A "Fueling" Giveaway!

The comments are not working on this post for some reason - I re-posted on Friday, Dec 9. Please go to that post to enter.  So sorry for the tech glitch.

Welcome to Part 2 of the My Favorite Things Giveaway!  (Congrats to Lani for winning the DrinkClick prize pack yesterday!) This week, as a way of saying "Thank You" to all of you for your support as I trained to run my first marathon this year, I'm giving you a chance to win some of my favorite race-day & training fuel!

Here's what you will win if your name is chosen by my awesome random name picker:

• A tube of Fruit Punch Nuun electrolyte drink tabs.  One tab will fill 2 - 8 oz bottles and tastes so much better than plain water. Each tube makes 12 - 16 oz drinks!
• 2 packets of Jelly Belly Extreme Sport Beans - Watermelon and Cherry flavors (with caffeine cuz that extra kick ROCKS) I eat a couple of these every 2 miles or so.  Like a yummy treat.
• 2 packets of Gu (Tri-Berry and Espresso Love) My fueling strategy is a Gu every 5 miles, taken over the course of 1/2-3/4 of a mile, also while sipping fluids.  These two flavors are my absolute favorites.  

All 3 of these products helped get me to the Grand Rapids Marathon finish line on October 16th and I hope you love them as much as I do.

Here's how you enter:

1. Mandatory Entry: leave me a comment telling me how you fuel for exercise.
2. Follow my blog (either through RSS or email) and leave me a comment letting me know.
3. Follow me on twitter and leave a comment.
4. Tweet about this giveaway and (you guessed it) leave a comment.
5. "like" Live Laugh Run Breathe on Facebook and leave a comment.

This contest will run until 8pm on Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2011 when I'll pick a winner using ClassTools Fruit Machine (if you are a teacher, this is an AWESOME tool for random name generation in the classroom). I'll announce the winner on Wed, Dec. 14th.

Good luck!

A Click-Tastic Winner!

Thank you to everyone who entered my contest this past week for an amazing prize-pack provided by CLICK Espresso Protein Drink!  Last night I spun the spinner and a winner was revealed!

Congratulations to Lani - AKA @armytbonegirl on Twitter for winning this great gift from CLICK! 

If you "liked" DrinkClick on Facebook, I'll be shooting you an email to get your mailing address. 

Thanks again everyone for playing along!  Stay tuned tomorrow for another giveaway of "My Favorite Things"!

True Confessions: Have I Blown It?

This is a hard confession for me to write.  I feel like all my hard work getting to a healthy weight has gone completely out the window.  I haven't posted a weight here in many many months (the last I could see was mid-July and I was well within my weight range of 135-138).  Not anymore.  Today I weighed in and saw 145 on the scale.  That's the heaviest I've been in 2011, a good 10 pounds above my lowest weight, and probably the heaviest since Aug 2010 when I finally got below 140 (a number I said I'd never see again and here I am 5 pounds above that).

I did a great job maintaining my weight loss for the better part of a year.  WTF happened?  I'll tell you what happened.  I trained for and ran a marathon.  Then...I've continued eating for the past 6 weeks like I was STILL training for a marathon.  I've eaten crap (hello - yesterday alone I had 2 donuts, went to McD's for lunch, and had an uber-high-calorie Starbucks - my guess? over 4000 calories yesterday).  I've been boozing with my friends a lot lately (dude - beer has a ton of calories, just so you know).  But you know what?  Unless you're running 25-30 miles a week, that really isn't a good idea.  Hell, it isn't a good idea PERIOD to eat and drink like that.

This shit has to stop.  NOW.  I am so pissed and disgusted with myself.  I not only feel fat, I look fat.  I can see the 10 pounds I've gained.  I changed shirts today so I am now wearing one that covers my stomach more.  (The weird thing? I went out dancing with a girlfriend 2 weekends ago in a short skirt and boots and the shirt I changed out of this morning.  I felt great about how I looked, even though I probably didn't look any smaller than I do today- this I cannot explain.)  In any case, overall, my clothes are tight (guess I shouldn't have gotten rid of all those fat pants, huh?).  10 pounds on a sub 5'3" body is A LOT of weight.

