First Snowfall

I woke up this morning to this…

And this…

Although the road wasn’t covered the ground, cars and rooftops were. Our first snowfall of the year. Even though I love the look of snow I was not impressed – it’s only October.

I had to get up this morning and drive my dad to the airport so after a long expedition (I won’t go into details but a 45 min trip ended up being about 2 hours) so on the way home I stopped at starbucks and splurged on this…

 

Grande Non-Fat, No Whip Pumpkin Spice Latte and this…

Pumpkin Scone.

And now I’m sitting on the couch doing this…

Icing my poor knee. I’m not sure what I did to it but I’ve been having throbbing pain in it for a little over 12 hours now. I’ve been putting the ice on for about 30 mins then giving myself a break from the freezing cold. I’m going to continue to do this for the next for hours and hopefully it will start to feel better.

So the reason I’ve been absent from the blog world for almost a week or so is the arrival of family. My dad and step-mom came into town on Wednesday evening and we’ve been busy ever since. Here’s a quick rundown of my weekend.

Thursday:

• Spend most of the morning cleaning and grocery shopping for the arrival of my dad and stepmom. They came to the our apartment for dinner that night. I made a macaroni casserole for dinner and it turned out great. Everyone seemed to enjoy it and it was really great to see family from home.

Friday:

• Friday was a little more chilled. Matt took the day off work and we hung out with the niece and nephew for most of the afternoon. That night the boys (my dad, Matt, and my two stepbrothers) went to a football game that evening so the girls (myself, my stepmom and my stepsister-in-law) hung out with the little kids, ordered chinese and had a girls night.

Saturday:

• Matt and I spend the morning/early afternoon in Banff with my dad and stepmom and then in the late afternoon it was the niece and nephew’s birthday party. The party was super fun and the kids were awesome.

Sunday:

• We celebrated a late Thanksgiving. It included lots of family and some great food. A wonderful way to spend the end of the weekend.

Well that’s it for me today. I should be back to regular scheduled blogging tomorrow. I’m subbing tomorrow (yay my first subbing day of the year) at a private school so my blog post might be a little later then usual but I’ll definitely be blogging.

I’ll leave you with a pic of my lunch. I decided to do breakfast for lunch since I enjoyed my pumpkin scone for breakfast.

Lunch was a two egg scramble with spinach and feta and a blueberry waffle. I topped the waffle with a little maple syrup.

Overall, delicious!

~ Katie :)

Being Healthy on a Field Trip

So I’m blogging early tonight. Dinner was finished early so I figured I’d write a quick post.

Matt is still quite sick and didn’t sleep much last night so that meant I didn’t sleep much either. I wouldn’t have gone to work today but we were taking out kids on a field trip so I didn’t have much of a choice.

This meant that this morning started with coffee. A Grande Non-Fat Hazelnut Latte to be exact…

And a Low-Fat Banana Chocolate Chip Loaf…

We were taking 16 girls to Daplex (a sports facility here in Halifax) for the morning and bowling after lunch.

I planned ahead and threw my second Kardea bar in my purse before I left. Around the middle of the morning I grabbed the bar and a bottle of water for a snack.

This one was pretty good – I liked the lemon flavour better and thought this one could have used some more cranberries but it was a great mid-morning snack.

At lunch I was craving ice-cream but I decided to go the healthy route and I went for another Hummus and Veggie wrap with a side fruit salad for dessert and a bottle of water from Healthy Way. I felt great afterwards. I’m so happy I went for the healthier choice.

On my wayt home I knew I wanted something easy and simple. I was so tired and I just couldn’t bring myself to cook. On my way home I stopped at Sobey’s and grabbed a fresh pizza from their deli.

I had two three slices…

I probably didn’t need the third slice but I was hungry and tired and gave in to the deliciousness of it.

Yesterday I picked up these…

I had a handful for dessert…

Overall, it was a pretty good day of eats. Especially being out and about with no plan.

My Water and Yoga Challenge Update:

• Water: I’ve been doing great with water. I stuck to water all day and in total I drank about 3 liters today so far. I’ve been getting in at least 2 liters a day so I’m happy with this progress. Thanks for reminders on twitter #projecthydrate #waterlogged. Keep ‘em coming!
• Yoga: I’ve only gotten in two yoga sessions since I started my challenge. Since the hubby got sick I haven’t done any yoga. I’m hopping maybe to get a session in tonight during the hockey game.

Just in case you missed it check out yesterday’s post on my Recent News. Lots of exciting things going on right now.

~ Katie

Simple and Healthy Eats

Evening All!

