Category Archives: Food for Thought

Pre-Valentine’s Day Chocolate

Daily Life!, Food for Thought, , ,

Happy Thursday! Or Happy Valentine’s Eve! It’s beautiful sunny day here, and I’m lovin’ it. Fifty degrees feels marvelous after the snow and single digit temps last week.

So today has been pretty normal. I woke up early and got in my 4-mile run – my weekly Thursday routine.

IMG_3275I started out SO slow. I was tired and pretty fatigued from running + Jazzercise yesterday. So for the first mile, I was just barely jogging and throwing a pity party for myself. But then I thought, “This is the perfect time to throw in some speed work.” Running at full throttle with extremely tired quads is the perfect marathon training. It’s a good way to figure out how you may be feeling in the second half/last 10K of the race. So I pushed through 3 sets of 1.5(ish) minute sprints up the worst hills on my route. I’m not crazy – I was just determined. I also wanted to hurry up and get home. 🙂 So the faster I ran, the raster I would be done!

I arrived home to a whiny doggie, so I walked Mac around the block since I had a few minutes to spare before my morning rush started. Once we got home, I got ready and made it to work at my usual 15 minutes ’til 8. I had my normal breakfast foods with me…

IMG_3273But after eating this, I knew today it wasn’t going to last me long. I’ve been craving chocolate and sweets like there is no tomorrow. Around 10 a.m., it got bad. By the time lunch rolled around, I was almost sick. Have you ever gotten this way? I rarely crave foods this intensely, but I was ready to do anything to get my hands on some chocolate. Nick brought some Thin Mints home yesterday, so luckily I snagged a couple of those for my lunch dessert, but they didn’t quite do the trick.

Yes, I’m hormonal this week, and that never helps. And also, I’ve been working out a little more than normal by teaching extra classes this week. Maybe my body just wants some extra calories and sugar? Either way, I will definitely be getting a small sugar fix soon…like tomorrow maybe??!

val1I’m just taking my craving as a sign that my body is ready and excited for Valentine’s Day goodies!

trufflesNick, if you are reading this, please have some chocolate truffles delivered to my office tomorrow morning by 10 a.m. Please and thank you. 🙂  hah! Some of these might be nice too…

master_CHCC041In all seriousness, I will probably just end up buying myself some V-day chocolate tonight, eat a few pieces, and then share the rest with my Jazzercise ladies tomorrow night. I’m also considering bringing some red wine to use as a door-prize for anyone that comes to class tomorrow. I’m hoping at least a small handful of students decide to come dance regardless of the holiday!

Well I’m off to put together a new song set for tonight and find some sugar before my mind explodes. 🙂  Have a great night and I’ll see ya tomorrow for Valentine’s Day!

Snow and Caffeine

Daily Life!, Food for Thought, , , , , ,

Happy Monday! I hope you all had great weekends and were ready for the awesome Monday morning commute today in the mini-blizzard that mother nature decided to drop on us…sighhhhh. Luckily, the snow didn’t mess up my day in anyway, so I’m not that angry about it. I still made it to Jazzercise this morning at 5:30 (after some slipping and sliding). And I had one brave student come workout with me!

IMG_3264I stood inside the door of the center watching it pour snow outside. I was pretty sure no one was going to come, so when that one brave soul pulled into the parking lot, I was ecstatic.

We had a quick and fun class followed by me frantically driving home to get ready for work and on the road before the mad rush happened during the bad weather. I beat most of the traffic and made it to work in one piece despite the 1.5 inches of snow on the road. Luckily, the sun also decided to come out mid-morning so the roads were clear and dry for my trip home for lunch. So it’s been a good snow day. Weird, right? I haven’t really had a good snow day all winter. Hopefully this is a sign that winter is on it’s way out soon!

Since I was rushing around to beat morning rush hour, I didn’t have time for my normal coffee at home while I was getting ready. So once I got to work I downed my mug of coffee (holds about 3.5 cups) and was needing more to fight off a small headache. I borrowed some Dunkin Donuts original blend and used the fancy Keurig machine in our breakroom. That was some of the strongest and most delicious coffee I’ve had in a long time!

0088133400046_500X500So I had about 7 whole cups of coffee before 11 a.m. I was basically vibrating from all the caffeine. I couldn’t sit still, and I was so happy and optimistic that my coworkers were ready to kill me. It was a good morning to say the least, but now I’m coming down hard. Nap time, anyone?!

Lunch

Lunch was quick and easy today since I made my awesome chili in the Crockpot yesterday. Leftover chili on a snow day was the perfect comfort food.

