Tag Archives: oats

Lifting, squats, and Indian food.

Slept pretty good last night and got up at about 6:50, which is pretty good sleeping in for me 😀 I had a protein drink and biked to the gym in gorgeous weather!

Did the iron – trying to do less weight and more reps.

Exercise Set/rep/weight Muscle worked
Barbell Squats 3 sets of 8 at 45#!!! Lower body
Chin ups 1 set of 2, 4 sets of 1 Upper back
Dumbbell Pullover 3 sets of 10 with 25# DB Back
Barbell press 3 sets of 12 with 45# bar Chest
Plank 3 sets of 1 minute holds Abs
Good mornings 3 sets of 10 with 30# bar Hammies and low back
Face Pull 3 sets of 15 at 20# Shoulders
Nosebreakers 3 sets of 12 at 25# Triceps

Good news – I was finally able to get back under the barbell!  Just an empty bar, but I could do the squat fairly balanced. Yay! I was feeling so good about that I hopped on the treadmill and busted out a mile jogging.  Really slow, but I did the whole mile.  About a 14-minute mile, but jogging nonetheless.  Maybe I will get over the injury after all :mrgreen:

Came home and made some custard oats with cocoa powder.

Topped with almonds and some fluff.  Then I relaxed and read blogs and caught up on emails.  Pretty soon, it was time for a visit here:

Dentist!  I have a chipped filling, which is going to be replaced next week.  They are also going to fill a cavity and build up between these 2 teeth. I have a large space between those teeth and food gets caught there a lot.  I have to floss it after every meal (annoying).   It will be nice to get that fixed.  I have to say that I really love my dentist.  He really seems to care about the patients.  I also found out I am an agressive brusher!  I have some exposing of my roots on one side because of that.  So, I have to make sure I keep the brush angled and to only hold it with 3 fingers to keep the pressure light.

After a good cleaning, you know I had to go spoil that with eating!

Isn’t this fun?  It’s a blue potato topped with laughing cow, some quinoa and broccoli.  Tasty, but I did put some hot sauce on it after taking a pic 😀  Plus a yummy pear.  Working in carbs today in preparation for tomorrow.

Spent time working in the garden.  Nothing new blooming, so no pics today.  I made lattes.

Looks a little green?  Don’t tell anyone.

Maybe it is because there was some of this in there:

Hey, it’s the weekend!  With this on the side:

John got cooking dinner.  He made a recipe link provided by Karen for Mujadara – a lentil and rice dish.

Caramelizing onions:

I cooked up lentils while John did the rice.  Mixed all together with cumin, cinnamon, salt and pepper:

We cooked up some chicken, too, because we need more protein.

Easy and tasty!  Although it did take a while to cook those onions.  Who knew the onions would be so yummy.  This from a girl who picked out every single onion out of things growing up.  (I know, Mom, can you believe it??).

I also made a batch of date protein ball/squares today:

Made this batch with almonds.  And I snacked on some.  I hope to have a recipe up this weekend for these. These are to take along tomorrow.  We are shooting for a 60-mile ride!  I am a little nervous, but looking forward to it.  We will be leaving early as it will be at least 5 hours of riding.

Have a super night!

More lifting progress.

Boy howdy it was hot last night!  We didn’t think to put in the window AC unit and it was 85 yesterday, which meant the bedroom was stifling hot.  Ugh.  So, not the best night’s sleep.  Humid this morning, too.  After quaffing my protein drink, I headed out to the gym.

15 minutes on the stationary (3 miles).  Then the iron:

  • Deadlift/row combo:  3 sets of 10 with 45# bar
  • Dumbbell squats:  3 sets of 8 with 10# DBs
  • Chin ups:  4 sets of 1
  • Barbell chest press:  3 sets of 10 at 55#
  • Face pulls:  3 sets of 15 with 20#
  • Crunches:  3 sets of 15
  • Hammer curls:  3 sets of 15 with 12# DBs
  • Good mornings:  3 sets of 10 with 30# bar
  • Overhead triceps press:  3 sets of 15 with 10# DBs.

