Fondue Fun

My apologies for the very late post... yesterday was go-go-go and then I had friends over all night (and into the morning!) so I had no time to post!

The day was so frenzied, I actually forgot to take some photos! I totally forgot to snap a picture of my morning smoothie as I was slurping it down while getting ready. I made another tropical version- 1 cup tropical frozen fruit, 1 cup nonfat soy milk, a banana and a scoop of chocolate designer whey protein.

I went to the gym in the morning, 35 minutes on the elliptical and my usual 35 minutes of arm work. The workout was a great de-stresser, which I totally needed because as soon as I showered and got to school I had my first Sports Nutrition Exam!!
I think I did well =)

I did manage to snap a pic of the food I packed for the day!

A cheese stick, which I ate to hold me through my exam, and leftover beef stroganoff & carrots for lunch.
I spent the afternoon running around... first to the URI sailing center because someone forgot to lock his car for the weekend (I wonder who that would be...), then to Belmont for half my groceries, to work to (try) and pick up my check but it wasn't there, so I headed to Marshalls to pick up some dinnerware for the evening... had a mild panic attack when I returned to work and my check still wasn't there... and then much to my happy surprise as I was sitting in my car I saw the Fed-ex truck pull up (check guy!!), got my check, went to the bank and grabbed groceries. Phew.
I was hungry during my outing (of course, I was out and about for 3 hours!!)... I grabbed a date I had in my bag, and a Kashi Crunchy Chocolate Pretzel bar... which was definitely a theme for the night... but more on that later ;)

After groceries, I headed home to unpack, do some dishes, some kitchen organizing and re-arranging, cleaned my room, and then it was time to make dinner! (See why I didn't have time to blog?!?)
For one of my best friends, Carolyn's birthday, I told her I would make her a big dinner! So her and her boyfriend Max came over and I made them a big Italian feast! She came to Italy with me, so I made a couple of recipes from our trip which she was excited about!
I set the table all nice!

We started with some roasted garlic ciabatta bread, which I forgot to photograph but had two slices of! Sooo good!
Then we had the main course- whole wheat spaghetti topped with meatballs and tomato basil sauce (with a sprinkle of fresh parm!) and warm zucchini onion salad.

Not to toot my own horn, but everything was sooo good!
I went back for two more meatballs... yum!

Carolyn, Max, Tyler and I had a lot of fun hanging around and chatting, then we decided dessert was in order! Carolyn had the awesome idea for fondue so we cooked some up and had a blast!!
This was the real deal- heavy cream, butter, dark chocolate, sugar, the works. Definitely a splurge, but oh so worth it!

Dippers included: pretzel sticks, marshmallows, raspberries, dried apricots, pineapple and crystallized ginger.
Here's a sampling of my plate...

but I definitely ate a LOT more than this!

Mmm, chocolatey goodness!!

A few more friends came over after to watch some movies and hang out, but we basically spent all night chatting around the fondue bowl! There was also some snacking on some easter pb m&ms (the holiday kinds are so better than the regular ;)!)


Speaking of indulgences...
I know I've been going a little overboard lately... and it's not that I've thrown all my nutrition sense out of the window, but I'm giving myself a little indulging freedom for a couple of days, because I made a decision this past week...

I'm going back into running training!

This means as soon as it warms up, I plan on running twice a week, shorter runs, and one long run on the weekends- adding more as the season goes along. My first planned race is April 11.

I wasn't sure if I wanted to go into it full force, but after my first run last week that felt great I knew I wanted to run again this year. This year will be different though. I started focusing on speed last training season, and it got way too hard on me... clearly, I ended up getting far too obsessive and I don't want to do that again!
So, I've decided this year I'm focusing on distance. As long as my job permits this summer, I'm going to do fewer 5ks, in favor of a few longer races, hopefully leading up to the 10 mile blessing of the fleet in July and a half marathon in the early fall!!

So that's my big annoucement! I'm very excited!!
Diet-wise, going back into training means a few things:
NO real restrictions, just paying more attention to:
-BALANCE of carbs, proteins and fats at each meal
-More whole foods, less processed junk
-cutting back on added sugars
This week I'll be cutting back overall, then the next week will be full on into it... with a little bit of le-way on spring break, and then right back into training after!

Back to the food =)
This morning I woke up, and much to my dismay, my camera would not turn on. There was some coke-spillage on it last night, so I am PRAYING it's just a dead battery, and not a dead camera... luckily I had the adapter so I could get you guys pictures from last night, but I'll post breakfast pics later because I used my roomie's camera for that!!

I was definitely feeling the excess fat and food last night... didn't feel the greatest this morning. I knew I wanted a light but filling breakfast to hold me through the morning and to my easy gym session. I decided on a cereal/yogurt combo. I tried a sample box of Total Cranberry Crunch that says a serving size is 1 1/4 cups, but there was only 1 cup in the mix, so I had it on top of a 0% chobani cup, with a sliced banana and 1/4 cup nature's path granola for a little something extra!

It was a really nice combo, exactly what I wanted- filling, but not too much!!

Whew, lots to do today so I better get going- my next post will be later on tonight!