First day back to the gym.....and back to running again!

Another picture of our Washington DC trip. That is me and the hubby. Our hotel package came with a fabulous picnic lunch. Arugula salad with walnuts and goat cheese, gourmet black olive pesto sandwich with roasted tomatoes and cheese, oatmeal cookie and of course Cabernet. We ate our lunch at Lafayette Park across from the White House. What a wonderful trip we had. Now, onto today's blog posting....

Today I was very excited. It was the first day I figured I would test out my knees and hamstring from their week off of exercise. Well, almost a week. So, I started with a shorter run, just 3 miles. Ran half way, stretched the ever tightening hamstring, and off I went to complete my run. And boy, did it feel good to be out there. I missed my running. It is like my therapy. And I missed the gym and lifting weights.

So, before I left to exercised, I jumped on the scale. Looked down and saw 129 lbs. even. Wow! For the past month, I have been up and down between 130 - 134. To see 129 even was surprising given my lack of exercise and recent return from vacation. And there is something psychological about 129 being in the 120's for me. I do like breaking the 130 barrier. But for the life of me, I don't understand the weight loss this week. I know I have watched my calories and food intake very carefully. I have not felt as hungry as normal which I attribute to my lack of exercise.

So, I am trying to figure this all out. Do I decrease my normal exercise routine? I kind of have to right now due to the injuries. Maybe the key for me is less is best. Less exercise, less food intake. Who knows? I guess only time will tell. I do know one thing, I need more sleep!

Lynda

Back from DC and resting the knees

Thursday, August 27, 2009

Since my return from vacation, I was pleasantly surprised to find that I did not gain any weight from my eating out every meal last week. I tried to make good choices and it is definitely challenging when you are a vegetarian.

We slept in every day. What a treat that was. We would go to bed by 8PM (wild party animals, aren't we?) and would wake up at 7AM. We would be on the road for breakfast by 8-9 AM. We had eggs on a bagel with cheese and a fruit cup most mornings. We did have pancakes and fried eggs one day. But they did not taste too good to me. I haven't had a fried egg in 20 years. One day, I had a yogurt cup mid-day to keep me going. I usually had salmon for dinner. One night I had a big salad and a flat bread cheese pizza. We had too many glasses of wine most nights (that is more than one for me). We never had lunch, since we ate breakfast late and dinner early.

My knees were sore when I left to go on vacation, so I figured it would be a good rest for them with no running scheduled. What a mistake that was! We walked 10 miles minimum each day while in DC. By the last day of our trip, there were no more walking left in them.

So this week, I have done NO EXERCISE. You have no clue how scary this has been for me. I need to rest my knees or knee surgery will be in my future. And a funny thing has happened to me. I am not as hungry and not as carb-crazed as I usually am. I have been diligently planning and counting calories each day and not feeling hungry at all. I am keeping that protein count up, eating bean dishes and lots of veggies. My lunches have been egg sandwiches (see prior posting) or peanut butter and sugar free jelly on fiber one english muffin. I do feel flabby, but my weight has stayed exactly the same at 130. It is nice to have more time in my life as well. I usually work out a minimum of 1 hour each day and some days I workout 75-90 minutes. Sometimes 120. I have tracked a ton of fitness minutes in since I started counting. Now, I sit back and think that maybe I should not do so much running. My plan is to try and run 3 miles tomorrow and see how the knees feel. I also plan on going to the gym and do a kickboxing class with weights. I do miss my running (I love it!) and I do miss the weight lifting, but sometimes it is good to take a step back and relax and heal. It is good for the soul!

Blueberry-Hemp nut smoothie

This is how my body feels this morning (See pic of my fat cat). I had fish and chips for dinner last night. It was a craving. BIG MISTAKE. It is good to do this to remind yourself why you eat healthy. I bravely stepped on the scale this morning and the fish and chips did not disappoint. Up 4.4 lbs. I didn't even finish my dinner last night. I also did not run yesterday. My leg has quite a bruise on it from my fall this week and the skin is tight from the abrasion. I have the 5 miler on rolling hills (this part scares me) tomorrow, so I am resting up. Did go to Powerflex class and upped my weights a little (punishment for the bad dinner?).

