A Slow Paced Saturday (Plus Weekly Weigh in #6)

This week has been a little bit rough. I have some personal (yup too personal for the blog right now) stuff going on and I really wanted to use today to recover from my fast paced week. I packed up the wonderbug bright and early and headed out for the morning. I made sure all of the essentials (purse, yoga bag, yoga mat, water, vitamin water, breakfast, etc) were all good to go since I would not have time to stop back by my house. I am amazed at my ability to be so prepared so early on a Saturday morning!

My first stop was Weight Watchers for my week 6 weigh in. I really busted my booty this week in terms of my workouts. I pushed myself hard, didn’t eat any of the resulting activity points, and made sure to get in tons of fresh veggies and fruits. I had myself all geared up for a stellar result but got this instead…

Week      +/-        Total lost

6               -0.2          21.2

Which makes my overall stats:

Week            +/-          Total Lost

1                   -10.8         10.8

2                   -3.2            14

3                   -3.0             17

4                  -1.0              18

5                  -3.0              21

6                 -0.2              21.2

I normally try (try try try) to take my number in stride. I really do. However, today to say I was disappointed is an understatement. I was pissed. My Weight Watchers leader was really supportive and answered my questions about how this complete injustice occurred. Her explanations made perfect sense but I am still upset. I feel like when you consider calories in versus calories out I should have had a three pound lost at least! I worked so hard this week and truly pushed myself. A 0.2 pound loss feels like a slap in the face. I know I should not be bitching about this. I posted a three pound loss last week and am seeing great changes in my strength and body shape. However, people feel the way they feel and this made me feel like crap. I feel like this early in the process a 0.2 pound loss should not be happening. I wanted to grab a latte and a scone after this less than stellar weigh in but instead I read over my Weight Watchers materials for the week, ate a quick breakfast of organic peanut butter on whole grain, and headed downtown to my Bikram yoga class.

Class was amazing as it usually is. My mind was all over the place when I first went in and I was really dwelling on the weigh-in. However, a few poses into the practice and I felt myself calm down. I worked really hard and even managed to get a little further into some of the poses than I have in the past. This is such a great practice and a wonderful studio. I truly feel at home/ at ease there now which is so unlike me. I have been at my current gym for over two years and still do not feel totally comfortable there. Plus, I can feel and see myself change from week to week with yoga. I am so glad I worked it into my routine. After class I was pretty much famished so I stopped at Subway to grab lunch for the hubs and I. I chose chicken on flatbread with loads of veggies and some Sunchips. I have not had Sunchips in forever and they were really yummy. And of course my gigantic water bottle made an appearance.

After our quick lunch the hubs left for his afternoon bike ride and I decided a bubble bath was in order. After the week (and super hard class) I had it was much needed. I also took in my trusty copy of Rachael Ray to get in some reading. Ya’ll know how much I heart that lady!

The hubs and I had a little date night planned so I got dressed in a super cute sweater I picked up in Dallas last fall and we headed out.

We headed out to an E A R L Y dinner. I am talking Golden Girls early. We were trying to avoid the Valentines weekend crowd. Mission accomplished as we pulled into one of my favorite local places, Neighbor’s Place, around 5:00.

I was totally craving a Spinach salad so I ordered one topped with yummy piping hot grilled chicken. It was pretty fantastic. I love it when restaurants have open kitchens. Its cool to watch how quickly they can get everything cooked up. They are the ultimate multi-taskers!

Since it was Saturday (yay Saturday!!) the hubs and I decided to share this amazing piece of chocolate cake. Even between the two of us we could not finish it.

Let me tell you a little something about said amazing cake- It tasted wonderful but was too much for my tummy to handle. We were barely to the car and I was sick with a capital S. It’s not that I never indulge, because I do. I have a piece of chocolate on Wednesday nights and pretty much an item or two I have been craving on Saturdays. However, I am apparently going to have to be a little more choosey because my body has started to change in terms of what it will tolerate. The hubs and I sort of marveled at what a difference six weeks makes.

The hubs and I ditched our original plan to see a movie and instead watched “The Killers” on DVD with my fave Katherine Hiegel at home. We capped off the night with a trip to Old Navy. The hubs promised me some new yoga pants and I was ready to collect. I somehow ended up with an entire new outfit. Not sure how that happened. 😉 (photos coming soon).

