Weekend Meal Plan Complete!

These last couple weeks I have done a horrible job getting meals planned and groceries bought. Today I had to bite the bullet and make a plan for the weekend and go grocery shopping. Since a budget has been set for the most part and savings are a priority this trip took place at Aldi. The prices don't include things that I already had in the pantry.

Tonight is one of our favorites!

This is 20-Minute Sriracha Shrimp Ramen. This stuff is great and can be found over on the blog Baker by Nature. The total price of this meal is around $10 and could have been less if I hadn't been low on soy sauce.

Saturday is another pasta day. Honestly I have never been a really big pasta eater but since getting pregnant I want it all the time!

I am in love with all the different one pot pasta options. I haven't tried this one yet but this is Easy One Pot Pasta Puttanesca and it can be found at the blog Creative Juice. I got everything to make this one for $11. 

Finally on Sunday since we are finally supposed to start feeling the autumn weather I wanted to do another soup.

Now I haven't tried this one either but I'm a sucker for a crock pot meal on a Sunday. This one can be found at Carlsbad Cravings and is a Slow Cooker Beef Stroganoff Soup. This soup was a little more expensive to shop for since it contains beef and came in at $14. 

While at the store I also picked up some snacks for the game tomorrow that cost about $7. There were also a few staples that we needed and they had pumpkins. We had to have a pumpkin! Over all the total for the weekend with tax came up to $54.60. Not bad for three dinners (which hopefully will provide some leftovers) and food for hosting the game.

Addicted to Planning

Not sure why but I'm totally addicted to planning right now. I am also on a budget so I am working on ways to not spend any money or at least as little as possible and still be able to decorate a super cute planner. 

The first thing I did was use a small binder that I had picked up at target a couple weeks ago for a different purpose.

Then I wanted to make dividers and cute pages for my planner. I started by making the dividers from half price scrapbook paper that I picked up at Hobby Lobby.

This is a cover page which I have decorated a little bit but not too much. I wanted to keep it simple!

Next I added this super cool washi tape holder so that I could carry around some of my washi tape without having the rolls all over my purse. This thing is genius! Behind that is a folder that I made.

This is the folder. Right now it is simply holding my stickers that I have printed off. All of these stickers are free on the internets and I will be having a separate post on those in the next couple days.

Above are the other folders that I made. I only spent about $12 dollars for everything that I made! Future posts will show the inserts that I am using right now, how I decorated them, and more resources for free or at least inexpensive planner supplies and printables. 

4 month prenatal visit

Well today was our four month prenatal visit. So far everything is good. The heart rate today was 134 or right around there. I expected it to be higher since Butterbean's heart rate has been running higher than that in the past. The doctor said it was nothing to worry about though.

Next week we have our ultrasound and we are both very excited to finally get a glimpse of the baby again. We are not going to find out the sex. We want to keep it a surprise. Hopefully everything will check out normal and we can continue with the rest of the pregnancy with no worries.

It's a Keeper

I tried a wonderful recipe from Half Baked Harvest last night. Chris didn't even notice that it didn't have meat in it! It is really that good. I did cut down on the cheese quite a bit. We like cheese just not copious amounts of it all at once. I would be interested to try the recipe as written to see how cheesy it really is.

http://www.halfbakedharvest.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/One-Pan-Four-Cheese-Drunken-Sun-Dried-Tomato-and-Spinach-Pasta-Bake-1.jpg

That looks really good right? Next time I make it I am going to try out a couple of changes. First I am going to add some Italian sausage. I liked it without meat and so did Chris but I would be interested to see how it turned out with some sausage. Also I want to substitute half of the canned tomatoes for rotel tomatoes. The red pepper flakes in the recipe do add a little bite to the pasta but I would like a little bit more without having to add tons of red pepper flakes.

So This Happened!

So many great things have happened since I last wrote a post. Why this is so hard to do I will never know since I love to journal and writing things out!

Let's start with the biggest most recent thing...well there are two but lets start with this last weekend. We got married! I only have one picture right now but there are more to come once we get them from the our friend that was in charge of taking photos.

