Friday, July 22, 2011

The Mean Reds

I’ve decided to take a break… I will be back in a couple weeks but right now my hearts not in blogging. I’m going through some stuff right now, and just can’t find anything to blog about without being whiny or complaining or just depressing.

What I’ve got is a serious case of the Mean Reds.

If you’ve ever seen Breakfast at Tiffany’s you will get what I mean, if not here’s a clip for you:

Part of my solution to get rid of the Mean Red’s? Watch this and many other movies like it – they always make me feel better.
Oh, and some quality time with Brandon too Smile with tongue out

For now, I guess I will “see”  you later! (I will still be reading all of your blogs though for sure!)

xox

Sunday, July 17, 2011

She finally decided to show up!

Hey!

Sorry I have been a little MIA for the past few days. I have a good explanation though!

Wednesday night/Thursday morning, this little one decided to make an appearance:

Julianne and I

Introducing my newest niece Julianne!

So for the past few days I have been no where near my computer. It’s been sleep, work, and going over to help my sister out. She also just moved on Friday (when she planned the move she thought she would have had the baby a little while before but of course she was overdue) so she needed help taking care of her girls and unpacking.

I’ve gotta say, it was so hard leaving them at the end of the day. I lived with my sister when she had my first niece Vanessa so I was spoiled with being able to see her so much! Luckily my sister is only a short drive away (but a long annoying bus ride!) so as soon as I can get a car I can visit a whole lot more.

I’ll be back later with a normal post! Smile

xox

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Daily Eats - July 12, 2011

 

Hello!

How’s your day going so far?

Mine was pretty standard, I worked 11-7 so it kind of ate up most of my day. I can not WAIT until I have a job with normal hours. I keep putting out resumes but so far no luck. I really thought I would have found something by now, but I think I was being a little too optimistic. I’m not giving up though, or letting it get to me. I just have to keep trying and I know eventually I will find something. My new personal deadline/goal date is by the end of August. I feel like that’s a good mix of optimism/realism!

Until then, I just need to keep working on my interview preparation. Like thinking of good answers for questions like this:

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Now for what I ate today!

Breakfast: Slice of w.w toast with basil, little bit of old cheddar and an egg on top

Snack: Quaker Fibre and Omega-3 Blueberry, Almond and Vanilla granola bar.

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Lunch: Salad and a diet Dr. Pepper (I was craving it soooo badly, I tried to ignore it but my water just wasn’t cutting it)

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     (Excuse the blurry picture, I took it quickly with my BlackberrySmile with tongue out)

The salad had: baby spinach, red peppers, cucumber, mushrooms and chickpeas with a homemade dijon vinaigrette that I found a recipe for on YumSugar.

The vinaigrette recipe is:

2 cloves of garlic, minced
1/2 tbsp dijon mustard
1 tbsp lemon juice
3 tbsp olive oil
salt & pepper to taste

The recipe suggests adding parmesan cheese too which I think I might try next time. I really loved this vinaigrette and think it is easily going to become a regular one for me! So easy to make and so good!

Snack: Bowl of frozen berries (raspberries, blueberries, blackberries and a couple of strawberries)

Supper: Two pieces of w.w. toast with peanut butter. My stomach was feeling super off and that was the only thing it would tolerate. Just thinking about anything else made me feel even more queasy. Sad smile

Snack: A small bowl of popcorn!

 

Now it’s time for bed!

xoxo!

Monday, July 11, 2011

Switchin’ it up!

Hiiii!

If you’ve been reading along, you might be wondering why I gave up on my original 5K training plan and started from scratch with the Couch to 5K program last week.

The short answer is: I really hated it.

I know, that seems harsh. But I really tried to give it a shot (twice!) but I just couldn’t get into it. The main two reasons were that it started out too much too soon (ummm I’m a brand spankin’ new runner who sucks at it. Sure lets just start running for 5 minutes when you have never ran before!) and it was in miles. Being in miles wasn’t that big of a deal, nothing Google maps/converter couldn’t fix for me, but it was a headache trying to make sure I figured it all out before I went to the gym. If I forgot to work it out before I left I was kind of screwed once I got there.

Basically, it was frustrating and a hassle.

Couch to 5K however is MUCH better. It’s time based (so it doesn’t matter if it is km’s or miles), easy peasy to remember, and it ease you in a little slower than the other plan.
I am in week 2 and so far I am loving it! Just enough of a challengeSmile

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I have been obsessed with iced coffee lately. Seriously, McDonalds has me hooked with their “only a dollar, alllll summer” iced coffees. And yes, I sing that whenever I ask Brandon to get me one Smile with tongue outI finally started making them at home, but realized I really don’t have many containers that I can keep
my coffee in in the fridge. So I got creative and decided to use an old tupperware container. Hey , it works!

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              (Splenda French Vanilla for coffee thingy, coffee and milk)

After my coffee, it was time to get ready to meet my momma for our lunch date! It was my day off, and since she gets an hour and half for lunch we decided to go for a little picnic lunch and do some window shopping downtown.

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It was crazy hot and windy so I decided it would probably be best to braid my bangs back. I am slowly getting better at it! Thank goodness, because my bangs are at that awful awkward length and combined with the heat = a not so cute Meaghan.

Even though I brought my camera, the only picture I managed to take was of the park I was at while waiting for the bus to go home!

