The home stretch

I’m in the home stretch now with my work program occurring over the next two days. After seven plus months of planning, it feels good to be concluding this event. Even today’s workload was a bit lighter as a result, which feels wonderful.

Still, I am looking forward to kicking back on Saturday night, with a hard cider in my hand, watching a movie (I get DVDs from the library and the ones I had on hold all seem to be coming in right now) and just relaxing. The movies we are getting to watch this weekend include the final Stieg Larsson movie, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, and the Oscar nominated Winter’s Bone. I have to wait on getting two others until next week so we don’t get “movied out.”

Breakfast was Stonyfield vanilla yogurt topped with strawberries and chia seeds, again. Seems like I like this combination since I’ve had it a couple of times this week!

Snack mid-morning was hot chocolate and a trail mix bar.

I ate lunch at the library while listening to a story by Alice Hoffman. My co-worker joined me this time and it was nice to hang out with her over our break. I laughed because about two months ago, I had convinced this particular co-worker and some others to try greek yogurt after I raved about it before we started a meeting. She is now hooked on it and has gotten her boyfriend and mom to love it. Her mom is a big Chobani fan like me. Wow, it’s kind of weird because she said that I influenced all three of them by just convincing her to try it. It’s a really nice feeling.

Lunch was a veggie sandwich with greek olive hummus, cucumbers, red peppers and a slice of pepper jack cheese. I also had a red delicious apple and an Activia peach cobbler dessert yogurt. I brought along a chocolate chip cookie for dessert.

Dinner was a leftover slice of pizza I had forgotten about and some brussell sprouts topped with Arizona Dreaming spice from Penzey’s and a bit of sea salt.

Dessert was a strawberry banana Chobani.

I let dinner settle in my tummy and then went to yoga. Shoveling the really heavy snow last night sure made a difference in how sore my back was today during yoga. It felt good to stretch!

I have to get to bed early tonight, so have a good one!

So happy

I leapt out of bed this morning (after hitting the snooze button a couple of times) and was so happy to start my day. Note: I haven’t felt like this in ages. The vacation in two days is giving me an extra reason to be joyous! I love to travel and especially to someplace warm with my husband in the middle of this icky Midwestern winter. I don’t know why, but I kept singing “on the good ship, lollipop” to my husband and cats this morning. Yes, I am weird and admit it. I don’t talk about my weirdness on my blog much, but my husband and I can be quite quirky together and that’s what makes life fun. Anyway…must have had a dream about the good ship lollipop or something.

Breakfast this morning was the absolute last of Jessica’s gluten free granola in my favorite flavor. I saved the best for last and had the Vanilla Maple. I’ll have to make my own granola and look for Jessica’s at Whole Foods.

Snack at work was a candy cane hot chocolate and the rest of the Newman’s Own cheddar soy crisps.

Lunch today was the pizza we had for dinner last night, a pink lady apple and two pitas with greek olive Sabra hummus. The hummus definitely was the key to filling me up at lunch.

After work, I changed and went straight to the gym. I did kind of what I did last night–biked for 18 minutes, walked/ran on the treadmill for 10, rowed for 5 minutes and lifted weights.

Dinner was a Boca Bruschetta burger on an Arnold’s Thin & a cup of skim milk.

Plus this larabar. I plan on bringing a bunch of these on our trip, so I wanted to make sure I liked this flavor.

Dessert was Newman’s Own Organics Super Dark chocolate with Reese’s pb chips.

I also had an airborne because I feel like I am getting sick and that cannot happen right now.

My food has been kind of random lately and it’s because we have been cleaning out our cabinets, fridge and freezer before this trip. For some reason, I just feel better doing that before a big trip and then we can start fresh with a big trip to the grocery store when we return.

I am off tomorrow so I can get a mini mani/pedi in the morning, head to the mall for a bit, pack for the trip, do laundry and clean up the house. Then it’s off to Florida bright and early on Friday morning!

Off tomorrow!