The wedding was just what I wanted...a little under planned and totally casual. It was basically a cookout and swimming party. It was really fun and low stress. Our friend who officiated the wedding did a wonderful job. We could not have been more pleased with his sermon. It was personal and sweet and perfect for us.

On to the next exciting news. We are also pregnant! It is so exciting. There is so much to post on this that I am going to do a separate post just for this topic very soon and obviously many more after that.

What Started Out As A Relaxing Memorial Day...

It all started out so relaxing. 

A movie on the couch. 

Then something happened and we were pulling weeds in the front yard, then Chris was mowing. 

The next thing I know we are pruning! 

By the time we got done we had a hug pile of clippings that Chris had to take out in the rain! 

Because that is all it does here!

So I didn't post this before but this is what happened to Chris's car the day before we left on our trip. We later found out that we had been stuck in an F1!

Stupid Oklahoma.

Tonight was rotisserie night.

I pulled out a rub that I had tried on the grill last summer.

This stuff was spicy and delicious.

The chicken turned out awesome. 

On to Trail Running or The Reserection of Trail Running

So when we started our running journey it was running on trails that was our passion. We wanted to run 5k obstacle courses. Those were the point of it all. Of course the major goal was the Tough Mudder but we really enjoyed running the 5k distance.

This that time I have explained why we moved to road running and our adventure into the road marathon. Through the exploration of road running we really discovered that tail running is our passion. Both of us agree that there is just something about running on a trail that is soul lifting and that is what we want from running.

At first Chris was like "let's sign up for a trail marathon!" and I was like "whoa! Let's sign up for a trail half marathon. Going from the road to the trail is actually a really big difference.

We signed up for a trail marathon at the end of June. It's the Osage Hills State Park Relatively Flat 1/2 Marathon. We are super excited. There is only one problem. It's been raining every day so there is no way for us to trail on an actual trail. It doesn't even look like there is going to be a break in the rain for at least another week.

It's back to the road for the time being.

The Crack Down

Well we are back from vacation so what now? It's time to crack down.

Spending got a little out of control over the last few months. There was a lot of eating out. Between school and training for the marathon cooking at home was just not always possible...and honestly eating out was a little bit of a treat for all the running we were doing.

Now that we are back from vacation, school is over, and the marathon is run it's time to budget up!

Today I did our grocery shopping at Aldi as an attempt to get the grocery budget under control. Let's see how I did.

Snacks:
Trail Mix                                      4.99
Trail Mix                                      1.99
Veggie Chips                                2.79
Hummus                                       1.99

Produce:
Mandarins                                     3.89
Sweet Potatoes                              2.39
Avocados                                      1.96
Baby Spinach                                2.49
Blackberries                                  1.59
Blueberries                                    1.49
Raspberries                                   2.19
Mushrooms                                   3.18
Mini Sweet Peppers                      2.39
Cilantro                                         0.44
Green Onions                                0.69
Fresh Asparagus                           1.79


Protein:
Raw Shrimp                                  10.98
Boneless Thighs                            6.49

Dairy:
Fresh Mozzarella                           2.49
Plain Yogurt                                  3.89
Greek Yogurt                                3.00

Other:
Organic Granola                            3.49
Passion Fruit Granola                    2.49
Italian Bread                                  1.69

With tax it came to a total of around $79 dollars with tax. I don't think that is too bad. I will be keeping an eye on grocery spending the next couple of weeks to see if I can get it down even more.

Travel Knitting Projects

Okay so I'm just going to admit it, I've been knitting for years and I have never taken knitting with me while I travel. I have taken a couple small projects with me on some car rides but that is about it. In my defense, I have never had the opportunity to travel so I haven't had many chances to try it out.

That is all about to change! I will soon be going on a trip. A ten day trip! That seems like enough time to get some good knitting in. I mean a 10 hour flight seems like prime knitting time. I really have no idea what types of projects to take so I have chosen two. One that is small and a little more complicated and one that is larger but extremely simple.

