Orange you glad it is almost Friday?

I know, pathetic joke, but you will see the reference in a bit. 

Workout

I loved my gym workout today.  I did what I call a tempo session on the elliptical.

Interval	Level	Time
Warm-up	3	5 minutes
Increase	4	3 minutes
Increase	5	3 minutes
Increase	6	3 minutes
Increase	7	3 minutes
Increase	8	3 minutes
Decrease	7	3 minutes
Decrease	6	3 minutes
Decrease	5	3 minutes
Increase	6	1 minute
Increase	7	1 minute
Increase	8	1 minute
Decrease	7	1 minute
Decrease	6	1 minute
Decrease	5	1 minute
Cool-down	3	5 minutes
Total: 40 minutes

This felt so good.  Especially the level 8s, they were so hard, especially to hold for that long!!  The workout seemed to go so quickly.

Work went well.  I sort of felt the same way I did this afternoon as I did on Tuesday.  Felt snacky and exhausted.  And the only thing that I did different yesterday that I didn’t do Tuesday or Thursday was that I had a diet soda.  Maybe I really do need that caffeine!  One thing I eat at work that I hadn’t brought with me was my frozen non-sugar added hot chocolate.  I made it the same way, about 1T of hot water to dissolve the mix and then cold water.  Then I put it in the freezer for awhile.

(Looks pretty boring and a lot like frozen coffee-but it taste great!)

I had my afternoon snack and that blueberry mix was a definite success!!!

On the way to my meeting at 6PM, I got there about 15 minutes early, so I ran into 7-11 and got myself this little guy.

This was the smallest size they have–12 ounces I think.  I got the Fanta Light because they didn’t have crystal light.  I had never seen (or obviously tried the fanta light).  It was pretty good but a bit sweeter.  I couldn’t find any nutritional data for it online.

 

Dinner

I got home a bit late tonight and was starving (and now VERY exhausted).  I had marinated some steaks (about 3/4 inch per steak) this morning before I left for work with a little soybean oil (like maybe a 1/4 tsp a side–just enough to get the herbs to stick) then put on oregano, basil, red pepper and a touch of brown sugar.  To cook them, I heated a skillet VERY hot and sprayed non-stick spray.  I seared them 1 minute a side and then cooked 3 minutes a side afterwards on a lower heat.  I actually felt like my steak was a bit overcooked (I liked mine medium rare at most).

Then I boiled some carrots and chopped them up.  I mixed this up with about 2T of lemon juice, 2tsp of lemon rind, some raisins, some nuts/seeds, 1T of light sour cream, salt and pepper.  I didn’t know how this would turn out well at all, but we both thought it was success!!

Lastly, I cooked some potatoes.  I had a sweet potato (actually half) and Justin had red skin potatoes.  I microwaved these for 10 minutes and then put them in the oven on the lower rack on boil for a few minutes to toughen up the skin.

I had half a sweet potato (Orange), 4 ounces of steak and about 3/4 cup of the carrot mixture (orange).  See, I told you the title was a pathetic joke, but I tried.

Seeing I have been on a brown sugar kick all day, I didn’t see any reason to stop now.  So I topped off my potato.

 

Okay, time to do my abs and then a snack. This is Number 2 out of the 6 sessions I must do by Saturday August 2 (when we leave for the Dominican Republic). I actually felt a bit hungry/munchy right after I ate dinner.  I didn’t let myself eat anything but I am assuming after abs I probably will want something.  And for some reason, I don’t think it’ll be my leftover Cold Stone ice cream.  I am craving something of more substance.

And I am a bit anxious about tomorrow.  (who gets anxious for Friday???!).  I am going to weigh myself in the morning and hope not to have a repeat of last week.  And then I have an all company picnic at lunch.  I was planning on lifting over lunch and swimming after work.  I need to figure out if I can sneak out to lift real quick and get back in time.  And I am just worried about the food they will serve.  I work for an Israeli company, so I am sure there it will be kosher (no cheeseburger for us! ) and there are quite a few vegetarians, so I assume I’ll be good.  I doubt I’ll be able to get a picture without looking like a freak.