So, after class, I decided to mix it up with a smoothie. I had a ton of blueberries hanging around, so I added 2 cups to the blender, 1 c. TJ soy milk, 1/2 banana, 1/2 container 0% fage, 2 scoops Lean 1 protein powder, 1.4 c. black raspberries and the newest ingredient: Nutiva Shelled Hempseed. I have to say the hempseed smells so good, really nutty. I was hoping I would taste it in the smoothie, but I did not. Hempseed has a ton of protein (33%) AND 9% Omega-3. This recipe made 4 cups. I ended up having two cups. Calories: 413, carbs: 49, fat: 12 and protein: 29

I am eating out for dinner this evening and I plan on having some edamame, avocado and tomato salad for lunch. Dinner is Pasta night. I better load up on the veggies!

Lynda

Waffles with fresh blueberries and a digger!

Doesn't this look yummy? It was so good.

I decided I was all smoothie'd out. I wanted to chew real food for breakfast. I went out and ran 5 miles and came back hungry. You know it is bad when you are day-dreaming about breakfast while running! So, I popped a couple of Trader Joe's multigrain waffles into the toaster. These are really good and much better than the Kashi brand. I added some fresh blueberries, some cool whip lite, real maple sryup (see my post from July from Vermont on that--I have syrup for life). I also added some Salba for extra protein. Well it as a good thing I ran this morning because the calorie count on this meal is as follows:

Calories: 521 (Well, that canceled out my run!) Carbs: 95 (ouch)Fat: 8 Protein: 7

See, that is the problem with not having the smoothie. I get so much of my daily protein from my morning smoothie. I have a hard time making it to my protein level for the day, when I start out with a 7 for breakfast.

Now to my digger story:

I had my 5k trail run last night in Bristol. The nicest group of people run this race. I was excited because it was cool and the humidity was low. It was much improved from last week's run, where it was so hot in the woods, it made me sick.

Anyway, the hubby has now taken to coming with me and bringing our dogs. This is a special treat for them. They get to ride in the car and go for a dog walk! You cannot get better than that in the dog's world.

So, it was dark last night with a threat of rain (typical Rhode Island). It was even darker in the woods. I was flying through -- trying so hard to get a good time for my run. There are TONS of roots exposed on this path. I was running up a hill, using the roots to propel me and increase my speed. When suddenly my right foot got caught in one and down I went. How embarrassing! The girl in front of me heard my fall and turned around to check on me. The girl behind me stopped too. What nice people. I see them every week, since we run around the same pace. I made them both promise to tell everyone that I fell gracefully, like a ballerina! They both laughed and promised to lie for me and we finished our race. I fell quite a bit behind them, but still finished in 30 - something for my time, which isn't too bad considering my fall. I was filthy. Covered in dirt on my left shoulder and my knee (the left, bad one) is scraped up a bit. Oh well.

Now, I am scheduled to run in North Attleboro this weekend in the 5 miler. I am taking a day of rest today since my left leg feels tight, probably from the bruise. I think my pride is hurt more than my body.

The good news is that my hubby met with the guys who run the race. He chatted with them both and they offered to lend me some timing devices for my 5k run that I am organizing in memory of my son in Bristol RI at Colt State Park on October 11th. I was having trouble getting any responses from the timing companies. I guess because this is my inaugural race, they figure I won't get many entrants and they cannot be bothered to even return my calls or my emails. I have had so many people offer their help with me arranging the race. I have a friend of my daughter's offer to disc jockey the race with some good music, one friend is donating the water, many have offered to help. I'll need it. I have one friend who has designed the t-shirt and promised it will be "cool". Since the charity is the RISPCA, I am sure some animal theme is in the works.

So, that is the story of my digger. I am sure that my race on Sunday will be very interesting.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

I had my 5k trail run last night in Bristol. The nicest group of people run this race. I was excited because it was cool and the humidity was low. It was much improved from last week's run, where it was so hot in the woods, it made me sick.

Anyway, the hubby has now taken to coming with me and bringing our dogs. This is a special treat for them. They get to ride in the car and go for a dog walk! You cannot get better than that in the dog's world.

So, it was dark last night with a threat of rain (typical Rhode Island). It was even darker in the woods. I was flying through -- trying so hard to get a good time for my run. There are TONS of roots exposed on this path. I was running up a hill, using the roots to propel me and increase my speed. When suddenly my right foot got caught in one and down I went. How embarrassing! The girl in front of me heard my fall and turned around to check on me. The girl behind me stopped too. What nice people. I see them every week, since we run around the same pace. I made them both promise to tell everyone that I fell gracefully, like a ballerina! They both laughed and promised to lie for me and we finished our race. I fell quite a bit behind them, but still finished in 30 - something for my time, which isn't too bad considering my fall. I was filthy. Covered in dirt on my left shoulder and my knee (the left, bad one) is scraped up a bit. Oh well.

