SCBR Week 3/Day 2 Food/Exercise Journal

11:00 am – Late AB + Chocolate Oatmeal + Coffee – Awake and Satisfied

I stayed up way too late last night working on my posts and ended up sleeping in quite late today. I didn’t have breakfast until 11 am! These are the days that I wish I were on more of a regular schedule.

I got a new coffee at the Fresh Market yesterday – Almond Amaretto. This was my favorite for a long time awhile back, but I kinda got out of flavored coffees for breakfast. I seem to go through things in phases where I’ll do something or eat something all the time till the phase has run its course. Either way, I thoroughly enjoyed my new brew with sugar and 2% milk.

I was super excited about digging into my new Barney Butter so I made a batch of oatmeal for hubby and me. I even made the oats on the stovetop, which is a luxury I can’t usually afford most weekdays, but it was one I could do today since I had today off!

In the pot:

• Quaker Old-Fashioned Oats
• Water
• Flax seed
• unsweetened cocoa powder
• sugar
• 2% milk, which I stirred in at the very end after the oats were completely cooked.

On top:

• Walnuts
• Sliced almonds
• Semi-sweet mini chocolate chips
• Spoonful of Barney Butter

This deserves another look. Yum! I really liked the addition of the cocoa powder to this mix. It made it more chocolately.

12:30 pm – Figure Skating – Sore

Since I had today off and got so much accomplished yesterday, I was able to take some time today to do one of my favorite things in the world – ice skating. I spent the majority of my childhood practicing for hours and hours on this big piece of ice…well, not this exact piece, but you get the point. The ice (any skate-able piece of ice) can be a sort of home away from home for me.

Ice skating is also a workout that kicks my a$$ every time I do it…even more so now that I’m all “out-of-shape”. It’s been awhile since I’ve stepped foot on the ice, but I made sure to warm up beforehand. I used to spend almost 30 minutes warming up before a practice session and then another 30-60 on conditioning, off-ice-jumping, and stretching afterwards. I shortened things today since I had to get home for a 2 pm conference call. I ran in place to warm up my muscles, then jumped up and down a few times to get them more “springy”, then did a couple axels on the ground, and I was ready to go.

On the ice, I did some forward and backward crossovers to warm up. I wish I remembered some footwork, because that could surely use some more work and help me regain my balance. I did a on to a couple of each of the single jumps (except axel): waltz, salchow, toe loop, loop, and lutz.

I also did a lot of spins, which used to be my fave part: scratch, back scratch, camel, camel/sit/back-sit, camel/sit/hold skate in right hand and stand up/back-sit, and I managed to squeeze in one camel/back-camel/grab blade + half beilman.

I’ll have to put some videos up some time.

Anywho, after skating was over, I headed home whilst downing a mini bottle of water, dialed into the conference call a couple minutes late and stretched while listening to the meeting. I felt better after stretching, but something tells me I’m going to be super sore tomorrow!

2:45 pm – Salad, Mocktail, + Water – Satisfied

One thing I’d really like to start working on is making sure I’m meeting all of my portion recommendations (i.e. eat 4-5 servings of veggies a day, etc). I’m taking some advice from Kath and am focusing on veggies firstly, so I got a big carton of baby spinach from the store yesterday so I can try to eat more salads.

I used to hate salads as entrees (I’ve always liked them on the side). I always heard salads could be unhealthy if you put too much dressing, etc on top, and they never filled me up. I would just as soon have a sandwich. What I’m learning is that a salad can be filling if you put the right toppings on, and they can be better than sandwiches because they can offer more servings of vegetables. You could always put lots of veggies on top of a sandwich, but I think the key for me will be trying to balance eating the 2 of them (sandwiches + salads) equally, even if doing so only gives me variety in my meals.

The other reason I’m coming around on salads is because I think they can be great to help you use up leftovers and pantry items. What to do with the rest of the tomato leftover from last night’s dinner? Chop into chunks and toss them in a salad. More baby carrots than you know what to do with? Cut them up and toss those in, too.

In today’s salad:

• A ton of spinach – about 2 cups
• baby carrots
• tomato (leftover from last night’s dinner)
• red onion
• leftover sweet potatoes (from last night’s dinner)
• sunflower seeds
• leftover croutons
• leftover parmesan cheese
• drizzle of Drew’s Rosemary Balsamic dressing

I also had a cup of water with a squeezed piece of lime…

…and a pomegranate mocktail. I think I like these things more and more as I continue to drink them.

6:45 pm – Homemade Granola Bars – Satisfied

I made some of Ellie’s health bars earlier today and enjoyed 2 of them as my pre-dinner snack while I waited on hubby to come home for dinner. I figured these would be good to make since:

1. I had today off and wanted to do something I actually wanted to do (not something I had to do)

2. I’m supposed to work on eating snacks with my meals this week for SCBR.

Bar #1.

Bar #2.

Boy, were these good! It was everything I could do to not eat more so I wouldn’t spoil dinner, but I reminded myself that I had something tasty planned.

8:30 pm – Chicken Piccata + Steamed Cabbage – Stuffed

Hubby came home from work early, so I got to eat earlier than I thought. Too bad I had that second bar, no?

For dinner, I made one of our all-time faves – Giada’s Chicken Piccata.

I served the entree with some steamed cabbage (this week’s challenge item).

The tangy taste of lemon juice and capers is a fave of my palette making this dish heaven to eat. Since I’ve made it so many times, I’ve been able to make this meal in 30 minutes. How’s that for a 30-minute meal? lol

I had a small glass of water with dinner.

By end of the meal, I was totally stuffed. I ended up taking a small piece of chicken from hubby since the chicken I used was in cutlet size, but I honestly didn’t need it and shouldn’t have eaten it. Oh well, I’m definitely happily full.

9:15 pm – Pear – Satisfied

Since dinner was a bit on the heavy side, I went light on dessert and just had a sliced pear. The pear was so refreshing after the filling meal and made a perfect end to this day’s eats.

I’m going to try to get to bed early tonight. I can’t remember the last time I went to bed “early” (i.e. before 11pm), but I’m going to continue to try. G’night!