IMG_3265But now my leftovers are almost gone. I need to make a bigger batch next time!

And now I’m pondering Valentine’s Day since it’s this Friday. I’m already craving chocolate like the cocoa bean is going extinct. It’s bad. Nick and I almost through an entire bag of mini Reese’s Peanut Butter hearts yesterday. That along with the donuts was just about more sugar than I should need in a whole week.

IMG_3266So maybe I’ll luck out and just get flowers. Flowers are pretty and smell good and they don’t cause tons of guilt from eating too many of them. 🙂 I want chocolate, but I really need flowers instead. HA! And now for a cute picture.

Valentine-Day-MemesAhhhhhh!! Puggy!! I love this for so many reasons. If Nick got me a pug for Valentine’s Day, I would forget all about the chocolate. Maybe….

Looking ahead through the week, I’m teaching a lot of Jazzercise and have a normal running schedule. I’m not in true taper mode yet for the Little Rock race, so I’ll still have my normal runs on Wednesday and Thursday mornings. Can you believe I’m 20 days out from my first marathon??? I can’t even wrap my head around that one right now.

I’m subbing Jazzercise tonight, so it’s going to be a busy evening. I hope you guys have a great one!

Craving Donuts

Daily Life!, Food for Thought, Running, , , ,

Hey there! Hope you’re having a wonderful & relaxing Sunday! We’ve had a great weekend despite the sun refusing to shine. I’ve spent most of my time running, teaching Jazzercise, eating, and napping – some of my favorite things!

20140209-171239.jpg
Yesterday started bright and early with my second (and final!) 20-miler before the Little Rock marathon. The sidewalks were non-existent and the roads were still pretty icy and slick, so it was a bit of a stressful run. The winter has made me really dislike running on the roads with cranky drivers everywhere. I cannot wait for spring and clear sidewalks and trails!

This run went a lot better than last week’s 20 mile run, and that makes me hopeful that my endurance is improving and my body is ready for the 26.2. I had to take a potty break at mile 11 and this was my only real stop. I’m hoping this pit stop was brought on by the mid-teen temps and that I won’t have to be using any porta potties along the race course!

After this run, a bagel with jelly for a snack, and a hot shower, I had to meet the Jazzercise ladies for a meeting at London Calling. A lunch meeting here after one of my long runs was probably one of the best ideas ever!

We all placed our orders before we sat down for our business meeting on the double decker bus. I ordered the traditional pasty because it was dairy-free. But I was happy to find that it was delicious and decadent!!

20140209-172200.jpg
It was buttery and stuffed full of beef, potatoes, and onions. Yum!!

20140209-172311.jpg
I ate this pasty in about 2 minutes flat and dipped my leftover ‘crimp’ in some grape jelly. My post-run belly was SO happy! And I even took one home for Nick after our meeting because I’m the sweetest girlfriend ever. He loved it too. 😉

And now for Donuts!!

20140209-172544.jpg
I don’t know what it is, but I have been craving donuts ever since last night. After dinner I wanted a donut so bad, but the roads were getting icy and we didn’t want to spend anymore time out before heading home. I had an apple to satisfy my sweet tooth, but it didn’t work too well. I went to bed still thinking about donuts and even woke up this morning still craving donuts!!

On a side note, donuts are awesome but really aren’t my favorite sweet treat. I would rather have a giant cupcake or a hot chocolate chip cookie. So when I was craving them still this morning, I knew it was one of those cravings I would have to satisfy ASAP!

Hurts Donuts was the only donut shop open this afternoon, so Nick and I headed downtown to try out Springfield’s newest donut shop.

20140209-173124.jpg
I had this fluffy streusel donut because it was hot when we got there. 🙂 I’m a sucker for hot donuts! And Nick had the plain glazed donut. I also got a special Reese’s peanut butter cup donut to bring home for later.

20140209-173307.jpg
Both of them were amazing and disappeared in 30 seconds flat!

20140209-173352.jpg
Yum yum yum!! Mac was sad that mommy brought home a chocolate donut that he couldn’t have.

20140209-173521.jpg
He was so cute that I’ll have to remember to being him a bite of a plain glazed donut next time!

Hurts was a really cute little shop with a great variety of donuts. They had one covered in Oreos and another covered in Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal. This place might convert me into a donut-loving fool! No they aren’t healthy, but a donut a month won’t hurt anything. 🙂 If you’re in downtown Springfield soon, you should stop by for dessert. They are open 24 hours!

Tonight we are just relaxing and finishing up some things around the house. I have some of my famous chili in the Crockpot that we’ll be digging into soon. I can’t wait! Have a good night and I will see you all tomorrow!!