Now, I am scheduled to run in North Attleboro this weekend in the 5 miler. I am taking a day of rest today since my left leg feels tight, probably from the bruise. I think my pride is hurt more than my body.

The good news is that my hubby met with the guys who run the race. He chatted with them both and they offered to lend me some timing devices for my 5k run that I am organizing in memory of my son in Bristol RI at Colt State Park on October 11th. I was having trouble getting any responses from the timing companies. I guess because this is my inaugural race, they figure I won't get many entrants and they cannot be bothered to even return my calls or my emails. I have had so many people offer their help with me arranging the race. I have a friend of my daughter's offer to disc jockey the race with some good music, one friend is donating the water, many have offered to help. I'll need it. I have one friend who has designed the t-shirt and promised it will be "cool". Since the charity is the RISPCA, I am sure some animal theme is in the works.

So, that is the story of my digger. I am sure that my race on Sunday will be very interesting.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

I had my 5k trail run last night in Bristol. The nicest group of people run this race. I was excited because it was cool and the humidity was low. It was much improved from last week's run, where it was so hot in the woods, it made me sick.

Anyway, the hubby has now taken to coming with me and bringing our dogs. This is a special treat for them. They get to ride in the car and go for a dog walk! You cannot get better than that in the dog's world.

So, it was dark last night with a threat of rain (typical Rhode Island). It was even darker in the woods. I was flying through -- trying so hard to get a good time for my run. There are TONS of roots exposed on this path. I was running up a hill, using the roots to propel me and increase my speed. When suddenly my right foot got caught in one and down I went. How embarrassing! The girl in front of me heard my fall and turned around to check on me. The girl behind me stopped too. What nice people. I see them every week, since we run around the same pace. I made them both promise to tell everyone that I fell gracefully, like a ballerina! They both laughed and promised to lie for me and we finished our race. I fell quite a bit behind them, but still finished in 30 - something for my time, which isn't too bad considering my fall. I was filthy. Covered in dirt on my left shoulder and my knee (the left, bad one) is scraped up a bit. Oh well.

Now, I am scheduled to run in North Attleboro this weekend in the 5 miler. I am taking a day of rest today since my left leg feels tight, probably from the bruise. I think my pride is hurt more than my body.

The good news is that my hubby met with the guys who run the race. He chatted with them both and they offered to lend me some timing devices for my 5k run that I am organizing in memory of my son in Bristol RI at Colt State Park on October 11th. I was having trouble getting any responses from the timing companies. I guess because this is my inaugural race, they figure I won't get many entrants and they cannot be bothered to even return my calls or my emails. I have had so many people offer their help with me arranging the race. I have a friend of my daughter's offer to disc jockey the race with some good music, one friend is donating the water, many have offered to help. I'll need it. I have one friend who has designed the t-shirt and promised it will be "cool". Since the charity is the RISPCA, I am sure some animal theme is in the works.

So, that is the story of my digger. I am sure that my race on Sunday will be very interesting.

Great run, great running friend!

So my friend and I planned on running 7 miles today so we can prepare for our 5 miler next weekend. She had the route all mapped out and I put on my gps (run keeper) app and off we went. It was a really nice route she mapped out. It ended up being 7.26 miles in total for the run part. We walked home another mile.

Our run was all through Rumford and actually almost went by my house. We ran by the back of Wannamoisett CC, down Roger Williams Avenue by the water where the breeze picked up. It is starting to get humid here, but is still very cool and quite enjoyable for running. No sunshine now, but there was some on our run.

On the way back, our ending point was the Seven Stars bakery in the Rumford Center. If you have not been by here, you need to check it out. The food inside the bakery is amazing. There coffee is fabulous. I had a ginger scone, with large pieces of ginger in it. I am assuming there was approximately 410 calories in that scone, so it probably canceled out much of my running, but it was so good. I had an iced coffee and they do what I do and put coffee ice cubes in hot coffee to make the iced coffee. So good and your coffee doesn't get watered down. The bakery is truly a treasure for Rumford.

