Up And Moving: No Candy Required

It’s so nice to get up with the sun!  Love the time change for the morning, although getting dark by 5:30 p.m. kinda stinks.  Oh well, can’t win ‘em all!

The daughters were off from school today, so it was a nice relaxing morning in the pj’s for us.  I took advantage of the extra time to make a bowl of Pumpkin Oat Bran…

• 1/2 cup oat bran
• 1 cup water
• 1/4 cup canned pumpkin
• splash of Silk Heart Health Vanilla Soymilk
• 2 tbsp. walnuts
• 1 tbsp. homemade almond butter

Delicious and very filling.  The addition of almond butter made it!

After breakfast, I got in a good amount of organizing and decluttering in various rooms.  It all accumulates so fast!  Especially books and magazines!

Lunch happened earlier than I thought.  The oat bran was filling, but didn’t hold me over as long as it has before.  Oh well, I ran with it and fixed up a leftover turkey sandwich on an Ezekiel Hamburger Bun with spinach.  The star of the sammie was this awesome mustard…

 

It wasn’t as zesty as Zesty!  But, it was the perfect compliment to the turkey sandwich, as were the POPchips and crunchy Gala…

Later, while I was packing up the mounds of Halloween candy, I had a little treat…

Then carried on along my merry way, pinching my nose so as to not be enticed by the smell of this…

or this…

Yes, you can smell it through the wrapper.  Uh huh.  Have I mentioned that I hate Halloween?  Yes?  Okay, moving on…

While little daughter was at dance, I decided to hit the gym for a quick run.  I wanted to do 3 miles today, but knew I probably wouldn’t be able to fit it into my 30 minute time frame.  I tried pumping up my speed, but it left me a little too winded, so I  resigned myself to the 2 miles and walked the rest at a 10% mountain climbing incline.  It felt great!

Dinner was prepped (me) and in the oven while I was gone (thanks, big daughter!), so a yummy cheesy Lasagna was waiting when we came home.  I wasn’t in the mood for it , though, plus I made it extra cheesy for the family and I didn’t think it was worth the splurge.  I decided on a Salmon Roulette with a drizzle of pesto, leftover roasted potatoes and veggies…

I’m turning into the Leftover Queen!  It’s my secret way of cleaning out the fridge :)

I ended the night with a decaf soy latte:  decaf coffee and Silk Heart Health Vanilla Soymilk…

Candy?  What candy?  Yep, I can say that now.  I am so over it.  Who needs it?  Nope, not me!  Whew!  Now to brace myself for Christmas cookies!!!  Aaaaah!!!!

ONE GOOD THING:  I’m back to running again and I love it!  So far, so dizziness and no major hip issues.  I’m going to try out a pre-5K training schedule which I’ll post about tomorrow.  I like pushing my body a little to see what it can do!

Have a great day all!

Race Reflections

It’s been one week and I thought about my 5K race  a lot today.  Ironically, the weather this morning was as crappy as it was last Saturday, so I think that brought up some of my thoughts!  I was replaying the race in my mind again and trying to figure out what I could do to be better next time.  Yes, I think I just said…next time!  Oh no!  But, the more I think about it the more I see that I have to try it again.  I can’t got down like that with my first race – LOL! 

Seriously though, it’s not about competing with others.  I’m not a competitive person at all.  I would classify myself more like “everybody’s cheerleader”!  It’s more about how to be better for myself.  There are lots of things that went wrong and thinking it over, I realize that the main thing is that I did not train as hard as I should have.  I kinda took the attitude that if I ran 3.1 miles once, I can do it over again, no problem.  And yes, that is true mentally, but physically, I think my body needed much more practice than I was giving it.  I primarily backed off due to my hip.  I was concerned that training may damage it so that I would have to bag out of the race altogether.  So I backed off, but that ended up hurting me in the end because I realize that my legs weren’t ready.

Another thing I need to learn is how to manage the racing jitters.  I was so nervous when the start gun went off  and that threw my whole breathing pattern out of whack.  I was unable to focus at all.  Even my music did not help.  And my head was so filled with nerves and doubts that emotions took over causing me to really lose it!  I’m not quite sure what to do to help with the jitters, but I did do some research on training for a 5K.  I found some good articles on Runnersworld and Cool Running, so I think I’m going to try out the program and see if I can get myself to run stronger and faster!  I would love any additional tips from my runner blog friends, so please feel free to leave a comment or email me!

Well, that being said, I took the day off from exercise today –LOL!  So much for training, right?!  Seriously, I am planning on starting tomorrow!  I’m a bit apprehensive due to my bouts of dizziness, but my plan is ,as long as it’s not acting up, I’ll get in a run.  Today, I was still experiencing a little dizziness, so I just puttered around the house which was kinda nice!

I wasn’t especially hungry for breakfast and couldn’t figure out what I wanted.  I finally decided a smoothie sounded right.  Not any smoothie…a BLUE MONSTER!  Green monsters have been all the rage, but I’m going blue…

• 1/2 cup Silk Heart Health Vanilla Soymilk
• 1 cup frozen blueberries
• 1/2 ripe banana
• big handful of baby spinach
• 1/2 packet NuNaturals NuStevia

Loved it!