My work already declared that they are closing tomorrow! Do you know what that means? I can sleep in, well except for waking up to feed the cats!

I left work early today and worked from home until 5. Tomorrow, I don’t have to work from home, but I will for a bit of the day. I think I’ll put in 3-4 hours tomorrow and then use the rest of the day to prepare for our upcoming trip! I also just want to use some of that time to read magazines. My magazine stack is huge!

Breakfast today was a mini bagel with strawberry cream cheese and a bowl full of fresh blueberries.

I was super busy at work, but I took a brief break for some hot chocolate and a jalapeno cornbread muffin.

Lunch was a buffalo tofu wrap with tons of spinach. I overestimated the amount of spinach I would need, but that’s ok, just more nutrients for my body! I also had a Granny Smith applesauce and a Raspberry Dark Chocolate attune bar for dessert.

Once home, I worked for a while, made some hot chocolate and had two Hermits from Newman’s Own Organics.

Love the back of the package! It cracked me up when I saw it!

Is it weird that I was really looking forward to watching Oprah today because it featured Michael Pollan and talked about her staffers going vegan for a week and how they felt as a result? Unfortunately, due to the blizzard news coverage, it got pushed to airing at 12:30 a.m. We don’t have DVR, so I won’t be watching that show except for maybe in a rerun. It really stinks that Oprah doesn’t have videos of her show available online. I guess I can always read the transcripts. Did anyone see it? If you did or plan to watch it on your DVR, can you please fill me in?

This is what our front yard and my poor little Honda Fit looked like this afternoon. This is nothing because we’ll be adding 12-16 inches on top of this already high amount of snow!

On his way home from work, Craig called and asked if I could start making some frozen pierogies.

This was our first time buying frozen pierogies. I was the one that pushed buying them. Craig is ancestrally half Polish and I don’t think he ever had a pierogie until tonight. I had had them before, but it’s been a while.

They were yummy, but three pierogies didn’t make a dinner. We are trying to use up food before our trip, so I didn’t have a lot of fresh food to pair with my pierogies.

Instead I made his and hers berry smoothies with Soy protein powder. I added frozen mixed berries, blueberries, almond milk and pineapple.

While Craig snowblowed, I read the February issue of Woman’s Day.

One of the quotes from a love story in the magazine sounded very familiar.

My husband and I knew each other in high school. We had algebra together and he sat behind me. We never dated. Nine years later, I moved back from California and in with my parents, who were now living in a town other than the one I grew up in. While perusing our high school alma mater grads on MySpace, my husband happened to see the name of the town I lived in and he recognized my picture from high school. He had been working in the town my parents now live in for 8 years at that point. Craig had been down the road the whole time and I never knew it. After e-mailing each other daily, we met for ice cream a couple of weeks later and the rest is history. He even proposed at the ice cream place we met at.

Ok, I am feeling like my writing isn’t so great and I am getting tired. Time to read a few blogs and then disconnect.

I’ll be back tomorrow with a snow day recap!

Haircut & lunch with mom

I started my Wednesday with a mini bagel and strawberry cream cheese, with a side of cantaloupe.

Instead of going to work at my usual time, I got my haircut at 8 a.m.

Before leaving the house, Craig took a picture of my “before” hair.

Here is my after.

I really liked the new stylist I went to this morning. She gave me more face framing layers, even though she could tell I was scared of getting them back again because I have had very short layers around my face before and they didn’t look good.

In order to get free parking at the Milwaukee Public Market while I got my haircut nearby, I bought this delicious Door County Cherry scone at C. Adams bakery and had my parking ticket validated.

Love anything with Door County cherries in it! I snacked on it at work, because the cup of coffee I had while getting my haircut made me a bit shaky. I can’t wait to eat the other half tomorrow.

Lunch was with mom. She came to my workplace and then we walked to Subway for sandwiches.

I had half (and a few bites of the other half) a ham and provolone on 9-grain honey oat.

