Tuesday, February 17, 2009

To Snack or Not to Snack?

Getting out of bed was such a drag this morning! I had such a lovely relaxing weekend and I just wasn’t ready for it to end, I guess! I’ll get a move on here with my eats!!

-1 cup water
-1/2 cup flax seed porridge
-1/2 mashed banana
-Enjoy Life Foods Mountain Mambo
-cinnamon

This bowl stuffed me to the gills today! I love all the colours in the “granola”. AND, there are mini chocolate chips in it! Ya just can’t go wrong when there’s chocolate involved!!

The morning was pretty uneventful. Spend most of it keypunching away! I’m actually on 12 o’clock lunch this week which hasn’t happened since before the Christmas holidays. I knew I needed to eat a pre-workout snack and I did at 11:30, but I really wasn’t hungry for it. I’m not sure what’s best to do in the situation…eat anyways for the fuel, or listen to my body and hit the gym without the snack? HELP! I’ve really been trying to listen to my hunger signals lately, so eating when I’m not hungry is going against my plan. Is it 100% necessary to have a snack before working out??? Or is that more of a rule when you workout first thing in the morning and haven’t eaten anything yet? I hope somebody has the magic answer for me!!

I ate, but didn’t really enjoy, ½ a carrot cake Clif Bar. Don’t get me wrong, the flavour of the bar totally rocked, it’s just that it felt like a bit of a chore eating it! :(

Hopefully I’ll be hungry when I eat the other half! I feel like this bar didn’t get a fair shake!

Here’s what I did at the gym; 30 minutes on the elliptical (290 cal), 10 on the stair master (109 cal) and 10 on the stationary bike (106 cal). When I did the routine last week, I came back to my desk with a serious case of the shakes from lack of fuel, no doubt. Today was much better. Still a little unsteady, but it was a great workout!

Time: 50 minutes
Avg HR: 167
Max HR: 179
Calories Burned: 505


Lunch was a mix of new and old! I brought the leftover corn, swiss chard and asparagus from last night topped with pan cooked tofu that I glazed with some hickory flavoured BBQ sauce.

This filled me right up! No need even for an afternoon snack! Love lunches like that!

DS had hockey and swimming tonight so dinner was split up a little…meaning that DD and I ate dinner together and the boys ate when they got home. There’s only a few more weeks that DS had hockey and swimming on the same night. Actually, weekend hockey is done in a month and swimming is done in 3 weeks. Sometimes its scary how fast time flies! Anyways, I strayed from my dinner conversation! Here’s what I had; baked cod fillets sprinkled with salmon spice, red lentils seasoned with cumin, coriander, dried oregano and basil, chili powder, salt & pepper and a side of steamed veg. DD and the boys had mac n'cheese in place of the lentils.

I ate an apple bran flax muffin as my sweet end. I took this photo at work, but didn't end up eating it there!
I had to bring some work home with me tonight. Having a day off was great, but now it's catch up time! I want to get that out of the way before the Biggest Loser starts at 8pm. There are also lunches to make and laundry to fold. *sigh* The work is never done! :) I've got a few blogs to catch up before I start all that so I'm off for the day! Sweet dreams, all!

Bye for now!!

10 comments:

  1. whoa that stuff looks great!!

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  2. Good luck getting caught up! That is the worst part of having time off :(

    Your package is officially in the mail via priority mail so you should have it in a few days!

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  3. Hey Krista,

    You don't need a snack before your workouts if they are less than 90 minutes long. Your body likely has enough glycogen stored in the liver and muscles to properly fuel you, so most of the time people are just snacking to calm a grumbling tummy. So if you're not hungry, don't have one! Post-workout meals are a bit more important since you will have emptied your glycogen stores. If you are going to be exercising for a long period of time (like running 10 miles) then you'd want think about fuel to prepare for all the calories you'll burn.

    HTH,
    Kath

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  4. getting back to work after a great weekend is hard! But the breakfast looks good enough to get u up, right? :D

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  5. I'm cooking up some tofu for dinner tonight :D

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  6. You definitely want to eat something before working out, if they're longer/more intense workouts (like Kath said). Otherwise, you won't have enough energy to get through it all.

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  7. I was going to suggest asking Kath but since she already posted, never mind :)

    That granola looks fabulous!!

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  8. Swiss chard and tofu sounds like good not just for lunch, but also for dinner to me.
    Cheers,
    Elra

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  9. Personally, I think it's more important to listen to your body and hunger signals than following rules. That said, I have read that if you're going to be running for 1 hr. plus, you should have a little something before-hand.

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  10. Hi Krista! I always love your comments, they're so helpful and "substantial"! :)

    Well, first off I really think it's important to listen to what your body wants, yet I make an exception before a "Hard workout" because I know that fuel will actually help me work out harder and better. I think half a bar was a super smart choice (I would have done the same) and I'm sure that helped prevent some overeating at lunch! :)

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