Eating a Green Monster

Why-oh-why did I wait so long to try a Green Monster?

I think I was put off by the green color and the fact that drinking a Green Monster meant sipping down calories, and I generally prefer to eat my calories.

Since I thoroughly enjoyed my first Green Monster experience, I decided to recreate it today. This time I ate my Green Monster with a spoon to satisfy my need to eat something rather than drink something first thing in the morning.

Breakfast

My Green Monster included:

• 1 frozen banana
• 1 scoop chocolate protein powder
• 1/2 tbsp. cocoa powder
• Almond Breeze almond milk
• 3 large handfuls of spinach

Chocolate Banana Green Monster

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Friends & Family Influence Drinking

Yesterday I read an interesting article about the influence of a person’s social network and family on their personal drinking habits.

The study found that heavy drinkers, moderate drinkers and light drinkers tend to flock together. Apparently people were 50% more likely to be heavy drinkers if one of their friends or relatives drank heavily.

Do your friends or family influence your drinking habits?

Awesome Month

Three cheers for April!!!

I love this month. Yes, it’s probably because it’s my birthday month (April 27, baby!), but I also feel like April is when the weather starts really changing for the better and the sun starts shining a little brighter (in between the “April showers” of course).

What are you most looking forward to in April?

This month I have a bunch of exciting things to look forward to:

• 5K Doggie Race with Sadie on Saturday
• Easter
• My sister’s sorority’s mother/daughter/sister weekend
• Meeting the designer of my wedding dress
• My 25th birthday!!!

It should be a good month!

Breakfast

Today’s breakfast was a chocolatey delight: Brownie batter hot cereal! Ahhhhhh!

Get in Mah Belly!

I combined Flax-Z-Snax chocolate cream hot cereal with a scoop of All the Whey chocolate peanut butter cup protein powder, a tablespoon of cocoa powder and some water and microwaved it until it was hot and super thick!

Flax-Z-Snax

Coo-coo for Cocoa

Thiiiick Brownie Batter Hot Cereal

I enjoyed my hot cereal with a tumbler full of my gym’s free coffee in Barnie’s cinnamon butter cookie flavor (the best flavor everrrr).

Thursday's Breakfast

It was a great breakfast after a sch-weaty workout.

Workout

My workout today was pretty random. I felt like running, but decided against it since Sadie and I are running in a doggie 5k together on Saturday. I wanted to give my legs a good rest because I feel like I run better in races when I haven’t run several days prior to race day.

My run-less cardio workout looked like this:

• 10 min. stair master
• 10 min. adaptive motion trainer
• 5 min. stair master
• 25 min. elliptical

Can you tell I was easily bored today?

April Fools’ Day

Happy April Fools Day!

Are you playing any good jokes today? Have you ever had a good joke played on you?

One year when my sister was pretty young, my mom and I convinced her to come running down the stairs because we told her that our cat (who was a boy) had kittens. 🙂 Poor Leslie was pretty disappointed to see that no baby kitties could be found.

Two years ago my mom really got me. I had NO idea it was April Fools’ Day, and when I got to work I had a really long email from her saying that she and my dad were adopting a young boy because they were so sad that both my sister and I were out of the house (it was my sister’s first year away at college). I was shocked and even told my boss that I couldn’t believe I was getting a brother. It was then that I realized what day it was and felt like one stoooopid lil’ blonde. 🙂

Country Music, I Love You

I’ve tried to fight it for years… That country twang, those hokey lyrics…

Well, I just can’t fight it anymore! I flippin’ LOVE country music.

Yeehaw!

I don’t know when it happened… or if it’s always something I’ve secretly loved. My parents would listen to country music in the heart of suburban Illinois, where no one listened to country.

How about you? Are you a country music lover or a country music hater?

Country music was the music everyone hated in high school. I don’t think there even was a country music station in my town growing up!

As I was running at the gym this morning, it hit me that nearly every third song that came up on my iPod was a country song.

There’s something sweet and innocent about so many country music songs (Honky Tonk Badonkadonk, excluded). I love that so many country songs highlight the simple things in life that truly make life wonderful like ice cold lemonade, BBQs, sitting on your front porch and your family on a sleepy Sunday morning.

What are some simple things that make you happy?

If I were to write a country music song, a couple simple things I’d highlight would be:

• The way your dog will bring you every single toy out of their toy basket until you play with them
• The way it feels to get a real bear hug from a loved one
• The feeling of being truly “at home” when you sit down to your mother’s home cookin’

Strawberry Shortcake Breakfast

Today’s breakfast was quite a treat!

I enjoyed a hot bowl of strawberry shortcake oats.

Strawberry Shortcake Oats

My mix included:

• 1/2 c. oatmeal
• 1 scoop All the Whey cupcake batter protein powder
• 3/4 c. thawed frozen strawberries

Thursday's Breakfast

This mix was sweet, warm and filling!

Workout

Today’s workout was a hodge podge of different cardio machines, but it made me sweat!

• 25 min. run (6.5 pace, 1.0 incline)
• 5 min. incline walking (4.2 pace, 7.5 incline)
• 10 min. stair master
• 10 min. elliptical

I actually didn’t want to get off the elliptical because I was really into the latest issue of Real Simple magazine. The recipes in this month’s issue look phenomenal.

Speaking of recipes…

Reader’s Recipes

Thanks for all the delicious lookin’ recipes you guys submitted last night!

If you still want to submit a recipe for me to make next week, be sure to comment on this post. I’ll let you know the recipe I select tonight. I’m going to recruit Ryan to help me pick a good one! 😀

Cake for Breakfast

Though I love my protein brownie, I’ll be the first to admit that it isn’t for everyone and can be a little dry. (Tip: Spreading peanut butter on top makes it taste even better!)

