Fit Mama Runs 2 Half-Marathons in 1 mo?, Vegetarian Meal Plan, Food Prep, AWESOME Falafel Sandwiches

So, I'm officially signed up for another half-marathon in April!  On April 14th, I am running the 13.1 miles in the Bixby Legacy Run.

 It is to help support the Bixby Outreach Center, which is a place that helps needy families in Bixby.  I thought running this race would be good training for my OKC run on April 29th!  So, I'm really looking forward to it and setting a great pace.  BTW, I wasn't sore today at all, following my 10 mile run yesterday.  Usually my legs would be a little sore and they were not at all today!



So anyway, today was my big grocery shopping day for the next week of meals.  I made 3 stops: Walmart, Akins, & Target.  Here are my meals for the next week:

• Southwestern veggie panini with tomato soup
• Skinny Shepard's Pie
• Clean roasted veggie & feta pasta with whole wheat artisan bread
• Jamaican red beans and rice with avocado salad
• Avocado pasta with peas and side salad
• Cheesy zucchini with pasta with whole wheat bread

I spent $134 at Walmart (excluding some household goods & easter basket stuff) and got everything on my list, other than fresh organic basil and 2 bags of frozen organic veggies.  I only had to make 3 stops because I forgot straws at Walmart so I had to stop by Target on my way home.  So, that's irrelevant I know.  Here is what my lists looked like:

After I got home, I had exactly 1 hour & 15 minutes and TONS to do in the way of food prep.  Here is what I got done before I had to go pick my son up at school:

Made another batch of protein bars

Made some peanut butter balls

(Awesome after school snack or after dinner treat!)


Put some dry beans in the crock pot to soak (yes, I'm finally trying the dried beans instead of canned.  I'll keep you posted on how it works out.)

Prepped falafel dinner

(I went ahead and blended the bean mixture and formed the patties.  I covered my pan and put it in the fridge for later)


Chopped the sweet potatoes for side dish with dinner

(Ok so in all fairness, this literally only took 10 seconds since I had my food processor)


Made a big batch of more spaghetti sauce

 I ended up sticking 2 jars in the freezer and left 1 in the fridge
As busy as I was, I hardly had time for lunch so I munched on a pear in anticipation of an early dinner

But, that didn't really work out very well either because dinner took longer than I thought since the kiddos were very demanding of my attention and the sweet potato "fries" took longer than I expected to cook.
And as soon as I took the falafels out of the oven, we were right out the door to Elijah's soccer practice.  Here is Sophia playing with her little friend, Lilah, at Eli's soccer practice.

 Baby Chris wanders on the field, hoping to play ball with the big boys...

 Day dreaming....

But, the good thing was that dinner was ready for when we got home from practice.  AND IT WAS AWESOME!!!  I served the falafels in a pita (on the request of my husband), with organic romaine and a lemon-tahini dressing.   Here are some pics and the recipes for the falafel and sweet potato fries:

Falafel Sandwiches (adapted from Experience Life Mag)

• 15 oz can garbanzo beans (organic/low sodium)
• 1/2 c minced onion
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1/2 t salt
• 2 T olive oil
• whole wheat pitas (clean ones, such as Joseph's, found at walmart)
• organic romaine lettuce

Sauce

• 1/4 c tahini
• 2 T lemon juice
• 2 T water
• 1 t honey

 Preheat oven to 425 degrees.  Combine all bean ingredients and blend in food processor.  Form garbanzo bean mixture into 8 patties.  Spread olive oil on a baking sheet and bake for about 15 minutes on each side.

For sauce, combine all ingredients & mix until smooth.

Prepare falafels into pita pockets with lettuce and drizzle sauce on top.

Sweet Potato "Fries"

• 2 large sweet potatoes
• olive oil spray
• sea salt
• fresh cracked pepper

Set oven to broil.  Slice potatoes thinly.  Toss on baking sheet with olive oil spray, teensy bit of sea salt and some fresh cracked pepper.  Cook in oven 10 minutes, turn over and cook 10 more minutes.  Every oven is different, so watch these closely.

Served with some ketchup, these were AWESOME!
Here is what the final dinner plate looked like

And the kids LOVED it!  Here is my pickiest eater in the family eating his 2nd falafel sandwich!

And Sophia was dipping her sweet potato fries in her water.  I know, it's gross, but she just loves to dip in everything!

Baby Chris had 2 helping of sweet potatoes so that made me a very happy mama!