Saturday Dinner

This was dinner tonight. I also had yogurt and raspberries for desert. This was the remains of my leftovers from last night's dinner out. I have not had the most productive day but I am in the process of getting my laundry done and at least all of the grocery stopping is finished for the week. I took today off from working out but I am probably going to try and get in some sort of workout tomorrow morning. Anyway, I am off to fold laundry and put another load in the dryer.

Ahh, Saturday

This is lunch today. Green peppers, spinach. baked beans, a tomato, two black bean burgers, light sour cream, and a glass of water. I did not photograph breakfast but it was basically this:

It is my ordinary saturday breakfast. Food yesterday was not very exciting, well except for dinner which I did not photograph. I went out to dinner with my friends and had beef kabobs with a baked potato and bread. I brought about half the meal home and you will probably see it tonight incorporated into dinner. The beans in my meal for lunch are from last night. This morning I ran out to the store and did all my grocery shopping for the week, I think it is fair to say that you will see a lot of broccoli this week. I also got more black beans and spinach because I am kind of addicted to black beans and they were on sale for a dollar a can. Anyway, I am off to clean and do laundry (my apartment is a wreck). I will be back with dinner tonight.

Freezing indeed

It is about 33 degrees today and running over to the gym was very cold. However, coming back from the gym with wet hair from sweating was much much worse. I did what I like to think of as a mini gym triathlon, 15 minutes on the treadmill, 15 minutes on the stationary bike, and 30 minutes on the elliptical machine. It was a good workout and I think it made up for wednesday when I only managed 30 minutes at the gym. I need to do some kind of stretching tonight because I am sore (probably because this is the first week in a while that I have been able to really workout). I did not photograph breakfast or lunch because they were the same as yesterday. I made my self a green smoothie for dinner.

I also had some fat free refried beans and popcorn.The smoothie had milk, spinach, agave syrup, yogurt, a few pieced of frozen mango and a banana in it. It was more than filling enough for dinner. The fact I made a smoothie on a freezing cold day probably suggests I am a little bit crazy on some level.

Hump Day

I did not make it to bed until 10 pm last night because of how late I got home on Tuesday. So, I did a shorter workout this morning because I was really tired (about 40 minutes, 35 minutes elliptical and 5 minutes doing sit ups), I may try and fit some more working out in later on tonight. Breakfast was the same as yesterday, oatmeal with raspberries and coffee. I did not bother photographing it as a result. However I managed to photograph my lunch salad which is the same as yesterday, so in a way you have seen all of my meals for the last two days.

I pondered what I was making for dinner this morning and ended up deciding to make a black bean soup with arugula, onions, light sour cream, and mushrooms. I threw a few slightly stale tortilla strips on top to give the dish some crunch. I also made my way through two ginormous glasses of water with the meal.

I also made some popcorn for desert (fortunately there is no more chocolate in the house). I do love popcorn and since it is better than the alternatives you will probably be seeing it a fair amount in my diet.


I am actually pretty pleased with the variety of my dinners for the week, it is much better than what I normally manage to do in the past. Apparently documenting my meals photographically is actually useful for my diet. Now I just need to vary my workouts but I have a plan for that which I am going to put into action this weekend. I am also going to try to do some real meal planning this weekend about what I am going to cook for next week rather than throwing items into my cart when I go to the grocery store. I am trying to make sure that a different vegetable is central to every week of dinners rather than meat as part of my attempt to cut down on the amount of meat that I am eating. I am going to try to go to bed early tonight and have a hard workout in the morning to make up for my easy workout today. It is supposed to be freezing tomorrow morning for around here (only in the single digits) and I am not looking forward to the run over to the apartment gym. We will see how it goes.

Long Day's Journey into Night

I knew today was going to be a longer than normal day because I had to work until at least 7 pm. So I decided to make sure my breakfast was a little more filling and I actually managed to take a picture of it. Two cups of coffee and oatmeal with hazelnut butter and raspberries. I even managed to photograph it this morning before I left for work. I am trying to finish the raspberries before they go bad because they usually only last for two or three days in my fridge before they become really moldy.

Once I got to work, I drank a ton of water to make up for the coffee and because I have been really lax about drinking my eight cups everyday. I had about two of the below giant cups over the course of the morning. In case you were wondering that is a giant cup of water and not mountain dew, it is just a mountain dew container that I got in an office competition about a year ago (I do not remember what the competition was for, just that I won the cup).

