Getting Organized for the Week

Recently, work and life (aka tutoring) have picked up so I have been busy for the past couple of weeks (a couple of 12 hr days at work followed by tutoring..yay!). 

I wanted to get back into the habit of going to the gym in September, then I hit a wall...literally. I accidentally moved too far over in the parking garage at my apartment to let a car by, and then scraped my car on one of the columns. Parking garage fail. Anyway that meant the car was in the shop for the 1st week, and that added a fun transit ride to my already busy schedule. Good news was I got a good deal on the repairs and got my car back in 4 days. (If anyone in the Toronto area needs car body work done...highly recommend Perfect Parts on Dundas St!!)

The next week I did make it to Body Pump!! It was the first time in sooo long since I went and for all of last week I was still feeling the squat track. Can't wait until I go again. I was planning to hit the gym/jog more but work got crazy busy, and then this weekend I got sick. Blech. I went 18 months without getting sick and so far in September I have had an allergy attack (yay ragweed) and then a minor cold..nothing major, but convientantly (I guess?) on the weekends. 

So today as I gear up for yet another crazy busy week, I wanted to let you in on a "typical" Sunday routine in our itty bitty condo:

1.Finish chores: I dealt with Laundry, Mike cleaned the bathroom (fair trade me thinks!)

2.Planned out our meals for the week, and ran to get a few groceries. We consider when planning meals that most of the time we come home from work/tutoring late, so we live on leftovers! 

3. Did meal prep for all of those meals:

Beets, Zucchini,  Romaine Lettuce, Beet Greens, Kale Salad..etc.

 This meal prep/making lunches the night before is the only way for us to be prepared to eat healthy!

4. I did something extra tonight..I have some big meetings at work this week so I figured it would be good (and fun) to plan my outfits:

Lots of blues and pencil skirts..that is how I roll. (Sorry for the bad phone pic)

I even got to dig through some old stuff to accessorize. I recently started reading a blog Putting Me Together, and the chicky on that blog has really inspired me to, well put myself together. I would like to think that I look professional for work, but my accessorizing was limited...so it is new project time!

Doing all that prep work, and looking over my calender and making a to-do list is one way that I can calm any stress before any extra busy week. A delicious cup of Chamomile tea also helps!

Nom Nom!

Anyone else have any Sunday routines? Anyone else eat as many beets as I do??

Restaurant Resistance

Happy Sunday night readers!

I am getting geared up to go back to work after another great weekend. The weekend was pretty chill, but did involve a Sunset Canoe adventure to Toronto Island with Mike on Friday (Groupons are awesome)

I love the Islands!

There was also a free Rugby game on Saturday, and my first hot coffee beverage since spring..it was chilly!!

With the "back to school" restart mode the other thing that Mike and I  were talking about recently was money..and saving money!! Mike and I are big on budgeting and don't splurge too much, but I think summer just lends itself to spending more (patios, shopping, fun activities..Canada's Wonderland..etc.)

One thing that I still feel I spend way too much money on is eating out. It is so easy to do in Toronto and as Gail Vaz Oxlade once said, people in general eat out way too much. Back in the day, people would get together and have dinner parties and potlucks, and a restaurant was a big fancy smancy event, but now people (including me) eat out all the time!!

So that all being said, one way to cut back on going out to restaurants is to make restaurant inspired food at home!

Last week I had a bunch of veggies that needed to be used up from my Fresh City Farm box. And I was craving Thai food (I crave Thai food at all time..lets be serious). So a catch-all veggie/tofu curry was born.

At home Thai!

I loosely followed the recipe from this website, but made some few changes. I doubled the recipe to make lots of leftovers. 

First I brought 1 can of coconut milk, and 2 cups of homemade veggie stock to a light boil (while stirring). The funny thing was the veggie stock had some beets involved so at this point it was a nice pink colour. 

Next I added some cauliflower, green pepper a pre-cooked sweet potato. I let that cook for a 5-8 minutes, and then added the spices, ginger, tumeric, curry, garlic, chili etc. Let it cook for 3 more minutes, then I added the drained tofu. I served it over rice.

This dish gave me what I was craving, but was super easy and way cheaper than going out to a restaurant! 

Tonight we were craving restaurant nachos. So Mike took over and made baked nachos with chicken. (Ate it too fast to take a picture..oops!) They tasted just like a restaurant, but was once again cheap and fast, and was most likely healthier. Yay! 

Any other simple restaurant inspired meals? Anyone else want Thai food all the time?

September Equals Running

And it is September. Holy Cow the time sure does fly. 

