Niki's Neverending Adventure

Happy New Years Eve!! I hope y’all enjoyed my 2010 goals post!! I am just going to do a quick race recap because I had a great race this morning!!

I ran the DAC 10K this morning, which was out by my parent’s house where I normally do my long runs! I can’t say how fun it was to be used to running the course! It was nice!! It was also a small race. I think only 66 people ran, so I was never trying to weave through people. That was nice also!! The race was very well organized and I really enjoyed it! It actually only ended up being 6 miles instead of 6.2, but that’s fine by me! Who really needs those 0.2 anyways?! They said after the race that they had to quickly change the course last minute, which was why it was a bit short! Either way, I ran SUPER hard and definitely have a new 6 mile PR!!

My time was 54:59 for 6 miles! Whoop Whoop!! That’s a 9:11 min/ mile pace! That’s totally fast for me!! Here’s my mile splits:

Mile 1: 9:25

Mile 2: 9:12

Mile 3: 9:19

Mile 4: 9:06

Mile 5: 9:10

Mile 6: 8:53

I am so happy with my pace for this race! I was a little worried since I’ve toned down my running a bit since the half marathon, but obviously I am still doing GREAT!! Here are some pics my mom and dad got of me.

This is at the beginning of the race, I’m all smiles!

This is around mile 4, I was getting hot but still smiling!

And this is at the finish, haha! Funny how the time clock basically beheads me in this pic! Would have been a good one if the time clock wasn’t there! LOL

Right after the race. I ended up getting third in my age group, but unfortunately they only gave medals to the first in each age group :( Oh well!

I really enjoy 10k’s and am looking forward to the next ones in February!! I will definitely do this race again next year, it was a blast!

Posted in: on Thursday, December 31, 2009 at at 4:58 PM 3 comments    

Hey friends! Like I promised, here are my 2010 goals/resolutions!! I broke them down into a Fitness and Nutrition and a Personal category. Since I am in school and jobless, I am leaving the Professional category blank since my goal is just to continue doing well in school and finish Dec 2011!! So here they are:

Fitness and Nutrition

1. Run at least 2 half marathons

2. Try to run at least 1 race per month (if possible, according to races available in my area)

3. Strength train at least 2X per week- includes ab workouts, bootcamps, and free weights.

4. Incorporate more veggies in my diet. Try to include a veggie with lunch and dinner at minimum.

5. Limit sweets to one treat a day- This is going to be SUPER tough for me!!

6. Drink more water!! I think I will try to drink 48 oz a day minimum. That’s 3 of my Nathan water bottles which is a lot more than I’m drinking now!

Personal

1. Finish planning my wedding and honeymoon and continue enjoying every minute of it!

2. Marry the love of my life on June 11th, 2010!!

3. Daily quiet times reading my Bible and spending time in prayer- I have definitely been slacking on this, I need to make it part of my morning routine. I always feel so much better after spending time with God!

4. Become a better listener, less bossy, and more understanding.

5.Cut back on needless spending and put more in savings. This is VERY important!! I am in school and have NO job so I don’t need to be spending money like I have an income! I am going to try to save $200/ month minimum.

 

I think that about covers it! Haha :) What do ya’ll think? I think they are definitely achievable! I am glad I will have this post to reference back to to make sure I stay on track!! What are some of y’alls goals/resolutions? I hope y’all have a wonderful New Years Eve and Happy New Year!!

Posted in: on at at 11:00 AM 3 comments    

It’s so crazy that tomorrow is New Year’s Eve! I can’t believe it is almost 2010! I still remember exactly what I did for New Years Eve in 2000! Y2K anyone? Haha :)

Since I am running my last race of 2009 tomorrow, I thought I would post about my last pre-race dinner of 2009!! I had to pick my packet up out by my parent’s house, so I decided to stay there for dinner :) Coincidentally (or not), they were having pasta for dinner!! Since they are my support team/ photographers for my race tomorrow, my mom may or may not have planned the pre-race carbo loading dinner! Haha!

