Halfway There

What a day!  We’re so close to being done with all the cleaning stuff.  Thank God!

After cleaning/organizing for most of the morning I was pretty hungry for lunch.  I had  gotten Barney Butter packets in the mail to sample so I was super excited because I’ve actually never even tried almond butter.

I had this spread on 1/2 a WW wrap.  There was actually a good amount in this little packet.

On the side I also had some grapes, mango,and baby carrots.

 

This was a really great tasting lunch.  As for the Barney Butter, I liked it but I didn’t love it.  I’m interested to try other almond butters now though.

Well back to tackling that to do list!  Hope you’re all having a great FRIDAY! 

Last Time…

This is the last Thursday night where I will have work the next day for the next 24 weeks.  Sounds kind of nuts huh?  With almost everything figured out I’m feeling much more upbeat and plan on spending a lot of time enjoying my Fridays during the summer.  2 of my friends don’t work on Fridays so we’re already planning some beach Fridays!

For breakfast this morning I had my usual Chobani (peach flavored today) with some granola.  Maybe this picture will make it a little less boring since I’ve eaten this breakfast everyday this week.

My boss is on vacation both today and tomorrow so I was fielding a lot of questions that would usually go to her it was a busy and draining morning so about 1/2 way through I had a gigantic orange for some energy.

 

This orange was super juicy, just looking at this picture is making me want another one, unfortunately I think this was my last one.

For lunch today I brought a GIGANTIC salad in.  This salad contained:

• romaine
• spinach
• 3 meatless meatballs
• carrots
• mexican cheese blend
• and Salsa

 

I didn’t finish all of this salad it was just too big.  But it certainly was delicious!

When I came home there was a package waiting for me!

You’ve probably seen these floating around on the blogs and I was so excited to give these a try.

I got 9 bags of chips to sample.

I wasn’t very hungry yet but I decided to snack on a bag of these before dinner.  I choose the sea salt & vinegar to try first.

Excuse my nasty nails they need to be redone so badly!

These chips are really delicious, they are not like normal potato chips the texture was more like a rice cake.  The flavor was really good though and I can’t wait to try the others.

Finally I got hungry for a meal so for dinner I had brinner once again.

I had a mozzarella and spinach omelet.

On the side I also had a butter piece of double fiber toast.

And some grapes:

All together:

This dinner definitely hit the spot!

Well I’m off to read and go to sleep, after such a busy day I am definitely exhausted!

Enjoy you’re night everyone, and hope Friday flies on by so we can enjoy the weekend!

Thank You!

First of all I can’t believe that you all took the time to write such heartfelt comments yesterday!  I knew that venting on here would make me feel better and your comments were amazing.  I was literally tearing up just reading your super sweet words.  I knew I could count on you guys to make everything seem better.

I’m sorry I didn’t get to post again last night I just needed to sit and think for a while.  Everything is definitely looking up I realized I do have enough vacation days to cover 12 of the days off.  Every time I get paid I automatically have money removed from my checking account into my savings if I put that on hold for the next few months, I will only be down $79 from what I usually get.  Obviously I’d rather save but if I just save what I can instead of a set amount I’ll be a lot better off then I thought.  I also have started looking into freelance work and other small jobs to keep my cash flow up.  The only thing now is I don’t feel comfortable signing another 1 year lease in case in 6 months things aren’t looking up, when I paid rent today I sent a little note asking my landlords to call me.  Since I’ve lived here for the past 2 years I have never had any kind of trouble with the landlords and have always paid on time.  So I was going to explain my situation and hope that they will let me do the lease on a month to month basis until I get back to full time.  I really see them saying yes, they know Andrew and I and really seem to like us, and I’m sure they’d rather have our money coming in instead of having the place empty.  They live right below us so we have really gotten to know them, and it’s not some big apartment complex but their home so I think we might have a really good chance.

Now since this is a food blog let’s talk about my eats.

Before going to my mom’s yesterday I had a string cheese.

While I was there after talking to my mom about everything I fell asleep on the couch for a few hours!  Nothing like a nap to put you in a better mood.  I left their house and came home for dinner.  First off look at this amazing plate!

How cute right?  My friend, Michelle, gave it to me for my birthday, she got it while on vacation is Savannah.  It was actually designed by a student at SCAD (Savannah College of Art and Design)  such a fun gift!

