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Got Avocados?

Date: May 20, 2013

Author: astottler

I hope everyone had a great weekend! I feel like the days are just flying by now! Next week is Week 8 of our 10 week quarter. And then…freshman year is over. How crazy is that??

A quick blogging sidenote-my blog currently has basically no recipes and basically no workouts, When school is out (which is fairly soon) I’ll get on posting some more of those things in a more organized manner.

Also, I really want to tell you guys about a complement that I received the other day. I was at a party with some friends and a guy came up to me and complemented me on my weight lifting. This was super awesome; I am so proud of my weight lifting! Best complement ever!

Saturday morning, I was in the mood for a smoothie, but I couldn’t really pass up the guacamole, so I mad a small Mexican salad bowl as well. I was trying to base the smoothie off of my Dark Chocolate Blueberry smoothie, but I kind of failed at that. I didn’t have the protein powder or peanut butter, or really the right amounts of anything. And I added spinach. The flavor wasn’t terrible, but the smoothie just wasn’t cold enough, so maybe it would have been better if I had added ice. Not that it was a bad smoothie or anything, but not my best effort.

After brunch, I did a quick workout before meeting up for coffee with some friends. And by coffee, I mean a mango smoothie. Basically the same thing, right? I didn’t have time to get through everything I had planned, but basically I started with 1k on the rowing machine, then did a leg circuit with single leg squats and single leg deadlifts. I had planned on doing another leg circuit, but I ran out of time. I always overestimate how long things will take, and how much is reasonable to do in one workout. I plan these elaborate long workouts, and usually end up skipping things. I had planned on doing some sprints on the rowing machine later as well, but that didn’t happen.

Next, I did this:

20 Minutes, As Many Rounds As Possible of:

5 Pull ups (I did pull downs on a machine)

10 pushups

15 air squats

I have no idea how many rounds I got through, but each round took less than 1:30. I followed that with a plank circuit.

That afternoon, I went to Half Moon Bay for a retreat with my sorority. We went to the beach briefly, mostly to take pictures. The water was quite cold, and getting even my feet wet was unpleasant, but worth it for the scenery!

And we saw a cat on the way back! Yay!Dinner at retreat was burritos-with plenty of salad of course!As you have seen, throughout the week I received gifts from my Big (a sorority thing). Yesterday was when I got to find out who she was! How did she do the reveal? She held up this shirt:HOW GREAT IS THIS???

Hmm I might just have to wear this for a race…I feel like it expresses me quite well. And yes, thanks to my big, I do have avocados.

We spent to rest of the night doing fun bonding type of activities, and before I knew it, it was time to return to the real world.

I was thinking about doing a run today, but then I remembered there was a power yoga class offered today, and I haven’t had any rest days all week. Since I ended up not going to yoga at all this week, I decided it would be perfect, and it was. My hips are sore from a lot of the leg work I’ve been doing lately, and we focused on that quite a bit. I also saw my Psych professor- she’s an aerobics instructor, and was teaching the class before mine. It’s always so weird to see teachers/professors outside the context of the classroom. After yoga, a nap was in order. I wasn’t all that tired, but I did not get much sleep the last 2 nights, so I knew it was a must. This afternoon and evening has been spent working on a take-home test due tonight-I finished right before writing up this blog post! I did break for dinner around 5:30. My friend wanted to go to Jamba Juice, and since it was hot, I decided that it might be a good way to cool off. I got one of the fruit and veggie smoothies- the tropical one. In this one, I think the only veggies in it are veggie juice, but I actually really like it because it wasn’t as sweet as smoothies blended with fruit juice. After that, this happened:Turkey burger and sweet potato fries. Hey, I got the veggies in my smoothie, right?? As I may have discussed before, we get a certain number of meal plan dollars to use each quarter as part of our meal plan. They work at several different restaurant type places on campus, including this place, which I’ve never actually eaten at before. I have never used up these meal plan dollars. Last quarter, I had a good excuse though (leaving school 4 weeks before the end of school due to illness). This quarter, I all of the sudden realized that I have three weeks left, and over $100 to spend, otherwise they will go to waste. So at dinner, I treated my friend, as well as some other people we happened to meet up with, and chipped away $50 from this mountain of meal plan dollars I need to spend. Yay! I still have a ton, and I am planning on buying some really expensive salads in the near future!

