I Met a New Year's Resolution Today!!

So at the beginning of the year I set a few goals for myself for 2011. One of these was to finish a 5K at some point this year. I kept putting it off for whatever reason...I planned to do the St. Paddy's Day Dash on Greenville before the parade - it didn't happen. Then I was going to sign up for one in May. That didn't happen either, and then of course it was way too hot to do anything during the summer. October and November I was out of town for work or vacation, and suddenly I was facing the end of the year.

A few weeks ago while I was at home I looked up races before the end of the year and found the Frosty 5K and Fun Run in Frisco. I signed up for the 1 mile Fun Run since I hadn't trained at all for a 5K and figured at least I'd get used to a race-day atmosphere and how the whole thing works. 

This morning I woke up at 6:30AM...on a Saturday...when it was below 30 degrees outside. I got ready and drove out to Frisco. I went up to the registration booth and figured...I'm here, I might as well do the full 5K. So I paid the difference, got my tshirt and goodie bag, and went back to my car to take a nap for an hour (apparently when they say registration starts at 7, it's ok to get there at 7:55).

And...I finished!! They haven't posted official times yet, but I used my phone to unofficially track myself and I think I ended up around 48 minutes. I really wanted to finish in under 45, but I was close! I walked most of it, but I did run some, I was not last, and it was fun. Very, very cold. I did not bring gloves. Mistake. I will post my official time and pictures (?) that were taken during the race. The only picture I thought to take while I was there was this one, when I decided it was way too cold and way to early for me to process nonsense like this:

It was 30 degrees outside. As if these shorts would be ok otherwise.

I signed up for another one in Addison on January 14th - the Hotcake Hustle. I really didn't hesitate after I found out there will be free pancakes and hot chocolate at the finish line.

UPDATE: Official time was 49:16, woot! My goal for the January 5K will be to finish under 45 minutes!

Thanksgiving Break!

And my final vacation of November...a visit to Notre Dame and then back to Arkansas for Thanksgiving!

Johnny's dorm room in Carroll.

By the lake. 

Me and mom!

Notre Dame beat Boston College, which was great, and it was my first time in the stadium with the new music playing. Here's a clip from the kick-off - they gave everyone pompoms and the stadium atmosphere was awesome!

There was also an Undertones concert in the bookstore after the game, which was lovely. Too bad all their CDs were sold out...I hope my brother will remember to bring me one back for Christmas!

My mom and I came back home for Thanksgiving, and of course we can never have a relaxing week. Bear, our little dog, ended up ripping a big gash in his belly and mom and I had to take him to the vet. The poor thing had stitches and a drainage tube put in for two weeks - thank goodness he's okay, the vet said the gash missed his abdominal cavity by 1mm!

I went and saw The Muppets movie at Aaron's (Rivka's brother) birthday party, and it was the best movie I've seen in a long time. It was just so cute, my cheeks hurt afterwards from smiling the whole way through it. Now that I'm back in Dallas I'm finishing up my Christmas shopping, wrapping presents, and drinking copious amounts of cider and hot chocolate.

A Step Back in Time

Fun fact? They filmed Sister Wives here a few weeks ago. 

To Plimoth Plantation! One of the many exciting places we visited while I was visiting Boston a few weeks ago. Meaghan was a fabulous hostess and took Debbie and I exploring the whole weekend. Also, there was a dance party, which is really all it takes to make me happy anyway.

Outside of the gates of Hahvahd Yahd.

On Friday we went to a hockey game at Harvard, which was pretty much what you would expect. I am pretty sure there were more Cornell fans there than Harvard fans, but who's counting? The players were pretty and the place was packed - and it had been so long since I'd seen a hockey game I was definitely into it.

After that we attended a dance party (Cronk 2.0 was the name of it, I believe) some students in Meaghan's program were throwing in an old gymnasium on campus. I had so much fun, even though I definitely regretted my decision to wear my new boots.

Dancin.

Bein gorg. The yooj.

On Saturday we went to Plimoth Plantation and the Mayflower II (a recreation of the original Mayflower). Plimoth was fantastic except for the part where I was harassed by a pilgrim. I asked him "What do y'all do for fun around here?" and he acted like he couldn't understand me and didn't know what "fun" was. RUDE.

The MOOflower. Hilarious.

Inadvertently racist. I promise I was just making a he's-so-hot face. 

The happiest sheep in the world. 

The culprit. 

Baby. Goats. 

That girl was SUPER skeptical about the breadmaking going on here. 

Then we tried on some hats. Obviously.

Sexy Pilgrim.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6YuLgyYZhc
You're welcome.

A wolf mask. No one told me this was not...right.

Adorable character hats. 

The Mayflower II was excellent...it was crazy to think how many people were on that boat while it slowly made its way across the Atlantic. I fear I would've thrown some people overboard had that been me.

Really excited to be hanging out with the cannon.

Debbie was not pleased with my climbing antics.

But we got the cutest picture ever out of it!