I know the hubby wants to eat healthy the next few days because of the bad eating he did during his golf tournament, so I have to start planning!

Lynda

Two very good eating days in a row

So, the hubby was in a golf tournament this week. I was free to eat and plan my food around my own choices. So, I was good. (Now, I am not trying to imply the hubby makes me make bad choices, but.....). I had grilled tuna, grilled sweet potatoes and grilled asparagus. So good and so low in calories. And high in protein.

Today, I went out to lunch with the girls. I could have chosen the "Annie's special" grilled cheese on multigrain bread. Till one of my girlfriend's told me "there is a lot of bread in that sandwich, but it is so good." Well, my weight climbed 4 lbs this week. As much as I wanted that sandwich, I chose spinach salad. It was good. And the dressing came automatically on the side. We ate at the Rue on Hope Street in Providence. Great service and they come by with fresh baked (just out of the oven) Italian bread that was to die for! So, I still got my bread, but in a much more manageable portion. I also ran 5 miles today and went to an hour long powerflex class.

Weighed myself this morning and I am only up one pound now. So, all of my good efforts (and increased cardio) paid off.

Lynda

Too Many Calories, but good food

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Well, I need to start with last night's run. It was so humid in the woods. I actually had to walk part of the run. I just could not do it. I was mad at myself for taking my vitamins at 4PM and eating those Triscuits so late. Ugh! Half the race, I felt like vomiting. Burped all the way. Just awful. I guess I need to learn from my mistakes and this was a big one.

This morning, I woke up bloated and sore. My upper back hurts. I am not sure why, but I blame the class I took in the morning with Beth. I must have done something to hurt this much.

Now, onto today's meals:

Breakfast: I had a pure protein drink. It was good. I poured it over crushed ice. Then I had a bowl of Kashi Autumn Harvest Wheats and blueberries. Very Good, Very filling.

Lunch was a hollowed out french bread stick with homemade egg salad. This is basically hardboiled eggs, chopped scallions, and light mayo. Add a couple of plums.

Dinner was so good. I chopped up 1/2 an avocado, 1/4 c. black beans, 2 Joseph's oat-flax tortillas (small size), 1 piece of light swiss cheese, 1 chopped tomato. I just put all the ingredients in the tortilla, rolled it up and put it in my frying pan, sprayed with Pam. Additionally, the tomatoes I have are from a friend's garden and they are just starting to turn. So, I put some on the side for a side-dish. Added a little motzarella. Yummy!

Calorie count: 1795 (over my total req'd. by 35), carbs: 235, fat: 55, protein: 97

Lynda

Eating Junk

Sometimes I cannot for the life of me understand what makes me crave things. Especially after the kick a.... class I took this morning. She turns me into a carb-o-holic! It is so hot at Bally's, it is unhealthy. If you are in the east bay area of Rhode Island, I highly recommend joining another club. If it wasn't so close to my house, I would not be there. First of all, the club is filthy. The equipment is old and now they have instituted a new policy that the gym be kept at 75 degrees. In this humidity, it is down right disgusting in there. Not a great gym at all. Too bad because they have great instructors that work there. They are the ONLY reason to belong to the E. Providence Ballys.

Okay, enough griping! So this morning I finished my green drink from yesterday. Then I went to that hard class and came home and devoured the box of Triscuits (lowfat kind) and Fiber one cottage cheese. I also made two wraps for lunch with Black beans, lite swiss cheese, a tomato from my friend's garden-yummy, and 1/2 an avocado. Then more triscuits. I am going on my run this evening, so that is it for me for food. Oh yeah, and they had goldfish on sale at the supermarket and I ate 1/2 a bag of them too!

Lynda

Popcorn for dinner????

Yes, I did have popcorn for dinner. I was doing so well for the day, too. I started the day with an amazing grass smoothie that had arugula, chocolate amazing grass, blueberries, chia seeds, salba, hemp protein, soy milk and strawberries.

Good start to the day with 398 calories and lots of protein. Then I had some leftovers (again) for lunch. The eggplant - quinoa dish from last week. I have to admit, I am not liking quinoa. I won't give up on it, but also will not be making that recipe again. Well, maybe I will try it with the smoked motzarella cheese. It could be better, but that recipe was time consuming. The quinoa never held together very well in the pattie form either.

