Fellow Blogger Tradegy

I just got finished reading Jenna's post where she revealed that her 19 yr old brother John passed away early this morning. I was stunned and couldn't believe what I was reading. It is beyond my comprehension on how devastated they must be. Wow. My heart goes out to Jenna and her family and my thoughts and prayers are most certainly with them.

It feels kind of strange for me to write a big upbeat post after hearing such tragic news, so I think I'm going to stick mainly to picture's today.

Breakfast:
-1 cup water
-1/3 cup Old Wessex 5 Grain cereal
-banana
-cinnamon
-honey
-enjoy life foods trail mix
DD and I went to the market today where I picked up some lovely produce; organic kale and yellow tomatoes;
I also bought some of the world's best vegan cookies from a fabulous baker;
Left to right is chocolate chip, ginger, PB & chocolate chip and cranberry pistachio. While at the market I taste tested a mini vegan cupcake....
This gal has the BEST goodies to sample! It looks full size in the photo, but I promise it was a mini one!! :)

DS had a ball hockey game, but I'll post more about that tomorrow.

I made big salads for DD and I for lunch. Pretty much anything that was in the fridge that could be put in a salad was. Salads for 2...
Mine had cranberry walnut Gorgonzola dressing and DD's had Caesar.
Lunch dessert was the cranberry pistachio cookie....
Just as good as I remember!

We spent the afternoon shopping and running errands and didn't get home until 5pm. I made dinner following this butter chicken recipe, but I used chickpeas instead of chicken. I served it over a big bed of fresh baby spinach;
DELISH!!! I haven't had a sweet end yet as I wanted to get this post up before my parents come over. I'm sure something will make it to my belly later on this evening, though.

Now I'm going to turn the computer off and go hug my kids. You just never know, do you?

Bye for now!!

Out of the Dumps

It dawned on me this morning when I woke up in a fabulous mood that I have been down in the dumps a bit this week. Funny thing is, I didn’t even realize it! Upon getting out of bed this morning I felt energetic and ready to take on the day. Wonder if it being FRIDAY has anything to do with it?!

I had a bit of pumpkin that needed to be used so into my breakfast it went!
-1 cup water
-1/3 cup Red River cereal
-goji berries
-pumpkin puree
-cinnamon & pumpkin pie spice
-carob chips (wink, wink Veggie Girl!)
-sweet cinnamon sprinkles
A-MAZING! This was one of those bowls that I was sad to see the end of! And this was the last of my carob chips. Note to self……go buy more this weekend!!

The morning passed quite uneventfully. I snacked on the last 3 prunes. I took a picture of the bag today to avoid photo boredom! :)
With my prunes I enjoyed a latte from the office machine;
And later on I munched on a ½ cup of “granola” that I made last night. I got the recipe from the new Hungry Girl cookbook.
I think the options are endless on this recipe!!!

I hit up the gym today and did 30 minutes on the stationary bike (my ankles were OK with this movement), 10 minutes of ab work, 3 set of 15 tricep dips as per the BBBC and a 5 minute walk on the ‘mill. It felt so nice to just MOVE my body! I even got some magazine reading in while on the bike!

Lunch was a good 2 cups of mixed veggies with this tuna steak on top;
All together now!
I snacked on an orange and some strawberries over the course of the afternoon…
There may have also been a few chocolate eggs consumed. DOH! Just before I left work I drank a chai tea. This is the brand that I used;
I like the idea of the aluminum vs a bag for easy use, but I don’t like that it promotes waste. At least a bag is bio-degradable.

My MIL bought me a cute little mini rose plant for my birthday and it didn’t like any of the spots I put it in at my house so I brought it into work to see if I could keep it alive until planting time. Not only does it LOVE it’s place on my desk, its got a bloom!!!
Too cute, eh?

I had very limited time between leaving work and going to Pilates. I picked up Subway for the kids, then picked up the kids and took them to my parents so they could eat. I had no time for dinner myself so a Z-bar came to the rescue! I knew just the one I wanted to try, too....Honey Graham.

This was every bit as good as I imagined it would be and held me over until I got home at 7pm.

Dinner ended up being a toasted bagel with a LC wedge, ham and egg whites. I had some steamed asparagus on the side.
I ate this so fast I almost didn't taste it. Tsk, tsk! Seven is a bit late for me to be eating dinner. Growing up, we always ate at 4:30...my parents still do. As a rule, we usually eat dinner around 5:30 now. What is a "normal" dinner time for you? My sweet end was a SF creme brulee pudding.
I don't know that this really tasted like creme brulee, but it was still tasty so no complaints out of me!

My hubby came home from work early tonight, so I'm gonna go spent some time with the fam as a whole. He's back on day's next week....YIPEE!! Life should be back to normal and I can't wait! I hope everyone enjoys their Friday night!

Bye for now!!

