WIAW and Sunshine

Date: January 13, 2015

Author: astottler

Happy Wednesday! I’m going to link up to WIAW today because I have lots of unshared food pictures!

Before we get into that-on the fitness front, I’ve sort of switched around my schedule. In the past, I tended to run in the mornings versus do Crossfit in the evenings. The problem with that is when I do Crossfit in the evenings, it’s really difficult to make it back in time for dinner before the dining hall closes! Plus my evening motivation to make it to Crossfit is too low! That being said, I’m officially in 5k training mode with (hopefully) lots of speed work coming up!

In terms of actual workouts, I went to one last spin class at the gym from home (it’s halfway between home and school so it’s not outrageous to go once) before my membership ended. Of course, it was fantastic.

Monday morning we tested our 1 rep back back squats for a final time during the squat cycle we’ve been doing. Mine was sort of meh, sort of improved. I improved 5# from my 1 rep max at the beginning of the cycle, but I was still 10 lbs below my all time 1 rep max (205#). It was meh because 195# felt easy, but I kept missing 200#. Back squats are frustrating because the second you give in, you’re not making the lift!

After back squats I had the pleasure of doing and AMRAP of I believe it was Crossfit Open 14.4 last year? The Open workout at the time was probably the worst Crossfit workout I’ve done. 21-18-15-12-9-6-3 thrusters and over the bar burpees. Thank goodness, we did a 12 minute AMRAP, which meant I didn’t make it all the way down the ladder! But now my squatting muscles are scorched.

Tuesday’s Crossfit workout was lighter. I went to the 6am class since I have 9am class on Tuesdays. We did hang power cleans for strength and kettle bell snatches, wall balls, and 400m runs for the WOD. Then, after spending hours in the library, I went for a 3 mile tempo run (5k training!). I have a ways to go…but I kept my tempo pace pretty closely. It’s a good start! Ok-food time!

I went to a yoga class last Thursday and went to Eric’s deli-cafe afterwards for dinner with my parents to discuss pre-vet stuff. I had half a turkey and avocado sandwich, and a house salad.

My mom got me a couple of these protein boxes. They’re pretty similar to the ones at Starbucks, but sun butter instead of peanut butter! Good and easy. I had 2 meals of this on Friday. We don’t have to mention the fact that I didn’t have a single vegetable…

Saturday morning, I had to drive a ways to get gas. Long story short, my car is SUPER picky with the gas it will take and the check engine light was on and the engine was shuddering so I topped it off with “better” gas. Anyways, Whole Foods was close so I stopped in for brunch. Maple french toast casserole and chilaquiles were the highlights here!

Mexican dinner at the dining hall! But more importantly-GUAC! I made myself a salad.

Salad I picked up from Whole Foods.

Dining hall dinner-BBQ chicken on salad, and cheese and broccoli mini-casserole.

Dining hall breakfast-eggs and roasted veggies! I LOVE when they have those!

Cappuccino because I woke up before 5:30am and I’m a college student. However, I’ve gotten a lot of coffee lately and I’ve been generally over caffeinated so there’s that. I get to my 9am and announce to my friend that I got coffee. Her response? “I can tell.”

Lunch courtesy of my freezer. Balsamic roasted brussels sprouts, grilled chicken, and mashed sweet potatoes.

My favorite morning glory bread from a little cafe on campus.

A greek salad with chicken, roasted carrots, and sweet potato fries. This is pretty much my ideal dining hall dinner right here.

And lastly? The weather here lately has been insane. Sometimes I forget how lucky I am to be here.

What is your ideal meal?

First Run Back

Date: October 7, 2014

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Happy Wednesday!

First things first….YAYYYYY WE WON! NLCS HERE WE COME! #evenyearmagic

SO excited. Such a crazy and stressful game. The playoffs are seriously like a 5 unit class too, in terms of time commitment! Worth it.

Second things second. I ran for the first time on Monday! I did 3 miles with a friend, and it felt good. I was so amazed by how much better my feet felt. And it wasn’t crazy hard like I was sort of expecting, although I definitely wasn’t going fast. I was actually pretty sore from it though! Monday night I started to feel some soreness in my inner thighs, and then this morning my calves were sore. Crazy.

