Kale

What up reader? Finally went grocery shopping and I grabbed some real food. I'm trying kale in smoothies for the first time. I tried making kale chips before (they sucked, but I was told that I over cooked them), and after all the raving on the internet about kale smoothies, I'm giving them a shot. I'm doing kale, bananas, strawberries, and soy milk (I love this stuff). So, we'll see how that goes.

I've decided that I'm going to try some personal medical research this summer. I have two skin conditions called cold urticaria (cold hives) that acts up when my skin is exposed to cold things like snow, cold air, cold water, etc. The other one is dermographism (allergy to physical pressure) where my skin if brushed up against something, or scratched I get raised hives in the shape of the scratch.

At this time there is no known cure, little research, and I'm unable to find a treatment that's side effects aren't worse than the reactions I'm trying to avoid.

Since I've been eating mostly natural foods my skin has become much less sensitive (or I could be growing out of I suppose, but eating this way can't hurt). Recently I discovered that spray sunscreen may help (I realize that if I'm using sunscreen I'm probably not cold, but just hear me out). I went on a bike ride when there was drizzling rain, and came back covered in hives. Apparently I don't learn and did it again with sunscreen and nothing happened. I plan to look into this further, this summer in a more controlled setting. I'll post my results conclusive or not.


So that's my plan, and I'll write again if something interesting happens

Time to buckle down

Hello digital natives. I've been able to maintain my 175 lbs. while indulging quite a bit, but I'm ready to get back on track, and kick it back up. Tomorrow when I go to the grocery store I'm gonna get all the stuff I need to make smoothies and nice meals. What I need to do is come up with something healthy to help beat the heat. Most of my problem lately has been my shameless ice-cream consumption. If anyone has any recipes they like for healthy or fake ice cream, please don't hesitate to share, and I'll do the same next time if I find one.

On a sort of related note, I made some progress on my paddle boarding goals. Yesterday I managed about 10 pushups, 25 full sit-ups, and I lifted my right foot for about a second (and had to quickly put it back down). I'm on my way.

So getting back to eating less ice cream is my next step. Until next time keep it cool.

I have regained my health!

Greetings bloggers. It's true, through green tea and "Amy's Organic" vegetable barley soup, I'm just about back to my proper health. I guess I was wrong. To get over a cold in about three days, I guess the remedies I was trying really did work (along with massive amounts of rest when I was home).    

It's just about the weekend again. I plan to SUP again, but this time perhaps a little less, and I'll add some stretching to the equation. Since last time I've been trying to come up with tricks and things to do on the board to keep things interesting. Right now my list includes: push ups (by the end of summer 10), crunches (50), belly dancing (still need to work that out), and paddling one foot (3o sec?). I can't wait to get started so I can show off on the lake. I also want to do four miles on my bike in one session, so I can stop being embarrassed about my 10 min rides, lol.

I think one of my biggest goals is to wear a two piece bikini bathing suit this summer, with the abs to pull it off. I have been saying that every year for the past three years or so, but I still mean it. I think I can really do it this time. I mean, I'm as close as I've ever been. I suppose I will wear my lifejacket so no one will see anyway, but I'll know.  Like I said in my first post, I'm in pretty good shape, but I just want to kick it up to the next level for me. With school almost over, I will have plenty of time to try to tone up some more.

So my summer goals have been set, now I just have to get out there and get to it.

Achoo!

Greetings reader, today isn't quite the fantastic day it usually is. As customary, finals are next week, and I have fallen ill. I'm all congested and all my little trouble shooting remedies aren't working. It looks like i'm going to have to get full-blown sick. I keep drinking greed tea with honey, good thing I like it because I'm beginning the think it doesn't do anything.

I'm not the first to fall to this cold. All around my school you can hear people sniffling. I'm actually proud that I lasted as long as I did.

Well it's too late in the school year to take days off (in my head, they don't have a policy or anything), so I think I'm gonna just truck trough. I just have to make it through the rest of this week, then I can enjoy a long weekend, and I only have three days of finals. I'm sure I can make it.

