We had some fierce storms blow through last night and it was a [...]]]> Ahhh… back to regularly scheduled programming    Glad you enjoyed the BOW posts.  It was a very nice weekend and such a great program to try things you never might think of doing in a very accessible way.  Women just rock anyway…

We had some fierce storms blow through last night and it was a crap-filled road for riding today.  John had a flat.  He had one the other day.  Brand new tube and came out today and that one was flat as well.  Our tire luck is flipping unbelievable this year.  So, he decided to walk while I rode around.  It takes about 25 minutes to walk there, so I got in a little over 5 miles of riding and met him there.

Bagel!  I haven’t had a bagel since before the weekend!  I keep thinking about making my own bagels, but I don’t really need to have more than the 2 a week I normally have.  Or do I??

Then I biked around more before heading home.  A good day for riding, but a squidge humid.

The last couple of days, I needed to food detox.  While my general meals were pretty good at the workshop, the food on Sunday was not what I am used to eating, and then I got wanting chocolate and stuff because of that, I think.  So, I had 2 no sugar days and no grain days Monday and Tuesday and really felt good by this morning!

Having grains today.  With lunch:

Plain greek yogurt, berries, and Kashi Heart to Heart.

This week is a little slower for work.  I think there is the preholiday slow down going on.  John made up some cookies to take to his poker game tonight, and I snagged one to have with my latte.  He used the recipe on the chip bag, but subbed wheat flour with some peanut flour and some of the butter with coconut oil.

I hope very, very few of these cookies come back home with him.

During the slow times, I watched  a cute birdie friend visit the feeder a lot today.  I think this is a very young sparrow:

I love the birdies. Well, I just like nature in general.

I made a new discovery for my salads this week.  Cooked broccoli makes a nice addition to salad!  I don’t like broccoli raw, and I wanted more substantial veggies on my salad, so I sauteed up some broccoli and added it.

The typical BBQ chicken/feta mix with the broccoli.  It was tasty.  Who knew?

I normally visit with my mom on Wednesdays, but she was busy tonight, so I thought I was going to spend the evening solo.  Then my sister texted that she was dropping by!  Her dog Georgia had surgery a couple weeks ago because she ate a bunch of things she wasn’t supposed to and they had to remove part of her intestines.    Tonight the stitches came out, so that was why Colleen was in town.  Here is Georgia:

It took about 10 pictures to get this shot.  Never work with kids or animals, right?

Colleen also brought my belated birthday gift:

It’s a little garden cart that I can keep on the front porch and store all of my tools and stuff!  It has a removable pad there for kneeling and a couple cup holders.  Yay!

Now I am munching on some cashews and trying to avoid cleaning the litter pan…

Question: How easy is it for you to get back on track after an indulgent weekend?

It was about a 2 hour drive.  [...]]]> Grab a cuppa for a long post! I survived without the internets!  I am chilled to the bone, though.  It rained for most of Friday, but it stopped by the time we (meaning my sister, Colleen, and nieces Logan and Devon) were on the road to Massachusetts:

It was about a 2 hour drive.  The Camp and Pack is for the Alaskan Malamute Rescue of New England. This group rescues Malamutes that are either in a situation where they just don’t fit or in an abuse-type situation and are found new and loving homes.  This weekend is for dog owners of all types to get together and learn and have fun.  It’s definitely a good cause.  The weekend was held at a Girl Scout Camp.  Here was our cabin:

We actually scored because this cabin was a staff cabin and had electricity (but no heat)!  Woo Hoo!  That meant we could see at night – at least inside LOL.  It was, however, flipping cold.  Probably in the 30s and damp.  I was quite cold, even in the sleeping bag with several layers on.

The sun came out on Saturday and we had a nice breakfast.  We all volunteered for chores.  Logan helped serve breakfast:

She did so much work this weekend,volunteering a lot.  She has a good heart.

Yum!  I had to make do with Folgers Coffee this weekend.  D’oh!  I drank a lot, too, just to keep warm.

After breakfast, we went letterboxing.

This is pretty cool.  You basically have clues to find buried boxes and you stamp the notebook inside and sign it with a date.  The official site for US Letterboxing is here.  See if there is anything near you!

Here is a buried clue:

It had us going around the camp and climbing on some rocks:

Plus saw some more of the beautiful area:

And Storm and Honey had a good time:

After that it was lunch time!

Plus some unpictured cookies.  Lots of unpictured snacking went on, we’ll just say that right now.

