Cookies, Meal Plans, and a Dolphin Topiary

Hello!

Isn’t this little dolphin topiary the cutest? He lives, er swims, in my neighborhood.

Being Grateful

I wrote in my last post that I want to be more conscious of  counting my blessings and being grateful.

Right now, I am very grateful for the long weekend and the extra time to catch up. I have some cleaning and cooking to do, but I also found the book Intuitive Eating at my library and I’m really excited to tuck into that.

Staying Fit

Tues, Wed, Thurs – Continuation of my self-imposed rest week from the LiveFit trainer.

Eating Food

1) Did you know I love Aldi? You didn’t, did you?  I couldn’t believe that these strawberries, tomatoes, and apples were actually super delicious and sweet.

2) My wonderful brother- and sister-in-law surprised me with a care package in the mail – locally roasted coffee and a very sweet card that said something like, “We know it’s tough to be separated from your best friend. Hopefully this treat will cheer you up.” sniff. I’m SO lucky to have the best family ever.

3) COOKIE. I know I was a little hard on Panera’s salads, but DAMN, their cookies are hella good. I split this with a friend and also enjoyed an unsweetened iced tea. mhm.

I don’t talk about it on the blog very much, but I have a seriously unhealthy obsession with cookies. If you told me that I would die tomorrow, I would eat cookies nonstop for the next 24 hours.

Meal Plan

Although you couldn’t tell from above, I’m currently following a loose adaptation of the meal plan outlined in the  LiveFit trainer. I follow this plan about 80% of the time on weekdays and 50% of the time on weekends.

Breakfast – Egg white omelette with veggies, corn tortillas
Lunch – Chicken, coconut oil,  sweet potato, veggies. Topped withGreek yogurt and salad dressing
Snack – Turkey burger, quinoa, veggies, apple
Post-workout – Protein shake
Dinner – Same as lunch
Snack – Hard-boiled egg whites and hummus

This comes to roughly 40% carb, 40% protein, and 40% fat.  I’m never hungry, but I do often crave sugary starches (cookies!).

Having a meal plan definitely helps on Sunday nights, when I prepare and pack ALL of my food. I’m out of the house 7:30am-10pm on Monday-Wednesday, so I need to have everything ready to go. Keeping things standardized and eating the same thing for lunch and dinner really streamlines my meal prep and I prefer ease over variety anyway.

Any meal prep tips?

1 Part Fitness, 2 Parts Food, 10 Parts Bitching About Allergies

Hello!

Workouts

Fri - LiveFit, Day 40, shoulders & cardio
Sat - LiveFit, Day 41, legs
Sun & Mon – Rest 

Eats

1) Jess sent me the most wonderful care package! Coffees with all sorts of delicious flavors, roasted green tea, cocoa dusted almonds, and an amazing salad dressing. I ate all of the almonds before taking the photo, ha! #piggy

2) I LOVE ALDI. I promised that I wouldn’t buy the garlic variety and chose this roasted red pepper hummus instead. So delicious with super cheap roma tomatoes.

3) Another treat from Aldi - kiwi! They were 3 for $1 and actually quite sweet, though I left the others on my counter to ripen a bit. I love you, Aldi!*

*Doubtful that I even have to mention this, but: Aldi gives me nothing to say that I love them. NOTHING. Sadly, I don’t get any free shit from blogging.

Blah

Do you have allergies? I didn’t develop them until my early 20s, but they RAGE every spring and it’s all that I can think about. The sore throat made me sad, but these sinus pressure headaches make it impossible to focus on anything. One of my Facebook friends suggested starting a support group, which I would strongly consider if I didn’t feel so terrible.

FUCK YOU, FLOWERS.

