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1-10 Friday

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Happy Friday!

I have no cohesive post to write, so this random blurb of words is about to happen. Sit down, grab a drink and enjoy.

1. Yesterday I worked out. Hahahah DUH! I always work out. I went to the gym before noon (which hasn’t happened in a long time) and I ran on the treadmill for 40 minutes, then 10 minutes on the row machine. I counted the row machine as a strength workout because it kills the core, arms and legs. I intended on staying on the treadmill for an hour, but my legs were feeling heavy from the lower body workout the night before. 

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I even tried foam rolling for about 30 minutes prior to working out, but it didn’t seem to help that much. Ah well.

2. I can’t believe I am about to type this, but I think I like having brown(er) hair. Perhaps that’s just winter talking. But I am actually getting ahead of myself and thinking that it would go best with my wedding dress. Ew, I’m thinking about that kinda stuff? Yuck. But seriously, I think it will.

3. Last night’s dinner was YUMMO. I made a lightened up version of chicken broccoli alfredo. Real quick, here’s what I did. 

  • Sliced 2 chicken breasts, cooked fully, set aside
  • Oil, garlic and crown of broccoli florets, sauteed and covered to steam until cooked to desire.
  • No Yoke pasta noodles, cooked according to directions.

That’s the easy part, now here’s the sauce.

1. In a saucepan, add 1 tbsp oil and 3 cloves minced garlic.

2. Add 1 cup low fat milk and 1/2 cup vegetable broth.

3. Slowly add 1 tbsp of flour to mixture at a time, stirring constantly to ensure there are no clumps. You should add about 5 tbsp of flour total. (Start using a whisk, damnit!)

4. Add 1/4 tsp salt and 1/4 tsp pepper, 1 tbsp pesto paste, and 1/4 cut grated parmesan cheese.

5. Keep stirring, lower heat.

6. Add chicken, broccoli and noodles. Stir. Eat.

7. I topped mine with sirarcha and loved it.

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4. We are on to phase 2 of our beer making. I’m getting more excited for it.

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5. I was watching Jersey Shore this morning and thought to myself about how sucky it would be if I were at one of those clubs when the cast was there and they referred to me as a grenade. Because honestly, a lot of those ‘grenades’ aren’t ugly, they’re just not guidettes or whatever. 

6. My recent downloads. Very alternative. And I actually listened to it while working out yesterday- and didn’t get bored! I suggest you try it.

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7. This article hits home a bit. Part of the tragedy of moving so much.

8. I think cleaning the kitchen has finally surpassed making the bed as my least favorite household chore. 

9. I have realized that we almost NEVER get mail on Thursdays or Fridays. Super disheartening. That said, feel free to mail me letters, gifts, postcards, etc. 

10. Ok this post is stupid. SO, I am going to stop here, press Publish for some stupid reason, and go work out or something.

Layla’s lucky day

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Well, folks. I did it. I turned in my last exam of grad school yesterday afternoon. I am officially done with school and have my Masters! Woo hoo 🙂

I started yesterday off quite sluggish- I wasn’t really looking forward to tackling some of the final calculus equations

12.7 me

 

But I persevered through it and was done around 3pm- plenty of time to get to the gym and the grocery.liquor store before Tyler got home! I picked up a bottle of bubbly that came with free chocolates (which oddly enough, have yet to be consumed)

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Then I whipped up some grub and we had our champy and dinner in front of…..the football game.

12.7 dinner

 

This morning, Layla was looking a little glum.

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I think she was bummed that I had more free time to bug her while Tyler’s at work. She was soon un-bummed when a package from my parents arrived at the door. My mom had strict instructions that Tyler and I couldn’t open our gifts, but Layla could. Rawr.

12.7 layla christmas

 

She seriously lucked out! A cute christmas toy and a fleece!

I decided to add to her day of excitement by taking her to the dog park. She doesn’t ever play with dogs. No. Even when there are about 3 dozen dogs (which there were today) mine is the one by herself rolling in the snow. Her and I both have social complexes, I guess.