We started off the evening with a beer tasting. Apparently, my dad bought some sort of Samuel Adams variety beer pack and had a special beer saved for me!! I let everyone else in on the beer tasting too! I’m not stingy :)

My dad knew how much I enjoyed the Seadog Blueberry Beer at The Flying Saucer after my brother’s graduation, that he thought I might enjoy this Blackberry Witbier! He was right!!

I had this pour X2. It was very good, had a nice blackberry flavor without being too sweet! Definitely something I would try again!!

And onto dinner…

I had a little bread and butter sample while I waited.. hehe:)

We had Cheese Ravioli,

salad, and garlic bread!

Now all together! With a little pour of Educated Guess Cabernet to wash it down! This dinner was great! Perfect pre-race meal! Great job mom!!

I may or may not have had a small slice of homemade pecan pie. No picture because I didn’t want to stop to take one! Ha!

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I am excited about tomorrow’s race! The weather looks good, I am super familiar with the course, and my parents will be there to cheer me on! More people have signed up now, I think there were 66 people the last time I checked. That’s much better than 35!! I hope more continue to sign up!! I really don’t have a goal in mind for tomorrow. I just want to have fun and run it the best I can!! I am just excited to be ending 2009 with one last race!! I basically need a base 10k time so I can try to beat it with the 2 10k’s I have on the schedule for February! Ha!

And with that, I must go!! I have some blogs to catch up on and a book to finish! I will hopefully have my goals post up sometime tomorrow!! Have a wonderful night y’all!!

Posted in: on Wednesday, December 30, 2009 at at 8:26 PM 5 comments    

I went ahead and signed up for the DAC 10k on New Years Eve morning!! I am a little nervous about it since there are only 54 people signed up so far! I’m not used to such small races! But, it’s going to be right by my parents house where I do most of my long runs so I am pretty familiar with the route. I have never raced there before!! The weather is looking good for race day. Right now it’s supposed to be cloudy and 40 degrees. Not too bad! This morning I had an early 3 miler with Erin. It was a nice run but FREEZING!! We both tried out our new reflective gear! She had a blinking light ankle thing and I had reflective slap bracelets! I definitely think the cars could see us! Tomorrow is going to be a rest day from running since I have the 10k Thursday! My arms are sore from that boot camp workout yesterday!! Mostly my triceps, but my back is a little sore also! It’s definitely a GOOD sore!!

I am working on thinking about my 2010 resolutions and hope to share those with you soon! We are just having leftovers for dinner tonight, so new new recipes to share. We are working our way through that huge candy stash! I will be so happy to have it gone!!

Well, that’s all for now! Trying to enjoy my last few days before I have to head back to school!

Posted in: on Tuesday, December 29, 2009 at at 3:09 PM 2 comments    

Hey bloggy friends! Yep, that’s right! 2 posts in one day!! I’m on a roll! I am sad to say that I took down all my Christmas decor this evening and put the tree out by the curb for the trash men to pick up. Makes me sad! My house looks so bare!!

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I had a great workout today! I couldn’t decide between a bootcamp workout or running, so I did both! Here’s how it went:

1 mile run on the treadmill: warm-up

Bobbi’s 20 minute Bootcamp

1 mile run on the treadmill: cool down

This workout took me about 40 minutes and I was super tired by the end! My heart stayed pumping the entire time! I loved it!! Y’all should definitely try this one!!

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I have so much candy in my house from Christmas. For some reason, my parents and fiancé think they need to buy me loads of candy. While I love candy, I just am so bad at controlling myself around it! Look at all this!

Luckily the fiancé is helping me eat it, but it’s going in the trash after New Years!!

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We had another really good dinner tonight! Like last night’s recipe, I got this one from IGE also!! If you can’t tell by now, I love everything she makes!!

Crockpot Santa Fe Chicken

Ingredients:

1 can chicken broth

1 can diced tomatoes with green chilies

1 can black beans, drained & rinsed

8 oz frozen corn

3 green onions, sliced

1 teaspoon cumin

1 teaspoon dried cilantro

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon onion powder

3/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper (more or less to taste)

Salt, to taste

2 large chicken breasts, thawed (I used 3 for extra leftovers!)