Assessment:  Couple exciting things – I did squats with weights for the first time in about a month.  I do find that I tend to lean to the right because of the weakness in my left leg, so I have to be really careful not to do that or I will end up with a huge right thigh LOL.  I actually tried the 15# dumbbells, but couldn’t quite do it.  I also did full chin ups for the first time in a month.  I lost a wee bit of strength on these, as evidenced by the single sets, but I am pleased that these do not hurt to do now!  Yay!

Even though it was pretty warm and humid this morning, I decided to have oats for breakfast.  When John shopped without me a few weeks ago, he got quick cook oats instead of rolled ones, so this bowl looks funny.  Pumpkin oats topped with nutzzo and the last of the maple cream.

In my new bowl!  I don’t know why clear dishes and cups are so appealing to me, but they are.

I have to tell you, my leg is driving me crazy today.  I am having phantom itching now.  I still have the numb spots on my knee and my inner calf.  Those spots itch now, but when I scratch them, I can’t feel that – so the itch never goes away.  I had this some yesterday, and more today.  Maybe this means the feeling will come back soon.  I have been rubbing my leg, because I can’t tell how hard I am scratching those spots and I don’t want to break the skin.  This is fun – I told John it’s like spinning the sciatica symptom wheel to see what comes up for the day :mrgreen:  It’s always something different.  I do like variety at any rate…..

Lunch time with its lame accompanying photo:

Lunch eaten at the computer  – guilty as charged.  Tuna wrap hidden in there.  We didn’t really buy enough fresh fruit for me this week (we kind of shopped in a hurry yesterday), so I went with applesauce.

Who’s ready for chocolate??

As much fun as I had working Storm yesterday, I am a cat person at heart.

Dinner time.  John cooked up pork and chicken for the week, so I had trouble choosing, but ended up with pork 😀

I love anjou pears.  I decided I don’t like the green pears as much.

Done with work and will be going out to work in the garden a little bit.  Or possibly out for coffee as John got the scooter running for the year, vroom, vroom!

Question:  Do you ever eat at the computer (or somewhere not at the table)?

Status quo?

It’s a beautiful morning!  Sing it!  Actually, it is very nice today.  Still a little cool, but the sunshine is out!  It feels good to be done (pretty much) with the real estate deal.  It’s funny, but whenever a firetruck would go blaring by in the direction of my old property, I always had a thought it could be going there.  Today a firetruck went by and I realized that I don’t have to worry about that anymore!

I slept really well last night.  Fell asleep around 11 and woke up at 7, which is a *lot* of sleep for me.  😀   Decided that I wanted some banana pecan custard oats for brekkie today.  I put 5 pecans in the microwave for about a minute to toast them up.

Topped with marshmallow fluff.  This was a very tasty bowl indeed.

Got right to work.  It’s funny how work gets slow and busy, and you just never know when that will be.  I need to decide whether to stay with this job or not.  The main reason I took this job was because of the investment property and needing extra money to cover it while I waited (spinning wheels, so to speak).   John and I were talking about what I should do next.  I always feel like I have to be doing something, but I think it is okay to tread water for a little bit (which is pretty much what I did the last year).  There is nothing wrong with the status quo, at least for a while.

Lunch time!

Tuna salad and FSTG sweet potato chips.  These are good, but most of the bag was all busted up.  Boooooo – these are too pricey for that to happen.

I wanted to share a super cute picture of Pixie.  Even though she is several years old, she will suckle on her own toe (guess I would call it a thumb if she actually had one).  I don’t know why she does it, and she only does it when she is on one of our laps.  I think it was because she got weaned too early as a kitten, but we will never know.  So, here she is doing that:

She kneads with the other paw while she is doing this.  Everyone say “awww….”

Latte time!  Plus an Attune bar.

We won’t mention the cookie dough ball I snuck in there as well.

