Girls Just Wanna Have Fu-hun!

I took relaxation to a whole new level yesterday and decided NOT to post last night. SAY WHAAAA? This is UNHEARD of for me! I just needed a night to myself. One which did not involve opening my shiny, bright, little magical box of electronic laptop wonder. IT FELT GLORIOUS!

My Saturday was glorious and perfect in every way. Reeeeeeeeeeeeeeewind.

BREAKFAST (meal #1) at 9:30am.

I slept in till 9:00. LOVED it! I celebrated with a lovely cup of coconut macaroon coffee. See me waving? HA!


I also had two open faced spinach, egg white, ham and cheese sandwiches on wheat bread.


After breakfast I changed and met Ann at the gym to get a good workout in. I was craving it bad. I hate missing a day during the week and as you all know I missed Thursdays' workout due to work enslavement. I was ready for a good SWEAT session.

WORKOUT!

Treadmill Warmup
5 minutes, 6 incline, 3.4 speed
Leg Extensions (cable)
100lb x 15
100lb x 15
90lb x 15
80lb x 15
Seated Leg Curl (cable)
100lb x 15
90lb x 15
80lb x 15
80lb x 15
Reclined Leg Press (plate loaded)
140lb x 15
160lb x 15
180lb x 15
160lb x 15
Inner Thigh Machine (cable)
75lb x 15
75lb x 15
75lb x 15
75lb x 15
Outer Thigh Machine (cable)
85lb x 15
85lb x 15
85lb x 15
85lb x 15
Free Weight Squats (straight bar)
45lb x 15
55lb x 15
55lb x 15
60lb x 15
Conventional Deadlift (straight bar)
45lb x 15
55lb x 15
65lb x 15
65lb x 15
Treadmill
12.49 minutes, 1 mile, speeds 3.2-6.5

Total Time at gym = 1:27
Max HR = 182
Average HR = 136
Calories Burned = 653

After our workout we ran to feed Mama and Papa Babushkas cats and tidied up their house a bit. We're talking cleaning like maniacs. Once we started we just couldn't stop. Papa, if you're reading this, SHHHHHH, don't tell Mama. I want it to be a surprise. HA! :)

I know I said yesterday was relaxing and it seems like all I've done up to this point is workout and clean. Don't worry, it's about to get WAY better. AND I enjoyed my workout and cleaning. SO THERE!!!

SNACK (meal #2) at 2:00pm.

When I got home I had a quick snack of plain Dannon Greek yogurt, Nature's Path Crunchy Maple Sunrise cereal and a drizzle of Kodiak Cakes raspberry syrup. DELICIOUS!


I also took a nice long bubble bath. My leg felt a bit stiff from my little run and the hot bath felt amazing. Afterwards I got ready and left to spend the rest of my afternoon over at Annie-Boos' new apartment. We had planned a serious GIRLIE evening together. It was just what I needed.

The rest of this post is going to be a photo recap of our evening. With a few exclamatory highlights. Enjoy.

Havarti cheese, rosemary + flax crackers + honey wheat pretzels + grapes + wine (AKA meal #3)

SHY little Pepper.

SWEET and delicious red wine. We're talking candy sweet. YUM!

Loved the bottle, did NOT love the wine. Not a fan of Oaky wines. Overall, not bad, but not great...

Notice the BAD KITTY Pajama pants? HA! Ann was hardcore lounging. Naturally, the awesome pants were a present from yours truly! LOVE IT!

The next few SHOCKING photos can not be explained. It's just something we do when we get together.... and wine is involved.... It seems to happen EVERY time! HAHAHAHA!

Our evening ACCIDENTALLY ended at the Mexican restaurant around the corner from Ann's apartment. We had fresh, warm tortilla chips with awesome hot salsa and raspberry lemonade.

And sadly, when our food came out, I was SO EXCITED that I dove right in without even thinking of taking my camera out. :-o

I had what I always have when I find myself being NAUGHTY at a Mexican restaurant. The Chicken Quesadilla Fajita. Ann got 2 chicken and 2 beef Flautas. We split our meals and shared. I ate maybe 60% of everything and felt like I was going to EXPLODE! It hurt so good! The food was delicious!!!

After dinner I dropped Ann back off at her apartment and drove home. I IMMEDIATELY changed into my pajamas and crashed on the couch. Nick and I attempted to watch a movie but I passed out after about 20 minutes. He woke me up and I went straight to bed. It was such a great day!

I'll be back later tonight with a post about today. Enjoy your weekend my lovelies!

ONLY 5 MORE WORK DAYS LEFT BEFORE VACATION! OMG!

HUGS!

Ildie

Lazy BUM!

HELOOOOOO there. I somehow managed to get ten (YES, 10!!) hours of sleep last night. Good grief it felt fantastic! I didn't wake up during the night either. A rare occurrence indeed! Now then, where did we leave off last night? Ahh, yes, my friends Birthday dinner. Let's recap shall we?