Fitness-wise, I did a 45 minute spin session Tuesday morning pretty early because I had an early morning dental appointment. I was supposed to go to Crossfit Tuesday night-it looked like such a fun one! But then I didn’t want to miss the game so I skipped it. Still bummed but oh well. I’ll go tomorrow. I’ve slacked off a bit on my workouts as of late, so I should get back into that more soon.

Foodwise, I finally managed to capture a picture of the pumpkin muffins my roommate made. They were amazing. She added a brown sugar/butter/cinnamon swirl too. Crazy good.

I got a Trader Joe’s salad to try. It had persimmons! Overall, it was good but very vinegar-y.

I went to the dining hall a couple of times Tuesday, which I almost never do (twice in a row that is).

Lunch was Mediterranean. It was just ok. The falafel was pretty hard. But there were roasted carrots, and they were totally amazing.

I wasn’t super hungry for dinner thanks to a cheese and crackers snack beforehand, but I had some good things. Roasted carrots, spanakopita, and a barley stuffed mushroom. I was excited to see the avocado. While I’m certainly not complaining about having avocado, I felt it could have been used better-this was a strange thing to put it on!

In terms of life, besides watching baseball and going to class, the other night I went to a recruitment event that consisted of roasting marshmallows, which was a ton of fun. I inhaled a ton of smoke and left smelling like a forest fire, but it was worth it!

But for now, there is lots of CS in my future!

How do you like your marshmallow?

I’m a golden brown type of person but I definitely lit mine on fire on accident!

Moved In

Date: September 21, 2014

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Well, I’m all moved into my dorm and sort of ready for school to start! I also only sort of have Wifi so there’s that…It has been so nice to catch up with friends these past couple of days!

In terms of fitness, I went to my last class at my home Crossfit on Saturday morning. The workout was tough, and I barely made the 20 minute time cap! It was the following:

10-1(start with 10 reps of each, then 9, then 8, etc.)

overhead squats

chin ups

-Between each round: 5 strict press and 10 pistols

I used 55# for the overhead squats and 45 for the press. I’m definitely sore today!

This morning, in lieu of a 9 mile run, I took the opportunity to squeeze the last bit out of my gym membership by going to one of my favorite spin classes, and it was fantastic!

Foodwise, I just had my first dining hall meal. My closest dining hall this year is known for having the best food, and it’s also nut free! They even have sunflower seed butter!

Dinner was veggies with a vegetable pot pie:

Plus plain yogurt, rice chex, raisins, and sunflower seed butter.

In terms of other food, brunch after spin was from Whole Foods because I needed to buy dairy there. I had huevos rancheros and fruit.

Breakfast the other day was eggs and berries-I love this plate! It used to be at school but I ended up taking my DC dishes to school.

The other noteworthy food was roasted plantains that we made at home. My parents ate them with brown sugar and cinnamon, but I went to sea salt route because they were cooked in butter and it seemed just right!

In foot news, I’m trying to treat them well. One thing that was recommended to me was getting a night brace. This keeps your foot in the flexed position so there isn’t so much stiffness in the morning. The one I got is basically just a sock with a strap that connects the knee and toes. I sort of feel like it’s a foot straight jacket. And I’m sure some night I’ll get up in the middle of the night and run into someone in the hallways, and said person will think I’m insane.

But it seems to be helping!

In the next few days, look for another recipe post and a little tutorial on watermelon cutting!

How was/is your dining hall food?

Workout Log #1 and Still Eating All the Fall Things

Date: October 31, 2013

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

I hope everyone had a fabulous Halloween! I’m currently taking a study break. I’ve been studying HARD for Bio. I actually feel much more confident about the material and life now than I did after a mini meltdown I may or may not have had earlier today. I actually opted out of flag football for…you guessed it-studying! I’m kind of bummed I missed it because we only have 4 regular season games, but I did get a lot done, so there’s that. Before getting to some eats as of late, I thought I’d post a little workout log for the week. This week is a little bit different than normal because I’m not following any sort of running schedule, but I will starting next week, so ~~if we make it there~~ when we get there I’ll go over that with you guys! My schedule varies a lot week to week-it depends on what workouts are what days for Crossfit-I love that they post the week’s workouts so you can pick and choose. This week was a little lighter on the workout front though because I had more going on. I’ve also been trying to squeeze in one on my own spin workout in preparation for certification, but as you’ll see this week, that doesn’t always happen.

