Back to Running

Happy Friday- so glad it's finally the weekend!

I've been thinking about registering for a spring half marathon for the past month or so. Today I went ahead and signed up for the Country Music Half Marathon! I ran it last year and had a great time. I've been slowly getting back into running after taking a little hiatus and have been dying to get back to Nashville, so I figured this was the perfect opportunity. I'm still looking for a training partner though. Any takers?

Food:

Dinner packed for class-half of a Kashi Margherita pizza with broccoli slaw. Class doesn't get over until 9, so packing a dinner is a must!

Lunch the next day- the other half with spinach salad, tomatoes, and Whole Foods No Oil Balsamic.

Scrambled eggs with spinach + goat cheese and roasted sweet potatoes + butternut squash on the side (my healthy version of hash browns). Amazing. So much good stuff in this meal!

Overnight Oats- always a delicious breakfast choice.

This was on sale at Target this week, so I decided to give it a try. With 10 g protein and 9 g fiber, it's definitely a winner!

I used it to make trail mix along with some almonds and raisins.

Going to dinner at Rojo later tonight. Hope you have a great weekend!

Nabeel's

Good Weekend Eats:

On Friday night, Will and I went to a new Mexican restaurant called Frio En La Paz for dinner.

Texas-Style Margarita. I'm usually not a big fan of the margs, but this was really good and not too strong.

Baja Fish Tacos (grilled whitefish, honey cilantro lime slaw, chipotle tartar, avocado, and mango pico) with Roasted Street Corn on the Cob. I was very impressed with how fresh the ingredients were and loved how colorful my plate was! This is the kind of Mexican food I love- not the greasy, fried stuff.

 Greek Chicken Pita with fruit. I could eat at Zoe's every day.

On Monday, I had the day off, so I went to lunch with my parents at Nabeel's- a super authentic Greek restaurant.

Don't you feel like you're in Greece?

We started out with some pita bread and hummus.

I went with the Sautéed Shrimp Special.

Greek Peasant Salad- cucumbers, tomatoes, feta, and olives.

Seafood is just so good.

Some other food:

Spinach salad with tomatoes, avocado, butternut squash, hardboiled eggs, raisins, and walnuts. It doesn't look pretty but it was good!

Wild Alaskan Salmon Burger with whole wheat pasta and broccoli slaw. Bought these salmon burgers at Sam's this weekend and really like them a lot!

Scrambled eggs, spinach, tomatoes, pesto, and goat cheese on a Multigrain flatout wrap.

Since December, I've been scheduling my weekly workouts in advance and writing them in my planner. I've found this is the most effective way for me to get my workouts done. It's a good habit that's carried over into the new year!

Here's the projected schedule for this week....

Workout Schedule:

Monday: Grand Jeté barre class (got a Groupon for 5 of these classes!) + 4 mile run with Laura (complete)

Tuesday: spin class + weights (complete)

Wednesday: off

Thursday: spin class + weights

Friday: yoga + 30 mins arc trainer

Saturday: 3 mile run + weights? This one is still up in the air.

Sunday: yoga

Just turned in my first paper for grad school and am off to do some reading before my next class!

It's Been Awhile

So, it's been awhile.

Being busy means there's not a whole lot of time for blogging. Since I posted last, I started graduate school and have been getting into the swing of a new job.  I've felt a little out of touch with the blog world and I miss it, but at the same time, it's been nice to not have to worry about taking pictures of everything I eat or varying up my meals as much. Sometimes I eat the same thing for lunch every day for a week and sometimes I eat dinner in my car at 9 pm when I get off work. Whatever, I'm learning to make it work.

Being busy is not an excuse to compromise your health! Here are some quick and easy meals that never let me down:

1. Whole wheat sandwich thin with peanut butter, pumpkin butter, sliced banana, and cinnamon.

Best pre-spin class breakfast ever. (if you're going to the 8:30 class)

2. Overnight Oats.

Best post-spin class breakfast ever. (if you're going to the 5:30 class)

3. Baked tilapia with roasted sweet potato rounds and Brussels sprouts.

Look how pretty my new dishes are!

4. Whole wheat veggie pasta.

Veggies=sautéed spinach, eggplant, and mushrooms.

5. Turkey Burger with provolone and sautéed mushrooms and a side of steamed broccoli and cauliflower.

Everything tastes better with ketchup, obviously.

6. Scrambled eggs with cheese, avocado, and salsa.

I've said it many times before, eggs + avocado= amazing.

7. Chicken Salad Salad.

Other salad additions: carrots, tomatoes, pumpkin seeds, raisins.