We arrived at Aladdin's Eatery right on time and promptly sat down to feast. I was FAMISHED! Seriously! I was completely and utterly starving by the time I opened the menu.


Drool and food fantasies ensued as soon as I started reading over my options. They have great choices for vegetarians and meat lovers and everything is delicious. It's why I love the place so much! I decided on the Ali Baba Pitza. (From their site: A fresh pita topped with pureed eggplant, sliced tomatoes, feta cheese, char-grilled slices of eggplant, slivered calamata olives all sprinkled with oregano.)


I also enjoyed two cups of green tea and a small side salad with their delicious almond nut dressing but I forgot to take a picture. I love their almond nut dressing!!! It's to DIE for!

After dinner I pulled out my LAME card and decided to call it a night. I was physically exhausted from my busy day! Everyone else moved the party to a friends house to enjoy some homemade cake. Sadly I didn't have the energy to join in the decadence. I passed out less than an hour after we got home and stayed in bed for 10 hours straight. I clearly needed it!
______________________________________________________
SUNDAY....

I woke up feeling refreshed and ready to go! The best part was that I had nothing to do and nowhere to go. GLORIOUS! A whole day ALL to myself! YAY! I loaded up the French Press with vanilla biscotti flavored coffee and enjoyed a cup while perusing blog land. So lovely!


BREAKFAST (meal #1) at 11:00am.

Breakfast was WAY later than usual today. I sort of lost track of time with all of the magnificent blogs I was catching up on. ;)

Here we have an egg white scramble made with 4 eggs (seasoned with S+P), a fruit salad (1/2 banana, 1/2 fuji apple, 1 kiwi, lime juice and Splenda), and a wheat bagel thin with Better N' Peanut Butter on one side and sugar free strawberry jam on the other. Perfection!


After breakfast I did some amazingly boring and unexciting things around the house. I made the bed, emptied the dishwasher, cleaned my makeup drawer and organized the medicine cabinet. WHOAH! FUN I KNOW! ;)

I then proceeded to do some SERIOUS vacation destination investigation (I like rhyming) online. Somehow I managed to get lost in my deeply focused research for nearly two hours. BUT, I do think we decided on a destination. I'm excited!

LUNCH (meal #2) at 4:00pm.

Once again, lunch was WAY later than usual because of my super late breakfast. I wasn't very hungry so I decided to make a small salad.

• Spinach
• Orange bell pepper
• Tomato
• Carrots
• Chick peas
• Morning Star Farms black bean burger
• Sea salt & garlic sunflower seeds
• Spray Butter
• Light honey mustard dressing

SNACK (meal #3) at 6:00pm.

I was craving yogurt like MAD so I made a delicious little treat with plain Yoplait Greek yogurt, a Fuji apple and a sprinkle of Udi's original granola.


OMG. This granola is amazing. Jam packed with raisins, banana chips, walnuts, cashews, almonds and pistachios. The flavor and texture is incredible. I'm seriously in love with this flavor. Though the Au Naturel variety is tasty, I like this one EVEN more. I gladly rate this one a 10 out of 10. NO! WAIT! 11 out of 10. Yeah, that sounds better! :)


After my snack attack, Nick and I dove head first into vacation planning again. We're driven damn it! We're DYING to pick a place already. We have officially decided on Ocracoke Island, NC. We've narrowed it down to 3 rental properties and plan to call them up (hopefully tomorrow) with some questions. Details to follow once we make it official. SOOOOOOO EXITED!

DINNER (meal #4) at 9:30pm.

Nick's brother Dan just showed up for another MANLY SESSION of Rally race watching. The two of them decided to have a classy dinner together. Breaded fish sandwiches, hot fries and Red Stripe beer. I don't get men sometimes!! HA! I, being the responsible (and lazy) one, decided to have cereal instead (without beer of course). :)

• Kashi 7 whole grain honey puffs
• Nature's Path Crunchy Maple Sunrise
• Unsweetened vanilla Almond Breeze
• 1 Banana
• Raisins

Easy peasy. I just didn't feel like cooking. I've been a LAZY BUM all day and I loved every single second of it. I didn't even get dressed until 10 minutes before Dan showed up. Classy I know! ;)

I think I'll go hibernate in my bedroom now. The boys are hootin, hollerin and getting all PUMPED UP over some crazy Subaru's going 100 mph on winding snow covered roads (that's like my worst nightmare by the way...). Again, I'm baffled at their excitement. I think I'll go watch some of the Travel Channel or HGTV instead. To each their own I guess. ;)

Be back tomorrow!
XOXO
Ildie

All up in my grill-d cheese

Szerbus (hello in Hungarian) dear ladies and gents. Hope you're all having a fantastical day. It's sunny here which immediately puts me in a happy-gabby mood. Ahhh, the power of the sun. If only I could bottle it up and have it with me always! Sadly, a storm will be moving through this evening which may bring some freezing rain by the morning. I hate freezing rain! This classy, sassy lady doesn't mess with black ice driving/sliding adventures so I hope it all works out. EEEK!

