"It's Cairo. It's always the battery" and fleas and stuff

I'm blaming what is sure to be a really lame post on the fact that we're leaving for the airport in 3 hours, and we still need to go grocery shopping (which is a long, involved process here) and do so in a borrowed car, because it turns out ours is dead (when dh called the mechanic he said, "It's Cairo. It's always the battery."), and even though the mechanic actually came to our house after going to buy the new battery for us, it turns out something or other in the car is something something (I am a mechanical genius!) which means he has to come back tomorrow with different tools and another guy to help him.

Have I mentioned that I like run-on sentences? I really do.

So anyway, I found a good article on sparkpeople.com called Lose Weight Over the Holidays! (enthusiasm theirs). I don't think it has a whole lot of groundbreaking information, and most of the tips in it are likely things you've already heard or read, but it's worth reading anyway. For the same reason I like reading magazines and blogs about fitness and weightloss, I also like reading articles about fitness and weightloss, because it keeps me in a fitness-and-weightloss mindset. Reading things like this not only reminds me (have I told you that I have both the attention span and the memory of a flea?) about some of the tips and tricks that help me lose weight, but they also remind me that I actually want to lose weight. Sometimes I forget that. This is most likely to happen when I'm either doing really well with my diet and exercise or when I'm just kind of cruising, not losing but not gaining, and I convince myself that I'm just fine where I am, thank you very much. It's also been known to happen when I'm doing nothing but sitting on my duff and eating fried cheese and chocolate. Basically it happens a lot. But it becomes less likely to happen when I read magazines and articles and the like, because it keeps it closer to the forefront of my mind. And if anything is going to register in my consciousness enough to do any good, it needs to be as close to the forefront as possible.

Not only do I make Holly go along with my crazy ideas..

...but I also steal her good ones.

Today we were chatting on IM, and she said that she thought we should occasionally post some recipes. And since I was simultaneously wondering what the heck I should blog about today, I quickly agreed with her--and then tried to figure out which recipe I could post today.

It took me a little while to come up with one, since most of my favorite recipes aren't exactly, erm, appropriate for a "diet" blog. But then I remembered a fun, easy, and really good recipe I found last year that my kids and I all love.

I found it on Green Lite Bites, which is a veritable treasure-trove for healthy meals, snacks, and food ideas. Plus Holly and I both like that Roni's our height and is currently at our goal weight, so we like seeing pictures of what we may look like when we get there, too.

So here's the recipe for "Big Simple Chocolate Cupcakes." They are awesome. I highly recommend adding the sprinkles. Everybody loves sprinkles.

The only thing I do differently is that I make them in mini-muffin tins, not giant (just reduce the cooking time to more like 15 minutes). I do this mostly because I have a lot of kids. It doesn't matter if I'm using the same amount of batter to make the cupcakes--if the end result is a lot of things for them to eat as opposed to a few, they are happier. They get this from me. And also, like sprinkles, everybody loves mini cupcakes. If they say they don't, they're probably lying.

Oh, and one important thing to remember--make sure they are cooled all the way before you feed them to your children. If you don't, they will say, "Hmm...what's the deal with these?" sprinkles or no (though they'll still eat them, mind you), but if you wait they'll only know they're eating really moist chocolate cupcakes. And maybe fight about who got more sprinkles.