Taming the Hunger Beast

The sun finally made an appearance today! WAHOO!! Nice to meet you, sunshine! It wasn’t exactly what I would call warm, but that’s OK, I’ll take it! My breakfast this morning was reminiscent of a childhood favourite….PB&J!
-1 cup water
1/3 cup Quaker oats
-2 tbsp PB2
-1 tbsp Cinnamon Plum Tea jam
-cinnamon
-pecans
Ohhh….so good!!! The oats turned out to be really creamy which was a HUGE plus for me! Unfortunately, this bowl didn’t hold my hunger at bay for too long. I found myself itching to eat again by 9:30! I broke into my stash of prunes earlier than normal…
An hour later, I was hungry again! I held off another ½ hour before I finally ate my muffin.
This was consumed a good hour before I would normally eat it! A minty piece of gum helped tie me over until I could get to my lunch, but just barely.

I had a few errands to run over the lunch hour, one of which involved the grocery store. Not good to go to one of those hungry! I did well, though. I only left with what I went in for. Every time I found myself gazing at something naughty, I told myself to walk away, it only looked good because I wanted to eat.

There was some quesadilla “stuffing” left from last night so I brought that for lunch today with my very last Flatout wrap to bundle it in. I left out the cheese today but added some sliced cucumber for some crunch.
Horrible picture, I know, but I just could not make this look pretty! I did eat some pretty strawberries for my lunch dessert, though! :)
I got lost in paperwork this aft so it went by nice and fast. DD had an eye doctor appointment right after work so I ate this chopped up mango about 10 minutes before calling it a (work) day;

I love mango's, but most times can’t be bothered preparing one to eat. Lazy, I know! I’m glad I took the time this morning because this one was juicy and sweet.
The eye appointment went just peachy....especially since they were able to fix my glasses!!! YAY! My contacts didn't fail me at work today which was a relief. I usually have a headache by noon, but my eyes didn't start getting uncomfortable until the last hour of the day. When I go for my eye exam I'm going to look into a different kind of contact so that I can wear them more often.

Dinner tonight was a Sol veggie burger on a toasted English muffin. My toppings were lettuce, hot peppers, honey mustard, a LC wedge and ketchup. A side of steamed broccoli with walnut cranberry Gorgonzola dressing rounded out the plate.
I really enjoyed this burger pattie!! I bet I could pass it off as meat with my hubby which is saying a lot! :) They were a little pricey, but a decent size so I'm certain that I would buy them again. My sweet end was a Cravings macaroon;
Heaven. 'nuf said.

I let my dinner digest a bit and then got right into shredding. I traded off the cardio parts for ab work again. Until I find out what's up with my ankles (which are now very swollen as well as painful) I'll be staying away from any high impact activity. This is already driving me nuts and it's only been 2 days, but I do not want to do any further damage. **Sniff, sniff** Anybody have any ideas on some heart pumping cardio that doesn't include feet??? Besides swimming that is. I abhor swimming.

On tonight's agenda? Helping with homework, dishes, lunches and then some down time watching CSI, which I hope is much better than last week! :) Tomorrow's Friday!!! Enjoy the evening!!

Bye for now!!

Tick Tock.....

Does this week seem to be dragging for everybody or is it just me? It seems like Friday is still forever away!!! Jeez, Louise!!!

I got this dreary, cool day started off on the right foot with a comforting breakfast;
-1 cup water
-1/3 cup old Wessex 5 Grain cereal
-1/4 cup pumpkin puree
-cinnamon & pumpkin pie spice
-raisins & walnuts
I cut back the portion size of cereal from ½ a cup to a 1/3 and didn’t get hungry any sooner than normal. I’ve been feeling quite full after breakfast lately so I wanted to see if a smaller meal would affect my hunger throughout the day. It did not and I felt much more comfortable after eating it.

While I’m on the topic of oats, I was really craving some around 9pm last night. Weird, I know! I went with it and made myself a bowl with 1/3 cup Quaker oats, 2/3 cup water and some maple flakes.
This is exactly what I wanted!! I know that if I had resisted the urge to eat this, I would have eaten everything else in the kitchen to try to satisfy the craving!

I got a lot of little picky things off my desk this morning which is a good thing because we are heading back into pay week and I always like to have those bitty things out of the way. I snacked on some prunes mid morning, but I’ll spare you the picture today!

