We had a great day and it went by so fast!  First off, John and I had a nice quite breakfast and then headed out for our 5k for Alissa’s Thanksgiving 5K.  We both walked it since I am not [...]]]> Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!  Or Thursday for my non US friends 

We had a great day and it went by so fast!  First off, John and I had a nice quite breakfast and then headed out for our 5k for Alissa’s Thanksgiving 5K.  We both walked it since I am not running anymore.  It was a little chilly, mid to upper 30s, so I bundled up.

After we got back, it was time to prepare a few other things to bring with us for dinner.  Alton Brown’s Corn Bread Pudding.

This stuff is so good – I love it!  John made up a dutch apple/cranberry pie to bring.

Our first order of business on the way to my sister’s house was the eggnog latte though.  I would not let myself have one until today and I was ready!

Yum.  We tried another local coffee shop, but they didn’t have egg nog lattes this year.  What is up with that??

So, we had to head to Starbucks.  $4 for a tall eggnog latte, and John’s was even more as a grande.  It is getting too expensive to go to Starbucks, especially for the quality of the espresso. Booo…

We arrived at my sister’s to meet Turkey-zilla!  My BIL raised turkeys this year and they all grew huge!  This bird is 36.5 pounds.  Yes – 36.5 pounds.  It was too big for the roaster:

We just could not get over how big this bird was! I think it will still be being eaten come Christmas.  This is the difference between a feed lot bird and a hand raised bird.

The table was set for 10:

My niece made the ‘place cards’ for everyone:

Each of the nieces also made the centerpiece decorations.  Potato turkeys!

The turkey came out of the oven (5.5 hours of cooking time) and we all laughed again at how big it was.  Next to a quarter for comparison 

We couldn’t even get it out of the pan to get the juice for making gravy.  We had to carve in the pan and ladle out the drippings.

John’s carving skills were tested with this bird.

That is one giant leg!

Everyone ready to eat!

This was one breast of the turkey and the legs:

We had the usual suspects of green beans, mashed taters, gravy (which I made), cranberry bread (my mom’s).  Plus some sweet potatoes and crescent rolls.

My beverage today:

Love this stuff and I have it once or twice a year.

After dinner, it was hunting time for some, football time for some (me and John) and naps for others:

Then came dessert time!  We had several pies, including pumpkin ones made by my dad and John’s apple/cranberry pie:

And game time!  This was Imaginiff

Then we played some Star Wars Trivial Pursuit.

The questions were really too hard, though, and John was the only one getting any right LOL!

A good night was had and I didn’t get stuffed, although I did eat too many mini Reeses peanut butter bells.  I never eat these or the mini cups unless I am at Colleen’s house and I am powerless against them 

The day ended up even better because I am one game up on the football picks for the week already!

Question: What was the biggest turkey you have ever had?

This morning did bring a change in routine for me. Meet my new gym!

Lookie [...]]]> We had such a nice weekend. Again, it went by too fast. I am still celebrating with my football gloating. I am making John take me out to dinner this evening because this week is jammed full of stuff.

This morning did bring a change in routine for me. Meet my new gym!

Lookie what’s back! The lifting routines. I guess you all missed them?

I did a light workout to get back into the swing of the gym, get used to the new equipment there and start trying to fit in. This was a good start.  I missed the cable machine at home! Sorry Bowflex, you just didn’t do it for me. Here is a link to me doing the face pull if you want to see it.

This gym had a 1 year membership for $99.  There are no classes or anything at this gym, but that is okay because my old gym didn’t have them either and I am not inclined to take them. The only thing I don’t like is that it is 5.5 miles from home versus 2 like my old gym, but saving $175 a year is worth it.

I came home to make up some brekkie. Even though it was somewhat warm, I felt like oats.  These were cooked with some egg white at the end and topped with peanut flour and jam.

In my new bowl from the weekend! Yay! It’s the little things that please me. John is so lucky.

Today was just like a summer day. Almost 80 degrees! With this warmth and the moisture lately, going outside lately is like starring in an episode of Attack of the Mosquitoes.  They even bit at my face, which is weird. I’ll probably be anemic for next week’s blood donation. 

Lunchtime! I had an open faced egg sammie on a gluten free bread I made this weekend from this recipe.  It actually came out really good and I think I will play with it.

It was a very steady work day today.  One of these days I will talk about my job and what it entails. I get a lot of emails about.

Snack break of some chocolate:

And a latte!

