I do enjoy Sunday mornings.  They always seem slower and easier than the rest of the week, unless of course one is nursing a hangover!  But since I am off the booze this month, I am not experiencing any of those, thank goodness.

I tried one of my Wholefoods Market purchases yesterday – Raw Ecstasy make ‘Activated’ nut products.  I bought 2 to try and today popped open the ‘Activated Almond Butter’.  As it says on the side of the jar; “This butter is made in the UK in small batches.  Using un-pasteurised, chemical free Spanish almonds, that are sprouted and gently dehydrated at low temperatures.  The activated almonds are then slowly cold-pressed in a granite stonegrinder instead of the high speed metal blades commonly used.  Our process is very similar to the way indigenous people from around the world have ground nuts and grains for thousands of years.  In this way we achieve the smoothest, lightest and most luxuriously rawesome almond butter imaginable.” I added a tablespoonful to my porridge which I served with a pear and a mug of black coconut tea.

I have mentioned before I am counting calories and I am finding it very interesting.  I am not consuming dairy in January so instead of dairy milk I would usually use Soya or almond milk instead.  However, I noticed that coconut water has approximately half the calories of my unsweetened soya milk so I made our porridge today with half coconut water and half soya milk.  It was delicious and the nut butter was lovely.  I am definitely making porridge this way again.

378 calories. Harvey and I were out all morning in the fresh air and when we returned the table had been set and lunch was ready.  Thank you Lara, that was a lovely surprise. A large salad made with mixed leaves, spinach, peppers, tomatoes and avocado.  Served with olives, 3 spinach falafels and some homemade hummus.

513 calories, very well spent. Dinner was a traditional roast.  I stuck to white chicken meat and no skin.  A huge pile of broccoli, green beans and carrots plus roasted parsnips and roasted sweet potatoes which I roasted with a minimal amount of oil.

548 calories. Total calories today was 1,454 but I burnt 186 on a walk so I was only 68 calories over my daily target of 1200 so I am pleased with that.

Last year, on January 1st, I blogged about the Happiness Jar.  You can see that post here.  After dinner tonight we poured out all the little happiness’ we had put in to it all year and enjoyed reading them.  Harvey and I were the main contributors and we enjoyed remembering good times and are doing the Happiness Jar again this year.

There was a common theme to the things that made me happy; being on holiday, being outside and being with friends and family.  So I shall try to do more of those things this year :-).Why don’t you try a Happiness Jar?