I did not photograph lunch because I had a conference call at lunch and worked through it. I had a banana, a tangerine, and a cranberry walnut salad. I did not have time to finish the salad because of the conference call. I had stuck the banana in my lunch bag because I wanted to make sure that I got an extra snack in since I knew that I would be working late and not eating until well after my normal dinner time.    

Above is my dinner, well there was also some chocolate and popcorn but that did not get photographed. This is a deconstructed hamburger (i.e. no bun and no cheese). Two veggie burgers, arugula lettuce, onion, light mayo, and honey mustard. I inhaled this when I finally made it home at 8 o'clock. It had the benefit of only taking 5 minutes to make once I walked in the door. I was starving since I usually eat dinner no later than 6 pm. This is why I keep veggie burgers in my freezer, they are healthy and fast. This is also why I work out in the mornings so I do not have to deal with the gym at night when I am tired. I managed 15 minutes on the stationary bike and 45 minutes on the eliptical machine and I feel like I am slowly getting back to my routine after having been sick on and off for the month of December.

Monday oh how I do not like you

I did not photograph my food this morning (hey it was 5:15 am in my defense) 1.5 cups of coffee, 1 cup of water, and a bowl of oatmeal with milk and a little syrup for sweetness. Lunch was a premade salad, diet Dr. Pepper, and 3 tangerines. Clearly I failed to photograph the tangerines, on the plus side they were very tasty.There was also some additional water consumed at work along the way which was also not photographed, then again it was not that exciting. I generally eat the same thing everyday for breakfast and lunch (unless I go out to eat) which means I am going to mostly focus on posting my dinner meals which should be more interesting.

I pondered what I was making for dinner this morning and ended up deciding to make baked black bean falafels based what I saw on the Oh She Glows website. I used a can of black beans, a cup of spinach, some garlic powder, cumin, salt, pepper, and bread crumbs and then rolled them in chia seeds and baked it for 15 minutes. This makes dinner the exciting meal for the day. It was alright but not great (although really filling) and since I just threw some spices in a bowl I have no idea how much of any I used. I am very bad about cooking during the week but I am glad that I actually did, especially since it ended up being a really healthy meal. I had some light mayo as a dipping sauce (did not have a lot of options in my fridge) and a glass of light soymilk.

I am trying to cut back on meat (not entirely eliminate, just cut back) and focus on eating more vegetarian meals with complex grains and vegetables for ethical reasons mostly and because I think it will force me to eat more vegetables so I did not buy any meat this week other than what is in my salads. I have decided that I am going to mostly focus on making sure that I photograph dinner and post it. Also dinner is when I usually end up snacking so hopefully this will cut down on the snacking and force me to eat real meals. Speaking of snacking, I also ate what is posted below.

That would be a chocolate bar which my secret santa sent me. It is dark chocolate and fit within my calories for the day but it was probably not my best idea. Still it was really tasty and dark chocolate is good for you. Yeah. In other news, despite getting horrible sleep last night, I managed a full workout this morning, a 10 minute run (I am easing back into the whole running thing) and 45 minutes on the eliptical machine and five minutes of cool down. I am going to do situps and planks tonight which I have been neglecting recently. I was pleased because I changed up my eliptical workout and felt like it was a lot harder as a result so I do feel like I got a decent workout for the first time in a few weeks since I have been sick (oh and I really bruised my toe a few weeks ago by dropping a can of pumpkin on it, that sucked). So, I am going to go and drink some more water and get ready for tomorrow which is going to be a very long day at work.

Beans and green peppers

This was dinner and my snack today. The popcorn was obviously the snack and dinner was the black beans with onions, green peppers, and some mushrooms. It was tasty and since black beans are one of my favorite things, I devoured everything on the plate. I spent the afternoon wrestling with one of my closets and I need to throw a ton of trash out but I think I am finally ready for the week and all of the major chores are done. I am going to go watch tv with the cats and get ready for start of the week.

How I spent my morning

This is my closet that I organized this morning, it is not perfect yet but I think you can see that it is much improved. I spared the internet the picture of my sports bras, underwear, and regular bras that I also organized. I am also including a picture of my lunch, a chocolate spinach smoothie with banana, light chocolate soy milk, chocolate amazing grass, agave syrup and ice. It is super thick because I used xanthan gum to thicken it and thus saved my self the calories in the yogurt I would usually use for this smoothie. I figure this is about 250 calories and filled with vegetables. I will probably have popcorn for a snack this afternoon and I am contemplating something with veggies for dinner. Anyway, I am off to organize yet another closet that is overflowing with shoes.

