Vegan never tasted so good!

Made this for breakfast #2. First half went directly into my tummy. It is so good! Everything bagel (don't care how processed it is- sometimes I just need a whole bagel), big slices of cucumber and yellow tomato, spinach and edamame hummus with a bit of salsa slathered on it.
#1 was half a cantaloupe.
Possibly working out has increased my metabolism?

Sooo... This weekend some non-Eat to Live activities occurred..

Those activities mostly revolving around drinking booze. I am all about the vegan thing; just the teetotaler-vegan thing make socializing super hard!

We found a little slice of home here in Portland- The Landmark Saloon. They have live music every night and we went there every night this weekend. The music was a bit honky-tonky, which I love, and it was a laid-back, with cheap beer and a big patio. Sitting and listening to steel guitar while drinking High Life made us feel like we were back home for a little while.

To make up for all our drinking, we did work out several times this weekend. I discovered my cardio flies by, so long as I'm reading! I've bought all my groceries for the week and flagged a bunch of potential recipes for dinner. Usually, I try to plan what meals I'll be cooking and just buy the necessary ingredients on Sunday. This week I just bought good materials and am just going to see what I come up with.

What stumbling blocks have y'all come across this week? What have been some healthy pleasant surprises?

I hope y'all are doing this too!

Day 2 (or 3) of hooray, we're vegan! I drank lots of coffee today, but did resist eating caramel corn. That balances out, right?
My menu for today ended up being this and this is what I'll be eating tomorrow. 
Do y'all want to know this? It feels very weird detailing all the food I eat publicly.

	Thursday	Friday
Breakfast	Coffee	Banana Smoothie
Morning Snack		Coffee
Lunch	Peaches, blackberries and Strawberries	Falafel at Pita Pit
Afternoon Snack	Meeting over Coffee	blackberries
Dinner	Thai Lettuce Wraps: Cucumber, spinach, zucchini, scallions, carrots, radishes with peanut sauce wrapped in Butter Lettuce	Salad somewhere out!
Dessert	banana, spinach, strawberry, almond butter, and orange juice smoothie	peppermint tea

Awesome website: Healthy Girl's Kitchen

Just stumbled across an awesome website before my post-run shower. Though it was such a short run, it barely counts.
http://healthygirlskitchen.blogspot.com/
She has awesome no-oil dressings, vegan pesto, non-fried falafel, and the most yummy looking crunchy thai salad, pictured below.

Please expect all future recipes to come from this website!

And we're back! It has been a couple of years, but since a couple of us are trying to do Eat to Live, here we are.
Since my house is full of chips, bread and cheese, veggies (and some fruit) needed to be purchased. I was planning on going to Fred Meyer, but since it is beautiful outside here, I decided to make a run to a local farmer's market nearby. I think this is going to have to be a regular occurrence until the farmer's markets close for winter as I got everything pictured below for $19! 

To help out all of us, I'm going to be posting menu plans and recipe links for what I've got going on.
First, some helpful links!
Five simple vegan breakfasts
Pinterest- Vegan!
Awesome looking breakfast or dessert smoothie/neat health website

What I ate yesterday and I'm eating today, with warning notice.
I love Eat to Live, but there are 2 things I'm not willing to compromise on: Salt and Coffee. I will always have those two on my menu, so sorry for starting out with cheats already built in!

	Wednesday	Thursday
Breakfast	Coffee	Coffee
Morning Snack	White bread toast	Peaches and Strawberries
Lunch	Carrots with Almond butter and celery with black beans and salsa	Mexican Salad: Green lettuce with red onion, black beans, cucumber, radish and tomato
Afternoon Snack	Blackberries	Meeting over Coffee
Dinner	Heirloom tomatoes with balsamic, salt and pepper and toast	Thai Lettuce Wraps: Cucumber, bean sprouts, quinoa, carrots, celery, peanut sauce wrapped in Butter Lettuce
Dessert	strawberries	peppermint tea

Good luck today and check back tonight or tomorrow!