I was really undecided about going to the gym today. I did have a few errands to run, but it was nothing that couldn’t wait and the weather was pretty gross so I ended up going. In trying to rest my ankles I did 25 minutes of weights and 20 minutes of walking on the treadmill. That really left me feeling kind of blah. I know I need to be doing more strength training, but I really missed the cardio today. Patience is not a virtue of mine, so dealing with this “injury” is going to be trying to say the least!! To add to my grief, I stepped on my glasses (I took them off to do some push ups because they fall of my face) and broke them….good. ARGH!!! Thankfully my hubby hadn’t left for work yet and was able to bring me my contacts. I don’t normally wear contacts to work because I spend a lot of time staring at the computer keypunching and my eyes dry out and I end up with a headache. Good thing DD has an eye appointment tomorrow so I can order some new ones! All said and done, I guess I did still get a pretty decent workout in because I burned 260 calories. Much more than if I had just sat around! ;) Oh! I should mention that I ate half this Clif Bar before I went...
DD took the other half in her lunch. This flavour was just OK. The mint really over powered the chocolate. I have to admit that this is one kind I won't buy again. :(

Holy ramble! Sorry about that! I grabbed a portion of chicken divan from the freezer this morning for lunch. I added a handful of fresh broccoli to beef it up. Can you see the difference in the frozen to fresh broc? WOW!
My afternoon snacks included some grapes and strawberries….
No shredding for me tonight. The kids are back in the pool at 7pm so homework had to get done first thing. I made a quick bean & cheese quesadillas dinner tonight using a recipe from Family Circle. It was in the May issue.
They turned out really well! I made mine with a flatout wrap folded in half and I didn't use much cheese as what was called for. They came together much quicker than I anticipated so I had no time to get some veggies cooked up. Strawberries to the rescue!!
My sweet end was 2 yummy cookies....

Well, I am off to read pool side for the next hour! The only thing that would be better is if I was some place warm!! :) Have a great night, all!!

Bye for now!!

Magic Bullet Wonders

All day today I had to keep reminding myself that it was Tuesday, not Wednesday! ARGH!!! Don’t you hate when that happens?? If you haven’t noticed yet, please check out my sidebar when you have some time. I’ve re done my profile and finally figured out how to link my recipes so that they show in an alphabetical column as opposed to a list. They should be much easier to see now!

Here’s breakfast!
-1 cup water
-1/2 cup cream of wheat
-cinnamon
-banana
-PB2
-carob chips & almond slivers
Ahhh, back to my favourite combination of flavours!

Back tracking a bit to last night...I was feeling some hot chocolate to take the rainy chill out of my bones so I decided to get a little fancy with it. I combined 1/2 cup soy with 1/2 cup water in the Magic Bullet then added the HC packet. I let that whip around for a good minute to get all frothy then popped it in the microwave to heat up....
OMG! So. Good!!!

Work went by a little faster today which is a plus. I snacked on some of nature’s candy mid morning…
This was the last of my figs which is sad because it was a good batch! I also snacked on half a piece of Banana Bread before the gym;
Keeping my aching ankles in mind at the gym today, I did a 25 minute fast walk on the treadmill while I waited for the elliptical to open up. Once it did, I hopped on for 30 minutes. I really pushed the envelope time wise today, but lucky for me, nobody seemed to notice that I got back to my desk a little late!

Time: 55 minutes
Avg Hr: 148
Max Hr: 174
Calories Burned: 446
Distance: 5 miles (elliptical/treadmill combined)

I made the world’s fastest soup last night for my lunch today!!! Here’s what I did (please note that I didn’t measure anything so the amounts are not 100%)

Cauliflower Spinach Soup

-1 cup cauliflower
-2 big handfuls of baby spinach
-1/4 cup onion
-1/2 cup vegetable broth/water
-1 Laughing Cow cheese wedge
-salt, pepper, chili powder, cumin, coriander

*add all ingredients to Magic Bullet (or blender/food processor)
*whirl until smooth
*bring to a boil, then let simmer for a few minutes
*serve

The flavour of this soup was fantastic. And look how green it is!!! I ran it through Spark People and came up with 99 calories, 3.2g fat, 7.3g fibre for the whole shebang! I ate a serving of Mary’s Organic Crackers with it.
I also ate the rest of my banana bread as my lunch dessert. A juicy orange was my “just before” going home snack!
I decided to just veg out for a bit when I got home tonight instead of jumping right into the Shred DVD. I was feeling a little overwhelmed for some reason and just couldn't face any sort of activity. I made myself a cup of coffee and watched TV for 1/2 an hour before getting supper started. That did the trick!!!

Speaking of supper, I made/ate something tonight that I haven't had in ages....Manwich! I found the lonely can at the back of my pantry and decided to put it to use. No, you all know me well enough to know that I didn't cook it up with regular old ground beef! I had to healthify it a bit! I used ground white turkey meat instead. The kids had theirs on cheese buns, I had mine on an English muffin with a side of spinach salad drizzled with TJ's Cranberry Walnut Gorganzola dressing.
What a fun meal!! My sweet end was this bar that I got in my package from Coco....
Tasty little treat, it was!! It was like an Italian cookie filled with some dark chocolate yummy stuff!
Some chocolate covered edamame may have also fell victim to my mouth!

Now that my dinner has had a chance to digest some, I'll be doing my shredding. I think that due to my ankles I will skip the cardio part tonight. I'll work on abs while they're jumping around! I really, really want my ankles to stop hurting!!!! After that will be Biggest Loser time. Don't forget all the kid related stuff that I'll be squeezing in there, too!! :) Hope you all enjoy the night!!!

Bye for now!!