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Alright, time for me to go and get my workout over with. If not now, I might be tempted to go grab more champagne or something. I’m going to milk the celebration for as long as I can.

Random: 

I got $20 from the bottle return today. HELLS YES.

If you haven’t already, I highly urge you to check out PV Body. It’s a monthly subscription program where they send you one athletic top and one bottom. It’s only $49, but if you click ON THIS LINK, and sign up through me, you will get 20% off! What a great Christmas present 😉

 

 

11 things

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Last night, I saw in the bloggy world that I was nominated yet again for a Liebster Award. (insert dusting off shoulder here). I don’t want to go through the WHOLE thing again, since I just recently did. But for the sake of procrastinating work, and talking about myself (love to do that), I decided to answer the 11 questions posted by liv.
1. What are you wearing right now?

  • jammies!

2. What was the craziest thing you’ve ever done?

  • define ‘crazy’ all of my actions are completely rational (hahahahahahah)

3. You can go anywhere in the world right now. Where would you go?

  • home (NY). Ok, ok, that was a sentimental answer. How about Fiji?

4. What is a secret talent you have?

5. What is one piece of technology you can’t live without?

  • my iPhone. NO WAIT. The refrigerator. That’s technology.

6. If you were dying, what would your last meal be?

  • In-N-Out burger, my mom’s wacky cake, and a Pyramid Apricot Ale<—my ALL TIME favorite beer on earth. SOMEONE PLEASE SEND ME SOME?!!!!!!!!!

7. Target or Walmart? Why?

  • TARGET. Because of this:

 

8. Lake or beach? Why?

  • Beach. I was born in one called NEWPORT (maybe you’ve heard of it?) Also, I’d rather risk being swept away and eaten by a shark than swim in a dark dank nature-pool full of grody fish.

9. Do you have any siblings? How many? Are you close to them?

  • No.

10. Write down the last song you listened to?

11. If you had a million dollars, what would you do?

  • Pay off my wedding, the house, buy a car and book a vacation.

Workouts and Christmas Gifts!

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Hey, internets. It’s me, Jen. I’ve been SUPER busy the last few days working on my finals. MY.LAST.FINALS.

EVER!!!!!!!!!

I actually turned one in Tuesday night and already got my unofficial final grade (it’s an A 😉 )I have a little more to complete of my other exam, then DONE!

The only breaks I really took were to workout, make dinner, and watch Ellen. Priorities, people.

My workouts have actually been following this phase from Best Body Bootcamp! I have been feeling pretty great this week- even under all this stress!

Monday: 30 minutes of sprint intervals on the treadmill. I made up my own intervals: 2 min run, 1 min run faster, 1 minute SPRINT. This was done quite a few times through- each time shortening the ‘rest’ intervals in between. Thanks, Pitbull and Will.i.am for getting me through. I waited until I got home from the gym to do the strength portion of the workout: tabata style! Tina had planned Monday’s strength tabatas to be focused on upper body moves. I seriously couldn’t stop flexing all night because I loved how awesome my arms looked! (and it only took 24 minutes. I didn’t get bored. AND I wasn’t even listening to music!)

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Tuesday: 30 minutes of spin. I have been actually really good at motivating myself and pushing myself on the bike lately- since I haven’t liked ANY group ex classes since moving here. On the Keiser bike, I noticed that I was getting in about 12.5 miles per 30 minute session on the bike. I know it’s not about the distance- especially since I love to dial up the resistance once in a while, but Tuesday I decided I wanted to ‘beat’ my average. I kept using the varying resistances, but I really pushed myself and got an extra mile in. SUCCESS! I also did 100 stability ball sit ups at home.

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Wednesday: I knew I didn’t want to get to the gym (I really only go there now to run or spin) because I didn’t want to overdo it on the same type of cardio I had been doing this week. So, before I got in bed last night, I managed to get in strength Workout B from BBB. This one was focused on lower body, and after 24 minutes I was nice and sweaty! Great way to end the day and snuggle in bed.

