) so I am experimenting with quinoa. My first experiment was learning how to pronounce it (keen-wa) then I made it yesterday for lunch. I did a cold salad with it - tomatoes, cucumbers, feta cheese, and a lime vinaigrette which turned out really good! Tonight I did a warm bowl of Asian veggies, extra added edamame, and some Asian inspired salad dressing with the quinoa and it was super good. An easy way to get my fix of Asian food - and that is saying something for this girl that could eat it 7 days a week. Anyone else out there experimenting with no/low meat intake and have any suggestions?