A Revolution

In my English class our theme has centered around food and how it relates to our lives. It's a really great topic to write about and we recently had to do a research paper about a topic of our choosing.

I chose childhood obesity and the reforms being made in America with school lunches and physical activity.

And the next week my teacher wanted us to watch the first episode of a series called Food Revolution with Jamie Oliver. The premise of the show is that Jamie Oliver comes to America to start a healthy food revolution in our schools. He takes on the school lunches and works to make them healthier while still being cost efficient.

The one thing that angered me during the entire episode was how defensive and ignorant the people in the town he was in were. It just flabbergasted me that these people in Hungtington, West Virginia didn't believe they had a problem with obesity. Even when Jamie states that they are statistically one of the unhealthiest towns in the country.

The lunch cooks in the elementary school that Jamie starts out in think there's absolutely no problem with the insane amount of frozen food they're feeding the children. Jamie pulls out a box of frozen food and asks the ladies if they recognize any of the 6 rows of ingredients, the ladies could only recognize ground beef. Jamie tries bringing in fresh, healthy food and is met with hostility and doubt and it just saddens me that people think it's just easier to feed children food laden with preservatives and chemicals.

There's more to the series that I plan on watching and I highly recommend you would it as well.

It's Good To Be Home

Yesterday was my first day back at the gym and it felt wonderful!

It was raining and freezing cold so it made it a bit difficult to roll out of bed and get my workout clothes on, but somehow I found the motivation (probably the fear of Michael lecturing me on not going) and got a move on. I'm so glad I did! I felt so great walking back into the gym.

I kept to a light strength training workout with the machines since I haven't done any strength training in weeks and I didn't want to hurt myself. Surprisingly all of the weights on the machines were the same as when I had stopped going, but it's not exactly where I want to be. But time and consistency brings progress!

My workout included:

2x12 lat pulldown 40#

2x12 assisted chin ups 55#

2x12 assisted dips 55#

2x12 chest press 20#

2x15 leg press 70#

2x15 hip abduction 40#

2x15 calf press 25#

2x15 leg curls 40#

After my workout I headed home to stretch for awhile with some yoga and recover with a protein shake. I feel so motivated to be healthy and help motivate others!

WIAW: A Crap Load of Pumpkin

It's been a long while since I did a WIAW and I'm glad to be hopping back into it.

Thanks Jenn for putting this fun party together!

This theme is definitely appropriate considering the amount of pumpkin I've been eating!

The food is mostly from Monday and Tuesday

 Post workout/Breakfast (Mon.): Chocolate almond milk protein shake

I got to use my new shaker bottle which made the protein shake so much smoother!

My protein shake kept me full until lunchtime

Lunch (Mon.): Greek yogurt w/ honey, vanilla, blueberries, and granola

Eaten in my car while I waited for my next class to start

My polisci class had this town hall debate that had a refreshment table full of cookies, but I resisted

Snack (Mon.) unpictured Annie's Cheddar Bunnies

Snack (Mon.): ripe juicy plum

Michael came over to watch the Bears vs. Lions & SF Giants games so I made us a healthy dinner

Dinner (Mon.): whole wheat pasta w/ garlic olive oil, veggies, & parm cheese. Spinach salad w/ raspberry vinaigrette

 Dessert (Mon.): Pumpkin Cheesecake Mousse

I'd been wanting to make this recipe for awhile and it was delicious! Make it now!

I promise Tuesday has less pictures!

Breakfast (Tues.): Healthy Pumpkin Bread

This was so moist and delicious!

 Lunch (Tues): Vanilla chai tea w/ almond milk & Truvia. 2 baked sweet potatoes with butter & salt

Snack (Tues.): 2% cottage cheese w/ blueberries. 2 slices of pumpkin bread--It's addicting!!

Dinner (Tues.): I didn't manage to get a picture of dinner, but I had Portobello pizzas, steamed artichokes, and 1/2 a twice baked potato. My stomach is crazy stuffed!

Phew! Done! Now I'm off to lie down in a food coma from dinner!

What's your favorite pumpkin dish?

Staying Active

I haven't gone to the gym in a long while (I'm embarrassed by how long), but I've been trying to stay active while some problems with the gym are sorted out.

While I was trying to regain strength in my recovery I couldn't do any intense exercise so I stuck to simple things like walking my dog Boogie

He doesn't have a walk mode so I'm usually going at a speed walk while he trots along in front of me. We go for at least a mile walk everytime and I've been working on trying to go everyday. It usually takes us about 25 minutes to go a little over a mile and we always have a gorgeous view

I've dragged my mom with me on a walk with Boogie and she enjoyed it (yay for getting other people moving!)

Michael has always been exercising more and we motivate each other to get moving and keep each other in check, it's definitely kept me going having someone keeping me accountable

Besides jog/walks I've been doing at least 15 minutes of yoga every day to increase my flexibility and enjoy some me time. Link has decided to join in the yoga sessions too

He has his own modified kitty version of corpse pose.

I'm trying to experiment with harder poses and hope I can finally get a handstand!

Once the problems with the gym have been sorted out I plan on being at the gym 5 days a week. I've missed being there!

How do you keep active?

I'm Alive!

Nobody be alarmed, I'm still alive!

It's been a long time since I posted and it was mostly that I needed to focus on my recovery and life around me. No hard feelings right?

Good! Now let's play a little catch-up, I'll try to make it short and sweet.

First off, my recovery is going really well. I haven't gained any weight, but I've been eating regularly and it's definitely improved my mood and energy levels. I would be lying if I said I'm not happy with the size my body is right now though I'm looking forward to adding some lean muscle and will be starting regular exercise tomorrow. I took a break from it so I could focus on eating more and I've been missing it like crazy.

I've been trying to do yoga everyday to keep me calm and just enjoy some alone time. And my boyfriend (who I'll be getting to in a second) and I have been trying to run at least a mile every day.

Onto the boyfriend. I'll make it quick so I don't go overboard on mushy romantic stuff ha! Michael and I have been best friends for 6 years and started dating at the beginning of the month. It was definitely a surprise, but if I could have written the perfect guy for me, it would be him. He makes me laugh and smile all the time and it's just so easy with him, I mean it'd have to be to deal with him for 6 years lol.

Not to mention my stepdad and mom love him so that's a definite plus!

School has been crazy busy with midterms coming up but I've been enjoying all my classes. Most of my time is spent in my room doing homework, but hey, that's what a college student does to get good grades.

Finally, if any of you remember I was coaching cheer at my old high school, but I decided to leave the position for my own mental and physical recovery. I was also partially asked to leave for the safety of the girls, but I won't go into the controversial problems with that one. Needless to say the whole matter wasn't handled very well and I felt it best to not coach anymore. I'm much happier to have free time to myself and less stress from high school girls, though I do love them and miss coaching every once in awhile.

Whew! No more gabbering for today! Isn't it marvelous to take a break from something and come back refreshed? I'm happy to be back to blogging again!