So I of course had to have a pb and j sandwich on it for it’s first use.

One the side I also had some grapes.

It definitely was:

Once Andrew returned from work I talked to him and ate 2 tagalongs.  PB overload!

This morning upon waking up I knew today was going to another tough day.  I decided to keep my eats really simple since I didn’t spend anytime preparing them last night.  Let’s just say there was plenty more pb.

For breakfast I had a peach Chobani and granola.

 

I ate this so incredibly fast because my boss asked me to run home to grab some papers from when I worked at home 3 weeks ago.  That took a nice hour and a 1/2 out of the work day for me. 

For lunch I had pb and banana on an arnold’s sandwich thin.

Yummy as usual.

After work today I had to drop Andrew off at the pharmacy to work his second shift and I had to go get another MRI of my back to make sure it’s healing nicely from my accident last summer.   Before I left work I knew I had to eat something because I didn’t think I’d be able to eat for a while (I was right.)   So I had a Chocolate Brownie Clif Bar.

Brownies are like the only sweet that I can NEVER turn down.  Growing up when it was your birthday you would bring cupcakes or munchkins to share with your class to celebrate.  I never liked either one of those things so I would make my mom bake brownies the night before for me to bring in.  All the teachers loved my birthday because it was something different.  I remember proudly walking around passing out the brownies and listening to everyone get excited because it wasn’t the same old thing.  Another year for my first non-family birthday party my mom asked me what I wanted to have at my party, knowing I wouldn’t cake, I asked her to make Jell-o.  What little kid does that?  She wound up making jell-o jigglers that spelled out Happy birthday Danielle!  What a weird thing to have instead of cake!

This clif bar did not taste like a brownie but it was good none-the-less.

I was so glad I ate because by the time I got out of the MRI and got home it was 7:30.  My parents had just finished eating dinner so even though I wasn’t that hungry I decided to have some of their left over egg noodles with a little butter, garlic powder, and parmesan cheese.

I wish I had only eaten 1/2 a clif bar so I could have had a better dinner.  But this tasted good no matter how many veggies are missing.

I also have been meaning to post this for a few days now.  The lovely Kate of Cooking with Kate has passed on an award to me.

First of all, have you all seen her blog?  She’s adorable, she’s a fantastic writer and she’s also a Jersey girl!  (Although she does live in LA now, believe me you can take the girl out of Jersey but you can’t take the Jersey out of the girl)  she went to the same beach club as Bon Jovi and Bruce!  (Remind me one day to tell you my Bon Jovi story it might be my most embarrassing moment!)  So definitely check out her blog!

When receiving this award you are supposed to list 7 things you love so here goes:

1. My sister, she is the most important person in my life, she has really made me into the person I am today and I would do anything for her.
2. My parents, everyone says they’re parents are the greatest, well mine really are, my mom has become one of my best friends who I can tell anything to and she always helps me out, and I will always be a Daddy’s Girl.
3. Andrew, we went out in high school our junior year and broke up a few months later, we met up again when I was in my sophomore year of college and started going out again. I like to say we were high school sweet hearts even though there was a 2 year break in there. He is definitely my soulmate, and I’m so lucky to have him in my life.
4. My friends.  I don’t know what I’d do without them, I’ve known my 4 closest girlfriends since elementary school!  We are a tight knit group, and I am very grateful to have them.  Once summer comes you’ll be seeing a ton more pictures of them because we’re always on our deck in the summer relaxing and talking.
5. The beach, I’ve grown up less then 15 minutes from the beach, and there’s nothing like the feeling of the sand between your toes.
6. You guys.  I can’t tell you enough how much your comments have impacted me, especially in the last few days!  You girls give me inspiration on a daily basis, you are some of the strongest women I (kinda) know.
7. My extended family, aunts, uncles, grandparents, cousins, I have a pretty great family on both my mom’s side and my dad’s side, and there’s always a ton of laughs when we all get together.

I’m supposed to pass this on to 7 bloggers now but I’m having a hard time coming up with 7 and I’m sure most of you have already gotten it, so I’m passing this on to everyone on my blogroll!  If you’re there consider yourself a Kreativ Blogger award winner!

Well I’m off to bed now, hope you all have a great night!  Tomorrow is Thursday already!  It’s my last full week of work until October so it’s flying by with meetings and redistribution of work so the rest of the week should fly!

