refocused.

hey guys!

i have had a bit of a hard time focusing on regular exercise and clean eating lately. i think this is due to a few things:

• i felt under the weather last week and workouts were not in the cards.. plus i was super grumpy! hormones? maybe.
• marshall had the whole week off work last week so i decided not going to the gym at all and eating dessert with him was a good idea.. every day.
• the majority of my co-workers had the whole week off last week, so it didn’t feel like a real work week, it felt like it was still the holidays. and i acted like it.

i woke up today refocused and full of good intentions. my stocked pantry and fridge definitely helped fuel the motivation fire. the fact that i will be on the beaches of mexico in less than three weeks is another reason to refocus and get back to regular meals & moves. although, despite the crappy habits as of late, i still feel ready to go as is.

breakfast was enjoyed while watching the snow fall outside. i <3 snow and don’t care what you haters say.. i hope it snows thirteen feet this week!

1 cup plain chobani greek yogurt, the last of my nature’s path ancient grains granola & a dollup of skippy natural peanut butter.

i know i said i need to switch up my breakfasts, but this one is so good and so filling! i am going to aim to have a different breakfast every day this week, though. mark my words!

lunch was eaten while browsing the interwebs. here are a couple things that caught my eye..

these mugs were featured on my owl barn today.

(source.)

um, who doesn’t want to find a cute little animal hiding in their mug?! i need these. at least the owl one, if not all three critters.

(source.)

i also came across this website called blog2print.

so cool.. you can turn your blog into a book! i think this would be a great thing to do. granted, i would probably have to break it into a few books because i have so many posts.. but it would be fun to have meals & moves on hard copy to pass down to my kids. that is, if i ever have them. if not, i can pass the books down to penny and randy.

the website lets you generate what your book would look like. i played around with it and it’s really neat. it does all the work for you! although printing out all of my posts could get really pricey.

i also will be doing this with my things i see photo blog at the end of the year. i can’t wait to have a book of 365 photos from 2011!

where was i? oh, yeah, right.. lunch.

turkey + laughing cow blue cheese + spicy honey mustard + salad greens on whole wheat. and steamed veggies.

sometimes convenience trumps price and i give in and buy the bird’s eye steamfresh veggies. now is one of those times. the bags were on sale the other day for $2 a pop. the bag says it is 4 servings, but in all reality it is two servings.. so $1 for a serving of veggies isn’t bad! not bad at all, when all you have to do is pop the bag into the microwave.

work went by incredibly fast today, and since i was so focused on getting my gallon of water in, i wasn’t too hungry when snack time rolled around. it is amazing what a belly full of water can do for your appetite.

i did eat my snack, of course, because i need to keep that metabolism pumping. (i just typed “pumpkin” three times in a row and had to keep backspacing before i got “pumping” right.. geez!)

two clementines + a muscle milk

more carb heavy than usual since the muscle milk already has carbs.. but i am addicted to clementines! i can’t go a day without eating a few of these little guys. plus, in my opinion, i think carbs from fruit are OK to be a little heavy on. i mean, it’s fruit!

since i haven’t been working out at all lately, i don’t have much of a schedule going on. i was pretty open to any sort of exercise so i just did what i wanted. here are the details:

treadmill.

time	speed (MPH)	incline (%)
1 min	6.0	0.0
1 min	6.5	0.0
1 min	7.0	0.0
1 min	6.5	0.0
1 min	6.0	0.0
90 seconds	6.5	5.0
30 seconds	4.0	5.0
90 seconds	6.5	5.0
30 seconds	4.0	5.0
90 seconds	6.5	5.0
30 seconds	4.0	5.0
90 seconds	6.5	5.0
30 seconds	4.0	5.0
90 seconds	6.5	5.0
30 seconds	4.0	5.0
90 seconds	6.5	5.0
30 seconds	4.0	5.0
90 seconds	6.5	5.0
30 seconds	4.0	5.0
90 seconds	6.5	5.0
30 seconds	4.0	5.0
90 seconds	6.5	5.0
30 seconds	4.0	5.0
90 seconds	6.5	5.0
30 seconds	4.0	5.0
1 minute	6.0	0.0
1 minute	6,5	0.0
1 minute	7.0	0.0
1 minute	6.5	0.0
1 minute	6.0	0.0
2 minutes	2.0	0.0

this is kind of random, but as you can see, i warmed up with 5 minutes of various speeds at no incline, then for 20 minutes i ramped up to 5% incline and did 90 seconds of running/30 seconds of walking fast. i finished up with another 5 minutes no incline (same speeds as the first 5 minutes) and then cooled down for a couple  minutes. i went a little over three miles.

i finished my workout with 10 minutes of stretching. getting closer to touching those toes every day!

like i told you guys yesterday, on the menu for tonight’s dinner was chicken enchiladas.

i never follow a recipe for enchiladas, but some of you said you can’t wait for the recipe.. so i will share what i did tonight!

ingredients:

• 16 oz chicken breast tenders
• 1 (10 oz) can rotel
• 1 (7 oz) can diced green chiles
• 2 (10 oz) cans green enchilada sauce
• 1 bunch fresh cilantro, chopped
• 1 cup shredded cheese (monterey jack & cheddar blend)
• 6 whole wheat tortillas

to make them, i first poached the chicken in a bit of low sodium chicken broth. i find that either boiling or poaching chicken (as opposed to baking or pan frying) makes it easier to shred. it retains more moisture.

after the chicken was cooked through, i shredded it and then combined it with the rest of the ingredients (except for the tortillas, of course). i reserved a bit of the cheese and the sauce for the topping.

i filled the tortillas with a bit of the mixture and then tightly rolled each enchilada before placing into an oven safe baking dish.

once they were all rolled up nice and tight, i topped the enchiladas with the remaining cheese and sauce.

i covered the dish with foil and baked at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes. i uncovered them for the tail end of cooking so the cheese could get nice and bubbly.

i had a one enchilada serving and marshall had a two enchilada serving. i topped mine with salsa and oikos greek yogurt.

for a little extra fiber, flavor and fun (and alliteration, apparently) i served the enchiladas with a side of black beans.

i <3 mexican food.

i am slowly but surely getting better at scaling back my recipe sizes. we do like leftovers in our house, but since it is just marshall & i, i try to not cook for a small army. lord knows i grocery shop for a small army…

i made just enough enchiladas for us to eat for dinner and have two leftover portions, one enchilada for me and two enchiladas for the mister.

i am now diligently working on filling out thank you cards. oh, speaking of..

thanks for liking my thank yous!

some of you told me how much you liked my thank you cards after i posted this photo the other day.

we took the photo with the signs on our wedding day. it was actually an accident that we had the signs backwards at first, but it was funny and marshall really wanted to use the mess up photo. my maid of honor, kristen, made the signs for us. i love them!

i wanted the photo transformed into a postcard so i wouldn’t have to deal with envelopes. smart, eh?

lucky for me, i know someone who is in the card bizz. chances are, you do, too! lisa’s mom (from i’m an okie) has a card making business. if you are ever in the market for cards, you need to check her out at winning photography solutions. she does amazing work and her prices are very reasonable! thanks, denise!

welp, this is long, so i will letcha go now. see you tomorrow!

Qs~

1. do you prefer to follow a recipe (whether it be your own or someone else’s) or just make it up as you go?

2. any cool things you have seen in internet land lately that you’d like to share with the class?

xo. janetha g.