Category Archives: eating clean

Where’s the people?

So you all really are looking forward to me doing a video playing guitar at the end of the year? I hope you know what you are in store for…

I did not want to get up this morning. I have to say that going to the gym in the dark is not my favorite thing. I am okay once I get there, but I will be glad when it is lighter out!

My gym was surprisingly uncrowded today. Not even all the regulars were there and those of us that were commented about how empty it was. Weird, although I really liked it 😈

Exercise	Set/rep/weight	Muscle worked
Cable Squat to Row	3 set of 10 at 60#	Full body
Dumbbell Pull Over	3 sets of 10 with 25# DB	Back
Dumbbell Lying Fly	3 sets of 12 with 15# DBs (30# total)	Chest
Decline Sit Ups	3 sets of 10	Core
Triceps Pull down	3 sets of 10 at 40#	Triceps
Stiff-legged Deadlifts	1 set of 10 at 75# 1 set of 8 at 80# 1 set of 6 at 85# 1 set of 6 at 90#	Lower Body
Seated Calf Raise	3 sets of 10 at 140#	Calves
Upright Row	3 sets of 10 at 30#	Shoulders
Lower Back Extension	3 sets of 10 at 100#	Low Back

I can do different chest moves now! My shoulder is almost fine now, so I can do flyes and incline presses again. Not back to full weight, but at least I am not stuck with pushups and bench presses only anymore. Yay! I was feeling really strong today. I think because I had an extra day off since I lifted last Thursday.

Headed home for a warm breakfast.
I soaked steel cut oats overnight and cooked them up this morning.

In the mix: 1/2 cup of pumpkin, pumpkin pie spice, 7 grams of toasted walnuts, 14 grams of crystallized ginger, 1 tablespoon creamed honey. (Total calories – 360).

Slow work morning, which is pretty typical for Monday, so I made sure to be productive instead of sitting and reading blogs all morning and practiced guitar and rode my trainer. Since I knew I would be working at night, I actually got my evening stuff done early. Now that is managing my time better, which I tend to be terrible at. Good start to the year.

Lunch time. We have a bunch of bananas to use up, so I decided on something very different for lunch. A banana protein shake! A little on the cold side, but still good.

These blueberries are so awesome, too. We normally don’t find blueberries up here in the winter except for tiny packages that cost as much as a small car. These pints were on sale yesterday for $2.99.

I told John to pick me up some more when he went out to play poker since I was going to eat these so fast. His response? “I am not spending money to support your blueberry habit.”

Work schedule still a bit whonky. It will take a couple days to settle out with the doctors having appointments and dictating again. Until then, it will be swinging my hours around. No football on tonight (omg – the season is over, waaahhhh!!), so I should be able to work uninterrupted… Of course, then I am going out of town for a couple days on Thursday. It just never ends.

John made lattes, which I paired up (tripled up?) with some clems.

It’s a fruit and veggie kind of day! Especially considering my dinner:

We grocery shop on Sundays, so there is always a plethora of fresh produce at the beginning of the week. I have such a hard time deciding what to have.

Tonight’s planned snack? Girl’s gotta have some chocolate!

I really have been on a good eating streak since the day after Christmas. I have had 1 Christmas cookie from the freezer all week, although I did have a bite or 2 from ones on John’s plate. I have not had the urge to have them. I will have one or 2 nutmeg logs before they are totally gone, but it is nice that they are not calling to me.

Tomorrow I will be back at the gym on the treadmill for a run. I wonder if the uncrowdedness will continue?

Question: If you belong to a gym, has it been hellaciously crowded this week?

Cookin’ on the hob.

Sunday was a complete rest day for me and it felt really good. I biked in cold weather to the gym this morning. I think the days of shorts for the gym are over, at least on days I bike.

Exercise	Set/rep/weight	Muscle worked
Barbell Deadlifts	3 sets of 10 at 80#	Lower body
Dumbbell Pulloever	3 set of 15 with 20# DB	Back
Push ups	3 sets of 10	Chest
Captain Chair	3 sets of 12	Core
Seated Calf Raise	3 sets of 10 at 110#	Calves
Cable Squat to Row	3 sets of 10 at 50#	Full body
Lower Back Extension	3 sets of 10 at 100#	Low back
Prone Cuban Snatch	3 sets of 10 with 8# DBs (16# total)	Shoulders
Cable Triceps Pulldown	3 sets of 15 at 30#	Triceps

Then I biked on home. It was a little warmer because the sun was out at that point, but still pretty chilly. I think around 40? There is another frost advisory tonight. 😯

I was all excited to try my Irish porridge! Assuming a hob is the stove –

How quaint. Looks kind of like quick cook oats.

