Planting New Seeds

It’s that kind of point in life where I feel like everywhere I turn, I’m finding things sprouting up. New beginnings. Seeds that I hadn’t realized that I had planted coming to fruition.

While the herb seeds I planted today in the pots above haven’t come to fruition yet (they’ve got a while to go before they turn into green delicious things) other things have. I’m not quite ready to share everything about it yet, but just know that things are going to get rather awesome soon.

I’m signing up for Cassie over at Back to Her Roots’ Super Summer Challenge in an attempt to help myself shape up both my mind and body as the summer goes on.  My goals are to get my eating cleaned up, which will jump start my weight loss efforts when combined with my efforts to raise my level of activity.

Activity isn’t hard to find when constantly moving on my days off like I am. So much lifting, so much moving, so many stairs. And yes, that pertains to my awesome developments in life.

My bad habit of forgetting to eat on my days off is something I still struggle with. It hit about 2:30 PM today and I realized that I hadn’t actually eaten anything solid today, despite having been up since about 8 AM. It’s crazy how my body can “forget” that I need to eat when my usual work schedule is disrupted. On days that I work, if I go more than 10 minutes past my usual breakfast time and my tummy is rumbling like no one’s business, but on my days off it can go for hours before deciding to inform me (with rather disastrous effects of bottoming out blood sugar and the shakes) that I need to eat something.

Whoops.

At least I didn’t make my usual mistake of gorging myself when my stomach did wake up. Self control is a learned habit, and I think it’s finally catching on with me.

 

Oh hey, life.

I honestly didn’t think two weeks had gone by since I last posted. Guess the dates proved that wrong, huh?

Same thing where I didn’t think it had been two weeks since I really decided to get back on the wagon and control my eating habits and up my activity levels again. Especially since… to be honest, I haven’t done that until yesterday. I finally stepped on the scale and while I was grumpy at the number (it really is higher than I want it to be, even just maintaining) but at least the number wasn’t as high as I feared it would be.

Because man, I was afraid that it was going to be bad. I wouldn’t have been surprised. Because really, I’ve been half-assing my food choices. I would make good choices for maybe half the day, and then throw it all away on dinner and eat whatever I wanted. It means that my body has gotten used to having that big meal at the end of the day, and I’m starving by the time dinner rolls around.

All of that aside, I realized that I have given so much time for other people lately (not that I regret any of it, especially not the wedding planning, the apartment cleaning) that I had decided that my needs were secondary and I could let my priorities slide.

Until Cassie posted this photo, I was almost content to let it stay that way. Because if I’m focusing on other people and making their lives easier, I don’t have to look at the hard aspects of mine, right?

That can’t last, though. I can’t keep focusing on everyone else. I need to focus on myself. I need to do the things that make me feel my best, like eating well (clean, healthy, balanced if you need a ‘label’ that’s more specific than ‘well.’) and taking time to exercise and focus on myself. I realized that I had been doing so many things with other people that it had actually been weeks since Richard and I had a date that was just the two of us.

Don’t worry ,we solved that with going to see Star Trek together on Friday. I’m so glad he accepts, loves and finds my nerdy tendencies, haha.

But look how snazzy we looked at Emily’s wedding!

So now I’m back to life as I mean to live it. Good  thing there’s a learning curve, right?

And I promise there will be less than two weeks before my next post.

So now I’m a year older

But I don’t feel a single bit different.

That’s a lie.

I feel wonderful.

After pancakes at Cracker Barrel last Saturday, dinner with my parents (I always forget to take pictures with them), it came time for my real birthday on Sunday.

On which I hiked 5 miles with my very tolerant, even excited boyfriend. And we rocked the crap out of it. We did three different trails at Princess Place Preserve down in Flagler County that added up to the distance.

And I didn’t take a single picture with my phone, because I had made the decision to leave my phone in my bag in the car. Yep. Technology free (other than the ridiculously awesome GPS watch my parents got me for my birthday) and blissful. We talked. We counted blue tailed skinks. We enjoyed the wonderful weather. I talked him out of doing silly things. He talked me into doing silly things.

Then came dinner with my friends.

Psst… the two on the left are getting married on Friday and I’m a bridesmaid! The one on the right is their wedding photogapher! I love bringing my friends together for the greater good.

 

The picture of the other end of the table didn’t turn out properly, and that makes me sad. But know what picture did turn out?

 

So that’s my birthday. It was low key, but wonderful. Everything I wanted to do, I got to do. I was even surprised by how many people wanted to be a part of it (which is silly, I know).

After all the food of the weekend, I was beyond ready to get back into my normal eating pattern and make sure that I fit into my bridesmaid dress.

Fruits, veggies, and lean proteins. And pizza. And salt (because holy crap, I didn’t know i could crave salty things as much as I have lately. Jiminy Cricket.). But balancing with water (BECAUSE WE HAVE WORKING BATHROOMS AT WORK FOR THE FIRST TIME SINCE NOVEMBER) and getting my activity in when the weather allows it.

