Campbells to the Rescue!

I’ve never been a HUGE soup person.  It’s delicious, but I find it fills you up for the time being, but leaves me hungry soon after.  That said, I don’t think I’ve ever consumed as much soup as I have recently. 

My diet as of late:

Notice a theme?

I have been feeling completely nauseous for days and chicken based soups have never hit the spot so well. And it just so happens that I was sent coupons to try out Campbell’s line of healthy soups a while back.

First day I had the Chicken Tuscany, which I’ve had before and knew I liked!

Different than chicken noodle, it has white beans, and more of a “cream of chicken soup” taste to it.  Delish!!

While babysitting one night, I brought along the can of Chicken with Whole Grain Noodles – easy and portable dinner!  I like how they have whole grain noodles

And when I was starting to feel a bit better, I had a soup with a bit more zest to it

Topped with some chips and cheese of course.

I’ve always enjoyed Campbells soups in the past. I love how the “light” versions are light enough to be enjoyed as a side dish, snack or appetizer, but still with delicious flavor! 

Of course, who only eats half the soup can, am I right?

They’re low in fat, packed with protein, and a decent amount of fiber (well some of them).  And all 11 Select Harvest Light varieties are 100% Natural.  AKA they contain no artificial flavors, colors or preservatives. Real ingredients people! 

Sure, the sodium is high, but honestly I really don’t pay attention to that at this point in my life (even though I should).  Meh!

Thank you Campbells for providing me with some delicious soup during my sick days!!  (Please note I was given coupons for the above soups to try and review).

I’m actually excited to try out some different flavors I’ve never had now.

Besides soup, I’ve also had quite a bit of bland toast.

And I went through a whole lot of Diet Sierra Mist.  It’s really weird how such foods/drinks really do help you feel better.

I’m feeling better now thank goodness, but it was the weirdest thing.  The way I knew I really truly was not feeling well was because I had ZERO appetite.  Bites and thoughts of food constantly had me feeling sick to my stomach.  I could only tolerate certain things at certain times (such as soup and toast!).  That never happens to me.  Even when I’m sick I can always still eat.

I could also sometimes stomach cereal such as this delicious granola I got cheap at Ralphs:

Yummmmm.

 

What’s you choice of food when you’re feeling sick/run down?

Things

Yo!!!  Missed me?  I hope so

A few things I’ve noticed as of late.

1. Family Time > Blog Time

We traveled to Washington last weekend for my sister Paige’s graduation!

It was the first time my family has been together since January!

 

 

2. There’s a reason I don’t live in Washington

3. Fruit makes champagne that much better.

 

4. Mimosa brunches with friends are that much better with a beautiful view.

It seriously makes you feel like you’re on vacation.

 

5. Guys really like bacon.

 

6. Don’t go down to the beach with “under-the-influence” guys and expect to stay dry.  No matter your protests, they will pick you up and dump in in the ocean.

Even in brand new jeans and shirt, and with straightened hair.  They just don’t understand.

 

7. My 10 year old sister might just be the funniest person I know.  We had a fun photo shoot with her 2 life-size stuffed animals.

   

 

8. I love this one.  Love

 

 

9. It’s a smart thing to put your food pictures on your computer before you take your camera to events such as graduations or mimosa brunches.  Because when you run out of camera space, the food pics are the first to go And then you end up with no food pics from the past 2 weeks.  Seriously.

 

10. I MISSED YOU!!!

 

Tell me the highlight from your past 2 weeks.  Anything exciting!

New Obsession

I’m obsessed. 

Frozen blueberries.  Topped with peanut sauce (mixture of peanut flour, almond milk, dash of salt, and a bit of cream cheese.  I’ve also mixed in honey apple butter for a bit of sweetness before).

It. Is. SO. Good.  The peanut sauce hardens a bit due to the frozen blueberries.  And as you eat, the blueberries slightly defrost making them a little mushy/easier to eat.  It seriously tastes like peanutty blueberry-ish ice cream.  I’m not joking. 

I’ve had it every night this week.  And maybe twice

Can’t. Get. Over. It.

 

Today I was feeling a bit off (thank you Cinco de Mayo celebrating last night).

I had a waffle at some point this morning.

And then leftover cream of broccoli soup before work this afternoon.

I snacked a bunch of this crack at work:

I’m quite serious when I say crack.  I’m not sure how Trader Joe’s finds it legal to sell this stuff.

And some iced coffee thank bajesus. 

After having a bowl of Blueberry-Peanut-Butter-Delight (what I shall call my new love), my body told me it was craving something fatty and Chinesey (I shall thank my roommate who had me looking at Thai food menus online).

