sweetie pie

screw flowers - this is the bouquet I want!

 

Whenever I'm told that I can't have something, it's like pushing that 1 thing to the forefront of my mind. It's all I can think about. I'll obsess over it. It's currently happening. All I can think about is some delicious, decadent dessert. Zach keeps informing me that it will be worth it come May 27, but I'm skeptical. I really like anything sweet. My mind is filled with ice cream (waffle cone wednesday with mint chip & cookies and cream or, mmmm a hot fudge sundae), scotcharoos (made by my future aunt), and a strawberry shortcake. O. MY. GOODNESS. Delish! I am sorry if anyone is trying to avoid sweets like the plague; I'm sure that this post didn't help. My deliciousness today was honey covered strawberries. It was good, but did not satisfy my sweet tooth. Looks like I'll be visiting Elana's Pantry tomorrow to make something yummy and sweet. Hopefully, Zach doesn't complain too much. ha.

She's a Brick....wall.

Well hells bells. I ran head first into a huge, solid brick wall today. I don't know if it's the changing seasons or the fact that the wedding countdown is flirting with 50, but I hit it. Hard. I had a melt down of seemingly epic proportions. I have been working out fairly consistently since January. My diet has been relatively on point (minus a little chocolate here and there). My body hasn't changed in the least, in my eyes. Granted, I feel much better and have tons more energy - hard to believe, I know. HOWEVER, I am sleeping horribly and am currently gaining those precious #s that I thought I would be losing like crazy. I get that I'm lifting heavy sh!t so my body is gaining muscle. That's all well and good, except I have a number in my head that I wanted to weigh for the wedding. Turns out, working out the way I do, that was is unrealistic. I'm ok with this as long as I loose inches on my waist. BUT I'M NOT. I don't see any change in my body from the beginning of the year. This, as it turns out, is incredibly disappointing. It all came to a head while trying on dresses for a bachelorette party deal thing. I don't really like the way any of the dresses look on my body; either my boobs are too big, the dress makes me look preggers, or all I can see in the mirror is  things I want to change. Fail.

So I freaked out a little today. Ok, fine. I'm not going to be this goal weight (probably ever). I could get there, but I'd have to eat nothing but grilled chicken, egg whites, and a crap ton of veggies and run a bajillion miles everyday: ie, hate my life. Everyone knows I despise running. Plus, I really enjoy trying new foods. Even more than new foods, I love eating classics like my momma's chicken parm or a delicious hot fudge sundae. So I decided something today. If I am not going to be at this unrealistic goal weight, I'm going to give myself a little more leeway in my diet. Don't get me wrong, most days of the week, I'll still have a home cooked meal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. However, if I'm craving ice cream, I might just indulge - just not as frequently as I'd like.

All that being said, we just finished a delicious meal, if I do say so myself. I got the recipe (Salmon Kabayaki) from Elana's Pantry. If you have yet to visit her site, do it. It's gluten free and she's brilliant. I have made so many of her dishes. She has a lot of great desserts as well. Which, if you are like me, trying to find a "healthy" dessert is a nearly impossible, but necessary, task. These are all the ingredients I used (minus salt and pepper).

The original recipe calls for ume plum vinegar; since I didn't have that, I used plain white vinegar and added a little salt. My only piece of advice is to make sure you pat the salmon down really well before adding it to the pan. I had a little incident with the smoke detector and flying hot oil. For the cauliflower, I just cut it up, threw olive oil, salt, and pepper on it and threw it in the oven. (the drink was my dessert tonight: strawberry vodka, strawberry sparkling water, and a strawberry. delish!) Here's how it turned out:

I really enjoyed dinner tonight. It was relatively simple and the salmon only took a total of 4 minutes to cook. Can't get much better than that after getting a power snatch pr!

cheers!

Food, food, food

This is one of the meals I've made recently. I found the recipe from Real Simple (one of my favorite magazines!). It is slow cooked pork roast, red peppers, snap peas, and noodles. It was amazing and really easy. We've also been making more of an effort to drink red wine with dinner, as you can see. I have been making more dishes from cook books so we don't get bored with the same meals every week. Although, ZachR could have the exact same thing for every meal, every day.

With 2 months to go till the wedding, we are really trying to be smart about what we eat. No fast food, no soda, no desserts. Should be simple enough; its always easier when there is an end in sight. The hardest times will be when we are vacationing in AZ and our bachelor/bachelorette party.

Other than that, things have been pretty boring. Since I started a new job, it's been harder to get into the gym. However, now it is more important than ever to work out.

cheers.

cfo.m.g.

It's an odd feeling being back in the gym after so long. There are so many new faces! It is still a weird adjustment, but I'm back. I love how I feel after a strength day, even if I didn't hit the weight I wanted to. I love how I have to lay on the ground for 5 minutes after a met-con because it kicked my ass. I love comparing my times/weights to the other fitters to see how I'm doing. Most of all, I love what it does to my body. Even if my diet isn't on point, I am not gaining weight. I have a goal weight in mind for the wedding that I would love to achieve, however unlikely. Luckily, I have an extremely helpful boyfriend  fiance who wants me to succeed.