If you haven’t heard what the rain is like in north east Florida for the past few days, allow me to enlighten you.

Once again, that’s supposed to be a dry moat. And the sea is supposed to stay BEHIND the sea wall. Mmk?

It’s been pretty ridiculous, and almost makes me wish I had my gym membership still so I could go plug into a treadmill and get some miles… but not enough to make me really, really wish for it. Instead I just did indoor things and went to see Iron Man 3. Eeeee Tony Starke. Laughter is a great core workout, yeah?

Anything else I’ve missed over the past week?

Hm. I got my nails done for the wedding?

Having my nails done make me feel so silly and girly. I kinda love it.

It’s starting to rumble outside so I’m gonna log off and get some early shut eye. Have a great Cinco de Mayo, guys!

 

 

 

 

It’s my birthday weekend!

This week has been busy… I worked seven days straight to make it to the four days off I asked for this weekend to celebrate my birthday. By the end of the seventh day all I wanted to do was go for a really long walk and go to bed ridiculously early.

The walk got scrapped in favor of sitting at the dinner table for two hours as my nephew refused to finish his vegetables (the kids dish out their own plates – he hadn’t put that much on his plate, and he decided that he was going to sit there rather than finish it) and pinning a whole lot of gardening ideas on Pinterest for the vegetable garden I see in my future.

Yesterday I strapped on my rubber gloves and got down to cleaning in the apartment I’m hoping to be moving into soon. It’s attached to a friend of mine’s house and needs some TLC and sorting after it’s previous occupant (his mother lived there until her move to hospice and death, so it’s an emotional process) and I’m really kind of stupidly excited to be moving on to a sense of independence. Moose will love the stairs.

But that meant tackling one of the worst fridges I’ve ever seen.

You don’t want to know what I had to do to get the fridge to be white again. Unspeakable things.

But it’s worth it. So worth it.

I’m tackling the bathroom today as he sorts through closets and we chat about things like vegetable gardens and farmer’s markets.

And tonight Scuttered the Bruce plays in town (it must have been a special planning for my birthday, hahahahahahahahaha… I love coincidences!), tomorrow I’m planning on going to the Farmer’s Market that I never get to go to since it’s on a Saturday, maybe a trip to REI for my birthday present to myself, and have dinner with my parents for my birthday. Sunday… there’s no definite plans but it might involve a hike, a beach, a something, but then dinner with a big bunch of friends to celebrate my entering my 24th year.

All I can say is that somewhere in there, there better be a cupcake or two.

I’ll be back next week with a recap of the festivities!

Until then, enjoy this gem:

Happy weekend, guys!

Sometimes life just gets in the way.

When I say that my life has completely blown up lately, I’m not kidding. Tonight is the first night in over a week that I have actually just taken the time to be at home. I could be out dancing (honestly, activity-wise, I feel like I should be out dancing, but I refuse to dance out of a sense of guilt) but I decided that I really would just rather be home tonight.

Home in my yoga pants with a detoxifying mud mask on my face writing on my blog. TMI? Oh well, you’re the one who opened my blog.

Lately my food habits have been up and down, but mostly up.  Sometimes the “up” is in quantity, but the quality is still there. I have the acknowledged before that I have a bad habit of matching the people I’m around when I eat… which is a problem if I’m with, say, a male who works out far more regularly than I will and has a metabolism that burns a good third more calories than mine does just existing. Getting that under control requires a pretty constant mindfulness, but that’s what my relationship with food in general requires, a constant mindfulness. The checking in with my body of “Am I really hungry? Have I eaten enough? Does the sugar craving mean something else?” is something that I’m always going to have to do.

The main struggle is actually listening to what my body tells me, but that’s a topic for another day.

I have so many exciting things happening that are up in the air right now, and as soon as some of them settle down and become definite, hopefully my life will be more blogging friendly. Yesterday I caught myself saying that I’m not blogging as much because I’m “happier” now, but that’s not true — I didn’t start this blog because I was unhappy with myself, and I don’t only blog when I’m unhappy. Blogging helps me be happy, but being happy for me also means having less available time to blog.

It’s a blogger’s catch-22. Oh dear.

But here are some really amazing pictures that my friend Jessica took of my New Man Friend (ish. It’s going solid for a while now. And it’s amazing, thankyouverymuch) the other day as we wandered through downtow.

(here is where she catches me having a deep, soulful conversation with Moose’s mother and step siblings)

And where we prove that we’re goofballs.

And that, my friends, is all for now.

 

 

Ten Things Tuesday

Because my life is kind of generally moving along apace, and I like lists, I decided to make a list today.

So here are 10 things that I’ve done/liked/eaten lately!