Panda Express to the rescue!  Dude, that lady OVERLOADED my tray with almost twice as much food as normal.  And I ate it all.

String bean chicken.

Mushroom chicken.

And I had a free entrée coupon (check the back of your receipts people!!) so I tried the Mandarin Chicken.

Yuck.  Slimy, greasy, chewy, yucky taste.  I did not like. 

 

Is it bad luck if you (accidentally) rip your fortune in half?

Whoops.

 

Did you do anything to celebrate the 5th of May?

First off – happy birthday to my sister!!  (well it was yesterday)  But besides that I just went to a Mexican restaurant/bar with friends.  It was fun!  But an interesting night…I wish I could have partaken in margarita happy hour!

Back in Action

Dayumnnn weather – you be lookin’ GOR-geous today!!  Keep it up

Today started out with some gym time.  I usually go do weights for about 30-40 minutes, but I felt pretty awful when I woke up, and decided to head in later at like 7:00 instead of 6:30. So I got in:

• 15 minutes easy weights (including pull-up machine…working on that!)
• 25 minutes abs class

Let me tell ya’ – doing ab work is dang hard with a boot on my leg.  I don’t know how much it weighs, but it ads to the intensity!  Of course I have to modify planks and such though.

Breakfast wasn’t eaten until 9:15 at work:

Voskos Greek yogurt (topped with a bit of granola)

…mixed with some Trader Joe’s honey apple butter.  It’s definitely yummy, but just reminds me of extra sweet applesauce.  It’s good, but I’d rather have jam (or pumpkin butter!!). 

While at work at snacked on watermelon which I was asked to cut up:

And a mini baby ice cream cone!  Cute.

Lunch (prepared in my wok – love love this thing) – stir-fryed broccoli slaw with ground turkey and enchilada sauce.  Sounds weird, but it was tasty!

 

Topped off with some Jalapeno greek yogurt dip (found at Costco) instead of sour cream.

I also snacked on 2 small random pieces of chicken while this was cooking.

And a couple carrot cake cookies for dessert.

I got this container 75% off at Cost Plus the other day, and have been plowing through.  Love you after-holiday sales!

 

I failed yet again at taking a picture of dinner at work.  It rarely rarely happens since I don’t carry my camera/phone around with me in my pocket (obviously), and we go straight on break into the cafeteria. Unfortunately, I just have to describe it to you

• Creamed spinach (so so good!)
• Steamed broccoli
• Vegetable soup (Au Bon Pan)

There are always 2 entrees, 2 vegetables (not always healthy steamed vegetables ), and 2 starches as options in the cafeteria.  Plus a salad bar, prepackaged wraps/sandwiches, and a soup.  The entrees are often foods I don’t eat (red meat, over-dried meat, meat with skin, etc), so I often go for the salad bar, veggie sides, and soups. 

Once home, I self massaged my tibial tendon (where I’m having lots of pain – right above my inner ankle), and snack on my new favorite dessert – frozen blueberries topped with a peanut flour sauce (will take a picture next time, promise!!). 

Plus hot chocolate! I needed to warm up someway after icing

 

By the way – yes I am counting calories (as part of my weight loss/fit back in my pants plan).  And today’s calorie count totaled out around 1500.  Probably a little more since I estimated on my peanut flour sauce and snacked on a few unmentionable carrot cake cookies I don’t necessarily like to talk calories on the blog (since I know many people do not like that, and I don’t want it to become all calorie talk since I don’t like that either), but I will occasionally talk about it.  Just the facts!

 

PS – yayyyy we made it through Monday!! (even though today is technically my Tuesday at the hospital, it is still my Monday at babysitting).

Return of the Oldies

My old workout videos that is

Today I busted out my Tae Bo DVD

Source

Sup Billy?

I’m getting so bored of weights weights weights at the gym, plus I wanted to SWEAT.  It actually worked out okay with my boot!  Of course I had to modify it, and not do the kicking segments as fast, but I’ll definitely be doing this again I actually love Tae Bo and used it all the time when I lost weight a long time ago in high school, and then again when I was losing weight (before I started running) freshman year.  If you do it right your upper body is SORE. 

And then I whipped out the old school 8-minute abs.  Although next time I’ll be blasting my own music in the background.  There’s only so much “C’mon gang!!” I can take.

Yay I actually felt like I got a workout in!!

Haggard post-tanning/workout/makeup runneth over look is all me.