We headed home and are currently bonding with our TIVO. My relaxing Saturday is just what I needed. Check back tomorrow for my re-cap of my Anti-Valentines date with fabulous fave Kristen.

Have a Happy and Healthy Weekend!

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Moves and Food on a Sunday

Since last night’s movie party was pretty indulgent in terms of food I wanted to make sure my Sunday was 100% back on track.

Today’s Food:

A fruit and yogurt smoothie

A bacon and egg sandwich with an oatmeal/chocolate cherry low sugar dessert

Spinach Artichoke Chicken Penne

And Today’s Moves…..

5 miles at a slow pace on the paved trail

Now, Im enjoying the rest of my evening with the hubs, my pups, and a full TIVO! How did you spend your Sunday?

PS: I finally busted out the new Rachael Ray cookware my parents gifted me for my Birthday. LOVE IT!!

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A Salad in Paradise?

In the midst of some Sunday errand running and workouts the hubs and I headed a bit North to catch up with one of my oldest friends Tiffany, her husband Robert, and their little one. They weren’t able to make it down for Saturday night’s Birthday celebration so we took the party to Charlottesville! It was a pretty dreary day here in Virginia but we were excited to make the trip and meet up with our pals.

We decided to meet up at Cheeseburger in Paradise. It has a really fun vibe and reminds me of the super fun rainy day the hubs  and I spent at the beach last summer.

We had a really fun afternoon catching up, chatting, and making some plans for future get togethers. I was also super entertained by their little boy who has some sweet dance moves!

Then came the moment of truth, time to order lunch. As tempting as a cheeseburger was (I mean it is Cheeseburger in Paradise after all) I decided to make sure I remained on plan and ordered the “Calypso” salad. This salad was mixed field greens with roasted chicken, pineapple, apples, oranges, strawberries, and almonds. I got a balsamic vinaigrette on the side that I used sparingly because it was very thick. It felt good to stay on plan and I will tell you a secret….spending time with pals is just as much fun whether you have a burger or a salad!

After lunch we posed for some more photos with our pals and headed home. The hubs and I still had stops at Target, Best Buy, and Kroger to make. Luckily, I got Season 3 of Gossip Girl out of the errand running so I cant complain too much!

Later that evening the hubs whipped up his killer Chicken Tacos. I do LOVE a man in the kitchen! These tacos are amazing and very low calorie. They are also extra super spicy and smoky which I LOVE!

How do you handle dining out on a diet?

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My Meatless “Brinner” Masterpiece

So perhaps “masterpiece” is a bit of a strong word to describe tonight’s dinner but it was pretty fantastic. Since we are going to be surrounded by friends and loved ones for the rest of the weekend to celebrate my Birthday I decided to have a little “me time” today. I worked out, got my make-up done, shopped the Victoria’s Secret Semi Annual Sale ( scored some awesome yoga pants for super cheap!), and generally had a super girly and fun day. Since the hubs was out having burgers and beers with the guys I decided to end my day with a yummy girl friendly meal (plus it was meat free). We don’t do meat free too much around my house. (I live with a total carnivore.) However, sometimes I find myself craving a veggie packed meal.

To begin I chopped up some fresh green bell pepper, mushrooms, onion, spinach, and tomato. The more veggies the better. Pile them on!!

Next I sautéed up my yummy veggies in some olive oil until they started getting tender.

Once my veggies were tender I combined 2 eggs, a touch of milk, and a touch of hot sauce. I placed this mixture in a second skillet. As the egg began to set I added my veggies and some cheese

Flip your egg and “close” it up. I had WAY too many veggies for mine to close all of the way but that was just fine by me!

After plating this veggie filled omelet I placed a liberal amount of all natural salsa on top and paired my “masterpiece” with a piece of whole grain toast and an orange. YUM!

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Another Random Sunday

Today was a no plan, do whatever the day brings, sort of Sunday. Inspired by last night’s cookies I decided to add some craisins to my morning oatmeal. It is kind of amazing what the smallest change will do for a dish. My boring bowl of oatmeal suddenly felt really sweet and indulgent. The calorie/points plus value was the exact same as when I use raisins.

Next, I went out on some random errands (groceries, bill paying, etc). I ended up at Target to pick up dog food for the fur babies and I spotted these really cute bowls. I like to mix it up from time to time with what plates/bowls I use on the blog so I love finding a cute print/pattern. I am pretty sure these bowls were meant to be since I was recently watching reruns of friends where they were using oversized cups in an almost identical print. I even searched for them online with no luck! Plus these were a steal at $7.00!