I am not a huge fan of black licorice, so I brought my mom the package I received from Newman’s Own Organics. I did try a few bites and it was really good.

Mom was in black licorice heaven.

Mom is a great quilter and sewer, so I asked her to make me a yoga mat strap. She brought it along today and here is the end result.

If you want to make your own, go here.

Since I went into work late, I had to stay late. I had some hot chocolate and an attune probiotic mint chocolate bar to perk me up.

Yum! I really enjoyed the attune bar. I will be trying them for the next two weeks straight, so you’ll see a bar on the blog every day now. I hope it helps my tummy! I wrote attune when I heard about them through Meals and Miles and they sent me a week of raspberry dark chocolate and a week of mint chocolate probiotic bars.

I haven’t revealed this on the blog before–I have Ulcerative Colitis. I need all of the probiotics I can get. Having Irritable Bowel Disease is one of the other reasons I wanted to start this blog. Since eating healthier and exercising more in the last year or so, I have noticed a difference in how I feel with IBD. I am glad I can track what I eat every day and how I feel in general through writing this blog.

Dinner tonight was a falafel sandwich.

Dessert was a tofutti mint chip sandwich and some cantaloupe.

American Idol is airing their Milwaukee episode and I have to go watch it now! No sighting of me in the background of any shots yet. Bummer.

Disappointed

As predicted, everyone was in such a good mood at work because of the Packers win. Sorry Bears fans.

Breakfast was Stonyfield plain yogurt, a bit of almond milk, fresh blueberries and Jessica’s Vanilla Maple natural gluten free granola. I am sad that bag is almost finished, but I’ll move onto one of the other two flavors soon and let you know how it is!

Between meetings, I was ready for a snack! I had a mini cinnamon raisin bagel with some cream cheese and a hot chocolate.

I have been feeling a little weird taking pictures of my lunches at my work. My co-workers don’t know about my blog and it would seem odd if one of them walked in to see me taking a picture of my food. So, I took a picture at home this morning and will probably do that from now on. Now most of my pictures will have that lovely yellow glow to them. Wish I could magically fix that! I can’t wait for winter to be over with and the sun to be shining when I wake up and when I get home from work.

Lunch was pasta with fettuccine sauce, a Musselman’s Granny Smith applesauce that tasted so yummy, a Vanilla Bean Dessert Activia & a lot of carrots. Seriously, I think that applesauce is the best I have ever had in my life. The Activia was just ok. I think I got it for free with double coupons, so I figured it was worth a try.

I snacked on some Newman’s Own Organics mini pretzels later in the day and then I left work a little early to head to Bodyblast Boot Camp.

Sadly, I think that was my last boot camp class at the Y. I was really disappointed in the teacher tonight. He was a total chatterbox and we all didn’t feel like we got a great workout in. In fact, after class, I went to the weight and cardio machine room to find so many familiar faces from the boot camp class I had just finished. One of the girls was on the elliptical and I chatted to her a bit. She looked over at me and said, “you feel like you need to work out more too because you didn’t get a good workout from class?” I told her yes and we talked about our disappointment. She said she’ll give him another shot, but I said I am not too sure I will. The class is called boot camp for crying out loud! Make us work hard! Sorry, I needed to vent. I think I am better off doing my own thing with weights and cardio on Mondays. After class, my friend Angie and I looked at the class selection for Mondays and nothing else really grabbed my attention. I wish we had a new teacher. The previous one left to go back to school and I attended her class once, but she was excellent.

Have you ever tried a boot camp class? Did you feel like you got a great workout from it?

When I got back from the gym, I had a Morningstar Black Bean burger with swiss cheese and a salad.

I’m looking forward to going to yoga tomorrow night. I used to declare Tuesdays my rest days, but now I think I will go to yoga when I can.

Off to read under a cozy blanket. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest is getting really good and I need to read about 250 more pages and finish before it’s due back to the library in a week!

Hope your Monday was fantastic!