What I ate to help me through Day 2...

Breakfast:
I took water and protein powder and quick cook steel cut oats and mixed them all together - microwaved for about 3 minutes? . I added frozen blueberries and cinnamon and peanut butter! We were out of bananas and milk this morning so I knew I had to head to the store!

I wasn't quite sure how well it would turn out because I am not up to speed with cooking properties of protein powder, which is typically not cooked. I do know how it can clump and not work out well- but this was fantastic!

Post Fantastic Run Fuel:
A slice of pizza ( I had made this the other day and gave it to Jeff for lunches etc.) there was this guy left so I had him with a salad: cabbage, baby spinach, arugula, goddess dressing, cabot cottage cheese...

I also sliced up that lovely pineapple with a kiwi. It was incredibly juicy and sweet and tropical. I almost felt like I was in Hawaii or something...


So I ate all of this lunch while I prepared dinner....

Eggplant Bolognese Lasagna!

I cooked 8 lasagna noodles as directed while browning 93% lean ground beef ( and one buffalo chicken sausage I had froze, thawed, and de-cased). When the noodles and meat were done, i put the meat in an empty pot and filled in with a jar of hunts pasta sauce ( garlic and herb) , a jar of TJ Marinara, and a jar of Bolognese sauce...

In the now empty meat pan, I sauteed eggplant slices with a little smart balance oil. I put sauce in the bottom of a 9x13, layered one layer of noodles, sprinkled with a little parm cheese then eggplant slices then covered with a layer of the tomato meat sauce, then sprinkled with shredded mozzarella and globbed with cabot cottage cheese.

I repeated with a layer of noodles and sprinkling of cheese

eggplant slices

tomato meat sauce

mozzarella shredded...

Dinner: 1/12th ! with a little extra sauce!

I am so glad I made the big pot of sauce I did- I love having extra sauce available and now I can use it for pasta later this week OR it freezes so nicely that I can just freeze portions for whenever!

I am in the mood for dessert- especially with the run this morning! I was surprised that although class was longer than expected, I was NOT hungry at all until I got home. I will probably bring a snack on wednesdays from now on though, esp since the class is 3 hours long!

Did you all have a wonderful wednesday?

I definitely feel like I did! Sometimes I get so excited about life in general just thinking about what my future holds ( like an engagement, a wedding, getting my degree, getting my certification, finding a great job, having babies, fixing up my home etc etc ) , even if it may not all happen the way I think or when, it is just uplifting to think about for me.

Warm Fruit, Cottage Cheese and Blueberry Oats

I wanted something warm so I heated up frozen blueberries and pineapple. The juices came out of the fruits and I thought I would make fruity-oats, so I put in some quick cook steel cut oats and added a little water. In they went to the microwave for a couple minutes and on top went Cottage cheese (cabot is delicious!!), Cinnamon, Banana (organic) with Smucker's All Natural Peanut Butter.

With Black Coffee:


Blueberry Oats Underneath:



Up early today thanks to jeff (really thanks because I hate sleeping in!) ... HAPPY NEW YEARS EVE!

the plan:

gym ? run ? keep your fingers crossed for a 6 miler depending on my knee/toe status.

yoga- it really does fill body, mind, and soul.

Maybe looking at trucks with Jeff, we might drive down to the beach tomorrow to look at one ( its only about 1.5 hr away)

Maybe heading to his parents for new years eve festivities !? I don't think we really want to spend money on going to a bar to stand in there, sweat, be squished, and drink crappy free champagne. I am always in the mood to dance though!

I usually don't even photo what I drink unless its something other than water, but just so yall know- I drink a glass of water before each meal and another 4-5 throughout the day as well. Water is SO important to help with proper digestion and helps your body cell functioning. If I drink something else, I usually make note of it.

Speaking of drinks, hope all of you have a safe, fun plan for tonight!

