Balloons, Manicotti, and Juice Feasting

My diet has hit a steady decline during the last few months of winter, the lack of produce I'm sure a major factor. Suddenly, my diet consists of cheese, pasta, bread and ice cream, oh my! I am so grateful for the return of the farmer's market; this week's bounty consisted of fresh greens, herbs, carrots, radishes, califlower, strawberries and the best pecans known to man. Eating fabulous salads has definately been an improvement, but I still feel like I'm a bit toxic. My skin has been breaking out, my skin has gotten oozy and gross (eczema flaring), the tumor in my left armpit has been cranky and talking up a storm. Time for a juice fast/feast. Usually I only last about a day or two before I cave, but this time I'm determined to really get clean. In the past I've used the "everything but the kitchen sink" method for juicing, but this time I've got a book with recipes that I plan on utilizing to increase the tastyness factor. My initial goal is 3 days, but I think that 10 would be perfect!

Last night my Dad came over and I made manicotti, my last hurrah before the juice fast begins. We had a lovely salad with ingrediants from the market. I also snacked on some sugar snap peas, so good!



Triton greeting his "Grandpa" before dinner



Yummy Salad



Manicotti!

After dinner we headed out to Olathe, KS for the Annual Hot Air Balloon Festival. We had a few directional challenges, but managed to make it there in time to see several balloons lift off into the sky.



As the night progressed we watched several more balloons, starting from the moment they took the folded up balloon from the van, unfolding it, blowing it up, and flying! Towards dusk they had a total of 10 balloons that hung out and just glowed in the park. One balloon (sadly we didn't see it during the daylight) had a tail hanging from the back and the front had the head of the Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland!! Gorgeous night and brillant time overall.