Note how I balance the latte on my laptop which is balanced on my lap.  One of my less endearing traits is the risks I take with my electronics.

Dinner time is a fast one.  Baked crabcake topped with hot sauce!  I am almost out of my hot sauce, too. These are called Smart Option crab cakes (I wrote carb cake LOL) and are 170 calories each.  The smart is because they are inexpensive, I think.

Posting early tonight, as John and I are going to a symphony concert and it is a bit of a drive.  Haven’t been to one in so long because they are pretty pricey, and not all orchestras are worth the $$.   ( I am a former musician who played in orchestras, so I can say that 😛  )

Have a great night!

Question:  Do you feel the need to always be “doing”?

Just breathe

Had a good night’s sleep last night, which felt very good!  I made myself a protein drink and headed out to the gym:

Bottom’s up!

I rode the stationary for 15 minutes, then did a longer lifting routine today:

  • Chin ups.  From a box, so really 1/2 chins:  1 set of 4, 2 sets of 3.
  • Cable squat to row:  3 sets of 15 at 40#
  • Pushups:  3 sets of 10
  • Straight arm pulldown:  3 sets of 15 at 40#
  • Rope crunch:  3 sets of 15 at 20#
  • Lying triceps extension:  3 sets of 15 with 10# DBs
  • Upright row:  3 sets of 10 with 25# bar
  • Pliet squats:  3 sets of 10 with bodyweight (this hurt a little)
  • Biceps curls:  3 sets of 15 with 25# EZ curl bar

I decided to keep the weights lower and do more reps.  I was going to start the endurance phase of strength training in May, but may as well start it now since I am hampered a little bit anyway.  Then I got on the treadmill for the first time since the injury.  I could only walk at 2 mph LOL!   That lasted about 5 minutes before I got back on the bike for a bit.

Came home undecided for breakfast, which is unusual.  Normally I have already planned out my meal while I work out 😀

I chose banana custard oats topped with some nuttzo and a sprinkle of dried cranberries.  Really good.

This is a new bowl I bought for myself on Saturday.  On sale for $5 from $14!

I figured the morning would start out as normal, but alas, it was not to be.  The house closing has all kinds of stressful snafus, including much miscommunication between lawyers.  Nobody informed my lawyer they wanted to close tomorrow, so my lawyer didn’t tell me that I needed to order the mortgage payoff letter from my lender, since they didn’t know we were ready to close.  Apparently this is new legislation with banking privacy laws and the home owner has to do it now?  First I have heard of it.  So that means delay until that letter gets through.  I had to go fax a request with 1000 urgents written all over it.  I cannot get through to the payoff department directly by phone (WTF?).

This is not a face that you want to have looking at you, let me tell you.  And then the buyer’s agent is flipping out today about a car in the driveway at the house (which is actually gone as of the writing of this post) and are threatening to not close if it isn’t gone.  Chill out people.  Do I not own this property until we actually close?  You can bitch after the walk through, and not before.  I am so not radiant about this right now.  I am trying really, really hard not to stress snack.  I just want this over.  I need to remember all this if I am thinking of flipping another house.

I cannot control what other people do. I can only control my reactions.  Breathe in and out.  This will pass… It means nothing in the larger scheme of things.

Phew….

Lunchtime involved some wrappage:

Tuna wrap!  I stopped getting the wraps for a while, but decided I wanted them again.  Hello Rutville, it’s good to be back.

John made lattes and I had my chocolate fix this afternoon:

Then I popped over to the property to make sure said car was gone (and it was).  I feel better about that, but there is a futon frame in the back that we need to remove.  I feel like my radiance got buried under lawyers, former tenants, and real estate agents!   John has been studiously avoiding saying anything that might get me riled up today.  I think he wants to fly under my radar right now LOL!  That’s a good thing.  ( He is a smart man.)

Dinner time brought on a baked crab cake (from frozen) and brussels.

I was pretty close to deep frying this because John was frying up sweet potato fries for himself (which I snuck a few of).