Sunday we went on a Harpoon brewery tour which was fantastic! They walked us through the brewery and then we had a tasting afterwards. They had all the different beers on draft. I loved the seasonals but my favorite was the UFO Hefeweizen.

Sniffing something they use to make beer. I got a lot out of the tour.

Tasting everyone they had on draft - yum!

Aw yea!

After that we had a tour of downtown Boston with our cute, historically-garbed tour guide.

And then we went to Mike's Bakery where it was INSANELY busy and bought way too many cannolis that we ate later back at Meaghan's apartment.

The whole place was packed.

Spoiler alert: they were delicious.

And finally some amazing Italian food - I wish I could remember the name of this seafood linguine dish, because it was incredible.

Something about pesce. I don't know.

The endangered pentapus, nature's most noble creature.

Definitely loved visiting Boston, but I knew it was off to ND after only three days back at home. Yes, November was a complete whirlwind.

Third Eye Blind in DFW!

Third Eye Blind had a last-minute show in downtown Carrollton and I talked my cousin Steven, who just happened to be in town, into coming with me to see them. 3EB is absolutely my favorite band I've ever seen live, and this is the second time I've seen them this year after they did a show in Addison back in May (they were also my very first concert back in 7th grade and they came to perform at Notre Dame my senior year).

Here's a video of them playing my favorite song, Motorcycle Drive By. So good.

And a short clip of their encore song, How's It Gonna Be. Can't wait to see them again!

Get Ready for a LOT of Updates

I'm going to split all of these updates up so it's not one overwhelmingly long post (you are welcome), so be prepared!

The first update I need to share is from my Halloween trip to New Orleans. Yikes, it has been a while since I've updated. My costumes were Snooki and the Tin (Wo)Man from the Wizard of Oz. I went with Ashley and Megan (both from Chicago) and it was a total blast as evidenced by these pictures...

Scared on the Haunted Swamp Tour!

We were a hat trick the first night. Get it?!

YUM. Cafe du Monde was necessary.

Met the entire cast of WWF.

Snooki!

Cowardly lion, scarecrow, and tin man!

We stayed in a great hotel about a block away from Bourbon street, did all the fun touristy things like the swamp tour, the ghost tour, and the cemetery tour. We went out every night (Pat O'Brien's of course, and then wandering Bourbon St.) and met some interesting people - one guy dressed as Wolverine claimed to be a movie star and did have a picture on his phone of him playing a bailiff in Drop Dead Diva. His business card listed him as an actor and martial artist. Quality.

I will make sure to look for him in the next GI Joe movie.

Going back to work after this awesome trip was rough -- good thing I only went back for a week! After that, I was off to Boston, which will be my next update...shortly.

PS: I only gained 1.4 pounds the whole time I was in New Orleans, which was INCREDIBLE since I ate everything in sight. Not sure how that happened.

Fall Salad: Pomegranate, Goat Cheese, and Salmon Salad

Yum! This was so good. Check out that giant scoop of goat cheese. Totally brill.

Ingredients:

Gordon's frozen salmon lemon pepper filet (cooked in the oven, not the microwave) - 100 calories

1.33 oz goat cheese - 93 calories

Seeds from 1/2 a pomegranate - 52 calories

Mixed greens, about 2 cups - 15 calories

2 tbsp cranberry basalmic dressing - 20 calories

Fresh ground pepper, to taste

Nutrition:

Total calories: 280

Fat: 11

Carbs: 27

Protein: 24

Chicken Chicken Chicken!

You guys, I went to the gym Friday, yesterday, and today, and I've been tracking my calories. I have to make these last two weeks of October count before I gain like 5 pounds in New Orleans.

I've been working on cooking / planning meals for the next couple weeks - since I've been travelling so much I haven't had to cook for an extended period of time in a while. I did my turkey enchilada casserole (one of my favorite new recipes) and still have 2 pieces of that left that I hope to save for lunch this week. I had some chicken tenderloins that were going to spoil, so I needed to cook them all at the same time.

When I've mass-cooked chicken before, I always make the same type, whether it's all BBQ in the crockpot, all italian spices, or all mexican (for fajita salad). But I inevitably get tired of the same chicken after 2 meals and the rest ends up going to waste. Enter solution:

I am a secret genius. Lemon pepper and lemon juice, rosemary and olive oil, and soy sauce. Three different types of chicken ready to go for lunch, dinner, whatever. I used the soy sauce chicken in my chicken fried rice last night, and I think I'm going to do some kind of pasta tonight with another flavor. Delicious!

Teambuilding 2011 - Kansas City!

Back from the teambuilding event! Everyone had a lot of fun, and the organizers (including me) worked hard. I'm exhausted tonight but I did some arm exercises anyway. Woo!

My favorite picture from the event...scariest scarecrow EVER!

And here is a picture of the hailstorm we had at the corn maze. This was CRAZY. Colleen and I got stuck in the car while everyone else was huddled under the tent. I can't believe that everyone had a great attitude about it and after the storm stopped we just went on with the event as planned. GREAT team!