Workouts for Week of 10/28

Monday: AM- easy pace 5 mile hill run

-nothing too crazy, but I wanted to keep my running going a little bit in preparation for Saturday’s long run

PM- Crossfit: Strength was clean and jerks with a front squat

WOD: 300 jump ropes

30-20-10 kettlebell swings/ sit ups

300 jump ropes

I felt the jump ropes in my calves 2 days later!

Tuesday: AM- 45 minute spin class plus 1 mile treadmill run

-I wanted to get a mile in at a decent pace. It was harder than I expected. I have a lot of work to do before attempting to PR my 5k!

PM- Crossfit Strength was 3 rep max push press-I got to 100 pounds, and 2 reps at 105.

WOD: 10 minute ladder (3-6-9-12…)

Push press/pull up

OW. Can I just say, OW. My shoulders are STILL super sore from doing a million and three push presses. I had every intention of working on clean and jerks Wednesday morning, but nothing overhead is going to happen for a looong time. My abs are even sore.

Wednesday: AM- Lifting on my own. I worked on dead lifts and cleans. I set a few goals for November, and some of those include PRing on my cleans and deadlifts, so those will be one of my bigger focuses. I also did some rowing and weighted planks.

PM- I had every intention of practicing a spin class, but I was so sleep deprived I couldn’t see straight, much less make up a class on the go. I ended up calling it quits after about 25 minutes and going to my dorm to take a nap. The good news is I still worked up a pretty good sweat, which I take as a good sign for my ability to make up a spin workout.

PM- Pumpkin carving! That counts as a workout, right…?

Thursday: AM- Crossfit. Strength was practicing Turkish Get Ups. I’ve done something similar in the past, which turned out to be more like half of a Turkish Get Up, but the movements still felt pretty intuitive. I was even able to try it with a (light) barbell, which is hard because you have to balance it with one hand.

WOD: 12 Minutes as many rounds as possible:

6 squats

12 weighed sit ups (overhead)

200 m run

I actually ended up getting the second most rounds! Go figure.

PM ~~Flag Football~~

Friday: Likely rest, maybe some abs or yoga

Saturday: Long run-we’ll see how long it actually turns out. I have a specific number in mind but we’ll see.

Sunday: Probably rest, maybe take a tour of the NEW GYM OPENING ON CAMPUS TOMORROW. I’m so excited-it’s supposed to be super nice, and it will have an actual spin studio (not just some bikes thrown in the corner of the weight room…) and nice spin bikes that actually show speed. The current gym is literally right next to my dorm, and the new one is way across campus, so I probably won’t go there a ton besides for spin, but I’m hoping the current gym will be half as crowded! Also, I know the new gym will be having spin classes on top of the ones that are still going on at the old gym, so maybe this is an awesome opportunity since I’m getting certified soon?

Ok enough exercise talk. Let’s move on to the good stuff, some food from the past few days.

I think I put a little too much weight in the prophetic abilities of the amount of milk foam in my cappuccino. Yesterday’s? AMAZING. TONS of milk foam-going to be a great day. Today’s? Not so much.

Someone shook my kombucha! Speaking of which, I need to get more…

Cottage cheese, spinach, and pesto- #strangebutgood or just #strange? I’m going to go with the latter-this was way too salty. Not a fan.

Love.

Mystery bread as a study snack.

Pumpkin soup take 2! This was really good! The pumpkin soup was kind of boring plain, so one of the twins suggested I add rice to it. I loved the idea! I went to the dining hall in search of brown rice, but all they had was a mushroom barley mix, which was absolutely perfect! I also added some grilled chicken and spinach-YUM.

The other day my mom brought me some pants from home and dropped them off in my car-but she really is the best-she also thought to bring me some other clothes-which I discovered lat last night as I was trying to muster up the energy to do laundry. The best care packages are the ones that let you put off laundry another day. But anyways, she clearly know me way too well because she included tons of dried fruit.

This coconut was really delicious! I’ve never had YOUNG dried coconut!

But she also left me THIS.

A caramel apple! WAY better than Halloween candy!

I wanted some protein on the side-clearly it was not overkill to eat a caramel apple with apple butter, right?

Cottage cheese. Apple butter. Sunflower seed butter. Perfection. I’ve actually hopped off the pumpkin train-I’m ready to move on to other fall items-apples, cranberry bread, and (soon) gingerbread. My roommate and I are currently drowning in apples from our CSA box. She brought a slow cooker, so we’re planning on chopping a bunch up and throwing them in there with some apple pie spice. Which would be awesome on yogurt. I’ve been wanting plain yogurt so much lately, and I don’t have any! Sad.