I need to relax and recoup tonight, as well as finish up work.  All that running around and phone calls means I had to flex work hours to tonight.  I am feeling much better about the whole thing, though, and my sense of humor about it has returned.

I’ve got a cup of tea and a hand full of ginger chews to tide me over – fingers crossed for no over snacking!

Flashback Friday: The Pixie edition.

Happy Friday!   Had another nice workout today.  I went to the gym and the owner was there, so I showed him the Shape article.  He was pleased to see a member in there!  He took the article and set it out in the waiting area so other members can see it.  A little embarrassed there LOL!

I hopped on the stationary bike and rode for 15 minutes.  It’s getting easier – I might have to try the real bike this weekend.  My knee stings now, which is weird.  It’s constant, too.

The iron:

  • Stiff legged dead lift:  3 sets of 10 with 45# bar
  • Incline Barbell chest press:  3 sets of 8 with 55# bar
  • Rail squats:  3 sets of 10 with body weight only
  • Dumbbell pullover:  3 sets of 8 with 25# DB (surprised this one felt fine)
  • Military press:  3 sets of 10 with 15# DBs
  • Crunches on a bench:  3 sets of 15

Then I did 10 more minutes on the stationary.  Felt good.   Slow progress, but progress nonetheless!

Happy to be working out again.

Came home after thinking about creating some gingerbread custard oats during the last bike session:

1 tbsp of molasses cooked with the oats, along with ground cloves, then stirred in the egg whites.  Topped with some crystalized ginger bits from Ginger People and 5 toasted pecans.  Ah-mazing!

Here is a little backstory on Pixie for the Friday Flashback.  This was 3 years ago.  We had a cat already (Chloe), and she was pretty much a 1-cat household kind of feline.  I had spent a month working on befriending an injured stray cat outside and finally getting it into our house.  She had a lame front leg, at some point she must have been hit by a car. We named her Moxie and I set about finding a home for her.  We got a home for her and I burst into tears when she left, because I had grown very attached to her, but it wouldn’t have been fair to Chloe to bring another cat into the house (not to mention John being allergic and all).  Moxie needed to be an indoor cat because of the lame leg.   John felt so bad that he bought me a little stuffed kitty.

Look familiar?  Right about that time, a thin, raggedy, and desperate cat with giant feet came meowing up to the door.

She had ticks on her face and had fleas, not to mention that she was pregnant (which we did not know because she was rail thin).  John said I could feed her, but she couldn’t come in (hahahaha – famous last words!!!).  She stayed in our shop behind the house, and then miscarried kittens a couple weeks later, which was sad.

I took her in to get spayed before we were going to find a new home for her.  Here she is recuperating next to her doppleganger:

Isn’t that the most amazing coincidence?  I say that John brought her to me with that stuffed kitty.  After she was getting better, I kind of made up my mind to keep her.  Pixie adored me and seemed very needy, so I didn’t want to give her to a stranger.  The problem was breaking the news to John.  I don’t think he was very happy with me, but I thought she could live in the shop and then come into the house after Chloe passed away.  It worked out pretty well, and she lived out there for a year and seemed perfectly happy.  When Chloe passed away at age 18 last year, Pixie moved into the house with us about a month later.  She’s all fat and happy now:

And John doesn’t seem to mind so much:

It’s amazing how time flies, isn’t it?

Time for lunch!  I had a deconstructed BBQ chicken salad because the lettuce was like lettuce soup (ewwww….).

After lunch I finished up the rental house cleanup.  All fresh and sparkly clean.  Not sure if we are closing Monday or not, as the lawyers didn’t set a time yet.  Sigh….

After that, it was time for lattes:

Plus some mini ginger snaps:

These are tres delicious, which could be a problem!  Since it is the start of John’s weekend and the middle of mine, we decided to have a cheap dinner date.  That always means pizza!  John biked, and I drove.  I think 10 miles would be a bit much for me right now, although I am really starting to want to move.  The greens:

And a cheeze pizza wrap on a wheat wrap.  So good!