Well, that’s all I have for you today. Before I leave you guys those, I want to make a shout out to my friend Elizabeth. She just started a fashion blog, so if you like fashion (or even if not), check it out! It is called Styles by Elizabeth.

Have a great week!

Happy Pants

Date: May 18, 2013

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

First of all, let me just say, I am so jealous of everyone going on the BLEND retreat this weekend! Beth from Mangoes and Miles had the great idea of trying to put together a retreat for college bloggers. How awesome would that be??

My morning began with a quick workout- 3 sets of stairs. Each set- single leg hops (each leg), squat jumps, 2 sprints, and 25 (ea) scissor kicks. Then I followed that with 4k on the rowing machine.

I tried to finish my workout a little bit early so I had time for a photo shoot for my pear. Food blogging at its finest.

This is one of my birthday pears from Harry and David! Harry and David has the best pears ever. Sweet, juicy, and the perfect firmness. I seriously can’t eat any other pears.

Guess what? My duct tape solutions to my bike’s woes actually worked. My brake works fine and my basket stays in place.

Pshhh who needs to go to the bike shop?

A couple of shots from last night?

I do not like being locked out. Thank you car key lanyard for looking exactly like room key lanyard.

I had to walk to the library last night because my bike key is attached to my room key…which was in my locked room. But at least I got a nice picture!

My Big is seriously awesome. How great is this? 2 of those pictures are Lilly. Can you find them?

So this morning, my flowers all of the sudden looked….really really bad.

This thing drinks like crazy, I even watered it yesterday! I swear I’m not a bad plant mama!

Today was such a nice day. I got to pretend to be on the quidditch team and ended up with a free Ike’s sandwich. If you aren’t from CA, you probably don’t know what Ike’s is. If you are from this area, you are incredibly jealous. It was veggie with garlic and pesto!

And since we’re on the topic of food…

Guacamole complements of my Big. She gave me the MOST PERFECT avocados, and since I have guacamole mix, this whipped up to be a great snack!

The other half was used for dinner on my egg scramble with pesto.

See how much better the flowers look already?? Phew.

Now let’s get to the meat of the post. Today in Psych, we had a lecture on the Psychology of Health. Did you know that when you are stressed, you are way more likely to get colds? Ok, you probably knew that. But there are tons of other interesting studies. Apparently, you get sick more when you’re lonely as well. What I don’t get is how the researchers got the approval to administer the cold virus to tons of people…I would not want to participate in that study! Anyways, when you are stressed out, it is as if your body is in a continual fight or flight response. Cortisol has signals for the cells in your immune system that kill them off. Basically, your body focuses on the fight or flight issue, and conserves energy by shutting down your immune system. Yep, sounds about how I got Mono. Crew 5 hours a day, no sleep, and no clue what was going on? Yeah.

We also talked about the amazing benefits of exercise. Exercise can significantly reduce depression and anxiety. It has been shown to work as well at alleviating clinical depression as anti-depressants. How cool is that? This whole lecture got me thinking. What stresses me out? What is valuable to me? What makes me unhappy?

I realized, I exercise most days. I do hard exercise. That is awesome. I need to appreciate myself more, and what my body can do for me. I need to appreciate the world more. I feel like this past week I’ve really had my head in the clouds. I do feel like I got quite a bit of schoolwork done, but not a lot in terms of social interactions (which are SUPER important). And although it was technically a good week, it was just kind of blah.

The takeaway? I am trying to look at everything with a super positive light. I want to experience things more, and stop being concerned by the things that really don’t matter that much in terms of everything else.

I have some fitness goals that I set for myself. I had a reward planned for each goal. But I simply wasn’t meeting them, and it was getting extremely frustrating. So I decided to stop being so hard on myself, and appreciate myself for what I can do. So I went out and bought the first item on the list.

Did I need these? Absolutely not. But I decided that they are going to be my Happy Pants. They reflect a decision I made to appreciate and celebrate myself (wow that sounds incredibly selfish…). When I wear them, I want to remember that. On a different note, I am smack in the middle of the midterms. And I want a bit of time to myself to try and figure some things out. Anyone interested in doing some guest posts for next week? Shoot me an email at astottler@gmail.com.