After my errands were done I stopped at Macys. It had just opened for the day and happened to be on the way home. I had two $5.00 gift cards (well use them or lose them $5 credits is more accurate) with a 1-31-11 expiration. I scoped out the sale sweaters and truthfully they were so incredibly “picked over” I almost just bought some tights to use up the credits so I would not lose them and be done with it. Luckily, I spotted these gems from last summer being put back out for sale. They were 75% off with an additional 40% off and I had a 15% off coupon. That plus my two $5 credits got me these fun little summer pieces for $0.03. True Story!

Once I dropped everything off at home I figured it had warmed up enough to go for a run outside. I drove downtown for a change in scenery to hit the trail. Apparently the trail did not get the memo that the snow had melted so I was faced with a frozen snowy mess. I slowed WAY down but the workout was still a good one. Not only was it a workout for my booty (trying to stay balanced) but it was also peaceful to just concentrate on what I was doing. I put U2 (my absolute favorite) on the I-Pod and enjoyed the beautiful scenery.

I am now settling in at home to catch up on some TIVO (Rachael Ray has a LOT of shows during the week!) and start a chili meatloaf for dinner. What did you do this weekend?

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Love and Cookies

Saturday night the hubs and I headed out all dressed up for the wedding of a friend. Admittedly, I did not know the groom or bride very well but the groom has been pals with my hub’s family for quite some time. At any rate I just love love and so I love weddings. We had a fun little evening out (we got to spend some time with the hubs family) and even with a few bites of wedding cake I was able to stay 100% on plan. Also, the brand new Mr. and Mrs. Chose a Broadway theme for their reception which was very cute

After the hubs and I got home I decided to bake some oatmeal cookies. I had seen this recipe last week in a “craisin” add inside of Rachael Ray’s magazine. I only had one and gave the rest over to the hubs to either share at work, or just have himself. The recipe is super easy!

~Pre-heat the oven to 375. Mix together ¾ cup butter and ¾ cup brown sugar until it’s fluffy. Then mix in 2 eggs. I busted out my trusty Kitchen Aid mixer for the task but a hand held would be fine too.

~Combine 1 ½ cups flour, 1 ½ cups old fashioned oats, 1tsp baking soda and a pinch of salt. Add this mixture to the wet ingredients in several segments

~Once you have added all of the dry ingredients stir in 1 cup of white chocolate chips and a 6oz pack of craisins by hand. I love Ghirdeli chocolate. It always reminds me of Downtown Disney and it makes me smile!

~Spoon onto a baking sheet and bake for 12 minutes. Makes 2 ½ dozen cookies!

Do you have a favorite oatmeal cookie recipe?

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In the 212- NYC Trip Recap Day 2

Saturday morning found us all looking a little better and brighter than the night before. We got up around 6:00am because we wanted to soak in as much NYC as we possibly could. Here I am looking a touch too chipper for 6:30am!

We also woke up to a freezing cold room. After calling the front desk our heater was promptly repaired and the four of us were compensated with free breakfast at our hotel. You’ve got to love free in NY so we headed up for some orange juice, scrambled eggs, fruit and toast. I also indulged with a scone every morning. YUM! Other than a passive aggressive wait staff breakfast was simple and filling. We were out on the streets of NY in less than 30 minutes.

Our first stop was a 7:30am stop at what I lovingly now refer to as “the only Macys that matters”. This was a very smart move on our part as it was reasonably un-crowded at this hour.

The four of us split up since there was a lot of ground to cover. This Macy’s is massive. You could literally spend an entire day in there and not cover everything. However, with only 3 ½ hours allotted for Macys I had to do some serious speed shopping. This Macys was full of amazing sales and deals. My favorite find was this Dooney and Bourke bag.

A few hours later the four of us, multiple overstuffed bags in tow headed back to the hotel to drop off our purchases. Our room was starting to look a little bit disastrous but that was ok. At this point we went out searching for some NY style pizza. After a bit of a smart phone snafu we found exactly what we were looking for. I went with the somewhat unconventional choice of ham and pineapple.

This pizza was good but all of the grease immediately made me sick. It left me more than a little grossed out. While I was down, I was not out! We decided to head up toward Union Square to do some more shopping.  After some subway confusion (we went down the exact same set of steps, wrong steps I might add, TWICE) we hailed a cab and headed on our way.