Lets start with the larger more simple pattern. This one is for a small sweater that I found on the Purl Bee Blog, it's called Short Row Sweater.

Obviously the back of this sweater is my favorite but I can't wait to see it over a few of the new tops that I recently acquired. I think it will look so cute! The best part is that I am going to be using some homespun yarn!

Lets Review Marathon Running Motivation

This is my favorite photo from our training runs...okay it's also one of our only photos from our training runs. I was really bad about not wanting to take pictures. Or have fun at all...they were hard! This is us about to cross the Sky Dance Bridge on our 20 miler.

I would like to take a moment to reflect on what my actual motivations were for running the marathon. What worked and what didn't? What I expected compared to what actually got me through the runs?

Is health a motivator for me?

In the end this was still not a motivator for me and quite honestly I did not feel any healthier after it was all done. I probably am but with an injury it didn't really feel that way.

Is weight loss/looking good a motivator?

This motivator did actually get me through the training. I started seeing changes around the second month and I have to say that I liked them. I was not thinking about looking good on race day though. I was thinking about not looking like I was about to die...I looked that way anyway.

Raise Awareness for a Cause?

So, while at no point was this actually a motivator for me to run the marathon I did end up raising money for the Oklahoma City Memorial. Which was pretty rewarding and fun.

To Mark a Goal Off of Chris's List Together?

This was the reason that I ran the marathon when it really came down to it. When things got really hard I would think about the fact that this was the one thing that Chris wanted to accomplish this year and I would just keep going. At some point during our marathon training so one said you can't run a marathon for someone else. I don't think that is true if you know how much the other person wants it. I do agree that you need some other forms of motivation but you can do it for someone else.

To Make New Friends?

We made so many running friends. This was really the biggest reward of the whole experience. I am so glad that we joined the program that we did and met all the new friends that we have. I look forward to seeing them all out on the road or trail in the future.

The Sense of Accomplishment?

I thought this would be the one that got me through on race day but it wasn't. It did get me through a lot of the training runs. I wanted to accomplish each long run. When I finished that 20 mile training run it was awesome!

We Soooo Did It!

We ran a marathon. That is right a MARATHON. The whole GD 26.2 miles.

It was amazing and amazingly difficult. It was fun and painful. I was going to blog about the whole training process but it turned out that with school and work it was just way too much.

We ran the marathon slower than we had planned but with me getting injured during the training and having to miss the Tuesday workouts we still feel like we did well.

So here are some photos from the adventure. There are some blurry ones from the start. Some of us running the course. And finally one of the infamous Gorilla Hill from the drone that was flying the course.

So what will our next running adventure be? It's already been scheduled so stay tuned for details.

What Goes Around Comes Around

People around me have been dropping like flies with the head cold of doom. It was only a matter of time before me and Chris got it. I have only run 1.5 miles this week and that almost killed me. Like I really think I almost died from a respiratory stand point. Luckily I had a rescue inhaler on hand. I did run the 1.5 miles with an average pace of 10:35 though so I was proud of that. Our plans to run the Pack Pint Run tonight have been canceled. We are definitely not going to be getting our miles in this week. Some how we have to find a way to run the 6 miles we have planned for this weekend or we will be too far off schedule. We just got signed up for the marathon so this is going to happen! I will just run it really slowly if I have to this weekend. Being sick sucks.

A Shorter Long Run

Yesterday's long run was actually shorter than the week before and as you can see I really needed it to be. My legs were beat. My lungs were beat. And surprisingly my butt was beat as well. I kept getting muscle cramps in my butt! I have never had that happen before. EVER. It was not comfortable and I had to really slow down my pace at the end of the run. Initially I wasn't too disappointed in my run considering how my body felt but Chris was disappointed in it and in my attitude. To be honest I really didn't want to run yesterday. I already knew how tired my body felt and I was not looking forward to it. I was going to run no matter what, I just was not going to be excited about it this time around. Let's hope Tuesday morning's run is better and my body has recuperated enough to run strong. 

What is My Marathon As Motivation Anyway?

