Better

Ok so I weasled my way out of my bike workout. I was tired and hungry... I know lame excuse which means I'm doubling up tomorrow.
Anyways since yesterday was really good unhealthy dinner today we have a really good healty dinner.
I made some flank steak that I marinated with lemon juice, olive oil, a splash of balsamic vinegar, herbs from the garden (sage, thyme, oregano and rosemary) half a shallot and two garlic clove.
B bbqed the meat. With it we had some asparagus and some red quinoa.
Before that I made a salad with cherry tomatoes, black olives and mozarella!

I am far from being stuffed actually a bit hungry still but ready to go to bed...

Oops

OK so B went out tonight and usually eat good when I'm alone. Well I ate good but not good good.
It was delicious but really not that healthy and now I'm feeling stuffed and blah for the third night in a row... Not pleasant.

So I feasted on bacon/onion/blue cheese pasta... yes I dared and I will be mad if I'm 1lb heavier tomorrow duh! For dessert, I seared some fresh apricot in a bit of butter ( a real small bit), with a bit of maple syrup sprinkled some almond meal and served with a scoop of vanilla icecream.

Again I will be mad tomorrow when i realized that well tonights dinner added a pound to my weight!

So good night I need to digest ;)

quick update

My vacation is quickly approaching but yet a few things have to happen before I can even begin to get ready. First of all big deadline at work, it is in good shape and I'm hoping to finish two days before the deadlines but still. Second of all big triathlon well for me, my first close to Olympic distance is upon me. Thank god for my coach I'm in a much better state of mind than for my first race of the season. Lets face it there is not much more I could have done so well what will happen will happen.

Since I have a big deadline at work well my beloved son who didn't get sick once all school year was sick on his first day of summer! I felt bad for him because that day he was supposed to stay a friend of his. He was so excited about it. Instead he spent 1 hour on their couch sleeping before I picked him up :( Strep throat. But as a kid he got his antibiotic and was good the next day yay!

My legs are trashed! Went for my run on Saturday, then did my whole bike ride on Sunday but completely died after 10min of my BRICK on the run. I walked home.... I finally brought my bike to the store and I am ashamed to say that most of my derailleur issue were caused by all the dried up sugar from my energy drink spilling and me not cleaning yuck! But also a couple of loose screw. It now rides super smooth.

I also learned that it isn't normal to be trapped in your clips and that un-clipping should cause bruising! 180$ later I had new pedals and clips. I have to say that it is nice to be able to un-clip easily.

Taper week is here and I get to run with Bunny tomorrow, Nevertap weaseled her way out of our run once more but for weights so I'll forgive her.

On the house front, well not much. I did fold a couple of laundry load then everything went south again. I can't find the perfect laundry solution. So I have to think about it. It has to be easily reachable for the clothe to make it in there. It has to have two compartments one for the white and one for the dark it has to be pretty and not take too much space.

I did make the mat for the picture of B's mom and I put it in the frame. It now hangs above our console table completely off centered but ah well.

The books are still in the dining room along with the kids toys. Maybe we will tackle that next Saturday. It should be a nice distraction from the upcoming race. Yikes, I will wake up before 5 twice in 4 days! Not right not right.

It will be my longest event to date. I'm expecting a finish time anywhere between 2:20 for bestest case scenario and 2:45.... 2:30 being more likely

Here I can't have a picture-less post. On Saturday we went shopping for more workout clothes. I bought two sport bra bringing the total number of sport bra I own to 4! I now am the proud

owner of 4 full running outfit, and a couple extra long sleeve running shirt!