This morning, I started tracking again.  I re-downloaded the Livestrong Daily Plate app that I used before.  I measured the creamer in my Drink Click this morning (speaking of - today is the last day to enter my giveaway - I'm picking a winner at 8:00 tonight).

My plan:

• continue to track calories in/calories out at least through the end of the year
• no more eating after 8:00 pm
• at least one strength training session a week, preferably I should be getting in 2-3 sessions, but I'm trying to be realistic
• at least 64 oz of water every day
• Cut out the booze

Back to basics I go.  I just know how hard it was for me to lose these 10 pounds before, so I'm angry at myself to have to do it all over again.  All I know is this trend cannot continue.

Menu Monday: Dad's Goulash

This here is going to be an interesting recipe post.  There will be very few actual measurements.  This recipe is a throw-it-together and taste-along-the-way sorta recipe.  Every time I make it, it turns out slightly different, but is always good.  It makes a ton, so invite friends over or plan on eating leftovers (they heat up very well).  So, without further ado, I give you:

Dad's Goulash

Ingredients:

1 pound ground chuck

one onion, cut in large chunks

one green pepper, cut in large chunks

2 large cans stewed tomatoes

8 oz sliced mushrooms

brown sugar

ketchup

Worcestershire sauce

1 can kidney beans, drained and rinsed

1 1/2 cups dried macaroni noodles

Step 1: assemble your ingredients

Step 2: saute hamburger, onions and green peppers until onion is translucent.  You probably won't need to drain the meat, but if you used higher fat beef and there is fat in the pan, drain it.

Step 3:  Add the rest of the ingredients except the noodles.  Squirt in enough ketchup (1/2 cup or so) and Worcestershire sauce (1/4 cup?) to add some more liquid.  Add brown sugar to taste (a TBSP to start?), depending on how sweet you want it.  Stir and then add the noodles.  Add more ketchup and sauce if it needs it.

Step 4: reduce heat a little and simmer until the noodles are cooked and the liquid is absorbed.  While it's cooking, taste it.  Add more Worcestershire or brown sugar if it needs it. 

Serve with some crusty bread and a salad, or just by itself. 

This is definitely one of our favorite skillet meals.  Do you have a favorite one-dish meal?  

PS: Tomorrow is the last day to enter my Clicktastic giveaway!





LLRB 365: 2011 week 47

Heading into the home stretch - week 47 brought us to December! 

Monday

11-28-11

A gift from one of my students.

Tuesday

11-29-11

Bundled up for a run. Winter is officially here in West Michigan.

Wednesday

11-30-11

Picked up my new shoes!

Thursday

12-1-11

Yeah for earning free Starbucks!

Friday

12-2-11

Went out with friends to see Mega 80s. So fun - we even danced on stage.

Saturday

12-3-11

Started decorating for Christmas.

Sunday

12-4-11

The tree is up!

I hope you are staying sane as we head into the holiday season.

Have you entered my Click Espresso Protein giveaway yet? Only a couple more days to enter! Click here To Enter!

Fitness Friday: Race Memories

I've run a few races over the past 5 years or so.


This is how I remember them (well, this & that tab that says "race results" up there ^). Pictures, race bibs, swag, and lately medals. You'll notice only one is actually hung - I might need to fix that this weekend.

What do you do to remember your races?

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Thankful Thursday: New Shoes

There's nothing quite like the first run in a new pair of shoes.  What's even better is finding your favorite running shoes for 20% off at your local running store.  Bonus!

Let's hope tonight's run feels as good as the shoes look.

ps - how in the heck did it get to be December????

pss - go enter my awesome CLICK Espresso Protein Drink giveaway