Lucky Friday!

Happy Friday everyone! This week went by quickly! I hope the weekend goes by slowly. Tomorrow, I must clean the house, go to Craig’s grandma’s b-day party, grocery shop and then relax and read my book. On Sunday, we have to devote the day to taxes and I plan to start by 10k training.

Breakfast was strawberry waffles and coffee.

At work, I needed a Friday pick me up, so I got an almond latte. I can’t get used to drinking those fancy drinks and I need to go back to my peppermint tea.

Lunch was applesauce and a pb&j sandwich. I had a cookie for dessert.

I always read blogs on my lunch break and was so excited to see that I won Food Snob STL’s “favorite things” giveaway! I won justin’s almond/chocolate butter packets (which I also love), KIND bars (love and eat all the time), a meal/grocery planner notepad (totally need this badly) and raw honey (will definitely use).

It was definitely a lucky day! I came home to find a lovely package in my front door! Vitalicious was kind enough to send me some of their products.

Yum, can’t wait to try these! I put all but one in the freezer. I am saving that one for tomorrow morning!

When I get home from work, I often just want a little snack. Today, I had a few cheese curds.

My workout was 10 minutes of rowing, some weight machines and 25 minutes of biking while reading Health magazine.

I wasn’t too hungry for dinner, so I just had a mini bagel with an egg white and cheddar cheese and some red grapes on the side.

Now Craig and I are geeking out. He likes watching Shark Tank and we both are being geeky and watching a PBS show called “Electric Dreams” where a family goes back in time with the technology in their house and they see how things change from the 1970′s to current times. It’s the history nerd in me that loves this type of show! It’s so interesting to see how technology really does isolate the family members over time. I hate that it does that, but then again, here I am blogging away for the last hour on a Friday evening when I could be reading a book I have to finish by Wednesday.

Do you embrace technology or have you found it has isolated people at work and at home more over time? What is your favorite piece of technology? Mine definitely is my iPod touch. I don’t have a fancy phone, but I love playing with my iPod touch and surfing the web when I don’t feel like pulling out my laptop.

Rest day recap

Aaah, this rest day was exactly what we needed.

I had a yummy bowl of Apple Cinammon Oatmeal with peanut butter for breakfast. I also had a peach yoplait and coffee on the side.

After sitting at breakfast a lot longer than we normally have during this vacation, I went back to the Lululemon Athletica outlet. Since last Friday, I had thought about purchasing the Speed Up tank. Sometimes walking away and thinking about purchases is a good thing. I had tried on my normal size and it seemed a little tight in areas. I asked the girl in the fitting room if their sizes ran a bit small and she said they normally are the same size you always wear. She said the top I chose did feature a tighter fitting material, so I went with the next size up.

I like the mesh features in the back and the little zipper pocket.

I thought this tank would be perfect for yoga, especially because of the longer length. But when I mentioned the yoga factor at the checkout, the cashier was really nice and reminded me that the zipper may get in the way. I’ll just try it out and be careful when I do poses on my back.

I tried on pants and sports bras at Lululemon too and just wasn’t feeling the way either items fit. The girl at the fitting room was really helpful. Did you know that if you buy Lululemon pants at the outlet (which are about 40% off retail), you can get them hemmed for free at your local Lululemon? All of the pants I tried on today were super long, but I still wasn’t loving how they fit in other areas. I actually think I prefer Gap Body’s pants for yoga and cardio.

When I got back from the outlets, I read a bit of The Omnivore’s Dilemma and then Craig and I got ready to head out of the hotel.

We went to Giordano’s deep dish pizza for lunch. Yum! Seeing that we only have had the opportunity to eat deep dish when we have gone to Chicago, we took advantage of the fact that Florida also has deep dish pizza.

Two pieces of this sausage and cheese pizza was so filling for the both of us! Leftovers for tomorrow’s dinner!

After filling up on yummy pizza, Craig wanted to drive by the hotel he stayed at with his family when he was a kid and we knew it was just down the road. It was still there, but too bad it’s probably going to be torn down soon because it’s no longer a working hotel and there are no tresspassing signs all over the property.

When we got back, we sat by the pool and went in the hot tub. We think the hot tub has been broken this whole time, because it really wasn’t that hot. It looks like someone was working on it tonight, so hopefully we’ll get a chance at a real hotub tomorrow night.

