So long 2010

Happy last day of 2010! It’s been a good year and I am looking forward to what 2011 brings.

I have had a nice, relaxing day off from work so far.

I made a more elaborate breakfast, since I had the time and all.

I put together a breakfast burrito with scrambled eggs, pinto beans, a little colby jack cheese, Frank’s Red Hot sauce and topped it with some sea salt & Penzey’s spices black pepper and mural of flavor.

I watched the Today show while eating breakfast and then got bored with that, so I read My Spiritual Journey.

I am about 70 pages in and I love it so far. His story is so interesting and his positive thoughts are inspirational. I read about 30 pages before bed last night and I kept telling Craig cool pieces of information. One of my favorite quotes so far was this, “…every new obstacle will be regarded as a good opportunity to improve our state of mind!” I definitely need to keep this quote in mind when I come across an obstacle.

I let my tummy settle from breakfast and then I headed to the Y. It was packed there. I completed 25 minutes on the elliptical while watching House Hunters international on HGTV. Then, I did the rowing machine for 6 minutes and almost lifted a full circuit of weights. It was so crowded that I couldn’t get on one last machine because there was a line. Oh well!

I recovered with a berry and banana smoothie with a scoop of soy flavorless protein powder.

Lunch was a yummy salad filled with spinach, baby carrots, Irish cheddar cheese chunks, tomatoes, red sweet peppers and broccoli. I topped it with Penzey’s Garden Salad and Trader Joe’s greek feta dressing.

I was still hungry, so I had a little bowl of Stonyfield Oikos plain non-fat greek yogurt with sliced almonds and honey.

Time to put some makeup on and run errands to Target & Kohl’s.

Have a good New Year’s eve everyone!

Review of Gardein Tuscan Breasts

It was “Friday” for me today since we have a three day weekend with New Years Eve tomorrow. I thought it would be an easy day at the office, but I volunteered to step away from my peaceful desk and help out in the public arena. It’s funny because my job title has public in it, but I rarely work with the public face to face! For two straight hours, I helped answer questions, shuffle people from one line to the next, etc. It was fun and the time flew. My workplace has been busy all week, which is wonderful to see, so I wanted our guests to have a positive experience despite the crowds. Helping out was rewarding, but it also made me appreciate my quiet desk, more or less because I am not used to standing in one place like that anymore. My body ached at the end!

This is where yoga class tonight came in to save the day! I just got home from there and I feel so much more relaxed and less achy. We did a couple of new poses tonight and always like trying new things in fitness classes, so that was cool. We concentrated on lots of twists, which our teacher said was good for our backs and digestive systems. This was perfect for me and especially for the day I had.

At yoga, I also got to try out my new GAIAM yoga socks that Craig got me for Christmas!

They worked really well. The room wasn’t as cold tonight. Despite that, I loved that my feet were warm and the grippers on the bottom helped me stay more stable, especially in certain positions. When I put them on, it was hard to separate my toes, but then I sort of forced them into their spaces and it was fine.

Rewind to earlier today.

Breakfast

Coffee (in my “I Do” mug in honor of Jenny) and Kashi Go Crisp! cereal.

Lunch

I had an Arnold’s Thin sandwich with provolone cheese and sweet peppers on top. I added Frank’s Red Hot sauce and Chipolte mayo. Other lunch items included two clementines (I am trying to use them up), a strawberry Chobani yogurt, and baby carrots.

After work, I went to Whole Foods to use up a bunch of coupons for free or discounted items. It was packed there like it was at my work. Must be the New Years eve rush. Among other things, I picked up three different Gardein items, which I had never tried before this evening. I asked Gardein if I could sample some of their products and they graciously sent me some coupons.

Dinner

Craig made the rice and microwaved the Tuscan Breasts from Gardein.

Here is the packaging it came in, which included the tomato basil sauce.

We both enjoyed the meal, but I loved the flavor and texture more than Craig. I would definitely buy the Tuscan Breasts again.

I eat a mostly vegetarian diet and even though I like the flavor of chicken, I don’t necessarily like eating animals, nor does eating meat always agree with my stomach. I like that one of these tuscan breasts has 21 grams of protein because I definitely know that I need more protein in my diet.