After lunch I decided to take my new bike on a solo mountain ride:

Hmmm… something wrong here….

Ah – that’s better!

I did about a 9 mile ride and it was tough.  The road was really rough and I was on monster hills.  I couldn’t figure out why I was so tired until I saw the sign that said 12% grade!  Now that is some hill!

I was wiped out from that.  I had hoped to bike more miles, but the hill and rough roads were really hard.

After I got back, it was costume contest!  Honey went as a convict:

Don’t you love her prisoner number?

More costumes:

We had a lot of laughs at the costumes.

This is one mammoth dog.  Meet Ziggy with my niece Devon:

Hay ride time!  Mother/daughter:

Of course, I have to get in the picture:

Dinner was a western theme:

The food was really good.  The most tender ribs!

There was a hoe down afterwards (which I did not partake in, tired).

It was another really cold night on Saturday, but I had an extra blanket and wore gloves to bed    I felt warmer.

Today was breakfast and a few more doggie things and we headed home.  I had a wonderful time with my sis and the nieces, but I sure am glad to be back indoors!  I am currently under a blanket with some hot tea trying to get rid of the chilled to the bone feeling I have.

Today’s pink item! This is Logan working with Storm.

It’s Bagel Day!  I love my bagel days

Since I am resting from lifting this week, I decided not to go to the gym this morning.  I didn’t really want to run 3 days in [...]]]> The Attune bar giveaway ends on Thursday, so don’t forget to enter if you haven’t yet!

It’s Bagel Day!  I love my bagel days

Since I am resting from lifting this week, I decided not to go to the gym this morning.  I didn’t really want to run 3 days in a row, so I decided to do  it old school today with a Walk Away The Pounds DVD.

I kind of forgot how annoying Leslie can get   (just kidding…kind of).This is a nice workout, though.

Then it was a shower and off to the cafe.  They probably didn’t recognize me because I was showered and not wearing my hat.  Noshing ensued:

I can feel spring coming!  I so badly want to break the bike out with temps in the upper 30s.  Too bad the bike trails are still covered with snow.  When I see the tulip buds, then I know we are on the way.  But, the snow has to melt first.   I decided to think even warmer and have a Mediterranean theme for lunch – tuna and hummus topped with sundried tomatoes on a tortilla (okay, a little Mexican thrown in there).  Plus some brussel sprouts.

That was a change up for lunch!  Then there was a lot more working.  Busy right now.

Snack of champions to go with my latte.

Speaking of coffee, I got this question:

Do you have any coffee before your afternoon Latte? Do you have any in the morning with breakfast or before your workout? why or why not?

Oh my, yes.  I do have coffee every morning with breakfast.  We make cafe au lait, where we heat up 1/2 cup of milk, froth it up and fill the mug with coffee.  I just don’t take a picture of it because I am usually drinking it   I have 2 of those with breakfast (to equal 1 cup of milk).

I do not have coffee before my workout just because I don’t have time, as I just eat my preworkout snack and go. I don’t want to make some and try to slug it down.  I like to savor my coffee.  However, if it were already made when I got up, I would probably drink some before leaving the house. If I could get John’s butt out of bed at 6:30, maybe he could make the coffee….

I didn’t get a picture of dinner, but it was Kashi cereal and a tortilla on the way out the door.  Now that is nourishment for you.  I had to leave the house at 5, so it didn’t leave time to fix dinner.  Dog training tonight!  Storm is my job.  He is better at this stuff than I am, since he gets training and I just wing it each week

Look how he loves me.  It’s really because I was the keeper of the cheese tonight.  Food rulz for doggies.

Then there is my dad and Lizzie – she is getting big.   6 months old now.

Speaking of the snack of champions, I brought home stellar nutrition for John and I after class was over.  Did I mention that Dunkins is only 1/2 mile from my house?

Flash picture, sorry about that.  Now I have to get back to work and finish up a little bit.

Question:  Coffee, tea, neither, or both?

I woke up early for the gym today.   [...]]]> Whew – what a busy, busy day!  Hence the reason for the late post.  I also was going to do a post on the naming of this blog, but I think I will wait on that and post next week, as it deserves its own post

I woke up early for the gym today.   Da muscle:

• Chin up:  2
• Barbell squats:  3 sets of 8 at 85 pounds

• Widegrip lat pull down:  3 sets of 8 at 60 pounds
• Pushups:  3 sets of 10

• Static lunge:  3 sets of 10 with 25 pound plate
• Prone Cuban snatch:  3 sets of 10 with 10 pound dumbbells.
• Incline reverse crunch: 3 sets of 10.

