The Best, Ugliest Green Smoothie Ever

Date: May 15, 2014

Author: astottler

Today was another warm one here on the West Coast! For most of the day, the heat really didn’t bother me. But now…

Let’s start from the top. I’m being a good person and going to yoga again! I went again this morning after spin (spin is necessary prior to morning yoga or else I’m insanely stiff). I can already feel myself loosening up, thank goodness! My hips were super tight, so we focused on those today. I was the only one in the class-surprise, surprise, 8am fitness classes aren’t super popular with college students. It is really nice to have the personal attention! I want to go to that class as much as possible-I think it’s really going to help my tendonitis.

I was glad I snacked on a granola bar (KIND great grains) before my workout because I was pretty hungry by the end!

For breakfast, I finished up the last of my berries with plain greek yogurt and sunflower seed butter, plus a mango and another granola bar on the side.

I only had one class today, but I had a busy afternoon! Lunch was a quick one-scrambled eggs with manchego and a sour grapefruit!

After lunch, I ran out to embark on the first of many errands. Stop 1-a party store for a tutu for Bay to Breakers on Sunday! I also got some fun socks and face paint! I’m ready! (minus the whole distance running thing. Ehh race clothing is clearly more important.)

From there, I went straight to the allergist. At my last appointment, they tested for food allergies. This time, they tested environmental allergies. The verdict? Welp, I’m allergic to basically everything. Severe to pretty much all the trees and pollen they tested for, as well as pretty severe for dogs, somewhat for cats, and super strong for dust mites. Sooo there’s that. There’s not a lot I can do about it for now, but most of the time I don’t have terrible reactions to things and it’s ok. But let’s just say they had to give me allergy medication after doing the dest because my skin was reacting so severely!

After the appointment, I raced back to school for softball practice. There wasn’t a huge turnout, but I got to play catch and shake out my arm, which was nice. We ended in time for me to rush to the earlier Crossfit for a strength day (no WOD). One of the movements we did was weighted planks-doing a plank with a weight plate on your back. I absolutely love this. I used to do them with my trainer way back then, and I loved them so much I did them on my own a lot. Well, my core strength is about half of what it once was! Hah!

I ended up missing dining because there was a special dinner thing going on that ended earlier, so I went to Whole Foods. I’m trying to be more frugal, and I walked out of Whole Foods carrying all my groceries in one hand!

Somewhere between finishing Crossfit and eating dinner, I got pretty dehydrated. I didn’t go back to my room at all in the 8 hours or so I was gone, so I ran out of water at the end of my workout. I figured it wasn’t a huge deal, but by the time I was walking around Whole Foods, I was deliriously thirsty so I grabbed everything as fast as possible! I got a green smoothie-technically. They were out of mango, so I substituted blueberries, turning my smoothie a lovely shade of brown. I seriously could not have cared less how it looked. Or how it tasted for that matter-as long as it was cold and liquid, it was the best thing in the world. I CHUGGED that smoothie!

On the side, I has cornbread and tortilla soup.

Other eats from the evening: a date with unsweetened chocolate, and some of my beloved goat Brie.

I’m still feeling sort of tired/thirsty/out of it-it’s so hard to cool down! I’ve been chugging water all evening, so hopefully I’ll perk up!

What’s your favorite cheese?

Big Game

Date: November 24, 2013

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Happy Monday! I hope you all had a terrific weekend! I was busy, busy!

Sunday morning, I went to Crossfit. The WOD was rough-it took me 46 minutes and involved lots of push ups, pull ups, and double unders. I actually did all 100 double unders! It was hard. And I have a bruised pinkie to show for it!

Immediately after Crossfit, I headed out to Big Game-the football game against our rivals.

It must have been my lucky day-I caught a free water bottle AND a free t-shirt!

Things started well when we scored a touchdown in the first 30 seconds or so.

I ended up leaving at halftime-we won 63-13! It was great. I actually ran into some of my high school friends who now go to my rival school while I was biking around after the game-how crazy is that? It was great to catch up-it had been way too long!

Then, it was time for a mass packing and room cleaning. I had to take home an insane amount of stuff, especially given I’ll only be back for a week! Since finals are coming up, I had to take every single textbook. The number of shoes I brought back is embarassing as well-like 7 or 8 pairs, and I am almost positive I’ll wear them all. When you have Spin shoes, Crossfit shoes, workout shoes, running shoes, old running shoes for if it rains…etc. It adds up quickly. Getting everything to my car was an adventure to say the least.

For my first meal home, we brought back food from a local restaurant, and I had huevos rancheros and a salad.

As well as a delicious pumpkin cookie with sticky toffee icing from my grandma.

