‘stickers and squash

Wednesday night, I was feeling pretty tired so I decided it would be a good idea to just lay down for a bit. Ehhh…I woke up at 3:30 AM, lights on, clothes on, contacts in, makeup & hair a wreck!! After a nice tooth brushing session, finding jammies and doing some face cleansing, I made it back into bed for a much sounder 3 more hours of sleep. I awoke feeling not too refreshed and super hungry! My coffee kept me satisfied for the drive over to the office until I could assemble this beaut.

Lunch was a last minute grab-and-go Lean Cuisine, with a side of broc to bulk it up a bit.

I used my break to catch up on my Reader (finally, sorry for the lack of commenting y’all!) and hit up the Farmers’ Market for some fresh produce. The last $6 in my wallet bought me an eggplant, a bunch of basil, 3 peppers (green, yellow, red), 4 baby zuchini, and a bag of sugar snap peas. My fridge will be very happy to see this greenery!

Later in the afternoon, I had a pre-workout snack of a heated cinnapple with 1 serving of crushed ak-mak crackers. I did this once with a Lorna Doone shortbread 100-cal cookie pack and it tasted like a yummy pie crust but ak-mak crackers don’t exactly have the same effect. I bet graham crackers would be good though! Everyone in my office was still jealous of how delicious it smelled…

I almost had a mini freakout at work yesterday.  I have been sick-to-my-stomach missing home and decided to go back in July to see my family. I looked into flights on Monday; between then and yesterday (had to get vacation time approved, check with my family’s schedule, all that jazz), tickets went up $150. Actually, I found the one I wanted to book Wednesday morning but had to wait for my boss’s final okay which I got after lunch. Yes, prices went up $60 in those few hours. Then, thanks to some small miracle, as I was in the process of booking the flight, a message popped up telling me “GOOD NEWS” and that it had dropped back down to the morning price point. No idea why but hey, I’ll take it!  I couldn’t select a seat on the return flight for some reason but at least it’s booked!!! I can’t wait to go back to Jersey and spend a few days at the beach with my family 🙂

After work, I assessed my mile-long to-do list and decided that a gym session was definitely in order. Luckily I had some good mags from the office and was able to do 50 minutes of intervals on the elliptical before heading home. 

Dinner was prompted after seeing some delicious TJ potstickers on Slim Shoppin’s site. I whipped out my own slightly freezer burned bag and cooked the remaining 4 in a little soy sauce with salted edamame and a great blend of veggies on the side.

With the potstickers coming in at 130 calories for 4, this whole dinner was pretty light for me so I decided to roast some butternut squash to use in Friday’s lunch and have some of the extra as a little snack. I’m very proud of myself for waiting the 40 minutes of slow roasting and not just caving in and making rice which was my other thought! The squash was well worth the wait.

Later I got my Skinny Cow on with a minty cold dessert! This was much needed after I did all my laundry and then the cat peed in my bed. Again.

I’m so glad the weekend is here again already! I am always amazed when Friday rolls around so quickly, even on my busiest weeks. Tonight I am going to see Katie Jo’s boyfriend’s band play at the Viper Room. They are debuting that music video we all did a few months back. Hopefully I can get a link of it so you can see all of our “partying rockstar groupie” impressions in the video 🙂

Three Things for Thursday

1. Ate a cinnapple for workout fuel instead of relying on the usual bar
2. Marinated the potstickers in 1 tbsp of soy sauce instead of using it for dipping (I use so much less that way!)
3. Waited for the squash to roast instead of making brown rice with my dinner

 

Happy Almost Friday! I mean, Thursday :)

Just kidding about catching those rays! As the lovely Caroline pointed out to me… “wait, isn’t it supposed to rain this weekend?”…Ryan Seacrest is a BIG FAT LIAR and it’s actually supposed to be 60 and raining. Boo, hiss!!

I kicked off Thursday (can I rename this day to Almost Friday??) with my yogurt mess.

Today I knocked some magazine reading off my to-do list. I had a huge pile to get through! Think this times 20. I know, such a hard task 🙂

For lunch, I started with some cinnamon-doused fuji apple slices, which I ate while reading about Chef Chris Bianco’s delicious pizzas. I can’t wait to try his dough recipe!

I also had spinach, grape tomatoes and mushrooms tossed in some light balsamic and topped with my leftover bean burgers.

I saved some of the burgers to eat along with a sweet potato. This lunch was super filling!

At 2, we all got booted out of the office for a building fire drill.  We had to walk down from the 14th floor…YAY for boosting my heart rate!  It was super long, which was annoying, but we got to spend 40 minutes outside, which was nice 🙂

I grabbed an iced coffee from Coffee Bean because I really needed the caffeine boost.

I got a second boost with my pre-workout snack, the Fiber One Chocolate Mocha bar.

After work, I was having one of those days where I really wasn’t feeling the gym.  So I made a bargain with myself to do 30 minutes.  Plus, I am out of Kashi and the grocery store is next to the gym 🙂

After my half hour on the elliptical, I headed home for a good free weights workout.  This is one thing I really want to add back into my routine!