Thanks guys! I’ll leave you with this-my current phone screensaver.

How I Gave Up Desserts

Date: May 17, 2013

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hey guys! I’m not going to go into today’s eats much today…maybe tomorrow. Plus today included a ton of snacking (which is always a bad sign for me). I woke up this morning for Spin, but barely. I seriously wanted to crawl back into bed. But I went. And I’m glad I did. And it was raining! What the heck? This is California, darn it! On another note, my bike is causing me great annoyance, which is a problem considering campus is HUGE and I definitely need to bike everywhere. First, my brakes started jamming. The front brake will brake just fine, but when I stop pressing on the brake, it won’t go off. Awesome. So I have to reach down to the wheel and pull the little spring-type things apart manually.

(That thing.)

The good news? Upon further examination, I think this problem can be solved with a few pieces of well placed duct tape. Please tell me I’m not the only one who used to think duct tape was tape with pictures of ducks on it?

Also noteworthy: I tried Overnight Oats for the first time! I actually broke into them last night for a snack. I didn’t expect them to be so thick! Also, a note to first timer OOers, remember before you taste your first bite that the oats contain an entire container of rather tart yogurt.

I just had it with some sunflower seed butter. I had the other half today with some thawed blueberries and sunflower seed butter. I just opened a new crunchy sunflower seed butter, and it’s my new favorite!

Overall, I’m not a HUGE fan of overnight oats, but I would probably make them again. I’m thinking they have some serious staying power!

This afternoon was spent snacking (GAH I blame you again nap!) and looking into becoming a Spin instructor. The general requirements for group fitness at my local gym require a group fitness certification as well as 1 year of experience….but I have no experience, so I’m going to look into tons of other things.

And now onto the topic of this post. Some of you may recall that the night before my birthday, I declared I’d give up desserts for the rest of the school year. Now, it’s been almost 2 weeks! (My record is 3 weeks, for anyone that cares.) And to be honest? I don’t miss desserts at all. To be fair, I am still having some sweet things, but these healthier alternatives are still cutting my sugar intake and keeping me sane. In my previous sugar challenges, these are items I probably would have done without. But those have all failed. So this time, I decided to take a more low-key approach and allow some things. Like this deliciousness:

And I’ve had some granola with chocolate chips. And who needs oreos when you could have this beautiful combo? (Flax snacks with the sesame seed butter.)

Ok, I admit, this one kind of pushes the boundaries, as both items are sweet. But they’re almost gone. 😉

Another thing I noticed, a few days in to my challenge: a lot of things just tasted sweet. I had my yogurt+sunflower seed butter+pumpkin bread combo, and it wasn’t as enjoyable as it had been before. The point is, my taste buds have adapted and I don’t miss everything all that much. Ok, I know I’m painting this up to be all daisies and sunshine; there have been some very difficult things to pass up. Like in Yosemite when all my friends were eating Oreos and M&Ms. Or on my Mom’s birthday when the table ordered a ton of specialty desserts. But I’m glad I did choose to pass up. In the long run, I know this is better for me, and I’ve reached the point where it is mostly smooth sailing. That being said, maybe a few less ThinkThin Divine bars wouldn’t hurt. (Yeah. I had 3 today. But now they’re gone so that’s that.)

The point is, once your taste buds readjust, there is no turning back! I love healthier alternatives. Last quarter I had many bananas mashed with cocoa powder.There’s seriously one picture every day from the beginning of last quarter. (Try this one guys! I haven’t had it lately because my bananas haven’t stuck around long enough and because it was awesome with peanut butter. Which makes my face blow up. Just microwave a banana, and mash it up with cocoa powder!)

There are tons of healthy alternatives out there (and I will most likely spend my summer finding them). I’m still deciding what I want to do when my so-called “challenge” is over. I think I might continue. I wish I was one of those people who could have a bite of chocolate and be good to go. I’m definitely an all or nothing personality type. And eating sweets is a VERY slippery slope for me. Although you guys don’t see it on the blog, previous to teh challenge I was eating a ton of sugar. It just doesn’t usually stick around long enough to be photographed!