After Craig left the table, Karma joined me. It seemed that he wanted some Gardein too!

Dessert before yoga class was toffee Moser Roth chocolate.

Time to start a book I picked up at the library tonight, My Spiritual Journey by The Dalai Lama. I’ll share more on this tomorrow, but one of my goals for life in general is to read more books. I love reading, but have been slacking lately on reading books. I got hooked on the Stieg Larsson books a couple of months ago, but since then, I haven’t been as “hooked” on reading. Maybe I should blame my addiction to reading healthy living blogs?

What was the last book you read that you couldn’t put down?

Dinner with the girls

I was out late last night, so I am catching up on Wednesday’s post.

I felt a lot better on Wednesday. I am so happy that illness passed. I had so much more energy at work, luckily, since we were cleaning again and I pretty much got my workout in by walking a lot and lifting boxes.

Breakfast was Kashi Autumn Wheat and coffee.

Morning snack was coffee, raw almonds and Newman’s Own Organics Berry Blend.

Lunch was the rest of my Subway sandwich, a berry applesauce, Stonyfield honey oikos yogurt (really not loving this flavor now) and two clementines. I am still eating more calories to make up for Monday.

After work, I had dinner at the Wicked Hop restaurant in Milwaukee’s Third Ward with my friends. We finally celebrated Christmas together by eating out.

Our friend Jenny arrived last and had wonderful news! She got engaged on Christmas eve! She has been dating her now fiance Tim for about 10 years plus. We were all so happy for her that we squealed with excitement, were ooing and aawing over her ring and loved hearing about how the proposal happened.

My dinner was a Tequila Chicken Wrap with fruit on the side. I also enjoyed a Strongbow. I am definitely a cider or wine girl vs. beer.

Me, Loni and Kim

Laurie, Jenny and Kelly

We had to celebrate Jenny’s engagement with some dessert! It was delicious Red Velvet Cake that the Wicked Hop gets from the C. Adams bakery at the Milwaukee Public Market.

What a fun evening spent with the girls! Congrats to Jenny and Tim on their big news!

Wine and dark chocolate=the best medicine

I am finally feeling a little better. The afternoon of rest and relaxation is certainly what I needed.

Craig and I had a nice dinner together and I had spent my evening reading the newspaper (I’m always behind on reading the Sunday newspaper, except for the ads, of course).

I picked up this Dubliner cheese at Aldi and it is really good. I have had it before, but not for a couple of years. The price was probably half of what it costs at other stores.

I had snacked on a few slices of the Dubliner cheese and then decided to include it in my random dinner creation.

I added slices of cheese to toasted Arnold’s Thins and topped one of the slices with Trader Joe’s Bruschetta.

I also had some broccoli and baby carrots on the side to get more veggies in my diet. I enjoyed another small glass of the Bolthouse Farm Berry Boost smoothie (also available at Aldi’s currently).

Later in the evening, I felt like having some wine. I paired it with some Newman’s Own Organics Dark Chocolate. I only had about three small squares because the flavor hit the spot perfectly and I didn’t have any more cravings for something sweet. Maybe this combination could be the medicine that cures me of feeling sick anymore this week.

2011 is fast approaching and so many other bloggers are putting their goals or resolutions out there. I would like to come up with some to hold myself accountable. I already have a few in mind and probably will blog them on Friday. If you have any big goals for 2011, please share them to inspire me and other readers!

I like what Paige at Running Around Normal did with her 2011 goals. I especially liked how she reflected on her 2010 goals and whether or not she achieved them–this is the best way to be accountable for your actions if you are going to put your goals out there in the blogosphere. Like Paige did, breaking some of the goals into certain parts of the year always seems to work for me. Then there are other goals or resolutions that you just try to achieve throughout the year. I am excited to write down some goals and work towards an even healthier 2011.

Well, it’s getting late and this girl definitely needs sleep so I can make it into work and have energy for tomorrow.

Still sick

I woke up this morning after tossing and turning all night and decided to shower and attempt to go to work. My instinct in the morning was correct–I still felt very weak and tired and thought that I should call in sick. But, I tried to tough it out and went into work anyway.

