Gnomes, Wild Horses & Sunshine

If you ever scrolled through this little blog of mine, this will come to no suprise to you: I love nature! I love discovering new places and just being in awe by how beautiful this little globe of us can be. I have a pretty complicated and rushed life, but this really helps me wind down and realize what's really important in life. We headed out to our favorite spot last weekend and we were accompanied by my mom and brother. A little family outing. And since I have the compulsive need to take pictures of everything, I have plenty shots of this day to share with you!

Now how cute is this? I always get so excited when I discover little things like this in the woods. It's a little step and a door carved into the bottom of a tree. It looks a little gnome house. I obviously have no idea who was responsible for this, but I think it's absolutely genius! It definitely delivered a smile on my face when I stumbled across it.

We often encouter wild horses on this trail, so I should be used to it by now. But I just can't help myself. I still find it so special to see these beautiful animals roam around in their own habitat. No fences, no owners....just nature. 

My little monkey swinging among the trees and playing with her favorite uncle.  Never mind her little bum peeking out of her skirt. 

How gorgeous is this? Nature as far as the eye (or in this case the camera on my Iphone) can see. I work in (and for) a city that is always crowded, busy and full of traffic. So this is really a very welcome change of scenery. Love it!

But being outside all day sure can make a gal hungry. So I indulged in the most disgustingly delicious pancake ever. It's a mandarin, cointreau, sugar, chocolate, whipped cream and vanilla ice cream pancake. It was awsome, but I don't think it justified the regret I felt afterwards. So yeah, I'll just be eating salads for the rest of the week! Haha!

Too much nature for you? Don't worry! I'm going on another city trip this weekend, so I'll be back next week with pictures of the concrete jungle... and possibly a shopping haul! :)

organic & guilt-free banana chocolate pancakes!

What the fudge, right? A second food post in a week! But I can assure you that I have a really good reason for this. I got hit with a really bad sinus infection this week and it got so bad I had to call in sick today. So I figured I needed to eat good and get me some proteine. And that's where these pancakes came in! And since they were majorly delicious as well, I wanted to share them in this quick update. You know, before crawling up the stairs again and collapsing on my bedroom floor.

These pancakes are really easy and quick to make and you only need a few simple ingredients. All you need are two organic eggs, an organic banana, a small table spoon of high quality organic cocao and a tiny drip of olive oil. 

You throw the banana, eggs and cocao in a bowl and mash the ingredients up to make a smooth batter. It helps if you mush up the banana first and than mix the other ingredients into it. You can use a kitchen aid for this, but a fork works just as well. 

Once you have a nice and smooth batter you throw it in the pan and prepare them just like a regular pancake. You use a tiny bit of olive oil for this. I use a ceramic pan, so I could probably pull off not using any oil at all. But I just like it better this way. This batch makes about 4 - 5 pancakes depending on the size. 

And there is the very yummy result! I used some powdered sugar to sweeten them up a little bit more. I thought they were really good, easy to make and hopefully they will help me get my strength back soon! I'm just not the sitting at home being sick type of gal. So, what is your go-to food when you're feeling a bit under the weather?