Even though it is September I am not jumping on the "end of summer" train. Yes the days are getting shorter, and the nights are getting cooler, and the geese poop is everywhere...BUT I refuse to say "Oh summer is over"...hells no. That all being said, I love September, especially since I am no longer in School. The weather is perfect for outdoor exercise (minus the ragweed allergies kicking up), and most importantly September seems like a fresh start. 

To backtrack, just like June and July, August was full to the brim. I had my trip back to the Maritimes the first week, followed by a family get together for my Grandpa's 80th bday. Next was a big weekend with the friends that involved Canada's Wonderland, and actually going out in Toronto to a real life club. The weekend after that was a trip to Stratford to see 42nd street with my grandparents, and Mud run (more later). 

Since September is my "fresh start" I am trying to get back into exercising. I have a few specific fitness goals, and I feel really good about meeting them. I have also gotten back into running which is the main topic of this post. September to me still reminds me of high school soccer days, and it is my favourite time of year to jog. 

I got a head start by signing up for Mud Run on August 25th with two other girlies from work. Mud Run is a 6km obstacle race involving...mud. Lots of mud. This event was amazing and we finished in 1hr, not to bad! I was personally impressed with how I didn't feel as dead as I expected after the whole thing. 

So much mud, yet so much fun.

Having this run scheduled gave me motivation to get back into running. I pretty much stopped after my 5 km last year. So on the August long weekend I went for my first attempt at an outdoor jog. It was a horrible fail I ran maybe 3 minutes and felt like I couldn't breathe. But then something changed. 

For the longest time I was trying to run by distance "ok I will go to the next lamp post, the next sign" and that just doesn't work for me. So I decided to look up the Couch to 5km work out. I used that is inspiration to make my own one. For some reason I thought the first attempt should be Run 8 min, Walk 5, Run 2, Walk 3, then Run 1 alternate Walk 1 for 16 mins. 

And then I did it. 

For me, having the timer counting down makes it that much more bearable. It also helps me pace which I was really bad at. The next week I did 10 run, walk 5, run 5, walk 3, run 4, walk 2, run 3. So I suddenly went to running 2 minutes maybe to a total run time of 22 minutes!! The next week I went trail running and did run 12, walk 4, run 6, walk 4, run 6 and could have ran for longer!! Then it was the mud run, then I got sick, so running got put on hold. 

This weekend I went out on Sunday and did a 14 min run, and then walked for 20 mins (due to the stuffy nose), but then I went to the gym to do back and arms for the first time in a long time! Monday I went on a 16km roller-blade with my friend Brittany. Then today, in the rain, I did 14 min run, 3 walk, 10 run, 10 walk, with sore roller-bladey legs. 

My goal is to do the same run as last year, run for the cure, and run the whole thing without stopping. I still have a month to train, and I am in a much better running place than last year so I think this is a totally doable goal. And the best part of all this I actually like running now. Being outside, feet and pavement, it is getting as calming as yoga. I am much more red after running than yoga but you get the idea. 

The point in all this is sometimes you just have to figure out what works for you. Distance based goals didn't work for me, but "ok 2 minutes left out of 14, you can do it" works wonders. 

Anyone else have running methods? Anyone else a lobster after a run?

Eating The Vegs From Fresh City Farms

Wow my first food post since April 19th. Way to get off topic! 

A few weeks ago a friend asked me if I ever look into getting a CSA. My response was what the heck is a CSA (even though I had been reading about CSA’s over at Whit’s Amuse Bouch, but I was distracted by all the DELICIOUS BACON). So after a quick round of google I learned about CSAs. CSAs are Community Shared Agriculture, so basically you buy a share of a farm, if the farm does well you get food from the farm, if the farm has a drought you take that risk. Unfortunately most CSAs start in May, and this was mid July. But then we found Fresh City Farms.

We liked them because they were not a big investment (weekly payments not a lump sum in May),  you can start and stop any time, they deliver, and the contents are from a Urban farm within the GTA. So we signed up. 

For the past month (and then some), for 40.99 for a large box of veggies and fruit (just more than enough for two people who eat a lot of Vegs and Fruits for a week), we have been getting a wonderful surprise on Wednesday night. This may seem like a lot for veggies, but we spend at least that much at No Frills and they are not local, organic, or as delicious.

Glorious Veggies

It is like Christmas except with veggies. Even though I had an awesome vacation, and went to Morocco and did 8 million exciting things this summer…getting the veggie box is one of the highlights.