Directions:

1. Combine all ingredients from chicken broth to salt in crock pot. Salt chicken breasts, lay on top of mixture and cook on low for 8 hours.

2. Remove chicken breasts and shred with two forks. Return shredded chicken to crock pot, stir to combine, taste and adjust seasonings.

3. Serve over cooked rice, or in tortillas. Top with more green onions, sour cream, cheese and fresh cilantro.

Once again, this recipe was amazing! The chicken was literally falling apart in the Crockpot! It was so moist and tender! Loved this!!

Can you tell I’m using my new camera? Don’t the pictures look awesome?!

Well, that’s all for now. I want to get back to the new book I’m reading!! The Last Song by Nicolas Sparks! Love him!!

PS: Click on the book title to go to Nicolas Sparks’ homepage and check out the trailer for Dear John! Loved the book and the movie looks awesome! Comes out in February!!

Hope y’all have a great night!!

Posted in: on Monday, December 28, 2009 at at 7:41 PM 4 comments    

Hey friends! I hope everyone is having a good start to the new week!! Today marks only 1 more week of my school break :( Next Monday it’s back to school for me! This semester is supposed to be a lot more busy and hard than the last one. I am just hoping it goes by fast because then it will be time for me to get married!! Yay!!

Anyway, I have some new “Big Girl Toys” to share with ya’ll!! I call them “Big Girl Toys” because only adults think that new bowls are super exciting! Ha!! I received a gift card to Kohl's from the fiancé's grandparents, so my mom and I hit up Kohl's the day after Christmas to spend that gift card!! I got lots of kitchen stuff. A new(super sharp) knife, some orange measuring bowls (I use orange as an accent color in my kitchen), and 4 new oatmeal bowls (2 of each bowl)!! Obviously, they can be used for other things besides oats but that’s what I specifically bought them for!!

It looks more yellowish in this picture but it is actually orange!! A huge plus is that the bowls I got are all microwave, dishwasher, and oven safe! Gotta love that!

 

Tested it out yesterday morning and it worked great for my morning oats!!

This is the other bowl I got. Cute right?!! The other side has a moose on it! I thought they were very “wintery”!

I tested it out this morning on my oats. Love both sets of bowls!! I also tried a new PB in my oats this morning. It’s called Dark Chocolate Dreams PB and is wonderful!! But anyway, I will definitely be hitting up Kohl's more often for all their kitchen items!!

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Yesterday I did an easy 3 mile run to test out some new running gear!! Loved my new Under Armor pants and Nike jacket!! I also tested out my new handled water bottle. I had the bottle filled up completely for half of the run and my arm started to get really tired! The bottle plus the water seemed pretty heavy!! So, I dumped half of the water out and that was much easier to carry. I didn’t necessarily like carrying it, but I think it will be very useful for long runs. I did 3 miles in 29:29 at a 9:50 pace. The wind was pretty strong and was freezing cold, which is why I decided to only do 3 miles.

Not sure if I will run today or not. If I don’t, I will be doing a boot camp workout instead. I’m trying to take it easy in case I decide to run the 10k Thursday morning. The only thing that will hold me back from running it is the weather. Yesterday it said it might rain Thursday but this morning, the weather man said no rain Thursday. I plan on making my decision tomorrow so I can still get the early registration price! So far there are only like 35 people signed up! I’ve never done a race that small! Makes me a little nervous that I will be last! Haha :)

I have some extra Christmas money leftover and am thinking about buying a Spibelt to use for long runs also. I want something to carry my IPhone in and don’t want to use an armband thing. Anyone have one? What do you think? I have heard really good things about them!

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In other exciting news, I bought a new point and shoot camera!! I had just enough Christmas/Birthday money from both sets of grandparents to buy the camera and memory card! It was perfect!! I ended up getting the hot pink Sony Cybershot!

It’s 12.1 megapixels with a 4X zoom and a huge LCD screen on the back! It was everything I wanted!! I haven’t been able to use it just yet because the battery is charging! So all these pictures you see on this post are still from my old camera :( Can you believe my old camera is only 5.2 megapixels?!? This new one is more than double! I am so excited about the picture quality!! Hopefully on my next post, y’all will be seeing much better pics from my new camera!!

