Life lately

I usually don't post on Saturday nights, but we are just relaxing at home and I was in the mood to blog. We've been enjoying our weekend so far and I hope you have too!

Earlier this week, I shot this photo while walking to the bus stop. I had just finished an interview on the radio (taped, not live, luckily) and I was so relieved to be done and heading into work. The leaves under my fantastic and comfortable Tsubo boots were just too pretty not to capture.



I go through phases where I become obsessed with cottage cheese. This week, I put it on everything and also ate it plain. I really enjoyed it on toast as an after work snack and in my lentil soup.



Last night, we walked around the mall after enjoying a dinner out. I almost always take stairs vs. the escalator when I can, so I loved how Aurora Healthcare encouraged people to be well and take the mere 30 steps to the top with their "30 steps to a healthier you" slogan.



This morning, we woke up and packed our gym bags for a trip out to Mukwonago. We met my parents at the beautiful new YMCA and enjoyed working out by doing cardio and weights and then hitting the pool. I am not much of a swimmer, but I did love their walking pool, the water slide, chilling in the whirlpool and swimming with the kick board. We had a lot of fun with my parents and I hope it's something we can do more often.



Once we got home, I wanted to chill on the couch and read My Berlin Kitchen. I am only 55 pages in so far, but I like Luisa's story and recipes. There is a recipe that really sounds delicious and uses quark--it's called quarkauflauf. I had actually just read about it in Alysha's article on quark that was featured in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Entree section on Sunday. I hadn't read Luisa's blog, The Wednesday Chef, before picking up this book, but I am following her site now because I like the way she writes and I love Berlin.



I think reading about Germany made me crave pretzels. Luckily, I had picked up this Deutsche Kuche pretzel dough at Aldi a couple of weeks ago.



This is the pretzel I was most proud of, although I realized after that the ends didn't need to extend down so far.



The verdict? They turned out pretty good. They didn't taste like the "bretzeln" we adored in Germany and reminded us more of bread.



Well, I am off to listen to Spotify, drink some wine and keep doing laundry. Night!