Winesday Wednesday 4/17

Posted on April 17, 2013 by Jen @nutcaseinpoint

Happy Winesday Wednesday, everyone! I only got a few submissions for this week, so it’s gonna be a short post. Just a reminder, it’s called Winesday Wednesday, but that doesn’t limit you to just submitting wine pics. You can choose other alcoholic or non-alcoholic beverages as well. I want this to be a fun weekly post so we can show off what we’re each drinking, and perhaps inspire others to try it too!

Let’s see what was on tap this week!

Ashley sent in a pic of La Crema, saying: My mom had this for me at my birthday celebration at home. Went great with the home cooked swordfish I requested! Oooh, lucky birthday lady! I love La Crema!

Monique @burpeestobubbly (Twitter) tweeted that she was “kicking off the #birthday weekend with J. Lohr Wines. Love love love their wines!”

..wow, these birthday gals chose some great vino for their birthdays!!!

Athena @fitnessandfeta (twitter) said the following pic was “my favorite bevvy from this weekend (and there were many bevvies!)” Love me some beer, girl!

Keith sent this pic in, saying “A nice fruity wine, lots of bold flavour, mixes well with lots of food. This was bottled sept 2012, so it’s still maturing. I suspect in another 6 months it will be very rich, and might well become one of my favorites.” Ummm, yumm-o!!

My mama texted me this pic of her and her friend Marg sewing in the basement. No, it’s not a sweat shop. They’re retired ladies who get together and ‘sew’ on Wednesday nights. I put the word sew in italics because I’m pretty sure that no longer happens once the wine is opened. Actually, I know that doesn’t happen once the wine is opened.

And I leave myself for last because it’s the courteous thing to do. I enjoyed a bit of prosecco from Costco and mixed it with some of my favorite kombucha. Sounds weird, I know, but don’t knock it till you try it. Mmmmmm

Thank you to everyone who took the time to send me their goods this week! Please please please join in for next week!

Monday Moves #2

Posted on April 16, 2013 by Jen @nutcaseinpoint

Hey everyone. This week’s Monday Moves post is a day late because I got caught up in everything that was happening in Boston. But we’re still gonna call it Monday Moves.

Onto some moves for this week. Keep in mind the pictures are terrible, but they are just to give you an idea of how the exercise is performed.

1. Wall Sit with Shoulder Rotation and Overhead Press

-Aside from the fact that I obviously need to sweep my dog’s hair before taking pictures, this move works your lower and upper body. Pressing the length of your back against the wall (be mindful to not let your lower back ‘roll’ forward) and dropping your hips to knee height (get that 90 degree angle), hold the weights as pictured (keep elbows stationed at shoulder height).

-Rotate the weights, keeping your shoulders and elbows put. Engage your core so that your back remains pressed against the wall while performing this part of the exercise.

-Press the weights over your head. That is the entire move. To return to starting position, reverse the order of the pictures as shown. (Aka: drop the elbows, rotate the shoulders, and lower the weights).

2. Bridge and Chest Press

-Start laying on the ground, feet planted. To engage your inner thighs, place either a bender ball or extremely light weight in between your knees. Cheese relatively heavy weights to hold- elbows lined with the chest.

-Engage your core and press with your heels to raise your hips into bridge position. Be mindful of the weight/ball between your knees. At the same time, press the weights overhead.

-In a slow, controlled movement, drop your elbows down to starting position and simultaneously round the spine to lower your butt to the floor. Repeat. Repeat lots of times if you want a great butt.

3. Single Leg Deadlift with Overhead Press

-Ok, stick with me on this one, there are a lot of moves involved. But I promise, it is SO worth it. This is probably my favorite exercise. It requires balance and lots of coordination. Something I don’t generally have ~~(on a Friday or Saturday night. Bahahaha, good joke Jen!)~~

-Start with your feet together, holding heavier weights at your sides. Keeping one foot planted, gradually kick one leg back- leg extended and foot flexed. At the same time, lower the weights to almost touch the ground by your planted foot.

-Then, bring the leg back to starting position (but DO NOT touch your foot to the floor. In a fluid and immediate motion, rotate the weight and begin a bicep curl while also lifting the ‘moving’ leg so that the knee is at hip height.