The time has come to sit in contemplation about the hows and the whys of my decision to run a marathon. This week marks the beginning of my actual marathon training. I have finished the 10k and we are increasing our runs so that we are at the correct long run distance to start our formal training program. Looking ahead is more than a little intimidating. So now I must look deep inside and find the why. The answer I repeat to myself when (and the day will come) I don't think I can take one more step. The thing I remind myself of when there is one more mile of a long training run. The last long mile that seems impossible to conquer. What is it that I will remind myself of that motivates me to take that next step, and the next, and the step after that?

"That moment of inspiration- when we know what we are doing and why- is like an arrow that we shoot. Wherever that arrow goes, our mental and physical troops will follow" -Sakyong Mipham

Today while reading this quote it became clear to me that I can't just run a marathon. Without a clear picture of why I am doing it and what I want to accomplish I will never get to the finish line. I am not by nature one of those people who just decides to do something and then does it out of sheer stubbornness. Don't get me wrong I am the most stubborn person that I know but I use that stubbornness to not do things, not to do things! There has to be something I want at that finish line and I'm not talking about gifting myself a new outfit, the apple watch I want, or the tattoo that I keep telling myself I can have when I do something truly spectacular. I'm not saying I wont do any of those things for myself, but what I know about myself is that those things will not get me past the last mile marker and over the finish line.

So that brings me to asking myself what will carry me through training and across the finish line...

Is health a motivator for me?

When I really think about it health is not what is going to push me to my limit. I do want to improve my health but lets face it I don't have to run an entire marathon to do that!

Is weight loss/looking good a motivator?

This is not a race day motivator but it is a very real motivation during training. I have always been a small person but the years and the pounds are sneaking up on me!

Raise Awareness for a Cause?

Lots of people run a marathon to raise money and awareness to a cause that they believe in. While I find this inspirational it will not be my motivation this time around. This first marathon I will not be running for others.  Which brings me to...

To Mark a Goal Off of Chris's List Together?

So I was wrong, this is a big motivator for me. I will to some extent be running for someone else. It is extremely important to me that Chris accomplish his goals for this coming year and any goals that I can be apart of I will. (He did want to run the half marathon and I talked him into the full...remember I have to maintain that it was my idea!)

To Make New Friends?

This is a motivation for me, sort of. Its why we started doing the Pack Pint Runs and signed up for the 10k training (well and because 10k was a goal). That said, I haven't actually made any new friends yet doing these things so I don't think is is a major motivator. I do enjoy running with a lot of other people and feeling like I am part of something bigger than myself. Something BIGGER than MYSELF...I feel like I'm getting closer to my motivation.

The Sense of Accomplishment?

Yes! I think that is it...but lets make it more personal. What is it that I want to accomplish? Is it just the miles? I know it is not. I want to prove to myself that I am capable of something BIG! I am capable of something AWESOME! The only person who can stop ME is ME! I will not be stopped...especially not on MY BIRTHDAY!

Thursday PPR

Oh PPR (Pack Pint Run) how I totally wanted to crush you! But I failed. So last night we added an extra half mile on to the usual PPR route so that we would get our full 4 mile run in. Because of this we ended up running at the very end of the pack! Which must have affected me mentally because I pretty much killed myself on mile 2 and 3. Killed myself dead. I ended up having to walk some during the last mile. I was so disappointed! If I had just kept my pace reasonable I would have been fine. Still a pace of 10:32 is about exactly where I want to be...just with out the walking! Hopefully my 5 mile run tomorrow goes much more smoothly. I'm am hoping to stick right at the 10:30 pace for most of the run. 

Knitting! My friend Cristal sent me a picture of a arm knit scarf. I couldn't help myself. I'll try almost anything knitting related. I made her this scarf in about 20 minutes! How awesome is that? The picture doesn't do it justice. Too much cheese from me but it's really cool. 

Fuel:

Today's run was fueled by sushi form Sushi Neko and after the run the body was resupplied with some pizza from Upper Crust.