Today: since my legs feel rested (ok, maybe not completely rested after last night’s workout) I am looking forward to mixing up my cardio at the gym with a combo of sprints, spin and rowing! Then maybe some abs at home.

A while back, I signed up for a blogger Christmas swap that Leigh set up. I was paired with Jolene, whose blog I had not yet come across. We swapped some emails to get an idea of what each other liked, and began reading each others blogs. On Monday, I received my package from Jolene, and I was blown away with all the awesome goodies she included. They were so ‘me’.

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She had individually wrapped everything, so of course I was super giddy. The dog looked at me in horror as I ripped and threw paper around the room, gasping with each item. Not to mention, the paper was SUPER cute. Here’s the loot:

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Along with a cute card came Lindt chocolates, Toffifee, taco scented stickers, a face mask, 2 different perfume samples, lotion, chapstick, ESSIE nail polish, chocolate cake vodka, shampoo/conditioner, BACON SALT, and some treats for Layla!

The Lindt chocolates are already gone (they were PEPPERMINT flavored. Of course I ate them already) and half the box of Toffifee has been eaten (only 2 pieces from me. Tyler loved them too!) I actually never had them until Jolene sent them to me, and now I can officially say they’re on my list of favorites!

12.6 candy

 

Caramel, nougat, chocolate and hazelnut? Pass it on.

A huge thank you to Jolene for the awesome gifts!!!

Ok, back to the books. Hope that helped with your Jen fix. Layla says hi.

12.6 layla

A list of “always”

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This weekend was fa-fa-fa-freezing. Nevertheless, we got a jump on Christmas:

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Our first tree!

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Tyler spent a few hours on the roof (in -12 degree weather) putting up more lights, while I stayed below on the patio making sure he didn’t fall. Or just taking pictures of myself. Before my hands froze.

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And we got some of those obnoxiously large blow up thingys:

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I spent all day yesterday on homework. I’m now in my last week EVER of grad school!

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And I managed to ease the pain of all that work with a nice sweaty workout at the gym:

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I really kicked my own ass- HARD – so that I could get home, bust out some strength stuff, and snuggle up with the pup.

Nothing else majorly exciting- we went to Michael’s to get our gingerbread house kits (because I had TWO 40% off coupons!)- we watched Christmas Vacation (Merry Christmas! Shitter’s Full!) -we ate pizza (pepperoni, green pepper, black olive and mushrooms)- the end.

Oh, and me being the proactive person that I am, I decided to go online and renew my Canadian Visitor Visa to extend my valid time here before my Permanent Resident Application is approved. Well, I shouldn’t have done that. I ended up having to call to speak with a rep, then decipher new security crap, then fill out an application [AGAIN], then realize I need Tyler to help me with writing, supplying and scanning additional information for submission. ACK. How did I survive April-June of this year when I was doing this almost every day?! So now I’m pissed.

At least I have a bottle of bubbly that I’m planning on opening as soon as I submit both finals this week! 😉

So here’s something random: I was in the shower last night (that’s not the random part) and I was thinking about all the things that I always do. Like, the order of operations when I take a shower. I decided to compile a list of my “Always” things. Here goes:

I always eat Multi-Grain Cheerios for breakfast.

I always bite my nails when I get stressed.

I always have to sleep with the covers over my head.

I always wipe down gym equipment after I use them (hint hint).

I always accidentally put the first TWO letters on my last name in caps when I’m typing.

I always check Instagram (hey, follow me on there!)

I always blame my dog on my burps.

I always justify chocolate.

I always watch You’ve Got Mail when it’s on.

I always wear my retainers

I always look over my shoulder when changing lanes- even if I use my mirrors.

I always see if I can hold my breath through the entire intro song of Golden Girls (long version)

I always drink my coffee black.

I always check sales racks first.

I always put my socks on inside out (not on purpose)

What do you always do?!