Weight watchers, attempt 2

Cowbell! You're posting again! I'll do WW with you, and hopefully I'm now mature enough not to go crazy like last time. My problem isn't with eliminating foods, its the tiny portions! For some reason, the keeping track of points plus eating tiny meals made me cut down my food more and more until I got sick and luckily, I don't mix diets and illness. I'm on for class, since I'll be a member until end of November because it takes 30 days for cancellations to be processed. I tried to go to our old gym this morning but didn't have enough change in my car for the meter! :( Damn $.99 cones at TCBY! So, I just went home and ran. I wanted to run through the graveyard, but remembered mid-run that they don't open the gates until after 8am. Then when I came home, I caught the dog in the act. Cat food bowl on the ground, empty, with his face in it finishing off the crumbs!! He got a spank and then everytime I looked at him afterward he would crawl under the coffee table, like I was going to attack him. Mean mommy! Also, after J woke up he told me that he woke up last night to the sounds of the cat vomiting in my underwear drawer. Bleh. Luckily, he got up and handled the situation so I didn't have any unpleasant surprises while dressing in the dark this morning! Tonight J and I are going to go to the gym and weight lift. I hate doing that with him because he is such a pusher, "Come on, you can do more reps than that!", but lazy folks like me need pushers I guess. Call me if you wanna come over while we clean the kitchen and watch Pushing Daisies. That's the big plans for the night. :) Btw, do you think you could make this? Click on the picture to see the construction piece by piece. Sooo cute!

Weight Watchers!

B, why don't you do weight watcher's with me? It's really good bc there aren't any foods that you CAN'T eat. I think the vegan thing is so hard to do because there are so many restrictions. I can give you my ww online password, and you can look up point values of things. I think that you can be more successful if you don't have so many limitations. Plus, you know how well it's already worked out for me. Are you still going to come to Thursday class with me? I get 2 guest passes a month. Let me know what you think.

One step forward, two steps back

So, I've been a bit MIA, though unfortunately it has not been because I've suddenly become Miss Outdoors/Sporty. I've been a working woman, climbing the corporate food chain! With that extra time in front of the computer and not behind a stove, I've also earned a few extra lbs. So, I've signed on as J's spouse at our Alma Mater so I can get the cheap gym membership! Now, I just need to cancel my current membership at my fancy wonderful gym that is very far from everywhere I am. The only downside to this situation is that I will have to workout around younger, fitter undergrads. :( It doesn't matter though, because the more I go, the fitter I'll be! Also, I need to get it better shape because J let me know that regarding him popping the question, "Things are happening". Once that happens, I want to be able to have pictures taken without needing to have Barbara Walters lighting.
As far as diet goes, I've been pondering going back to being vegan. It is inconvenient and time-consuming, but I never have felt better and lost weight as easily as that time period of my life. It is something I've been thinking about a lot, but not necessarily doing anything about. I need to bust out my Eat to Live book again and remind myself of why I went vegan in the first place.
A deterrent to my vegan dreams is the discovery that my younger brother subscribed to Gourmet magazine and forgot about it, so my mother is giving me all the issues he received and will receive! That mag is serious food porn. Everything is beautiful and they have at least 20 recipes per issue and explain how to do the hard stuff. Would I ever have thought to poach meringue in milk? No, but now all I want to do is cook these beautiful, heart stopping recipes! I think I will and will post my results (with a photo comparison).

Joyfully thoughtless

I don't really have anything interesting to report as I am not actively doing anything right now. I've just come off of doing so much stuff that I think my brain is coping by hibernating. If I could have a cruise control for my life, I would be using it right now. The hardest parts of trying to do as little as possible are feeding yourself and dressing yourself. Surprisingly enough, work is one of the easiest things. I probably should take steps to pull myself out of this autopilot, but I think I'll wallow in it just a little longer. I think J has noticed and is worried, but hasn't yet confronted me on it. He bought me a video game but I think that will make the situation worse as I can lay on the couch and play it, thus eliminating any chances that I will clean, cook, plan for the events we have quickly approaching, workout or even talk. If I had some resistance to this behavior I would probably relent, but I just was praised for my hard work by my boss and the owner of my company told me yesterday that I looked like I had lost at least 10 lbs. Maybe the powers that be are trying to tell me that this is the best way to be right now? Yes, I think that is all the reassurance I need.