I have my Amy's organic vegetable barley soup, and my tea. Like I said, I'm getting skeptical, but I love those things either way.

So until next time, stay healthy.

can't move at the moment

Hello once again users of the internet. Today wasn't the best I've ever had. Not that anything went wrong specifically, but I'm still incredibly sore from yesterday's mega SUP session. Reaching for my alarm clock this morning has never seemed so painful. I need to stretch my forearms the most, because the muscles are getting strained every time I extend my fingers. I had an epic amount of fun yesterday, but I'm definitely paying for it now.

I'll be resting and stretching at least today, my bike regiment can wait for a bit.

So until next time, have fun, but don't forget to stretch after.

Full Body Soreness

Hello all. I've been taking the paddle board out on the lake every available minute today. I can believe how much fun it's been. You feel like you can do it for hours before you really get tired. I was warned that SUPing is a full body workout, but no so much on not being able to move 20 min after (as well as feeling that I was still rocking back and forth). When I got home, I dozed for about a half an hour, and then when I tried to get up for more water, I could barley move. Everything was achy. I'm not saying I regret being out all day at all, it was a ridiculous amount of fun, but I'm glad I didn't have to go anywhere important after. From now on, I'll have to make sure all I'm responsible for at the end of the day is a good long sleep.

I guess the bike ride I took before breakfast was unneeded.

I just want make a quick mention to the amazing dinner I had. I bought a pack of Morning-Star veggie burgers, and they were pretty good. I was a little skeptical, I love fresh veggie burgers, but the frozen ones usually suck. I even microwaved it, and was pleasantly surprised. I put one one a whole gain bun with spinach, provolone, and cilantro from my garden. So woo, I can finally enjoy veggie burgers at home. Just to clarify, I'm not now, nor have I ever been a vegetarian (not that there is anything wrong with that, it just doesn't fit my lifestyle at the moment), I just really like veggie burgers. Frozen beef patties have always been kind of gross looking to me (I don't eat hotdogs either), through I'm sure I've had no less than a million frozen burgers  in my lifetime. Either way, Morning-Star beats Boca Burger by a landslide.

Well, I think I'm going to have to go back to bike rides for during the week. I have too much to do when I get home from school to go play surfer. At least the year is almost over anyway.

Well, I hope your weekend's were as fun as mine... and if they weren't, the summer has only barely begun. I'm sure you can still catch up.

Surf's Up

Hello to all who read this. My little post about not eating pizza yesterday worked! I'm down to 175 lbs. (I kind of expected for it to come off fast. I put it on really fast. My lowest has been 170-172 before I started screwing up. this all took about two weeks.) I grilled myself some fish and left the rest of the family's pizza alone.

Today's adventure revolves around me getting a new paddle board. I live right across the street from a lake, and the flat water and relatively nice scenery makes stand up paddle boarding (SUP) (you stand up on what's essentially a big surfboard, and paddle yourself with a kayak paddle), a perfect new exercise for me. I love the water, and the washboard abs some people claim you get after a while won't be too bad either. It didn't take me very long at all to get my balance. I never even got wet. Highly recommend it to anyone thinking about trying it. I'm planning on going out at least once a day, as long as I have time. I was going to take the old man pug out but I don't think he has the balance for it anymore, but for those of you who might try this, dogs usually do very well with it.

Good thing I got out to SUP. There was an event in my neighborhood and it was way to dangerous for me to take my bike out with all the crazy drivers. 

I almost forgot, I finally got all my organic plants in the ground for the summer. I started them from seeds in Febuary, and I've been keeping them in my kitchen, bringing them out on nice days/ bringing them in at night. It took almost all day, because I had to pull a jungle of weeds, turn my soil by hand, and plant: cucumbers, swiss chard, romaine lettuce, pumpkin, squash, eggplant, tomatoes, red bell peppers, and a ton of strawberries. At least the worst is over and all I have to do now is water it.

Well I had a fantastic day, and I hope you all did too.

