Very Berry Red Smoothie and Weekend Recap

I am always making new smoothie concoctions.  They are so yummy, and it feels like I am having a "treat" when I drink them.  I made this one up and really loved how it turned out.  To make it such a rich, red color I used grape juice for the liquid.  You could swap out grape for pomegranate juice if you don't like the grape flavor.   When I made it I was worried that the grape flavor would overpower the rest of the flavors, but it didn't.  I have a bunch of fresh peaches and so I peeled one and dumped it in.   I loved the end result, and will definitely make it again!

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cup frozen strawberries

1/3 cup frozen blueberries

1 cup of 100% grape juice (secret ingredient)

2-4 Ice cubes

Instructions:

Blend until smooth.  Add more ice, if you want it thicker.

Brandon had Friday off, so we had a nice three day weekend.  I love when that happens. I didn't run on Friday or Saturday.  We spent those days cleaning the house and getting ready for our yard sale, so I didn't have time to run.  I did my long run for the week on Sunday morning.  

When I woke up I decided to weigh myself before I got dressed for my run.  So I weighed myself without any clothes on and after I used the restroom.  I weighed 144.3 pounds.  When I got back from my run I thought, hey I should weigh myself again for kicks and giggles.  So before I hopped in the shower I weighed again and I was 143.4 pounds.   I lost a whole pound.  I'm pretty sure something was off, because that just isn't possible.  Is it?  

Anyways,  like always I started out pretty slow the first couple miles.  I was actually feeling pretty good during most the run.  Then I hit 3.5 miles, and I hit a wall.  I wanted to stop so badly.  I wanted to just walk the last mile home.  I was about to have a meltdown.  I really thought I was going to just burst into tears and lose it.  But I didn't.  I kept repeating in my head, "I can do this."  It was by far the hardest run so far mentally.   It's like my mind is telling me there is no way I could possibly run any further.  But I pushed through it and I made it.  

I didn't die.

I wanted to.

But I didn't.

Sunday was our 7 year anniversary.  I can't believe how time passes so quickly! 

We didn't do anything huge to celebrate, we just spent the day at home relaxing.  My husband made me  one of my favorite things for breakfast.  Breakfast burritos.  YUM.  Yes we ate on our finest china. (paper plates)  I love breakfast burritos, they are so yummy and so filling.  I could eat them for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  We also baked up some cookies and had hot cookies over vanilla ice cream.  I may or may not have went back for seconds.  I have a really bad sweet tooth and would rather have dessert than dinner any day of the week.  It's my weakness.  I just can't say no to dessert. It's not possible. 

Just looking at those cookies now is really not helping my "smoothie cleanse" today.  Hopefully I survive today without killing somebody out of hunger.  I'll update how it went tomorrow. 

Change.

This quote applies to all aspects of life.  

I read this a few weeks ago and it really spoke to me.

Change.

People talk about wanting to change this or that so often, but when it really comes down to it they change nothing. 

Why?

 Are we so lazy that we would rather live with unhappiness in our life than really make an effort and change those things and be a happier more content person?

I feel like people make changes all the time.  But more times than not, they are just temporary.  I find that I constantly get stuck in the same patterns and routines and it's really hard to get out of them.  It's hard to really want that change.  It takes dedication and hard work to actually truly and completely change something for good.  And even then, a lot of the times we step back into those patterns again.
Why?
Because it's more comfortable?
  It takes less effort?
It allows us to be more lazy?
It's easier?

I feel like a lot of people just settle.  They settle for the mediocre life.  They have no excitement, no adventure.  They are alive, but they are not LIVING.  They are just going through the motions of everyday life.  We live a life full of excuses.

We don't have the time.
We don't have enough money.
We don't have the resources.

If something is truly important to you, you will find the time and resources to do it.  You will make a CHANGE in order to do it.

We can do hard things.  We can push ourselves farther than we ever thought.  We can change our attitudes, our minds, and our lives.

