Back from Vacation and a Big Yummy Salad

Okay so first, the following pictures are total crap. I still don't have a working camera and so I'm using my phone. Sorry. Moving on.

We are back from our amazing vacation. We spent two weeks with my brother-in-law and his wife in Seattle and it was wonderful. It is beautiful there and we definitely enjoyed escaping the 100+ heat in Austin for 60 degree days in Seattle. We ate out a lot. I was surprised however when I got home to find that I had only gained 3 pounds. I was expecting a lot more. Yeah! Now to get that off. Here's a picture from some of the beautiful scenery on our drive through the Cascade Mountains.

Once we got home I was ready to eat some veggies.  I was seriously craving them.  I think it's funny how once you start eating pretty healthy that your body will start craving the good for you foods when you don't have them.  So, I decided a big salad was in order for our dinner last night.  I used Green Leaf Lettuce, Spinach, Grape Tomatoes, Avocado, Cucumber and Carrots. 

Making the salad also let me use my new salad spinner that I got for cheap at IKEA.  This thing is awesome.  So easy to use.  I dumped in the greens that I wanted to use, used the little slotted inner bowl as my colander when I rinsed and then just stuck it back in the spinner and started spinning.  It got the leaves super dry and saved me time and paper towels.

This is what I ended up with.  I picked up a new salad dressing at the store.  I had never seen or heard of SASS dressings before, but it caught my eye this time.  I brought it home and I love it.  I tried the Smokey Ranch dressing and it was delish.  It almost tasted like Bacon Ranch.  Besides being delicious here are some other reasons I love it:  32 calories a serving, no ingredients that I didn't easily recognize, no corn syrup, and they're located in Austin (I love supporting local businesses).  After reading some of their website I think I'm even more in love.  I am going to pick up some of the Sesame Garlic dressing next time I'm at the store to use on chicken.  When we were in Seattle we had some amazing take-out from a terayaki place and there was a garlic sauce for the chicken that was awesome!   I'm hoping this dressing compares.  I'll let you know.