My study buddy! Filled with chai tea. I was trying to decide if I should use almond milk or water to brew my tea in. Then I realized I’d have to get up and walk all the way down the hall to the bathroom for water. Guess which I decided to use?

Spinach buddies! I was actually planning on going to the dining hall for dinner…and then I was browsing twitter and saw on the local news that my University has had some horribly outbreak of a “mystery illness,” some type of food poisoning and probably norovirus from the food at one of our dining halls. 51 students were sick, and some hospitalized. Umm, no thank you-I’ll stick to my room! I’m just mad I had to hear about this on the news-no one told us students about it!

So on that cheerful note, I shall leave you. Have a great day!

What did you do for Halloween? I’d love to live vicariously through all you guys!

The Day I Ate Nothing But Yogurt and Pumpkin

Date: October 10, 2013

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hi friends! Can you believe tomorrow is Friday? It kind of snuck up on me this week! Tonight I still need to do a lab report and a prelab. Fun stuff. I skipped yoga in favor of homework for once…

WARNING: If you’re looking for a healthy lifestyle, today may not be the best example. But such is life.

I actually slept 8 hours last night. I can’t even remember the last time! I had weird dreams though-driving to softball practice on a motorcycle??

I went to 8am Crossfit. The workout included lots of thrusters and push presses (a brutal combo), and more double unders. Thankfully, I didn’t have to do a million and two single unders-I just had to attempt doubles for one minute each round. Way easier on the calves! And I actually did string some double unders together too-something sort of clicked!

Post-Crossfit.

I decided to go to the dining hall to restock on eggs.

And might as well get breakfast while I’m there, right?? Plus, after seeing these vats of yogurt….Swoon.

I also did something crazy…I drank decaf coffee! Who am I? Drinking coffee for a reason other than caffeine?? It was eh. (That’s what I get.)

I decided to pack lunch today-it was time to attempt pumpkin yogurt! Sadly, my yogurt got a little beat up in my bag and ended up leaking all over my lunch bag…it could have been much worse!

Here are the ingredients:

Plain yogurt, pumpkin pie filling, cinnamon. And yes, I did pack the entire cinnamon container-I’m just cool like that.

Yummmmm. So if we’re keeping a tally-yogurt #2 for the day.

After my Ochem section, I was mentally done. I’ve worked pretty hard this week, and my brain was feeling it. I decided to take a break and just watch an episode of How I Met Your Mother. SO good. Here are a few pre-football snacks:

I mashed up a small avocado with my guac mix and BAM. Instant guac party of one.

Pumpkin pie filling and sunflower seed butter. Pumpkin pie filling obviously isn’t the most nutritionally sound food, but folks, I have a big can to finish and it’s delicious. Hence, the don’t do as I do. Also, multiply this by more as a later snack.

Snap pea crisps and a pumpkin granola bar from Trader Joe’s. These are not my favorite, but interesting to try.

Then, it was off to my first flag football game of the year! It was really fun-we lost but I wasn’t expecting anything crazy. I got knocked down twice by the same guy and skinned my knee up a tiny bit. #battlescars Ok, technically I ran into him, and when a smaller mass and larger mass collide, guess who falls? Putting my Physics knowledge to use people!

On the way back to my dorm, I saw my little friend from last year! DAY. MADE.

He actually had a tag this year-his name is Finnegan, and he lives with the Resident Fellows in a dorm nearby. And he always seems to pop up around exam times…

I debated 1. going to yoga 2. going to the dining hall 3. eating in my dorm. I chose the dining hall. Nothing exceptional today-I got some type of fish which was pretty good.

They also had a baked potato bar today, which was fun. I got a small potato with all the fixings.

Aaaand because I obviously didn’t have enough sugar in the form of pumpkin pie filling, this happened.

Soooo yeah. That’s that. The rest of the nigh is homework time for me! Tomorrow morning, I’m hoping my calf is sufficiently recovered so I can get a solid run in. I’d like to get one more speed workout in-I’m hoping to get 3 miles in-.5 mile there, .5 mile back, and then 8×400 repeats. Cross your fingers!

Do you ever get into food ruts?