Of course I've been eating out some too....

Turkey Crunch with roasted veggies from Urban Cookhouse.

Moroccan Chicken Salad from CPK. This is my favorite salad of all time. It's so so so good!

Whole Foods Hot Bar.

Other Things Worth Mentioning:

• I celebrated NYE with these two:

Laura and I at dinner.

We were festive :)

Why do I look so awkward?

• Will and I like to eat cookies from Whole Foods sometimes.

Sometimes we split them....

Half Ginger, half Pecan Pie.

Other times, we take them home, drink hot tea, and watch movies...

This is my ideal night.

• Muffins are one of my favorite foods. Fun fact: I asked for muffins one year for Christmas (I was two), and I even named my grandparents' dog Muffin. 

Let me introduce you to the "Health Nut" muffin from Magic Muffins. It is one of the best things I've ever eaten in my life, and the best part is that it contains no butter, sugar, or white flour!

• Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is a really good movie.

Suspenseful.

• NEEDTOBREATHE is my current musical obsession.

Love love this song!

• I registered for Food Blog South with Brittany. It's a food blogger conference at the end of this month! The great part is that it's located in Birmingham! What, there are actually other people who take pictures of their food in this city?! It's kind of ironic due to the fact that I've been doing such a poor job keeping up with my blog lately, but perhaps the conference will provide me with some inspiration. I'm really looking forward to it!

I guess that's enough rambling for now. I'll try to update as often as I can!

Hope you have a great rest of the week!

Merry Christmas

Hope everyone is having a Merry Merry Christmas!

How I spent my Christmas:

• Going to the candlelight Christmas Eve service at church.

The whole church lit up! Not my best photography skills...

• Curling up by the fire and staying in my pj's all morning, while watching Home Alone on repeat. It never gets old.

Macaulay Culkin was one of my many childhood crushes.

• Eating delicious brunch food, while listening to the new Michael Bublé Christmas CD. Love his White Christmas duet with Shania Twain!

Breakfast casserole, cheese grits, broccoli salad, ambrosia, deviled eggs. And obviously lots of coffee from my dad's new Keurig!

Icing that tastes like fudge=best chocolate cake ever.

• Keeping our Christmas tradition of seeing an afternoon movie. This year's choice was War Horse.

It was a good one! I can't recommend it enough.

• Balancing out my sugar consumption with nice healthy salads. We ordered food from Taziki's, and I made a yummy Greek salad with lemon chicken, basmati rice, and pita bread + hummus.

Winner winner chicken dinner.

"The best of all gifts around any Christmas tree: the presence of a family all wrapped up in each other."

Where Has December Gone?

Good Morning!

I can't believe December is already halfway over- where has this month gone? Things have been really crazy, so I'm sorry for the inconsistency in posts lately.

Things I'm loving lately: World Market Pecan Pie Coffee, group exercise classes (yoga, pilates, spin), Glee radio station on Pandora, Christmas movies on ABC family, and cookies.

 I received two more packages from the cookie swap yesterday!

Sugar Cookies from Erin. Loved these!!

And Nut Horn Cookies from Britne. There were more, but ummm- they're already gone!

For the most part I've been having really healthy meals...

Creamy Oatmeal. Keeps me full for hours!

1/2 C oats prepped with water and 2 spoonfuls of Greek yogurt stirred in. Toppings- 1 T ground flax, cinnamon, sliced banana, blueberries, and 1 T Jif Natural PB.

Overnight oats=lifesaver. Makes my mornings so much easier!

1/3 C oats, 1/3 C skim milk, 1/3 C Greek yogurt, 1 T ground flax, 1 T almond butter, sliced banana, blueberries, cinnamon.

Kombucha, you are worth every penny.

So are you, Whole Foods Salad Bar with all kinds of deliciousness.

Multigrain FlatOut Wrap with scrambled eggs, avocado, goat cheese, cherry tomatoes, and pesto.

Kale salad with roasted sweet potatoes and Brussels sprouts, pumpkin seeds, dried cranberries, and WF No Oil Balsamic.

Turkey Burger with BBQ sauce and roasted sweet potatoes and Brussels.

Sunshine Burger with ketchup, kale chips, and half a baked sweet potato with cinnamon and vanilla Greek yogurt. 

Whole wheat gnocchi with sautéed squash, zucchini, mushrooms, spinach, tomato sauce, and parmesan on top.

But then sometimes....

I eat fast food in my car.

And stuff myself with Chinese takeout.

Let's be real, sometimes life happens.

Hope you all have a great day!