Goodbye June...

{ clouds over Tampa Bay on June 18 ~ photo by me }

I'm baaaack! This month has been the lowest number of blog posts I've had in a looong time. Today was a good day! I got a massage with Margie first thing this morning. Picked up some of my healthy habits again. Ate pretty much all whole foods and I feel like I'm on the way back up. I did a few Basic Workouts, many a sets of Hoe Downs and applied some T-Tapp techniques throughout the day (shoulder rolls, curling my core, sitting and walking in alignment, etc, etc). I've been really needing more consistency with exercise this past month, but have been so busy. Anyway, I decided to do a 4-day boot camp using Tempo 2 (8 Reps). Today is day 2! A bit sore, but the massage helped a bunch.


Healthy Habits

Body Care
Body Brushing - check!
Oil Pulling - check! (Oil pulled while brushing this morning... multitasking!)
Salt Bath and Sauna - I miss you! We'll meet again soon.
Workout/Exercise - Tempo 2 (8 Reps)... Boot Camp Day 2!

Nourishment
Fruits - check! 2 servings today.
Veggies - check! 5 servings today.
Water - check!

Supplements
Alfalfa: 6 caps
Emergen-C: 1 packet
Natural Calm - Raspberry Lemon: 2 tsp
Vitamin D3: 4 sprays


Eats

Brekkie

Yummy Purple Monster.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup frozen wild blueberries
• 1 frozen banana
• 2 cups fresh spinach
  
• 1 1/4 cup original Almond Breeze
• 1/4 cup Chobani 0% plain Greek yogurt

Boiled Egg with sea salt.

Lunch

Crispers Spinach Salad.

A bit too much cheese and bacon for me, plus I'm not really down with the crispy Ramen topper. The Light Ranch dressing was delish! I ate about 1 Tbsp.


Dinner

Black Beans and Brown Rice with fresh spinach, onion and garlic.

Yesterday...

Healthy Habits

Body Care
Body Brushing - check!
Oil Pulling - check!
Workout/Exercise - Tempo 2 (8 Reps)... Boot Camp Day 1!

Nourishment
Fruits - check! 1.5 servings today.
Veggies - check! 5 servings today.
Water - check!

Supplements
Alfalfa: 6 caps
Emergen-C: 1 packet


Eats

Brekkie

Yummy Purple Monster. (Same recipe as today's with less banana and milk.)

Hot organic green tea... and a Starbucks Grande Nonfat Vanilla Latte.

Lunch

Boiled Eggs and Salad... plus a few bites of that Ezekiel wrap.

Post-workout "snack"???

(Let's just call it that!)

I just had to try these... Chocolate Lucky Charms with original Almond Breeze.

They were good, but not enough marshmallows and I prefer the regular ones anyway.

And this one too... gosh, guess I was hungry!

Can you tell that cheap-o cereals were BOGO @ the store?

Dinner

1/2 of this Stuffed Pepper with Cabot 50% Reduced Fat Cheddar.

Au revoir!

Gettin' My Health Groove On!

Playing catch up again... ended up falling asleep before I could blog last night. Oops!

I've realized that for me to be happy in life I have to feel good in my body. When my body hurts it really impacts my daily activities. Doing healthy things for myself in turn make me a happy woman. Making the time for giving my body what it needs is vital to my well being. For example, here are some of the things that my body currently needs on a regular basis: the quality of consistent T-Tapp movement, alkaline water, organic God-made whole foods, weekly sauna sessions, body brushing, enough sleep, the proper supplements and a balance between work and play. I'm sure there are more, but that's all it's demanding from me right now... and that's a lot to keep up with!

There are times when we get so busy in life that we let those signals (or warning signs) from our body fade away as we attend to more important matters. For me that always results in running out of energy or wearing myself down even faster. If I take time out of my busy day to do a few of the important things on my body's to-do list, the other things seem to fall into place naturally.

The moral of this story is to tune into your body and find out what it's asking for. More veggies? More water? A nice afternoon nap? A few sets of Hoe Downs? A walk around the block? Take a little time for yourself each day to do something healthy for your body. And remember that what you do today helps you get closer to your goals tomorrow... and you'll feel better doing it!


Tuesday, May 18th

Healthy Habits

Body Care
Body Brushing - check!
Oil Pulling - check!
Exercise - Primary Back Stretch before brushing.

Nourishment
Fruits - 2 servings today.
Veggies - 3 servings today.
Water - check!

