Day 2 of 12

21 Dec

Alrighty peeps, it is Day 2 of the 12 Days of Fitness and I’m sure everyone has been active today, right? Right!

I was up earlier than any human being should be when on vacation but that is what happens when you are staying with parents who wake up early…and when you are going to a morning WW meeting lol

Today was a happy day, went to my meeting, down a pound, entered a new weight decade, out for brunch with the parents, ate a delish meal at Cora’s. It was a random mixture of healthy and non-healthy foods, as most meals out are.

I got Theo’s Omelette which is an omelette filled with oh so many vegetables, covered in cheese, and served with a side of potatoes, fresh fruit, and toast. I asked them to make the omelette with half the normal amount of cheese because restaurants always seem to drown food in cheese and I think it came out with a pretty decent amount.

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After brunch it was errand time, borrowed my Dad’s car for a while and bonus points for me, I returned it in the same condition it was in when I left the driveway. 🙂

This evening after dinner I realized that even though I had parked far away and walked when going to all the shops I hadn’t really done anything worthy of being called exercise so I grabbed one of the exercise dvd’s I brought and started working out.

Tonight I did the 5 Mile Walk dvd by Leslie Sansone, it is a “walk at home” dvd which means you are walking on the spot, or forwards and backwards, or side to side, in random combinations and taking her word for it that eventually you have walked 5 miles. I tend to jog for large parts of it, and incorporate more arm work, so I get a better work out.

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The woman, Leslie, is so annoying, ugh. But she keeps you moving which is the important part. Normally I play the dvd on my laptop with the volume down low and watch something on tv while walking but my mom joined me this evening so we kept the volume up high and we kept being told to “walk! walk! walk!” lol  😀

My fear that I would fail this challenge by Day 2 has been relieved. Now on to figure out where to fit something in on Day 3!

Did you work out today?

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Day 1 of 12

20 Dec

It is Day 1 of The 12 Days of Fitness! You didn’t think I forgot did you? 😉

Like I said in the original post about the 12 Days of Fitness all that is required for this challenge is to find time everyday, for 12 days, starting December 20th, to be physically active.

What the activity is doesn’t matter, it can be a walk around your neighbourhood, following along to an exercise dvd, taking part in a plank challenge. Whatever! Just do something active. Every. Single. Day.

Today I went bowling. 🙂

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See? Not crazy active. Not some big massive workout. But it still counts! I played two games, met up with old friends, had a blast, and most importantly (for this challenge anyways), was active when otherwise I most likely wouldn’t have been.

I contemplated following along to an exercise dvd in the evening but by the time the thought came to me it was already a bit too late. But that is ok because there is always tomorrow and not like the exercise dvd is going anywhere lol

What activity did you do today?

 

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Junior Snowmaggedon

9 Dec

Snowmaggedon didn’t quite happen. Did we get snow? Sure. Was it at levels that made functioning outside of a person’s home almost impossible? Nope! The more important question, was it pretty? So freakin gorgeous! I once again took a stupid amount of pictures of snow. SNOW! *rolls eyes*

When I left for work it was big fat flakes falling, I was grinning like a fool the entire time I was getting snow off the suv aaaaand while I was driving to work. Snow like that gives tires great traction so the driving was a breeze…well, for me. Some people appeared to be having trouble but it seemed like most people remembered the horror that was last Monday and were taking extra care with their speed and such.

It continued to snow for pretty much all of my work shift, at some point it turned in to more of a slushy snow instead of the pretty stuff which is unfortunate but oh well, had to happen at some point I suppose. shrug.

By the time work was over it was raining and everything was melting, sadness. If temps get to freezing over night tomorrow will be interesting, what with every surface being like an ice rink but that’s a problem for another day.

When I got home from work it was about 9:45p and I reeeeally wanted to go for a walk but most of the sidewalks were not cleared and I had no desire to be picking my way across uneven terrain so instead I grabbed a shovel and started shoveling.

Get this…I really enjoyed myself!

Shoveling the snow turned in to a multi-tasking dream lol

(1) I am counting it as my exercise for the day – hey don’t judge, I’m lazy and have to count whatever I can!

(2) I not only did the path and sidewalk for the place I live in but also for the neighbour and then for the house beyond the neighbours so that’s my good deed for the day

(3) I made tomorrow’s shoveling easier by clearing what had already built up today

I maaaay not have done my poor back / shoulders / neck much good since they are still hurting from this past Monday’s car accident but I’d like to think it is better to be at least partially active so the muscles don’t all seize up and become unhappy with all movement then to be lazy and doing nothing. Besides, shoveling snow can be quite soothing, especially when no one else is out; it is so quiet, so pretty, so zen like.