Breakfast was the rest of the Banana Nut Cheerios. One of my goals for 2011 is to eat more fruit and protein for breakfast and not so many of these sugary cereals. We had some major cleaning and reorganization to do at work and it was in a room that is humid and smelly. I can’t explain why it’s humid, otherwise that will giveaway where I work, but it’s really unbearable to be in that environment. I tried to balance being at my desk and in that room and even then, I felt so tired and weak.

I ate a Danish Kringle from Racine, trying to see if that would perk me up a bit. I also had some raw almonds.

Alas, around 11:15, I decided I couldn’t take being so out of it at work. I never function well after a day like yesterday of nausea, sleepiness and a bad headache. I told my boss I was heading home sick and hit the road. I stopped by Subway on my way home for a footlong ham and cheese with spinach, tomatoes, cucumbers, pickles, black olives, and tried something new–their buffalo sauce. Not impressed. I’ll stick to Frank’s Red hot from now on.

I was so hungry that I ate 6 inches, let my stomach rest a bit and then ate half of the other 6 inch. Geez, my body sure needed food badly! After lunch, I sat in the glorious sunshine shining in our living room and relaxed a little. I had some of this Bolthouse Farms Berry Boost smoothie. That hit the spot!

And I had a Moser Roth English Toffee chocolate bar.

I also enjoyed two Raspberry kisses. My mom makes these for Christmas every year and my siblings and I love them but the in-laws “just don’t get it” as one of them said on Sunday at our Christmas celebration.

When I laid down on our couch, two little kitties joined me and held me hostage. I fell asleep with them in the sunshine. Karma always sleeps by my belly.

Karma sleeping with his teeth out.

Tanzi cuddles up where my legs curve.

I didn’t want to sleep all afternoon because then I struggle with sleeping at
night, so a little nap with the cats was perfect. I hope I wake up tomorrow feeling much better than today! It’s no fun being sick.

Christmas donation

I mentioned this the other day in a post, but we probably will donate money to a needy non-profit every holiday season and cut back on giving material items to each other.

We donated money to our state humane society to sponsor a random cat. Today, I saw the posting of the cat we donated money to. It is appropriately named “Kitty.” We call our cats the kitties all the time, even though they are 4.5 years old. It was a perfect match for us! She looks kind of scrappy and in need.

Here is Kitty and our donation message.

It felt so good to give to someone else this holiday season.

Do you donate to any organizations during the holidays?

Last family Christmas celebration

I was off of work today and wanted to go to Target, Kohl’s, etc. to see what Christmas stuff was leftover in the stores. Unfortunately, I woke up sick with what I think was the flu. I slept most of the day away and struggled with a horrible headache that usually comes on when I don’t have coffee. I am starting to feel better now, but not 100% because I didn’t eat much all day. It just sucks that I caught something over the weekend and then it hit on my one totally free day where we didn’t have to go to someone’s house to celebrate the holidays.

We had the last of our Christmas celebrations with my family yesterday. Per usual, my parents’ house was full of people and this didn’t even include three of my siblings in the mix (I am the youngest of seven kids).

Food I ate before going to my parents’:

Breakfast was a blueberry Chobani yogurt, a piece of a Danish kringle, and coffee.

I went to the gym in the late morning and did 35 minutes on the elliptical, 15 on the bike and lifted a few weights.

Shredded cheese in a whole wheat tortilla and a clementine for lunch. I originally put pinto beans in this, but I think they were bad because they tasted awful. Maybe this is where I got sick from, but that was such a tiny bite.

At my parents’ house, Craig and I opened our gift from my parents right away. I opened one bag that had Bath and Body Works soap, an Axe shower gel for Craig, Penzey’s baking spices and a holiday towel with “P” on it for our last name.

I thought that was a great gift and then my mom plopped a very heavy and large package on my lap. I figured out what it was before I unwrapped it and was elated!

