One day I will post about my weekend on a Monday... I promise! This past weekend was pretty awesome. Friday night the hubbie and I just had a chill night at home. Saturday I did exactly what I had planned. I met my good friend Erica at 7am and we did a 4.7 mile run and then we did a 3 mile hike on some trails. I was pretty excited because our average pace was 9:34 for the run.... I am usually closer to a 10 minute mile. I thoroughly enjoyed it =] After that I went home showered and went over to Erica's place and we watched the first two twilight movies and ate Indian food. It was great and between the exercise and the heavy food I fell asleep early and slept hard that night! On Sunday I pretty much read all day and cuddled with the doggy I was watching. My dog Sammie is not cuddly at ALL so it was nice to have a dog who wanted to be close to me! I think I will be begging Chris for a lap dog now! I almost finished my book One Day. It's pretty good but I have a feeling the movie will be better which I hardly EVER think. The book is just kind of... drawn out. Still good though. So yeah not a very eventful weekend but I have no complaints =] The past couple days I have had some really good runs, I feel like I am actually getting faster which makes me feel good!!

In other news, I am going home/on vacation on Friday for 10 days! Chris and I wanted to get away and have some time to ourselves before the craziness of law school begins! So not only will we get that time together but I will be able to see my family as well. I am super excited and Friday cannot come fast enough!

Well so long for now! Here's a couple pictures for you 3 people that read my blog...okay I exaggerated.. you 2 people!

My hubbie surprised me with this book that I wanted and I LOVE it!! It had some amazing tips that I really think are going to be very beneficial!




Am I the only one who "squeals like a monkey" (my hubbies words) when their favorite magazine shows up in the mail?!





Just one of the gorgeous views on the hike!

Fridays make me so happy!! Almost as much as Saturdays which is my absolute favorite day of the week! I have plans with a good friend of mine to do a long run first thing in the morning and then watch all the Twilight movies again in anticipation of the new one coming out in November! Somewhere in between watching those and eating fists full of Swedish Fish, we are going to eat Indian Food! Doesn't that sound like an awesome Saturday!? I think so.

Random but can anyone see the little Swedish Fish in the browsing window next to my website name? I can only see it in Firefox...

Well this morning I had planned to do an easy 2-3 mile campus run with my husband but we slept in so I will be doing a couple miles on the treadmill after work. Nothing too crazy since I have the long run in the morning. So speaking of my running, I feel like I am starting to get into a rut. I am averaging about 20 miles a week and my endurance is pretty good but my speed is not. I usually do between a 9:30 and 10:00 mile. I know I should be getting faster. Obviously I need to start doing more speed work, I get so consumed with how many miles I am doing but I need to make speed a priority as well! Any advice?

As I do almost every morning, I had a chia shake for breakfast. It consisted of 1 cup of milk, half a frozen banana, 5 fresh strawberries, half a scoop of vanilla protein powder, 1.5 tablespoons of chia seeds and a couple ice cubes. It was quite delicious and filling! =]

Well that's it for now but I will leave you with a hilarious picture of my pup. We are dog sitting a little chihuahua and I think Sammie got a little confused about the cage situation....


Poor little girl was stuck until we helped her out.

Well enjoy your Friday!

Strawberry Pies & Journals

Wow, I cant believe it is already Wednesday and I am just now posting about my weekend! Well the first half of it was awesome!! Friday night was spent with some awesome friends eating dinner and seeing Harry Potter! Saturday night was spent with other awesome friends eating dinner and watching Unknown.. can you tell that eating and watching movies are two of our favorite things to do? :) Oh and my hubbie and I also went for a long run Saturday morning! 7 miles woop woop! Those two awesome days were followed up with two days of being sick. Some kind of stomach bug or something but I feel much better now! I obviously wasn't able to run while I was sick so I ran yesterday and this morning. 5 miles yesterday and 3 miles today, both done on the treadmill. I used to prefer the treadmill over running outside but after doing long runs on a regular basis I am now hooked! Its nice but it also stinks because I get so bored on the treadmill now!

Well I have to make this short but I will leave you with a few pictures from the weekend!

Mmmm Passion Tea Lemonade makes super hot days a little more bearable!

Journals Chris and I decorated that our church is sending to a school that is being built in India! Can you guess which one is mine!?

Picture taken in the Walmart parking lot to put in the journals. Isn't he handsome!? I call this my proud dog smile... one of those things that only makes sense to me...

Strawberry pies (my mother in laws recipe) that I made for a church event that got cancelled. That's okay though, I got to share them with friends =]

Finally an excuse to take pictures of my food!