Breakfast, Brunch, and Brinner

Every meal I ate today I would, or have already had, at some point for breakfast.  Breakfast is my favorite meal so it’s not weird that a whole day’s eats could be considered a breakfast food.  It’s a rainy gloomy day so I just stuck with my favorite foods for today.

For breakfast I had a delicious bowl of overnight oats. It contained 1/2 a cup oats, 1/2 a cup skim milk, cinnamon, and vanilla, with a scoop of pb on it of course.

As much as I love my yogurt and granola breakfasts, there’s nothing like oats to make you feel satisfied for hours.

Lunch I had a yogurt mess.  It contained 1/2 a cup pb puffins, 1/2 a cup organic apple cinnamon morning o’s (whole foods brand), 1/2 a mango, green grapes, a banana, and of course a Vanilla Chobani. 

It doesn’t look good at all does it?  But it was delicious, it took me forever to eat.  It was a really great lunch and something I will probably have again very soon.

For a snack around 3 I had an McIntosh apple.

I was craving eggs for dinner so I decided to just have that and make it a day of breakfast food.  I had 2 eggs scrambled with lots of spinach, and a less then an ounce of Mexican blend cheese.

On the side I had Dr. Prager’s Potato Littles, they are obviously supposed to be for kids, but I like my food in fun shapes sometimes too!

And a veggie breakfast “sausage”

All together:

After dinner we caught up on some things on our DVR, including last night’s Biggest Loser and Lost.  No Lost spoiler or anything but seriously, WTF is going on?  So confusing!

While watching TV I decided to enjoy a serving of fro yo with some chocolate chips. 

I’ve had a ton of sweets this week, a piece of chocolate birthday cake, and Ice cream cake Monday, Tagalongs yesterday, and Fro yo today.  I know most of you allow yourself to have something for dessert each night, but it’s so weird to me that I’ve been craving sweets.  As I’ve said many times I don’t have sweet tooth at all so to have this many sweets in a week is pretty unheard of for me.  At least I’m keeping my portions small.

Well tomorrow is Friday!  I’m so happy that this week is almost over, just one more day.  I have no definite plans but some of my friends were in Savannah last week so I’ll probably be seeing them this weekend.  What are you doing this weekend? Anything exciting?

The weekend is in sight…

I can’t believe today is already almost over, this week is flying by!  And the fact that a week from now it’ll be April is nuts!  2009 sure is moving quickly!  Anyone else think this year is going fast?

For breakfast today my old love is back.  Chobani!  Oh how I’ve missed my Chobani, especially my vanilla.  I had that with a peak protein granola sprinkled on top.

 

This is a heavenly combination!

Lunch today was a pb and banana sandwich with some green grapes on the side.

Some of my grapes were very tart, I didn’t enjoy those few, but the rest were perfectly sweet!

Around 3 I was ready to gnaw my arm off, I didn’t think I had any snacks with me because I really haven’t been snacking in the afternoons.  I was about to hit up the vending machine when I remembered that I did, in fact, have a snack courtesy of Missy.  She sweetly handed out some clif z bars on Sunday at the brunch, and I luckily still had it in my bag.  So thank you so much Missy for keeping me away from the vending machine! 

Once I got home from work I was once again hungry, I don’t know what is with my appetite today.  I knew exactly what I wanted I was inspired by this meal.  I had some meatless meatballs and was craving tacos so I made a taco wrap.  I used 4 meatless meatballs broken up and cooked in taco seasoning, romaine lettuce, spinach, mexican cheese blend, and salsa, on whole wheat tortilla.

This was so good! 

After resting and watching some of last night’s Biggest Loser it was time to go to the gym.  I did strength training first and then jumped on the treadmill, I didn’t feel like running today so I walked at a steep incline for a while.  According to my HRM my stats are:

• 450 calories burned
• Avg HR 153
• Max HR 181

Have I said how much I love this HRM already?  One thing I did notice on the treadmill is since they’ve got Polar HRM built in my stats show up on not only my treadmill but the one next to me.  I don’t know if that’s normal or not.

Once returning back home I snacked on 2 Tagalongs.

Last year when I got my 2 boxes of Tagalongs they were gone in about a week, I’ve had these for a week now and this is my second helping of them.  Just goes to show me how much I’ve improved since the beginning of the year.