Relaxation and Temptation

It's a lovely day to be alive (as usual). Today when I woke-up and weighed myself I was pleasantly surprised, 176 lbs. I realize that's no reason for a parade, but at least that proves my bike rides yesterday paid off.

Today is my day off (woo), and that gives me some really nice options of what I can be doing and eating. It's also Friday, which means my family will be ordering pizza. I always say I'm gonna hand up, but at the last min. I usually go YOLO, and get a spinach, tomato, garlic deep dish pizza. The problem is not only will I just screw up Friday night, I will continue to be screwing up all weekend long reheating it instead of making real meals. I hope that by posting this out into internet land, it will give me some sense of responsibility. I know, God forbid, the handful of people who look at this see I ate some pizza, but that's my plan.

I'm starting out the day well with Post Banana-Nut Crunch (my favorite). For lunch I'm gonna make one of my shakes/ smoothies (I go back and forth on what to call them. Is there a difference?). I have all the ingredients to make a....

watermelon smoothie:
1 c. fresh watermelon, 1 c. fresh spinach, 1 c. lite soy milk, and 1 tsp. unsweetened  cocoa powder. If you add ice it's kind of a watermelon milkshake. Just blend it all in your blender (duh), until smooth. It's really good, and the spinach flavor completely disappears. I have a Ninja blender, that gets mine really smooth, I don't know how well other blenders stack up.

My goal is to make a real dinner like grilled salmon with rice and vegetables or something, to go on 3 bike rides at least a mile each (I don't yet have to endurance to it all at once, but I'm getting there), and to leave to pizza my family orders alone. I can do it!

I wanna ride my bicycle, I want to ride my bike

Well, I just wanted to make a post for today. On sunday I got a bike. I know that doesn't sound like that big a deal, but I'm 17 years old and this is kind of my first  one. I haven't been bike riding (that wasn't a stationary bike at the gym, where I lift weights) since I was about seven. I'm kind of psyched about it. I'm finding it's much more difficult to ride a one-speed cruiser around in a hilly neighborhood, than a stationary bike where I can lessen the resistance when I get tired. Meh, it's good for me, and I'm getting used to it really fast.

I have a driod, and I just got an app that uses GPS to track my speed and distance, which is pretty cool. I also have a heart rate monitor that tracks my heart rate (duh) and the number of calories I've burned. Today, I went on three rides, lasting about 15 min. each. I tried the new technology on the last one. I rode for 1.77 mi. and burned about 180 calories. WOO!

I also have an old man (13 -year-old) pug that I like to take out for about a 1/2 block long walk as my cool down. He can't really go any further than that at his age, but he seems to enjoy our little strolls.

So all in all I would say today, I could have eaten better (I normally eat really well, like fresh organic vegetables from my garden raw, but I've been stressed about my high school junior year finals, and indulged in a little stress eating), but my exercise went pretty well.

So, that's all for now. I think I'm really going to enjoy this blogging business. Even now I'm thinking about all the recipes for organic raw fruit/ vegetable smoothies, and how to make an organic garden, and all the other hippie crap I do, and could be posting about. I'll try to  pace myself.


Until next time, keep on rollin'.

I've already started, but let's keep going

Hey there internet goers. As some of you may know, I have another blog I'm maintaing simultaneously (the journey of a thousand miles has just started). This one is to document another goal of mine. I have Always been heavy, right now I'm actually in a pretty good place at 177 lbs. at 5'4'' (I am a pretty dedicated weight lifter with higher than average muscle percentage for a girl my size, I'm not delusional). I still want to work on myself, as I mentioned on the journey blog I want to be a Nutritionist after I graduate in 2013, but early next year I want to get my personal training certification. That being said I want to continue to work on my body by continuing to exercise and eating right. My goals of this particular blog are to keep me motivated, track my progress in an emotional way (as opposed to only a statistical way, as I have been), I hope that someone might read this and will learn something or be motivated to start their own journey, and I don't know, maybe this will turn into something. If no one reads this, and all this is just for me, it's still worth it. So...here it goes.



"The information provided on this blog is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always consult with your physician or health care provider for your specific health care needs." I do.