Even with it almost 80 degrees out, I wanted a hot latte.  Why yes, I am a creature of habit, thank you.

And speaking about creature of habit:

She was sleeping, but opened her eyes when I had the camera about 2 inches from her face.  I just can’t resist taking pictures of her, sleeping or not.

I was ready for my football dinner   I actually decided to take it a little easy on John as we have our anniversary dinner on Wednesday and then my mom’s birthday on Friday. Not to mention my niece’s birthday also on Wednesday. Did I already say this was a busy week coming up? So, I picked a BBQ joint – Dickey’s.

Kind of corny decor and the music left a lot to be desired from an Iamnotacountrymusic fan perspective.

I decided on a baker with BBQ chicken that had some cheese, sour cream and bacon on it.  This was huge and I left probably a third of the potato behind.

I do like their chicken there. Better than the brisket, I do say. Not so crazy about the lighting. Don’t they understand bloggers need good lighting??

They also offer this:

I realized that I had been gluten free all day, so I forewent the cone and had a little dish to keep the GF thing going.

Yum.  Victory tastes delicious!

I am going to go back to work tonight.  Just getting in some extra lines to cushion in case all the doin’s this week make it hard to get in all my work.

Question: If you belong to a gym, does it offer classes?

1 minute muffle topped with a sauteed banana and some maple cream. [...]]]> Hope you all had a fantastic holiday weekend! I actually had a complete weekend off of 2 days, but did work a 3/4 day today.
It was kind of a rainy, drizzly day around here. Good for a fall kind of breakfast.

1 minute muffle topped with a sauteed banana and some maple cream. Tres good!

It was a quiet work day and quite productive. I like work days like that. No pressure and I could work as much as I wanted (and there was plenty to do!). Good for saving up for our Disney World trip! Not sure if I mentioned that we got our plane tickets already when there was a nice price on nonstop flights End of January in 2012. Is it too early to start the countdown to vacation?

I ate the rest of the pork ribs for lunch today.

I also worked on my bread. I did a no-knead sourdough boule again with this recipe.  Baked it off and it came out looking quite good!

While the bread cooled, John and I went out to run a couple errands and  for ice cream.  This was  a small…

It was a little sad with it being the end of summer and drizzly.  The signs were up at this particular place that they are closing for the season September 18th.  That means this is coming:

After we got home, I had to test my beautiful sourdough bread!

Oh my!  So good and I really just wanted to eat this for dinner.  But, we cooked up some shrimp instead.

I did a 20 minute Pilates workout tonight and I am so going to feel my core tomorrow!

Pixie was stretching while I was.  Only somebody replaced her kitty arms with T-Rex spindly arms.

Now is time for some real relaxing.

Question: How was your Labor Day (if you had one)?

But first, there was my day.  We are in the midst of a long rain spell right now.  That means no outdoor [...]]]> Happy Birthday to my dad!  He is the same age and has the same birthday as Bob Dylan.    His choice to eat out for dinner is Golden Corral. He loves that place.

But first, there was my day.  We are in the midst of a long rain spell right now.  That means no outdoor biking.

I hopped on the trainer for 20 minutes before we headed out to Bagel Wednesday!  We stopped at Orange Cat, where I had a blueberry bagel.

Very tasty. It came with a portioned cream cheese this week, which makes counting the calories really easy, I have to say.

Work was super busy. This whole week has been super busy.  I am not sure why, but it can be a good thing if we don’t get overwhelmed.

Protein for lunch today.  Since I knew I would be eating a lot of veggies with dinner, I didn’t want any with lunch.

I made an open-faced BBQ chicken sandwich on a slice of the sourdough bread.  Yum!

The rest of the day went fast.  Pixie slept away the day.  What else to do when the weather is icky?

I knew I needed to redeem myself a little for all the eating on Sunday at the picnic, so Golden Corral was a chance to do that.

I had a plan going into Golden Corral.  Kind of the same as last year for my dad’s birthday.  Funny how that was the last time I was at Golden Corral, too, for his birthday!  Just not our choice of dining establishments.

The plan:

• All the fruits and veggies I want to have.
• Lean seafood protein, not breaded or fried.
• Small baked potato
• Possible fruity dessert (cobbler type) if desired
• Talk lots with family.

I wrote this part of the post before leaving the house.

Here is how I did:

For those that are not familiar, Golden Corral is just a giant buffet.