Well lovelies I’m off to bed, I hope you all have a great night!

Drained

Thanks for being so understanding about last night’s crappy post.  I don’t know what’s wrong with me lately, I just feel physically drained, I’d love to blame it on Daylight Savings Time but I’m getting the same amount of sleep most nights, the other night I had a restless night but surely I must have made that up by now.  I just feel like from the moment I get up to the moment I lay down I’m constantly going.  This Saturday I will make the time to go to the gym at some point but other then that I am having a me day, I have some of ideas of what it will include, but suggestions are welcome.  When you want to treat yourself what’s your favorite thing to do?

I’m going to make this post quick as well so I can get into bed and get another full nights sleep.

For breakfast today I had a 2% Plain Fage yogurt with peak protein granola.

I’ve loved all the Fage yogurt I’ve received but for plain I definitely prefer the 0%. Flavored 2%’s are fine but I really like the 0% better.

A little before lunch I got hungry so I snacked on what was supposed to be a part of lunch.  Some grapes that were on their way out, I had toss quite a few of them.

For lunch I had a pb and raspberry preserve sandwich on an Arnold Thin.

Looks like my sandwich is sticking his tongue out at me.

Around 3:30 I got hungry again, and I wanted popcorn, so I took a single serving size 100 calorie bag to one of the microwaves, within in a minute it smelled like burning so I took it out, more then half of those little kernels didn’t pop, and about 1/2 of the ones that did pop were burnt, disappointing to say the least.

Such was my day.

For dinner I made tacos with the MorningStar Veggie crumbles, the texture took some getting used to but it was really good, I put the taco “meat” over a bed of romaine, 4 mini sweet peppers, taco cheese, and some onion, for dressing I used taco sauce.  

A little while after dinner we got ready to go to the gym but stopped by my parents house to see their new couch, very nice and comfortable, I see many naps on that couch in my future.  As we were leaving Andrew found some soft pretzel he had left from school, I gladly took a piece from him.

The gym sucked, I just don’t have the energy, I did as much as I could on the treadmill, and then accidentally punched it, I pushed the emergency stop button, and waited for the pain to go away, then restarted it, then I realized how crappy I felt and how I did not want to be there, and instead of pushing through I freaking gave up.  I feel like I’m getting upset ofverstupid stuff lately and I need to calm the heck down.  I should have stuck it out, but I got too upset over something stupid and decided to leave.  Tomorrow WILL be a better day at the gym.

So after we came home I decided to crack open a container of fro yo that’s been in my freezer for over a month, just haven’t been in the mood for it lately.  But tonight the craving was there and I gave into it.  I had a serving of the frozen yogurt and some chocolate chips on top.  Heavenly.

Well I’m off to read and go to bed, I’m reading A Thousand Years Of Solitude and so far it’s pretty good.  Hope you all have a really good night!!!  See you tomorrow, and by then it will be Thursday!  We’re almost there!!!!

My First Time…

Get your mind out of the gutter!  Today I did something I’ve never done before,  I baked!  Sure I’ve made some slice and bake cookies, but I really have never baked anything.  I don’t like cake, I don’t like sweets in general, really no reason for me to bake.  But I found a recipe I really wanted to try and had some ingredients I needed to use up so I found a recipe and gave it a try.  Success!  But more on that in a second, let’s get to my other eats for the day.

For breakfast this morning I decided to try a Cherry Fage 2% sample I recieved.  Holy crap you guys, this was great, reminded me of a cheesecake.  So yummy!

I can’t wait to look for these in the store because it was seriously yummy, although I typically prefer 0% yogurt, this is something I would love to indulge in.  After I snapped this shot I mixed in some granola, took it to a whole other level.

For lunch I had a big romaine salad.

With a light caesar dressing.  On the side I also had 4 mini sweet peppers.

I also had 8 kashi crackers with pb.

This lunch was super filling and oh so good.

After work I had to go the chiropractor and then on my way home I snacked on some grapes.  Andrew took the pictures of the grapes for me since I was driving, can you tell I couldn’t wait for him to take the pictures before I had to start stuffing my face with them.

When I came home I decided to make an omelet.  I used 2 eggs, less then an ounce of mozz cheese, 2 peppers, and some onion. 