Semi-Stuffed French Toast

I didn't want to get carried away with my "stuffing" since I was having three slices ( It is low-cal, 7-grain bread) and the egg whites took care of my protein, I was so so excited about the grapefruit I got yesterday as well- so I didn't really need the stuffing but wanted just a little

Three pieces of French Toast , Three Mangos, Strawberry, Blueberries and heated up in the pan, I used some Stoneyfield Plain Organic Greek Yogurt with Cabot Cottage Cheese ( mixed together was about a tablespoon) to spread on as stuffing and sprinkled with cinnamon.

Grapefruit- I only could manage to release three slices from half the grapefruit, I drank the juice and managed to fork out the rest of the grapefruit.

1/4 c Egg Whites with Texas Pete ( yuummm)

All together now... with black coffee and....

What is that dark blue/green thing in the cup below my coffee? you might be wondering....Well, I made the french toast by putting the 1/4 cup egg whites in a bowl ( I put the other 1/4 egg whites into the pan to cook- they wanted some privacy) For the eggies in the bowl, I added a splash of milk, cinnamon, mango, strawberry and blueberries to sweetened up the batter. So when I finished dredging the toast in the bowl and dropped it in the pan- I had leftover "Berry Blue Eggs". So after everything was finished cooking i figured why waste the eggs, threw them in the pan and ended up with those.

Suprisingly, they were actually kind of good!! I would not suggest doing this since I am sure not too many people would appreciate em but they reminded me of the pumpkin egg mix I make often, only blueberry. Almost cake like. Almost.


Body:
Update to Yesterday: Strength: C,S,T,H ....Cardio: Bike 10 miles (20 minutes), Elliptical 20 minutes, Treadmill Run: 5 minutes, Stepmill :10 minutes.

The stepmill was love/hate. I loved the sweat I had going on my arms, BUT I cannot believe how UNSAFE that machine is- There is no "auto stop" on it and its REALLY high up off the ground- you see:
When I went too slow (9): My toes got squished at the crease of the stair...
When I went too fast (15): My toes would bang into the side of the stair...

Even when I was at 11-12 , every other step I would do one or the other- hit my foot for not lifting it high enough or then squeezed my toes in the crease for lifting it too fast. Even though I hate the idea of stopping, there is no way you can balance yourself if you are going fast for awhile and want to slow down- I nearly fell off!

The only good part: I was so freaking worried about falling off and getting dizzy looking at the stairs move and trying to look up but then hitting my foot- I wasn't even looking at how fast the time went by while on it.

I would never recommend this machine because of how dangerous it is- and unnecessary ( I get just as good of a sweat running) but maybe that is why there are only 2 of them in my gym and 35 treadmills and 40 ellipticals... ? hmm... maybe my gyms is just a really old version of them...

So TODAY:

My toes still hurt to curl them, but not as bad as a few days ago after my 5 mile run on Tuesday. So... I would LOVE to run today and get a good cardio session in. I will see how it goes.

Mind:
While normally cleaning would be under my soul section because I enjoy when everything is clean- I have a long to-do-list in my head so it will be another thing to get checked off. I also have some reading to do for the volunteer info and

Soul:

Jeff comes home this evening, his cousin is in town this weekend so hopefully we can meet up with her and her new hubby ( they are staying closer to Jeff's g-mammy for the weekend)

We are going to Disney On Ice tomorrow morning with his neice, nephew, sister(s)?, and Dad. It was his Dad's idea for christmas presents for everyone, and while neither Jeff, Melissa , KC or I would prefer that for a present- It is a way to get everyone together. I don't have kiddos yet so it will be awhile before I have an excuse to go see some Disney performance without looking like an odd 26 year old woman by herself. I am kind of excited about it- the last show I saw like this was the US Olympic Gymnastics Team in Pittsburgh ( I forget which year it was but shannon miller was performing with dominique dawes )... my parents took me and we sat in a box and it is such a fun memory since at the time I was on the gymnastics team! We were state champions in high school 2 years in a row!

My mom ( is in college right now as well! go mom!) and she had her last final for the semester yesterday! I hope you did well Mom! Call me!
So she and I are plotting a christmas shopping trip close to me since she doesn't have any good stores near her- Wooohooo can't wait!