Sunday Morning Brunch

This is my idea of a decadent breakfast and I try to save it for Sundays. I had coffee and greek yogurt with raspberries and a spoonful of chocolate hazelnut butter. It is about 400 calories worth of food but it will hold me over until lunch and it tastes great. I am spending today spring cleaning my apartment and getting rid of a lot of junk that I am not using and then I am off to the store to purchase some additional storage devices (lack of storage is a constant problem in a small apartment). Tomorrow is back to the regular routine for the first time since I got really sick and hopefully back to running as well. I will probably try and do some yoga today and stretch but I am not planning any serious cardio until tomorrow morning. Hopefully I will be back later with lunch and what I am making for dinner as well.

Hmm no pictures today

I have been failing the past few days in taking pictures of my food so instead you get a picture of my furry kids. I am going to start again tomorrow which is when I am officially starting on my healthy post holiday eating. I don't really believe in starting New Years Resolutions on New Years Day. Anyway, most of my food has been relatively healthy for the past few days, but it could certainly be better. So, my resolutions this year are pretty basic: 1) Work out more effectively (i.e. put in more effort) 2) Eat more vegetables/green food 3) Eliminate sugar from my diet 4) Limit bread and pasta-this is not because they are bad for you, because they are not, but because they are trigger foods for me I tend to really overeat bread and pasta 5) Run a 5K race 6) Work on lowering my stress level 7) Post on my blog at least 3 times a week Those are my health related resolutions for the year. I am not making losing weight a goal because I think it is more important for me to work on healthy eating and workout habits because I have been really slacking on those for a while. I am also going to limit my shopping (especially shoes) and work on saving more money over the next year for retirement. I have some other goals but those are the big ones for right now.

Monday once again

This was dinner last night, chicken, whole wheat tortillas, light mayo, brie and spinach. I failed to photograph my food today, but I had the same breakfast as yesterday and went out for lunch and had a turkey panini. Dinner was a green smoothie and popcorn because of the large lunch. I am still not 100 percent over my cold so I did not work out this morning but I am hoping to get back to the gym tomorrow morning. Of course, we are supposed to get 3 to 5 inches of snow tonight, so I am not sure my apartment gym will be open in the morning but I am going to get up and try to get some sort of workout accomplished. If it snows, I am going to try and get some good pictures of the weather since I did not get any good pictures from the last snowfall before Christmas.

Sunday Morning Oatmeal

This is my standard breakfast these days, a bowl of scottish oatmeal with soy milk and a mug of coffee (usually two mugs actually). I added a spoonful of almond butter to my oatmeal for some healthy fats but I did not really like it that much so I will probably just stick to the oatmeal and soy milk. The cats were really interested in being in my photos until they realized there were no kitty treats involved and then they disappeared into the bedroom to nap in the sun. I have no real plans for today, I am trying to avoid the stores and the post holiday rush but for once I have nothing else that needs to get done today.

Easy Dinner

Clearly I grew up eating texmex because this was my default easy dinner choice today. Two flour tortillas with reduced fat sour cream, pico de gallo, roast chicken, and reduced fat cheese and a diet Dr. Pepper. I really need to work on the lighting in my kitchen but I will work that out tomorrow. In the meantime, I cleaned my entire apartment today and took a nap because I am still only operating at about 80 percent with this head cold. I am going to watch some tv and then off to an early bed in the hopes that this cold will finally be a thing of the past by the end of the weekend.

Back with photos

Well after a year I am back, maybe. We will see how it goes. Anyway, I am going to try blogging my food through photographs now to keep myself more accountable than I have been in the past. This is lunch today, a green smoothie filled with spinach, a banana, milk, agave syrup, a spoonful of Amazing Grass, and a splash of eggnog (it is the Christmas season after all). Imagine this flute times about 4 and you can see what I had for lunch. I got sick right before Christmas and have spent the whole holiday curled up asleep in my apartment so this is the first real healthy food I have had in days. My body was craving something green so I bought spinach at the store and broke out the champagne flute to make it feel fancy for once. I read about green smoothies on the web and figured I would try them and see if you could taste the spinach and you really cannot taste anything besides the milk and banana. Hopefully this will help my body feel healthier and I will be able to get back to the gym by Monday (totally not an option right now with a head cold).