Supplements
Alfalfa: 6 caps
B-12 Plus: 8 sprays
Vitamin D3: 8 sprays


Eats

Brekkie

Jamba Juice! I shared a shot of wheatgrass with Marcel. He loved it too! Then drank almost half of the smoothie I ordered... Protein Berry Workout. I discovered that I do NOT like the taste of the whey protein they use. Yuck! The aftertaste and smell were hardly bearable... and it ended up in the trash. I had a few sips of Marcel's all-fruit smoothie, which was pretty yummy.

{ sorry no photo}

Lunch

Wolfgang Puck's Lentil Veggie Soup.

Has to be the grossest photo ever, but the soup actually tasted delicious for a canned soup!

And an Iced Grande Nonfat Vanilla Latte.

I drink these so much lately they need their own acronym: IGNVL!

Dinner

Chobani with Cascadian Farms Hearty Morning Cereal and Frozen Blueberries.

Wednesday, May 19th

Healthy Habits

Body Care
Body Brushing - check!
Oil Pulling - check!
Sauna - check! Yay, for sauna time. My body really needed it. Feeling SO much better!
Workout - check! Tempo Lower Body Standing. Got a great workout, then had to run out for about an hour to jump my dad's car.

Nourishment
Fruits - check! 1 servings today.
Veggies - check! 6 servings today.
Water - check!

Supplements
Alfalfa: 6 caps
Pyruvyl Glycine: 12 sprays
Vitamin D3: 8 sprays


Eats

Brekkie

IGNVL (see above).

Got my Lifefactory Bottle in the mail!!! Isn't it cute?!
Eco-friendly, on sale and stylish... can't beat that.

Jen brought in her blender today and we made purple green monsters!

• Fresh spinach
• Frozen organic cherries and blueberries
• Original Almond Breeze
• Stonyfield Farms Vanilla Yogurt
• MILA
  

Just what I needed!


Ava and La stopped by for a quick minute and I just had to snap a photo.

She's so adorable!

Lunch

Amy's Spinach Pizza Pocket Sandwich and sliced Cucumber with Garlic Hummus.

And... Iced Tall Nonfat Vanilla Latte #2

Dinner

Leftover Buffalo Wild Wings and Broccoli.

Post-workout Snack

Chobani 0% Vanilla Yogurt.

Well, good night friends...

Au revoir!

Rainy Monday

Tampa Airport... 4 airlines on the blue side and all the others are red. What happened?

It started pouring this morning... I mean really coming down. Ordering Starbucks in the drive-thru left me and my car soaked. The weather cleared up by the afternoon and the Florida sun was shining again.

Today was pretty uneventful, except that Marcel came home!!! A week without him was kinda strange... I kept busy, but at times didn't know what to do with myself.


My horoscope for today:

It's a good time to start a new exercise regimen -- or to intensify the one you already follow. Your physical energy is just right for making a positive difference in your health in some new way.

Healthy Habits

Body Care
Body Brushing - check!
Oil Pulling - check!
Workout/Exercise - check! Primary Back Stretch this morning.

Nourishment
No fruit today!
Veggies - 1 serving today, that's just sad.
Water - check!

Supplements
Alfalfa: 6 caps
B-12 Plus: 8 sprays


Eats

Brekkie

Starbucks Iced Grande Nonfat Vanilla Latte and a (less than) Perfect Oatmeal with a little brown sugar and nut medley.

Lunch

Leftover Scallops Penne.

I ♥ leftovers!

Then I tried this out...

Tastes like a creamsicle!

Dinner

Buffalo Wild Wings Naked Tenders with Fries.

As I was eating this I really just wanted some broccoli... this whole lack of fruits and veggie in my diet is killing me. Tomorrow I will go shopping for green monster ingredients and easy veggie meals. Missing my kitchen.

Au revoir!

{ weekend } Besties & Beach Bunnies

Me & Lolly

Friday, May 14th

Well my friends, the weekend is finally here! I am super excited about hanging out with Lolly for the next few days. It's been forever since we had best friend time together.


Healthy Habits

Body Care
Body Brushing - check!
Oil Pulling - check!
Workout/Exercise - check! Well, just Hoe Downs.

Nourishment
No fruit today.
Veggies - check! 3 servings today.
Water - check!

Supplements
Alfalfa: 6 caps
B-12 Plus: 8 sprays
Pyruvyl Glycine: 4 sprays
Vitamin D3: 4 sprays


Eats

Brekkie

Starbucks Egg White Turkey Bacon Whole-grain Sandwich and a Iced Grande Nonfat Vanilla Latte.

Actually will never order breakfast like this from Starbucks again. SO not worth it, but I wasn't feeling up to a wheatgrass detox. AND I really miss the spinach on egg and cheese sandwiches.