On another note, I’m considering trying Paleo again now that my yogurt phase has more or less come to an end. Every time I’ve tried Paleo for a few days, I’ve loved how I’ve felt. ANd to be honest, yogurt was a BIG reason why I didn’t want to try it again. Plus I’ve been feeling so-so with my food choices as of late. Thoughts?

Would you ever or have you ever given up desserts? What was it like?

Leg Demolisher and An Award

Date: May 16, 2013

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hey guys! I swear one of these days I’ll do a WIAW…but let’s just do a normal post, shall we? I lifted weights this morning. Since yesterday‘s workout included a bit of everything, especially arms (I’m looking at you snatches), I wanted to focus on legs. So, I figured, why not demolish my legs? Here’s a picture of what was on tap for my day, although the sprints and abs were in the afternoon:

I started with squats to a fairly heavy weight, and then settled into 135# for my typical back squat workout of 2 squats every 30 seconds for 8 minutes. I followed that up with the workout on the card, the Metcon Honky Tonky. Yeah. My legs were pretty much done. SO naturally the logical step was to move on to RDLs and calf raises. Go hard or go home, right? I finished with a few sets of single leg squats and hamstring rolls. Can you say JELLO? Legs=demolished.

Breakfast:Plain greek yogurt topped with granola and frozen blueberries. Plus a biscuit. I LOVE BISCUITS!

Aaaand here’s lunch: salad with a hard boiled egg and garlic hummus.After lunch, I had the pleasure of taking my Ochem midterm. It seemed difficult, but crossing my fingers, I think I pulled it off.

After class, this was waiting for me in my room:It’s Big-Little week! My big is awesome, I can already tell. I got more mangos today, and here’s what I got last night:She knows me too well! Mangos and avocados?? I’m soo spoiled!

After a quick snack of freeze dried edamame and a mango, I went outside to do some sprints and abs (see workouts above). The sprint workout was from my old agility/conditioning coach I used to train with my sophomore and junior year of high school. Is it weird that I get nostalgic about workouts? And then I started to really miss softball. I miss everything about it, pitching, hitting, running after balls. And yes, I did love softball conditioning. Sigh.

Before dinner, I whipped up some Overnight Oats. I’ve never had them before, but given I’m on a yogurt kick, and my last yogurt expires tomorrow, I figured I’d give it a try. I seem to have lost my almond milk…so I used sunflower seed milk. It’s not my favorite, but that’s ok. I also discovered after dinner when I was eating a banana with sunflower seed butter, that I have a nearly empty jar! So that’s going to happen. I swear, either a) my room eats things or b) I’m going to find a ton of random things when I move out (in three weeks!!!). Also missing: a bowl (I only had 2 so this is bad…), 2 knives, and now my almond milk.

Dinner was very unsatisfying (which explains why it was followed by the banana and a Thinkthin Divine bar). I had some avocados in the fridge which I thought went bad a while ago, so I brought those to dinner. The avocados were fine, but even they could not save a sub-par dinner. Our dining hall is so bad that NO ONE goes there anymore. It was pretty empty. How can a salad with chicken be so unsatisfying?Plus parsnips. Those were good, I’ll give them that. I eat so much more at the dining hall when the food is bad, ironically. So I made a vow to never eat there for dinner again for the rest of the year. I brought some spinach back to my room so I can make an omelet for dinner tomorrow, now that I know I have some decent avocados.

Also, I haven’t forgotten about this Miranda! Thanks for nominating me for the Versatile Blogger award!

The Rules:

1) Add The Versatile Blogger award photo on a blog post
2) Thank the person (or animal) who presented you with the award and link back to him or her in your post
3) Share seven things about yourself
4) Pass the award along to 15 favorite bloggers. Contact the chosen bloggers to let them know about the award.

7 Things You Don’t Know About Me

1. I have a Youtube video with over 38,000 hits. Find it here. But here’s the thing. It’s a softball skills video I made to show to college coaches. It should have less than 1000 views. I have ABSOLUTELY no idea why it has so many. If anyone knows, please clue me in.