Still Sick

I was horribly sick from Thursday afternoon through today, I am better today but not nearly better. I find myself getting tired quickly if I try to do a lot of stuff and that is very bad. Especially bad given I am in trial right now. Fortunately we are doing a half day tomorrow because I don't think I would be able to manage a full day. I took Friday and Saturday off from working out and depending on how I feel, I will try and do a gentle workout tomorrow. I did not pay attention to what I ate, but I ended up eating healthy anyways. Today, I made it to the grocery store (because I had no food left) and then I slowly (i.e. with lots of breaks to rest) did my laundry and cooked food for the week. As you can see below it is uninspired because it was all about easy to prepare food. Roasted Red Pepper hummus Roasted sweet potatoes Carrots Turkey Burgers with whole wheat buns Onions Reduced fat provolone cheese Oatmeal with Splenda and Cinnamon Roast Chicken Thighs Pears Bananas Mango smoothies Light Yoplait Yogurt I have been craving hamburgers with buns for some reason (well not while I was sick, before that) so I bought 100 percent whole wheat buns to go with the turkey burgers. That will be dinner all week long and hopefully by next weekend I will feel inspired to make something different and more complex for food.

Pushing through the wall

I do not really feel better today, but then again I do not feel worse. I cannot tell where that leaves me at this point. So, I keep working out and eating all of my usual foods in the hope I will get better quickly. My run this morning was not great, probably because of the cold. I hit a wall at 16 minutes (and yes I know it was exactly 16 minutes) where I suddenly felt like crap. I kept running to see if it would pass and it did eventually but it made the rest of the run rather unpleasant. Really, I think it was all mental and I just had to convince myself to keep running and moving through the workout. This I suspect is the part that trips everyone up in weightloss, the inability to convince one's brain to push through a mental block. I am getting better at it, but it is really hard on days like today.

Exercise a cold

My head hurts, and I can't breathe through my nose. Still, I had a decent run this morning which makes absolutely no sense given my head cold. Admittedly, I usually workout through sickness unless I am really ill. Most everything I have read says that you can keep working out with no ill effects as long as you are careful. So, rather than break my workout schedule, I got up this morning and went to the gym. I will go tomorrow and keep running until I feel like it is a bad idea. It was back to work today for me and that means going back to my carefully planned weekday meals which are the same as they have been for the past five months. I really don't get bored of eating the same thing which is good news for me because it makes my life simple. Anyway, I am off to curl up in front of the tv and then crash early because of this cold.

Like coming home

So, I will find out some time this week if I made it into the play or not. I am really rusty so who knows how I did in my audition. I can tell you this, it felt like coming home (hence the post title). It felt really good to do something that I love to do and to be free to express that side of myself again. Part of the reason I stopped doing theatre in high school was the teacher and part of it was because I knew I would never get major parts at my weight. This time around it is less about the parts and more about the love of acting and I am more at peace with who I am and what I look like (although I am still working my butt off at losing weight). I will say that one of the things they don't tell you about working out is that it makes you brave. Somehow the fact that I can get up in the morning and run for 30 minutes makes me fearless and willing to try a lot more things. I lost that for awhile over the past couple of years but it is back now with a vengeance. So, on I go and whatever happens with this play, I will be back to audition for the next one as well.

My weekly menu

I am about to head out the door to try out for community theatre. I doubt I'll make it into the play, there are only three female parts and I have not been in a theatre production since my freshman year in high school. In other words, here goes nothing. However, I thought I would pop in with the weekly menu which is as follows: Roasted Red Pepper hummus Roasted sweet potatoes Carrots Turkey Burgers Peanut Butter Pumpkin Soup Oatmeal with Splenda and Cinnamon Roast Chicken Thighs Pears Bananas Blueberry smoothies Light Yoplait Yogurt Light Coconut and Soy Milk Rice pudding I am finally all but finished with the bran muffins I made a month ago, now it is on to finishing off the pumpkin soup which is still hanging out it my fridge. If I don't finish it this week I am going to chuck it.

Community Service Again

Once again this is community service night for me. So, I am working what amounts to an eleven hour day although I do not begrudge the time I am spending volunteering. Partially I suppose it is because the more I work out, the more energy I have in the long run. I am a little tired today because I stayed up late last night (10 pm which is late for me) and I am relying on the energy from my run this morning to get me through the rest of the day. We will see how that works and whether I make it successfully through everything. I did run at 5.5. mph today and while it was not a great run and my legs feel pretty spent, at least I managed to run. I have one more run left this week and hopefully I will accomplish that (unlike last week) with no major issues. I did wear ballet flats to work today to rest my improving ankle and I think that will help as well with running. Food is fine, and I am still staying away from white bread and sugar which is my major concern in terms of my food. I have been a little low on protein so I am going to work on increasing that amount in my diet over the next couple of weeks. I think it is low because I have been eating a lot of vegetable soups and I need to have more chicken and fish in my diet since I am not big on red meat. So, I am keeping going and at least tomorrow is Friday.