Andrew decided to make potato pancakes to go with his dinner and made me a little guy.

I think I’ll keep him around, this was really delicious.

I also had another one of those ww onion rolls I picked up at Whole Foods last week.

So now onto my first baking project.  I used a recipe from the site Vegetarian Times, I made their Peanut Butter Banana Bread With Chocolate Chips.  The thing I changed from their recipe was I used smooth pb as that’s all I had instead of the crunchy the suggest.  It was a super easy recipe, and it came out perfectly.  I had no idea what I was doing and was pleasantly surprised with the outcome.

Here’s the bread:

And of course I had to sample it immediately.

I cut a small slice and split it with Andrew.  Wow, wow, wow, this was amazing.  Andrew said after eating his half.  “This is delicious, we have to make more, and you have to look up more recipes on that site because this is f***ing amazing.”  Nice mouth huh?  I kid, I’m much worse then him, but I censor myself as to not offend all you lovely ladies.

Anyway the recipe is a hit and I’ll be making more bread over the weekend.  You all are a bad influence, I caught the baking buck from you!  Well I’m off to read and then go to sleep, g’nite bloggies!

Braving the Snow

My gameplan was to not leave the house today, besides to clean off the cars.  I was content with staying inside all day reading, commenting, and relaxing.  But of course it didn’t go that way.  But more on that in a couple minutes.

After I finished posting we went out and cleaned off our cars and dug them out, with a little help from our township, they were coming around on tractors digging people’s cars out and plowing the driveways.  Pretty nice for us, but it was still a ton of work.  It took us 2 hours to get everything cleaned off.  I tried to take some pictures but the now just isn’t as pretty as last time, I think because it was so dark and cloudy out all day.

 

 

Once we came back in I made some hot chocolate and some lunch.  I had a peanut butter and raspberry preserve on a whole wheat wrap.

I also had some grapes.

I also tried a new treat, which I absolutely loved.  I had to get it when I saw it at Whole Foods yesterday.  Just look at the name.

Danielle Crispy Fruit Chips.  I’m pretty sure it’s a rule if you’re name is on something you have to try it.  I’m so glad I did give it a try these were delicious!

They have a bunch of different flavors, but I went for my favorite fruit.  I highly highly recommend them, they’re a little pricey at 4 dollars a bag but really good, a great treat.

All together with my hot chocolate.

After lunch I logged on my computer and tried to catch up on some blogs and do some commenting, when Andrew came in to tell me our hot water heater is leaking.  Our landlord came up and told us he had to turn the water off, so we won’t have hot water until at least sometime tomorrow if he can get someone here to replace it.  So I had to run to my parents house to take a shower so that I could go in to work tomorrow.  What is typically at 10 minute drive took us over 1/2 an hour.  The roads here are a mess!  Ice and snow everywhere still.  I’m so nervous to go into work tomorrow, Andrew has a delayed opening and is working his other job in the evening so I can’t go with him, because I’d go in 2 hours late and have to leave 2 hours early.  I’m going to have to suck it up and get there somehow.  I already have anxiety thinking about my commute tomorrow morning.

Before we went to my parents though I through together a super quick dinner.   I’ve seen this brand before on other people’s blogs and decided to give it a try.

I followed the directions to cook, then added steamed broccoli and mini sweet peppers.  I ate a serving which is one third of the box.  It was really very good, and I’ll definitely be branching out and trying other things the brand has to offer, and buying this one again.

Well I’m going to try to relax for a little while before I get into bed.  I’m letting myself get to worked up about work tomorrow, I loaned someone else I work with my laptop on Friday so I don’t even have the option of working from home.  Okay I’m sorry, I’m being a major Debbie Downer right now, I’m sure some/most of you had to get to work today in all this snow, sorry to be complaining.  Good night everyone!  I promise to be in a better mood tomorrow!

Fat Sandwiches

Hey everyone!  I’m feeling better again, still not 100% but so much closer, I’m excited to go to the gym tomorrow.  I took another night off and I know I needed it, but I’ll be so happy when I’m able to workout at full capacity again.  I’m sure tomorrow is going to be hard but it’s going to be so nice to get back in there.

