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Sweet Day

Hey everyone! Sorry I didn’t post yesterday. I thought that my no sugar recap had some ideas that should be shared, so I left it up an extra day in the hopes that more people would see it. Well, this leads ironically to my next topic…I ended my no sugar challenge. I had some cake yesterday, and more stuff today. I want to get back to eating healthy, but no challenge. Just to clarify my comments on not wanting sugary foods yesterday, I want to be clear that I like sugar. I have a huge sweet tooth, so I’m inevitably going to eat sweets. What I don’t like is all the hidden sugar. If I’m going to eat something bad for me, I want to at least enjoy it!

Ok, back to more normal posting. Today started out well. Why? 2 words: PR and gear. We had our tough erg this morning. It has 4 different pieces, each different distances, and each all out. I went slower on the first 2 (slower than last time), and PRed on the second 2, including a 5k, for an overall PR. It felt really good! I was a little discouraged by the first 2 pieces, but during the 3rd, I decided I was GOING to PR. To be fair, this is only the second time I’ve done it. But still.

And second: GEAR! It’s a really big deal for athletes to have gear. Today I got a t-shirt for the Director’s Cup, and Nike running shorts with my school’s name! SO EXCITED. Plus, the weather was absolutely beautiful! Onto my eats! I’ll just post a few shots from yesterday to catch up.ImageImageImageImageImageImage

Just a few comments: my smoothie definitely didn’t hold me over like my French Toast Microwave Bakes normally do, so I was starving after class and ended up having a huge snack. Plus, have I mentioned that whenever I nap, I wake up with a huge urge to eat? And then I start shoving food i my mouth in a half asleep, dazed state. So yeahh. I’m pretty sure that huge snack set me up for worse eating later, and ultimately the cake that broke the camel’s back. If you haven’t noticed, I have a weakness for chocolate cake…Another note: those banana chews are so weird! I don’t know what to think of them. They only have 1 ingredient, bananas. I ate them with that super smooth almond butter. Maybe I’ve been eating them because I ran out of bananas…the dining halls haven’t had bananas lately, which is actually pretty frustrating….

Ok, on to today! 2 granola balls before my workout. After:Image

Protein smoothie! This wasn’t a great one. No bananas 🙁 I made my typical berry smoothie with blackberries and watermelon, which would have been good until I added vanilla protein powder, which was just weird. So to fix that I added cocoa powder. Not bad, but not great. And then, since I deserved it, this:Image

3/4 of a whole wheat waffle (I tried to make half. Ehh go figure). Plus thawed frozen blueberries, peanut butter, and butter on top. Yum! Although I must admit, the whole wheat batter isn’t as good as the regular. It occurred to me the other day that I could whip up my own batter and bring it to the dining hall. But that might be a little odd, even for me. That brings me to the next point: BIG NEWS! The dining hall may be getting more natural peanut butter! I saw them scooping it into the container today, and it was a different type! It was even the kind that had to be stirred! I tried to read the label, but the lady was looking at me strangely. But it only had 1g of sugar, so it’s likely that there is no added sugar. 

Class and then lunch. Yeahh lunch was where my sugar challenge really went downhill…Image

But first! Salad with a black bean burger, carrots, and brown rice pilaf. Nothing wrong with that. Buttt then I had some other things. Unpictured. Cinnamon raisin toast with smart balance to start. That was delicious but the dining halls have started stocking a different brand of cinnamon raisin bread, which I don’t like as much. Then a scone…and some small cookie bars. 

After class, my sweet tooth was still raging so I ate a Chocolate Mint Thinkthin bar, and brought back the good ol’ mug brownie.ImageImage

Practice today I was on land because we had an odd number of people. I actually don’t mint being on land. It gives me some freedom in my workout. And let’s be honest, rowing at steady state for over an hour on the water can get a bit…repetitive. Instead, I Spun, did some abs, and worked on some erging technique, which was much needed. I did a lot of legs only work because I know I’ll gain a lot of speed when I start using my legs again. I think I made some good progress!

Dinner was rushed, but it was what is currently my favorite meal!Image

Liquid egg whites with spinach, cheese (cheddar this time), pesto, and avocado. Bonus: I learned I can microwave egg on a plate! Anything to save dishes. After a rushed dinner, I headed out to my mom’s nutrition class. My mom is taking a couple of adult classes on campus, and she has the same professor I had last quarter for my nutrition class. I thought a brush up on my nutrition wouldn’t hurt. It was fun, but I liked how he taught my class better. 