Lots and lots of food of varying nutritional value:

My starter plate was a salad that contained some hardboiled egg, cheese, carrots, cucumber and a drizzle of dressing:

Plus a bowl of berries and fresh pineapple.

This fruit was most excellent!

Happy Birthday Poppa!

It’s a weeknight, so half the family is missing.

After eating this, I went for my hot plate.  Lots of corporate meat on the buffet (it was rib night), and most of the seafood was breaded.  I kind of expected that.  There was one fish dish that was not breaded, but you know me and my  love of fish

Hot plate – lots of broccoli   (I took all that was left LOL).  A baker with some sour cream and butter on the side (hooray for fat!). A hush puppy and about a tablespoon of artichoke dip to try.

A little lean on protein, but I did have some egg and cheese on my salad.  Glad I got in protein with lunch.  I ate probably about half of the potato.  The hush puppy was really good, too!

I went over to peruse the dessert bar.

Of course, this all looks decimated, but it is only a tiny portion of the entire bar, including an ice cream bar.  I looked long and hard. After looking at everything, I decided it was not worthy and got more fruit instead because it was so tasty.

Okay, I lied. I got one thing off the dessert part – the chocolate dipped piece of pineapple.  Now *that* was good!  I had one bite of John’s chocolate cake to try.  It was good, but kind of reaffirmed that the fruit was the right choice for me.

It is possible to eat very well at Golden Corral or totally indulge.  Whatever you feel like doing.  Right now I am satisfied and not over full and really pleased with myself LOL.  The only thing missing from my plan was more lean protein, but that was a function of the buffet and not me. Sometimes I can make a plan and stick to it!

Golden Corral: 0  – Lori: 1+

The routine:

I woke up not too early this morning.  For the last couple days, I have been able to sleep on my stomach again!  For whatever reason, my herniated disk made it very painful to try sleep any way but on my [...]]]> Okay, I promised myself that I would eat much cleaner today, so here goes!

I woke up not too early this morning.  For the last couple days, I have been able to sleep on my stomach again!  For whatever reason, my herniated disk made it very painful to try sleep any way but on my back, which is my least favorite sleeping position.  So, that hasn’t meant the greatest of sleep for the past month.  The last couple of nights I have been able to be on my stomach, although not with a bent leg yet.  Funny how little things like that can make me so happy

I needed some good super foods for brekkie, so that meant protein waffles!  I added some extra oat fiber to them, too.

Then hit the ground running with work.  Since I actually ate early – I was hungry for a morning snack, but I told myself it had to be clean!  So I made a mini green smoothie.

1 cup of spinach, 15 g of chocolate protein powder, 1/2 a banana, cinnamon, ice, and water.  It was pretty good, but I think raw spinach may not agree with my tummy.  I get rumbles whenever I have a green smoothie anymore.

Lunch time was a baked crabcake and a pear, which I ate while working.

That actually slows down my eating because I work by typing, so that means I have to put the fork down to work LOL!  The good side to a bad habit.

I filled up all the bird feeders the other day.  So many different birds on this one today from sparrows to gold finches to chickadees and a woodpecker (surprising!).  All day this was going on – but when I sat there with a camera to take a picture, all I get is this.

Had the usual latte for a snack, just as I finished up work for the week (early to boot – woo hoo!).

Plus an Attune.

After finishing this and a little goofing around, I went out for a walk.  Went to the high school track, and John followed to run.  I would say I am probably about 90% healed from the herniated disk at this point, but the last 10% is  the weakness/numbness.  I still am unable to run.  I can kind of shuffle for about 5 yards, but my leg just gives out, so I can’t do it.  Same reason why I can’t do split leg lifting of any type.  Walking is okay, but my thigh feels so tight when I walk.  Not sure why that is – I stretch and foam roll every day.  It’s funny how what seems to be the easiest form of exercise (walking) is the slowest to come back when I can bike pretty well and do most of lifting exercises.  I actually yelled at my leg to wake up last night LOL!

Anyway, I came back and had a nibble before cooking dinner:

I was in the mood for sweet potatoes tonight.  Going with more superfoods on my clean eating day.  I sliced one up, sprayed with nonstick spray and salt and pepper, then popped in the toaster oven on 400 for about 25 minutes.  Golden brown and delicious!

Those are shredded brussel sprouts on the side.  Funny that it looks like cauliflower in there.

I made up my dessert for later.  This is a pseudo protein cheesecake.