Today I was in a really good when I got to work.  The sun was shining it was in the 50’s, I was feeling better, and then I got to work, everyone seemed to be in a bad mood today.  The clouds quickly rolled in with drizzles here and there, and the temperature dropped down to 35*.  But it’s Thursday so I was trying not to let everyone else’s moods affect my attitude for the day.  It’s hard trying to be positive when everyone else was so negative, but I know that tomorrow everyone will be happy it’s Friday, as will I.  I mean you get to wear jeans to work tomorrow.  Things don’t get much better then that right? Ha.

So I started out the morning with a blueberry Chobani.  I still think this isn’t the best flavor, I’ll stick to plain, vanilla, and peach from now on, but I’m glad I was able to find this in the store and try it.  I also had 2 clementines on the side.

All I wanted today for lunch was pb on a bagel, I settled for 1/2 a bagel with lots of fruit on the side.  I had grapes, blueberries, and 2 prunes to go along with my peanut buttery bagel.

Yum!

I still don’t have my full appetite back so there was no snacking in between meals, but my mom texted me this afternoon to ask if Andrew and I wanted to go to one of the local diners for dinner.  If you’ve been to or are from NJ you know that diners are every 1/2 mile on the highways.  If you’re from Jersey I’d bet you spent many countless hours at a table in a diner, just drinking coffee or eating pork roll, egg, and cheese on a hard roll (ewww not me though, I’ve always loathed pork roll).  I’d even go so far as to guess you’ve gone to a diner after at least one homecoming or school dance all dressed up with a big group of friends.  Yeah, we really love diners in Jersey.  At a diner you can get anything, Italian food, Greek gyros, Mexican food, and of course breakfast 24 hours a day.  Or if you go to my local diner you can get a “Fat Sandwich.”  Intrigued?  Here’s the selection of Fat Sandwiches at the diner tonight.

All those ingredients are on one Sub roll.  So if you order a Fat Flo you’d get a sub roll with chicken fingers, mozzarella sticks, french fries and marinara sauce all stuffed on there. Or perhaps you’re very hungry and that’s not enough.  May I suggest a Fat Manny, which is  cheese steak, eggs, pork roll, lettuce, tomato, mayo, and ketchup all on a long roll.

I ordered a Fat Nancy.

I’m kidding of course.  My order was not on the “Fat Cat” portion of the menu.  I got a veggie wrap which included grilled eggplant and zucchini, spinach, tomatoes, romaine lettuce, carrots, red onions, and mozzarella cheese, with balsamic dressing on the side.

 

It came with french fries, but Andrew’s meal came with home fries so I gave him all my fries for 1/2 of his home fries.   Delicious.  I ate one 1/2 the wrap and then picked the eggplant off the other half and just ate that, and I also ate almost all of the home fries.

Oh and my dad got a greek salad with his entree so I gladly ate some of that as well.

Here’s the whole salad.

I ate less then a 1/4 of his salad, mostly just picked out all his onions and ate those.

So there you have it, a typical night at a Jersey Diner, hope you enjoyed yourselves!

 

Hope you all have a great night, and hope your Friday flies by so you can start enjoying your weekends!

Friday Night Slumbey

Hey I wanted to do a quick post, my sister is here for a sleep over.  So I’m just quickly going to post my eats so I can get back to hanging out with my sister.

For breakfast I had vanilla chobani, cranberries, and granola.

This stayed with me right until lunch.

As I was getting my lunch together to eat I got a call from the receptionist to come up to the lobby.  When I walked in Andrew was there with flowers!!!  He had the day off for President’s day and came down to visit me for lunch and bring me the flowers.  How sweet is that?

For lunch I had pb and banana on a ww bagel.

A few hours later I was hungry so I had some grapes and 2 clementines.

For dinner Andrew made Crock Pot Chicken parm.  He just pounded out 2 chicken breasts until they were about 1/2 and inch thick put it in the crock pot with a jar of marinara sauce and let it cook on high for 3 hours.  After it was completely cooked he sprinkled on some part skim mozzarella cheese.  It was unbeleviably delicious!  Definitely didn’t miss the breading at all, cooking chicken in the crockpot makes it so tender!

On the side I had a serving on ww penne.

Sooooo good!  Can’t wait to make this again, Chicken parm is my ultimate favorite food so finding a much healthier version is exciting. 

I hope you are all having a fun Friday night I’m off to hang out with Andrew and my sister.