Run Down of this week since Cowbell's last post

Quick recap of the last week:
-We purchased no bachelors, but plan on getting the number of the top priced bachelor through our sneaky ways.
-I dropped my cell and broke the screen, thus eliminating most weekend phone use.
-Cowbell's chair and stove are both magnificent. Glorious even.
-Cowbell's birthday was tons of fun though cake and wine don't mix well in my book.
-I bought the HRM I posted about earlier.
-I convinced big sister to go Vegan and I'm following suit on Friday.
-Tubbs has been MIA, possibly because of her high falutin' new job.
-Bachelorette party planning is in full swing (contact me if you want to come to any of the 3 I'm helping coordinate)
-I joined Sparkpeople.com last week to help motivate me with workouts and diet stuff
-I regressed to my old cell phone to carry me over until I resolve the screenless PDA/phone issue
-I'm in all day meetings/all evening events until Thursday night, so text or call me if you miss hearing from me!
-I've been eating like I don't gain weight... which I most certainly do, so next week may be a serious fat week. Like "don't get in this elevator with me for your own safety" fat week.
-I just ate a cookie.. see earlier dart

Best Week Ever!

Alright, so this Saturday I am receiving a new stove and a new chair!!! Hooray! I'm so excited. So, this week has been my birthday, I've will receive 4 cakes, have a party, and hopefully buy a hot bachelor. So, there ya go. Life is pretty good. =)

Picked my HRM, tenatively

I think I'm going with the Polar F11 Heart Rate Monitor. It has a lot of awesome features and the $50 dollar uplift from the F6 model I was originally thinking about getting is actually is cheaper in the long run since I was planning on purchasing the F6 plus the better chest strap that is $55. The F11 comes with the better chest strap (standard) so I will be paying $5 less for a better product that comes with a better chest strap. Plus it's prettier than the F6 because it comes in this ice blue model. :)

Happy Birthday Cowbell!

Happy birthday Cowbell!
Part of your birthday present is the present of winning a contest you may not have realized you were in. My body age results were given to me last night and due to my scoring at the bottom of the flexibility test (poor) my body age is.... 25!!! :( My trainer shamed me for not stretching when I workout and told me I need to start doing yoga again. Also, 1/4 of my body is fat. J didn't think this was bad but really?! 25% of me is straight jelly and in no way is that acceptable. I'm researching heart rate monitors today and have a MAP test tomorrow, which tells me exactly what heart rate range my body burns fat at. I will get down to 20%... this is my new goal for after the wedding!

FYI, big sis wants to try a new recipe for the birthday cake I'm making Cowbell, but don't worry- I'm making the box cake regardless of how that one turns out!

I promised Cowbell a yellow cake with fudge frosting and strawberry jam filling for her birthday, though it probably won't be quite as pretty as this cake...

Holding steady... yet somehow backsliding too.

So I weighed myself this morning and (drum roll please...) I'm at the weight I was when I started working out/watching what I ate. I know the reason my weight is doggedly still at that detested number- booze. I lived it up this weekend, but my new, healthier lifestyle starts today! Tonight I finally have my fitness evaluation and 2 months to get to a shape that won't make me want to punch anyone who wields a camera in my direction at big sister's wedding. I think I'm going to tone down the bread making to once a week as I think that may be a factor as well. Wish me luck my peeps, as I am about to start on the Eat to Live diet again. I don't want to stop eating dairy but that diet was so freakin effective, that if I really want to make leaps and bounds weight and shape-wise, I need to. Obviously, this rule will not apply on 4/5 for Cowbell's birthday celebration. I also just signed up for sparkpeople.com as they have suggested menus and workouts for everyday and groups to encourage you along the way. I think this will help me when J is on one of his beer and Whataburger diets. Let me know if any of you want to join Sparkpeople too and we can be buddies!

