Big Day for the Little Guy

This morning was a big one for our little buddy.

Before heading into work, I made a stop at our vet’s office to drop Telli off to be neutered! Poor little guy had no idea what he was in for when I told him we were going for a car ride.

He clung to me like a bad habit while the vet’s assistant was trying to take him from me. He doesn’t like me that much on a regular day but this morning I was apparently his BFF!

I’m hoping that surgery goes well and that he will be back to his normal self when I pick him up tomorrow. It’s his first night away from home (besides being at my parents’ house), I hope he doesn’t get homesick!

Workout

Planning out my workout schedule for the week was successful on day one! I was up and ready when my 5:10 a.m. alarm went off and hit the gym for 20 minutes of cardio and full body strength training.

Cardio:

In each Tabata, the 20-10 cycle was repeated 8 times for a total of 4 minutes per.

Strength & Toning:

I repeated this circuit 3 times through with reps of 12 for each exercise.

I repeated this circuit 2 times through with reps of 10 for each exercise.

Breakfast

Pancakes…again…sorry. Actually, I’m not sorry because they are so delicious.

Today’s were blackberry protein instead of banana.

Fresh blackberries and syrup on top.

Yum!

Question:

Do you plan your workouts for the week in advance? Does it help you hold true to your schedule better?

Sunday Scramble

I’m finally settling in for some down time after quite the busy day. Since I last was here, I’ve had a jam packed day that was extremely productive. Double bonus!

Workout

Prior to running around crazy for the day, I spent 32 minutes on the treadmill doing an interval run with a cool down to cover 3.5 miles in total.

After my last .5 mile interval, I had covered the 3 miles in 25 minutes.  I’ll take it!

Post workout, I was all over the place – Best Buy, Target, Giant, my parents, my kitchen, organizing closets, doing laundry, setting up my new kindle touch 3G (yes! Kindle is was!)…you name it, I was doing it!

I actually was so busy that I never even got hungry for lunch and finally realized at 3:30 p.m. that I maybe should snack on something. You know I’m busy if I forget to get hungry!! 😉

Finally it was time to have a real meal and dinner was in the works.

Dinner

I took care of my grocery shopping today and did a little meal planning for the week to make sure that I take advantage of the fresh food in my fridge. One of my meals for later in the week calls for 1 lb. of ground turkey, however, the package that I bought weighed in at 1.25 lbs, which meant that I had to plan to use that extra turkey in another meal.

Enter tonight’s dinner. Turkey cheese burger with balsamic vinegar ketchup.

If you haven’t tried this ketchup, you need to. Look, even the burger was drooling for it! 😉

On the side I had leftover kale from last night’s dinner…

and freshly made Greek potato salad.

More to come on that *healthy* potato salad later!

After dinner, before I let myself fully relax, I sat down and mapped out some workouts for the upcoming week.

I have really been missing my weekly workout schedules. I find that when I have them in place prior to the week, I do a better job of getting up early in the morning and making it to gym. Knowing what I’m planning on for my workout and how much time I need gives me that little boost to get my booty moving!

So in order to keep myself on track this week and to make sure I get quality workouts in for my body, I put together my Monday to Sunday schedule.

Weekly Workout Schedule

• Monday – 20 minute sprint workout, full body lifting
• Tuesday – 3 mile run, 30 Day Shred
• Wednesday – 3 mile run, Body Flow class
• Thursday – 4 mile run
• Friday – 3 mile run, upper body workout
• Saturday – 5 mile run, core workout
• Sunday – Body Flow class

I’m already excited to get to the gym tomorrow morning!

Now that I have a full belly, an almost empty to-do list and a workout schedule for the week, I’m settling in for down time on the couch with the pup! Have a great Sunday night, everyone!

Question:

Did you have a busy or relaxing Sunday?

Have you tried balsamic vinegar ketchup?

Looking Forward to Lunch

All morning I couldn’t wait to get to lunch time!

Why?

Well, duh!  I love food and look forward to pretty much every meal or snack that I eat every day!

Oh, you mean besides that?