We got a Kitchen Aid Classic Plus mixer! Now that I bake more, I really needed one of these and my mom felt sorry for my recent experience of using a very old hand mixer in a non-mixing bowl and how my cookie dough flew all over and didn’t mix well (when I made the peanut butter dough balls). My mom ended up getting an excellent deal on it at Kohl’s and couldn’t pass up the chance to get this excellent present for us for Christmas.

Craig and I joked that I’d be using the present and he’d be eating the product of it since he doesn’t bake.

My parents opened up their presents from us. Wine and pistachios for my dad.

The Jonathan Adler Starbucks cup for my mom. It coincidentally matched her shirt yesterday!

And we got them a gift card to the movie theater. With the senior citizen discount, that should last them most of the year!

As Craig said, I did my “Nancy Drew” thing and took photos of and looked at ancestral documents/photos. Since I am getting so into genealogy lately, I need to keep getting as much info compiled so I can add to what I have.

My great grandma’s birth certificate, in German.

A photograph of her husband, Henry. He was a part time policeman, hence the uniform.

My parents with my older brothers and sisters in the 1960′s.

We used to play Trivial Pursuit every Christmas and then that sort of faded away. That tradition was brought back yesterday. For once, I didn’t play.

Phew and Christmas is all over!

Merry Christmas!

Hope everyone had a great Christmas. We have so far! Two of our three celebrations are over now so I’ll recap the last two days.

Yesterday afternoon, we went to my in-law’s house for my mother-in-law’s side of the family celebration.

Lighting and timing wasn’t right for taking photos of my meal. I’ll share these lovely sugar cookies Craig’s cousin makes every year.

These are Craig and his sister’s stockings. His sister is also named Lisa, so things always get a little confusing when we’re both together for the holidays.

My sister-in-law, Lisa, and Craig’s cousin opening gifts.

My husband and I on Christmas eve. Craig was so proud of his Christmas Story shirt.

Too bad we didn’t get to watch the movie this year. We were hoping it would be on TV tonight, but no such luck!

After eating and celebrating, we went to the candlelight mass. I was so tired by the time church ended! Christmas is exhausting.

We slept in until 8 a.m. this Christmas morning and there were no kitties pawing at our door. I wondered why they were both innocently sleeping and not begging for food an hour past their feeding time. Turns out, they opened some cat food we got from my in-laws last night and had a little Christmas morning feast! That or Santa helped them drag the bag out and open it up this morning.

I made a lovely breakfast of whole wheat pancakes with soy protein powder for Craig and I. Since it was Christmas and all, I added chocolate chips to mine!

This morning, I opened two presents from Craig. I got GAIAM Yoga Socks! I really wanted these because my yoga room at the Y is always chilly and I the grippy things on the bottom should help me be a little more steady on my feet.

Craig and I didn’t exchange large gift items this year (he bought himself a large item on Black Friday), so I thought that was what he got me until he told me to get one more gift for me under the couch.

It was the EA Sports Active 2 Personal Trainer!

I tried it out right away!

Even though I go to the YMCA very regularly now, I do like to use the EA Sports Active on the Wii once in a while. I may just be doing that more with this lovely present motivating me.

I really liked the improvements they made from the first EA Active. The leg strap with this set is much more secure on my leg and the heart rate monitor is a cool feature. I love seeing my heart rate at the gym and monitoring it while I am on machines, so this is pretty cool to see how certain exercises increase my heart rate. There are new activities and I was looking forward to trying those out. They didn’t disappoint.

The only thing that confused me was when they said I would be doing “skipping” next and it turned out to be jumping rope virtually. I think that EA is a Canadian company, because things like “about” are said “aboout” and then I guess jumping rope may be called skipping in Canada or elsewhere?

Mountain biking was fun and there’s no chance for clumsy me to injure myself!

Besides these two fitness appropriate gifts, I also bought myself the Jonathan Adler Starbucks mug for Xmas and got a Bell bag to attach to the front of my bike so I can stash my cell phone, camera, sunscreen, wallet, etc. on our bike rides. Craig and I decided that we didn’t “need” a lot of items this year and instead of spending a lot on each other, we’d donate some money to the Wisconsin Humane Society for some needy animals. This is very appropriate after I lost my childhood pet bird last week and after our cat Karma was diagnosed with an incurable problem with his lungs. We love animals and that is the perfect place to donate to this year. I think we are going to make donating to a needy non-profit an annual Christmas tradition.

