Alimental

March 18, 2012
by hannahsurges
2 Comments

Switched out banana for apple in my oats this morning. Just living on the edge, as usual.

I spent most of the day (and weekend, really) studying for chemistry, because my midterm is on Tuesday. This week is going to be crazy busy and stressful, but after that, it should be pretty smooth sailing until after spring break. I’m extremely anxious right now, but I know it’ll all be over before I know it, and everything will probably turn out fine.

I am not a confident test taker. No matter how much I prepare, I’m sure I’ll forget everything as soon as I start the test (although this has never happened.) *sigh*

I did use some of that nervous energy to start a little bit of spring cleaning.

Closet cleaning!

I cleaned out/organized my pants, underwear, and workout clothes.

It’s a start!

I’m not posting a picture of my underwear drawer on the internet, but believe me, it is very tidy. I also got rid of a lot of stuff, so I’m all set for a shopping trip next weekend when my hellish week is over.

Greg had an exciting day too.

He learned how to sew buttons and mend seams. I was so proud of him! He fixed 3 pairs of his pants that have been out of commission for a while, and then asked me if I had any clothes that needed mending.

He’s a catch, in case that wasn’t already clear.

Time to go pack my lunch, set my alarm, and get ready to kick this week’s booty.

Goodnight!

March 11, 2012
by hannahsurges
4 Comments

I’m not a fan of the first few days of springing forward. Due to the time change, I slept in until 8 and felt behind all day. I was still pretty productive, but I definitely felt off.

I’d been craving pancakes all week, so I finally made some on Saturday morning. So delicious.

This morning, I was back to the classic. Oats, raisins, banana, and almonds.

I spent most of the day alternating between reading and studying with a few chores and errands in between.

I’m still not running, but I’m taking some very brisk walks, and my knee seems to be okay with that.

I finally bought a lunch bag today, and packed an extra delish lunch for tomorrow.

It’s supposed to be for young children, but it’s actually huge.

In the bag: salad (arugula, cucumber, and avocado), carrots and snap peas, 2 apples, strawberries, plain greek yogurt, 1/2 an ounce of almonds, and leftover soup. In case you’re wondering, I don’t eat all this food in one sitting. Tomorrow is my nearly 12 hour day, so I pack a ton of food.

This is the soup in my lunch.

I made this for dinner. It was really good and easy.

I added carrots, an onion, celery, vegetable broth, and some herbs.

Possibly the only good thing about springing forward is that there was still sunlight for photographing dinner.

March 9, 2012
by hannahsurges
3 Comments

All that hematology studying turned out to be worth it. It’s nice when hard work pays off.

Two exciting things arrived this week, and it was so hard to ignore them until the week was over.

My Bob’s Red Mill delivery.

And my new cake decorating book! I probably won’t be making any cakes this weekend, but I’m going to figure out what supplied I need and try to get started next weekend or the weekend after.

Blog stuff:

I’ve added Pinterest, Twitter, and Facebook buttons (by which I mean Greg did), so you can now share any posts you like one those sites. You can also follow me on Pinterest with the button on the upper right in the side bar. I’m pretty new to the whole thing, so my boards aren’t too exciting yet, but I’m getting the hang of it.

Do you have any big plans this weekend?

March 5, 2012
by hannahsurges
2 Comments

Forgive me in advance, because none of these photos was taken in daylight.

6:00

9:30

Yogurt, apple, and a banana that was supposed to be for the afternoon as second breakfast, veggies and iced coffee on the way to work.

1:45

Leftover tofu spinach lasagna from last night. Ended up not eating the apple.

4:00

The banana that I actually ate this morning, granola bar.

6:45

We made Soba Noodles with Sweet Ginger Scallion Sauce for dinner. It was awesome, and only took about 15 minutes to make from start to finish. Highly recommend.

7:30

Apple from lunch + strawberries.

Off to study for my Hematology midterm and lift some weights. And fold laundry.

Goodnight!

March 4, 2012
by hannahsurges
3 Comments

Yesterday was a day of baked goods.

This was my Saturday baking project. A blueberry danish. I used this recipe that I found on Pinterest, but swapped black berries for blueberries, and made my icing almond flavored (and also made it with almond milk). This recipe is super easy to veganize if you’d like to do so. Just use non-dairy milk in the icing, croissant dough without lard, and non-dairy cream cheese.