I lurve cheese!

I may or may not have had more mini ginger snaps when I got home.  Just sayin’

We are still trying to decide what to do for the evening.  Either some shopping or movie time.  It’s the weekend!

Question:  Tell me all about your pets.  How many do you have?

A wee bit of lifting

Thank you all so much for your comments on my Shape Magazine debut!  If it inspired even just one person to never give up, that would make me so happy!  It really is worth all the effort.

Since I didn’t post any food or other doin’s yesterday, I thought I would let you know how the first foray back to the iron went.  Mornings are the hardest time for me right now.  I am not sure why, but maybe I am just super stiff after the night of basically sleeping in one position.  I cannot sleep on my stomach or side yet (my 2 normal sleep positions).  So, I am pretty stiff and sore in the mornings, particularly my hip.  I was a little limpy at the gym, which was noticed by people (I got sternly warned not to over do it 🙂 )  There are certain moves that I cannot do currently, which include  weighted squats, lunges, full dead lifts, and floor work like push ups and planks.  Those hurt too much, plus I have a little weakness in my knee.  No pull ups, either, as I have to jump up to the bar and drop off of it.  Not chancing that yet.  I am not going to risk reinjuring myself, so don’t worry about that.  My body certainly does tell me, as well.

I rode the recumbent bike for 10 minutes to warm up.  I was going about 7 miles an hour.  This is my first cardio I have done in almost 2 weeks!  It was a little sore, but not painful, so I was pretty happy.  That means regular biking is not far off in the future!

The lifting:

  • Straight-leg deadlift: 3 sets of 10 with 45# bar
  • Arnold Press:  3 sets of 10 with 15# DBs
  • YTWL: 3 sets of 4 (each letter) with 8# DBs
  • Nosebreakers:  3 sets of 10 with 30# bar
  • Bent over row:  3 sets of 8 with 25# DBs
  • Barbell chest press:  3 sets of 10 with 55# bar

Then I did 10 more minutes on the recumbent bike.  That was enough for a first try.  It just felt so good to get back to it, even if it was light and somewhat limited.  At 2 weeks out from the herniated disk, I think I am doing pretty well.

Now back to today!  Breakfast was a fab combo of pumpkin custard oats topped with a few dried cranberries, toasted pecans, and maple cream.

Dang, that was a good bowl of oats.

I got to work early and fast today!  Lots to do, so I put my head down and started busting out lines.  I stopped for a babybel snack.

I am going to actually post yesterday’s lunch, because it was so good (today was yogurt and cereal combo, btw).  I had seen some sweet omelets on the net, and I cannot remember the original blog this was on.

I mixed 1/2 scoop of strawberry protein powder with 2 liquid egg whites and 1 whole egg, plus some cinnamon and blended in the magic bullet.  Then I cooked it like an omelet and sandwiched in a laughing cow wedge and blueberry sauce

D-licious.  Who knew sweet eggs could be so good?  Note to self:  Spray pan with nonstick spray next time….

I finished up work early today, so I went over to the rental house and started some clean up.  I am able to walk around without crutches now – yay!  The closing should happen on this house on Monday, and you had better believe we are going out for a nice dinner to celebrate!

Came back to make some dinner. Everybody say ‘stir fry’!

I am liking the broccoli slaw.  It’s fun and easy, plus it has some nice color.  With precooked brown rice chicken and I had a 10 minute dinner.  I had a kiwi, too, instead of strawberries so my dinner was color coordinated 😀

Headed out to pick up a few things for the rental house:

Hopefully the last money I ever spend on this particular property…..

My sister was also in town tonight, so we met at Starbucks!

I had a tall skim latte:

Plus a bite of oatmeal cookie.  These actually are really good.

Just to show I am not the only ham in the family:

13 years of marriage, people….  At least he bakes good bread 😉

I also got a package today from the Ginger People – I won a drawing and they sent an amazing amount of stuff to me.