All of that is only here fyi, in any other part of the country I’d be shoveling snow in bitterly freezing temperatures and I’d be complaining louder than anybody else out there. Here though, it was pleasant out, didn’t even need to bundle up. 🙂

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Don’t mind all the pictures of trees, I just really like trees covered in snow. 🙂

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Preparing for Snowmaggedon

8 Dec

Apparently we are about to be hit by snowmaggedon which of course means the stores were full of people today…buying Christmas present lol

Depending which weather report you believe the snow is going to start within the hour, continue on all night and tomorrow, be combined with strong winds, which will create white out conditions and basically tomorrow will be ridiculous.

The other main weather report says it will start snowing around 2am, snow throughout the day Friday, and then turn in to freezing rain around 2pm.

Gotta say, if I have to choose between white out snow conditions or freezing rain I choose white out.

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Either way, it is looking like there is going to be a lot of snow to deal with. What comes along with snow? Power outages. Crazy driving conditions. Restricted body movement because of wearing so many clothing layers. Ya know, normal winter stuff. 😉

So, in preparation for possibly losing power in my place I stocked up on food, in a sense. I bought a foot long sub from Subway, got them to cut it in half, and saved half for tomorrow.

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One for today, one for tomorrow.

Look how organized and in planning mode I am! Seriously, it is a wonder I have survived in Canada this long lol

Last time I lost power I went to Tim Horton’s, ordered a tea for my travel mug so it would stay hot longer, a tea in one of their to-go cups, a sandwich and I believe I even got a doughnut. Then I hunkered down in the apartment with a throw blanket, the cat, a flashlight that I borrowed from my landlord and a book.

This time I at least got some ready to eat food in advance!

I still haven’t gotten a flashlight though…

 

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Dinner and a Movie

7 Dec

A friend and I met up tonight for, in case you didn’t guess from the title, dinner and a movie.

We went to a place called Raglan’s Bistro on Lonsdale and had a pretty decent dinner. Normally I rave about places I eat at, and there was nothing actually wrong with what I ate, but it wasn’t oh-my-gawd-you-must-go-there-right-now-and-eat kind of a meal. It was a good food, decent price, left with a full belly kind of meal.

I checked out their menu before we went but ended up changing my mind on the advice of the waitress so instead of the Vegetarian Burrito I got the Quesadilla el Vegetal (vegetarian quesadilla), it had zucchini, eggplant, bell peppers, mushrooms and mozzarella with salsa, chipotle sour cream and a green salad, for $13. I was trying to be good so I asked for it to be made with half the normal amount of cheese. It was still good, despite having noticeably less cheese, kind of proving that restaurants put way too much cheese on in the first place…at least proving it to me lol2016-12-08-01-56-15

We split an appie, Coconut Prawns, Mmm! The waitress forgot to put in the order so when our main course came first and we asked about the shrimp the look of confusion on the guy who brought our meal was real. They did a rush order for us so it all turned out ok in the end. 🙂

For the movie we went to see Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them and holy crap that movie was good! How does JK Rowling come up with this stuff? Her imagination is a wonderous thing. 😀

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The movie theatre, for reasons not explained, was super cold so we ended up not only wearing our winter jackets while watching the movie but also putting on gloves and my friend put on her toque lol I would’ve put my hood up but I’m vain and didn’t want to mess my hair lol  😉

We decided this year to not exchange Christmas presents, instead we are waiting until the New Year and going to have ourselves a day trip adventure, yay!

She however did not forget my birthday, which oddly enough, I kind of had lol She bought me such a pretty ornament, the picture doesn’t do it justice! She also got me the best socks, I have started collecting funny / odd / unique socks and these totally fit the bill. 🙂

It was a fun night, totally worth freezing my ass off if I get to spend time with her. 🙂

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12 Days of Christmas Fitness Challenge

7 Dec

Tis the month to gain ridiculous amounts of weight super fast if not careful! With so many social gatherings, and treats, and just general feelings of wanting to eat alllll the food this month it can be easy to wake up January 1st and realize your jeans aren’t fitting quite as well anymore.

I so don’t want that to happen to me!

Yes I know that being healthy is 80% what you eat and only 20% exercise but let’s be real here people, there will be food aplenty all over the place and I am sure I will end up eating more than planned.

So the idea is to help minimize some of the food damage I will end up doing by ensuring I stay active this month.

Here is the plan…

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The challenge begins December 20th and goes to December 31st. You don’t have to be out there running marathons, or making massive gains at the gym, I’m not looking for crazy changes in fitness activity. All I’m looking for is fitting exercise in to the daily routine over those days when so many of us skip exercising.