To keep right on track with my oatmeal obsession, this mornings breakfast was a bowl of Doing Just Peachy Oats. Because my day was sunny and peachy. Get it? :)

1/2 cup Irish Oats
1 1/2 cup water
1 banana, sliced
1/2 cup frozen peach slices, thawed and diced
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
dash salt
Splenda to taste
1 tbs sugar free peach preserves


Twas..... Twas..... Just peachy! :)

After breakfast I took a mini break from work to discuss tonights workout with Ann. We discussed it yesterday before arriving at the gym and it worked out beautifully. We got more done in less time. Sometimes (meaning ALWAYS) we spend TOO much time trying to decide what to do next. I find this to be highly annoying. After a little HUNGARIAN MINDS UNITE power meeting, we had tonights moves all planned out. YAY!

Lunch consisted of steamed greens beans and carrots sprayed with spray butter and a light FlatOut wrap with turkey breast and dill pickle wedges.


I love green beans. Veggies are our friends boys and girls. Don't be scared!


We escaped the office (just barely) and decided to venture WAY across town to pick up some of my beloved Oikos. The only place around here that sells the plain 4oz four packs is the always scary Super Walmart. Oh the sacrifices I make for my beloved Greek Goo! I may have went overboard. I picked up five 4 packs. Yes, I said five!! I spent a small fortune on the stuff!! Oikos..... Will you marry me? (please say yes....)

My pre-workout snack was the last of my Trader Joe's plain Greek yogurt. I had it with pumpkin pudding (left over from last night) and a sprinkle of pomegranate granola. SERIOUSLY! I love this pumpkin pudding mix (link **HERE** for pudding recipe) It's like sex in a bowl! PLEASE try it! PLEASE! At first I took sweet, innocent little nibbles of the pudding and the yogurt separately.


Then I made a GRAVE mistake and mixed them together.


Uhm, not good! The somewhat sour flavor of the yogurt did not blend well with the sweet pumpkin. OH THE TRAGEDY!!!! NOOOOOO! At least I got to enjoy some before I made this horrible decision. HA!

After work it was off to the gym. With our plan of attack and moves in mind, we were able to get in and out quickly and had a stellar workout. My arms and shoulders are on FIRE this week! This was my second shoulder, triceps & biceps workout in 3 days. OH IT BURNS SO GOOOOOOD? BAD? BOTH?

Arnold Press (dumbbells)

15lb x 15

15lb x 15

15lb x 15

Bicep Curls (barbell)

35lb x 15

35lb x 15

30lb x 15

Tricep Pulldown with bar (cable)

80lb x 15

80lb x 15

70lb x 15

Standing Military Press (barbell)

35lb x 15

35lb x 15

30lb x 12

Hammer Curls (dumbbells)

15lb x 15

15lb x 11

12.5lb x 12

Overhead Cable Tricep Extension (cable with rope grip)

40lb x 12 (from bottom pulley, did not like this)

40lb x 15 (from top pulley)

40lb x 15 (from top pulley)

Concentration Curls (dumbbells)

15lb x 10 (each side, arms are now FRIED)

12.5lb x 12 (severely losing form.. ha)

12.5lb x 10 (so bad lol)

Elliptical - Interval Training - 15 minutes total

7.5 minutes (resistance 8-10)

7.5 minutes (resistance 8-12)

200 calories burned

When I got home I was greeted by a lovely package from Nature's Path. YAY! They sent me two boxes of cereal (Crunchy Maple Sunrise and Millet Rice Flakes) and a box of granola (Pumpkin Flax Plus) to sample. I can't wait to dive in! Thanks so much Nature's Path.


Dinner was low key and simple tonight. Tomato soup with a grilled cheese sandwich. This meal always brings back my youth, which now seems like ages ago. AGES! I made the grilled cheese sandwich using sprouted 16 grain & seed bread from French Meadow Bakery.


I received a loaf of this bread to sample a while back and boy am I glad I did. It gets a 10 out of 10! It's dense, delicious and jam packed with flaxseed and sunflower seeds which give it a great crunch. Not to mention each slice has 6 grams of protein. I think I'm in LOVE!


I used a slice of fat free American cheese and a wedge of light Laughing Cow cheese. It was freakin delicious! ;)


Dinner was enjoyed with a nice warm cup of wild berry blend tea. Ahhhh.


I think I'll go rot on the couch with a fluffy blanket now. Nick is already curled up, looking all warm and adorable. I want in on some of that comfy action!

Friday morning is weigh in. EEEK! Wish me luck and please don't cry, I'll be back tomorrow!! ;)

(It's already raining and I hope it doesn't freeze by he morning..... UGH!!)