I thought long and hard about biking to the gym today, but my limit is below 40 degrees and it was at the freezing mark when I got up!! Brrrr…..  I had to scrape the car off, too.   The gym was nice and quiet this morning, guess other people thought it was too cold to even go out!

NROLW (New Rules of Lifting For Women) Stage 6 A

• Negative chin ups:  3 sets of 1
• Wide grip lat pulldown with slow release:  10 sets of 2 at 70 pounds
• Barbell split squat:  3 sets of 6 at 65 pounds
• Push ups:  3 sets of 6 (real style)

I am not getting any better at the chin ups.  I am very strong, but I am just too heavy to have that much upper body strength (that’s not me knocking myself, just being realistic about my upper body strength). Then I walked on the treadmill for 25 minutes.  This man got on to the treadmill next to me and he had the worst breath!  I swear he ate an onion quiche with a garlic chaser.  I almost got off because I couldn’t stand it, but I didn’t want to be rude and move to another treadmill.  That’s why it was 25 minutes for me until I couldn’t take it anymore 😛

Returned home to make some Cream of Wheat with pumpkin, cranberry sauce and a tablespoon of dulce de leche that John made yesterday  :0

Very good, but dangerous.  I could eat that stuff straight off a spoon.  It was Alton Brown’s recipe, although he used 1% milk instead of whole to lighten it up a bit.

Remember the little  kitten that I rescued last month?  He got a new home!  He was nursed back to health and is happy in his new place.  That makes me feel great!  This was a picture during his foster care – he is so durn cute!

Lunch today was more homemade goodness.  John also made some clam chowder this weekend.  It’s only 150 calories a cup and so creamy and good.  I think the recipe was modeled on Dave Lieberman, but I am not completely sure.  I’ll have to ask J and get a link for you.  So good.  I don’t think I ever want canned soup again.

Winding down on the pink pictures for the month of October!

Here is today’s pink item:

This is another one of our soap colorants.  This is sparkle pink mica.  It’s actually the same stuff that is used in making cosmetics like eye shadow and blush, but just the pure colorant without any binders.  It’s one of my favorite colors of mica (although gold or copper are even prettier!).  I was contacted by an old soap customer and am working on a large order for her – so it is keeping me hopping on top of working full time.   That means those Christmas ornaments are put on hold.  Remember how I said it was a good thing I started them early??  Hahaha!!  Maybe in a couple weeks I can get back to them.

Doing this soap almost makes me want to start doing that again.  I kind of miss it a little bit now that it has been a while.  Does that ever happen to you?  Where you can’t stand doing something you used to love so you stop, then get the hankering for it again?  We’ll see how long that lasts.  I’ll take some pics when I get most of the order done.

Dinner was my standard trifecta:

This was the best shot I took.  The old camera doesn’t quite know what to do when the food is steamy.  My replacement camera shipped today!  It’s crossing the country, so I probably won’t get it until the weekend.

So, feeling a little swamped and overwhelmed – but I’m keeping it together.  I did snack on some cashews today – more than I should have, but part of that was the nibbles I get due to lack of sleep.  I am going to bed early tonight, since John is out playing poker.  He had better win, since he has to take me to dinner this week 😀