When I returned to my dorm, I decided to make brownies. Why? I decided I was better off making brownies with my open bag of mix and sharing them with my dorm (and eating some of course) than if I had an open bag, and therefore unlimited access to mug brownies. While the brownies were in the oven, my dorm decided to have a s’mores night. Soo needless to say I’m a little sugared out! I really should go to sleep soon because I have a morning workout, but I don’t want to be farther behind on this blog, plus I need to burn off a little of this sugar first. Image

Needless to say they were well enjoyed! I don’t care what anyone says. being popular in college is easy. Just bake something! As you can see above, some people obviously like the middle! I personally like a little of both the middle and the edge. Most things I don’t like the edge of though. 

Ok, I really need to rest up for tomorrow. I’ve been having some nutrition thoughts lately though, so I think tomorrow might be a good time to talk about that!

Challenge Accepted

Hey everyone! I’m posting a little earlier today because I’m going out to dinner with my friend, then heading home to visit my cats, so I’m not sure how much opportunity I’ll have later to post. I just deleted all the pictures of my meals on my phone so if someone happens to look through my pictures, they won’t know just how food crazy I am. 

This morning, I had practice at 7:30. Well, sort of. I wasn’t on the water yet again, because the awkward number of people we had. Instead, I got to have the pleasure of timing all the boats. I got about 4 seconds of action in the more than 3 hours that the boats were on the water and it was FREEZING. Luckily, I had good enough sense to grab my iPod halfway through to listen to nutrition podcasts, but at least I had some time for reflection. 

Before practice, here’s what I ate:Image

A thawed quinoa breakfast bake and an orange. I got the recipe for the bake from Whole Foods. You can find it here. It’s still good 6 months later! 

After freezing through practice, I had a cinnamon raisin bagel because my coach brought bagels for the team. It was a really good bagel, nice and chewy! As soon as we got back, I rushed to brunch (it was almost 1 at this point) even though I had just eaten a bagel because Saturday brunches are probably my favorite meal of the week. Why? One reason. AVOCADO. Saturday brunches have Mexican food, and included in that is mashed up avocado. SO GOOD.Image

I normally make my Mexican food into a salad, as I did today. I figured I probably needed some veggies and protein to round out my meal anyway! At the end of my meal I wanted something sweet so instead of a waffle, I reached for a piece of whole wheat bread with blueberry cream cheese and peanut butter. 

After some work on a group project, I was ready for my second nap in 2 days. I may not have gone to bed as early as I should have last night. When I woke up, I had the hugest mug brownie craving. I tried healthy mug brownie take 2, this time with a different proportion of ingredients. I added less yogurt and more brownie mix, and it tasted more like the real thing.

ImageImageProbably because it was more like the real thing. Ugh. After that, I decided that the best way to use the brownie mix in a healthy way was to get it the heck out of my room. After all, it’s been open in my room for over a month, and I had picked quite a few of the chocolate chips out, and let’s be honest. Way too dangerous. Plus, if I want brownies, I’m better off baking a full batch and sharing them because they’re way better when made for real. However, I decided to get the last few chocolate chips out, and discover that brownie mix+plain greek yogurt+cocoa powder=deliciousness. After that, I had a few frozen cherries to get some decent food in my system. I decided to forgo my workout for today and just do it tomorrow because brownie+rowing machine would not be a good combination. This led my to the main topic of today’s post.  I spent some time today exploring other food blogs, and I came across a post on fitcupcaker about a 30 day no sugar challenge. I’ve done a few no-sugar challenges, and my biggest success was 3 weeks. Ever since the holidays, I’ve been indulging in my sweet tooth a little bit too often, so I decided this was a great time to do the challenge. I counted out the days on my calendar, and it ends on my sister’s birthday, which is perfect because I can enjoy cake on her birthday to celebrate my (hopefully) achievement (well, and her birthday). One thing I love about challenges like this is that they inspire creativity. If I have a sweet craving, I have the challenge to find a healthier way to satisfy it. (Hint: 2 great ways: nut butter and baked apples). I’ve never blogged about a no sugar challenge, and I’m super excited to start. Hopefully the encouragement will help me, and hopefully I can inspire you! And don’t worry, I’ll make sure to do some posts on sugar during this time, as it is one of my absolute favorite topics in science. Want some inspiration? One of my favorite videos: Sugar:The Bitter Truth, by Dr. Robert Lustig. Enjoy! My motivation? Dr. Lustig’s new book, “Fat Chance.” I absolutely cannot wait to read it!

Would you ever do a no sugar challenge?