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I made a yummy recipe last night that I wanted to share!! I got this recipe from IGE a while back! Both the fiancé and I loved it!!

Lemon Tuna Noodle Casserole
1 cup dried pasta
1 1/2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/2 cup chopped celery
2 Tablespoons chopped onion
1 Tablespoon Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon hot sauce (or more to taste)
1 Tablespoon lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
dash of garlic powder
salt & pepper
2 Tablespoons flour
1 cup chicken broth
5 oz Canned tuna packed in water
Topping Mixture:
1 Tablespoon butter
3/4 cup crushed oyster crackers
Dash of salt, onion powder & garlic powder

Directions:
1. Pre-heat oven to 375 degrees. Cook pasta according to package directions. Drain and set aside.
2. Heat olive oil in a sauce pan over medium low heat. Sauté onions and celery until soft, ~10 minutes.
2. Add mustard through flour to pan and stir until combined. Add chicken broth and whisk until mixture is smooth, thick and bubbly.
3. Add pasta and tuna. Mix until combined and pour into greased casserole dish.
4. Top with oyster crackers that have been toasted in a skillet for about a minute with melted butter, salt, onion and garlic powder.
5. Cover casserole dish and bake for 15 minutes. Remove cover and bake for an additional 5 minutes.
6. ENJOY!

I forgot to take a picture until I had already plated our food! Whoops!!

I served it with Balsamic Green Beans (recipe below). It was a wonderful combination!!

Balsamic Green Beans

All I did was cook whatever amount of green beans you need (I did mine in the microwave). Then sauté about 2 shallots in some EVOO in the skillet for a few minutes. In a bowl, whisk together 1 tsp Dijon Mustard, 2 TBSP Balsamic Vinegar, 1 TBSP brown sugar, salt and pepper. Add to shallots in skillet, combine. Pour over green beans and serve! They are delish!!

I have a lot of cleaning to do today while I wait for the cable man to come hook up cable TV in what will be the fiancé's “MAN ROOM”. Haha. I also have to take down the Christmas decorations. So sad :( Not sure what our New Year’s Eve plans are, we usually keep it pretty low key. What are your plans for NYE??

Posted in: on at at 10:42 AM 5 comments    

Hey everyone!! I hope ya’ll had a great Christmas! I had the best Christmas EVER! I really enjoyed spending time with my family and celebrating Jesus’ birth! It has been an awesome 2 days, I’m going to start with Christmas Eve!

I got up early Christmas Eve morning and did a 5 mile treadmill run because it was stormy outside. I watched The Santa Clause while I ran, so that was fun!! After my run, I headed over to my parent’s house so my mom and I could go to Muddy’s Bake Shop and pick out some Birthday cupcakes!! We got there right when they opened and there was a huge line!! We picked out 8 cupcakes and headed on our way! We stopped and got the dogs some treats at 3 dog bakery and then came home and frosted some sugar cookies. We headed to church around 5pm. It was a very nice candlelight service! After church was my Birthday dinner. We headed to Mr. B’s to try it out. Unfortunately, when we got there, we realized we were the only people in the whole place and they basically only served fried food! I am definitely not a friend food fan, so we decided to head elsewhere for dinner. I totally thought Mr. B’s was a nice steakhouse! Guess I heard wrong!! We ended up at Bonefish, one of my favorites!! We shared Bang Bang Shrimp as an appetizer and I got the Ahi tuna for my entree! It was delish!!

My brother and I at Bonefish.

My parents at Bonefish.

After we ate, we headed home to watch The Santa Clause (yes, I realize I watched it once already that day) and then hit the sack!!

I always am the first one up Christmas morning, guess I’m just really excited for Christmas and Birthday festivities!! So, I decided to go on a run! It was dark when I started, and very windy. But the thing that made this run so awesome was that it was SNOWING!! Not a lot by any means, just kinda “mist snowing” but it was definitely snow!! I was smiling so big the whole run because it was just a perfect setting for a Christmas morning run. My Garmin’s batteries were dead so I think I ran about 3.5-4 miles. That run put me in such a happy mood all day! I loved it!! A little while later we started all the festivities! I am just going to show ya’ll pictures of the day so this post isn’t forever long!!

