So Much Time, So Much To Do

Don't you just love the feeling of having so much time to do all the things you want and need to do over a long weekend? This is definitely the case for me this Easter Long Weekend. Late last night Ashley and I were sitting around home watching hockey and we decided to up and head out to see "Alice In Wonderland" in 3D which let me tell you was an amazing movie definitely a must see in my mind, filled with a star studded cast highlighted by Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter!

After a solid nights sleep I started my day off with a good hard 30 minute workout on the Nintendo Wii Fit Plus this morning. I just love the feeling of starting my weekend days off with a solid workout of some form to get the body loosened up and ready for whatever may come that day.

Following my workout it was time for breakfast omelette's and coffee, withe fruit smoothies.

Our smoothies this morning were made of:
-2 extra ripe banana's
-6 large strawberries
-1/2 cup frozen cranberries
-1/3 cup plain yogurt
-1/3 cup vanilla yogurt
-1 cup fat free milk
-4 large ice cubes




Our omelette's were made of:
-2 eggs per person
-red onion
-red and green peppers
-mushrooms
-Siracha Vietnamese hot sauce

Ta-DA!!! Breakfast was served hot and tasty!

While we ate breakfast and drank coffee this morning we watched "Ordinary People" starring: Donald Sutherland, and Mary Tyler Moore, 1980's Academy Award winner for Best Picture, and Best Director; Robert Redford. I hadn't seen this movie in 10 years since senior year of high school when we read the book in English class, and I watched the movie on the side. this however was the first time Ashley had ever seen this movie.


After the movie I had a little pre-run snack of a carrot muffin, and sat down to write this blog post before Ash and I go out for our Saturday afternoon run.


The rest of my Saturday will likely be spent running, going to the market, going out for an Easter-esq dinner with Ashley and her family, and then Ash and I have tickets to a mystery theatre play tonight courtesy of my mom. It'll be a busy but extremely fun filled day, and after all is that not what long weekends are for? I sure do think so.

Have a Happy and Healthy day lovelies!

-Ben-

Great Good Friday

Happy Good Friday to you all! Hope today has been a good day and hopefully day off for all of you. We started our Good Friday off with a bit of a sleep in, well we slept in till 8am ish which yes is a sleep in for us believe it or not.
For breakfast this morning I made "Banana Oats" and Coffee.


After breakfast we just kinda lounged around and enjoyed our morning, well more specifically I did, Ashley spent much of the morning on the phone dealing with work issues as she is finishing up her 2 weeks of on-call at work.
This afternoon Ashley went with a friend to see "The Last Song" (Miley Cyrus)movie, while I elected to stay home and go for a glorious Friday afternoon walk, in the lovely spring sunshine, followed by a 30 minute "Power nap" and then it was time to shower and start getting the food on for our Good Friday Easter Dinner with my dad, step mom, and aunt.



For dinner Ashley and I made roasted chicken, mashed yams, roasted potatoes, tossed salad (Iceberg lettuce, red cabbage, red radishes, cucumber, tomato, and green onions). Also with the salad I made a homemade Dijon Peanut Butter salad dressing.
This is funny seeing as I'm allergic to Peanuts and all nuts in fact, but we have this huge Costco jar of PB for Ashley and I was just trying to use some up.



Both supper and dessert (I sent Ashley out last minute before company came to pick up some dessert, Thanks Baby), were absolutely amazing.
It was so nice getting some family time tonight for dinner, now we will go have another Easter Dinner with my mom, sister, grandma, and uncle on Easter Sunday, lots of poultry this weekend for us, haha!

Hope you all have an amazing Easter 2010 Weekend!
Stay Happy and Healthy

Nighty Night ;)
-Ben-

Yay Weekend Time!

Breakfast with Ashley at her office marked the start to my Thursday this morning. For my breakfast I had a Denver Omelet sandwich on whole wheat bread, along with 1/3 of Ashley's breakfast omelet and a slice of her whole wheat toast, and half a bottle of Tropical Citrus Vitamin Water. Unfortunately I didn't get pictures of my breakfast.


Once I arrived at work after breakfast I was greeted by a chocolate Easter Bunny waiting for me on my work station, courtesy of Larry and Donna two of my amazing co-workers.
Once my work day got going in full swing my big catering job was a brown paper bagged lunch for 53 people which included a sandwich or wrap, a cookie, a bag of chips, and a side salad. Thankfully I had some help from two co-workers (Donna and Amanda) on the bagging and wrapping of all the items in order to ensure that the order made it out on time.
Lunch today at the restaurant was busier than we were expecting it to be, but still not too bad, and the busier it is the quicker the time goes, and that's always a good thing the last day of work prior to a long weekend.