The Super (foggy) 10K

That's right we did it. We ran our first 10k. While it was not the farthest that Chris has ever run it was the farthest that I have ever run (without stopping to do an obstacle that is). Plus I did it at the fastest average pace to date!

The course was a little confusing and at the very end I wasn't sure I was going to make it without getting a stitch in my side but I did it and in the fastest time yet so I am super proud.

After the race our running group went out to lunch where I met Bob who taught me how to swing...who tried to teach me how to swing. I'm not the fastest learner!

I'm just now posting this because it is the first time I have had since the race when I have had time! So very busy! I have been eating really well though...until today. I will have to try harder the rest of the day and the rest of the week. :(

Otherwise Known as PPR

PPR (Pack Pint Run) is the weekly running event held at our local running shop. I haven't met a lot of people yet. Mostly all I have done is spend a lot of money! It's really fun though because it is like a party atmosphere. Everyone is running happy! Plus at the end they give you a free beer. What could be better than that?

One of the things that I really like about the PPR is that I get to see all different types of runners. There are the super athletes. They just fly past you on supper springy legs. They make it look so easy and almost magical. Then you have a bunch of people like me and Chris, just out there doing the best we can trying to increase our speed. The most inspirational people are the ones just starting their running journeys. I love seeing them and thinking how I felt when I first started. When I first started I didn't ever know if I was even going to be able to run a mile much less the 5k we really wanted to work up to. It's just fun to be reminded of where I have been, where I want to be, and where I will never get to even if I run every day for the rest of my life. I'm never going to be one of those gazelles that flies right through the miles. I'm just not built that way.

I run much better in groups of people though and I feel more accountable for my run. Usually when we go to PPR Chris runs with one of his friends which leaves me free to run at my own pace without any worries. Tonight Chris's running buddy couldn't make it so we got to run together. My pace was good and I felt great during the run. I feel like I'm ready for Saturdays long run.

The Fuel:

Breakfast: a piece of multi-grain bread with butter

Lunch: Taco salad

Dinner: Leftover southwestern soup and a piece of jalapeno bread

Extras: two beers after the run

ONWARD! - a marathon training book review

I needed a book to read on the train for our trip to Ft. Worth. A book about a woman running a marathon seemed like a good bet and it was. This book is not particularly long but I found it funny (like giggling to myself out loud funny) and a good source for some of the things to expect while training for a marathon. The book consists of Brook Kreder's blog posts during her training. I'm just going to be perfectly honest, this book is what got me back on here and blogging again. The way she documents all the funny, horrible, triumphant moments for her readers was inspiring. I have no readers as of now but hopefully one day I will pick up a couple. This is a short book and a super easy read. Really entertaining. I'm not sure that my training will look anything like Brook's but she gave me at least the courage to try. She put her failures right out there for everyone to see and then set out to prove that they were just bumps in the road not road blocks. The book does contain mass quantities of curse words (they are kind of bleeped out though). This didn't bother me because I am absolutely positive that my marathon journey will have a fair number of it's own curse words! I would recommend this book to anyone that is thinking about training for a marathon...that's a girl. I don't think a guy would get as much from it.

So before we went out for our long run this weekend I was really nervous. I actually had butterflies! It just started right before the run though and once we got started I felt good. This weekend we increase our distance by an entire mile. Up to this point we have increased at half mile intervals. I am freaking nervous right now and I have till Saturday to think about it. I can only imagine that it is going to get worse from here. We run tomorrow with the Pack. Hopefully I run well and feel strong I think that will help a lot. Skipping my run yesterday does not help! I really don't want to do that again unless I have to. 

