Miranda Jayne: Avocado

Showing posts with label Avocado. Show all posts

Monday, May 10, 2010

Looking for a Garmin

I have recently in the last year started to run. I started early last summer, however once the heat got cranked up, unless it was raining, running pretty much came to a halt, hmmmm maybe this is where my love of running in the rain comes from!

This past spring, I have reconnected with my love affair with running. I have been doing the same route and minor variations of this route since last year. Originally I ran to my parents and circled back to my place for a 4.3K run. Then I added an extra 1K to the run by taking an alternate route home. How do I know the distance? I reset the trip meter in my car.

I do not like this. 1. it is not environmentally friendly to go and drive your running route just to get an accurate distance read. 2. it really kills any spontaneity that I could be incorporating into my running.

So I have been drooling over Garmin GPS watches, via blogs, The Running Room, and Amazon. However the prices are all too rich for my blood. Plus Kevin would kill me for getting one priced at over 300$ after getting a Polar HRM several months back.

So this morning I had an idea. Kijiji! Well I was lucky this morning and found a posting for a 2 year old Garmin Forerunning 305 with a HRM. So I've emailed, and they have responded that they still have the item, and now we are just trying to arrange a time and place to meet. I am super excited!

So today it is ab-so-lute-ly frigid in my office. Everyone has their coats and and are keeping their arms crossed across their bodies to keep the heat in. I am lucky that Kevin bought me a 20$ space heater from WalMart before the cold set in over the winter. So my heater is cranked and like everyone else, my office door is closed today.

I went to the water cooler and got a plastic cup of hot water (I wasn't feeling coffee or tea today), to drink to help warm me up.

See the little steam condensation. This was the best I could manage.

My morning snack was some Nordica Non Fat Cottage Cheese. I really love cottage cheese, however two things. I like cottage cheese when it is dryer, I do not like the wet cottage cheese (pictured blow). Also, man cottage cheese does not picture well.

Life in the office is pretty boning today. Not much to report with every ones doors closed. Lunch came fairly quickly, which was good because I was pretty excited. This is my last installment of this lunch for a little while as my supplies have dwindled.

Miranda's Capreses Salad

Ingredients

10-20 cherry or grape tomatoes
10-15 Tre Stelle - Mini Mini Bocconcini
5-10 Fresh basil leaves
1/2 TBSP balsamic Vinegar
1/2TBSP EVOO
1 pinch of sea salt (however I do not add the salt)

Directions

If you are making this to serve right away, combine the tomatoes, cheese and basil together and mix in a bowl.
Mix together your balsamic and EVOO
Pour your EVOO&Balsamic dressing over the salad.
If you are putting this together to serve later, do not pour your dressing other wise you will have a soggy salad.
Also as I am usually out of fresh basil, I do not add it until I am about to eat it, keeping it as crisp as possible (you can find packaged fresh basil at in your produce section).

I also had some veggies to take with me for lunch. I however opted to not transfer them from their fridge storage container to another glad lunch container. I seriously freaking love these things. They are genius. I have 3 pepper shaped ones, 1 tomato, and one onion. I store my avocados in the green pepper one I have after using a section of avocado. It really works to keep your produce fresher longer. Some red pepper, some orange pepper, and some baby carrots. I just got an email back, I am meeting the seller, Erika this evening between 6-6:30pm to scoped out the Garmin. So EXCITED plus we are meeting at Startbucks!

Question: What toys do you have that help you workout? Is there something out there you have been dreaming and saving for?

Monday, May 3, 2010

Who's got a case of the Mundays?

I have a bad case of the Mundays (Office Space). I will fill you in on why later, when I have more information to share.

This morning I did day 2 of my 30 Day Shred with Jilliam Michaels. It's the same workout routine for 10 days at level 1 then move on to level 2. So I knew what I was getting into at 6:15am.

I grabbed my 3lbs weights and headed to the basement to workout with Jillian (we are going to be best buds I might as well just refer to her no as Jillian).

After yesterday the shoulder presses with 5lb weights is just too much for me right now. I will have to build up to it.

Over all it was a great workout. Nothing like burning 310 calories in 27 minutes before starting your day.

After the work out I decided rather than shower right away, I wanted to eat my breakfast. Kind of gross I know.