Okay, time to clean!

Savory Oats, Attempt #2 COMPLETE SUCCESS

Body:

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO....HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!
Can you tell I am excited? I ran 5.15 miles in 42 minutes!
It was hard, the first mile was easy - i was like this is so awesome this is so awesome- and then I started coughing and was thinking to myself "I can I can I can I can" every step of the way until the 5 mile mark.

Sigh... my quads are super sore from yesterday's lifting but I am fairly confident by thursday (rest day tomorrow) I will feel fine!

I am a little sore all over, just in that lovely " ooh we missed you exercise" kind of way.

Mind:
Heading to work on paper- metabolism paper only today- lots of reading and then writing- Hyperglycemia Cell Metabolism this is your warning, I will conquer you !


Soul:
I love running I love running fast I love running slow I love being able to run I love runner's high I love that my knee did not hurt one bit I love running

I am so excited for my parents to come here - It takes off SO much stress from me and I can relax and conquer the (world) I mean, metabolism paper.

Pre-Run Fuel:

English Muffin
Nonfat Cottage Cheese
Pumpkin Butter
Banana
Flaxseed Butter

Savory Oats Lunch:

In this order, I re-arranged from yesterday


3/4 cup Leek and Potato Soup
1/2 cup irish oats
Trader Joes Poultry Seasoning (which actually contains all healthy spices and no salt or chemicals!)

Heated up in the Microwave for 2 minutes..let cool while I seperately heated up 1/2 cup frozen spinach and broccoli. Drained out any excess water and added it to the oat soup... Added some chopped red pepper, parmesean and pork from last night

Heated it all up for another 1 minute...

YUMMMMM!

So I had an apple and pumpkin butter on the side but then since pork and apples go so nicely together- I threw in some apple into it to.




I would recommend this to anyone and everyone!

Bowl of Texture

Body:
Early Sunday morning Circuit Training! Got up early so I could study, and hang out ( aka watch football)

Elliptical Warm Up 10 minutes

Strength: Back, Biceps, Abs 20 min

Cardio: Biked 2 miles, 5 min

More Elliptical 25 minutes

More Biking 8.5 miles 25 minutes


Wowza that felt great!

Bet you havent had this Vegetable for breakfast....?
I came home and was starving after all that exercise! I thought about function of my fuel:
I want some whole grains, protein, antioxidant fresh-ness... So I looked in my fridge and saw leftover spaghetti squash, cabot cottage cheese, and the ick yogurt...and the other half of my banana I had before the workout ( not pictured sorry)


As I ate this I was completely satisfied because of ALL these textures...

Crunchy Kashi Heart to Heart
Smooth Creamy Clumpy Yogurt and Cottage Cheese
Spicy Cinnamon
Mushy Sweet Banana
and.. Spaghetti Squash ( noodley..? )
The yogurt and cinnamon served as its "dressing" and I squirted some honey on it too.
How delicious, seriously, i loved it!
Off to another busy day

Breakfast:

Kashi Oat Flakes with Blueberry Clusters, Cabot Cottage Cheese sprinkled with Cinnamon, Banana with Peanut Butter, Splash of 1%... I was starving when I woke up!!

Did you cinnamon helps regulate blood glucose? It was one of the thing we covered in class which will be on the next exam!

* I also had a problem with this kashi cereal- there was a ball of what looked like brown sugar/ oat crumbs that had burned maybe- It was so hard I bit down without realizing I had put it in my mouth and almost chipped a tooth! Jeff had a problem with Kashi Honey Almond Flax cutting up the inside of his mouth too ( mine had sores all week from how rough it is)

Has anyone else ever had issues like this with Kashi cereals?

Harrump, oh well. I am going to do a yoga session and rest (study) today! Madison of Follow My Weigh inspired me since I wanted to post about the dvd I use anyway!

Here it is!
Gaiam's Power Yoga , Total Body with Rodney Yee