I really need to get over my Starbucks addiction... again!


Dessert

Lolly baked some cute little cupcakes! She calls them Neapolitan Cupcake Sandwiches. And they are gluten-free!

Lunch

Leftover Panang Chicken with Brown Rice from Ban Thai.

Dinner

Lolly made me dinner... it was delicious!

Cool Cucumber Sandwich.

Something about the combination of cool cucumber, tomatoes and crispy bacon on whole grain bread... it's mouth-watering.

Drinks

La's Rose Colored Glasses Drink.

Every girl needs a signature drink named after her!

Then we headed to The 8th Avenue Pub to hang out for the rest of the evening.

Yes, this is my "go anywhere" dress!

I tried some other kind of beer, but ended up starting off with a classic Yuengling.

And then another Yuengling, then a Blue Moon.

We headed back to Lolly's after that and were excited about our beach day in the morning.


Saturday, May 15th
Beach days. Sun rays. Blue skies. Dragon flies.

Healthy Habits

Body Care
I pretty much skipped everything... but I re-applied my sunscreen about 4 times and didn't get burnt at all.

Nourishment
No fruit today.
Veggies - check! 4 servings today.
Water - check!

Supplements
Alfalfa: 6 caps


Eats

Brekkie

Iced Coffee (cream/sugar), Pancakes, Eggs and Bacon from the Venus Restaurant in Largo on the way to the beach.

To DIE for! Topped with some syrup and ate a little more than half.


Eh, I ate a few bites of eggs and 1 slice of bacon.

The beach was no less than amazing. Sand Key Beach has a lot of shells in the sand. It's not as powdery white as Clearwater or St. Pete Beach. But the traffic was minimal and we found parking easily. The skies were clear (except for those pesky man-made lines) with a strong breeze.

The only bad thing was the dragon flies everywhere!!! They were HUGE.


Mike caught a dragon fly on his hand. He sat there for a few minutes.

I did not want to leave the beach... I think I could have stayed until the sun went down just lounging in the sand, swimming in the salty water and soaking up the rays. We're going to try to go again next Saturday too.

Lunch

Picnic Chicken Pita + added romaine. Oh and there was a margarita on the rocks somewhere in there as well... with lots of rocks!

Recipe Review!!

This one is a keeper. I never would have thought about mixing broccoli with chicken, cheese and bacon and then stuffing it in a sandwich. It was delicious and La had it ready in 20 minutes flat.

After picking up Roxy and recouping from the beach (a day in the Florida sun takes a lot out of you) I met up with Caroline and Logan, her new baby. He is a heart breaker already! SO friggin' cute!!!

Dinner

Shared this Greek Salad and Hummus and Pita with Caroline.

Dessert

1/2 of this Chocolate Baklava.

And a bite of Caroline's Tiramisu.

Then I headed over to Matty & Vally's place to help them pack up a few things for their move. They just bought the most spectacular home in Safety Harbor. It's a very exciting time. I am so happy for them!

Later, I did have 1/2 a glass of wine and a few more bites of a Picnic Chicken Pita sandwich before heading back to my Dad's to turn in for the night.


Sunday, May 16th

First thing of the day was to get in a real workout... and then run some of those errands I've been putting off. I got my car cleaned (boy, did it need it) and bought 4 brand new tires (it rides SO much better now). Of course it started raining as soon as I got to the tire place with a sparkling clean car! I finished up the rest of my errands (returns and exchanges) then came home for an excellent dinner.

Roxy went everywhere with me... and only barked a few times. She's such a great little traveler!

Healthy Habits

Body Care
Body Brushing - check!
Oil Pulling - check!
Workout/Exercise - check! I did a Basic Workout from Maxi Max #1 then the floor portion for about a 45 minute workout.

Nourishment
Fruits - check! 3 servings today.
Veggies - check! 5 servings today.
Water - check!

Supplements
Alfalfa: 6 caps


Eats

Latte

Starbucks Grande Nonfat Vanilla Latte.

Also drank a Venti Iced Green Tea (unsweet).


Lunch

Wendy's Mandarin Chicken Salad (minus the dressing).

Dinner

Scallops Penne with Basil and Spinach, plus Greek Salad.

Delish!

And two glasses of red wine...

Not at once... the other one is my dad's.

It was a fabulous weekend! Looking forward to Marcel coming home tomorrow after work. I can't wait to see him and give him a big hug.

Au revoir!

P.S. I might actually make it to bed before 11pm tonight! Shocker.