There are raisins, papaya, and pineapple bits in this, with no sugar. Stats are the same as rolled oats, pretty much.

Of course, I had to make it my way with a mashed banana and custard style.

Creamiest bowl ever! These were good and very smooth. Sort of like pudding almost. A nice change up from more chewy oats. Ah oats, is there anything they cannot do?

I really have been indulging a lot on weekends lately. Yes, I have been doing long rides, but I think I need to get my balance pendulum swinging on a smaller arc than it has been. Especially with the holiday season coming up shortly. With that in mind, I am going to participate in Steve’s Hot 100 challenge that starts later this week (to coincide with the last 100 days of the year). You can join if you like! I need to firm up what I am going to set for goals for myself and post that by the 23rd.

Lunch time! I made up an interesting carrot salad and will post the recipe tomorrow. It’s got yogurt and cinnamon and raisins in it. Sort of Morrocan flare to it, I think.

Paired with the last little tuna can. Tuna is out again for a while. It just officially flipped over to the “I’m tired of it” list.

Work was very steady with both jobs and then totally died in the early afternoon, just before I was all finished with my lines for the day. Booo…. that means evening work during the Saints game tonight. However, I was able to go out and help John with the biz, as that is really ramping up as per usual in the fall.

Made up a protein latte today. I have to say that I am really liking the whey protein isolate. It is a little more expensive than regular whey, but it mixes easier and has hardly any taste to it, other than maybe a little milky (that is as close as I can think for a description). It’s pretty much pure protein as 28 grams has 27 g of protein in it. Sweet. I buy mine from True Protein.

Now I have a latte with 15 grams of protein (including that in the milk). And a delicious bowl of grapes to go with.

Pixie says, “Can we go outside and play?”

Sorry kitty! No more outdoors for you.

I sure am getting in the fruits and veggies today. They dwarfed my pork burger for dinner.

Think I went a little overboard on the strawberries 😳 They were pretty tasty, though!

Evening walk in store, plus more work. And this snack all the way from Canada via Suzi:

Tomorrow is a brick workout. Just not sure if I am going to do run/bike or bike/run.

Question: Do you eat any import food?

No refined sugar day 1!

I tossed and turned all night last night from the heat and I had restless legs, so I got very little sleep. I had 1/2 a mind to skip the gym this morning because I was so tired, but that is just not me, so I sucked it up and got up.

Had a protein drink and biked there. Really nice morning, actually! Fairly standard routine today:

Exercise	Set/rep/weight	Muscle worked
Barbell Deadlifts	3 sets of 10 at 55#	Lower body
Chin ups	2 set of 2, 3 sets of 1	Upper body
Wide grip lat pulldown	3 sets of 15 at 50#	Back
Pushups	3 sets of 10	Chest
Decline sit ups	3 sets of 10	Abs
Dumbbell Squats	3 sets of 10 with 12# DBs (24# total)	Lower body
Arnold Press	3 sets of 12 with 12# DBs (24# total)	Shoulders
Bench dips	3 sets of 10 with body weight	Triceps

One of the guys that is usually in the gym when I work out actually said to me that I looked tired today. I have never cared for that comment, really, because someone usually says that when I feel chipper, but it was truthful today.

Then I got on the treadmill and jogged for a mile. Speed at 4.5 mph. Speed walkers would be passing me, that’s for sure….

On with the no refined sugar thing, so I decided on custard cream of wheat for breakfast made with a banana. Of course, that is nothing new, and a great way to sweeten the bowl without adding sugar. However, I normally top with jam, which I didn’t today. Just toasted pecans.

Quite tasty!

Work started out completely dead, which is not uncommon for a Monday, so I got out and roasted coffee and did a little weeding and cooked up some brown rice. Temps of mid 80s today, so getting that done early helped a lot.

The scale showed a big bump up today, which is kind of funny. Normally I see that the day after a long bike ride from water retention, but I did not – so I think I must have been pretty dehydrated, which is why the gain is here today. It’s frustrating, though. Funny how it can drift down for weeks and then in one day pop back up again. Sometimes I feel like I will never get this last bit of weight off. I don’t suppose it matters much in the long run as I feel in pretty good shape, but it would be nice.