I had a good food day today:

Breakfast: green smoothie and half an English muffin

Lunch: small salad, tabouli, and a multi grain sandwich

Dinner: Santa Fe soup and a piece of jalapeno cheddar bread

It Was Yoga This Morning

Fitness

Well really it was just super cold this morning! I'm such a wimp. I know I should have gone and ran but I wimped out and did a Jillian Michael's yoga workout instead. I am really feeling guilty about it now though. Let me tell you I needed the yoga! I didn't even realize how tight my legs had gotten until I started doing the workout this morning. Ouch! Plus that workout was hard. It was no lay around and stretch video. There were whole portions I couldn't even keep up to. I think that video will start showing up more in the rotation...if I had a rotation. Point is-more stretching is needed. Actually there are several points:

• I can't touch my own toes! There I said it. It's embarrassing but very true. Not only that but I would say I have always been at least 8 inches way from those ugly little suckers. One day toes I will touch you.
• Running is making me even less stretchy than normal. I have actually been worried about pulling something because of how tight my muscles are in my legs. I know Chris is worried about this too.
• I need more core strength! The video this morning was definitely a core workout and next to not being flexible that is my next worse fitness strength.

On my ever growing list of things to do today is to find a yoga video for runners for Chris and I to do at night to help with all the tight muscles we are experiencing. I would hate to mess up our chances at training for this marathon because we didn't stretch enough.

Nutrition

The last couple days we have been eating much better than we had been.

Yesterday

Breakfast: Green smoothie with half an English muffin
Lunch: Small salad (too small!)
Snack: Trail mix
Dinner: Jalapeno sausages with acorn squash and turnips
Dessert: Two sunflower seed cookies

Today

Breakfast: Green smoothie with half an English muffin

Lunch: Multi-grain sandwich with tabbouleh and a small salad 

Dinner: Frito Chili Pie (hey it was class night)

A Little Ft. Worth

Really it was just a little. We went on basically a two day trip to Ft. Worth. A little while back we road the train and thought that it would be something that Flint was old enough for and would really like. Since this was going to be a long weekend we decided it would be as good a time as any to head down and see what would happen. 

Flint loved the train ride and it was event free in the good way. On the way there we made sure Flint knew that we would have to walk everywhere. It was going to be city living for us. Flint deemed us "city civilians". Once we got there we went to our hotel and discovered that even though it was more than four hours before check in we could get our room. That was a life saver later in the day. 

We were starving so it was time to hoof it to a lunch destination. Flint decided that it was a cheeseburger day so that is what we went looking for. Once we found something on our phones that looked like it would give the boy a burger we were off. Unfortunately the place we found, although to the gills with kids, was not a kid friendly restaurant. There were inappropriate things written on the walls which of course we paid no attention to but Flint's new to the wonderful world of reading eyes caught. There was also some inappropriate tile work in the men's bathroom apparently as well. He loved his burger though. 

Once we had some lunch in our bellies it was time to go see what the Ft. Worth Water Gardens were all about. I can tell you that they were all about AWESOME. I think the pictures tell you everything you need to know. Flint loved it. When we were done it was time to go rest for a bit before the nights festivities.

It just so happened that the night we were going to be there a Christmas parade was going to be going on right outside of our hotel. Flint loved the parade. His favorite part was at the very beginning when they had a bunch of Elvis lookalikes riding mini motorcycles. That was pretty much the highlight for Flint. They were better than Santa. Santa wasn't doing wheelies though so he didn't really have a chance.

The next morning we decided to stay in downtown and just go places that we could walk to. We spent the morning at the Water Gardens. At lunch we decided on something safe! BBQ. I've never been in an inappropriate barbecue joint. Flint had another cheeseburger. Big surprise.

After some lunch it was time for a movie. The movie was way better than I expected. See below the crazy comfortable recliner that were the seats in this theater. Flint was in love. We saw Penguins of Madagascar. It was funnier than anticipated.

Earlier in the day we had discovered that Molly the Trolley was free! Flint was ready to try out some trolley riding after the movie. We needed to go back to the hotel and pick up our bags and head over to the train station. Flint loved the trolley. 

The rest of the trip was a little less fun. The train didn't leave the station till more than an hour after it's posted departure. The good news is that Flint handled it way better than me. He was a real trooper and a professional traveler. 

As for running...today was a rest day. We have quite a few training for the 10k. We only run 3 times a week. I'm not sure how that will change when we start training for the marathon. Today I am just focusing on eating right and drinking lots of water.