The Christmas tree at my parent’s house!

Opening my stocking

My brother and his dog Lexi

Our new IPHONES!!

Dad and his new floating key chain

Breakfast! Panera bagels and fruit!!

Mimosas!!

What Sadie wanted to do on Christmas morning! Sleep!

Afternoon snacks. Bruschetta, olives, cheese ball and crackers, meatballs and pineapples. This plate X2.

The fiancé and I.

Dinner!! Pork tenderloin, sweet potatoes, broccoli, stuffing, and a roll! Yum! I am having leftovers for dinner tonight for sure!!

The Birthmus Tree!!

Opening birthday gifts. Gold wrapping paper since it’s my Golden Birthday!! 25 on the 25th!

Love this scarf my dad got me!!

Blowing out the candle on my cupcake!

Mom, Josh, and I.

Cupcake sampler!! We cut up all the cupcakes in bite size pieces so we could try them all! I tried Red Velvet, Chocolate Peppermint, Eggnog, Hot Chocolate, and Lemon. My favorites were the Chocolate Peppermint and Lemon. This was so much better than regular cake!

It was a great Birthday and Christmas! I got lots of great stuff! I hope everyone had a wonderful day and I look forward to hearing about everyone’s Christmas’!!

And for those of you who have IPhones, what apps do you suggest? I’m clueless! There are so many out there! Have a great night!!

Posted in: on Saturday, December 26, 2009 at at 5:46 PM 4 comments    

I don’t know if I’m just lucky or today’s is MY day, but I found out this morning that I won a contest and a giveaway! Holy cow! I never win ANYTHING!! Ha! I won a contest on Lauren’s blog by guessing the most requested Christmas Song! Ends up I was right by guessing O Holy Night! I also won the Yurbuds giveaway that Frayed Laces was doing! And remember, my headphones just died last week! Perfect timing to win this giveaway!! I am super excited about winning both of these and I will make sure to share with ya’ll my prizes when I get them!!

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I am SUPER PUMPED that tomorrow is Christmas Eve!! I love Christmas Eve because there is always such anticipation in the air for Christmas morning! Plus, I love going to our Christmas Eve church service! Love the music, the Christmas story, worshiping the REAL reason for the season, EVERYTHING!! Also, after church it’s my birthday dinner!! I decided to try out Mr. B’s! Hopefully it’s yummy!! I also decided this year to have cupcakes instead of a Birthday Cake!! And, not just any cupcakes, ones from Muddy’s Bake Shop!! I am so sorry for those of you who don’t live in Memphis because these cupcakes are to die for!! There are so many flavors to choose from, don’t know which I’m going to choose! I know I’m definitely gonna get a variety so I can try a bunch!! Ha!

I have another great Christmas Cookie recipe to share!! My mom and I made these yesterday in a joint effort!! She mixed up all the ingredients Monday night and stuck them in the refrigerator, then I sliced and baked them yesterday. Turned out awesome!! Without further ado, I present:

Cranberry Orange Shortbread Cookies

1 cup butter, softened

3/4 cup powdered sugar

2 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp almond extract

1/2 cup chopped dried cranberries

1 Tbsp orange zest

2 cups all purpose flour

1/4 tsp baking powder

1/8 tsp salt

Wax paper

1. Beat 1 cup softened butter at medium speed with an electric mixer until creamy. Gradually add 3/4 cup powdered sugar, beating until smooth. Stir in vanilla extract, almond extract, dried cranberries, and orange zest until blended.

2. Stir together 2 cups flour, 1/4 tsp baking powder, and 1/8 tsp salt.

3. Gradually add flour mixture to butter mixture, beating at low speed until blended.

4. Shape shortbread dough unto 2 (7 inch) logs. Wrap each log in wax paper, and chill for 4 hours, or freeze in zip lock bag up to 1 month. (We chilled them overnight)

5. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

6. If frozen, let logs stand at room temperature for 10 minutes. Cut each log into 24 slices. Place shortbread slices 1 inch apart on lightly greased or parchment paper lined baking sheets.