Sorry for the pretty boring post.  I simply am exhausted.  Have a great evening.  Tomorrow is Friday!!!!

Taste like November

Once again, I definitely could have used some more sleep last night!!!  Even though I went to sleep around 10:30, I still was exhausted at 6:30.  Maybe I really am fighting something.  I am looking forward to this weekend to sleep in a bit, but I always have a tough time really sleeping in because I am so excited to get up and go for a bike ride or the farmer’s market or something.  Justin on the other hand is more than happy to stay in bed until noon or something….heat and humidity be damned.  He would rather ride in the middle of the day if it means he gets to sleep later. 

Oh, I forgot to post that I did workout yesterday!  I went to the gym over lunch and did the elliptical.  And I felt great!!!  It was actually a fun and enjoyable workout.  All of this was set to a level 3.0 incline.

Interval	Level	Time
Warm-up	5	5 minutes
Sprint	8	30 seconds
Easy	4	2 minutes
Repeated for 20 minutes
Steady	6	10 minutes
Cool-down	3	5 minutes
Total: 40 Minutes

 

Breakfast
I stole my breakfast idea from For the Love of Oats.  I went for pumpkin oats this morning.  I used 1/2 cup of oats, 3/4 cup of water, 1/4 cup of egg beaters.  Then about 1/4 cup of pure pumpkin puree, some cinnamon and nutmeg.  I microwaved for almost 3 minutes on 100% power.  After it cooled, I added some nuts, a few raisins, 1T flax seed, about 2tsps of brown sugar and some soy milk.  Tasted very….November.

Then I stirred it all up.

This actually wasn’t quite sweet enough so I added a bit of honey (you can see it glistening in that photo above.) I kind of wished I had skipped the brown sugar because it simply got lost in the flavor and was sort of a waste.  Honey seems always the way to go when sweetening this…a little goes a long way.

I really think this will keep me full for a long time.  It just seemed really dense and a lot of food to it, especially with the added nuts.  We will see if I get hungry to get my morning snack, otherwise I’ll just power through to the gym/lunch.

AM Snack
Went for a repeat of earlier this week (sorry, totaltransformation!) and just filled up a little container with edamame.  There is about one serving in there.

Lunch
I am excited about lunch today already.  I was craving an egg salad sandwich.  I didn’t have the effort time to really be original or think about additional things to throw into my egg salad, so we got about as basic as you can when it comes to E.S.  Simply 1 hard boiled egg, 1T of reduced fat olive oil mayo, salt, pepper, some spinach, sliced tomato and one slice of the Baker’s Honey Whole Wheat Bread.

You can tell it is getting to the end of the week because my produce is starting to run low.  I used the rest of my spinach in this salad and pretty much all the other things I could find in the fridge.  There is some cucs, some tomatoes, a little bit of red bell pepper and some sprouts.  I packed 1T of Newman’s Light Honey Mustard to go on top.

And of course I have my Kozy Shack no-sugar added rice pudding in the freezer right now for a nice dessert.  I also have an adora chocolate and Yogi tea packed away.

PM Snack
Another stolen idea.  This one I took from Carrots and Cake yesterday.  I too have an abundance of blueberries and after seeing this, I knew I must try it!  While I don’t have any blueberry fruit spread, I figured I could make due.   There is about 1/2 cup of cottage cheese in the bottom of this photo, then blueberries, a bit of raisins and some more brown sugar (I don’t know what it was with me today and brown sugar!!) Hopefully all these flavors will meld together during the day to be as sweet and fruit spread-y and blueberry as I am hoping.

Planning on hitting up the gym over lunch like normal.  I have been on an elliptical kick lately and I really would like to switch it up but nothing is capturing my attention.  I don’t want to do the bike, just well, because I know I will ride a lot this weekend and I am a bit sick of the stationary bike.  I don’t want to do the stairmaster because my knee just isn’t strong enough and my doctor told me I should stay off the treadmill until I am done with physical therapy.  GRRRR.

Question:
How many times a week do you weight train?