Now, today I worked really hard on getting another certification in QuickBooks. I passed!!!!! Now I am certified in Enterprise Solutions! The more certifications, the better. So, passing the test and watching all of the tutorials took most of my day. So, when hubby wanted dinner, I made him grilled cheese. Since we purchased the new refrigerator, I tossed out all of my old wheat bread. I tried Ezakiel, but just don't like it. Tried a couple whole wheat ones from Stop and Shop, again .... yuk. Slices too large and they just don't seem to be real type of bread. No flavor. So, since there was no bread and no cheese left for me, I decided to pop up some Act butter-lovers popcorn. Of course, I ate the whole bag (with the help of my dog, Sasha). Added a little parmesan cheese and voila....dinner. Not the best, but when I entered all of the food I ate today in Sparkpeople.com, I was okay. How did that happen with the dinner I had????

Which is a good thing. My usual 75 minutes of crazy Linda's HiLo weight class was missed by me due to the work I did today. I only worked out for 19 minutes doing Jillian Michael's 30 day shred level 3, parts 2 and 3 on www.youtube.com. Walking pushups, etc. got me sweating but by no means equals my usual workout. But, I passed my test and I am so happy! Now tomorrow, I will make up for the missed class. Which means Beth's killer HiLo with weights class. This class is way worse than Linda's. I will also try to get a little yoga in as well. Good for runners.

Then I also have my running group tomorrow evening. I cannot wait. It is so much fun. So, tomorrow's calorie burn will be high. I need to get on track with planning my eating better. I have fallen off the track. Sometimes, I feel like cooking, sometimes, not. But the hubby will be at a golf tournament at the end of the week. That means no cooking dinners for him for Thursday - Saturday. That makes life so much easier. He also informed me (from looking in our cupboards and our recent refrigerator move) that we need to concentrate on eating the food we have and not adding to the stored food. Our cabinets are full! So, I will work on emptying them out. Plan Plan Plan.

Lynda

I hate Mondays!

So, Mondays are always hectic and I am always tired. I don't know why.

This morning I went for my normal 5 mile run down by the reservoir. So beautiful and peaceful there. Except for when this crazy old lady on roller blades comes by me. She wears a helmet and she doesn't always look like she has control of her body (especially when she is coming down hill straight at you). Now, I am generally a kind person, but I have just had it with her! She comes right at you and at the last minute, cuts to my right and just squeaks past me. I swear sometimes I think she is going to knock me over. So today my evil Lynda came out and I yelled "you are supposed to pass on the right!" Which was probably not the best choice of words because she was on the right as she came straight for me. She yelled back that she is on the right and I just grumbled on my way.

So that was the start of my day. I ended up making a mango-banana smoothie with added Salba and Chia seeds for protein.

For lunch, I reheated my eggplant and quinoa from last week. I have also discovered Kind bars. So good. Today's was Macadamia nuts with cranberries. Yummy! I also had some protein water (Special K).

For dinner, I had a spinach pie from Uncle Tony's restaurant that I had frozen in my refrigerator. We just purchased a new one that is beautiful and it looks so organized right now. That is where I found the spinach pie.

Calorie count for the day: 1665, carbs: 199, fat: 65, protein: 105

Did I mention the one glass of wine or the tomatoes on the vine I had at lunch? All are added in the above totals.

Lynda

Great bread, Fat cat

Sorry I have been MIA for the past few days. I can honestly tell you that I have not been planning or eating the best of foods the past few days. We had dinner out yesterday. We ate at Squantum Dinner Club in Riverside, RI. This is a private club we belong to and the food is the best food of any restaurant ever. I had grilled swordfish with a double order of grilled asparagus. It was so good. How Chef Scott makes this asparagus is beyond me. It is so tasty! And the swordfish was out of this world. They do have a wood grill so maybe that is the secret. I did have two wines. Boo hoo! They also had ahi tuna appetizer with wasabi seaweed topping. So delicious. I could have eaten just that.

So, for breakfast, I had frosted shredded wheat cereal with blueberries. For lunch I had this fabulous bread from Trader Joes (Multigrain). I had a piece with peanut butter and one with butter.

Also pictured below is my cat, Jeter, who I should probably put on a major diet. He is the laziest animal I have ever had. He is fat for a reason. I named him Jeter so I could convince the hubby to keep him. He is a major Yankee fan and I am a die-hard Red Sox fan. It makes for interesting summers!

Lynda