Monday Meals…a photo montage

Just cause I got my act together….here’s a photo montage of my first day on the TIU plan.  It’s food…healthy style.  🙂

Breakfast pancake

Blueberry & tea Snack

Lunch wrap

Its juice…but chunky!

Dinner wraps & roasted veggies

And that was Monday….what’ll today bring…hmmmm   🙂

See ya later

Cathy

Friday Morning Wake Up

I will say that when that alarm went off at 5am and it was hecka cold outside of the blanket I needed to take 4 or 5 deep breaths before I stepped out of bed.  But I got into the garage/gym at 5:09am and jumped right on the stationary bike for a quick 5 min warm up.

Why is that riding the stationary bike for 5 min seems like so much less effort and excitement than warming up for that same amount of time on the treadmill?  Could it be that in the 5 min I rode 2.15 miles but only burned 23 calories?!?  Probably.

After the 5 min warm up I did a circuit work out made up of a bunch of different circuits that I’ve been doing…with a few random things thrown in to mix it up.

I used: Fitness Magazine‘s Fierce & Fab in 14 days and pieces of  Tone It Up’s gym free circuits.

Use that 1 minute breather to get your dumbells in easy grabbing position.

I try to focus on form and balance first.  Once it starts feeling too easy I’ll add more reps or change the weight of the dumbell or kettlebell I am using.

After that sweat-fest, I came in to whip up some breakfast.  While my green smoothie (see recipe in yesterday’s post) was whirring away in the blender I made an egg-less protein pancake.  Or attempted to make it into a pancake may be a better way to say it. It was delicious, but in no way would you call it a pancake.  It was more like warmed banana flavored stuff you hoped didn’t fall off your fork.  🙂  I should have used coconut flour or GF flour instead of the ground flax – to offer some binding opportunity.  Oh well.  That’s the nice thing about food experimenting, most of the fails you can still eat.

To make the pancake I replaced my egg whites with 1/2 a cup of unsweetened applesauce, kept in the 1/2 a banana, protein powder, ground flax meal, chia seeds and cinnamon.

The pictures still make it worthwhile.  Drool away…

That’s 2 cups of spinach!

Warmed banana “stuff”

It is so chilly today but the sky is blue and clear.  So here’s to hoping for a warm up in a bit.  Come on Sun!  You can do it.  🙂

See ya later

Cathy

 

 

 

Healthy Starts

commitments

Remember my big question the other day?  You know the one about exercising more or eating less?  Well last night I committed to the exercising more.  No, it wasn’t some big committment ceremony between myself and my treadmill and free weights.

Who doesn’t want to be a unicorn?!?

It was more like I ate a bunch of crap that necessitated my commitment when the alarm went off at 5am this morning.  Burn on myelf!  🙂

So I bounced…or rolled out of bed at 5am and was in the garage by 5:07am to do a sprint workout on the treadmill.  I actually love running on the treadmill although I do think it seems a little more daunting to go faster on the treadmill than to run fast out on the streets.  I’ll see how my theory plays out on my Sunday long run.  This is what I sweated to this morning:

Modified from an Active.com article

That was my first attempt at a picmonkey graphic’y deal.  Not sure if I’m digging the background shoe picture – I may need to find something with more lights than darks to use as the backdrop.  Anyhoo.  I survived.  My legs felt really good on the sprints and I liked the fact that I could test my ability in short bursts.  Since this was my first day of speedwork I did start at a reasonable speed.  My goal is to get to a 2:00 or a wee bit below a 2:00 PR for my next Half Marathon (January 2013’s Tinkerbell in Disneyland).  I’ve improved times in every race and I really believe I can hit a sub-2:00 if I work on my speed drills, some hills for endurance and then increase the long runs, distance and speed.

I’m committed baby!

Oh yeah!

To support this increased exercise (hey I know it was just one workout – but I committed remember), I started the day off with a healthy breakfast – which is my favorite meal of the day.

I got a whole bunch of veggies & fruit servings in these beauties.

Protein pancake

• 2 egg whites (used real egg whites since I didn’t have that carton stuff)
• 1/2 a banana
• 1 Tbsp protein powder (I use vanilla rice protein powder)
• 1 Tbsp ground flax meal (Bob’s Red Mill)
• 1 Tbsp chia seeds
• Cinnamon

Mix it all up and pour into a heated non-stick pan sprayed with cooking spray.  Let it sit for 6-7 minutes until the edges pull up and you can shake the cake around when you wiggle the pan.  Flip over and cook for another 3-4 minutes.  Slide onto a plate and toss on whatever fruit you want.

Green Smoothie

• 2 cups organic raw spinach
• 2 cups water
• 1 cup frozen fruit (the lighter the fruit the greener the drink)
• 1/2 – 1 banana
• 1 Tbsp chia seeds

Blend it all up and drink it up!  Will make a lot so be prepared to sip for a while.

So now it’s worky work time.  I think I’ve got 5 conference calls today – so far…I never know if another one will get scheduled in between.

See ya later!

Cathy