Just because there are a million and one things to do over the season doesn’t mean we should stop finding time each day to take care of ourselves. How else do you expect to enter 2017 feeling your best if you load up on food in this last month and don’t at least try to burn some of it off?

Some ideas for exercise could be:

  • a walk around the block
  • mall walking if you are somewhere cold
  • during the commercials do some squats, or sit-ups, or planks, or push-ups, or whatever you are able to do
  • take the stairs instead of elevators
  • park far away from the doors of the places you are going
  • snowball fight! build a snow fort! basically anything with snow!
  • pop in an exercise dvd
  • play tag with your kids, or nieces and nephews, or your friend’s kids

You get the idea!

So who is with me? Who is willing to try reeeeally hard to make the time everyday, for 12 days, over the busiest time of the year, to be good to ourselves and fit some exercise in to our days?

C’mon, you know you want to!

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Snow Day!

6 Dec

I live in the one section of Canada that doesn’t get a true “Canadian winter” every year so snow, any snow, is exciting and fun and destroys the city in mere minutes lol

This year we got snow! Yay! So pretty. So seasonal. So easy to have an accident in, sigh.

This is where my driver’s side mirror used to be…

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Now it is just some cables sticking out looking rather pathetic.

The gist of the incident is this…

I was driving, suuuuper slow, down a hill in my neighbourhood, I went over a speed bump, lost traction, started sliding down the hill, couldn’t stop myself so instead I tried to control the skid and make it around the corner that I was headed towards and instead I smooshed into the meridian that divides the traffic on the cross street. I managed to avoid two trees, so yay me! but the driver’s side of my suv became super close friends with a post, sigh. The post sheared the driver’s side mirror clean off and continued to scrape down the side of my suv until getting jammed in the back tire’s wheel well.

Good times! 😉

I was stuck there, waiting for a tow truck that wasn’t going to show for an hour and a half when a guy stopped, came over, and managed to manhandle the post to an almost flat position on the ground so I could gently roll over it and escape. Woohoo for escape!

I proceeded on my way and immediately became aware of just how much I use my driver’s side mirror because holy crap I went to look in to it what felt like a million times only to find myself staring at wires. Wires! Ugh.

I filed an online claim with my insurance people and got an automated response they’d get back to me in two days. Two days! Uh…I need my mirror now not two days from now! So I called them later in the day to find out what I should do, had the longest convo of my life lol, but the guy I spoke to did all the stuff to my claim right then that would normally take two days because I did my claim online, and next thing you know I have a case manager, a claim number, a list of of approved auto shops to pick from and strict instructions to make sure I get the courtesy car while the shop works on mine because I have gold-star something or other that entitles me to a car.

The accident was Monday morning and by Tuesday afternoon I had the suv in the shop being looked at. They managed to screw the mirror on to the side of my suv and then duct tape it to secure it. It isn’t pretty but it is functional so oh well. There is a bit of a scheduling problem for getting it officially fixed though…they can take it Dec 19th and work on it over Christmas but I have no way to get it there and then get me home to grab my stuff and then get me to the airport in time for my flight. The other option is wait until January to get it fixed and get a courtesy car. I’m still trying to figure out what to do…sometimes being a grown-up and having to figure shit out kinda sucks…

So instead of thinking about the damage to my suv lets enjoy some of the pretty snow pictures!

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Advent Calendar Time!

1 Dec

Woohoo! December 1st! Know what that means? I can finally crack open the advent calendar, yay! 😀

A piece of Lindt chocolate a day for 24 days? Yes please!

Never have I eaten a piece of chocolate soooooo slowly but I wanted to savour the taste lol That chocolate ball was so creamy and perfect. 😀

I’m thinking this piece of chocolate a day idea is going to make my tastebuds (and by extension, me!) very happy!

Enjoy your December!

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Spider Sequel

30 Nov

About three weeks or so ago I packed up all my stuff, bribed a friend in to coming over to help me move all my furniture 12″ away from the walls, removed the cat, the plant, and I out of the apartment for half the day and returned to an odour filled apartment because the pest control people had been here spraying in the hopes of making my apartment less hospitable to the spiders that were biting me on a regular basis.

Biting. Spiders.

You’d think I was in Australia or something! 😉 lol

Two days ago I did all of that all over again, minus the friend helping because she had to work. Oh, and this time the cat, plant, and I had to stay out longer than the first visit because the pest control guy was going to be using two poisons, not just one, and they are more powerful, hence needing to be out of the spray zone for longer.

