August 13, 2012

1. Cared About What I Wore to Work

I work in a very casual office, the ambient temperature in which is the approximate equivalent to that of a meat locker. I have to bundle up in a hoodie and/or sweater, wear fingerless gloves, and use an electric blanket on my lap (I wish I was kidding). Needless to say, knowing that I'm going to be bundled up like a snowboarder anyway, it's really easy to get sucked into wearing a ponytail, jeans, and a tee-shirt every day. But since I got my super chic haircut this weekend, I decided to try to look cuter than usual. That's right: I put on makeup. I also put together this snappy outfit on Polyvore and tried to recreate it with items in my own closet.

2. Tea at Lunch
I went with the girls to Starbucks on our lunch break. Normally, I get a tall skinny mocha, but even that has about 110 calories, caffeine, and sugar. So, today, I just got a tall passion tea, unsweetened. Delicious and hydrating. And we won't dwell on the two cups of coffee I had back at the office...

3. Spaced Out My Fruit Consumption
I read this article the other day that says you shouldn't eat fruit within a couple hours of eating other foods because it can cause digestion issues. This actually seems like a pretty tedious and unrealistic routine to get into, but I attempted it today. We'll see if I can keep it up.

4. Filled Up on a Healthy Smoothie

We had pizza for dinner. I'm trying to make healthier alterations to our normal routine because I think it's more realistic and easier to maintain. So instead of saying no to pizza, I had one piece and filled up on a smoothie made with a banana, almond milk, and chia seeds beforehand. Oh, and I remained meatless. 

5. Trip to Lowe's for Laundry Room Trim
We went to Lowe's and picked up the top and corner molding we're going to use in the laundry room! Yay!

August 11 and 12, 2012

Weekend Round Up Edition

1. Saturday Morning Yoga

I did some YouTube Yoga in my living room; just a quick little routine that loosened me up and gave me the energy I needed to get all my Saturday stuff done.

2. Got My Hair Cut and Colored

I made a spur of the moment appointment to get my hair cut cause I realized it was looking like a bird's nest. Then, when I got there, my stylist simply asked me if I was happy with my color and, all of the sudden, I'm getting my hair colored! Call it a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants moment. It's darker and redder than my natural hair color, but I kinda love it. And Big Tex was totally wowed and keeps commenting on how much he loves it. Yay!

3. Tried Soy Breakfast Sausage

We love the Sunday morning breakfast here in our house, and I'm always on the lookout for ways to participate in it without compromising my diet, ethical, and lifestyle goals. So today I had fake breakfast sausage with my one buttermilk pancake and green smoothie. My verdict: meh. The brand is MorningStar Farms and I'm so very in love with their Chik Patties, so I thought the fake sausage would be just as good. The taste was fine, but the texture was very weird. I don't have a deep desire to eat breakfast sausage anyway, so it's not like disliking this stuff will send me running back to the mystery pork parts. I'll give it a try again though. 

4. Finished Painting Washer-Dryer Pedestal

As part of our Major Kitchen/Laundry Room overhaul, Big Tex and I are building a washer-dryer pedestal that we can store laundry baskets underneath. Today, I finished painting it! I have a little bit of detail painting to finish up, but that can be done in the garage (where it currently is) or in the laundry room, where it will be very soon!

5. Sunday Style Post to Widgapae

I don't post to Widgapae as often as I'd like to (or to this blog for that matter!). I always feel like I need to have some great progress in a project to report. I didn't want to post the laundry pedestal because I do want to finish the detail painting before I post pics, so I needed something else. I'm starting to get super excited about fall, so I posted a few cute fall outfits that I made on Polyvore. It is actually a post that I had a lot of fun with! Stepping outside my blogging comfort zone turned out to be very positive!

July 28, 2012

1. Woke Up at 7 am - On Saturday!

I love to sleep, sleep, sleep, but getting up early and getting my day started always feels so great - after the initial trauma of waking up. 


2. Had Cantaloupe and a Green Smoothie for Breakfast
And my lemon water, of course ;-)


3. Bought the Last Three Packages of Panels for the Laundry Room!


4. Did All My Laundry
I'm not living in a nudist colony after all


5. Made a Delicious Vegan (Vegan!) Tomato-Basil Soup for Dinner
And didn't eat any meat all day :-)

July 22, 2012

1. Waking Up with Lemon Water

I read this article yesterday that discusses the positive effects of drinking warm water with the juice of half a lemon squeezed into it each morning. Since I'm always looking for ways to make my mornings less tortuous (I hate getting up in the morning), as well as tricks for drinking more water, it resonated with me. I did it this morning and it actually tasted good. A much cleaner feeling than the sweet, creaminess of coffee first thing in the morning. When I was done, I had a big mug of sweet, creamy coffee :-/

2. Healthified Sunday Morning Breakfast

Big Tex (my husband) makes the best blueberry pancakes and I have a total weakness for them (like I do with almost all sweets and baked goods!). So when he told me he was making pancakes this morning, I came thisclose to just throwing in the towel (on my healthy lifestyle journey that I re-start every morning because usually I break it at some point each day ;-)). But, today, I overcame the urge! Since it was Sunday morning and I love our Sunday morning breakfasts together, I decided to compromise. I had one blueberry pancake (whole wheat, thank you very much) with syrup and no butter. I also had a hard-boiled egg, an apricot, and a homemade pumpkin smoothie. Fruits, vegetables (is pumpkin a vegetable?), fiber, whole grains, and protein. YES. 

3. Laundry Room Progress

On my other blog, Widgapae, I've been documenting the Great Kitchen/Laundry Room Makeover of 2012 that is taking place in my house right now. Today, Big Tex and I made some serious progress in the laundry room. We finished installing about half of the paneling on the walls and it's looking great!

4. New Recipes

Today, I made two dishes that I have looooved for a long time, but have never made myself: moussaka and tzatziki. The moussaka recipe came from Rachael Ray, while the tzatziki came from AllRecipes. They came out awesome, and it was a good feeling!


5. I Made This Blog!
I've been thinking about creating this blog for a while now, and decided to just get on it today. Sometimes I get lazy and overwhelmed about trying to eat right, work out, read good books, be nice to everyone, wake up early, drink lots of water, do all my DIY projects...all the stuff that I want to do. So I thought keeping this log might help me make it fun and would give me a daily, tangible goal to associate with my larger, existential goal. You know, perfection :-)


It's a pretty huge goal to try to write on the blog every day, so I may not be able to expound on each of my Five Good Things each day, but I'll at least try to jot off a list!