• 32 g of fat free ricotta
• 15 grams of strawberry protein powder (soy)
• enough water to make it creamy
• 2 chopped strawberries
• cinnamon

This is chilling in the fridge now for during the movie.  About 100 calories and 14 grams of protein!

I think I will make it eating clean today!  I am reminding John not to let me snack other than this pseudo cheesecake.

Question:  What is your favorite sleeping position?

Took an easy day today.  I did wake up early and got right down to making breakfast.  Banana custard oats topped with [...]]]> Hi to all the new visitors who came over from Caitlin’s blog!  Hope you stick around for a while and feel free to say ‘hi’!  Join me on my snacktacular day, won’t you?

Took an easy day today.  I did wake up early and got right down to making breakfast.  Banana custard oats topped with nuttzo and fluff.

I really like this combo.  The banana was bigger than usual, though, so these were a little on the sweet side.

How about the authorities catching that NYC car bomber?  How fast was that??  They rock!  I can’t believe how little they had to go on and found a suspect so quickly.  If only all suspects were caught so fast.

Anyway, I got down to work fast today.  I like days like today where it goes by quick.  Pit stop for lunch.

Scrambled egg wrap with laughing cow and hot sauce.  I made a real mess with this wrap, too.

Then the snackies started hitting me.  Hello PMS.   I got a piece of toast with nutbutter.

Then a couple of cookies with my latte

After I finished up work, I took a walk.  Went fairly far today, which was good.  Then I had another snack when I got home before dinner:

Why I put fluff on a date is beyond me.  This was beyond sweet!  If the nut butter had been a salted kind, it probably would have made me have another, though.  That sugar monster sure is a beast sometimes when he gets loose.

I had someone email me and ask who cooked in our household.  Well, the answer is that we both do.  We tend to eat at the same time, but we don’t always eat the same thing.  We each generally fix our own breakfast and lunch, although we sit together and eat most days (unless I am up early and John is still sleeping).  Dinner time can be the same food or not.  As you know, I love my broccoli.  John does not like broccoli.  So, I am always cooking that for myself.  If I make a sweet potato, we generally share it.  One or the other of us will often fix the protein choice, and then we each add our own sides.  John does not eat as many veggies as I do, and he tends to eat more carbs with dinner than I do.  Sometimes one of us will cook the whole meal, like soup or stew or pizza.  We both really enjoy cooking.  We often work in tandem in the kitchen.  Kind of like an old married couple.  Not that we’re an old married couple or anything…

For example tonight, we were eating up leftovers, so we each had our own items.  I used cooked chicken for…..

wait for it….

You knew it was coming.    Yum!  (Celebrating National Salad Month, too) John had pork, strawberries, and Sun Chips (which I snuck some of).

Speaking of Sun Chips – have you tried these with the new compostable bag?  This is the loudest bag ever!  I can’t believe how much noise it makes.  I decided I am going to put this bag to the test and bury it out in a spot in my garden and see what happens.  I’ll take pictures along the way.

Also, I am going to be doing a little interview with John now that he has maintained his weight loss for 6 months or so.  If you have anything you want to ask him, email me or post in the comments.

I am going to be snacking more tonight.  Ugh!  It’s just been one of those days.  We are going out tonight for some coffee and to pick up a few groceries – more fruit for me, yay!  We normally shop just once a week, and then pick up more milk during the week.  I have a feeling I might be nibbling on something with my latte….

Question:  How many times do you shop in a week?

Bottom’s up!

I rode the stationary for 15 minutes, then did a longer lifting routine today:

Woke up this morning to go to the gym and I see this:

  What happened to spring??  It is bitter cold and windy, too.  Brrrrr………  Not [...]]]> I love all your habits of excellence from yesterday’s post!  Any excellent habit doesn’t have to be physical either, it can be anything at all!

Woke up this morning to go to the gym and I see this:

  What happened to spring??  It is bitter cold and windy, too.  Brrrrr………  Not to mention I had to scrape ice off the car to go to the gym I grabbed one of my protein cookies and munched before leaving.

Good workout this morning.  It was tiring, though.  Fridays are always hard.