Here are a picture of my latest acquisition

The picture doesn't do it justice as it looks more like olive green than the bright color it is. I'm more of a black/gray/navy girl. I love touches of color for accessories or tops. But for some reason this pair of short just called my name. I wish my running shoes matched the outfit

Good night!

ups and downs

These past two weeks have been all ups and downs! Work is doing great. I'm plowing through my workload which is quite heavy and with very tight deadlines for a change. I'm being super productive and it is nice.
Training is doing well although I'm getting a bit tired. I shorten sunday's workout, I willed myself into yesterday evening bike workout but couldn't muster the courage to do tonights. I decided to take the night off and truly enjoyed it. I stretched a little. I took a break before giving all I have til Sunday then it is taper for the race. I have no time goals. I have no place goals. I don't care. All I have is a race strategie which consists on pushing on the swim just enough to get out somewhat fresh, start my bike ride build to high tempo quickly then stay there for half the ride then try to push to threshold. Finally the run, same start off not too fast get into it then start speeding up in the second half! I just want to have fun, I just want to give all I have and we will see what it gives me back. All I know is that I have trained hard I trained right so whatever I get on race day is where I'm at and that's the end of it.

On the downs I believe I shaved off 2lbs! They have been off for a little bit now so I hope it will continue in that direction.

On the house front now that B put back the kids shelves I have been good and started folding my laundry again and put it away as it comes out of the dryer. I have still a backlog of probably 5 loads. The piles of books and other stuff are still where we put them 4 weeks ago.
MAC has been asking when the books will be back in his bedroom! well when we find the courage and time to do that....

Calories and Calories

I never believed in every calories are born equal. Hey I'm a food snob what do you expect?

So on the week end we workout quite a lot... Even though today I cut about 45min out of my workout but my legs are really really sore.

So this morning I made waffles and not your ole plain waffle... just the most mouthwatering melting in your mouth waffles...

Then we nibbled on some a bit of pita bread, some hummus... And dinner not healthy but the yum factor was off the chart, still decided if I'm gonna go for seconds. Here you go it isn't healthy but I am still firm believer in calories are not all born equal...

Cut some bacon (about 4/5 strips) choose the meatier ones because fat doesn't taste that good.

Slice 1/2 onion

saute until the bacon gets all crispy.

Add some fresh thyme, some sage...

Remove most of the fat come on lets not get carried away

Then either cook some gnocchies or some finger potatoes or maybe even some ole plain pasta...

If you chose the potatoes slice them and sautee, if you chose the gnocchies saute too... didn't try the pasta.

Once done sprinkle some blue cheese and voila serve that with a glass of red and enjoy!

Yum Yum.... Yesterday I totally binged on my rice balls (sorry bunny I was too busy eating and I forgot the pictures).

OK need to finish my dinner and watch "Burn Notice" hmmmm happiness ;)

Biting a bit more than I can chew

I am realizing that maybe just maybe I bit a bit more than I could chew. Unfortunately I have only so many hours in the day to do all the things I want to do and well maybe I'm spread a little too thin. Also I have to say that my last triathlon wasn't the joyful experience I was expecting. I absolutely hated hated the swim and it was only 450m long! the bike was fun but oh so windy and the run was a bit miserable because of the nausea! Then are the ocean swim that send me in a total panic mode hours before going in the water. I am wondering why I am doing this to myself. First of all I like to try things, I like to get myself slightly out of my comfort zone. Starting triathlon totally got me to a strict workout schedule and I love that.

I believe, depending on what my coach says, that next season I will be focusing on running and keep biking a bit. I am starting to love running and well I do love biking. I'd like to improve and well I do have a lot to learn. So I will keep working with my coach because I absolutely love it but I won't subject myself to scary ocean swims!

I do not feel like I failed. I do not feel like I am quitting. I am just changing my direction slightly.

This will also remove the two longest workouts of my week and I will probably be able to do some strength workouts.

Since B won't let me quit on my scheduled race darn I am starting to freak out big time for Sunday in two weeks! I mean I hated every meter of the 450M swim and this one is twice as long.

On another note, I picked up the outrageously expensive fabric I ordered to redo the old rocking chair and I just did it. It took me a whole of 15minutes and it looks great. I'd like to clean up the wood a bit and maybe re-stain it slightly. However B would like me to first make that white cover pronto since he is hoping that will get rid of the grandma smell.