This morning started bright and early at 5:15. When I got to the gym I did a 5 min run on the treadmill to warm-up then started Gina’s Summer Shape Up Week 1. Her workout’s are different this time. Instead of just strength training she included a combination of strength, flexibility and speed training. I’m going to follow it as much as possible as long as it fits into my workout schedule.

Today was strength training. I did the following workout in circuit-style (one of each exercise right after another with a 1-2 min rest at the end of each set and then repeat 3 times). Here’s a breakdown of my workout this morning:

Bend-Over Fly	15lbs	12 reps
Side Lying Lateral Raise	5lbs	12 reps per side
Ultimate Toe Touch		10 reps per side
Incline Bicep Curl (on Stability Ball)	15lbs	12 reps
Bend-Over Row	15lbs	12 reps
Reverse Crunch		15 reps
Stability Ball Back Extension		15 reps
Weighted Ball Crunch	10lbs	12 reps
Plie Squats	20lbs	15 reps
Chest Press on Stability Ball	20 lbs	12 reps

Overall it was a pretty good workout. Not my favourite but I got a great sweat in and felt pretty good afterwards. I did find the workout took a little longer then usual since I’m not use to some of the exercises. As well, I think I might need to push myself a little more with some of the weights. I will be doing this workout again on Friday so I’ll give it another try and let you all know how it goes then.

After my workout breakfast was a piece of flax toast and a protein green smoothie. In the blender: 2 large handfuls of organic spinach, 1 organic banana, 1 tbsp of flaxmeal, 1 scoop of lean whey and 1 cup of UVAB. Another great combo.

Lunch was a turkey sammie on an English muffin. Sliced turkey, mozza, spinach all on a whole wheat English muffin along with a yogurt cup and baby carrots.

After work I met a friend for a coffee date at Starbucks. I had skinny cinnamon dolce latte…

 

And one of these babies…

Lemon Coconut Bar. Not the healthiest but definitely delicious.

Dinner was simple but healthy.

BBQ Chicken…

Roasted baby potatoes with thyme, rosemary, oregano and a little parmesan cheese. I read this combo on someone's blog on the weekend. I have not idea who’s it was so if I got the idea from you please let me know. I’d love to give you credit for it.

Yummy! What a great idea.

Served with some bbq’d asparagus with a little salt and ground pepper…

All together…

Easy. Healthy. Yummy. I actually only ate two pieces of the chicken but all the potatoes and asparagus. The picture doesn’t give credit to how much asparagus was actually on my plate and how big the asparagus actually was. So filling.

Dessert was Skinny Cow Ice-Cream Sandwich. What a great sweet treat for only 130 calories.

I’d better go. The hockey game is going to start in about 15 mins.

Go Hawks Go!

~ Katie :)

Report Card Morning

This morning started early even though I was off again today.

It’s the last day of Easter weekend but Matt had to work I agreed to get up early and go for a run with him. Today we did Week 2, Day 2 of C25K. Run for 1.5 mins, walk for 2 mins – 6 times (for a total for 21mins). We ran just over 2 km total. This was the best run so far. I actually didn’t feel like I was dying by the end of it. I actually enjoyed the run (don’t tell Matt though :P).

Breakfast was piece of toast with pb, banana and a glass of milk…

After breakfast I drove Matt to work and stopped at Starbucks on the way home.

Venti Non-Fat Vanilla Latte…

And I spoiled myself with a piece of banana loaf as well…

I spend the morning finishing my report cards and I took a quick nap. I was able to finish them by noon and now I’m all done.

No more stress!

Lunch was six perogies, a ton of veggies (red, green, yellow peppers, cucumbers, and broccoli) and some Greek yogurt mixed with a little light ceaser dressing (for added taste) for dipping…

Yummy! A large sippy cup of water as well…

Now I’m going to do some other marking and laundry and later I have to pick up Matt and we need to head to the grocery store to pick up groceries. I love grocery day!

Not sure what is in store for supper tonight but I’ll try to blog later to let you all know.

~ Katie :)

Eats, Yoga and Month End Summary

Sorry for the lack of blogging last night. I didn’t get much of a chance and since I knew I’d be off today I just figured I try to blog twice today. This might be a long one so bear with me please.

Here’s a quick recap of yesterday’s food:

Lunch was leftover salad…

I have no idea how I ended up with such a crappy picture (apparently I just wasn’t paying attention).

Some Kashi crackers and pb…

And of course the standard yogurt cup…

Last night Jaime and I went to my first yoga class at Breathing Space. Long Slow Deep. It was fantastic. I really like the atmosphere, instructor and the class size. There was only 7 of us in the class which meant that the instructor could go around give each person some individual attention. It was hard, sweaty and gave me a great stretch. I woke up feeling sore this morning which I think is a sign of a great class. I’m trying now to convince Matt to attend the class with me next week. He’s never done yoga in a class before (just at home with me) so we’ll see :)

On my way home I stopped at subway and picked up a sub. Turkey on cheesy bread again. Since Matt had a work dinner last night and I was still thinking about my sub from the day before I figured it would be a perfect time to grab another one.

