Category: Running

First of all the good.

I have been loving bircher muesli for breakfast lately.

This one is nectarine, 25g oats, 100g soya yoghurt and 100ml soya milk and a lot of cinnamon, all left to mingle overnight. Yum.

And the same but with 80g frozen cherries instead of the nectarine, and sprinkled with coconut in the morning.

I had my sweet potato and kidney bean burgers again and they were yummy (with some rocket and some quinoa cooked with tomatoes, beetroot, spinach and courgette).

I found out that Ocado now stock Rude Health Multigrain thins 🙂

I got up super early on Friday to fit in a little run, and it was great. I only did 2 miles but I did that in 20 minutes and I was feeling like I am getting faster again.

I went to the Waffle house on friday! That is always good!

I opened my Starbucks chai and had a cup. Yum.

When I was tidying out my cupboards I found a whole box of Teapigs rooibos creme caramel! I thought I had finished the last teabag ages ago, so it was a lovely surprise! 🙂

I had my hair cut again (and in fact nearly forgot- I noticed it on the calendar when I went to add the shopping delivery time!). I feel I leave the hairdresser with a normal amount of hair!

And I made something fun in the microwave. Guesses? Answer at the end!

And now onto the bad.

I missed body pump on Thursday due to a late meeting at work (I got home at 8 whereas it starts at 7.15).

I had a rubbish run today. I think I am in fact under the weather. My tum felt a little weird before I left, so I waited around a little longer. My whole run was such hard work, I stopped a few times to re-tie my hair and I really appreciated the walking. I was not that much slower than before- it was a while since I had run that route, but it just felt so bad. And all day I have had a sort of tummy ache, so not sure if I ate something bad yesterday, but I think on reflection I should have not gone out this morning as it made me feel worse.

I am almost out of Rude Health Multigrain thins (but no need to worry- see the good points above!).

At least I have more good than bad.

Oh, and I made play-dough in my microwave- did you guess it?

(Add on)-

After dinner on Saturday I felt really bad, and when Andy got back from football (at about 12) we ended up turning the house up-side down looking for the immodium he bought to take to Stockholm, but never used, but to no avail. He did go out Sunday morning to get me some, and so I spent Sunday laying about, drinking water and nibbling on dry toast. But anyway I feel better now. No idea what that was.

Hello

I love my routine, I am someone who really likes to know what they are doing and I like the way I do similar things on the same day each week. After 6 weeks of no real routine (due to holidays etc) it has been great getting back into it.

On Monday after work I was really looking forward to my run, and did my 4 mile route and picked up the speed towards the end (9 something per mile 🙂 ). It was the first run where my legs felt normal (before that they had been feeling tight and not really flowing properly) and I am hoping that soon I can re-start with the audiofuel, which I was really enjoying before my routine stopped.

(By the way, we never made it to the allotment on Sunday, as it was such heavy rain, and I found out that I got sunburnt on the saturday-boo. Honestly I am so obsessive about suncream when I am on holiday, but I didn’t realise that my dress had a lower back, so I have a nice red circle on my back).

Today I am really looking forward to aerobics, as I have missed (I think) 5 weeks. Shocking! I know it is going to be hard work though, but I like the fact that I do the same class each week.

When I got home today I was most excited to have a parcel waiting for me;

The lovely Elise at Kallo foods has sent me a parcel of goodies to review for my blog. Smooth and crunchy organic peanut butter, smooth and crunchy peanut butter, dark chocolate spread (how good does that sound?), chocolate and caramel swirl spread, and organic cola and elderflower. So much peanut butter!

I also had a bit of a shock the other day. I was having a couple of squares of ghirardelli chocolate after dinner, and just by chance glanced at the ingredients (they are on the tiny wrappers) and noticed gelatin. Now as soon as I turned vegetarian (I think I was about 15) I stopped gelatin too. I felt horrible having eaten it, but it was too late to spit it out as I had already eaten it. Anyway, I went through the bag (it was a mixed bag) and found that 2 flavours contain gelatin.

Mint (which are just like after eights, I never would have expected it to be in there) and raspberry ones. So I have taken them out now- no danger of unexpectedly eating them.

Onto the weather (we love to talk about the weather here) how windy is it???? This morning when I was trying to get my car out of the garage the wind kept blowing the garage door shut. It was crazy! I am glad I am not out running and instead am working out in a wind free studio!

Finally (and only because I took a photo) I have been getting a little hummus obsessed! I got some more from Ocado (it was listed as another brand, but in the pic it also said Sabra on it, and it is smooth and delicious and garlic free)- so my lunch has been a sandwich thin with hummus and spinach, plus a salad of chopped apple (on the bottom so I have the sweet apple at the end), spinach, beetroot, roasted peppers and hummus. Yum 🙂

So, do you like routine or do you love to change things all the time?

Not sure if that is entirely accurate, but it is what came to mind!

I had my run this morning- while waiting for breakfast to go down I warmed up my new running jacket from Old Navy.

I worked out how to turn off the flash (after 3 attempts) but now not sure how to turn it back on oops! Anyway, the main reason I love it is because of this:

Thumb hole things! I love them! But I realised it does not have a tab over the zipper so I will need to either not do it all the way up or get some kind of neck warmer thing. Ah well, it was too warm to run with a jacket today.