We just have to make the decision to try.

30 Day Shred....and Random Bits...

For some reason I thought it would be fun to start this yesterday:

I just followed the YouTube video here.

I watched it first all the way through yesterday morning, and thought it didn't look too hard. 

Well it sucked.  Right after, my legs were jelly.  I could barely walk down the stairs.  It really kicked my butt! Supposedly you are supposed to start level one and do it for 10 days and then move on to level two and so forth.  I don't know if I'll buy the dvd yet, but I'm going to try to do level one for ten days and see where I'm at.   

The nice thing about it is that it is only about 25 minutes long and you are constantly moving.  There are no rest periods at all.  So it's over quickly.  I made my husband do it with me, and he was also sweating by the time we were done.   

I'll update my progress as I go....

This little super hero was being such a cutie the other day....I put her brother's cape on her and she loved having it on.  She is just like her big sister and thinks she's already a big girl and loves to copy her big brother and sister.  :) 

Charlie's newest fascination right now are cowboy boots.  Or in this case cowgirl boots.  He loves wearing his big sister's boots.  I really need to get him some, I just hate spending the money on such nice boots when he will grow out of them so quickly! 

Onto a new recipe I just tried from Pinterest:

I've been wanting to test these tasty little things out for a while now.  I love hot dogs and I especially love a good corn dog.  I made them for me my kids and they absolutely loved them.  I ended up changing the recipe a little because I thought it called for too much sugar and also had to add in a little more milk because the batter was so thick I could barely scoop it.  

Here is the link the recipe.  

Mini Corn Dog Muffins

I would definitely make these again, but maybe next time use larger hot dog pieces or cut them into smaller cubes and just add them to the batter.  Overall it was a great recipe and one that everyone enjoyed!

Running fail and baked italian chicken

I was supposed to run three miles yesterday. 

That didn't happen. 

It was stormy so I had to run on the treadmill.  I made it like 1.3 miles and then my knees started to hurt.  So I slowed it down to a brisk walk and they were still hurting.  I toughed it out and ran in intervals of running/walking so that it wouldn't be as bad.  

I finally stopped at 2.3 miles. 

I felt awful afterwards. 

Usually I feel like I can conquer the world after working out, but tonight I just felt thoroughly exhausted.

I have a couple of ideas of why I had such a hard time.

1. I didn't sleep at all the night before.

2. I am not consuming enough calories.

3. I am not quite used to treadmill running.

4. I had a bad attitude going into the run.

5. I was already really tired to begin with. 

I have never really had knee pain when running before.  I have had pain in the arches of my feet and in my heels, but never in my knees.  They just ache.  

I hope it's nothing serious. 

I took some ibuprofen and am going to try to take it easy tomorrow.  Hopefully it's just soreness and not something serious. 

I have no idea why it's so hard for me to run on my treadmill.  I feel like the pace I go outside and the pace on the treadmill are completely different.  I feel like I can't keep up on the treadmill and that even though it's the same pace I'm running outside it feels way faster.  

My other issue is how much to eat in a day.  I feel like I'm always hungry on the days I run.  I always try to have a post-run snack and I eat three meals a day plus two snacks in between, but I am still hungry.  I think I need to up my calories.  I think that's why I am feeling so tired all of a sudden.  I'm going to try to increase my calories and see what happens.  

This whole counting calories is kind of stressful and I kind of hate it.  I would really just like to eat whatever I want (in moderation of course) and not worry about going over calories.

Onto what I ate for dinner last night:

I pretty much just threw whatever I had in my fridge in this baked dish I made for dinner last night.
The chicken ended up being really moist and flavorful.  It was kind of an odds and ends meal last night.  With the chicken we had corn on the cob, green beans, and cottage cheese. I'm telling you I really need to do some major grocery shopping.  I was going to make some brown rice to go with it, but I got lazy and decided we could skip out on a starch for the meal.