By the way, how was everyone’s Easter?  My family (okay, minus 3 siblings) came down to visit on Saturday…

…and my dad fixed my camera!!!  I’m tellin’ ya’ –

Daddys = miracle workers.

This was my first Easter completely alone.  In the past I’ve always either gone home, or done some sort of celebration with my roommates.  So of course I had to keep up some sort of tradition

Hmm maybe I should have used more water?

Every batch has the ugly poop colored egg

 

Go Giants!!

Such pretty colors.

 

And then I used my new wok that my roommate got me for my birthday!!  LOVE IT.

 

So now that my camera is fixed I hope to be around much more!!

Are you a workout DVD type of person?  What’s your favorite?

Camera oh Camera

Hola mi amigos!  (I do not know if that is proper terminology, I never took Spanish in high school.  French.  And even still I don’t know much French).

So I seem to have the worst luck with cameras. 

I dropped and broke my 4-year old Camera Celeste (yes, her name) about 1 1/2 years ago.

I went a couple months taking pics with my Iphone until I got a new camera for Christmas.

And then I lost my 6 month new camera Antonio (yes, his name) last June.

So then I went 6 months taking Iphone pics again before I finally splurged and bought myself a camera in December. 

(Looked like this for the record):

Source

Then, about a month ago, I had the little battery/card window open to put pictures on my computer.  My camera was on my bed, and when I went to get up on my bed myself, I kneed on the door hinge, and it popped off.  And I can’t get it back on And the camera won’t turn on without the door on.  I was sooooooo upset.  Are you (*%&*(&(*^&%(&** kidding me?!?  My second BRAND NEW camera in less than a year. 

I’m hoping my Dad can fix it.  Or he said I can probably send it in and pay to have it fixed.  GAR!

So that is my excuse for not blogging as much.  I’m just not motivated with crappy Iphone pics!!  I’m sorry.

But I’ve captured a few things!  Such as my beautiful blooming flowers

My breakfast of choice this week – cottage cheese + strawberries.

With about 5x that amount of trail mix added in.

And my 20+ minute long gas getting adventures.  5 cars back in line for gas at Costco.  Cheapest in the area – and it’s still $4.17 a gallon.  Yikes.

Other gas stations around here are averaging $4.35 for the cheapest.  People are freaking out over this (yes, I am too), but I remember a couple summers ago when it was in the high $4.00 range.  Everyone was curious if it was going to make it to $5.00.  But then it started to drop again.  I hope it does the same this year!!

And just for fun – back in 2006 on our walk to a party when gas was CRAZY high for back then.  I remember we were like “Let’s take a picture – this is ridiculous!!”

(May 2006)

And then to keep up with tradition, we took another one on another walk past the same gas station later that year. 

(September 2006)

I wish it was that low now!!

 

How much is gas where you live?

 

Is there a certain electronic (camera, phones) or anything in general you seem to have the worst luck with?

I also seem to have awful awful luck with earrings.  I got a pair of diamond studs for my 8th grade graduation, and lost them the next year during swim practice. 

Then I got another nice pair of real earrings for high school graduation, and lost one of them working out at the gym (still have one of the studs though).

Then I got another pair of diamond studs for college graduation, and lost one within a few months while swimming again.  You’d think I’d learned my lesson to take earrings out while swimming, but this one was in my cartilage under my swim cap.  I thought it was safe!!

I also almost lost another nice pair of earrings a month ago when I realized the back had fallen off.  Luckily I felt it in time before the earring portion fell out of my ear.

And that’s not counting the numerous hoops and other cheap studs I’ve managed to lose.  It’s ridiculous!

Birthday Nights

There are so many great restaurants around here.  So many that I really couldn’t decide and ended up at CPK (California Pizza Kitchen).

I love love love their BBQ chicken pizza, but wanted to try something new.  Their Pear & Gorgonzola pizza always catches my eye.  I decided to try it out tonight!

“Caramelized pears, Gorgonzola, Fontina and Mozzarella cheeses, caramelized sweet onions and chopped hazelnuts. Topped with field greens tossed in our Gorgonzola ranch dressing”

The pizza was delicious.  But there was way way too much dressing/white sauce going on.  I’m not a huge ranch person, and there was just way too much ranch.  It would be good to have 1 or 2 slices as an appetizer or something, but it was lacking that traditional pizza flavor (red sauce or BBQ sauce) that I was craving.  Still deeeelicious though! 

And then there was always dessert

Passed around the table of course, although I ate half of it.

Last year: (desserts rule)

The rest of the night was filled with drinks, friends, and dancing.