I did my same route up to the lakes and back, which is just under 6 miles. I was getting a weird stomach feeling, which was maybe a stitch, or something, so after 40 mins I walked for a bit, and then finished running on the way home. I was quicker than Tuesday, and I felt better too (and only walked once) so I think my legs and lungs are remembering what to do!

Home to a snack- soya milk with nesquik and a coconut chocolate chip clif bar. Yum.

The other day Andy and I walked up to the allotment after dinner, and all my good work had been overgrown with weeds. So after a shower we headed up there, armed with a massive fork each. Now many hands may make light work, but this all depends on what work there is to begin with. We spent 2 hours digging before deciding to come home for lunch and a rest. So I felt OK after my run, but not so good after all that digging! We have a small patch left (maybe 2 metres square) so we will have to tackle that tomorrow (and get something to put down so the weeds don’t just come back again).

Lunch was thrown together in 2 mins as I was starving! An apple, lettuce, Food Doctor pitta and more lovely hummus 🙂 And we shared the pitta chips which were nice too, kind of reminded me of disco crisps- anyone remember those?

Dinner was another quick meal. Andy was also given some Warburtons flat-bread things, so we used those as a basis for a mexican meal. In a pan I cooked one chopped red onion, added a drained tin of kidney beans, some tomato puree and chilli, and mashed. Then I added a chopped red pepper and small tin of sweetcorn. We warmed the flat-breads in the oven for 5 minutes, and served with salad and guacamole. Delish and so speedy.

Not sure if digging up the garden was the best recovery from a run, but at least tomorrow we don’t have much more to do.

Time for some mint tea now, I am sure that helps me recover, right?

So today was my first attempt at a run since my holiday, which worked out at about 3 and a half weeks with no running at all.

I did not want to put any pressure on, as I realise that my legs would find it a shock, so I took my time over breakfast, and headed out much later than planned. I ran up to the lakes and around them, which was really enjoyable. I did have to stop and walk after mile 2 and mile 3, as my legs felt very stiff at that point, so I did some stretching and walked for a few minutes each time. While I was running my Nike+ was reading between 10.20-10.40 per mile, but by the time I got home I had done 5.7 miles in over an hour- can’t remember how many mins, but some of that was walking and a lot was stretching!

I feel this is quite positive really- last summer I did not have much of a break as we went away for less than 2 weeks I think, plus I was not running as far anyway. I remember the first year I started running, after my holiday I had to go down to a walk break every 5 mins or so, and it took me a while to get back up to 10k distance.  I also managed to run up the steep hill (I had decided that I would be allowed to walk it), and clearly it should not take as long to get back up to my normal longer distances (I was doing 10 miles for my long run before I went away).

But when I got home I felt so tired! I think it really shocked my system. It also meant I was running late to meet my friends, but luckily they didn’t mind.

Hope all you UK bloggers had fun at your meet up.

So question- how do you get back into things after a break from your routine?

Hey!

I think often we are all good at dishing out advice, but not following it ourselves. During my trip away I caught myself in that very situation. I will explain. One of my friends has a lovely figure (actually, they all do!)- full in the bust, quite curvy and looks amazing in fitted dresses etc. We were shopping and she kept on picking up big tops and skinny jeans and going to another friend (who is very very slim and was rocking the skinny jeans look) “I wish I had the figure to wear skinny jeans and tops like you”. I said to her “you have a lovely figure, you should love what you have as I bet there are loads of people out there who would love to look amazing in those dresses like you do” and she admitted I was right. I was impressed with my attitude, but really, that was not my attitude. I too was wishing I could wear skinny jeans, but they do not suit me!

I also have been guilty before of trying on clothes, they don’t suit me, and so then I get a little fed up about my figure. This time I tried on loads of clothes in one shop, and guess what. Some of them fitted and looked good. Some fitted and did not look good. Some of them didn’t fit. What did I learn? Clothes flatter different people. And my ultra slim friend tried on some of the same clothes as me (well, in a different size) but some of them did not suit her. So I decided that I am going to try and make sure that I accept what I have. Last week I had a little crisis of confidence when shopping for swim stuff (we are going to Discovery Cove and so need swimwear for the day), but after this trip I went home, tried on the stuff I have and decided that it looks fine. I have decided that I want to enjoy my holiday, and that I should take my own advice and accept myself. So that is what I am going to (try to) do. I hope you are all with me??

Back to general stuff- last night I went to body pump and decided to have some heavier dumbells for the shoulders track. I typically find it really hard, but this track the moves seem to be split more and I have found it a little easier, so I went for 3kg instead of 2kg for each arm (yeah, not heavy I know!) and I was prepared to swap back half way through to the lighter weights, but I managed it all the way through 🙂 This morning I had a 10 mile run. I got very hot and felt like I was going super slow, but in fact I was a minute faster than last week. Still a few minutes slower than my fastest time but not bad.

I have been packing today (not taking any running stuff with me) and am getting excited! All going well this time tomorrow we will be driving down to Key West! Whoopie I love holidays!

I think we have internet access in some places so I might manage a few little updates.  So have a fab few weeks, and (Florida style) see you later, alligators 🙂