For Lunch today I had a steak sandwich on a toasted Foccacia bread with a side of Mushroom soup.

After work I came home to an empty house for the afternoon and evening as tonight Ashley was over at her moms house for dinner and a visit, so I took advantage of the emptiness to clean the house and do our laundry. Along with cleaning and laundry I did a bit of looking into my next tattoo, by calling my tattoo shop, and finding out when's the earliest my artist could do my next piece and approx how much money I'm looking at it costing. I'm looking at having to wait approx 2 weeks from today for an appointment which for a good artist really isn't that bad especially considering he's on vacation till the 13th sadly.

For supper tonight by myself I had a bowl of Kimchi Noodle soup topped with Siracha Sauce which is a Vietnamese Hot Sauce.



Once Ashley got home tonight her and I finished watching "Zomieland" with Wood Harrelson which we started last night but weren't able to finish it cause we were too tired. It is such a funny action filled comedy as long as you don't take it seriously.


Now as I am blogging I'm sitting in bed and watching "LA INK" on the TV, I love Tattoo's and Tattoo shows.

Hope you all had a happy and healthy week, and hope you all have a very happy and healthy and hopefully day off Good Friday, and start to your 2010 Easter weekend!

Nighty Night!
-Ben-

I Love Short Weeks!!!

This morning started off a bit rushed but good none the less. I slept in this morning until 35 minutes before I needed to leave for work and had to get all ready for another day of work. After a very quiet drive into work this morning I started my day off at 6:30am and just hit the ground running with breakfast meeting catering orders galore at work.

Fruit Trays were huge this morning. I ended up sending a fruit tray with every single breakfast catering this morning.

Finally midway through the morning about 8:00am I was finally able to eat my breakfast which today ended up being just a carrot muffin and a few slices of pineapple, which hit the spot bang on!


After my breakfast it was time to start on lunch caterings which included lots of desert trays and also making up the dessert trays for tomorrow.


Lunch today at the restaurant was very slow and even somewhat boring, but the highlight of lunch was when Ashley and two other friends of ours stopped by the restaurant and surprised me by staying for lunch, it was a real treat for me to have them stay, cause I got to make all three of there lunch dishes. Ashley and Jordan each had a "Butter Chicken Pizza" which was my special of the week, and Emily had our "Asian Chicken Salad", and they all enjoyed there lunch.
For lunch today I had a side of Cheese-less Greek Salad (I hate Cheese) and a bowl of Mushroom soup.


After work this afternoon I stopped off at Ashley's work and had a "Chocolate Raspberry" coffee and a slice of "Apple Cranberry Loaf" with her and stuck around for about 30 minutes to have a little visit with her before I headed home for the afternoon and evening, and she went back to work, and then off to her soccer game.


This afternoon after commuting home on the bus, I went for a 25 minute walk to finish the journey home, and to also get some cardio in for the day, and just as a way to enjoy the lovely spring day we had here in Calgary despite all the wind.
This evening for dinner I had the remainder of my "Butter Chicken Pizza" from my lunch at work yesterday along with some Brussels Sprouts and a Diet Coke.



The remainder of my evening will probably just be spent with me trying to fix my BlackBerry which got slight water damage last Thursday, and then just relaxing, perhaps a workout, perhaps a DVD, perhaps both perhaps neither. Either way it'll be a good night in Ben-ville!

Hope you all had a great happy and healthy Tuesday March 30/2010, I know I did!

Nighty Night!

-Ben-

Great Food, Great People, Great Weather..... Great Day

So yesterday/Day 1 of my "Going Back To The Basics" went reasonably well. I started yesterday morning off with a 30 minute yoga workout, followed by a hearty and filling breakfast of:

Banana Oats with a huge mug of coffee.
The Oats were made by: (per person)
1/3 cup fat free milk
1/3 cup water brought to a boil with the milk
1/3 cup quick oats (added to the boiling liquid
1/2 large banana
3/4 tsp flax seeds (all above ingredients mixed together until desired consistency is reached
1 tsp brown sugar on top of final oats mixture

After breakfast Ashley had to run off to the dentist so while she was there I took the opportunity to swing by a branch of the "Calgary Public Library", and let me tell you I found so much stuff there.


Notice with the books a large amount of tattoo books? I am getting my next piece done on my lower right arm within the next month or two at least I'm hoping....Yay 2009 Income Tax Return! I figured I would find a few books with designs, and celeb tattoos to entertain me until I get mine done.

After the library and Ashley's dentist appointment we went to Subway sandwich shop for some lunch. Un-fortunately I don't have any pics of my lunch but what I had was a:
-Foot long Chipotle Steak sub all the fixens, on wheat bread and of course no cheese
-2 M&M Chocolate Chip Cookies
-Medium Diet Coke
-Medium Seattle's Best Coffee (it was 100% FREE!!!!!)