Here's the recipe

Ingredients:

4 boneless skinless chicken breasts

3/4 cup of Kraft Balsamic Vinaigrette dressing. (I used the Lite version)

1 red pepper sliced

1 tomato sliced thinly

2 slices of provolone cheese

Parmesan cheese to sprinkle on at the end of baking.

Preheat oven to 350* Lightly grease (I used cooking spray) an oven-safe dish.  Place chicken in dish and pour dressing over chicken and thoroughly coat the chicken. Bake at 350* for 30 minutes or until chicken is just about done.  Place sliced tomatoes and peppers on chicken and top with sliced cheese. Continue to bake until chicken is cooked through. (about another 10 minutes) Take out of oven and cover with tin foil and let sit for about 5 minutes.  When ready to serve, sprinkle with parmesan cheese.

*You could substitute peppers with roasted red peppers and also sun dried tomatoes.

Facing Reality and Taco Chili

Saturday when we went on our little ice cream cone excursion, my husband and I thought it would be a good idea to find a 6 mile loop around our area that we could run for our 10k coming up at the end of August.  So we reset our mileage thing on our car (I have no idea what that's called) and started driving.    I started to become really worried when we hit mile four....I honestly couldn't believe how far that was and I actually ran four miles the other day! It's kind of amazing to see.  I then got more freaked out when we finished our 6 mile loop and realized that we are going to be running that far in just a few short weeks. 

I honestly can't believe I'm going to be running that far.   I know it may not seem like much to serious runners who are running 12-20 miles a day, but for someone like me who was basically a couch potato and now a few short months have passed I'm going to run 6.2 miles.   I don't want to sound prideful or anything, but I am freaking proud of myself! 

Thought this was cute :)

Anyways onto what I had for dinner last night:

The other day I was standing in my kitchen and I suddenly wanted it to be fall.  I was thinking of how good a bowl of soup sounded and cuddling on the couch with my hubby watching football.  I love fall, it's not too hot, the trees start changing colors, and life starts slowing down.  I kind of love it.  

So when I was watching the weather the other night and it said that it was only supposed to be 80 degrees in our area, I got a little too excited.  I decided that Taco Chili was on the menu and I didn't care if it was too hot, I wanted to make it! 

Whenever I make chili of any kind, I pretty much rummage through my canned food and dump in what I have.  It just so happens that I was feeling like taco chili, and I had all the ingredients in my pantry already.  Which is always a good thing! 

Here is is:

I like my Taco Chili a little on the spicy side, but not too spicy that my face is burning off.   Since I had some jalepenos in my produce drawer I thought they would be great to add to my chili.  Turns out it was a good decision.  It ended up being just a little spicy.  Just the way I like it.  Now,  my husband on the other hand likes things really spicy and likes to add Tobasco Sauce to everything.  Me? Not so much.  

Recipe:
1 Pound of Ground Beef
1 14 oz can of black beans-drained and rinsed
1  14 oz can of Kidney beans-drained and rinsed
2 cans of diced chilies
1  14 oz can of Diced Tomatoes
1 can of Corn-drained
1 package of Taco Seasoning
1 cup of Beef Broth
1 onion chopped
1 green pepper chopped
1 red pepper chopped
1 jalepeno pepper chopped
1 tablespoon of cumin

Instructions:
Brown ground beef in skillet with chopped onion until cooked.  Add meat and all other ingredients in crockpot and cook on low for 6-8 hours.  The mixture will be super thick, but as it cooks it makes it's own juices. But if you want it to be less thick then just add some more beef stock.  Serve with grated cheese and tortilla chips.

The best $1.49 I ever spent and what was I thinking?

Yesterday we promised our five year old a snow cone if she did all her chores and helped out with our deep cleaning yesterday.  She did all her work and did everything we asked.  So we packed up all the kids and went to Walmart first.  I only had like 4 things on my list, but I came out with a hundred less dollars in my account and more than 4 things.  Which pretty much happens every single time I go to that store. 