Yesterday when I stumbled across April‘s recipe for a protein cake, I was extremely intrigued. I figured it would be more moist than my protein brownie due to the addition of pumpkin or applesauce and figured starting my day with some cake would be a nice treat!

I combined all of the necessary ingredients and used All the Whey chocolate peanut butter cup protein powder as my base.

Protein Cake Ingredients

I stirred everything up until a thick batter formed. It looked like real cake batter!

Batter

After slightly less than 70 seconds in the microwave, my cake was ready!

Done!

I loosened the cake with a knife and it popped out quite easily.

Double Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup Protein Cake

Yummmm

The great thing about this little cake is that it’s portable! April recommended spreading peanut butter between the cake halves and taking it as a to-go snack. Yum!

I enjoyed mine topped with Greek yogurt.

Cake + Yogurt

The cake was pretty moist, but I think that making it with pumpkin instead of applesauce would make it even more moist. I’ll definitely be making this again soon!

The protein cake kind of reminded me of the five minute chocolate mug cake, but about a bazillion times healthier.

Protein Cake

Ingredients

• 1/2 scoop protein powder (15g)
• 1 egg white
• 1 tbsp. cocoa powder
• 1/4 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tbsp. pumpkin or applesauce

*Note: April’s recipe calls for2 packets of Stevia, but I omitted this since I used a flavored protein powder.

Directions

In a microwavable mug, combine all the ingredients and stir well until you have a thick batter. Microwave for 60 to 70 seconds.

Loosen the edges of the cake with a knife, pop it out of the mug and enjoy!

Workout

My workout today was pretty decent.

I started with a 10 minute warm up on the elliptical before taking a 30 minute spinning class. After spinning, I still wanted to read more of the latest issue of Cooking Light, so I hopped back on the elliptical for another 20 minutes while folding down every other page in the magazine to mark good lookin’ recipes.

My legs are feeling a little sore today, so I followed up my cardio workout with five minutes of stretching.

You wouldn’t want to see pictures of me stretching since I’m sure it’s highly unattractive, so here are two pictures of Sadie gettin’ her stretch on this morning.

Sadie's Morning Stretch

Ahhh, Feels Good

She’s such a little yogini. 😉

Sadie Turns the Big 0-2

Happy birthday to Sadie!!!

Today is Sadie’s second birthday. Look how teeny she used to be!

Sleepy Sadie

Puppy Sadie

Smiling Sadie

Easter 2008

Picture overload, I know. I just love my lil’ puppers so darn much.

Do you celebrate your pet’s birthday?

In honor of Sadie’s birthday, I thought I’d share a few fun facts about her with you:

• Sadie is 34 pounds, about 10 pounds smaller than the average female vizsla.
• Sadie’s favorite toy is a stuffed pig named Pig Pig and she knows it by name.
• Sadie loves lakes and jumping off my parents’ boat into the water… but is afraid of pools and waves at the beach.
• Sadie can run 6+ miles and still want to keep running.
• Sadie is a cuddler and must be touching some part of you whenever she’s sitting or laying down.
• Sadie has very stinky gas.
• Ryan and I always forgot to work on Sadie’s tricks before puppy training class and would teach them to her five minutes before class. Luckily, she always remembered!
• Sadie was featured on The Daily Puppy.
• Sadie won the 2009 Baldwin Park Doggie Derby (description below).

(Please excuse the following ode to Sadie…)

Sadie’s actually quite a famous dog. Well, not really, but she did win the Baldwin Park Doggie Derby last year.

Doggie Derby Victory, May 2009

Someone at the dog park told us about the doggie derby on a Friday afternoon because he saw how crazy and fast Sadie was when she was running around at the park. The derby took place that Saturday and the entry fee was $15 and all the proceeds went to a charity. It sounded like a neat event, so we signed up that evening and headed out for the derby the next morning.

To participate in the derby, one owner stands at the start line, while the other stands at the finish line. Sadie is extremely owner-motivated, and this worked to our advantage. Vizslas in general are known as velcro dogs and Sadie definitely is one. She doesn’t understand the concept of personal space. The minute I started walking away from Ryan when he was holding Sadie at the start line, she was ready to take off! When he let her go, she shot out like a mad dog for the finish line!

First, she shocked us by winning her weight class (middle weight), and then she shocked us once again by beating out approximately 100 other dogs to win the overall competition. She got a trophy and everything! Ryan and I were proud puppy parents. Sadie was even mentioned in the Orlando Sentinel newspaper! It was the proudest day of her life. 😉

And that concludes my Sadie love fest (for now…).

Workout

At today’s BodyPump class, the normal Wednesday instructor was out sick, so another teacher took her place. Fortunately I really liked the man who replaced my go-to instructor, and I had a great workout. He selected songs from a variety of BodyPump tracks, which kept me really interested. I love not knowing what to expect in BodyPump!

After class, I did 25 minutes of light cardio on the adaptive motion trainer while reading the latest issue of Shape.

Adaptive Motion Trainer

Have any of you ever tried the adaptive motion trainer?

It’s definitely funky at first, but I like it a lot once I find my rhythm. It’s a nice alternative to the elliptical.

Breakfast

Breakfast today was a chocolate explosion! I am loving cocoa oatmeal lately and cooked up a creamy batch this morning.

I started with steel cut oats and stirred in one scoop of All the Whey chocolate peanut butter cup protein powder and a tablespoon of cocoa powder.

Cocoa Powder + Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup Protein Powder

Cocoa Oatmeal

I enjoyed my cocoa oats with a hot tumbler full of my gym’s free Barnie’s cinnamon butter cookie coffee.

Wednesday's Breakfast

Deeeelish!