If you’re wondering why it looks like hell, it’s because I was going to try making a fancy pattern with the dough, but the filling started leaking, so I decided to forget it and just wrap everything up.

It looked a little better when it was sliced.

I also had my very first Sprinkles cupcake yesterday.

Such a cute place, and all the cupcakes looked delish. I ordered a red velvet, because it seems to be their signature cupcake.

It was good, but not $3.50 good. Maybe the other flavors are better?

Today, I stepped away from the baked goods and had some cereal crumbs (grocery shopping day) with banana, strawberries, and almond milk for breakfast.

Side note: I bought this bowl on clearance at Anthropologie and really didn’t care for the color at the time. Now I’m in love with it, and I think berries look absolutely gorgeous in this bowl.

When we finished grocery shopping and cleaning up a bit, we were off to the beach for a couple of hours of studying in the sun. I can’t believe it’s 84 degrees on March 4th.

Study snacks.

On the agenda for the rest of the day:

• Studying for Hematology
• Lasagna
• Laundry
• Flashcards
• Wine

Have you been to Sprinkles? What did you think?

Did you eat anything extra delish this weekend?

March 2, 2012
by hannahsurges
1 Comment

This week has been craaaaazy busy. I’m even more ready for the weekend than I usually am, and it’s supposed to be 80 degrees on Sunday! I might just get that beach day I’ve been after, since I’m already caught up with homework through Tuesday, thanks to my ever improving time management skills (and coffee).

I’ve always been reasonably organized, but improving my time management skills is proving to be a very worth while endeavor. It takes some effort to organize my time, but having a plan helps so much to reduce stress and anxiety when I have a lot going on, and I’ve been able to increase my productivity significantly. Here’s a summary of how I got started.

Getting Started

Like so many things, the hardest part is getting started. A couple of things really helped me get on the right track.

Time Journal

The first thing I did was to keep track of how I used my time for several days. This is exactly like a food journal for time management. I wrote down everything I did and how long I spent on it. Just like with a food journal, it’s important to write everything down. That means writing down the two hours on Pinterest just like you’d write down the 5 pieces of cake. If you can’t identify the problems, there’s no way you can fix them. After a few days of time journaling, I was able to identify patterns that were keeping me from being more productive and having time for things that I wanted to do.

Setting Priorities

Once I knew where my time was going, I had to make a list of priorities. Next, I separated my priorities into two lists: negotiable and non-negotiable priorities. Non-negotiable priorities are things that take a certain amount of time, and either I can’t adjust how long they take, or I’m not willing to spend less time on them. My non-negotiable priorities include school, sleep, and exercise, to name a few. I don’t have much control over how much homework I have, and I’m not willing to spend any less time sleeping or exercising. A couple of things on my list of negotiable priorities were reading and blogging, which are important to me, but I can spend as much or as little time as I have doing them.

Knowing Limits

There are 168 hours in a week. When I subtract unavoidable things like hours spent in class, hours spent at work, and transportation hours, and then subtract the hours I need for my  non-negotiable priorities, I’m left with a certain number of hours that can be used for anything. It’s not a huge number of hours, but it’s definitely more than I imagined it would be, which means I can do more things than I imagined I could do.

But there’s still a limit, so choices have to be made. Choosing between priorities seems like a negative thing, but acknowledging that I’m making a choice is a very positive thing. I may not have time to keep my house spotless if I spend my time reading or cooking instead, but that’s my choice! Acknowledging that I’m making a choice makes me feel good about what I am doing instead of feeling guilty about what I’m not, and it also reminds me that if having a spotless house is important to me, I can always choose that instead. As they say, you can have anything, but you can’t have everything.

Happy Weekend!

February 26, 2012
by hannahsurges
1 Comment

This weekend was lovely and productive, but I can’t help feeling a little sad whenever Sunday night rolls around.

Highlights of the day:

This awesome breakfast. Apple, plain greek yogurt, cereal, a few almonds, and cinnamon, all in a pretty bowl. Pretty bowls make everything better.

AND I think I have a winner for my Bob’s Red Mill submission.

It’s so good. I could not stop eating it. So stay tuned for that.