For lunch I made a ginormous salad…

• lots of romaine
• diced ham
• 1 lite string cheese, chopped
• 1 hard boiled egg white
• 1/2 cup pinto beans
• 1 hummus filled egg white (filled with Trader Joe’s Chipotle Pepper Hummus)
• Kraft Light Three Cheese Ranch Dressing

and some tuscan crackers topped with asiago spread (from our Anniversary basket)…

I tried another Zevia this afternoon…

I didn’t like this flavor, so I tried another…

It was definitely better.  So far, I’ve only liked 2 of the flavors.  I think my affinity for diet soda has really diminished though. 

I felt like munching this afternoon, so I pulled out the Cheez-its!  I made sure to “control” myself…slightly, by putting them in a bowl instead of having my face in the bag :)  My cup overfloweth…

Dinner was random.  We were all in relax mode, so I just reheated some turkey meatballs for sandwiches and sliced up sweet potatoes for fries.  I went bunless but layered on the cheeeeese…

And ended the flop- around day with chocolate…

Running is definitely on the agenda tomorrow ;)

ONE GOOD THING:  While I was relaxing, I went through some magazines and pulled out some great new recipes to try this week.

Have a great day!!

A Crock Of…

It was a rushed morning, mainly caused by me trying to fit in some things before leaving the house.  Gotta cross stuff off the list!!!  No time for a proper breakfast, but I wasn’t that hungry anyway and knew I wanted to run, so I didn’t want a whole lot in my stomach.  I grabbed a Chobani and bagged up an apple for later…

I got to the gym and went right to the treadmill.  I ran at a decent clip for 2 miles, then walked the rest at an incline.  I forgot to take some Advil beforehand and my hip acted up a little toward the end of the run, but seemed okay for the walk.  I’m trying not to focus on it too much because I think my fear that it will hurt and keep me from finishing the race is weighing on my mind and it’s almost like I’m making it hurt more!  It’s that psychological game.

After the gym, I ate my bagged up breakfast in the car and headed to the supermarket.  I picked up something new to try for lunch- Gardenburger Portabella Veggie Burger…

I thought it would taste great with some of this topping…

And it did!  I served it on an Ezekiel Sesame Seed Hamburger Bun (love) with some Trader Joe’s Sea Salt and Pepper Rice Chips and 3 darling clementines…

The afternoon was a blur of picking up and dropping off and waiting and driving.  Yay for afterschool activities :(  I made sure to bring my “car snack” so I wouldn’t be screaming come dinner!  I found one of these Kashi TLC Pumpkin Pie bars in the pantry (a little past date-okay, a lot past, but I’m still alive!) and thought it would be just right for EWD (eating while driving) <---  that was very “Rachel Ray” wasn’t it? …

I also needed a little pick me up.  I chose a little bubbly.  No, not that kind.  This kind…

I grabbed another Zevia before I left.  This flavor was black cherry and not my favorite, although I find anything black cherry flavored to be too medicinal tasting in general!

We finally made it home at dinner time.  I had planned ahead, so dinner was waiting in the crockpot.  Or as I like to call it “The Crocker”.  I have a love/hate relationship with The Crocker.  I want to love it;  I really do.  I feel it would be an excellent time saving/ meal prepping tool.  HOWEVER, nothing and I mean nothing, I make in The Crocker ever comes out very well.  It’s overdone, overdry or has a  weird texture.  When I take The Crocker out and put it on the counter, the husband and daughters run.  They know nothing good can come of The Crocker.  But, my middle name is perseverance and I keep trying!  This dinner disaster came in the form of Balsamic Apricot Pork Tenderloin.  It had the potential for greatness.  I used a 1 lb. pork tenderloin and put it in The Crocker with 1/4 c. balsamic vinegar, 1/4 c. apricot preserves, garlic, thyme, s + p.  I put it on low for about 4 hours.  Dry and tough.  Yes, it broke apart leading me to believe it would be succulent pieces of deliciousness, but it had a dry texture to it.  Unappealing.  You can imagine the response from the peanut gallery ;P  The saving grace was the roasted diced sweet potatoes (I pre-roasted earlier in the day and reheated at dinner) and green salad with evoo and balsamic…

This lackluster dinner left me wanting dessert.  I was in the mood for coffee, too, so I decided to mix the two!  I made up another version of a Mock Mocha Frappuccino, this time using some Silk Heart Health Vanilla Soymilk…

I was sent a few coupons a while back to try this out.  We are already Silk soymilk fans;  little daughter has been drinking  the plain Silk since being diagnosed with a milk protein allergy at 8 months old.  Thankfully, she has outgrown that allergy and some others, but continues to drink the plain Silk because she likes soymilk better!

To make  my Mock Mocha Frappuccino, I used 1/2 c. Silk Heart Health Vanilla Soymilk, 1/2 c. Breyers Fat Free Double Churn French Chocolate Ice Cream (for some reason, I have 3 containers in my freezer!), 1 tsp. instant espresso powder and blended it up with about 5 ice cubes.  It was awesome!  I topped it with a tiny squirt of light whip…

This tasted just like the real thing!  And for about the same calories – mine came to 145 calories with whip!  This might be a daily thing now, just warning ya!

Since I like to share, I have 4 more Silk Heart Health coupons for a free half gallon in my possession, so I’ll be glad to give them to 4 lucky winners!  Just leave a comment here and you’ll be entered.  If you don’t have a blog, make sure to leave your email address with your comment so that I can contact you.  I’ll announce the winner on Friday morning, October 16th.

Have a great day!

ONE GOOD THING:  I made sure to have my snacks with me so that I wouldn’t be tempted to overeat at other meals:)

Question(s) of the Day:  Do you use a crock pot?  What the heck do you make in that thing that comes out good??!!