 

7. Bake shortbread slices for 10-12 minutes, until edges of slices are golden.

8. Remove shortbread from baking sheet, and place on wire rack. Let cool completely, about 20 minutes. Store in airtight container.

Ya’ll, these are seriously great and so easy to make! Give them a try, you won’t regret it!!

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I had planned on doing a longer run yesterday but I guess my body just had other plans! I got up around 7:30am, ate 1/2 a Clif Bar, and headed out to my parent’s house to run. The weather was pretty nice, in the 40’s but there was kind of a strong wind. Right around mile 1.3 I got a killer side stitch. I was SOOO mad! Seriously, at mile 1.3! Are you kidding me?!! And, my killer side stitches are to the point where I literally can’t run, I have to stop and stretch my side out. So I did, but it continued to come back. I also started getting stomach cramps and feeling really nauseous! It was so weird! So, I decided to cut it short at 4 miles and try my long run on Sunday. I was so frustrated!! I am thinking the culprit was the Clif Bar, since I only waited and hour and a half after eating it to run and I normally need like 2+hours to digest even something as small as half a Clif Bar. I have a crazy stomach, I know. At least I kept an ok pace while being attacked by the killer side stitch. My average pace for the 4 miles was 10:10, so, not awful but definitely not my best either. Oh well, some days you have to do what your body says and yesterday I had no choice! Ha!! Today is an off day from running and I’m planning to do a boot camp workout in a little bit!

I have a few things to do today, nothing major, so I’m hoping to relax some!! If the fiancé gets all his Christmas shopping done early today (yes I realize it’s the 23rd, he’s so last minute) we might get to go see New Moon, finally! We have been trying to see this movie since it came out, but our schedules are so conflicting! I have him talked into going to see it because I told him there would be more fight scenes in this one, since the warewolves appear in this movie! Ha! Such a guy! Well, I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas Eve Eve!

Posted in: on Wednesday, December 23, 2009 at at 9:23 AM 3 comments    

I made a yummy dinner tonight. Turkey Burgers are one of my “go to” meals. They are super easy and healthy!!

 

Turkey Burgers

1/2 lb ground turkey breast

2 Tbsp chopped onion

1-2 cloves of garlic, minced

1-2 tsp Dijon mustard

hot sauce to taste

palmful of breadcrumbs

1/4 cup cooked spinach

salt and pepper to taste

1 Tbsp EVOO

 

Place all ingredients in large bowl, mix together with hands.

Make 3-4 patties, depending on how big you want them.

Cook in EVOO in skillet over medium heat, about 7 minutes per side.

Enjoy!! I ate mine on a sandwich thin with more spinach, ketchup, and mustard with a mixture of oven baked sweet potato and regular potato fries. YUM!!

I loved the addition of cooked spinach to the actual burger! Any way to sneak veggies in something where you can’t taste them is awesome in my book! I am also totally loving these sandwich thins!! They are the Orowheat Brand and are so good! I prefer them over regular bread now!

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I did an easy 3 miles this morning, 2 with Erin and 1 by myself. Other than being extremely COLD, the run was pretty uneventful! I am doing a longer run in the morning but luckily I get to sleep in, so hopefully it won’t be so cold when I run! I am excited because I found a 10k race on New Year’s Eve morning that is right by my parents house! It seems like it’s a pretty small race but I am really thinking about doing it since 10k’s are pretty hard to come by here! I’ll let ya’ll know soon what I decide for sure!!

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I need some more opinions!! I am planning on buying a new point and shoot camera with my birthday and Christmas money I get from my grandparents and am having a hard time deciding between a Cannon Powershot and a Nikon Coolpix. Do ya’ll have either one? Likes/Dislikes?? Any other suggestions? Thanks!!