Anyways, I didn't have any cash in my wallet for a snow-cone so I convinced her we should go get ice cream cones instead.  I then remembered that I have been salivating over Wendy's Waffle Cones they have been advertising.

Like I said, it was the best $1.49 I have ever spent.  Here's why:
1. I love ice cream
2. I love waffle cones
3. I love sweet treats
4. I love ice cream
5.  Ice cream fixes everything

I think I inhaled that sucker faster than it took to order it.  After, I looked at my husband and said I could totally eat another one. :)

I know it wasn't gourmet ice cream or even probably a freshly made waffle cone, but in that moment it tasted amazing and I honestly could have probably downed three more!  It was definitely worth the 290 calories.

Now, sometimes I get into a mood where I want to organize everything.  Today I woke up and was in that mood. My husband was not happy with me. He wanted to just relax all day long and do absolutely nothing.  I however had different plans:

I decided that we have enough crap, I mean awesome stuff to have a yard sale.  So I started in my craft/sewing/junk/ room and started to go through boxes.  I then moved to our storage room and started to go through boxes.  I can't believe how much crap we acquire in such a short amount of time.

 It's disgusting.
I don't want all this crap.

 We have like 4 container bins of just things from high school/mission/college crap.  Why do we save these things?  What's the purpose? I haven't looked at the stuff for 7 years, am I going to look at it in 7 more?  Probably not.  So why am I keeping it?

I honestly don't know.   Or maybe I do know.  I think we actually enjoy hauling it around every time we move! :)

I also have about 8 containers of just holiday decorations. I mean who really needs that many decorations?  I have decorations for pretty much every single holiday.  Once upon a time I used to be really good about putting out cute little things for every little holiday. I've got Christmas ornaments coming out my butt! (I just had to buy 17,000 boxes when they went on clearance)  I haven't gotten anything out since I put Christmas away in January.  So why am I saving all this stuff?

Again, I have no clue.

So, I am getting rid of a lot of stuff.  Things I haven't used for years, things I wont use ever again, things that are just taking up space, and things I could live without.

I am not going to turn into one of those hoarders you see on that TLC show.  If I haven't used it for the past year and it doesn't hold sentimental value.  It's going.

It kind of feels good to de-junk.

You should try it. :)

4 Miles and some randomness...

Slow and steady today.  I was scared to do 4 miles. I was really struggling the first two miles.  I don't know why, I just was tired. My legs hurt and I had a bad attitude.  At mile three I started to get into a better pace and mile four was the easiest mile.  Which is so weird.  I would think that your first mile or so would be easy, but for me it almost takes me two miles to get into a comfortable pace.  

We planted our first garden this year, since we actually are renting a home that has a yard.  It has been so much fun! I am probably a little too excited about the fact that we actually grew real vegetables, but I am stoked!  Here is what we picked the other day.  We let the zucchini get too big so it was a little tough, so I ended up grating it up and freezing it for zucchini bread.
Doesn't the pepper on the left look like an old grumpy man face?  Or am I just crazy?

Strawberries are my favorite fruit to eat in the summertime. They are so sweet and refreshing, I really can't get enough of them! When they went on sale at my local grocery store, I kind of went overboard and bought 10 pounds.  

{Yes, our countertops really are that ugly blue.  Fortunately, we are renting this house and so I don't have to live with them forever!}

I like to cut the tops off and then freeze them in quart size freezer bags.  It is WAY cheaper to do this  yourself than it is to buy frozen strawberries at the store.  I also do this with blueberries when they go on sale.  They both freeze great and last forever! 

My next order of randommess is my new favorite song that I have on my running playlist.  We went to the Goo Goo Dolls/Matchbox 20 concert in Vegas and had an awesome time.  My favorite song from the whole show was this one:

I am in love with this song and I really can't get enough of it.  It is such a cute and romantic song.  I really love the lyrics.    Here are some random pics of us at the concert:

{Me, Jess, Emily, Katie}