(I feel like we’re going to a country concert in this picture)

Hey look I wore the same belt last year on my birthday!

Yes, The Boot (das boot) made an appearance.  But apparently not in pictures.

No worries, it made another appearance the next night when we went out for another birthday celebration!  (With pretty much the same people…haha.  Don’t ask why we didn’t combine birthday parties).

Night#2:

Birthday Buddies!

BOOT!  (Don’t ask why my roommate is doing the head tilt)

I had to work at 6 am the next morning, so I was the driver.  I had 2-3 drinks at around 9:30 before we walked downtown (so I could drive home by 2:00).  And this morning I felt AWFUL.  I mean shaky, sick…I even got sick at work.  That is not normal after only 3 drinks.  Especially because 3 drinks gets me no where near tipsy/drunk.  I really think my body is telling me NO ALCOHOL ENTER ZONE. 

Oh and we also rocked the glow sticks.  I obviously chose pink & orange

Day of my birth

Keep in mind this was supposed to go up yesterday, but I got distracted….

April 15 might mean one thing to most of you: TAX DAY.

But to me, April 15 always means…my birthday!

Source

Keys to a successful birthday:

1. Cake flavor.  In any shape or form.  While Funfetti Pancakes seem to be popular around here for birthdays, I didn’t have much time to make pancakes this morning.  And I’m on such a god-awful cottage cheese kick. 

Cake Batter Cottage Cheese!!

Don’t even knock it ‘till you’ve tried it.  It tasted like thick gooey cake batter.  Yummmmm.

And I definitely went back for seconds.

2. A good gym sesh.  Too bad I skipped this and slept in instead

3. Monster salad beast is a must for birthdays

I don’t even know what was in said Beast, but it consisted of normal salad fixins’ plus a scoop of Hawaiian Tempah, cashew chicken salad, and…..something else from the hot bar.

And it’s a good thing I didn’t buy a dessert because this arrived shortly after I got home:

4. More cake.  This time in heaven form:

Seriously people.  A deep dish S’mores pie (from Costco – where else would my family shop?).  My daddy knows me well

5. Beautiful flowers.  Flowers are a tradition on our birthdays.  My dad would always come home from work every birthday with a bouquet (from…uh…Costco).  LOVE.

Tonight is pretty low key.  Just grabbing some dinner, and then going out with friends! 

 

Foot/PT update: I stopped going to PT for the time being as it wasn’t drastically helping, it’s expensive, and I’m running out of appointments (due to insurance).  I caved last week and got The Boot.  Nothing is helping.  And I’m getting desperate here.  I know many people don’t recommend booting up, but I’m hoping it helps since I walk SO MUCH at work.  We will see. 

Which brings me to successful tip

6. Actually getting dressed in real clothes (and not the workout clothes I wear everyday).  Sexy boot isn’t it?

Fork in the Road

Hello friends. 

I don’t want to sound like such a downer here, but I’ve been having a really hard past week. 

Sure my sister visited last weekend and we ate delicious food such as Firestone’s salads

and their amazing french fries.  And can’t forget the BEST BBQ SAUCE EVER.  I wish they sold this stuff by the bottle.

I also took her to Cowboy Cookies and we shared yumtastic ice cream cookie sandwich.

I’m not super duper close with my 16 (almost 17!) year old sister, but we have our moments.  I feel like this was good for us

(2 years ago flashback when my sisters visited for the Lady Antebellum concert)

2009 Thanksgiving

Dying Easter eggs/playing Life 2 years ago

(Where did that sweatshirt go???)

Her prom this past March!

Cheers!

 

Anyways, last Sunday was match day for the dietetic internships.  I was nervous/jittery/excited all day long.  Because at exactly 4:00 (pacific time), it would be posted what internship we were matched up for and where I would be spending the next 1-2 years.

I don’t want to complain, or sound like a downer, or dwell here – but I know I have to (and want to) share on the blog that I didn’t get matched with any program.  It’s been such a big part of my life/stresser for the past 5 months, that I can’t just ignore the fact here. 

So that’s the main reason I’ve been absent for a good 1+ week now.  I’ve gone through so many emotions – disbelief, feeling sorry for myself, shock, upset, regret, jealousy, etc.  I took this hospital job back in San Luis Obispo thinking it would be almost a guarantee into an internship because of the experience (at least that’s what many people made it out to seem).  I spent so much time and money on those applications, and it all seemed like a waste now.  Not to mention almost everyone else I work with got matched up (that’s where the jealousy came in). 