• Chin ups:  3 sets of 2
• Barbell deadlift/row combo: 3 sets of 8 at 65#

Superset:

• Prone Cuban Snatch: 3 sets of 8 with 10# DBs
• Dumbbell pliet squat:  3 sets of 10 with 40# DB

Superset:

• Dumbbell pullover: 3 sets of 8 with 30# DB
• Lying flat chest fly:  3 sets of 8 with 20# DBs

Giant set:

• Decline sit ups:  3 sets of 15
• Ahnold press:  3 sets of 6 with 20# DBs
• Nosebreakers:  3 sets of 10 with 30# bar

Then finished with some leg lifts and then treadmill walking.  Whew!  John walked to the gym ( ~ 2 miles) to meet me and we went out for bagels!  Hee hee – on my weekend!

Oat bran bagel with some cheddar bacon cream cheese (I know!!).  It was okay.  We keep trying this place and it is just m’eh.  I miss Ridge Street.

Just a lot of goofing around today.  I couldn’t get much more productive than vacuuming and reading blogs!  I was hungry for an early lunch:

Last of the bagel thins.  Those won’t be coming back anytime soon.

Decided to go out and do shopping.  My sister’s birthday is next weekend, so it’s a good excuse to go shopping, right?  Then I stopped at Starbucks and relaxed:

And then got my hairs cut:

All neat and tidy again!  I keep getting it a bit shorter each time.  By the end of summer it will be really short.

Dinner was pretty standard.

We need to get some meat.  I haven’t had chicken in weeks!  The freezer is empty enough now that we can go back to the smokehouse.

I still wanted to eat after this.

My appetite has been horrible today!  It’s bad when you snack on plain mini shredded wheat out of the box…

Think we have a netflix movie planned tonight, or possibly going out for a snack (that appetite again….  Tomorrow we are going to tour some maple syrup farms that are open for sugar weekend!

Anyone have fun plans this weekend?

Fruit and veggie challenge:

F: pear, strawberries

V: carrots,  1 cup broccoli  (a little lame today)

The start of the weekend for me.  I actually slept until 7am this morning.  I decided to have a nice long workout today with an [...]]]> Hey there!  Waving *hi* to all the new readers, there’s a lot!  Please say hi in the comments or send me an email   Hope you stay for a spell.

The start of the weekend for me.  I actually slept until 7am this morning.  I decided to have a nice long workout today with an exercise buffet:

• 20 minutes on the stationary bike (see, Debby??)

Lifting workout:

• Chin ups:  1 set of 3, 1 set of 2, 1 set of 2
• Barbell split squats:  3 sets of 8 at 65
• Incline dumbbell chest press:  3 sets of 8 with 25# dumbbells
• YTWL:  3 sets of 8 with 10# dumbbells
• Lunges:  3 sets of 8 with 35# bar
• Lat pull down:  3 sets of 10 at 60 pounds

Then I hit the treadmill for 2 miles of walking and 1 mile of running with speedwork.  It was nice knowing I didn’t have to hurry to get back to go to work!  John met me at the gym and he took me out for my football meal.  We went to Maude’s and we couldn’t have gotten there soon enough.  My arm was looking pretty tempting by this point.  I wanted a good protein hit, so I had a 3 egg cheese omelet.  I ate everything on this plate!

So. good.  We had some strange salt and pepper shakers at our table.

Not sure what’s going on at Prince Edward Island, but it can’t be good …..

This was a pretty late breakfast (1o am), so I never ended up eating lunch!  You know I don’t skip meals, but I also don’t want to eat just because. So, I got other errands done.

One of my New Year goals was to do something with my hair.  I haven’t had it cut in about 11 months, since I was trying to grow it out.  Well, not sure I was liking it, so I went and had it trimmed up and shaped.

This way I can decided to keep growing it, or cut it back to short again.  She took off probably 3 inches!  That’s a bit more than a trim.  I have to say that I love it   When I got back, it was snack time!

Plus this:

Okay, 2 of those…..  This has not really been a stellar eating day.  I took some time catching up on emails and my google reader!  Whew.

I mentioned the word ‘pizza’ near dinner time, and John was all over that.  We walked to get a slice.  This place down the road has a deal for a drink and 2 slices for $4.50.  We each eat 1 slice because they are pretty big. Talk about a cheap date!  I usually bring my own bottle of water since I don’t drink fountain drinks.  I got in the requisite broccoli on my slice

Mmmmmm…….

I am actually getting the protein powder post ready to go.  It will be up some time tomorrow.  Sorry for the delay!

Doing some R&R tonight.  I think Pixie has the right idea:

Giveaway for the Lose The Diet book ends on Sunday!

FYI: This was the charity I donated to for Haiti victims: Medical Teams International

Question:  Any fun plans for the weekend?