I haven’t been around the past couple of days but there’s been a lot going on at work and at home. I was at an all day work retreat yesterday and by the time I got home my brain was fried. I had that I-just-took-the-SATs feeling.

Anyhow, here are a couple of highlights from the past few days in a nice organized list.

• I finally got my first Shamrock Shake of the season. This is the only thing I ever get at MickeyDs and omg it is so worth eating whatever it is made of.  I drank the whole thing in probably less than 10 minutes. oops… but I’m not sorry. SO GOOD.
  (source)
• Geisha has to wear an Elizabethan collar for 2 weeks. She’s been chewing on her paws and I took her to the vet on Wednesday. The vet took some fur samples to get analyzed but in the meantime she has to wear it so she wont chew or lick her paws. She looks so sad all the time, I really hate seeing her like that. I can’t wait until we can take it off of her.
• Yesterday I got in a 3.5 mile run with 2 miles at a faster pace. It felt good. I bet I looked super awesome wearing black capris, my black running vest, a grey shirt underneath and my bright pink shoes. Maybe I at least looked fast?
• At work today I’m getting a bunch of little, mundane, boring tasks done. You know how those add up so fast? After yesterdays work retreat, my brain still feels fried so I figured I would use today to take care of some things that have been hanging over my head for a while and get back to the real work on Monday after having the weekend to decompress.
• Speaking of this weekend, it’s going to be busy but fun, so I’m looking forward to it. Tonight I’m meeting a friend for dinner, tomorrow I’m going to a church retreat for the morning, and Sunday I’m going to be getting my doubly sweat on with a 5 mile run with my dad in the morning and a Zumbathon later in the day. My legs will be pretty tired by the time Sunday is over I think.

Nothing too exciting is going on here so I’ll keep this short.

Zumba last night was a lot of sweaty fun, as usual. Our instructor informed us that she’s actually teaching at a Zumbathon this weekend, on Sunday. After talking with a few people who are also interested, I think I’ve decided to go (two hours of Zumba for $5 – how could I not??) though this means both a 5 mile run and 2 hours of Zumba will be happening on Sunday. That should be interesting. Though at least my run will be first in the morning so I will be running on fresh legs, right? I hope I’m not completely crazy for doing this…

I’ve also had to adjust my workout schedule for the week based on a few other factors like taking Geisha to the vet (not for anything major), a meeting with our insurance company after work one day, etc.

I guess sometimes you can plan your workouts as much as you want but sometimes you have to adjust your schedule on a daily basis.

Monday – 3 miles
Tuesday – Zumba
Wednesday – Speedwork: 4 Mi, inc Warm; 2×1600 w/800 jogs; Cool
Thursday – Yoga?
Friday – rest
Saturday – rest
Sunday – 5 miles + Zumbathon

PS – I’m excited to take my bright pink shoes out for another spin this evening!

Yesterday I had some blood taken at the doctor so I didn’t feel like pushing myself through an intense heated yoga session. So instead I went for a three mile run. The weather was awesome outside – not too hot and not too cold. And now that the sun is staying up longer and longer I was actually able to see the ground I was running on.

I also wore my new shoes! Check out how bright pink these are!

They’re Saucony Kinvara 2s – I was previously running in the first version.

They really stood out with my black tights, haha. As soon as I put them on I realized how worn down my old pair are. It was like walking on clouds.

During my run my legs didn’t feel nearly as brick-like and I had no shin pain. It was all in all a pretty good run. Much better than yesterdays.

Dinner was simple last night – smart dogs with some steamer veggies on the side.

I spent the evening watching Revenge on Hulu.(source)

Is anyone else addicted to this show? I just got into it so I’m literally on episode 3 but I can’t wait to catch up and watch it in “real time”.

My updated workout schedule for the week:

Monday – 3 miles
Tuesday – Zumba
Wednesday – rest
Thursday – Speedwork: 4 Mi, inc Warm; 2×1600 w/800 jogs; Cool
Friday – Yoga
Saturday – rest
Sunday – 5 miles

I hope your weekend was fabulous!

We spent our weekend getting a lot of stuff done… including our taxes…. super exciting, I know, but I’m glad to just have them done. When you total all of what we owe and are owed together we come out about $50 bucks richer, which I guess is good but isn’t very exciting.