The best part? I was reunited with this guy:

He sheds like crazy. I’m pretty much a ball of fur at this point. My dad picked up my turkey trot shirt from the expo, and it got all furry just from ME. Well worth it though. Want to know a lesser known about Aurora fact? I’m actually allergic to cats. I just put up with it because they are 100% worth it-but it’s amazing how fast allergies come back-it’s not something that ever even crosses my mind at school!

This morning I went to my home gym to go to one of my favorite spin classes. I did a bit of erging and ab work beforehand. The class was amazing. It’s so nice to have good bikes-it’s a completely different experience. I left the class feeling exhilarated. I have a new appreciation for spin classes now that I’ve been making my own!

After spin I spent way too long in Whole Foods, mostly buying granola bars and THIS. I could not resist.

Almond milk eggnog. Guys, this was seriously amazing. And so much less sugar than regular egg nog, but the flavor was still spot on.

I also picked up lunch-an Asian chicken salad wrap and Thai carrot ginger soup for my mom and me.

Then, we did a little shopping-some Christmas decorations, some workout clothes, and some real people clothes-so basically it was great.

This is going on my dorm door. My roommate and I may or may not be going crazy with the Christmas decorating this year.

The mall was so festive! Santa is ALREADY doing pictures with kids. It seems ridiculous that this all is happening before Christmas, but I guess Thanksgiving is really late this year.

For dinner, I had a teriyaki chicken bowl. I can’t remember the last time I had one of these!

We also may a trip to Starbucks for some berry coffeecake and a peppermint brownie cake pop. They’re good. Get one. They are more or less moist brownies with peppermint bark on the outside. Yum. And so pretty!

The rest of the evening has been spent planning 12 Days of Christmas. And cranberry bread is currently in the oven-we’re going to Napa tomorrow per our usual Thanksgiving tradition, so we’re baking it to take along.

Throwback to Napa trip 4 years ago!

And here’s a question: What do I wear for a rainy race??

A Day of First: Kitten Nursery and Crossfit

Date: June 14, 2013

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hey everybody! I just got a Twitter and Instagram so follow me at @fitnessissweet and fitnessissweet!

Yesterday morning was another early wake up call-I had the morning shift at the kitten nursery at the animal shelter. Before running out the door, I had a quick breakfast of yogurt with banana and sunflower seed butter.

As soon as I got there, we went right to work. We had to clean out the kittens cages, weigh them, feed them, play with them, and then set up their cages again. When we took them out of the cages, we kept them in cardboard boxes, and then carried the boxes to a table and took them out there to play and eat. They were pretty mischievous- the boxes were so hard to close because little paws and heads kept popping out!To put it in perspective, most of them weighed about .5 lbs. The next pictures are the group of kittens we took care of last. Since we were basically done after them, we had them out for longer to play and socialize with them. This group was fast asleep when we took them from their cage. Anyone who has had kittens knows this is a recipe for disaster! Kittens have this instant on switch that brings them instantly from 0 to 60! These guys were rambunctious! So much so that the little stripy kittens wouldn’t even eat at first, they were so busy playing! On top of that, they kept trying to wander around. When there are 4 kittens on the table and one of me, there are going to be problems! They kept trying to climb onto the windowsill. The white and striped one was quite the adventurer- somehow he made it off the table without me even seeing him get near the edge! By the time we were all done though, all the kittens were snoozing. We then went back to the other kitten nursery where the even younger kittens are. These kittens can’t really eat on their own, so we learned to feed them with a syringe. It was pretty difficult-the kittens were pretty fussy! I ended up finally being able to get some food in by wrapping the little guy up in a kitten burrito. I managed to feed him enough-he even went for the food bowl a little himself! Soon though, he stopped opening his mouth, and a minute later, he was fast asleep! Having a tiny kitten fall asleep in your arms is the best thing ever. I can’t wait to go back!

When I got home, I wanted a snack, which turned into a snacky early lunch.

Edamame Leftover sweet potato fried from dinner the previous night. Turkey roll ups-big leaf lettuce with deli turkey, onions, avocado, and ketchup.I also wanted to try and recreate the delicious iced tea from the previous day. I brewed Earl Grey tea with mint leaves, and then added ice, almond milk, and a touch of honey. I loved how refreshing the mint made it, so I concentrated on that aspect. Overall, it was good but nothing really like what I had had the previous day. I think it would have been better with coconut milk, or something slightly thicker than almond milk. And the Earl Grey tea flavor kind of overwhelmed the mint. But it was quite thirst quenching all the same!I then spent some time on the old blog, attempting to figure out Twitter. I sent this to my friend asking her what it meant my username was. #clueless

If you follow me on Instagram, you can see tons of cute cat pictures such as this one 🙂Before I knew it, it was Crossfit time! It was in a warehouse right next to an indoor batting cage where my high school softball team would occasionally practice.