After lunch Ashley and I went and spent some time with her mom and went shopping, followed by taking her mom's dog for a 30 minute walk outside in the beautiful +15 degree weather.


Diesel is such a cute dog and so fun to take for walks, but he tires very very very quickly and really likes to think he's a big bad junkyard dog but truly his bark is way worse than his bite and that's if he even has any bite.

After our afternoon of shopping and dog walking we were off to pick up my Mom from my uncles and drive her home luckily both my mom and my uncle live only a short drive from Ashley's moms house. The reason though why we had to pick up my Mom is cause she broke her ankle and sprained her knee and has a cast on her ankle so she is not able to drive until she gets the cast removed, and my step dad is away on business trip, and my sister was working (really we were just asked cause of a serious lack of options).
However out of picking my mom up and driving her around we got a free Angel-Food cake, and 18 Angle-Food cupcakes, which went along with my cup of Kicking Horse "Kick-Ass blend coffee" just perfectly for my afternoon snack-eroo but only one cupcake of course.


Last night Ashley and I and her mom went to "Yuk Yuk's International Stand-up Comedy" with some of her moms friends from work as well as for drinks before. However before any of that took place Ashley and I came home for a quick supper for which I had:

a bowl of "Cream of Mushroom Soup" along with roasted broccoli, and mushrooms.

After Yuk Yuk's on our way home Ashley and I stopped by our neighbourhood "Tim Horton's" for a small Bacon Lettuce and Tomato sandwich. You gotta love those 1am food cravings.


Hope you all had a wonderful Happy and Healthy Saturday filled with Great Food, Great People, and Great Weather!

-Ben-

Going Back To The Basics

Has it really been 20 days since my last blog post? apparently it has... Well lets see in the past 20 days I've definitely had my good days and bad days fitness, food, and healthy living wise, but overall I'd say I've just managed to more or less balance the good and the bad out.
As we are moving into April next week and the first full month of spring I have decided that now is a great time for me to "Get Back To The Basics". Some of the "Basics" I want to get back to are: eating less, and eating smarter more balanced and vegetable and fruit based meals. Another basic I am going to go back to is working out in some physical form everyday when and where possible, and as much as possible doing some form of physical fitness outdoors such as walking, running, or biking. The third basic I want to get back to is cutting back on my un-nutritious drinking such as boozing it up and drinking lots of pop, and or high sugar fruit juices, and get back to primarily water, and fat free milks. Finally the fourth basic I want to get back to is just an all round positive attitude, and outlook on life and cutting back and hopefully cutting out stresses in my day to day life that make me feel compelled to become either lazy, or binge eat.
Now over these past twenty days I am proud to say that I have managed to keep my weight in my target range of 182-188lbs but I also know that with minimal work it is only a matter of time before that number begins to rise again and take me back to the shape I was in when I started this all back in November 2009. Also I feel in my goal to inspire people and help them achieve their fitness, and healthy living goals I need to do a better job with me and my goals.
I look forward to sharing with all of you again on a daily basis or at least to as close to one as possible from here on in.

Have a Happy And Healthy Saturday everybody!

-Ben-

Weekend Of Firsts!!!!

Firsts are always memorable experiences. This weekend Ashley and I had a weekend filled with firsts, which are all gonna go down as memorable experiences.

Our first first came yesterday at breakfast, we went to a dutch restaurant called "Pfanntastic Pannenkoek Haus" this was a first time visit for both of us but absolutely not a last time visit.

We each had a starter cup of their homemade cream of mushroom soup.

For my main breakfast item I had an apple and cinnamon pannenkoek with a side of cream cheese icing and a glass of chocolate milk.

Next on our list of firsts was our river walk with Ashley's mom. This was our first river walk with her mom after weeks of trying to but it just not working out before.


When it's plus 9 outside how could you not get outside and love going for a stroll?

Last night we added to the list of firsts by going skating outside at Olympic Plaza here in Calgary, which was a first for Ashley.



What a romantic night it was......

After skating we went to visit our friend Jordan working at the golf dome to hit golf balls at their driving range. Going to a golf dome was a first time experience for Ashley, and I got to experience a first too by getting to drive the range golf ball picker upper cart, it was soooooo fun. (sorry no picture from this though)

Then finally this morning we went for Sunday morning brunch with Ashley's family. The first in this experience was my first time going for a 100% vegetarian brunch buffet. I loved the selection of fruits, and veggie options.

I hope you all take time this week to experience some firsts in your life!

-Ben-