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After our visit, I went home for a lazy afternoon – I caught up on Big Brother (even though I am ADDICTED to spoilers so I knew what was going to happen anyway) and just relaxed. \

I was in a bit of a funk all afternoon, so after supper I decided to walk to the library and pick up my copy of The Happiness Project.

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After being on the waitlist for almost 3 months it was finally my turn to read the book. I guess that’s the “cost” of waiting to read it for free instead of buying it. Oh well, I’m just happy I can finally read it. I have heard such good things about it!

Now I am just waiting for The Bachelorette to come on, and for Brandon to come home from work.

Hope you all had a great Monday!

xox

Sunday, July 10, 2011

Lazy Post

Working the night shift this week has been awful for trying to stay on schedule for blogging! As soon as I get in the door all I want to do is crash, and that includes tonight. Hopefully tonight is my last night shift for a while!

I am going to keep tonight’s post light on words, with a couple pictures of the highlights of the last few days. I’m too tired to put much more effort in that that

My eats have been pretty good overall the past few days, but I had little to no will power when it came to sweets this week (damn hormones!). I tried to keep them in moderation as much as I could and I’m not beating myself up too much about my indulgences because I know I did really well with everything else. I even finished my first week of Couch to 5K. (Which reminds me, my explanation of why I switched is coming tomorrow)

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        Smoothies are always better in a wine glass!

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Open-faced tuna sandwich – I always seem to eat these and tuna melts a lot during the summer

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Had my niece for a visit, we made brownies and she was quality control Smile with tongue out

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Brandon and I went to Crystal Crescent Beach – it was a perfect morning at the beach!

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                                                  Gorgeous! Smile

Goodnight!

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Winning!

Dontcha just love free things? Especially when you win them?

The other day on Facebook I noticed my local mall had a contest on to promote the new stores opening up this summer. Normally I ignore these but I decided to give it a shot. They had three t-shirts in a picture and you had to tag yourself in the one you thought was from one of the new stores. Apparently I was one of the people who picked the right one and my name was entered in a draw and I won! I thought it was for the t-shirt itself but it turns out it was for a mall gift card for the price of the t-shirt . Which I suppose makes sense, it’s a lot easier than having one of every size ready since they wouldn’t know what size I am.

I decided to look around the mall to see if I could find any good deals, and wow there were tons!
Who knew the end of the season was July ?

I finally settled on these shorts from Aeropostale - on sale for only $12 (regularly $39.95)!  Normally I avoid this store as it’s not my usual ‘style’ plus I find the sizes make me feel giant (definitely geared for younger shoppers) but they had some great sales and I really needed new shorts so I figured I’d give it a shot.

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I kind of maybe want to cut out the tag with the size on it. Even though I know their clothes run super small, it still sucks having to buy a size much larger than I am used to. Colleen from The Lunchbox Diaries did a great post on buying what fits, not what size you wish you were/want to be. I made sure to remember that while in the fitting room today.

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Daily eats (No pictures unfortunately) but here’s what I had:

Breakfast – two pieces of French toast (whole wheat toast, 1.5 eggs – well I used two but there was still a fair amount of egg left in the dish afterwards so that’s what I’m guessing I used) and I tried to go easy on the syrup. Not the healthiest I know but I had a crazy craving for it.

Lunch – California Roll made with brown rice and a Nature Valley granola bar

Snack – A pita with peanut butter and jelly all wrapped up

Supper – A piece of salmon with a cup of frozen veggies (broccoli, carrots and cauliflower) + a peach.

Not bad overall. We are running low on groceries so I’m trying to get creative with what we have left.

Monday, July 4, 2011

Canada Day Weekend & Visit with Dad!

Hey!

Sorry I was MIA all weekend. My dad was in town and stayed with us on Friday and Saturday night so I spent most of my weekend unplugged making the most of our time together.

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I probably won’t get out to see him again until this time next year!
Well, that’s if you don’t count Skype

Also, I didn’t formally keep a food log. Breakfast was healthy everyday, but the rest of it....well... I can basically sum it up with the following pictures:


“Those who like it, like it a lot”

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I had this incredible burger from Jack Astor’s Saturday for lunch with some sweet potato fries. I just looked up the stat’s on this burger. Ignorance was bliss my friends... I definitely won’t be ordering this again. It’s delicious, but not worth almost my total daily calorie allowance! *I’m not technically counting calories but I am trying to be conscious of them!

Today I tried to clean up my act a bit – after a weekend like that my body is craving healthy food!

I had my new favourite breakfast – Peanut butter toast with fruit and cinnamon on top. Today’s fruit was a peach:

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I had a late breakfast, so after the gym (where I started my first day of Couch to 5K – explanation to come later, but long story short I really hated the last program I tried) I grabbed a snack size Brazilian Thunder smoothie from Booster Juice and a S’mores Luna Bar as my post workout fuel/late lunch:

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Which I smuggled onto the bus Winking smile and let me tell you, it is not easy taking pictures while it’s moving!

I forgot to take pictures of my supper I packed for work but it was pretty basic – w.w pasta with marinara sauce and broccoli and cauliflower. I also had a Nature Valley Granola bar and another peach.

Overall, not a bad day! Working weird shifts, like 3-11, can really throw off my day if I don’t plan it right. I need to make sure to pack enough food if I go out before work and restructure my day if I slept in late. I can’t wait until I have a normal job with normal hours! It’ll be so much easier to plan my days! I am sick of shift work!

Do you work random hours/shift work? If so how do you plan out your day if your breaks and meal times don’t always match up?
How was your holiday weekend? Smile