Lunch time: 1 egg and 2 egg white omelet with a wedge of laughing cow tucked in there.

I think I am done with kiwis for a while. They have had a funny texture as of late. Maybe out of season?

The afternoon latte minus any honey or chocolate drizzle on top.

Still pretty tasty because I know the coffee roaster

Plus a date square.

Did you see the post with the recipe?

I also ate about an ounce of peanuts, which are not pictured. That was good because the fat kept me full.

I worked later because of the late start. I had visions of making a stuffed pepper with brown rice and ground beef for dinner, but it was too late to start that. So, I fell back on my standby trifecta of clean eating!

I haven’t missed any sugar yet, but that is because I had fruit today and the date balls. I also made some prune puree to use if I want it on oats or something.

Evening snack:

This is the strawberry protein powder mixed with water and cinnamon. And a couple blackberries. I stuck it in the freezer for 20 minutes to get it really chilled, which makes it better. This protein powder is sweetened with Ace K, which doesn’t thrill me, but we have a ton of it left.

So far so good and pretty clean eats today for me. Will see how soon I start to miss the chocolate 😀

Why you should be biking!

Last day of my work week – happy, happy day! I was up early to eat (of course). Fairly clean eating day commenced:

Love those protein waffles. I noted that these blueberries did not taste as sweet as they normally do, and I think it was due to the sweet stuff I had yesterday. Interesting….

Lunchtime was a tuna salad wrap. My wrap was a little wet from being in the bag (and stale on the edges – how does that happen), and it exploded on my plate.

Tuna is once again losing what charm it had for me. Need a hiatus again pretty soon. Pears on the other hand, I am still in love with them!

Gorgeous day today, just meant for biking! Speaking of biking, Beth posted an article from Women’s Health about the 7 benefits of biking:

Calorie burn: A 135-pound woman pedaling 12 to 14 miles an hour blasts 488 calories in 60 minutes.
If you live close to your office, you can pedal to work twice a week and burn up to 3,000 extra calories—close to one pound of fat—each month
It works out your whole body (yes – upper, too!)
A study published in the journal Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics found that bike riding improved energy levels by 20 percent and decreased fatigue by 65 percent. Thank you dopamine!
It’s a low-impact activity.
You can really work some muscles. Pedaling while standing engages your core and triceps as you stabilize your body over the bike.
In one study, researchers had 32 women ride at a moderate to high intensity three times a week for at least half an hour. After a year, they’d lowered their blood pressure and LDL, as well as significantly increased their aerobic fitness.

Do you need anymore reasons to dust off that bike in the garage?? Not mentioned was just the fabulous fun that biking is 😀 , especially if there is a yogurt shop on the path…

Afternoon snackie before the ride. I had the last of the Kind bars I got on sale:

My least favorite, I have to say.

with a latte:

Then finished up work for the day. I was ready to ride at that point! I adjusted my clipless shoes a little bit so they set back just a bit and I think that was much better. We rode a different way today, down south. It’s along the main road and fairly flat except the big hill leaving from and getting home to our house. We stopped at the half way point:

It’s getting so green now!

We booked along really well. There was a pretty stiff headwind on the way out, but that meant fast speed on the way back! 16.4 miles with average speed of 13.2 mph! Woo Hoo! I made it up the hill at the end…. barely. That hill is really hard when I am 100%, let alone recovering. I kept thinking, “How slow can I go up this hill and still remain upright?” But, I squeaked it out. Really hard.

I slugged a quick protein drink and then we set up making dinner, as it was well past our normal dinner time. I made the best shrimp and grits. I used one strip of shoulder bacon (it’s leaner) and cooked the grits in water, then added a wedge of laughing cow. I reserved 1 tsp of the bacon drippings and cooked the shrimp in it. This was really good! A healthier version of shrimp and grits.

I guess bacon doesn’t really count towards eating clean, per se, but it was sooooo good!

Tonight’s snack will be that protein cheesecake thing, I think. And some relaxing!

My weekend officially starts……. now.

Bagel day and improvements.

Bagel day! I slept back in my own bed last night, which felt pretty good. I was very stiff and painful this morning, though. Mornings seem to be the hardest time for me pain-wise. After taking forever showering and such, we headed on out for breakfast at Panera. I was hoping to not have to use the crutches, but I needed them. I decided on a chocolate chip bagel.

Chomp!