So I have always liked to take random pictures of my food...up until now it was a little weird but on Healthy Living Blogs it is completely acceptable! I didn't take a picture of the smoothie I had yesterday for breakfast but it was a mixture of almond milk, PB2, chia seeds, vanilla, ovaltine, frozen banana and oatmeal.... and very delicious I must say! I mix all the ingredients except the banana and keep it in the fridge overnight and in the morning I throw it in the blender with the banana. It makes a very thick delicious smoothie that I actually like to eat in a bowl with a spoon. That was consumed after an early morning run before work with my hubbie on the university campus that we live near and also work at. So for lunch I had a salad that I was looking forward to all day. Have you had Panera's Strawberry Poppy Seed and Chicken Salad? Mmm it is so good but its about 9 bucks so I decided to make my own. I was quite happy with how it turned out!



Dinner was quite delicious as well. I am lucky enough to married to a man who loves to cook and is very good at it. We have been craving Cuban food (he is part Cuban) so he decided to make his own and the result was AMAZING!! The picture doesn't do it justice but trustttttt me it was delish!



So that's it for the food pictures from yesterday, everything else I ate was not nearly as interesting! So on another note I am reading two running books right now and I am loving both!!



Apparently every runner should read these so since I "want 2 b" a runner I figured I should probably read them. I am a total book worm so if anyone reading this (Mom? Chris? lol!) has any recommendations on running books, let me know! I already read Kara Goucher's book btw.
So yesterday I had kind of a reality check. I realized that despite all the running I have been doing I am not getting the results that I want. I try to weight train a couple days a week but I am definitely not as diligent as a I should be. My biggest problem area is my lower body (booty and thighs specifically!) so I am going to start incorporating more lunges and squats. So this morning I woke up early and did the P90X legs workout. I am going to try to do this at least once a week. It's tough so I know it's good! I think doing more runs with hills will also help with my "problem areas"! I also plan to do at least 3 miles on the treadmill after work!

Welp that's all for now!! Have an awesome day!!!

New direction

This is going to be my attempt at a Healthy Living Blog. I am constantly talking about running on Facebook so why not just talk about it on my blog instead!? This is more so for me as a way to keep track of my progress but if you are reading this... Hello and thank you for stopping by! =]

So I have dabbled with the idea of becoming a runner for a long time now but never stuck to it more than a couple months. That changed in January after receiving a gym membership for Christmas from my awesome hubbie (I asked for it in case you are wondering lol!). I made the decision that I was going to become a runner once and for all! I was sick of just talking and dreaming about it. So I downloaded the Couch 2 5k app on my phone and gradually worked my way up to being able to run 3 miles without walking. I haven’t stopped running since then. I am now at 583 miles for the year (thank you RunKeeper). My goal is to do 1,000 miles for 2011. I also have a goal of running a 10 miler in September. I have only done two 5k's so this is a lofty goal for me. Another big reason I decided to start running is because I am so uncoordinated and un-athletic (not sure that’s a word but go with it) so I figured anyone could run right!? Well I have definitely become addicted and am in love with it! I’m pretty stoked to have a place to be open and honest about that love! Hopefully I enjoy it as much as I enjoy reading other people’s Healthy Living Blogs. My absolute favorite ones are http://www.hungryrunnergirl.com/, http://fitnessista.com/, and http://www.pbfingers.com/. Those three women have really inspired me to actually do this!! My other favs can be found under Blogs I Read.

Well that's it for now! I will leave you with a gorgeous picture of my hubbie and I =P. Have a great Monday!!






In the middle of a long (for me) run on Saturday morning we came across a beautiful waterfall! As you can tell I am not the best photographer (and this was after several tries!) but trust me it was pretty! Excuse the lobster face and the sweat, it comes with the territory!

Still here!

One day I am going to be a great blogger...not today though! For now, I will just creep on other's blogs ;)

Broken

And I am here still waiting
Though I still have my doubts
I am damaged at best
Like you've already figured out

I'm falling apart
I'm barely breathing
In the pain
There is healing
In your name
I find meaning

So I'm holding on
I'm barely holding on to you

I still see your reflection
Inside of my eyes
That are looking for purpose
They're still looking for life

I'm hanging on another day
Just to see what you will throw my way
And I'm hanging on to the words you say
You said that I will
I will be okay

Broken lights on the freeway
Left me here alone
I may have lost my way now
I haven't forgotten my way home

I'm falling apart
I'm barely breathing
With a broken heart
That's still beating
In the pain
There is healing
In your name
I find meaning

These are part of the lyrics to the song Broken by Lifehouse. They never had so much meaning until today when I really listened to the song. Sometimes I feel like the past is going to overwhelm me. I feel like I can't survive it. I feel like it's hopeless and that I don't deserve to be doing "okay". At times I literally feel like I am drowning in the shame/pain of it all. But times like today I am reminded that God is in control. He is always in control. God does not want me to punish myself He just wants me to grow and learn from the past. It's so hard.