Oatmeal

1/3 cup quick oats
1/2 mashed banana
1.5 tbsp dried blueberries
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1tbsp chia seeds

Check out another one of my new bowls I got Friday. Too cute.

So let's rewind to yesterday, because I wasn't able to blog at my work because of my leaving my usb cord at my full time job.

So Friday morning after breakfast, Kevin and I went and did a run and then I did my Day 1 with Jillian. This is what I looked like after all that working out. I don't know that I've ever felt or been this sweaty before.

After taking a nice long shower and getting cleaned up for the day, it as 1pm, definitely time for some lunch. I made myself a wrap with, hummus, tomato, asparagus, avocado, and some smoked tofu.With a some sides. Baby carrots and some orange pepper. Instead of jamming it into my wrap this time I just ate them on the side. I also had a grapefruit.

Come 2:20, it was time for me to leave the house and head into work for my last marathon work shift (on the weekends that is).

Working 3-11.

For my mid afternoon snack I had some yogurt and granola.

I quite enjoyed this one better than the chocolate. It fits more with what I would throw together for a homemade yogurt and granola combination.

Wow, and I knew this when I packed my dinner, but Sunday is exactly almost the same as what I had Saturday just switched lunch and dinner between themselves. lol I guess I don't have room to be creative when I work 22 of 48 hours.

Strawberry, raspberry nut salad, topped with homemade raspberry red wine vinaigrette.

It was a pretty quiet shift at the group home Sunday. There was only 1 kid in the house and she for whatever reason wasn't in the mood to talk with me, and just talked with the other staff.

She didn't however mind watching any of the movies I brought in to watch. We watched Monster In-Law.

While watching the movie I grabbed the apple I had packed with me and a banana from the group home kitchen. Proud of myself for turning down blueberry muffins and frozen yogurt.
I hope everyone else is having a decent start to the day. Though it is raining here today, the air is warm and the sky is supposed to clear for a bit in the afternoon before it starts to rain again.

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Veggie head

Wow! I took this picture around 7:30 this morning. Look at what a beautiful day it is turning out to be at such an early hour. Spring has sprung!

Today is another day of rest of me. I woke up at 5am, not to my alarm going off, rather Kevin's alarm going off, as he had to be at work for 7am. It felt nice to see that it was 5am and know that I could roll over and go back to sleep for almost another 2 hours. I woke up before my alarm by 10 minutes, but stayed in bed just looking out the window and being relaxed. Wow I can't believe how badly I need this break. The best part is, when I wake up I don't feel bad for missing (spin today) class. I have other forms of exercise planned for this week that don't involve my regular routine.

For breakfast I made a Berry Cherry Green Monster.

1 tbsp dried cherries 2 tsp dried blueberries, 1/8 cup fresh blueberries, 1/4 cup raspberries, 5 strawberries, 1 beet, 2 cups baby spinach and 1 cup almond milk.

*Note to self, dried blueberries are too little to get blended up, and then only cause an annoyance when drinking your GM through a straw blocking the flow*.

Off to work I went, with no am workout.

Overall the office is pretty quiet today. Boss is away at another branch, and the other caseworkers are in and out. Kind of makes me sleepy it being so quiet like this.

For snack I bypassed my fruit I packed for the yogurt.

Peach Mango

Surprise surprise! More cauliflower rice, just like I predicted. lol Sorry that it kind of looks kind of not so tasty, I promise you it is. Avocado & Cauliflower. Swirly whirly beet. Sliced carrot & zucchini. With Tofu fried in Peanut Satay sauce. All rolled together.

Now I made this wrap last night, and yes the veggies did turn the wrap slightly soggy, but nothing that having made it fresh and letting it sit fr 30 mins wouldn't have caused.

For lunch I was really missing some granola of some sort from my morning snack. I look at my morning snack as a second mini breakfast. And Kevin has said 'we are breakfast people'. So thankfully I work beside a grocery store. I went over knowing I wouldn't find real true granola, so I headed for the cereal aisle & the yogurt section. This is what I grabbed. I layered this in a cup with my fruit.

Mango & Strawberry.