I am actually going to review this stuff because it is amazingly good and unusual!

Tomorrow is another lifting day and bagel time!

Question:  Have you ever had a sweet egg dish?

Fly by day.

Where did the day go?  Ever have days like that?  Woke up to a drizzly, gray day today.    I even had trouble deciding what to have for breakfast, so I pretty much had the same banana custard oats I had yesterday!

We then hit the farmers market so I could pick up some more parsnips and I am going to try beets this week!  White ones, though – not red.

Then we went and did work at my rental house.  The tenant left, so we are doing the little fixups before closing in about 9 day (fingers crossed!).  I still need to get it cleaner.  People are just dirty….

Came home to lunch of baked clam strips and a granny smith apple!

Then we went back to the house for  a little bit and did more work before deciding we needed some coffee!  It seems like we go out for coffee a lot, but we really don’t spend much money on other things.  We never go to the movies or other entertainment stuff, so coffee it is!

Yum:

John and I split this cookie, too.

And lookie what is in the background.  Might be the May edition of Shape magazine…..  (separate post coming up!)

By the time we got back home, it was about dinner time.  I reheated some coconut curry that John made, although I put broccoli in it while John had his with rice.  Need to work on getting that boy to eat broccoli!

He just sauteed chicken with curry powder, and then added some lite coconut milk and cashews.  Easy and tasty!

2 presents arrived by mail today.  One was for me:

The other was a present I bought John for taking such good care of me while I  recover from my herniated disk.

He’s been really wanting to bake good bread and home and has been going hit or miss, so I got him this book.

Movie night tonight from Netflix.  And probably some chocolate.  All this moving around today has exhausted me, which is a weird feeling.  I cannot wait to be back to normal (or what passes as normal around here, anyway!)

Guess I will end the randomness of today’s post. It’s kind of like how the day went 😀

Question:  Are you a bread baker?

Livestrong and the Battenkill

It’s my weekend!   A little chilly this morning, so I made some banana oats topped with Nuttzo and pineapple preserves.

Read the free weekly paper and then went out to the cancer center at the hospital, where they were hosting 4 of the riders from the Livestrong Trek team for the Battenkill Bike Race this weekend.  The Battenkill is a premier bike race, and we are lucky to have it so close by.

These guys are so young (and cute).

4 countries represented here: Canada, England, Australia, New Zealand.

There was a question and answer session with them about biking, the Livestrong team, training, and racing.  Some interesting points:

  • Bikes must weigh a minimum of 15 pounds (for safety)
  • This team will do 70 races in a year. 😯
  • They don’t go into each race thinking to win, as each rider has different strengths and you can’t be in peak condition all year long (lightbulb went off here for me).
  • Riders are invited to join the Livestrong Trek team based on their previous year’s performance on the pro circuit.  It’s quite an honor to be offered a contract.
  • They begin to eat a lot a couple days before the race and a lot during each race.  Nothing crazy, just more of their regular food.
  • The most common bike injury other than road rash is a broken collarbone. Ouch!

One of the Trek bikes.  It is so light!  It’s like picking up a 15# dumbbell.

Getting up close and personal.  Thin tire!

Seat looks comfy, no?

They said that while this seat looks gruesome (their words) the longer you ride, the more a padded, wider seat would chafe.  ‘Nuff said.

This bike has a computer on it that can tell the rider how many pedal strokes they are doing at any given time, GPS, calories, speed, RPMs, distance, energy output and more.  It can be downloaded onto a computer and they can analyze an entire race from start to finish.  Amazing.

After all that and I found out I touched a $10,000 bike (eeeeeeeeeeee) 😯

I cannot wait to get back on the bike now!  If work is slow on Sunday, we hope to be able to catch some of the race in person.

Came home and made a yummy lunch of greek yogurt, bran buds, strawberries and a drizzle of honey.  Not pictured is the medjool date I munched on.