It was just hard to wrap my head around the idea that I wouldn’t be living/attending any of the places I thought I would be next year.  For the past few months I’ve been imagining myself in Florida, Missouri, or Tennessee.  And then I had to pull my act together in a couple days and start researching the second match options (limited amount of programs that still have openings). 

I’m still trying to figure out what I’ll be doing next year.  I know it’s not the end of the world, and I know something will work out.  It’s just a sudden change I have to accept and deal with. 

I will keep you folks updated with whatever comes my way!

Tarsal Troubles

I swear there’s food under that ketchup.

Nothing like an egg & veggie sausage scramble with a side of taped foot.  Eaten in bed on a Saturday morning Oh relaxing.

 

So about that tape…here comes some injury talk!  Booooo. 

Anyways I really haven’t talked about it much.  I’ve mentioned it, but I’m injured.  Yes, again. 

Back in October, my heel gave me some trouble the week before my half marathon.  I thought it was plantar fasciitis, and it got 90% better within the week.  But my ankle still felt….funny.  It didn’t hurt, but on every run it just felt weird.  Like full or tight or something.  Not bad at all though.  The pain also sometimes radiated up above my inner ankle along the inner shin bone.  I thought I just needed new orthotics.  So I got some.

But, like I mentioned in January, my new orthotics didn’t help.  In fact, my problems just got worse with them.  I cut back on running.  I rested.  I iced.  I’m part of the Injury’s royal court by now, so I know the drill.  Finally at the end of January, I had enough and went to a podiatrist.

Diagnosis?  Tarsal tunnel syndrome.  Similar to carpal tunnel syndrome (of the wrist), but in the ankle.

Prescription? Rest.  Wear orthotics/running shoes all day long.  Limit walking.  Ice.  Prescription strength anti-inflammatories. Come back in 4 weeks.

By the end of 4 weeks, I was feeling 85% better.  Barely any pain!  So I tried a couple treadmill workouts that week.  2-3 miles on the treadmill of running/walking.  Took it very easy and slow.  And you know what?  I felt no pain during activity.  But that week it flared up.  Super painful.  Throbbing at night. 

When I went back to the doctor, he told me the same thing: Rest. Wear orthotics. Limit walking. Ice.  And now physical therapy.

So that’s what I’ve been doing the past 3 weeks.  Physical therapy.  Which seems to be helping.  But barely.  It’s feeling better.  But no better than it felt at the end of those initial 4 weeks.  And it still definitely hurts often, and always feels funny.  It almost always feels full and tight – like there’s something in there that just needs to be stretched out.

So I had another appointment yesterday.  And at this point, he wants to boot me up. 

He did take x-rays, but I guess nothing was abnormal since he didn’t talk about them.

And I can’t afford an MRI right now.  I joke that I’d “be rich!” if it weren’t for all my injuries.  You know how much I’ve spent on multiple pairs of new shoes, orthotics, doctor’s appointments, physical therapy, etc?  Yeah, you don’t want to know.  Neither do I.

Booting would limit all motion of the ankle and the tarsal tunnel.  Unfortunately, it would also limit movement of all muscles.  Which mean I would lose all strength down there.  Seeing as how physical therapy has been focusing on strengthening the ankle and calf muscles around the ankle in order to support the arch better, it seems counterproductive to me. My physical therapist wasn’t happy about this, and I’m having trouble with it as well.

I’m going to see how my ankle/heel feels this weekend/week and then decide.  I’ve just been dealing with this thing for almost 6 months now, and I feel like no matter what improvement I get, it comes flaring back again with activity.  (Keep in mind even swimming and the stationary bike hurt and bother it). 

I’m just sick of injuries!!

• Plantar fasciitis in 2006 (back when I just ran on the treadmill)
• Year-long calf pain following my marathon in 2007
• Knee pain from 2008-current (it got 90% better in 2009 but occasionally still bothers me)
• Oblique/side pain in August 2010 that lasted 3 weeks
• The heel pain in October 2010
• Oblique/side pain in November 2010-end of December (this one was much worse than the first – both sides and even into my back)

My body obviously is not meant for running.  Actually, I’m sure it all stems from my feet (which the physical therapist couldn’t get over how much my arches collapse and ankles roll inward).

 

Fun/Weird fact: I actually have very high arches.  My arches just collapse because my feet are so long (size 11), and there’s no support in the middle.  Kind of like how a bridge would collapse if there wasn’t a support pole in the center to help keep it up.

 

Okay, enough injury talk.  My sister’s coming into town to visit today and I have to figure out what to do with her!!

 

Have you ever dealt with an injury (or injuries)?  What type?