The diet has been easier lately than usual. We don't keep any crap in the house. I feel like I am cheating when I eat a LaraBar. The worst thing I eat on a usual basis is cereal or oatmeal 3 days a week. I don't want to raise my cholesterol too much by eating eggs every morning. Grilling season is right around the corner so I'll have a few nights off of cooking each week. I splurge a little on the weekends, but nothing too crazy. I didn't have ice cream for over 1 month; for those of you who don't know, that is a HUGE feat for me.

All in all, things are going really well. I am consistently going to the gym at least 3 days a week, although shooting for 5. I love what I've been doing in the kitchen. Finding new recipes is the best! I'll try and remember to post more of what I'm cooking, which recently included bacon wrapped shrimp and paleo meatloaf.

Cheers.

I'm Baaaaack!

Yet again, I am back to posting. I have been gone for so long because I haven't been working out at all and have been eating like absolute sh!t. It was pretty awesome. However, we are just a few months out from the wedding, so I am getting back to the grind so I don't fill out the dress as opposed to getting it brought in. ha.

So, we started the wedding diet on Monday. At first, I wanted to go strict paleo for a few months then just eat smart till the wedding. HOWEVER, for me to do well with any sort of diet, I can't do strict anything. I need to eat better quality food for most meals and indulge every once and a while. (For example, I had chinese food and ice cream on Thursday. It was delicious!) I have had a bunch of spinach salads. We need to get back into the swing of cooking most days of the week. Since I don't have a job, I am hoping that cooking dinner moves up on my priority list. It's gone pretty well. I am working really hard on not eating too much fruit, as I usually do.

I also started working out again. Started being the key word. My goal is to go at least 4 times each week. That doesn't sound that hard, but I have a real problem being motivated to get my ass there. I got there 3 times this week: Monday, Friday, and Saturday. I get so sore that it's hard for me to move much the day after a workout, hence the 3 day break. This will diminish as I continue to get into the gym, I know. I'm just kind of a weiner when it comes to sore muscles.

I keep looking at my wedding dress on a size 0 model as my inspiration. I don't want to crap out in March. I am going to work out consistently till the wedding, at least. I am going to eat better (smarter) for the last few months of planning. If nothing else, I have a goal in mind and a date which it needs to be met. Here's hopin!

mmm...

I haven't posted in a while. We have had some pretty amazing meals these last few weeks. I made Paleo French Toast. Yup, you heard right. I made coconut bread and then made it into french toast. Delish (the bacon just added to the amazing yumminess!). The bread itself was a little dry, so I need to experiment with a few different strategies to make it taste better; Zach has yet to complain about me tweaking a recipe that he already likes. I found the recipe on tasty paleo - a site ZachR stumbled on. It's great. They have all kinds of good stuff on there. I will make all kinds of new fun stuff.

One of these recent nights past, we had a grilling bonanza! I stopped at HyVee because we forgot to thaw any meat that day (rare occurance). I know HyVee doesn't have the highest quality meat/ingredients, but we REALLY enjoyed this dinner. We grilled up 2 pork chops and 2 turkey breasts wrapped in bacon along with farm fresh zucchini. It was amazing!! I wish I would have bought more meat so I didn't have to stop eating. mmm.

Then, there was the 4th of July weekend. Talk about a crap-shoot! We ate everything in front of us. Paleo was the furthest thing from our minds. Delicious scotcharoos, brownies, cookies, booze, ice cream - you name it, we inhaled it! It was a nice break from Zach's typical strict Paleo mindset. We both had a good indulgence, and now he's back on track. I, however, am too stressed and have too odd of hours to be doing strict Paleo; also, I don't like it. My body doesn't do well without some milk. I can continue to cook Paleo foods for Zach to keep him happy, though. I'll just sneak in a tortilla or chocolate milk every now and again!

I'm Back, Bitches!

My Coconut Chicken Fingers

It's been a long while since I've posted on here. Between work (2 jobs), school, and not working out at CFO, there hasn't been much to update. However, I'm back. I am going to try and post on this more. I am still getting back into the swing of things when it comes to working out. However, ZachR and I started yet another Paleo Challenge. This one (for me) will be from June 4-July 24. I started after he did, well, restarted because I had a rough 1st week 1. I will finish before he does. My conference work with Special Olympics is over on July 24, and I will have a shit-show of a day. However, we are going to try to be 90/10 (at worst, 80/20) with Paleo until the wedding. This gives us three hundred forty something days to lean out to look as good as possible May 27 and June 5. (Two days because of the 2 parties: one in Vegas, one in Omaha.)

That being said, I am going to try to explore more recipes this time around. Part of the reason I didn't like Paleo so much on rd 1 was because I was eating the same meals over and over. I don't do as well with this as ZachR. He can eat the same thing for breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day, not I. I like a variety. I can have chicken every day for lunch, but I want it cooked differently. This means, I will have to find different ways to cook it.

I found some good websites with different recipes for all kinds of things. I found bison burgers at Wholner's grocery. Today, I made chicken fingers "breaded" with coconut and almond flour, cooked in coconut oil. It was delicious! It is one of my favorite things to eat - it's just time consuming to make. I am going to post a lot of different meals we have on here, for those of you who would like to try it. Enjoy!