An Out and About Kind of Day

Yesterday was an out-and-about kind of day. After my breakfast of yogurt and granola I decided to head out on a bike ride. Our house is on a long spit, very close to the end, so we can easily walk or ride out to the ocean whenever we want.

I just rode to the look out bench. The islands in the distance are actually in the U.S., that's how close we are to the border!

It was such a nice day out!

The way to the ocean is all down hill, so you can imagine that by the time I got home I was out of breath and hot from going back up all the hills. Good exercise! So I made myself a smoothie. I wanted to try out one of my packets of smoothie vitamin enhancers, so I pulled one of those out. Here's what went into the blender.

Frozen blueberries, leftover fruit salad, fresh spinach, rice milk, and a vegan smoothie packet.

I was so ready to drink this! It looked sooo good!

But then it so wasn't. I am NEVER buying that brand of smoothie vitamin mix again. It made everything taste chalky and almost bitter. GROSS! I could only manage to drink half of it before it went down the toilet. B made a terrible face and hated it too. So disappointing! It was so promising too!

While I was sipping the nastiness in my glass I wandered around our yard, checking out the plants, searching for new blooms. My jasmine is doing so well! It's almost made it to the top of it's stake!

Then I found these awesome mushrooms just coming up. they are huge!

We have a small veg garden going, but it got started so late. We do have a few green tomatoes though. Hopefully they'll ripen.

This is a cute little succulent we planted. It's blooming! Isn't that just the coolest little flower?! We had never seen this variety before. (The snail shell is decorative only, it's inhabitant has been evicted!)

This is a wild-ish area of the yard, and we've got native wildflowers mixed in with the stuff we've planted. Daisies, rose campion, curry, lavender and who know's what else. Very pretty, though!

I was happy to see that my wisteria is finally sending out shoots of new growth.

My rose from B is blooming like there's no tomorrow!

And B and his dad finished the fence around the yard! They have been working on it for SO long! It looks great!

It's nice to see that all of our plants are finally starting to fill in. It's been fun starting a giant yard from scratch! Can't wait to see what it'll look like in the years to come!

Healthy Eating and Exercise: A Second Attempt

Yikes! Wednesdays are CRAZY! Every Wednesday I work 2 shifts at the bakery; A day shift to check in with my boss/friend Nora for order day, and my regular night shift with the guys. Not to mention that because I have a day shift I ride my bike the 6 1/2 miles to work in the morning. Not a lot of sleep happens, and things can get ugly.

Luckily, everything went just fine yesterday, and I got a good nap in. I also slept like a rock last night. Oh yeah!

So today I decided that I really need to step it up with the whole exercise and eating right thing. I've been feeling sorta chubby lately, and every time I look down at my midsection I think of Pulp Fiction and pot bellies. Not good! I did however weigh myself today, and I'm back down to 135 after being 140 for most of the year! Woot woot! Now I just have to keep working at it!

To work on the whole eating right thing I decided to try out a new recipe from Angela at Oh She Glows. Curry chickpea burgers. Of course my wonderful husband offered to help with dinner, which means we're having fresh french fries, but I promise I won't eat many(as in I won't take seconds ;) ) I hauled my laptop into the kitchen yet again ( I know, livin' on the edge!) and got out everything I needed for this recipe.

Things came together pretty quickly, as the recipe promised, and I love how few main ingredients there are. Granted, we haven't eaten them yet. But if they're as good as I think they will be, then i'll have to try this same basic recipe with other herbs and spices. I bet there are endless flavor possibilities! Ok, I'm getting ahead of myself here.

I formed the patties and laid them out on my sil-pat lined baking sheet. I only got 5 out of this recipe, but I made a couple of them kinda big for B and his dad.

Then I popped them into the oven for about 25 minutes. I did flip them once, just so they'd be evenly cooked. I plan on warming them on the grill just before we eat. We actually have some ripe avocado, so that'll go on top with some lettuce, mayo, and hopefully tomato if I can find one. We have fresh whole wheat Kaisers from the bakery too!

I think they came out looking pretty good! Great color, and seems like a good texture. I'm having a hard time restraining myself from demolishing one right now!

While doing the dishes I got to admire our yard and view. We live in such a beautiful place!

This of course inspired me to work on the exercise routine, so I started drying off (I say drying off, because it tends to look like monsoon season when I do the dishes. The counter, cabinets, my shirt, and shoes were all soaked!). While toweling off I discovered this! Guess I was a little too enthusiastic with the green food coloring at work last night! Seriously, that's above my elbow! How do I manage these things?!

I snagged one of my tasty banana spelt muffins from the other day (still delicious!) for a quick snack.

I think Izzie wanted some too!

Then we got ready for some cardio. Izzie LOVES walks! She recognizes my workout shoes/clothes and starts dancing around making happy sounds. SO cute!

We went to our mailbox and back, one mile each way plus lots of huge hills. I did intervals of 1 minute walking, 1 minute jogging the whole way, hills included. That got my heart pumping! When we got back I did some strength training. I use 5lb weights, and today I did arms. Here's the routine.

2 sets of 12 reps each:

chest press

overhead triceps extension

chest fly

triceps kickback

side lateral raise

alternate bicep curls

front raises

shoulder press

concentration curl

one arm dumbell row

I need to go finish dinner now, and get ready to go to work. Gotta get my stuff together for tomorrow too, as B and I are going to Victoria for errand day. The weather's been so nice, maybe we'll see the Orcas out and about on the ferry ride!

Do you guys work little errands in throughout the week, or do you do one big errand day? We obviously do it all at once! Sigh, it's gonna be a looong day tomorrow!

Picture Overload!

Last Christmas I bought B a Nikon D5000 digital camera. It is so cool! I have tried it out a few times, but haven't really messed with it much. While checking out other peoples blogs I have developed picture envy! Everyone's pics are just so beautiful! So I asked B if I could use his Nikon, and the request was approved!

So, unfortunately for you, I went on a photo frenzy today in our garden. Such fun!

This is my dog Izzie, after an adventure in the yard. She is such a bur collector!

Our yard...

O.K., I think i'm done for now. Hopefully I'll be taking most of my blog pictures with this camera now, and eventually my skills will improve. Yet another thing to play with! Pender is such a beautiful place, I'm sure there will be many more photos to come!