I made a deal with myself that I wouldn’t use the gift card that I was given by Bob’s Red Mill until after my recipe was submitted, so I was extra motivated.

Other things:

• My knee felt GOOD today. Probably all that vegetable magic.

• I did a bunch of homework, but not nearly enough. As usual.
• I finished Twilight yesterday. It was absolutely awful. What the hell.
• I started reading Xenocide.
• I made another giant batch of vegetable bean soup.

February 24, 2012
by hannahsurges
2 Comments

Hi everyone! So unbelievably glad it’s Friday.

As I mentioned in my last post, my knee is not doing so hot.

The pain started during my run on Saturday. My knee was feeling a little tight, which is not really unusual, but the tightness has never continued after a run. After running, my knee became really sore, and the soreness has persisted all week. Not to worry, parental readers, I do plan to see a doctor if the pain persists much longer, but it does seem a little premature to me at this point.

Not running is much, much harder than running. Now that  I can’t do it, I can’t believe there was ever a day that I didn’t feel like running. I have definitely noticed increased anxiety, and I have had dreams about running 3 of the last 5 nights.

Even though I’m feeling a little heartbroken right now, I’m hopeful that I’ll recover and be back out there in no time. I still have a half marathon to run this year!

Meanwhile, I’m focusing on other aspects of healthy living that I tend to neglect, such as:

• Non-running exercise. I’m walking, doing yoga, and working on my arms. I’m going to try a bike ride this weekend and see how my knee feels. It’s not the same, but it’s nice to change things up, and it’s absolutely necessary to keep moving.

I’m still hoping that this injury will resolve itself and everything can go back to normal, but if not, I’ll just be walking that half marathon.

Happy Friday!

February 22, 2012
by hannahsurges
2 Comments

Not much. Mostly this.

Camping out at the table with horrible posture, getting stuff done.

I also seem to have actually injured my knee, which is awesome. Not really sure what I’m going to do about that, other than definitely not run.

I have eaten some fine food, however, and I’ve been trying extra hard to eat lots of vegetables.

Oh, shredded wheat. So delish. Makes my stomach hurt so bad. I don’t know if it’s because my body doesn’t love wheat anymore or because I just eat so damn much of it.

I want to make every morning snack look like this!

Pasta, peanut sauce, and (over)steamed vegetables.

One Bob’s Red Mill test recipe. Good, but not the one.

Much improved school snack. Greg made me watch a video of Captain Vegetable from Sesame Street the other day, and now I have it stuck in my head ALL THE TIME. Especially with my carrots and my celery. Har har. (If you must know)

Bowl of lettuce and strawberries, which I ate with a bowl of miso vegetable soup (but that was ugly, so it didn’t get its picture taken).

Fajitas from last night with black beans and broiled tofu.

And now, back to this.

Currently considering:

• How to exercise with an injured knee.
• What to bake this weekend.
• How to squeeze in more reading time. And do less homework.

February 19, 2012
by hannahsurges
1 Comment

One thing that I wanted to focus on this year was cleaning up my diet. Overall, I think it’s going pretty well. Like most things, it’s not going exactly according to plan. Some things are working, some things aren’t, and I’m adjusting as I go.

One major thing: I had completely forgotten how challenging it is to plan and execute healthy eating as a student. I’m better at it than I used to be, since I do consistently eat breakfast, pack my own snacks and lunch, and generally don’t eat anything from the cafeteria. There have been a few times when I’ve seriously underestimated how much food I’d need between 7AM and 2 or 3PM and did resort to a bag of pretzels or Popchips in order to avoid gnawing my arm off, but other than that, everything has been from home.

Some issues that need addressing:

• Limited backpack space. This means I end up packing the most compact and filling things that I can find (granola bars, popcorn, yogurt) and leave the healthier, less compact, less filling stuff at home (fruits and vegetables).

A few overall thoughts

• Cheat days work. I’ve had a few PMS induced slip-ups involving chocolate,  but overall, it’s been pretty easy to postpone any junk food cravings until Saturday. I usually know exactly what I want on Saturday, and it usually ends up not being nearly as good as I think it will be. I remind myself of this when I’m craving junk during the week. Exception: pastries and bread are always as good as I think they will be.