First, let me just say- I loved it! Everything about it-I love throwing heavy things around. I really liked the warehouse atmosphere as well-it seemed very hard core (in a good way). If you are thinking about trying Crossfit, do not be intimidated! Everyone is super nice and of different fitness levels! We began with a warm up run and stretching with the regular class, and then another new person and I broke off with a trainer to be assessed and to go through a mini WOD. The WOD we did was actually one I had done on my own before,but a shorter version. I had had to modify it when I did it at the gym at school, and it was much harder yesterday.

10 AMRAP

100 m run

5 pull-ups (banded for me)

10 push ups (chest all the way to the ground)

15 air squats

I made it through 5+ rounds in the 10 minutes. I really, really loved the atmosphere. The workouts are very similar to what I did with my trainer at the gym in the past, and the atmosphere is more what I liked about softball conditioning with other people, except everyone actually cares about working hard!

The only thing for me is since I know all the Olympic lifts (there are very few Crossfit moves I don’t know), I would really like to try and skip some of the Intro classes and dive right into the normal WODs. I really don’t want to have to sit through classes learning the lifts I’ve been working on for the past 3 years. Plus, watching everyone throw heavy weights around kind of had me drooling-knowing I can do the lifts at the same weight that they are make same want to join right in! I totally could have done the normal WOD! I need to try and see if I can somehow be fast tracked at least a bit.

But I really, really loved it. I would say I’ve been bit by the Crossfit bug, but I know I’ve been obsessed for much longer! I’m going back again Saturday, and I seriously cannot wait!

Dinner was black bean soup from this Whole Foods recipe. We didn’t want to have to wait for the beans to sit, so we got canned, and probably didn’t add enough beans, because it was pretty liquidy (normally it’s pretty thick). Still delicious though! I highly recommend this recipe. HOWEVER. One major modification I made was using vegetable broth instead of water in the soup. It’s super plain without, but has a ton of flavor with!

My bowl was really weird/pathetic looking so I took a picture of my sister’s instead!Plus a side salad.After dinner, my wimpy mouth was burning! What better solution than frozen yogurt (with chocolate sauce)?What a fabulous way to end the day!

Have you ever done Crossfit? WHat did you think?

Good But Not Great

Date: January 21, 2013

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

It’s Sunday, and I’m back at school! Let’s go through my day!

I began with a quick breakfast before hitting the gym. I decided to do some experimenting, attempting to capture that amazing buttery, cinnamon-y goodness of cinnamon raisin toast with butter, but in a healthier way. I started with my French Toast base. I mashed up a banana, and then mixed in milk, and egg and egg white, cinnamon, and vanilla. I ended up only using half of this mixture because I wanted my bake to be more bread-y. I tore up a slice of whole wheat bread, and placed that in the mixture. And the final touch? A mix of cinnamon and dextrose (this is a glucose heavy sugar, you could use regular cinnamon sugar) to fill in the cracks! After baking this in the microwave for 1.5 minutes, I topped it with a little Smart Balance. Here’s the result:

It was good, but not amazing. I didn’t really capture the buttery factor enough. Oh well. That with a smudge of peanut butter and a cutie, and I had myself a meal!

Not bad at all!

At the gym, I went to Spin, and then made up yesterday’s missed workout. It was my favorite weights workout, plus a few embellishments. Here’s roughly what I did:

Back lunges from a platform(several inches)- sets of 3 each and decreased reps when weight got really heavy (I started at 135. last set was 175)

Single leg RDLs, 6 each leg, 4 sets. I worked up to 55 pounds. I supersetted this with 25 heel raises

A tiny (just a few minutes) of work on the erg trying to bring up my stroke rate (I have a lot of trouble simply moving fast enough)

1/2 kettle bell swing tabata (I did 2 minutes of 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off)

3×1 minute weighted plank (Place plate on your back)

Plus stretching and rolling out! I’m usually really bad about stretching, and I want to try and make a better effort! This workout tends to work muscles that complement each other for maximum exhaustion, and I’m already getting a little sore! I love having go-to workouts that I know will make me sore every time. Single leg RDLs do that for me. No matter how many or what weight, I’m almost always sore from them. Just a disclaimer: I’m not a trainer, and please don’t try this workout if you haven’t worked with weights before!

My gym is right next to Whole Foods. How perfect is that?? I needed to pick up some things, so Whole Foods was my next stop. I had a short list, but natrually I had to explore the whole store!

Free smoothie sample anyone? I was just telling my friend the other day how I haven’t had any free samples in a while! Love them! At whole foods, I got some random healthy ingredients, and some dried fruit and nuts. Nothing too exciting, but always fun! Oh, plus some soups for this week! And after the grocery, guess what time it was?

Ohhh yeah. Not that that cake was mine….but wooo!