The cat was not impressed, frankly, neither was I! Banned from the apartment is not really how I wanted to spend a day off. I think the cat’s expression says it all…

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This is Striker, hiding under a tent I built him on a couch at work where we hung out until 9pm, when we were allowed to go home.

On a happy note some good things happened that day…

  • there was a choir performing at work so for an hour Striker and I got to listen to some beautifully sung Christmas carols. I seemed to appreciate it more than the cat…
  • the chef on shift at work fed me, yay food!
  • I may not be strong enough to move all my furniture on my own but I’m healthy and strong enough to move all the stuff I packed up and stacked in the middle of the rooms, and was strong and healthy enough to unpack and put it all back that night when allowed back in the apartment. Health is not something to be overlooked!
  • even though I was grumpy and reeeeally wanted to eat copious amounts of basically allll the comfort foods I didn’t! I tracked all my food, ate healthy choices, and even fit in a fat free fudgsicle so I didn’t feel deprived.
  • by packing up so much of my stuff I weeded out a lot of things I could donate to a local thrift shop, hopefully some of those items can make someone else happy.

Also, something I am trying to remember to be grateful for, sure my apartment has an infestation of spiders hell bent on biting me to my breaking point of sanity buuuuuut I have a roof over my head, not everybody does.

Now I am crossing my fingers that the second pest control visit worked and I won’t get bit anymore, cause seriously, those bites hurt, and itch, and are highly unattractive! 😛

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Pulled Chicken

17 Nov

I cooked and it didn’t suck! Yay!

I saw a recipe on YouTube I wanted to try but couldn’t find one of the main ingredients when I was in the store today so I randomly decided to try making pulled sweet & smoky chicken in my slow cooker.

I’ve had my slow cooker for a while but never quite got around to using it. My intention was to try out slow cooker desserts, of which I have heard many a good thing! but well, yeah, didn’t happen, shrug.

But hey, why not try cooking in it today, right?

The inspiration for this meal was this…

Sorry for the ripped package, I forgot to take a picture before I oh so delicately opened it lol This is Club House brand seasoning mix for sweet & smoky pulled chicken. Mmm!

The recipe on the back made it seem super easy. Boneless skinless chicken breast, mixed with ketchup, water, brown sugar, and the seasoning mix. Pop it all in the slow cooker for 4 hours on high or 8 hours on low. Remove it from the slow cooker and tear the chicken with two forks, put it back in the slow cooker to fully coat the chicken and bring it back up to a hot temperature, then serve on a bun.

I did everything the recipe said to, except I halved it. I own a small slow cooker, and I’m cooking for one person over here, an 8 portion dish is a tad much for me!

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See? Tiny slow cooker!

Oh! I lied! I also kinda changed the meat, but not really. It is supposed to be 2 pounds of chicken breast, I used 1 pound of chicken breast fillets. Same bird, same section of the bird, just cut a bit, and cheaper. I thought the thinner cut might be the better choice because of the size of my slow cooker, also, it came in packages closer to the size I needed where as the chicken breasts were all packaged in larger amounts and I didn’t want a bunch of extra raw chicken lying around, what the hell would I do with that?

Since the original recipe makes 8 portions and I made half the recipe even I can do the math that means what I made would equal to 4 portions. Lemme tell ya, it made 4 reeeeally big portions!

I put the entire contents of the meat and sauce in a measuring cup to see how much it made, it was 2.5 ounces or 2 1/4 cups which I attempted to then measure out, on my kitchen scale, so I’d properly divide the meat and sauce but um yeah, that so didn’t work…sooooo I guesstimated *rolls eyes*

So here is how much ended up on my sandwich…

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And here is how much ended up in my tupperware container…

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I suppose if you don’t care for meat, or pulled meat, or meat in sauces, the above pictures won’t look good to you but to me, they look delicious. Mmm!

The dish turned out quite good.  🙂 Easy enough even I could make it, and a tasty end result, yay!

For all you Weight Watcher people out there, one serving is 7 SP. For those of you not on Weight Watchers, I have not calculated the nutritional information, sorry! 😉

I didn’t do anything fancy with it, just put it on some toast and made a toasted sandwich. I know in restaurants they usually put coleslaw on pulled meat sandwiches, and it is crazy delish, but I didn’t think to get any and lets get real here, I didn’t need to add even more to this sandwich, making it even more unhealthy lol

I’ll probably eat one more serving of it tomorrow then freeze the rest. I may really like this sauce but that doesn’t mean I want to eat it 4 days in a row, seems a tad excessive.

The ease of making this meal, and how good it made my apartment smell makes me think I should use the slow cooker way more often. I just might have to try some experimenting over here! 😀

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