I did a mini upper body workout today:

  • Wall pushups:  3 sets of 25
  • Tricep kickbacks:  3 sets of 15 with 12# DB
  • Overhead press:  3 sets of 10 with 15#

Then I walked.  I also walked a lot at the hospital today.  I had the forethought to take the crutches, and I was glad because I had to walk a lot more than I expected with parking.

After some guitar practice, it was latte time!

We just have a Mr. Coffee espresso maker.  Only was $25.  The espresso isn’t the best, but it foams milk like a son of a gun!

John wanted to take me out to dinner.  He kept asking me – it must be out of pity for me LOL.  So, we went to Arthurs where we split a plate of fries 😳

And I had a turkey and broccoli grinder with mustard instead of mayo.

I just love warm and toasty sammies!

Going to be a quiet evening at home tonight.  Is it too early to get into jammies on a Friday night after dinner?? :mrgreen:

Sm’oats!

I slept in some today!  Yay!  I woke up around 7 am, which is pretty late for me.  Had a pre workout snack of half a sandwich thin spread with some Nuttzo.  That’s unsweetened nut butter that is crunchy with seeds!

It was almost 50 degrees, so I laced up and went down to the track to run.  No school this week, so I could run without feeling like a stalker.  While the track can be boring, I do like it because I can just go on autopilot and think.  No worries about traffic or crossing the street or getting too far from home.  Just me, my tunes, and the early sun.  I did 4 easy miles.  I really need to do speed work (note how I keep saying that…), but I am just kind of lazy about not doing it.

It started to cloud up as I finished up and now it is raining!  I have been thinking s’mores a lot lately, so I had to find some way to incorporate that into breakfast without going overload.  So I present the sm’oats!

  • 40 g of Multigrain hot cereal (130 cal)
  • 5 g of dark cocoa powder (10 cal)
  • 1 small banana mashed (90 cal)
  • 2 egg whites (30 cal)
  • 12 g of Fluff  (40 cal)
  • 1 square of crumbled graham cracker (35 cal)

I mixed the cereal and cocoa powder and added to boiling water with the mashed nana.  Cooked until almost done and tempered in the egg whites.  Then topped with fluff and graham cracker!  Total calories for the bowl is 335 calories.  I carefully measured everything, because it would be so easy to go overboard and pack on the calories.  That’s pretty much why I weigh things, because if I go by teaspoons and tablespoons, I get a bit generous and still call it the lower number.  Not sure who I think I’m fooling that way 😉

Lunch time included some more leftovers.

Stuffed shells – I hadn’t had those in years, but they were on the Easter menu and I forgot how good they were.  I don’t eat a lot of pasta anymore (being a volume eater and all), but I do like it.

And this was the tartest kiwi ever!  Dang I think they crossed the tree with a lemon or something.  Hope the other 2 aren’t quite so tart.

Update on the downward scale movement.  I lost a net of 1 pound in March.  The turtle is back!  I don’t know why I sometimes put myself at odds with myself by working heavier weights and then expecting the scale to go down.   Some of my snacking isn’t all that conducive, either LOL!  Working muscles harder and I get so hungry, so I eat.  I’ll just keep trucking along.  If I lost a pound a month for 6 months, I would be happy.

Snacky time!  John made me a protein latte, which I paired up with some dark chocolate.

Lattes, chocolate and rainy days are made for each other, don’t you think?

This morning, I pulled out what I thought was chicken to drop in the crockpot and found out it was pork.  I decided just to do that anyway.  I added some homemade salsa (from one of our customers) to the cooker and dropped in the pork loin.

Delicious!  Paired with the usual 😉

Tidbit:  On yesterday’s post, I mentioned doing lower weights and higher reps.  The reason for that is periodization.  I did 4 weeks with lower reps and heavier weights, now I am doing at least 1 week at higher reps and lower weights to help with endurance (slow twitch muscle fibers) to help with my bike riding.  Now that warm weather is here, likely to change up some routines!  It’s so hard to do all I want to do in a week of workouts.  I need to focus more on what I need to do to reach certain goals (i.e. 100 mile bike ride.)