For dinner, I decided to make chicken potstickers, veggie eggroll, edamame and broccoli.  I cooked the potstickers in 1 tbsp soy sauce to get them extra flavorful!

This ENTIRE dinner, complete with the soy sauce for cooking, comes to 460 calories. Pretty good, right?! Much better than if I ordered from a Chinese restaurant for sure.

Three Things for Thursday

1. Ordered iced coffee instead of a latte
2. Bargained with myself to do 30 minutes at the gym AND a free weight session
3. Decided I was full enough after dinner to skip dessert!

Tomorrow night I am hoping for a relaxing evening, maybe with Bride Wars and another calzone. I have been oddly tired this week and am in need of a major lazy Friday night!

 

Early Summer

I got my first tastes of summer this weekend! Sorry in advance for the super long post; my computer is broken, so I couldn’t blog this weekend.  I am working on getting something to use though, even if just temporarily! Friday started out with some amazing coffee from The Fresh Market that Diana sent me in our swap, plus 2 slices of Newsroom bread with 1 tbsp almond butter and 2 tbsp cherry jelly. MMM!

And a very crunchy pear.

I tried to track down some sushi at lunch but the restaurant we went to had CLOSED two weeks earlier, so I ended up with a spicy tuna roll from Whole Foods.

And since I can’t resist their salad bar, I had a scoop of edamame, a scoop of some qunioa mix, and a nice fat falafel ball on the side.

This lunch held me over forever, until a late dinner of homemade veggie pizza. I had two slices of this whole wheat crust, spinach & mushroom pie.

Steph and I enjoyed our pizza plus a scoop of froyo topped with some PB puffins (my first time having these — I am addicted!!) and a few chocolate covered dried cherries while watching The Wrestler. The movie was so much sadder than I was expecting.  I liked it overall, but some of the fight scenes were gruesome!

Saturday morning, I did a quick 30 minutes walking/running on the treadmill as soon as I woke up, followed by a yogurt mess with coffee. I tried and loved this vanilla bean flavor!

My mix had 1 cup frozen cherry/blackberry blend, 1/2 small banana, and a heaping 1/2 cup PB puffins. I enjoyed this breakfast while watching Slumdog Millionaire. Awesome movie! I totally understand why it won all the awards this year.

I had lunch outside while finishing up Edgar Sawtelle. The sun this weekend was strong and gorgeous! I started with an apple and some seltzer.

I also made up a plate with a skinny stick of homemade bread, 4 ak-mak wheat crackers, and a handful of pretzel flats to use as dippers…

…for some TJ’s Egg White Salad with Chives! This stuff is SO GOOD, and the whole container is only 100 calories!!

Check out that dipping action 🙂

Lunch dessert was a repeat of Friday night, which I ate while watching The Secret Life of Bees. I heard this movie didn’t do that well with the critics, but I loved it. Maybe just because I also loved the book? And I really like Dakota Fanning too.

Later I got kind of snacky and munched on some fishies and veggies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

For dinner, I met up with a big group of friends for some Mexican. I started off with a house margarita on the rocks with salt. It was definitely the best thing I had all night! I also snacked on about a dozen chips with salsa and guac while waiting for our food. I was actually pretty restrained, normally I can eat half the basket!  I started with one of these chicken skewers.

Followed by two tortillas filled with some of this steak/shrimp/veggie fajita mixture. Sorry about the blurry photo!

After dinner I went out dancing with India. We had a nice hookup with some free drinks, but I only had a few obligatory sips of my vodka cranberry. I just wasn’t feeling it I guess!  Sunday morning we bummed around and watched a few episodes of Toddlers & Tiaras. Anyone else ever seen this show?? It’s like the runaway train wreck that you can’t look away from…those poor little girls!  I had a pink lady apple while watching.

Followed by a bowl (plus another half bowl!) of yummy honey nut cheerios.

After breakfast, India and I went on a nice long walk in the hills behind her house. The sun was beating down and I even got a little burn! We cooled down with some sugar-sprinkled grapefruits.

It was so nice outside, I decided to relax a little by India’s pool with some magazines. Lunch came pretty late and consisted of another yogurt mess, same as Saturday’s breakfast.

With some really good iced coffee.

Since lunch was on the light side, I followed it up with a pre-dinner snack of a skinny Newsroom bread heel. This bread is addicting! Every few bites, you get a nice crunchy sunflower seed/oat taste that’s divine.

For dinner, I found myself again craving instant Asian by Trader Joe’s: edamame, potstickers, and a veggie eggroll.

I also had a nice salad with some light Asian Sesame dressing.

Even though this was a lot of food, I couldn’t resist a cup of Ben & Jerry’s frozen yogurt for dessert. I got a couple delicious cookie dough bites in this 🙂

I think I did better with my weekend overeating, although I did do some mindless snacking since I was basically just bumming around.  This week is looking INTENSE. I have so much to do at work, it’s already stressing me out. I am going to try to get to the gym and eat fairly well so I don’t have that bugging me too! Hope everyone is having a good Monday kickoff!!