During the last week you may (or may not) have noticed that I never mentioned running. Well, I’m going to give a generic excuse. Life got in the way. It just… did. and I know I’m being vague here but it just happened. So my first run in about a week and a half was yesterday.

4 miles done and done.

You know what sucked though? my legs felt heavy and my shins started aching within the first mile. So I trudged through the four miles and got them done. But I seriously have to figure out what is making my legs feel so heavy lately. I thought taking some time off would help but it didn’t. so now I’m suspecting its my shoes. They have about 350 miles on them which is usually around when I have to switch them out. Luckily I have a new bright pink pair waiting in my closet. Here’s to a better run next time!

In other news, I have now tried all of the new Chobani flavors, and I’ve got to admit I’m not really a fan of any of them.

Apple Cinnamon

Blood Orange

Passion Fruit

I wanted to like them, I really did. But for some reason the apple cinnamon tasted weird to me when mixed with the flavor of greek yogurt, the blood orange seemed a little sweet and the passion fruit was too sweet for me (though I didn’t mind the seeds to be honest).

Oh well, you win some you lose some I guess.

I’ll probably be sticking with pineapple, mango, blueberry, strawberry and raspberry.

Here’s this weeks workout schedule:

Monday – Hot power yoga
Tuesday – Zumba
Wednesday – 3 miles
Thursday – rest
Friday – Speedwork: 4 Mi, inc Warm; 2×1600 w/800 jogs; Cool
Saturday – rest
Sunday – 5 miles

Have a good Monday. and if you’re off for presidents day today I am super jealous!

Things are getting out of hand.

Last weekend was the hubby and my moms birthdays. That means my grandma made cookies, pie and cake. We ended up with some of the leftovers.

Tuesday was Valentines day. My mom bought the hubby and I some valentines treats.

I like to bake, and in hinesight I STUPIDLY made some “smores bars” last weekend – they’re like rice krispie treats but with golden grahams, mini marshmellows and chocolate chips.

And my mom just texted me to tell me that our girl scout cookies came in.

This is just insane.

The current stockpile of sugar in our apartment consists of:
- 1 box chocolate covered macadamia nuts (from my brother in Hawaii)
- 1 peanut butter meltaway candy bar
- half a dozen chocolate chip cookies
- a few brownies
- a couple mint chocolate cookies
- maybe a dozen or so smores bars
- 2 slices of blueberry pie
- 3 pieces of chocolate cake with chocolate frosting
- a heart-shaped box of Russel Stover’s chocolates – luckily this is a small box, only 2 pieces are left.
- heart-shaped marshmallow peeps
- a bag of reeses hearts

and frankly, I’m sure there’s more than that.

and we’re going to get 3 boxes of girl scout cookies in the next few days.

Seriously, I think we need to stage an intervention or something.

I hate wasting food so I don’t want to throw it out, and it’s such a random conglomeration of sweets I’m not sure taking it into work would be appropriate.

but seriously, the hubby and I can’t eat all of that, and frankly we shouldn’t.

How was your Valentines Day/Tuesday? I hope you got to spend it just the way you wanted to, celebrating or not.

My morning started off with a smiley heart cookie at work. I freaking LOVE smiley cookies (from Eat N Park – a restaurant common around here). And because I’m so awesome I ate part of it before I even took a picture.

It definitely got me going on a sugar rush at about 8:30 in the morning.

Zumba was super sweaty, and it didn’t help I was still sore from yoga. The yoga instructor who I hate love made us do a lot of hip extensions.source

Oh it burned my booty. I’m still feeling it today.

When I got home from work the hubby had gotten me some gorgeous pink roses.We don’t normally really celebrate Valentine’s Day, but things have been stressful so it was nice to be surprised.

Dinner was pasta and roasted sprouts. After dinner I hopped in the shower quickly and then the hubby and I relaxed and watched hulu for a while.

Geisha fell asleep on my foot.

aww.

Anyhow, I’ve got a rest day today, mostly because I’ve got a little happy hour after work to go to.

Monday – Hot Power Yoga
Tuesday – Zumba
Wednesday – Rest
Thursday – 3 Mile run
Friday – 2 Mile Tempo Run with warm ups and cool down
Saturday – Rest
Sunday – 4 mile long run

Have a good Wednesday!

I hope your weekend was great and your week is off to a good start!