John and I went out for a little together time tonight.  He wanted to go to the library, and you know I won’t turn that down or the coffee afterwards.

I was going t to get the 2nd Twilight book out.  I finished the first one.  I am not totally sure I liked it, but I can certainly see why they are popular.  All of the others were checked out, so I got a Stephen King short story book instead 😀

Snack while updating this post:

I love butter snap pretzels.  They are even better when paired with chocolate chips, although I restrained myself 😀

Have a great night!

The letter P!

Happy Monday to all!  I woke up a little later today again because of the time change.  No one was at my gym either, maybe because it was still a little dark when I got there.  That just seems too early, even though it was near 7.  I jogged a mile on the hamster wheel to warm up, then moved some heavy stuff:   P is for Power!

  • Pull up:  0 (see below)
  • Chin ups:  2 sets of 4, 1 set of 3 (see below)
  • Barbell deadlift/row combo 3 sets of 8 at 65#

Superset:

  • Stationary lunge:  3 sets of 8 with 35# plate
  • Pushups:  3 sets of 10.

Superset:

  • Dumbbell Pliet squat: 1 set of 10 with 35# DB, 2 sets of 10 with 40# DB
  • 1-point dumbbell row:  3 sets of 8 with 20# DBs.
  • Planks: 1.5 minute hold, then two 1-minute hold
  • YTWL:  3 sets of 4 (each letter) with 10# DBs

Giant set:

  • Cable woodchop:  3 sets of 10 at 40#
  • Bicep curl with EZ curl bar:  3 sets of 10 at 30#
  • Overhead triceps extension:  3 sets of 10 with 10# DBs.

Yay!  It felt great 😀  I attempted a pull up just for kicks.  That was quite amusing, I have to say.  I dangled like a fish on a hook before giving up.  I moved to chin ups, but I went back to the way I did them before from a box with bent arms instead of dead hang and that is why I was able to do more.  I am getting stronger.

I was ready for breakfast and started the day with the letter P for pumpkin!  Pumpkin custard oats, to be exact.

Yum!  Work started off slow today.  That is always annoying because it means I have to work later into the evening to make my line commitments.  It’s not like a job where I go and work for 8 hours no matter how busy or slow it is.  If there are no files, I don’t get paid.  The not so glamorous side of working at home.  P as in Pfffffftttt…..

Lunch was an egg puff (just scrambled in the microwave) on a tortilla with laughing cow and hot sauce.  I am so into the hot sauce.

And on the side? P is for Plum!  This is called a lemon plum.  It’s yellow on the inside and has a lemon shape to it:

Interesting.  More sweet, as I find plums to usually have a tart side to them.

Afternoon snack – P is for protein!  I remember when Starbucks offered a protein shot with lattes, so I asked John to put 1/2 a scoop of protein powder in the milk when he steamed it.  He used chocolate PP and it looks like this:

It kind of was like a mocha.  This baby packed in 21 grams of protein!  I think I would use plain next time (which we don’t have on hand at this moment).  I am not used to sweet lattes, so this was a little odd for me to drink.  I know you are all probably proteined out, but I need to up my protein for snacks (meals are fine).

Dinner time.  I love how with daylight savings, dinner pictures have plenty of natural light.  Behold my plate:

Stir fry with chicken, broccoli, and sweet Potatoes!  This was excellent.  And these strawberries are like candy, seriously.  (There may have been some P for Peanuts snacked upon while cooking, too)

Does anyone else think it’s earlier than it really is at night now?  I keep getting surprised when I look at the clock and see how late it actually is.

Getting settled in for my evening snack.  P is for Pomegranate!

A couple squares of the new Hershey’s Extra Dark with Pomegranate.  Yum, yum.

The last P for today? P as in Publish post!  😀

A 10% off coupon is available to my Open Sky shop – just use the code THANKS when you check out for 10% off your order from my shop or any shop!