Green Monster

I came out of hibernation today. It seems that my hibernation was a little premature being that it reached 45 degrees outside. I also had a lot of worthwhile places to be.

After a filling breakfast of eggs and toast, I hit the trail for a ~4 mile run. The air was damp but the weather was warm. I kept having to remind myself that it was December 8th! There is nothing more refreshing after a run than a Green Smoothie…

Especially this time of year when greens are replaced with holiday sweets!

This morning’s blend included:

Kale

1 cup almond milk

1 banana

1/4 cup oats

Frozen mango (whatever was left in the bag)

Ice cubes

I’m still getting used to how powerful my new blender is. It’s incredible how quickly everything comes together. My old blender had to be 8 years old which is pretty ancient in terms of kitchen gadgets. I grabbed my smoothie, and the BOY and I headed out the door for our biannual dentist visit. It was a happy visit for both! Look Mom…no cavities!

On the way back we stopped for lunch.

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It was the first meal the BOY and I have had together in a few days, so it was nice to sit and catch up for bit before heading our separate ways. The BOY was off to the library (1 final down, 3 more to go), and I was back here for a facial.

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This was a HUGE treat and I walked out almost 2 hours later literally glowing! Clean teeth…clean skin…what a day! I swung by Whole Foods and then Target before making my way back home to return to hibernation.

Can you guess what I am doing this weekend?

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And No, the BOY and I didn’t break up…ha ha!

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I stocked up on sugar, chocolate, more sugar, butter, and flour for Sunday’s Bake-a-thon which I am SUPER excited for!

1 Trip to Target = 3 Full Bags of baking goodness!

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I walked in the door, unpacked my goodies and gave the BOY the hand off to get started on dinner. I picked up the food and he was in charge of cooking it.

My jobs…pouring the wine!

And making this simple seasonal dessert.

Dinner was ready (yummy shrimp fajitas!), and the BOY and I sat down to watch the DVRed Indiana Basketball game.

There’s definitely something nice about fast forwarding through the commercials and getting to replay all of the acrobatic dunks. After a busy day, it feels great to be back home in hibernation mode with the BOY. But I can’t stay up too late because I have a busy day of baking with my Mom ahead of me.

Happy Hanukkah!

I think that we are all striving to find some balance in our lives. Each day deciding between the things that you have to do and those that you want to do. Balancing friends and family, work and social lives. Every day is a challenge to find the perfect balance that keeps each of us sane and in a good place. For everybody this is different. I have found that time outside of work to exercise, bake, socialize, etc. keeps me passionate and focused while I am at work. For this reason, I make time for ‘ME’ activities and with my 4 day work schedule, it usually leaves one day during the week to play and focus on myself (and then blog about it).

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Over the summer, my work/play scale typically gets shifted in the direction of work. We have a lot of fun programs (aquatic therapy and a sports/fitness group) that keep me busy and require extra time. I love these activities and am thrilled to participate, but it makes carving out time for tri training or friends a little more challenging. Because of that, I was happy to discover this morning that my office was closed another day since we are still without power, although equally saddened for those families that have not yet had their power restored.

With a WHOLE DAY of ‘found time’, I knew exactly what I needed to kick start my day. So after a slightly chaotic morning of touching base with coworkers and calling families, plus getting the BOY out the door for work, I grabbed my yoga mat, new awesome yoga towel and headed to a HOT YOGA class at Tribalance Yoga. I was pleased to find that Joy was teaching this morning’s class and knew that I was in for a killer workout.

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We began the class seated and Joy encouraged us to take the next 90 minutes to focus on ourselves…to leave other obligations outside of the room. I set the intention for my practice towards inner strength and balance and allowed only positive thoughts throughout the class. I sometimes find myself comparing or criticizing my body in the mirror instead of praising it for its physical and emotional strength and flexibility. What I like about HOT YOGA and specifically Joy’s class is that she focuses a lot on core work. I sweat like crazy and worked deep into the poses. I left feeling great about myself and thrilled to know that the entire day was ahead of me.

Feeling super healthy, I was craving a green smoothie. At home, I found that my greens were getting slightly wilted. I washed them off and used some Chard (stems and all) as the base of my smoothie. I added mixed berries, Greek yogurt for protein, skim milk, and mango. I really do think I am getting better at cutting mangos!

With the fear of wilted greens, I think I got a little carried away and used too much Chard. After a taste test, I added in ice and some more mango making a wonderfully refreshing, although completely odd sounding, FRUITY GREEN MONSTER.