After playing with our presents, we went to my in-laws again for a lunch of leftovers and his 93 year old Grandma came to the house from the nursing home.

I took a picture of my dessert-Baker’s Square Peppermint patty pie (holy yum), an eclair and another puff filled treat.

Here are some photos from Christmas day:

Couldn’t resist sharing how cute my husband and his sister are in this photo:

Tomorrow, we’re off to my mom and dad’s to celebrate!

To my readers–enjoy the rest of your Christmas celebrations with family and friends and thank you for reading and supporting my site.

Happy eve before Christmas eve

Hooray, my mini Christmas vacation has begun! I am happy to be leaving this scene for four days straight.

Breakfast was Banana Nut cheerios and coffee.

I wasn’t feeling great today. I had a headache in the morning and a tummy ache all day. I grabbed a latte and that helped my headache.

For lunch, I got out of the office and had Quizno’s. My stomach hurt all day, so just to be safe, I avoided meat and ordered a veggie sub on wheat. It felt good to take a little walk and not eat at my desk. I didn’t take a picture at Quizno’s because there were a lot of people around. I often think that if I had an iPhone or something, you wouldn’t even be able to tell I was taking a picture of my food. When I whip out a little camera to take a picture of a normal sub, I always think that people will wonder why I am taking a photo of something so mundane!

Dessert was German candy, yum!

When I got back home from work, I was tired again and fell asleep on the couch, so I missed dinner and my usual Thursday night yoga class. I wasn’t that hungry anyway. I had a peach Chobani around 8 p.m. and that was all I needed. I finally know why I have been tired all week (girl stuff if that’s not TMI), but I haven’t been this tired with it in a very long time.

We are headed to different family parties over the next three days. Tomorrow afternoon, my in-laws are hosting my mother-in-law’s very large family, then it’s back to their house on Saturday to celebrate with Craig’s paternal grandma who is in her early 90′s, and finally on Sunday, we celebrate with my side of the family. One of my sisters is coming down with her family from Minnesota and my two brothers and their families will be there, as they live in the Milwaukee area.

Enjoy your holiday celebrations everyone!

My first oats in a jar

Anyone else ready for a mini Christmas vacation? I am ready for our vacation in Florida, but I have to wait another month and a half for that. Gee, we better get our flights, rental car and hotel booked soon! Anyone have any recommendations of where to eat and stay in the Orlando area?

My breakfast consisted of the blog world’s famous “oats in a jar.” I don’t know who started it, but they are a genius. I took a container of NuttZo that only had about an inch left of nut butter left and put stovetop oats into it. I also added some honey and greek yogurt to sweeten and add protein. No dishes to wash, just a container to recycle. This would be perfect to take to work, as long as you don’t mind a cooler bowl of oats. Obviously, I would highly recommend trying the oats in a jar idea.

Lunch was leftover Qdoba (veggies burrito), the last Oikos caramel yogurt, clementines and some chocolate–a Kinder Bueno to be specific. I am surrounded by chocolate at the office. Not just any chocolate, but German chocolate! My former co-worker (who is German and now lives there again) sent our office a nice package of treats to munch on before the holidays–thank god for her. Alas, I resisted the chocolate until lunch today. I also couldn’t resist the temptation of Haribo Frogs. For some reason, they seem to be softer from Germany.

I particpated in my third Zumba class tonight. It was challenging in the middle of the class. There were new dance moves and songs and I couldn’t catch onto the moves. I laughed with another girl in front of me and admitted out loud that I was lost. After class, I lifted weights for my legs. I haven’t been in the workout room in a while to go on machines or the weights. It’s been all classes lately and I miss the workout room.

Dinner was an Arnold Thin with sweet peppers, brie, chipolte mayo and oregano. It tasted yummy! I also had some carrots on the side and a Fig Newman. Like many of the Newman’s Own Organics products, these tasted like Fig Newtons, only less sweet.

I have more energy tonight and will not fall asleep on the couch!

Time to use that energy to wash dishes and pick up around the house. Night!