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Even though I was off this today I volunteered to drive Matt to work so I could run a couple of errands and hit the gym later.

The morning started with this…

I also did some banking and stopped at the grocery store to pick up a few things. They included:

Vitamuffins…

Sabra Hummus…

The blog world has been raving about this lately so I can’t wait to crack it open and give it a try.

And Orange Mango Liberte Yogurt…

I haven’t tried this flavour yet so I’m really looking forward to it.

And some Bert’s Bees Lip Balm…

I haven’t tried this kind yet but I love bees wax lip balm so I’ll see how much I like it.

After I got home and decided to make some oats. I followed the same recipe from last time and this time my toppings were 1/2 a banana (since I forgot to add it into the pot), a splash of UCAB and a scoopful of White Chocolate Wonderful pb.

This combo was fantastic. I’m already thinking about other combinations I can make while I’m off.

I was suppose to spend the morning finished any last minute marking and started report cards but I ended up working on a couple of other things that needed to get done. This probably means that I won’t make it to the gym later but last least I got quite a bit accomplished today.

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Month End Summary

So when Jaime posted last month about her activity calendar I knew I wanted to start something similar. The difference is that I also wanted to see how my healthy eating was going compared to unhealthy eating.

Here are my results…

Breakdown:

• Apples are for healthy eating days at home
• Hearts are for healthy eating (not at home)
• Ice-cream is for unhealthy eating
• Bees are exercise stickers

Results:

• 9 out of 31 days were unhealthy dinners
• 20 out of 31 days I was able to get in some exercise

Conclusion:

• Overall I think I did pretty well. I’d like to only have about half that much of unhealthy eat days – average once a week instead of twice.
• I think I did pretty well on the exercise. I averaged 5 days/week so I guess I can’t complain about that.
• I think there are quite a few days that were just yoga so I’d like to have a more regular schedule for weights and cardio

Goals:

• To decrease my unhealthy eating down to just once a week
• To continue with C25K (3 times a week)
• Weight lift 3 times per week
• Try to get a little other cardio in a week (twice maybe?)
• Get to yoga at least once a week (maybe twice)

I know those are pretty hefty goals but we’ll see how it goes for this month and re-evaluate again at the end of April.

I know this was a really long post and thanks for reading. I promise to keep it short and sweet tonight.

~ Katie :)

A Quickie Post

Didn’t get to post yesterday. Spend most of the day away from the computer hanging out with my husband.

Here’s a quick recap of my day yesterday and today.

Woke up yesterday with a pounding headache so went back to bed and didn’t get up until almost noon. This basically through off my entire day of eating.

Once I finally got out of bed I grabbed my last granola bar (unpictured) and some hummus, mulitgrain tostitos and the last of the carrots and a large glass of water for lunch. Not much but wasn’t feeling too hungry.

Then Matt and I spent the afternoon shopping (I got a new pair of jeans) and visiting and just basically enjoying the beautiful weather we’re having here in Halifax.

By the time we got home we both were starving so we ordered pizza and garlic fingers. I know not very healthy but oh so yummy.

Then we curled up on the couch and had a little Academy Awards movie marathon. We watched The Hurt Locker and Up in the Air. I enjoyed both but defiantly liked Up in the Air better. I ♥ George Clooney.

This morning got up to meet the girls at Starbucks.

 

Lynn, Tasha, Angie and Jamie. Leslie also showed up later but we didn’t manage to get any pics with her. I had such a great time. Thanks girlies :)

Didn’t have time to eat so I got a grande, non-fat, carmeal macchiato and a lemon carnberry scone.

 

We spent 4 hours there so I ended up ordering a Passion Ice-Tea Lemonade as well (unpictured).

When I finally managed to get home I made a bagel with some peanut butter before hitting the gym.

First attempt. Burnt…

Much better…

With pb…

Then I hit the gym for a quick workout (since I missed yesterday’s due to my headache). I did 5 mins of incline walking to warm up then Winter Shape Up Week 2. I did all the same exercises except for the following changes:

Stationary Lunges 24lbs, 10 Girly Push Ups instead of Wall Push ups and Bicep Curls 20lbs.

I can feel myself getting stronger and I can’t wait to try week three on Monday.

Now going to have some dinner and chill for the rest of the evening. I can feel some leftover pizza in my future. I hope everyone is having a great weekend.

~ Katie :)