Yum! Plus about 3 cups of coffee. I was babbling away at breakfast, I think it was the Vicodin talking or something. I think John finds it amusing…

Got to work, and luckily there was some to get started with. Sunday mornings usually are slow, so I was glad to see there was work available. I have been getting up every hour to walk around, and I was able to ambulate without the crutches by lunch, so either I loosened up, or the pain pills are really working better today.

It feels good to be doing more for myself now, and I made my lunch today. John went grocery shopping by himself while I was working (can’t imagine how long it would have taken me hobbling along with him in the store). He brought back some amazing looking strawberries – and they were delicious!

Tuna salad and brussels as well.

My appetite really does seemed to have adjusted to my lower activity. I was worried because on my regular rest days, I am usually a bottomless pit – so I thought it would be days and days like that with me being inactive. I still have the mind desire to snack, but not so bad that I can’t control it.

I have found there has been a little return of the fear of food, though, which bothers me. John wanted to take me out to eat last night, and I got thinking about where I could go that would be healthy enough and low calorie enough for me where I would actually enjoy it. I couldn’t think of anything, so we stayed home (plus it is just exhausting to move around so much). I don’t like thinking about food that way. Those are my old ways of thinking. It’s only temporary, I know, but it’s hard to draw that line between being sensible and being neurotic about it. I am also fighting a bit of the pity eating. You know how you want to pamper yourself with chocolate because you can’t do stuff?

However, I satisfied that with a sensible snack of a latte and an Attune bar!

I am glad the cheap person in me keeps me from scarfing these down

Dinner time was a veggie dinner. No meat thawed out, so I made do with what was on hand. 1/2 a sweet potato topped with laughing cow and sauteed broccoli and 1/4 cup of chickpeas in coconut oil.

Quite good. I don’t need to load up the protein right now like usual since I am not moving a lot. I did go for a very slow walk for about a block tonight with the crutches. I did not take anymore Vicodin today – I switched over to the diclofenac, because I don’t want to really like the narcotics, know what I mean? The pain is tolerable. Might use it for sleep, though.

I am hoping I’ll be biking again by next weekend! This is driving me nuts.

I have a fun idea for oats tomorrow and I hope it turns out good!

Anyone do anything fun and exciting this weekend?

Bagels and a new fish!

It’s Sunday, so you know what that means!

Like how I put the bagel on a nutrition paper? 😀 March is national nutrition month, so I am going to try to work in some posts on this topic.

We stocked up on so much fresh produce at the grocery store. I am making an effort to eat extra clean during March for nutrition month and lay off as much processed stuff as I can (I’m looking at you Balance bars), and get in more fruits and veggies. There will be a great veggie experiment this week, too!

Lunch showcased my increased veggies with a brown green smoothie!

Included in this was several hand fulls of raw spinach, 1 scoop of chocolate protein powder, 1 serving of frozen raspberries, 4 grams of oat fiber. Doesn’t look all that attractive, but it was pretty good. I actually got 2 glasses out of this, which I drank while working.

Snack time was the usual latte and couple of these:

The fresh produce brings up another FAQ:

What about the quality of food vs. the quantity? Food without pesticides, growth hormones or antibiotics, for example. I’m wondering how you feel these factors might contribute to weight loss!

I answered this a little in the comments that day, but I will post with a little more detail: I don’t know as those really matter all that much to me personally. We already eat hormone-free/antibiotic-free local meat and dairy. The pesticides – well, we just can’t afford all organic stuff. Hate to say it, but there it is. It’s too spendy up here. I would have to seriously cut back on my fruit and veggie consumption if it had to be organic. If it works into the budget, we purchase the organic version. As far as quantity/quality goes, I would likely get the same sense of fullness from an apple irregardless of whether it was organic or not. I think eating clean matters more than eating organic. I think it is better to eat regular grown strawberries than a 100 calorie snack pack any day. In a perfect world, organic food would be the norm, and I wish it was. Maybe it is moving towards that.

Also of interest, Cammy from Tippy-Toe Diet posted comments regarding how several bloggers measure success (including me). Interesting comments!

So, out of my food comfort zone for dinner. I decided to try fish (again). I was just looking at the fresh fish case and I saw some silver Hake (also called whiting). What caught my eye was the sign that said Hake was similar to sole, which is one of the only fish that doesn’t taste ‘fishy’ to me (but it costs $$). So on a whim, I bought some and John pan fried it up with some lemon pepper for dinner.