1. Chipotle Shrimp Tacos from Mango Mango’s

Yeah, totally need to recreate those at home. So simple, so fresh, so freaking delicious. It’s almost summer, I need more seafood in my life.

2. Filled my shell jar

I’ve been working on filling this jar with shells for about a year or more. Some shells I already had and put in the jar when I got it, others I’ve been collecting on beach walks since then. I finally got to where I had to do a little shaking to get the lid to close.

3. Drank my weight in water

No, really. My hydration is kind of awesome lately… even if it means having to suffer a bit because I refuse to use the “temporary restrooms” (porta-potties) they have set up outside of work.

4. Rye Crisp Sandwiches for Lunch

I put everything from tuna salad (made simply with tuna, nonfat greek yogurt and salt and pepper) to deli turkey or ham onto the crackers and call it my sandwich for lunches. Super simple and easy to portion out ahead of time to grab. I’ve gotten in the habit of layering baby spinach on the crisp before putting the protein on so I get a little extra veggie kick.

5. Saw a Pelican Up Close

 

But apparently not close enough to get a decent picture. He’s in there, just think of it as a hidden object game. Find the hidden pelican!

6. Walked on the beach two days in a row

And boy, did my ankles and knees feel it afterwards. Walking in sand is hard when you haven’t used the muscles in a while. The two walks together probably amounted to about 2.5 miles or so, which was just enough to make my body feel like I was actually doing something with it.

7. Hiked two different trails

I first went out to Princess Place reserve two weeks ago (How’s a hike for a, um, second date type occasion? Kind of wonderful, actually.) and today I went back with a friend of mine and her pup to explore some more of the trails. The day was absolutely perfect for it, and we hiked two different trails that came to about 2.1 miles total.

If you’re keeping track, that makes 4.6 miles so far this week. Who needs a stinkin’ treadmill when you have the great outdoors?

8. Man, I love this dog.

Not really a thing I’ve done this week, but Dakota is always just so much fun. She was super excited to be on the trails today.

 

9. Making Salads-in-a-jar and then not eating it as a “Salad”

Today Cassie posted “salad in a jar 101” and I love how easy they are. I’ve been making them for a while and love to toss anything I can think of into a jar and top it with some lettuce. I’ve got a couple in the fridge that I made to ward off lunch excuses and when I got back from the trail I decided to use one up, but really kind of needed something more substantial.

So I took a page from Anne’s book and wilted some extra spinach, put the lettuce from the jar over it, topped with some warmed up brown rice, a 100-calorie serving of guacamole and the mushrooms and chicken from the bottom of the salad jar.

It certainly isn’t pretty, but man was it ever delicious. Just what I needed, protein, good card and veggie filled. So good. And with the guacamole, I didn’t even need cheese. Next time I’ll put some beans in to make it a bit more burrito bowl-ish, but this was perfect for this time.

10. I love Spring in Florida

We get like, four days. But it’s perfect. Living here means I never get bored with being outside. Hot in the summer, maybe, but never bored. I mean, look at these views!

 

And that, my friends, is Ten Things Tuesday.

 

 

 

Why I quit my gym

The other day I came to the realization that I hadn’t been to the gym in the entirety of the month of March.

Woops.

Now, I like my gym. It’s a nice, no-frills kinda gym where no one really minds if I plug into one of the treadmills and read my magazine or Kindle for an hour (or more, if it’s a long magazine and I’m not dead yet). If I hit at certain times of the day, the strength machines are all but abandoned and I don’t have to fight to use them.

Others it’s kinda like a frat party, but avoiding that wasn’t hard since I just didn’t go during those times.

That didn’t change the fact that I hadn’t been in over a month.

 

And while my gym is cheap at about $10 a month for a basic membership, it’s still $10 a month for something I hadn’t been using. This month probably wasn’t the only one that I didn’t hit up the gym at all lately, it’s just the one that I noticed. I didn’t use the gym as much in the winter as I had planned to because we had a nice mild winter so I could still get outside to get my activity in.

Hard on the heels of my realization that I wasn’t using my gym came the awareness that I wasn’t going to use my gym any time soon. It’s heading towards summer, which means it’s already in the 80′s during the day, but that’s okay with me. I’ve always dealt with the heat just fine, and walking or running can be done in the heat just as easily as the indoors, and I really would rather be outside after being in my box of a job all day.

So I quit my gym.

I bought heavier weights (yay clearance at Target!) to make up for any weight lifting stuff I might miss at the gym (not really, but I needed the excuse to buy them anyhow, since my dinky little lighter weights weren’t cutting it) and tied on my running shoes and took to the great outdoors.

 

I found some treasures hidden in the marshes along the way…

And found myself clocking more miles on the map in less time than I would have gotten on a treadmill. Plus, I got out of the house and enjoyed my time wandering alone, listening to an audiobook (man, why haven’t I done that before?) and getting my activity in.

So far, life without a gym is pretty darn good.