I had a great big salad while watching the game!

Rotisserie chicken, apple, walnut, dried cranberries, and of course, avocado! All tossed in balsamic vinaigrette. And on the side? Only the best bread ever!

Cranberry walnut! Plus it’s whole wheat! This is one of my favorite breads! I really wanted to try my hand at baking some myself over the summer, but I never got around too it. Seriously, this stuff is so good! Can’t stop at one piece!

At halftime, it was time for me to get to work. I’ve talked about how great it was to have protein bars in the freezer last week, so this week, I decided to make something as well.

5 Minute Peanut Butter Granola Bars! Recipe courtesy of Anne from fANNEtastic food. The recipe called for Chia seeds, and I knew I’d never be able to use up a whole bag before they went bad. But look what Whole Foods had?

How perfect is that? 3 shots was just about right! To this recipe, I added raisins and skipped the ground flax, because I didn’t want to open a whole new bag (which I ended up opening anyway….) Aaaand the final result?

I ended up deciding to roll these into balls because I liked being able to have a bite sized piece, so that became this:

Perfect! I like how these granola bars aren’t too sweet. What first attracted me to the recipe was that they had brown rice syrup.

After my granola bars, I did a little experimenting. We had some leftover hazelnuts from a recipe over Christmas, so I tried my hand at hazelnut butter.

Add a few more whirs, salt, dark cocoa powder, and a few squirts of honey…

Not bad! It was a little dry. It probably could have used more blending but it was kind of difficult in my food processor so I left it. I ate a bit of this on bananas. Again for today, good but not great.

After the Niner’s game (!) I pitched for the first time since my last softball tournament 6 months ago. I’m considering trying to play this summer, and I suddenly had an itch to get back at it a little. It went surprisingly well! I was way less rusty than I was expecting! It was nice to be back out there.

Today was certainly the day of making interesting food. I whipped up another recipe from fANNEtatic food, Blueberry Apple Cinnamon Yogurt Bread.

Helper? Not so much….

While the bread baked up (the batter was certainly delicious, and no eggs so no reason not to lick the bowl!), it was dinnertime.

This is my all time favorite dinner. All recipe courtesy of Cooking Light. Cheese Souffles, Thyme Mushrooms, and an herbs and greens salad. The salad always tastes so fresh; half of it is whatever fresh herbs you have on hand or buy!

Such a great dinner. And the bread was finished just in time for dessert.

Unfortunately, I took it out a little too soon so the middle wasn’t totally done. Instead of put it in longer, I decided it was fine, since I was planning on freezing most of it for later anyway, and when I freeze it, I always microwave it. Still delicious!

Ignore the sloppy spot in the middle…

After all that great food and a few episodes of Castle, I packed up and headed back. Ok, while I absolutely love my cats, I am allergic to them. That’s right. This future crazy cat lady is allergic to cats. I’m not sure what causes my allergies to flare up; the entire time I was home for break it was fine, but today, my allergies are going crazy! I guess that’s a sign it was time to come back! Although I’m sure I have a cat’s worth of fur on my person and on all my clothes…I found cat fur all over a shirt I was wearing the other day. The mystery? I had received the shirt that morning! How does Charlie do it? (Because it always seems to be his fur…)

I have a lot of work to get done tomorrow. I also have team weights, and I’ll probably hit up a Spin class later as well. Plus, I have a new book that I’m absolutely dying to read.

After a yearlong Biology project last year, I discovered a passion for the science of sugar, its metabolism, and its effects on the body. Dr. Lustig has a popular Youtube video, Sugar: The Bitter Truth. After stumbling across this video, I was hooked. I’ve watched it 3 or 4 times, and read several other books. Plus, I downloaded all the Podcasts and interviews I could find with Dr. Lustig, and listened to them while I ran (I know, nerdy, right?). I am beyond exciting. I totally forgot that the book was coming out this soon (January 2013 seemed so far away!), so I am beyond excited for this. I’m a little rusty on sugar metabolism right now, which is why I haven’t posted about it. But this seriously could not have come at a better time, during my 30 day no sugar challenge. After all, it’s a little hard to stomach all this with a belly full of cake. On my challenge, I’m not cutting out all added sugars, just sweets. In honor of the book release, and all the attention surrounding it, I am considering doing and blogging about a few days of absolutely zero added sugars to raise awareness of the sugar lurking in so many foods. I’ve done this for a few days before, and believe me, it is difficult to find foods. Especially bread. Trader Joe’s is one of the only places I’ve been able to find bread without added sugars. And this would be even more difficult at a dining hall, because ingredients aren’t listed on everything. So who would want to try this with me to raise awareness to the something so many food processors pour into our foods? We should be able to have more control over what we eat!

What do you think of a zero sugar day to raise sugar awareness?