-Last part, extend the foot and transition the weights from the top of the bicep curl into an overhead press. To do more than one rep of this move, slowly reverse the order of steps. (Aka: Lower from the overhead press and bend the knee; reverse the curl; lower the leg.

4. Plank High Fives

-Yes, you will high five your wall. Or you can position yourself to high five your baby or your pet or perhaps someone’s butt (if they’re like sitting in a chair or something. But I recommend you telling them you’re about to TAP THAT ASS.)

-Before assuming the position, face the wall (or object you’ll tap) and extend your arm out to find the appropriate length. Place yourself at the correct distance and get into a straight-arm plank with your palms directly under your shoulders. NO BUTTS IN THE AIR, Y’ALL.

-Keeping your core engaged, alternate arms to give high fives. Just try not to rotate your hips as your reach.

***

There ya have it, folks. Some potentially new-to-you moves to add to future workouts. See ya tomorrow for WINESDAY WEDNESDAY!

Question: Done any of these moves before? Love em/hate em?

Exercise and Eats: Week of 4/15

Posted on April 15, 2013 by Jen @nutcaseinpoint

I don’t feel clever enough to write a little blurb before jumping right into the exercises and eats for this week. So there.

Last week’s workouts turned out as follows:

Sun, 4/7: No Weight Workout (2x through) DONE

Mon, 4/8: Strength Workout A from Best Body Bootcamp, 20 minute spin, 10 min run DONE

Tues, 4/9: ~~40 min run, 5 min row, ab tabatas~~ 60 minute run DONE

Wed, 4/10: Strength Workout B, ~~35 min treadmill intervals~~ 10 min row, 10 min spin DONE

Thurs, 4/11: 40 min ~~spin~~ run DONE

Fri, 4/12: Strength Workout C, ~~20 minute run~~, 10 min row, 10 min spin DONE

Sat, 4/13: ~~Hike or home workout TBA~~ OFF

Now for this week:

Sun, 4/14: At home workout (CBC kix and some TRX strength)

Mon, 4/15: Best Body Bootcamp Strength Workout A, 30 min run, 10 min spin

Tues, 4/16: 60 min run

Wed, 4/17: BBB Strength Workout B, 30 min spin, 10 min row

Thurs, 4/18: 40 min run, 10 min row, abs

Fri, 4/19: BBB Strength Workout C, 20 min spin, 20 min run

EATS

These are last week’s meals:

Monday: Southwestern Quinoa Bowls

Tuesday: All beef hot dogs

Wednesday: Loaded potatoes (regular tater for him, sweet tater for me)

Thursday: Penne Rosa (sans the shrimp) Recipe from thedancingrunner

Friday: Paninis (not sure what he wants, but I plan on having turkey, cheddar and granny smith apple on cinnamon raisin bread)

On tap for this week:

Monday: Teriyaki Bowls
Tuesday: Spaghetti Squash and Meatballs
Wednesday: Quesdillas
Thursday: Buffalo Turkey Burgers
Friday: Homemade Pizza

**Don’t forget to check back in later for this week’s Monday Moves Post!

*******Also don’t forget to submit your Winesday Wednesday pics/write-ups/what have yous. Stuff can be submitted by:

Tweeting. Don’t forget to use the hashtag #winesdaywednesday and include me (@nutcaseinpoint).
Sharing on my facebook page (Nutcaseinpoint)
Posting on Instagram. Again, using the hashtag #winesdaywednesday and including me @nutcaseinpoint.
Email me at jtougas77(at)gmail(dot)com.

Missed out on last week’s post?? (the first installment!!!) Check it out here 🙂

Stuff on the Internets

Posted on April 11, 2013 by Jen @nutcaseinpoint

*Just add to add this little story before publishing. Last night, a friend on twitter mentioned that she had just ordered pizza online for the first time. It immediately made me think of a story which I promised to include in this post, as it’s longer than the 140 character twitter limit.

SO. A few years ago, my ex and I were at my parents house in NY. They were in Florida for a few months, and their house was the halfway point between where he and I were living at the time. The first night we were together at the house, we decided to have a few drinks and hang out at the house. Fast forward to around 1AM and we were pretty drunk and STARVING. Since my parents were gone for quite some time, there was no food in the house. We decided to register and order a pizza online since it was pretty much the only available option.