The verdict? I actually liked it as much as I have liked any fish. It was good, but I’ll take chicken any day over fish. It had almost a buttery flavor and clean tasting. Not dry at all and very tender. I would probably give this one another go around. Yay me!

I’m liking doing these FAQs in bits and pieces. I will be doing 2 separate posts one on running and one on lifting because a lot of questions centered on these, so they deserve their own posts!

Overall a good eating day today, and a nice rest day from exercise. The last few days were not so good on the eating front.

Stay ‘tuned‘ for a give away on Monday!!

Question: Do you eat organic?

Pushing it this week.

I decided that I was going to work ultra hard this week, and not take a ‘vacation’ type of week from exercise or eating.

So today I changed up the strength training, as I don’t want to do a heavy lower body workout on Wednesday, the day before my race.
Doing 4 sessions this week:
Today: Biceps, triceps, shoulders, back, chest.
Tomorrow: Hammies, glutes, quads, calves, abs.

Then do today’s workout on Wednesday, and the the other on Friday.

I ate clean today, on the lower end of calories (1300). I also jogged today. It was about 34 when I went out, but there was no wind – which makes all the difference in the world. I don’t know how fast I will be on Thursday, I really seem to run slower in the cold. You would think I would run faster to finish faster, but alas, that is not the case. Weather might be a bit clearer for Thursday, and not the rain/snow mix – yay!

When we went shopping the other day, I found the perfect candy for me. Eggnog candy corn! My 2 favorite flavors all rolled into one. I did ask to have that in my stocking this year. I just have to try it, but not til Christmas morning!

Good on plan day.

Ate perfectly on plan today. Feels pretty good! Eating clean just makes a big difference in my attitude and how I feel.

My Broncos are on tonight, hopefully they will win! It’s a late game, though. Starts at 10:15PM! I’ll be up really late, which means my early morning jog might not be so early LOL. Have to get it done in the morning, though, as it is supposed to rain in the afternoon.

I am thinking about starting a separate blog with a food log. I get a lot of questions about what I am eating. I used to post my foods, but that is pretty boring on a day-to-day basis to read, I think.

I just joined this challenge:

It is good for me, because it doesn’t pit me against anyone, it is mostly a community challenge. Hopefully this will push me to goal by the holidays!

5 Days of Clean Eating done!

I made it through my mini-challenge pretty much 100%. I did have a teaspoon of dark chocolate chips last night, but I don’t consider dark chocolate to be junk.
Any other challengers out there have success? I hope so! (Dave, I’m looking in your direction!)

So, the weekend is here, and I know I will be having a cupcake 🙂 . Going out with my sis for a 5K run together later this morning. It’s neat running with her, we both took up running in April and it is something to do together besides eat!! LOL.

I’ve really been thinking hard about my macros. I want to get to 40/30/30 (currently around 50/25/25), but I have found I just can’t do that with my current menus without either increasing the amount of food, or playing with the food itself. So, I have made a decision to go back to 2% milk. I need to get my fat content up for the macros to fall better, and I didn’t want to just add more fat by itself. 2% milk will keep the protein there, plus give me a bit more fat without a whole lot more calories than the 1% I was drinking. A few more fat grams per day will help. If that goes well, then I will probably move to 2% Fage yogurt instead of 0%. That is the only fat free dairy I currently use.
I made a decision not to increase the nuts I eat in a day, because nuts can be a big trigger food for me if I am not careful. I eat 1/3 of an ounce, and wanted to wait until maintenance to increase that food item.

It’s a little scary to be playing with this close to goal, but gradual changes won’t disturb anything.

Looking at a new September workout routine, I will post more on that this weekend.

Day 4 of clean eating done!

Okay, Day 4 down, one more to go! Yesterday was really easy for some reason. Well, I know what my munchies were caused by last week. PMS! Sometimes it really affects me, sometimes it doesn’t.

Not jogging today, I am doing a virtual 5K tomorrow with my sister, so not going to run today. Just finished my upper body workout:

dumbbell shoulder press: 3X10 18lb
dumbbell front raise: 3×10 11 pounds
hammer curl: 3×10 13 pounds
triceps extension: 3×10 13 pounds
dumbbell chest fly: 3×10 13 pounds
dumbbell chest press: 3×10 18 pounds

Going to eat extra protein today to help my muscles.

Finding Radiance

Trying to live a fit life loving food, cycling, gardening and everything in between!