Our weekend was pretty low key. We spent Saturday at my parents place taking care of some miscellaneous things and doing a “first draft” of our taxes. Yesterday was spent being super lazy, with random bouts of productiveness here and there. It was a good mix of productivity and not doing anything. I like weekends like that.

Oh and I didn’t run or do any other type of sweating. I was thisclose to going to yoga yesterday morning and then decided against it, feeling like I should give myself a full week break from major exercise.

But it’s back to the grind today.

I spent some time getting together a plan for my next Half on May 6th and I’m ready to get back into it. I’ve incorporated some speed work too, because I really need it!  I’ll be running 3 days a week, and adding a 4th day around the end of March. Cross training will be a day of yoga and a day of Zumba.

I hope this plan will build my confidence and my speed, both of which I desperately need. I really play a lot of head games with myself when I run and it’s become more and more difficult to push through discomfort. I really need to get a handle on the negativity that goes through my head. And hopefully, starting at a low mileage for my long runs and slowly building up to 11 miles before the race will help with this. I try my hardest to be positive, but sometimes it just doesn’t happen. And the negative thinking really affects my performance when I run – a lot. I always say that running is seriously 90% mental for me.  It can make or break a run or race.

I’ve been building up my Work Outs pinboard on Pinterest with all things inspirational so that I have ideas I can go back to when the going gets tough.

Anyone else deal with negative thinking during exercise and have suggestions on how to push through it?

So, with all that said…

This weeks exercise plan:

Monday – Hot Power Yoga
Tuesday – Zumba
Wednesday – 3 mile run
Thursday – Strength?
Friday – 2 Mile Tempo Run with warm ups and cool down
Saturday – Rest
Sunday – 4 mile long run

Lets make it a good one!

and in the midst of it all I ended up taking a break – from blogging, and from running. I didn’t even look at my work out schedule this week. The only workout I did was Zumba on Tuesday since that’s a class I’ve paid for, and it’d be silly to miss it.

And I’m feeling great! I really needed the break I think. I wasn’t planning on it, but it just sort of happened and I’m really glad it did.

I’ve been putting a lot of pressure on myself over the past couple weeks to exercise enough, eat better, blog more consistently, etc. Frankly, it was making me completely stressed out, and this transferred to me just feeling unhappy and down.

This break was needed, and it was great. We all need that sometimes I think right?

I decided to get back into it this evening when I got an email that I was tagged in 11 things! So without further ado…

Thanks Kathy from Life, Really for tagging me!

The jist of 11 things is, post 11 random facts, answer the 11 questions from the blogger who tagged you, and then tag 11 more bloggers.

11 randoms about me:

1. I took dance lessons for 11 years through elementary, middle and high school.  I took mostly modern dance with some lyrics, ballet, jazz and hip hop mixed in. I LOVED it.
2. I never, ever, ever, ever, ever thought I would be a “runner.” Ever.
3. My husband and I met online. Thanks okcupid.com!
4. I actually enjoy doing laundry, though I wish it didn’t take as long as it does.
5. Very few TV shows or movies make me laugh out loud. The only ones that do are Friends and Modern Family.
6. The gingerbread house I made in December is still sitting on top of our TV stand. Whoops… I guess we should probably pitch it.
7. My favorite color is PINK!
8. Lately I can’t stand running on the treadmill. I didn’t use to mind it as much as I do now.
9. I don’t use credit cards and neither does the hubby. It was a decision we made when we got married.
10. I find grocery shopping cathartic.
11. I love buying my kitties toys when I go to a store that carries them. Usually they don’t even play with them.