We set up a profile for Domino’s pizza, entered my parents address, picked our poison, and prepaid. About 10 minutes later, the pizza arrived at our door. Genius idea, Dominos. Genius.

Ok, now fast forward about a year- year and a half. I was back at my apartment in Boston. I was out drinking with a friend and we decided to share a cab home. He ended up coming to my apartment for a food break (we tried to get the cabbie to stop for Chinese on the way home because we were STARVING. Cabbie wasn’t too keen on the idea). So we get into my apartment and start scavenging the kitchen for food. Pretty much the only thing that was remotely meal-like were a bunch of frozen dinners. Meh.

I had the brilliant idea of using the online pizza service. My friend got really enthused, and we quickly forgot about Chinese food. We logged in, picked our pizzas, paid, and waited.

And waited.

About an hour after the order was submitted (roughly 2AM), I get a call from my mom. There was a guy on their front porch (IN NEW YORK) with our pizzas. 200 miles away.

I couldn’t stop laughing.

My dad was PISSED.

I hadn’t changed the account information for my ‘pizza profile’ in over a year, so they still had my parents home address in the system!!!

AHAHAHA.

End of the story: My friend and I had those frozen dinners. And my parents had pizza the next night.

**********

Now, onto regularly scheduled posting:

Yet more things I have found on the internet to share. Perhaps they will inspire you. Perhaps it’s just some additional reading. Here we go:

FOOD

1. Cheesy Spinach ‘n Chobani Enchilada Bake. I am totally making this in the near future. Only, it won’t be with Chobani because they don’t sell the stuff here. Oikos to the rescue!

2. Creamy Almond Butter Fudge. Ummm, say whaaaaaaa? I am drooling. Need to jump on this one stat.

3. Wait, wait, wait. Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Overload Bars?! Yeah, I need to make those too. Even though I am pretty proud of my streak of not eating chocolate. Wonder how long that will last..

4. Perfectly Easy Pancakes. I’m actually already pretty familiar with this recipe. It just reminded me that I really need an immersion blender.

5. I once tried beef in the crock pot and royally failed. However, since this recipe uses beer WITH beef in the crock pot, I think I might try again.

6. Another enchilada recipe to add to the long list of other waiting to be made. I seriously need to start making them. I’m afraid I’ll love them way too much though. This just reminded me of the first and FAVORITE Mexican Restaurant my parents and I would go to when I was little: El Conejo in Irvina, CA. I just googled it and saw that it closed a few years ago. Sad.

7. Now this is a genius idea. I think I need to make these for when we go on long walks with the dog. Or really, when I want to sit a veg (because we know the latter of the two is more likely). Trail Mix Peanut Butter Cookies. Oh my Lawd it incorporates the best of almost every world (except the tequila world. but JUST YOU WAIT for what I have to say about THAT later!)

8. At my parents house, my mom would make Hollandaise sauce from scratch. Confession: Tyler and I now make it from a packet. Oof. I recently came across this recipe that makes it appear to be much easier than I remember back home.

(I have about 5029735209375 other recipes flagged on my computer. Ahhhh, to take the time to share them all..)

HEALTH

1. I just flagged this post because it really struck a chord. Finding your happy weight. I still haven’t found mine. There are too many issues that I’ve had with eating and dieting and fitness and body image and negativity for me to have completely weeding through all that to find my happy weight. Tina explains that it’s a feeling rather than a number. Yeah, still trying to get over that too.

2. Oh, and this post, too. I secretly love knowing that there are other people out there having the same struggles as me. (Not happy that we are all struggling, but you know what I mean). It’s about food. My best and worst enemy. Especially when it comes to wearing pants that have a button and a zipper and less than 90% spandex.

3. How to Eat Healthy on a Budget. Guys, it’s possible. I did it in Boston when I was making approx. 4 cents an hour at my previous job.

4. Ahh, I loved this post. Janetha had a comment on one of her previous posts that she addressed. And her response was phenom. The comment was in regards to her projecting a healthy lifestyle, yet still getting sick. She addressed the sick part, then the response evolved into things she does that fall outside of the ‘healthy living’ circle. It’s only normal, right? You have one life so live it. Out of all the healthy living blogs I subscribe to, I identify with her the most. If you don’t already read her blog, you should!