I enjoyed reading Fitness magazine poolside.

My dinner ended up being a peanut butter cookie Larabar and a small apple.

Oh and my husband scored me a white chocolate chip cookie from the front desk. I savored it’s goodness while watching Watson on Jeopardy. I am a total Jeopardy geek, so I was excited to see Watson in action.

Tomorrow, we are off to Kennedy Space Center! We chose the best tour to get close to the launch pad. Too bad we are missing the actual launch by a mere 6 days. Boo!

Time to get organized for our little road trip.

Have any of the readers out there been to Kennedy Space Center? Any last minute tips for us? We have read that it’s hard to cram everything in during a day trip, but we’re going to try to do it.

Good night!

Brrr, it’s cold outside & a perfect day for soup

It’s a soup kind of day…with temperatures the coldest they have been all winter, my body craved soup this morning.

So, I pulled out some Minestrone from the cabinet and packed it for lunch.

I also had some grape tomatoes, pita chips and a chocolate chip cookie.

Breakfast was Jessica’s granola again. I can’t get enough of the stuff!

For those of you interested in the nutritional stats on the Vanilla Maple Jessica’s gluten free granola flavor, here they are:

Morning snack was about 5 or 6 dried apricots and a Yogi green tea kombucha.

I got a big craving for chocolate mid-afternoon (blame it on the long email I had been writing compiling lots of stats and comments).

So it was off to the candy shop at my work. It was either milk duds or a $7.00 bar of chocolate that the cashier said was “just ok.” Milk duds it was!

When I got home from work, I found another package on our doorstep. It wasn’t something I won, but a package from Amazon which contained a yoga book for my husband and this book for me to read on our trip to Florida:

Karma wanted to read the new David Sedaris book because it’s about animals. I still have to finish the Larsson book, but will get started on Sedaris soon and just read two books at once. I need a funny book after this rough and tiring week! David Sedaris was on CBS Sunday Morning a couple of weeks ago and that man just cracks me up. I think I have read almost all of his books and my favorite is Me Talk Pretty One Day.

I finally made a quinoa dish for dinner tonight. It contained TJ’s organic quinoa, grape tomatoes, chickpeas, feta, mozzarella, dried basil, garlic and a few Penzey’s spices. I topped it with olive oil, balsamic vinegar and a little sea salt. Every time I eat quinoa, I think to myself, “I need to eat this more, it is so good.” I love it’s versatility. I don’t think I have ever made the same quinoa dish. I just use whatever ingredients we have that go together well.

My picky eater husband even ate it! I think this is the first time he has ever had chickpeas. I told him they didn’t really taste like anything particular and he bought it.

And because I can’t stay away from this stuff, I had more of Jessica’s granola for dessert tonight.

Then it was off to yoga. My favorite teacher still wasn’t there tonight, but we had the teacher whose class I go to on Saturday mornings from time to time. Class was empty, but the gym itself was packed. Probably the most packed it has ever been since I have been going there for four months and I was surprised because the wind chill is probably in negative temperatures tonight.

Time to start reading the first chapter of the Sedaris book called “The Cat and the Baboon.”

Tomorrow, I’ll be blogging in the morning if I have time. I have to work mid-afternoon until midnight. Probably an eleven hour day and I am on my feet for so much of that time. After these particular events, I am just so tired all weekend and achy.

Goodbye Garfield

On my way home from work tonight, I called my dad and he told me to call him back when I got home. I said, “did something bad happen?” and he said, “just call me when you get home.” I replied back, “is it Garfield, did he die?” And my dad said yes. I knew his time was coming soon, as with my other bird, I took one look at Garfield at Thanksgiving and knew he was at the end of his life.

Garfield is the last of my childhood birds that was left. He lived with my parents, but I truly enjoyed visiting with him when I went to their house. He died this afternoon and will be missed. I grew up with cockatiel birds, 5 of them in fact over time. I had Garfield since I was 9 or 10. He was originally called Felix and I loved Garfield the cat, so I named him another cat cartoon name. Rest in peace little birdie, I’ll miss your chirping, tough guy bites, enthusiasm for fresh bread, love of baths in the bathroom sink, pretty pretty bird songs and you looking at yourself in the mirror or lamp base.