2. I wanted to play softball in college, and got some good offers, but ultimately I turned it down in favor of the academics at the school I am at now. And I miss it like crazy.

3. When Lilly was a kitten, she loved sitting on shoulders. And heads. (Ok, this isn’t really me, but let’s go with it.)(Ignore the gross face and focus on the cat).

4. I drive a Prius (at least last year. Now My sister has priority access).

5. I’ve gone all over the country to play softball. Vegas, Southern California, Colorado, Pennsylvania, Florida. And of course all the armpits of CA: Hemet, Stockton, Fresno (sorry if any of you guys live there…but would you really disagree?).

One year in Vegas we played in 117 degree heat. Soo much fun. GAH I can’t believe I won’t be traveling everywhere this year!

6. I don’t think I’m a very patient person…

7. The one Midnight premier I’ve gone to is the Hunger Games, with all my friends in Senior year. The next morning was one of the first times I’d attempted coffee…and naturally I tried to drink it black. It didn’t work.

Ok, 15 bloggers! I’m not sure who has gotten what already, but here are some! SOrry if I missed you or if you’ve already been nominated!

1. Health Love and Chocolate

2. Spoonful of Sunshine

3. Road to RD

4. Modern Girl Nutrition

Hmmm pretty sure a lot of you other guys have been nominated! Have a great day!

FAIL

Date: May 15, 2013

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hey guys! I’m a bit more behind than I realized…

For Mother’s Day, my sister and her boyfriend, and I surprised my mom at lunch. Here are some pictures from the day:Yogurt. No kidding.

Salad at lunch. Unfortunately it had bacon (which I don’t eat) so I picked it off. My dad enjoyed the picked off bacon with his meal though!

I made dinner! This meal was inspired by a Korean restaurant I went to a while ago. Herbed quinoa and brown rice, spinach and mushrooms sauteed in teriyaki, and topped with an egg over easy. So simple and delicious! There are tons of different flavors going on!

“Dessert”-cereal and blueberry pomegranate kefir with sunflower seed butter.

Obligatory cat pictures.This little guy woke me up at 4:30 am Monday because he wanted to cuddle and be petted. And I can’t exactly be mad for that…

Monday morning I went to abs class (so hard!) and then thus began my juice cleanse. I always seem to overestimate my love for veggie juice. This would have gone a lot better if I actually, you know, could tolerate it.

Breakfast was a mix of the beet-y juice and the pineapple cucumber. It was chugged very quickly. Classy, I know.The pineapple cucumber would have been super good if I didn’t despise cucumbers! Isn’t that a strange vegetable to hate?

On a side note- my kitty Lilly is in the habit of chewing up tissues in the box, so my mom put the box upside down. Did that help? You tell me.

Lunch was a blend of 2 green juices.

Well at least it was a beautiful day!
When I returned to my dorm, I found a gift from my Big awaiting me! I love her already!
Mangos

And a friend for my avocado plant!

I had been saving the Cashew juice for “dinner” but I was kind of fed up with the whole juice thing at this point. I didn’t drink much juice since I didn’t really like it, so I didn’t have a lot in my system. Then I had some of these freeze dried edamame:
Then I had a banana with sunflower seed butter. I figured, hey, it’s still produce (sort of) so TECHNICALLY I’m still doing this thing. And then this happened.
And delicious it was. Plus a protein bar…so I ended up kind of stuffed.
Overall, the whole juice cleanse didn’t really work for me. Partly because I hate veggie juice (and am never buying it again) and partly because I don’t exactly believe in it, simply because the juices have so much sugar. If I were to do a cleanse, I’d do a fruit and veggie cleanse, and eat the whole veggie. Why are vegetables so much better not in juice form??
Other highlight of yesterday: I went to my PO Box on campus. For the first time. Yes, I realize that is bad and pitiful and I’m a terrible human being. Especially since my friends from high school sent these months ago:

I was coming back from a sorority meeting in an are I was unfamiliar with, and somehow ran into the back of the post office.
Since this post is super long, here are some shots from today:

Literally the perfect apple. I love Harry and David!

Workout

Have a great day everyone!
Would you ever do a juice cleanse?