Ah, ok.  That would be because I had the two leftover pieces of last night’s pesto pizza to enjoy.

So fresh and yummy

I paired the pizza with a banana to complete the meal.

Just can't compete

However, the banana definitely paled in comparison to the pizza.

I savored every. last. bite. of both pieces.

You will be seeing this pizza again my friends!

********************

As I mentioned this morning, today was my last day of my “taking it easy” workout week.  I seriously can’t wait to get back into a heavier workout schedule but I’m going to be careful not to over do it right off the bat and end up feeling run down and exhausted again.

Weekly Workout Schedule:

• Monday – 1 mile run with BoMF, 3 mile run after, Jillian Michaels Six Pack Abs
• it’s the first day for some new members of the BoMF group so we all are running their first mile as one group!
• Tuesday – 3 mile run, Group Power class
• Wednesday – BoMF run, additional run to get to 7 miles, Jillian Michaels Six Pack Abs
• Thursday – 4 mile run, Core and Arm/Leg Circuits
• Friday – 3 mile run, Jillian Michaels Six Pack Abs
• Saturday – 10 mile run
• Sunday – OFF

Off for the second half of the day at work before its time to celebrate my Mom!!! 🙂

Round 3 – Weekly Workout Schedule

Keeping with those April goals, it’s time for the weekly workout schedule.

• Monday – Run 3 miles, Core Circuit
• Tuesday – Run 5 miles, Group Power class
• Wednesday – Day 1 of BoMF, Run total of 7 miles, Core Circuit
• Thursday – Run 4 miles, Group Power class
• Friday – Yoga
• Saturday – Run 9-11 miles, Upper Body Free Weights, Core Circuit
• Sunday – Off

Speaking of April goals…a quick mid-month check-in:

1. Continue to work on limiting my post dinner snacking.  This has been going so-so.  I started off strong and have gone downhill since.  However, today’s check-in is giving me new motivation to really get on the ball with sticking to this goal.
2. Make a workout schedule at the beginning of each week.  Check!  I’ve done this every week for April so far and have found that it’s been a great way to keep me on track with what I want to accomplish in my workouts each day/week.
3. Have at least one post per week have a “feature” topic.  Fail.  I did one for the first week of April and did not do one last week!  I will, however, get my feature posts back up and running this week!  Food for Thought – issue #2!
4. Make the winter to summer wardrobe change.  This has not completely happened yet but I have been eyeing up what clothes/shoes need to be packed up to make the switch.  All in all, good thing I didn’t do this just yet since my spur of the moment trip to Syracuse this weekend warranted some sweater wearing – come on now, it’s APRIL!

Lunch

Lunch today was a cinnamon spice Alternative Bagel sandwich.

Between the bagel:

• 2 oz. deli ham
• 1 slice pepperjack cheese
• 1 tbsp. raspberry jelly
• spinach

Ham Bagel-wich

On the side:

• Everything bagel pretzels.

Lunch

Can ya tell I’m trying my hardest to finish this bag off.  It looks pretty small from the outside but apparently it’s never ending…

I also enjoyed a pack of Dole apple fruit bites after I cleaned my plate!

I grabbed some snacks to bring back to work for the afternoon before leaving the apartment.

Stinger Protein Bar and Animal Crackers…

Afternoon Snacks

And a pack of Fuji Apple Crisps.  I came across these at Wegman’s last night and picked up a few flavors to try!  I was impressed that the ingredients list is made up of one thing, Freeze-Dried Fuji Apples – no additives or preservatives.  Can’t beat that!

Crisps

Hopefully they taste as good as they are good for you! 🙂

As for now, it’s back to work until 7pm and then it’s workout time.  Totally prefer my morning workouts and would definitely bag today’s altogether if I didn’t already schedule it at the start of this post.

Be impressed please.  I could have easily scrolled up and edited, “Monday – Run 3 miles, Core Circuit” to read, “Monday – Off”…but I didn’t.  And I’m holding to it.

Getting an extra night with Brian makes it worth the extra effort to get the workout in tonight.