Question: Do you feel guilty when you are missing your regular workouts. Do you regularly make time for yourself to rest and recover (i.e. work out free days) or do you keep going until you injur yourself.

~ M ~

Best dinner bagel evah!

So Monday was my first day of rest. It felt good to get to sleep in, take my time with my morning routine, and know that I wasn't going to be running around like a complete mad woman.

My work day was different than the usual Monday. Today I went into my full time job for 8:30, to leave at 10:45am. Where did I have to go? Downtown Toronto. I got to go and do some U.M.A.B training for the group home I work with.

This was quite possibly one of the dullest U.M.A.B. refreshers I've ever had. It was 2.5 hrs of power point discussion. Thankfully, I have Nicole B & Paul to thank for keeping me entertained. With Paul's hilarious doodles (including Humpty Dumpty falling off his wall) and Nicole's off the cuff remarks, the time went faster. Also knowing that it was going to be dull I snagged myself a Tall non-fat, sugar-free vanilla chi tea latte (only 2 flavour shots instead of 3). Yummo!

I was anxious to get out of the training. After our supervisor wanted to do an annual review of the policies and procedures. Bah! It was already 2:45! People, I had to get from downtown Toronto to Bowmanville in rush hour traffic (DVP and 401). And before we could start the 20 min annual review, people needed a smoke break. Gah! lol. No matter, I still made it out of the city and home in no more than 1hr15mins (pretty good seeing as I didn't take the DVP and didn't get on the 401 'till Pickering).

Anywho. Though I am resting this week, I felt that I should still be going to Yoga. It's all about relaxation, stretching and what more do I need right now than to relax and a good long stretch. My cousin Courtney came to Hot Yoga with me as her first ever Yoga experience. Though she did try to back out on me, I managed to convince her to come.

(source)

Courtney says that she did like it and would consider going back again for more. Yeah!

For lunch Monday, I needed to make something that was portable, that could be eaten in the car if needed. So I went with a wrap.

I have learned that you can use cauliflower as a rice substitute, and frankly I love doing it. I have a feeling you will be seeing a lot of cauliflower 'rice' this week.

I cut 1 Florette from the bunch and tossed it in my 1.5cup food processor that I picked up at Wally World, for get this, 7.77$ Can't beat that!

Pulse for 5-10 seconds. Voila!

Cauliflower 'rice'. I sprinkled the cauliflower over 1tbsp of hummus on a tortilla wrap.

Topped it with, sliced zucchini,

Avocado, tomato, artichoke heart and green onions.

I had also packed myself my afternoon snack, which had baby carrots celery and 1 more cauliflower Florette.

When I got home I was 'marven! I grabbed one of my new buys from when I went to Whole Foods Sunday. I know I didn't' mention it sooner, but today is the perfect day to talk about it. I was so excited to go to whole foods and see what all I could find that I don't have at my local grocery store or health food stores. Now this was a special trip. If I make it to whole foods twice a year that would be enough. According to mapquest, a drive from home to Whole Foods is 59 mins. And I can tell you that doesn't account for city traffic. So what did I get to snack on?

This is quite possibly the tastiest bar I've ever had! I defiantly recommend you going out and trying one for yourself.

So I munched on my Luna bar while I prepped dinner. Which also included a new item I picked up at Whole Foods.

Whole Foods fat organic asparagus, toasted bagel with cream cheese & la piece de resistance. . . . Smoked salmon (it wasn't frozen in the store, it was fresh!). I sprinkled some dried dill on the salmon. OMG I seriously can't wait to have this again for dinner. I think I might do some rearranging with what I have planned out for this week (remember I've been making a week long meal plan so I don't have to think throughout the week. I just look and see what I have to eat).

Because this week I am not looking to stay below my calories, rather I am looking to repair my body, after getting home from Yoga I thought I should eat something just to replenish what I had just worked off.

I mixed Kashi Go Lean - Honey Almond Flax cereal, some dried cherries and blueberries, 1/3 banana, astro plain yogurt and a drizzle of agave nectar. Also a to note I think this is my new favourite cereal!

I am not going to count my calories burned or taken in this week through my blog. For those of you on MFP you can check out my food diary. I just don't want the calorie counting to be the focus this week. This week is all about self-care. So I will note that I did drink 12, 8oz glasses of water.