Source

With this program you need to be a bit creative because the contents of the box are dependant of the harvest, and could possibly have veggies you have never heard of (black radish, patty pan squash).But they send out an email the week before with “expected contents” and then have newsletter with the box with the list of veggies and some recipes.

A few weeks ago we got the above mentioned black radish and tried out the black radish, kale, mushroom salad recipe that Fresh City provided. It was delicious. I got leftovers for lunch..om nom nom. 

Recipe is from Fresh City Farms via Seasonal Ontario Food via Epicurious

Dressing:

-1/4 c sunflower seed oil (or olive oil)

-1/4 cup sour cream

-1 tablespoon lemon juice

-S and P

-1/4 c fresh Parsley

Salad:

-Black Radish

-Mushrooms

-Kale

Mix together the dressing. Chop mushrooms, grate radish, tear up kale. Massage kale with some olive oil to reduce the bitter flavour. Mix with mushrooms and radishes. Top with dressing

Mmm Kale and Radish

My plan is to share with you some recipes using the ingredients from Fresh city to showcase some of the veggies!

Is anyone else hoping on the CSAish train? Is it weird that I get so excited for a box of veggies?

June and July Recap

Ugh blogging fail. In the past couple months blogging (and normal life activities) has definitely been on the back burner. And since 1. I am OCD about chronologically posting, and 2. I use this blog to remember what I did here is a quick post of everything I did in June and July...ready...go.

Cute Moseby Photo to Start things off

June:
Work and More Work: Finished up the spring term of tutoring (all the students passed, YAY!) , and continued to work longish hours at my real job.

Rent: The Lower Ossington Theatre (LOT) put on a production of Rent, and my friend Katie and I got tickets on Groupon to go see it. It was such a good production, and it was one of the last days of the run, so the performers were so in to their characters. Made me miss musical theatre a lot. Perhaps I need to find a little community theatre program on my spare time (oh wait I don't have time to blog let alone have a hobby :P).

Russell Peters: Due to performance dates, the same day that I went to see Rent (in the afternoon) I went to go see Russell Peters in the evening with Mike and our friend Kareem. The show was great, and Russell Peters is so funny! He jumps from one topic to another and gets so off track, but that is what makes his show excellent. If the Notorious Tour comes out on DVD/TV totally check it out!

Family time: Mike and I had a laundry machine issue and it was broken/not replaced for about 6 weeks, which meant every Sunday we got to lug our laundry up to my Uncle and Aunt's house (THANK YOU!). Silver lining, getting to spend time with my family, and eating delicious food! (Machine is now fixed..finally!)

New Machine!

Surprise City Chase: Mike and I were planning to do City Chase in August, but due to a time conflict we decided at the last minute to do the June City Chase event. This year we were more prepared, but of course the fun of the event is you never know what to expect. We also some how ended up doing all of the physical challenges...so exhausted. We ended up finishing in exactly the same time, but a little lower in the standings. Oh well! It was an excellent day and as always, so much fun!

City Chase Finish

Birthday! It was Mike's birthday the same weekend as city chase, so after City Chase we changed and went to a nice dinner. The next day Mike, for his birthday present, got to drive a fancy car. He loved it! We had a nice bday "party" for Mike at my Aunt and Uncles and then ended up going to a drive in movie after. Fitting all that in may have been a bit ambitious for one weekend!

Oooo fancy car. 

July:
Long Weekend: The Canada long weekend was a much needed break from all the craziness that June brought. We spent Saturday at Centre Island. I loved the islands so much. It was so nice to take a quick ferry ride for a few dollars and suddenly be out of the city. Much easier than fighting cottage country traffic. Other than that it was pretty much relaxing.

New fav spot in TO

Fire Experiment: One weekend in early July, we got together at my friend's house and tried an experiment. We decided to try to see if a marshmallow on a sparkler would light on fire or cook from the inside (not to eat it though..it would have been full of chemicals). Fun fact: the sparkler burns through the marshmallow. So then we decided to see what else a sparkler would burn through (green pepper works) and that ended with us making a giant tower of marshmallows and sparklers...productive Saturday night!

GREEN PEPPER SPARKLER SPLOSION

Morocco: One of the main reasons I didn't blog this past month is I spent a week in Morocco for work! I think this deserves a bigger blog post so I will save all the details for later, but basically it is a amazing country and I am so happy I got to go to see the work there, and visit the region. I had a crazy messed up time getting home, but that is a much longer story.

Vacation: I just got back from a nice vacation home to NS/NB to visit the families, and it was amazing. So nice to have a week (and then some) to not worry about anything. Vacation is awesome! This past weekend my family came to visit me/Toronto for my Grandfather's 80th birthday party, so the past 2-3 weeks have been filled with family and food!

