Being Healthier

A hard day’s work…

This week was the beginning of my “full-time work”, I started full-time hours with EFNEP and continued with my 20+ hours a week with Bonefish. Overall, it was much less hectic than I felt this past spring semester because I could finally take classes out of that equation! I ended up working close to 69 hours as of yesterday ( Saturday- Saturday) and I have another 5-6 hours tonight! Obviously, I am thrilled for a break this weekend- I will be traveling to Hilton Head Island, SC!

The only negative thing I can say about putting in so many hours is that I wish I had a bit more free time on the weekends for friends and some time to get a rockin’ suntan for the beach! Ah well, I “have my cake and eat it too” all the time so right now I appreciate that I have the jobs I do. I think it makes a tremendous difference in working that much when you LOVE both your jobs!

This was my work day on Tuesday:

9:00 am- Meet with County Extension Agents and devise grocery list for recipe testing
10:00 am- Grocery shop

11:00 am- Prepare recipes to test

- Homemade Tortilla Chips with Black Bean and Corn Salsa

– Super Stir Fry with Tofu and Brown Rice

11:30-1:00 Taste recipes

1:00-2:00pm: Analyze thoughts on recipes and develop plan for next time
Travel to Job #2….
2:30-9:00pm: Welcome new guests, make sure they enjoy their delicious food, laugh with all my coworkers like Sarah and Alexa.
9:00pm-10:00pm: Enjoy complimentary dinner with best friend ( “The Cool and Enjoyable” Sarah) …

I ordered the Chicken Marsala with the vegetable medley and a salad…

Trainees and their Trainer ( me!) get complimentary dinner in order to taste the menu. The image above is from Bonefish Grill’s website and shows the chicken marsala with vegetable medley and potatoes au gratin. Unfortunately as I stated, we ate outside at 9:00pm so the image did not turn out clear enough to use for the blog!

Wednesday was pretty awesome as well! I started out with a bowl of Puffins, Fresh Blueberries, Crushed Pecans and Almond Milk

At work, I met with Emily ( co-worker and former classmate) to develop the training agenda for the Nutrition Program Assistants. We arranged the days on which we will be teaching Food Safety, Nutrition Basics, MyPyramid, Food Preparation (aka “lunch” ), etc. We had to take a break from meeting for a celebratory office lunch… There are several May birthdays, which means we were off to Second City Grill with most of the office!

The closest image is the Honey Mustard Chicken Salad ( my boss’s lunch), followed by a chicken philly cheese-steak sub, and other lunches included the BLT, Hot Dog, and plenty of sweet potato fries to go around! I ordered the Greek Salad with Chicken and a side of sweet potato fries-

Yes, I was made fun of because everyone warned me about the size of the salads…

Needless to say, I happily shared the fries and took half of the salad home for leftovers/lunch so it worked out just fine!

This week was just such a blast because I am finally able to use my degree for the work that I am doing! I worked on data entry for health assessments, my research proposal for the work that I am doing, discussed new projects, came up with grocery lists for the training that I will be doing with Emily, and developed new recipes for a cookbook/new program.

Even though I had a great week, I was excited for Friday and the weekend! On Friday, I had a quick breakfast of freshly sliced mango, blueberry yogurt, half of a Jonagold apple, and a half pb&j sandwich…

I love having halves of this, halves of that… I think I satisfied all of my taste buds – sweet and juicy mango, crispy crunch apple, smooth and creamy yogurt, and the sticky salty peanut butter.

I had grabbed dinner on Thursday night from “Noodles” with a friend, we both ordered the Pad Thai.

Here is that night:

Since it was a huge bowl filled with flavor from the Pad Thai sauce and scrambled egg bits,  I had saved half for lunch on Friday:

I added in chicken, frozen spinach, zuchinni, okra, onions and tomatoes and had a pear as well.

Friday night I had the chance to visit with friends after work. They had a fun party with samples from a company that makes sauces, dips, and breads etc. Here are the samples:

Top left was the chipotle dip, herb dip, then to the right was red pepper jam,  raspberry jam, and nearly devoured Key Lime Cheese ball ( so delicious!). Behind my glass of a french wine (Lillet) was a blueberry bread (phenomenal). The bottom row of samples were a few BBQ sauces that I didn’t feel like tasting, a black bean and corn salsa, and a garlic dip that was filled with GARLIC! I munched away on all of these samples for my “dinner”. I have finally given up on planning a formal dinner when I get out of work at 10 pm or later… I just cannot see the need to eat a full meal when I am not hungry enough for it and winding down.

Of course I will not finish a post without updating Body, Mind and Soul because that is what this blog is all about- balancing everything in your life (or mine rather)!

Body:

Monday: Went hiking for almost two hours with a friend…. I think we went between 4-5 miles.

Tuesday: Rest!

Wednesday: 9.5 mile Run at the Lake. Yes, 9.5 miles. I wore my knee brace and felt fantastic the entire time!

Here are some lake shots:

This one reminds me of the scene from Dirty Dancing, where Jennifer Grey’s character is talking with her Dad … Anyone remember that scene?

My stats for the run…

1 hr 25 minutes, my heart rate was 189 when I finished and total of 857 kcal burned.

Mind:

Work is going fantastic and if all goes well with a grant proposal, I have even more exciting opportunities ahead!

Soul:

I know where I want to go and am heading straight for it…

But I have to keep in mind that being flexible and taking a different path can be just as wonderful.

I think one key to success is to be ready for your opportunity when it comes. I am ready.

Are you ready for opportunities that come your way ? Do you know where you are going or where you want to go?