Back To Reality

Good Monday morning to you! I hope everyone enjoyed a long holiday weekend with family and friends. I sure did. And actually my weekend isn’t over yet because I don’t go back to work until tomorrow. Woohoo!! However it is time to get back to reality as far as my palate is concerned. Christmas brings good food and sweet treats, but my body has had enough. Don’t you just feel so much better when you’re eating clean? I do. I even run better. My schedule has been out of whack lately too. Let me tell you, for someone who prides herself in being organized, and always feeling the need to make to-do lists, I sure have been mastering the art of nothing. Yesterday I spent an hour in the morning writing emails to friends abroad. Then I went for a 10 mile run (the most productive thing I did all day, and lets face it, I needed that to recover from my food coma), followed by several hours of surfing the net. My intentions for being online were to start a new Elite Nutrition blog.. something around the topic of water versus sports drinks. As it turns out, I’m easily distracted. That’s right, possibly even A.D.D. So productive time quickly lead to reading food blogs. That is until my friend arrived to take me out to a movie. We saw the new Sherlock Holmes. It was really good. I liked it. Not the usual romantic comedy that I gravitate towards, but really good. Might I say Robert Downey Jr. makes a dashing detective? Oops, there I go again being easily distracted.

Here are a couple photos from yesterday’s run.. taken from my new Blackberry! I was impressed with the quality. Never would have expected descent pictures from a camera phone. I ran through the Seattle neighborhood Ballard and out to Golden Gardens, which is a pretty beachfront park. There were tons of sailboats out today, lots of families, kids running around. It was really a nice day. Fisherman’s Terminal looks like a fishing boat graveyard to me. It separates Magnolia from Ballard and is just full of big boats, but again this IS Seattle and I’m thankful for the abundance of fresh seafood here.

Golden Gardens

I started reading French Women Don’t Get Fat. Such an entertaining book, and full of excellent lifestyle guidelines. I say guidelines because the author, Mireille Guiliano,  emphasizes a non-diet approach to weight management. This is an approach I adopted in my own life several years ago, and I can honestly say that I would never go back to dieting. Food is one of life’s most enjoyable treasures. Everything from the experience of sharing good food with friends, to the pleasures of indulging in a way that excites your senses. Food is not the enemy. It just takes relearning how to enjoy all things in moderation. I used to deprive myself of so many good foods for fear of the unknown. Would it make me fat? I gave up my love for cooking and ate only bland foods because I thought that’s what it took to maintain/lose weight. Since reading Intuitive Eating I’ve relearned how to enjoy food without feeling guilty. I love to cook again. So with that, I’m enjoying French Women Don’t Get Fat, and you’ll hear more about it later. Also, its full of recipes, which I wasn’t expecting. Saturday night I made the Chicken au Champaign, mainly because I had left over Champaign from Christmas mimosas! It was very moist. I’ll have to find the recipe if anyone asks, but it’s basically chicken with shalots, thyme, salt, pepper and Champaign baked for 40 minutes.

Well I think it’s about time I get my cardio started! I hope you have a great day..

Questions:

What is your approach to healthy eating and lifestyle? Are you a dieter, non-dieter, or neither?
Is there a food that you eat every single day and never tire of?