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I made some more Rolo Pretzels today! Those things are so addicting! I am going to make some more Christmas cookies tomorrow at my parents house. We found a really good looking shortbread cookie recipe in Southern Living that my mom and I plan to try out! I am so excited that Christmas is only 4 days away!! I have narrowed down my Birthday Dinner Restaurant Search to Bonefish and Mr.B’s. Never been to Mr.B’s but I have heard good things about it! Any of you Memphians been there? What did you think??

Well, gotta get back to watching The Sing Off Finale!! Good night!!

Posted in: on Monday, December 21, 2009 at at 8:02 PM 3 comments    

Hey ya’ll!! I can’t believe today is December 20th! Only 5 days until Christmas and my birthday!! So excited!! Ok Memphis gals, I need your help!! I have to decide on a restaurant for my Birthday Dinner on Christmas Eve and I need ideas!! I am so bad at picking out restaurants! So, what are some of your favorite restaurants to eat at? Thanks ya’ll!!

 

Today was kinda a laid back day. I went to church, spent time with the fam, did a little Christmas shopping and wrapping, and watched a really good Hallmark Christmas movie. It was a nice, relaxing day!! Oh, and I also painted my nails! It’s been way too long since they’ve been painted!

 

No running again today. It’s hard to force myself to cut back my running some!! Only a few more weeks and I will be back to hardcore training, so I really want to enjoy this “downtime” from running, if you will!! But, I feel guilty not running! It’s kinda weird, haha. I have an early morning 3 miler scheduled with Erin tomorrow and then I’m going to do a longer run on Tuesday before the bad weather comes. No snow for us, just rain and thunderstorms forecasted for Wednesday and Thursday. I’m a little jealous of everyone up north who got all the snow! It looks so fun!!

 

I hope everyone had a good weekend and Christmas will be here in 5 days! I bet that means a short work week for a lot of you! Yay! Everyone ready?? I know I am!! I think 25 will be a GREAT year for me!!

Posted in: on Sunday, December 20, 2009 at at 9:24 PM 7 comments    

Today was my younger brother’s college graduation! He graduated from the University of Memphis! Go Tigers!! I have a lot of pictures to share with you!! I also want to say thanks to the guy sitting in front of me watching Transformers on his IPhone. Kept me entertained for the 2 hour long graduation! Haha :)

 

This is my brother Josh, the 2009 college graduate!!

 

My brother and parents :)

 

Josh and I, notice my fun headband with bow! More on that later!

 

After graduation we walked to The Flying Saucer for lunch. Here’s my plate:

 

I got a veggie wrap that had lettuce, Swiss, onions, tomato, avocado, peppers, and balsamic drizzle with chips and salsa. I ate half the wrap and about 3/4 the chips and salsa! Very good!!

I also tried a Blueberry Beer!

This is a Seadog Blueberry. I have seen Blueberry Beer on other food blogs before and have really been wanting to try it, so when I saw they had it on the menu, I had to get it!! The verdict?? Delish!! Absolutely LOVED it!! Will definitely be getting this again!

 

Here is Josh with his German Beer Flight.

 

After lunch, we went back to my parent’s house and had cake!!

 

A Memphis cake of course!! This cake was from Kroger and it was actually really good! The frosting was so yummy! I had a small piece with some chocolate chunk ice cream.

It was a fun day and I am so proud of my brother! Congrats Josh! Love you!!

I bought a fun headband the other day at Ann Taylor Loft, and knew it would go perfectly with the outfit I planned to wear to the graduation this morning.

 

It’s basically just a black headband with a big leopard print bow on the side!! It’s so fun to wear!! I feel so trendy wearing it and I am so NOT trendy at all! Haha :)

 

Cute right?? Unfortunately it hurt my head after wearing it for a while so I am going to work on stretching it out a bit!!

No running for me this morning, but I did get up extra early to fit in this 20 minute bootcamp workout! It was another GREAT one!! Thanks Bobbi!!

How’s everyone’s weekend going? Anyone getting snow? I hear it’s pretty bad up in the northeast!! Hope everyone stays safe and has a GREAT rest of the weekend!!

Posted in: on Saturday, December 19, 2009 at at 8:48 PM 3 comments