“I want you to feel like you’re going to die”

It was an early end to the work day today with the storm that came our way. I ended up getting home from work early and although I started to feel the “laze” start to creep in where I could have just vegged in front of the TV for the rest of the afternoon, I didn’t. I did a good and intense 35 mins on the elliptical followed by level 2 of the 30 day shred. Booooyah! After that we had supper and I cleaned up and then I still didn’t sit down, I ended up cleaning out the fridge and putting drawer liners on my kitchen drawers etc. I am just now sitting down for the first time really since about 3:00! I feel tired, but it feels great :-)

Breakfast today was a special treat of oats. I never in my life thought I would at one point in my life refer to oats as a “special treat” :-D . Today’s mix:

• 1/3c organic large flake oats
• 1/2c unsweetened vanilla almond breeze
• 1/2c water
• 1/2 medium banana, chunked
• 1 tbsp ground flax meal
• 1 tbsp Bob’s Red Mill Almond Meal Flour (which is really ground almonds) – idea compliments of Helping Myself (thanks for the tip!). Most of it went right into the mix and a little sprinkle went on top
• pinch of salt
• splash of vanilla
• dash of cinnamon
• splash of starbucks sugar free cinnamon dolce syrup
• 2 tbsp chocolate pb2 constituted to be drizzly
• a few organic unsweetened coconut chips

Oh and of course my coffee with scotsburn blend cream and a splash of starbucks sugar free hazelnut syrup:

So I have to talk about the almond meal flour. First of all, it’s expensive. It’s $16 something for one of those little bags. That said, it is ground almonds and almonds aren’t really that cheap either. I really really loved the additional flavour it gave the oatmeal this morning. But because I used the ground almonds, I didn’t toast my usual sliced almonds for toppings. That’s why I added a few dried unsweetened coconut chips for some crunch on top. All in all it was a fantastic bowl of oatmeal and I was supremely satisfied all morning. Breakfast was a total of 415 cals.

My lovely boss brought me in a tea with milk from Tim's and I enjoyed sipping on that about two hours later which was a measly 23 cals:

I was still satisfied from breakfast, but I am making an effort to keep my metabolism going and I had a big workout planned for later on, and well, I don’t really need to convince myself much to want to enjoy this awesome morning Snack of a deep chocolate vitatop with one tablespoon of pb2 on top for 127 cals:

Lunch was a bit of leftovers. It was 1/2c chick peas with the leftover balsamic & pine nut brussels sprouts from last night’s supper and the leftover steamed beets. I also enjoyed a delicious $1million dish of fresh plump raspberries which are apparently sprung from a golden bush because they were $5. I want Pete’s Frootique to put them on sale again!!! :-( Not likely eh?

Lunch was a total of 347 cals:

And since I’m a little Jillian Michael’s soldier and I’ve been listening to her podcasts from her Sunday radio show on iTunes, I knew that it was wise to fuel up before hitting my workout when I got home from work because otherwise my body will draw from my muscle to fuel the workout and I wouldn’t have as much energy to give it the intensity that I wanted to! Here that Jillian??? So I used the opportunity to enjoy a Jocolate Chocolate Cherry Larabar for 190 cals:

About 45 mins later what when I kicked some ass and did my awesome workout. As much as I want to punch Jillian right then and there I still find myself laughing out loud because she says things like, “I want you to feel like you are going to die!” lol How can you not laugh out loud at that! It does make me push harder though because I’ve seen how far she pushes the people on the biggest loser and most of them have actual serious health concerns and she’s not afraid to make them faint! They’ve all survived so far! (Of course they’ve all signed waivers up the yin yang!)

Anyhoo, I couldn’t help but notice that on the Level 2 of the shred, the girls were at least throwing me a bone this time around at least pretending to be having a tough time keeping up. God love yas! :-D

I had such a delicious Supper tonight. It felt like a comfort food in a way and it was perfect given the weather conditions outside. It was a pasta combo which consisted of:

• Catelli Smart Pasta – rotini
• Janes chicken breast strips
• green, red, orange, red peppers
• white button mushrooms
• red onion
• zucchini
• black olives
• swiss chard, tiny bit of kale
• baby spinach
• tomato
• light cream cheese
• olivieri tomato basil pasta sauce

I got so carried away with all the veggies that my recipe ended up making 3 reasonable portions. I estimated each portion to be around 360 cals and I also had a thin slice of the rosemary fococcia bread with a smear of becel for another 120 cals:

I sprinkled it with some fresh parm reg, of course (which I actually didn’t end up adding to the calorie count. It would have worked itself out in the wash somewhere in the estimations I’m sure)

And according to my new little My Fitness Pal counter, because of the elliptical training and the “circuit training” that I used to count for 30 day shred, I was entitled to 1900 calories today to keep up with losing 1 lb per week! I felt a little unsure about eating that many calories! I dunno, I’ll ease into it. So after coming down here to figure this all out, I am going up stairs for a little palmful of sweet & savory trail mix for another 150 cals which I won’t have a picture of for yas because I can’t be bothered to come back down after and re-post the pic, sorry guys! I am thinking about getting a nice hot bath, so the bath won :-D

My daily target for calorie intake was 1901 and I ended up consuming 1735 calories (including the trail mix to be consumed momentarily).

Does that blow your mind???? It blows mine! I’m a little nervous about it, but I think it’s all just because I’m approaching it a little differently and not used to looking at it like that. Plus I set it up to lose only 1 lb per week, so that would definitely explain some of the calorie increase.