I’m feeling too gross to compose a coherent piece, so a list it is:

• I did nasal irrigation for the first time. I don’t have a neti pot, but I used a little squeeze bottle to flush out my sinuses. It’s incredibly uncomfortable and only brought relief for a few minutes, after which everything clogged right back up.
• My LiveFit program has me resting every Sunday, but I prefer to take an entire week off if I train for 6 consecutive weeks. So that’s what I’m doing. Also, I need to catch up on schoolwork. Also, I feel like garbage.
• This is a really interesting photo series that documents a month’s worth of groceries for different families from around the world; some are quite sobering.
• During a study break, I stumbled onto a free Children’s Film Series. I had gone to another film festival in October and wrote that most of the films were lost on me, but this most recent series was geared towards kids 4-8 and I enjoyed it a lot more I found a few of the films on Vimeo, if you want to check ‘em out:

Metro, by Jake Wyatt (super beautiful)

Behind, by Ga young Back (super adorable)

ETA: I published this post before learning about the horrible destruction in Oklahoma and I feel like such an ass for complaining about Pittsburgh’s weather and allergy season. It’s embarrassing to realize that I only count my blessings after being reminded of tragedies elsewhere…

How do you remember to count your blessings?

Trying to Judge Less, Not Trying to be a Jerk

Hello!

Thank you all so much for the lovely comments on my last post! I loved reading your notes. Sometimes I worry people won’t want to read about “off-topic” things, i.e. things that aren’t related to food or fitness. But, I think everyone could tell how much fun I had telling the story (and adding to the Blogger Obsession List )

Workouts

Tues – LiveFit, Day 37, chest, abs, & cardio.
Wed – LiveFit, Day 38, legs.
Thurs – LiveFit, Day 39, arms, abs, & cardio.

Eats

1) Pretty much living off of this - chicken, veggies, and a starch (like rice or couscous).

I mix salad dressing with greek yogurt, which helps to keep things saucy, while decreasing the sodium. Though, I gotta stop using garlic hummus for nights that I eat during class. Sorry, world!

2) My first time cooking tilapia. Served with pan-seared green beans, hummus, and greek yogurt. I had no idea what I was doing, so I looked up a recipe online and sort of half followed it. I smushed on some almond flour, plopped some coconut oil in the skillet, and hoped for the best.

It was okay. I get why the lemon juice / white fish combo is so popular – that would have been really good. It was nice to have a switch from chicken, but it was a little expensive. Not sure how often it’ll be in rotation.

3) Pancakes. Because pancakes. Still using a version of this recipe. Amazing.

I had mentioned that I ran out of wheat flour, but still really wanted pancakes. I think these were made with flaxseed meal and oat flour? Maybe some almond flour? I try to throw a little protein powder in, too. I guess it doesn’t really follow the recipe, after all

Gym Manners

I recently watched an amazing video created as a companion to a commencement speech given by the late writer David Foster Wallace. If you can’t watch the video now, I really do encourage you to bookmark it for later. The basic premise is that life is full of irritating inconveniences and, as a now-educated adult, it is within one’s power to decide how to interpret and react to these irritants.

It’s really beautifully done and makes you reconsider how you view others and if you judge without realizing it. My main takeaway is that you aren’t inside everyone’s brain and, if people do something that you don’t understand or approve, there may be reasons.

I especially try to remember these things while I’m at the gym. I used to be annoyed by people who talk on their phones while on cardio machines. But, now I am one of those people and I’m sure others don’t realize it’s because my husband is on the other side of the world and time zones prevent us from talking at any other time (FWIW, I do try to keep my voice low ).

I do a few other things that people might view as being shitty, but I promise I’m not trying to be a jerk:

1. I leave my stuff on the ground when I go to the water fountain and it probably seems like I’m not putting the weights away.
2.  I sometimes alternate between two different exercises and it might look like I’m leaving without wiping down the machines.

Having said all of that…there are still some things that people do that drive me bananas. I tried to come up with some sort of explanation, but cannot:

1. Being absurdly unsafe, like squatting without the safety spotter bars…which are lying on the ground at your feet.
2. Counting your reps out loud - whyyyyy?????

Would you add anything to this list? Am I being unfairly judgemental?

Please watch that video!