I challenged myself today by doing 30 second rests between exercises instead of 60.  Then hopped on the treadmill and walked for 40 minutes.

In the spirit of the Hot 100 challenge to myself of spending time with family – I invited my parents out to bagel day today!  Even my dad came, which was nice – although he doesn’t eat breakfast and just had coffee.  Bad blogger that I am, I did not get their picture…. I had a nice bagel,though:

Still with lots of work to do this week.  I am thankful for that.  Some doctors are trying to play catch up with all of their old files before the holiday and we are getting dumped on with work!

Lunch break was a quesadilla – Smart carb wrap spread with laughing cow cheese, BBQ sauce and cooked chicken pressed between 2 fry pans:

It was yum!  Plus a side of carrot sticks.

Snack of champions:

I ate too many snacks today.  I just could not get satisfied for some reason.

More family time tonight included meeting my sister and niece at the dog obedience training tonight.  Here is my sister with Storm:

And then my niece Logan with Annie.  Annie is the old lady at 10?  She’s also deaf, so training can be difficult, although she is still quite good at it

Logan is going to a junior handlers show next month.  None of us had had dinner (I was working right up until I left), so we stopped at Subway afterwards.  I broke my corporate meat rule and had a turkey sandwich:

It was kind of m’eh.  It’s been so long since I have eaten Subway.  We used to eat their quite a bit.  I still am surprised sometimes at how my tastes have changed over the last couple of years.

I somehow agreed to do weekly training classes with one of my sister’s dogs starting in February.  How did that happen? 

Ornament of the day:

This was the 2nd ornament I did this year.  It’s a little loose, but I like the colors.

Sorry for the disjointed post tonight.  Still have things to do and I have not opened up my google reader yet today!

And John had his first bowl of souped up oats ever!

He said it gave [...]]]> Saturday was busy, busy!  My sister had invited me to see a dog shows where she was showing one of her Clumber Spaniels.  I had a nice PB&J oatbran breakfast using PB2 (with extra water).  Banana cooked in.

And John had his first bowl of souped up oats ever!

He said it gave him lots of energy.  He went out and ran 5K in a little over 27 minutes, so I guess so!  He is going to rock the race next weekend

Then I left for the dog show.  This was an obedience rally and Colleen’s dog was going for the 3rd and final leg of novice rally obedience (hope I got that right!).

Meet Storm:

He is a big goofball and was very good today.  They had to go along this course and do various sit, stay, turn, down, etc.

He did very well on the course (except for some face licking) and qualified, which meant he completed his novice rally title!

Congratulations Storm and Colleen!

Storm loves his aunt Lori, too:

That was fun.  I have never been to a dog show before.  We went out for coffee to celebrate at MochaBlend Espresso Cafe in Troy.

Fantastic latte!  Wish this place were closer to us.  It blows Starbucks out of the water.

I think I might have eaten this, too.

Yum!

On the way home, I took a wrong turn and had to backtrack some. Gotta love that.  Once I got home at about 4pm, we turned right around and headed out grocery shopping, as my folks were coming over for dinner!

We decided to cook a clam chowder and used Alton Brown’s recipe

This is a pretty healthy recipe, as the only fat is the bacon and whatever milk % you use.  We used a good pepper bacon instead of salt pork (as that is what we had), and didn’t use fresh clams.  We used 1% milk.  The chowder wasn’t super thick, but it was very, very good:

You puree some with a stick blender to thicken the soup with potato rather than a roux.  This one is a keeper!  Served with a crusty artisan multigrain bread (which I forgot to photo) and salad.

Dessert was an apple crisp:

I had 2 of these   Crisps can actually be a healthier dessert because the topping uses oats and you can control how much goes on.  Plus there is no bottom crust, as it is all fruit.  There are a lot of variations on the recipe out there.  For me, granny smith apples are the key because their tartness balances out the sugar.

After dinner we played a little playstation and then looked through photo albums.  That was fun!  It’s hard to believe how people change so much.  We were looking at pictures of my niece Logan when she was only a year or 2, and now she is 10!  Time sure flies.  I also hardly recognize myself.  I need to transfer some of those to digital.

Not the best of eating days today and not a whole lot of exercise.  Hope you September challengers are doing better with your respective goals this weekend than me!  It was a very busy weekend and back to work on Sunday – plus watching some football