So after a CRAZY two plus months, and not having a normal routine for at least 6 weeks, I am definitely looking forward to getting back on track, and getting back on schedule with many things (blogging, gym, healthy eating etc.)

Hopefully I will be able to blog more regularly, but last time I said that I ended up going half way around the world!

Anyone else having a crazy busy summer? Any one else do sparkler experiments with marshmallows and peppers?

From Paris with Love

Here is the final part of my trip to France this past June.

So after a quick weekend in Paris, four days in the French Riviera, it was time to round out the trip by finishing it off with a few days in La Belle Paris.

From our late night train into the city, we found our hotel, very quickly fell asleep, and got up nice and early to see the sites. Since the free tour was a quick overview of most things, we went and hit some of the highlights. Be warned, this day was jammed packed full, and gave most of us sore feet.  It is possible to do all of these activities in one day, but you may pass out at the end!

First we went to the Arc de Triomph. It is way bigger than I imagined it. (Tip..if you don't bother going to the top, it is free and no line!)

 Next we strolled down the Champs d'Elysees

 Next the Effiel Tower! (I forgot to mention in the first post that we had been in Paris for about 24 hrs before seeing the Eiffel tower.) It is one of my favorite structures so I was pretty pumped to see it!

 Tip: If you walk up to the second level it is cheaper and there is way way way less of a line. We waited maybe 20 minutes to go through security.

Line for the elevator..suckkaas

It was a bit of a hike to the 2nd level but the view was great! We didn't bother going all the way to the top because it would have been a good view, but we had other plans! I also learned that I am slightly afraid of heights. I think the openess of the ironwork scared me. 

Next we stopped by Notre-Dame, but there was a big event going on a huge line up. So we planned to return the next day. We got some nice photos of the outside though. The building is amazing.

So instead of wasting time and money to go to the top of the Effiel tower, we went out to Montparnesse tower...super modern "ugly" tower...

but it has an amazing view.

By this point it was getting late in the day, so we headed back to hotel, barely made it to supper, ate the worlds largest crepe for dessert and came home to bed. We had full intentions of being normal 20some year olds and going out..but I for one just couldn't handle it. Site seeing trumps partying in my book...does that make me old??

The next day was our last day in France!! Noooo! Mike and I let the girls recover for our Amazing Race style of taking trips and ventured out to the Louvre. Now this day was kind of all over the place. We first tried to go the Louvre for a scheduled tour, but the one in the morning was booked. The good thing was we went early so we got our ticket when the line wasn't big. TIP: Go into the Louvre from the Metro, where the line is tiny! So instead of the Lourve in the morning we chose Plan B and went out to Montparnesse to the Catacombs tour..but that had the world's biggest line up. So instead we did Plan C and we went back close to the Eiffel tower and went on a...wait for it...

TOUR OF THE SEWERS.

Yes I am a super nerd, and thanks to Mike being a good sport I got so see some cool sewer stuff.. unfortunately smell some sewer stuff too. 

On our way back to the Louvre we had some delicious crepes!

We made it back to the Louvre, and had a great (quick tour) it was more expensive, but totally worth it, got to see the highlights and get some history..our tour guide was kind of crazy though, and the whole thing felt a little rushed. 

Everyone says the Mona Lisa is disappointing, so I guess I was expecting worse, but it was actually pretty cool. The Louvre itself is an amazing building (like Versailles) so the works of art are surrounded by a beautiful building. 

After the Louvre, we went to the Pont des Arts to do something a little romantic. There are tons of locks on this bridge, and couples lock the lock and then throw the key in the Seyne. 

The older couple who took our picture kind of laughed at us...but still it was a very nice moment!

Right before going to supper we went for another fly by visit of Notre Dame. There was actually a mass going on, so it was really powerful to see the church in action, not just as a tourist attraction.

After a wonderful supper with Brittany and Trish (and Brittany's France roomie, her roomie's brother, and her roomie's brother's friend) we had one last thing to do to call the trip complete....

See the Effiel Tower Sparkle!!!

On Sunday we sadly had to go back home. We came home feeling full, content, exhausted, and happy. I ended up seeing the Eiffel tower and the CN tower in a span of 24 hours, and sorry Toronto, you just can't compete with Paris!

The trip may have been very fast, but it was amazing for every second. I am so happy I got to spend my first trip to Europe with two of my best friends, and my wonderful boyfriend (how is that for sappy). 

Anyone else craving Macaroons?