Back to June!

So partly thanks to me not eating whatever I want and partly (mostly?) thanks to me getting sick this Tuesday, I'm back to my low weight from June. Woo hoo! I went to work out last Sunday and Monday, and then was deathly ill on Tuesday so I didn't go back to the gym until Saturday.

We're having the teambuilding event in Kansas City this week, and I'm going to do my best to stay on track. I know I'll be eating out every meal, but I will also be running around trying to get everything together for the event, so I'm hoping it will even out.

I'm thinking about my halloween costume(s) and I've decided on being the tin man for one. Instead of buying a really cheap slutty one and looking something like this:

I'm going to try to make my own costume and see how it goes. Plenty of pictures will be posted I'm sure!

Off to bed now, it's going to be a long week...

Recipe: Baked Eggplant Parmesan

So I'm not really sure if this counts as eggplant parmesan even though there's no actual parmesan cheese, but let's go with it.

I've never cooked an eggplant before, but I picked one up at the store this weekend and since I'll be out of town at the teambuilding event in Kansas City this week, I figured I better go ahead and cook it. I will definitely make this again, especially when it gets a little colder. I didn't even miss the meat in this meal.

Yield: 3 servings


Ingredients:
1 eggplant
1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup italian style breadcrumbs
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 1/2 cups of pasta sauce (I use Newman's Own Sockarooni - it's a little spicy!)
3/4 cups italian cheese blend
5-6 fresh basil leaves, sliced
salt and pepper to taste



Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees and place a sheet pan inside while the oven heats up.
2. Slice the eggplant lengthwise (long way) in half-inch thick pieces. You should get about 8 pieces out of one eggplant. Do not peel the eggplant!
3. Dip the eggplant slices into the egg and then into the breadcrumbs.
4. Coat the sheet pan in olive oil and place the eggplant slices on the pan. Bake for 15 minutes, flip the slices, and bake on the other side for 10 minutes.
5. In a small casserole dish (I used an 8x8 pan) sprayed with nonstick cooking spray, layer the pasta sauce, eggplant slices, and cheese (use 1/3 of the pasta sauce and 1/2 the cheese). Make another layer of pasta sauce and eggplant slices. Top with remaining pasta sauce and cheese. Lay the basil slices over the top and season with salt and pepper.
6. Bake for another 15 minutes at 475 degrees. Serve over spaghetti or with a salad (or both)!

Baked Eggplant Parmesan

Recipe to follow! Must eat first!

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My Birthday!

So...I didn't meet my birthday goal. Wonk wonk. I totally lost my mind the past month with lots of traveling to New York and Kansas City and Arkansas and basically did nothing but eat and sit around. I honestly thought I had gained about 10 pounds, but it only turned out to be like 3 pounds...phew.

My birthday was fabulous with a delicious lunch at Breadwinners, happy hour with a lot of work friends, dinner at Goodfellas with more work friends, and then Banditos on Saturday. Mom even sent me beautiful flowers!

Of course I went to the gym this week trying to be good, and I went to a kickboxing class for the first time. I walked in and the instructor girl asked if anyone was new. It was only me and one other girl, and the advice we got was "Just keep punching." Okay...apparently everyone else had been in the class since Week 32 and they were on Week 47. Yikes. I stayed through the whole hour, but around 45 minutes something was feeling off. Since then my back has been hurting - pretty sure I pulled something, and I had to stay home from work Thursday afternoon and just lie on the floor. I did go work out this afternoon (just on the elliptical) but I'm definitely still feeling some pain after being up and about all day.

So a lot happened in September. I went to the U.S. Open in New York while on a business trip and got to see my favorite tennis players (Nadal, Roddick, and Isner) and bought a bunch of presents for all my jealous family members.

I went home to Arkansas for a weekend, hung out with Rivka at her awesome new place and ate lots of delicious indian food, and watched football with the family.

I went to Kansas City for work, conducted a training class, and made some new friends at our teambuilding venue. (Also ate delicious apple cider and apple cider donuts...I may have ordered both a cider slush AND a hot cider. No guilt. And I traipsed around a corn maze for 45 minutes, so they were also well deserved.)

The cutest earless goat you will ever see. 

As far as goals...I'm pushing my ultimate goal out to December 31st. I haven't really lost anything since June, and I haven't tracked my calories or been to the gym (besides the kickboxing incident this week) so I'm rebooting. My only travel plans for October are the 11th-13th for our teambuilding event, and then at the end of the month I will be going to New Orleans for Halloween, woo!! I can't wait!

I revamped my goals/rewards sheet in case anyone is interested in reading the updated breakdown. November is going to be a lot of traveling (going to visit Meaghan, Alicia, and Johnny) so I'm pretty much hoping to break even over that month, and then go hardcore through December.

Hopefully more consistent updates now that I'm back in Dallas for a while!