1. What do you think is the most annoying blog trend? Yogurt messes with tons of stuff mixed in. I just don’t really get it. I like yogurt, I like it with granola sometimes. But I don’t really get adding oats, cereal fruit, chocolate chips, chia seeds, etc all mixed in as well.
2. What is one thing you wish you liked, but just don’t? Mushrooms. Yuck. But liking them would make food choices so much easier.
3. How long were you friends with your best childhood friend? Until she moved from town when we were in elementary school. We weren’t really friends for too long but we got close.
4. How many blogs do you read on a consistent basis? There are 50 in my google reader. Some are updated more frequently than others though.
5. What’s your favorite fro-yo topping? Fro-yo isn’t really a fad where I live yet, but I would imagine I would looove the oreo cookie pieces.
6. Did you go to college? If so, where and why that school? I did. I went to Juniata College in small town PA. I went there because I wanted to leave my hometown for school and I liked that it was a small school since my high school was huge. I also really liked that it is a liberal arts school because it forced me to take electives in a lot of areas of study, which I feel made me really well rounded. When I took the campus tour I loved the campus, and I knew it was where I wanted to go to school, and it was the only place I applied. Whew. that was a long answer haha.
7. What’s your all-time favorite TV show? Friends!
8. Did you have an invisible friend growing up? Not that I remember.
9. Is there any social media that you refuse to adopt? Foursquare. Its too creepy stalkerish for me.
10. What is one thing you see other people doing that makes you say, “You couldn’t pay me enough”? Eat meat. I really have no desire to. When I tell people I’m a vegetarian they always ask “but don’t you miss [insert food here]?” And honestly, no, I don’t.
11. What is the first thing you do when you get up in the morning? Check my phone to help me wake up.

I think a lot of people have already done this so I’m going to break the rules and just tag a fw folks. I’m tagging Girl Gone Veggie, Eat Live Run, Happily Ever After, and Just Call Me HaHa. And you ladies can just answer the same questions I did and then tag some folks.

Enjoy your weekend!!!

But first lets back up.

The groundhog day party was so fun, and our food was a huge success. For our food-shaped-like-an-animal we made Turtle Pizzas! We took some pre-made pizza dough and shaped it into small turtle shapes.

We covered the “shells” with the pizza sauce, mozzarella cheese and chopped green peppers. Then we put an olive sliced in half on the head for eyes

.We popped them in the oven and they came out so nicely!

They looked cute and tasted awesome too!

Yesterday was an amazing rest day on the exercise front. I needed a day off and it felt great to take one!

This morning I woke up and ran for an hour. I felt good and there were some great parts of the run where I definitely felt strong and a little bit fast.

After running and a shower I decided to bake another Pinterest find. Andes mint chocolate cookies. They go from looking like this…

To this!

YUM. They are so easy to make too (only four ingredients). They taste a little bit like thin mints but are super fluffy from the cake mix and thickness of the cookie.

Well, I’m off to watch some stuff on the DVR and relax!

Enjoy your Saturday!

And typically I’d do a Thankful Thursday but I think I’m going to start switching things up a bit. I felt like I Was falling into a rut with doing Thankfuls every Thursday, so I think I’m going to cut back to every other Thursday or Thursday when I feel in those reflective moods.

Today is not one of those days.

I woke up early and got a run in – I was super proud. I was thisclose to staying in bed when the alarm went off.  It was a little more chilly than yesterday – mid 30s, so it took a little longer to get dressed in tights and layers than it did yesterday. Anyhow, after my run I was REALLY looking forward to showering and putting on my  fluffy robe.

The hubby and I went on a cruise for part of our honeymoon in October 2010. On the cruise a “romance package” was gifted to us via our honeymoon registry. (Yes, I’m well aware that some people hate honeymoon registries whereas others think they’re a great idea. For us and for our circle of family/friends it worked great. That whole debate is another post for another time.) Anyhow, part of the romance package was two fluffy robes that we wore constantly on the cruise and got to take home with us.

The robes have been just kind of hanging in our bathroom for over a year, and I recently had a DUH moment when I got out of the shower one morning. I should wear my fluffy robe! Duh!

So every day since, when I run in the mornings, after my shower I put on my fluffy robe and wear it as I dry my hair and get ready. It’s something I actually really look forward too because its comfy, warm and brings back lots of memories from our honeymoon. It just makes me happy.

Sometimes it’s the little things right?

Anyhow, I’m super happy that I have a rest day tomorrow. My legs and whole body really need it I think. Wearing my compression sleeves yesterday seemed to help with the lead leg syndrome, but just in general I feel tired and lethargic.

Tonight we’re heading to the Groundhog Day party I’ve mentioned a few times. (By the way, I’m so annoyed with the whole six more weeks of winter thing. Grr) I’ll be sure to post some pictures tomorrow of our food shaped like an animal!

Planned workouts for the week
Monday – Hot Power Yoga
Tuesday – Zumba
Wednesday – 30 minute run
Thursday – 30 minute tempo run
Friday – Rest
Saturday – 7 miles
Sunday – Rest