5. Remember Fraggle Rock?! This video montage shows that were actually pretty depressing. (I’m afraid to admit I actually laughed while watching this.)

6. 5 Superfoods to eat in April. Have you been eating any on the list? (If you have, and have a cool recipe, send ’em this-a-way!)

7. Dara Torres says that exercise helps her sleep. I totally agree. I LOVE when I do a late night workout, come home, shower, and fall into bed. Then, it’s lights out for Jen for the WHOLE night. Lately, I’ve been doing my workouts in the afternoon (due to digestion issues) and I’m really bummed I don’t get that workout high right before beddy-by time.

FITNESS

1. Here’s a sweet poster that might address things you didn’t know: 40 Facts About Fitness

2. A challenge for women to go shirtless (not in the skanky way. In the ‘be-secure-about-your-body’ way.) Oh and ladies, while you’re shirtless, you’ll be participating in group fitness classes. Tie ’em down if you knowwhatimean.

3. An article that addresses the best way to change up your workouts. It wasn’t what I thought! (But totally makes sense)

4. Don’t forget to stretch! Athena explains some great upper body stretches.

You Turn: Have anything to share from the internet that stuck out to you this week? Link up in the comment section!

Winesday Wednesday: 4/10

Posted on April 10, 2013 by Jen @nutcaseinpoint

Hey guys and welcome to the first installment of Winesday Wednesday!!!!

I’m so excited about this post and can’t wait to see how future Winesday Wednesday posts turn out! This is a chance for anyone to submit wines (or other drinks!) each week so that I can assemble them in one neat little space. Submissions may include what foods were paired with each drink, how it tastes, where it can be purchased, price point…you name it! Let’s jump right to it!!!

Mary @mkc7946 (Instagram) enjoyed this lovely wine

Keith sent this in:

…He also sent me a pic of an Italian Nebbiolo that he has in the works!

Ja @ja_ontherun (Instagram) had some Choco Noir that she said was a sweet and smooth creamy chocolate drink with an alcohol bite

Monique @burpeestobubbly (twitter) had some post-workout wine (that’s my kinda style!)

Athena from Fitness and Feta sent in an awesome collage and mini write-up of her drinks:

This weekend I stopped by a wine tasting at a local wine and cheese shop called The Spirited Gourmet, and I thought it would be fun to share my three favorites! For a white, I really enjoyed the Durnberg. It smelled delicious, almost like a granny smith apple, but then had more of a subtle grapefruit taste. Very light and refreshing! For red, a dry and crisp Greek wine (obviously) called Boutari. Finally, we also sampled one beer from Dogfish Head, the Positive Contact. This was an ale brewed with apple cider. Right up my alley!

Chelsea from thedancingrunner sent in:

She said: I had it w/ my stuffed peppers Sunday nite…it’s a crisp white wine from Argentina. $15 from Whole Foods!

Sara @Turner_SR (twitter) sent me a pic that made me very jealous (since there is SNOW still here in Calgary) She said: …not actually wine, it’s a very large mug of pina colada in Cuba this past week

MY MAMA sent me this pic on Saturday. She has some white wine with Chicken Masala & Garlic Pasta.

Katie from KatieEnPursuit send in two awesome pics, saying:

Looking to join the Wednesday wine par-tay! Super cool idea. Now that the temps are warmer, it’s often called for to sit outside after a long day & enjoy some crisp white, the Seccola label from Trader Joe’s is $4.99 a bottle, hello bargain!

(So jealous that I can no longer hop over to Trader Joe’s some some super inexpensive, but AWESOME wine! And probably $50 in unintended groceries 😉 )

And to round off the first installment of Winesday Wednesday, here’s what I have to bring to the table:

Thank you so much to everyone who participated this week!! (If you want to tweet, share on facebook, link in your blog, or email all your friends and family this post, please do! That way others can see what you had, what others contributed, and possibly contribute themselves in the future! Here’s the shortlink: http://wp.me/p2fSnj-2oj)

See ya next week for round 2!!