There seems to be shopping at every turn in the city so after hitting a few stores we took another cab uptown. We wanted to look at the beautiful store windows at Bergdorf Goodman, Barney’s, etc and they did not disappoint.

However, our final destination uptown was Tiffany and Co. (~cue angels singing~). It is no secret that I love anything shiny and fabulous so I was pretty much beyond excited to get into Tiffany’s. I had visited a Tiffany’s with my blog pal Andrea on the Magnificent Mile in Chicago over the summer but had not purchased anything. However, during this trip the group of us were giddy from all of the shopping/giggling/fun and several of us rode up to the sterling silver floor (floor 3) and made purchases. I loved getting that famous little blue bag in my hands. It made me all warm inside!

We made our way back to the hotel, stopping to shop along the way. We were four totally worn out girls by the time we made it to dinner.

We chose a little place called Jack Dempsey’s since it was just a block or so from our hotel. I had an amazing lean bison burger (not pictured) and we spent the night talking, laughing, and winding down.

Even though we were pretty worn out, we could not resist the appeal of a late night trip to the top of the Empire State Building. We walked the two blocks from dinner to the Empire State Building and since it was around 11:00pm we were able to go right up with no waiting!! We were shocked. Even though this is a very touristy thing to do, I highly recommend it. The photos were beautiful, the view amazing, and the experience with my girlfriends is one I won’t ever forget.

We literally could not cram another ounce of fun into our day so we headed back to our hotel. We had a big day of site seeing and musicals to rest up for!

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Snow Day

It snowed today in beautiful central Virginia which caused the oh so rare occurrence of my office being closed for the day. So what have I been up to on this unexpected snow day?

Snuggling in my favorite spot trying to stay warm

 

Baking Brownies

 

Looking at the Snow

 

Catching up on blogs

Packing for New York

Yup-the girls and I are leaving at 5:15 am to catch a train to New York City for some shopping and holiday fun.  Since the weather is so crazy today they are all heading to my house tonight so there is no chance of anyone getting snowed/iced in. It’s going to be close quarters but we are looking at it as an impromptu slumber party to get the weekend started!! I don’t know how much time I will have to blog while on my little winter vacation but rest assured I will be back Tuesday with all of the fun details!!! Have a Great Weekend!!

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Friday Smiles…..

Here is what has me all smiles this Friday!

I went into the salon looking all crazy like this……

But came out with fabulously colored and straightened hair like this…….

I got to spend some time with one of my favorite people, my hair stylist Caleb, AND I ran into Denise from my work. (We have had the same hair stylist for years but have never run into one another at the salon until today!)

I got a manicure/pedicure with one of my favorite gals in some super cute red shades from the OPI Burlesque collection.

I got a good laugh (sorry Siobhan!) when my friend forgot her pedi flip flops and had to walk to her car all Britney Spears style without her shoes!!

And my pups are all dressed up in their jingle elf collars!

What had you all smiles today?

Check back this weekend as I decorate a winter cake, shop for party supplies, start planning for NYC, and hit the pavement for a winter run! Have a great weekend!!

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Sometimes You Have to Get Away

Fact-The last few weeks have been crazy busy. Fact-The holiday season will be even busier. Fact– It is important to get away with your significant other and leave the madness behind for a bit. That is exactly what the hubs and I did this weekend. We got up super early Saturday morning to make the three hour drive to Williamsburg, VA also known as Colonial Williamsburg. The weather was snowy cold but the clear brisk day set the tone for our fun little adventure.

The hubs and I bundled up in our warmed gear to visit “Christmas Town” in Busch Gardens. This is the second year for Christmas Town but essentially it is tons of lights, warm drinks, good food, and fun times. Each “country” has it’s own theme and they even set up special holiday themed attractions like a polar “penguin experience” and Santa’s workshop.

We spent a lovely afternoon/evening wandering around the park admiring the animals….

Listening to carolers….

Scoping out the lights…

Visiting Santa’s Workshop…

And even sneaking in some snuggles!

The next morning the hubs and I woke up to snow on the ground. After a warm country breakfast we headed out for a super faun day of shopping. (Read all about it in my Sara Shops segment tomorrow). One of my fave finds was this super cute “tree hat” topper for our Christmas tree!

Spending some time away with the hubs was the perfect way to get rested and energized for the upcoming holiday season.  How was your weekend?

 

 

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