Well ladies.... this is a time of great change in Tubbs life. In fact, pretty much everything except my gargantuan weight is in flux. The pounds however, they get to stay for some reason. I'm not eating sugar or flour, but it's only been about three solid days. I want instant results damnit! B and I have, however, not eaten out once this week. Go us! And he's actually kind of stoked about the cooking at home thing. I'm so proud! We had a very yummy meal of chicken, rice, and broccoli yesterday and despite B suggesting we smother everything in cheese sauce, he was pleasantly surprised that healthy doesn't need to taste bad. Anyway, small victories. Tubbs is going to be employed doing the EXACT same thing she was doing her senior year of high school, albeit at double the pay. Oooooo.... in the words of my mother "why the hell did you go to college?" Anyway, it's all for the greater good right? At least this way I can all but guarantee that I will be at the August nuptials and hopefully at the July fiesta before that. Yea for cheap mindless labor. That paycheck, however small, will indeed be heart warming.

Happy Easter!

Lazy Springbreak, eh?

Hiya girls,
I see that there wasn't any breaking news while I was away! :) Mexico was great, especially because no one stresses there. There was a bomb threat and even the cops were calm about it: "No, you can't go this way... No really, there is an emergency." while idly shooing us away. Hehe. Turns out the bomb threat was really a bottle with something in it, so they thought it was a Molitov Cocktail?? Anyways it wasn't and wasted a bunch of our time. We ate delicious cake and catered foods and saw some amazingly beautiful places! And when I came home, I had lost 1 lb! Thank you San Miguel for being super hilly. You guys will love the wedding and Bridezilla contained herself really well throughout the trip. I felt bad for her for a couple days because everything kept falling through and she seemed on the verge of tears at one point. Both the brides in our lives are anxious to know if Tubbs will be bringing herself and her man to their weddings and our fall bride wants to know if Tubbs is coming on to the bachelorette party in NO. Fall bride and I worked out last night at my gym and my body really forgot how hard the gym is! But I gotta keep it up b/c J is determined to be a bad influence. FYI he has only 24 beers to go to reach his goal of 200 and looks exactly the same as when he started.... He hasn't changed his diet or even started working out. How??? It makes me crazy. He even ate all my "I've been really good today treat" ice cream that was in the freezer and that stuff was not even close to low fat! Erg. Luckily, he was so sweet and excited about me being home it all makes up for it. Especially since his truck was stolen last week! :( Ok, can't go into that now as I gotta go to a meeting!

Can I just say that I LOVE the Peeps picture!? Cuz I do. Anywho, went to the gym yesterday for like five seconds. Feeling very lazy these days. I think it has to do with the fact that I'm going through a sever life crisis and I'm unable to function. Just had a very good smoked salmon sandwhich. I'm off to the gym today in just a bit. Hopefully I'll work a little harder this time. K (I'm going with abbreviations of names cuz I can't seem to remember our pin names) came up with the very good idea of me being a nanny. Is that lame? I could make like 40k a year doing something that I really like to do anyway. And I wouldn't have to go to an office. I'd have weekends totally off. And, I could work on school at the same time. All while paying my loans off at an acceptable rate. The only real problem I have with it is saying that I'm a nanny. That blows. Wish they had a better word for it. But as long as I'm doing school or something else while I'm doing it, I don't feel so bad. Sorry, I know this is a fitness blog and I'm ruining it but there is a total lack of fitness in my life currently so I'll blog about other things. Can't I just get married and pregnant?! Damn.... that's all I want. I figure if I work for a few solid years and get rid of my debt, I'll be a lot more ready to be a mom and stay at home. That way the hubby won't have to work for my debts as well as the families. Those are my thoughts.

Thank goodness for Mexico!

This week has been plagued with an excess of drinking and eating and no working out. My first workout for this week will be tonight as my fitness eval fell through and going out for work evening activities made me too drunk/tired/hungover to even think about physical fitness! I'm excited to be leaving for Mexico on Friday night as it will be a break from all this "get fit now!" pressure I've put on myself. Hopefully, I'll get some running time in on the trip as well. Adios, chicas!

LIfe is Good

Well, I feel as though I'm still on track physically. I've been going to the gym 6 days a week... except 2 weeks ago when I was sick sick sick. My clothes fit better. Parts of my body feel more different than they ever had. The only thing that's not changing very much is the scale... but that's fine as long as I can see the results. "Chubby Bunny" and I worked out yesterday. I also did an hour of weights before that. I'm glad that today is my day off. I think I'll celebrate with a rita. Time for my kiddies to arrive ttyl. Keep up the hard work ladies =)