Anyways hopefully I'll have some more pix because I have quite a large number of projects and I'm really planning on making them all... Might take me a bit of time but I didn't give myself some crazy deadlines ;)

Shark bait

First of all love the new styles offered by blogspot so much more stylish/artsy than before.
This week started like hell on the work front and finished on a better note! So we are back to a very focused me which means less blog stalking! On the bad front our home computer crashed, our microwave decided to quit and when I decided to ship back my Michael Kors sandals I realized that well the 21 days were expired. So I'll have to keep my teal blue sandals.

However we caught a break when they updated the hard drive that crashed for nothing, when B's cousin booked us in a motel closer to her wedding location and 35% of the cost!

Training has been going well. I had a tough run on tuesday. LP wanted me to put the treadmil at 1% warm up 10min, then run 1M Hard, 5 min easy then 1/2M at least 30 sec per miles faster then 5 min easy and do it again! I completed the 1M Hard at 8min/mile, the 1/2M at 7:20 but when it came to do it again I came undone after 0.6M!
The next day was BRICK... 10 min WU on the bike, 10 min WU run then 4x 1min interval hard on the bike followed by 30 sec easy, and 3min Hard run do it 3 times. I was going to call it quit after the 2 time I even stopped my watched. I pulled all I had of energy left climbed back on my bike and went around the block once more!
Finally today was a ocean swim hence the title of that post. Each time I think ocean an awful shark image pops into my head. Anyways it was great, I went with two guys from work. They were super patient with me and stopped lots of time and stuck with me. I was actually having fun!
Tonight my lovely neighbour cooked too much meatloaf and shared with us. Yummy..
Tomorrow we are going out and I am running 45 min with bunny yeah!
Now I'm beat and I going to read and probably crash very very quickly.

Thank you america

For forcing a poor soul work at a cash register at night and thus savings a bunch of forgetful parents! I love to have a grocery store open 24/7.

This the mom talking to you... the mom who at 10:45pm remembered the "sharing lunch" happening on Monday. The mom who had a mild panic attack when she realized that the little friend wished to have for lunch

• 1/2 PB&J check
• Grape Juice thanks the MEC check
• Cheetos yikes we don't let that crap, good delicious but nonetheless crap, in the house
• Brownies oops didn't make any...

So here I am ready to go to bed but instead dumping my PJ pants and running to Von's hey while I'm there I can pick up the eggs, the heavy cream items forgotten from our first grocery shopping trip earlier that day.

As I pulled out of the parking lot, sick in my stomach to be buying Cheetos and brownies for an overweight little girl when these items never make it in my shopping cart Von's, a thought crosses my mind... Wait a minute Monday the 14th... hmm but tomorrow is only Monday the 7th. The fleeting feeling of pride for a mom saving the day is quickly replaced by the Duh moment of the we have to not forget NEXT week...

In the mean time the Cheetos are hidden in our cupboard really really far from our finger. One brownie will be saved for the kids the rest will be shared with my office mate.

But hey I got to eat some cherries tonight so all isn't lost. On these words I will be going to bed because now I am tired and it is late!

Bad hair day....

So we just finished a new episode well two new episodes of CASTLE. I just love that show. It isn't late enough to sleep. Although if my head touched the pillow it would take me a whole 10 seconds to fall asleep with the lights on! What I really want to do is read but well I don't have a book handy. They are all buried in a box or in a pile in the house. I just read all the new posts of my favorite blogs. Various race reports, epic workouts, beautiful remodel every facets of my being have been satiated, well almost.

Anyhow what is left to do, is to share with you some disconcerting news. I am getting old and I'm not sure I like it. I know I know I look so young, I mean I get carded all the time. The Von's cashier refused to sell me beer with an expired driver's license. Come on if a teenager is going to get a fake idea don't you think they will stay in the early twenties range not go for 35!

But here it is I am passed 35 yes my 36 birthday is little ways away. I have now joined the rank of the tough age group in triathlon. 35-39 is one of the best age group in triathlon. Much faster than their10 years younger siblings. I wish I had known that when I started thinking about triathlon 10 years ago!

I know I'm getting older, the kids are growing up so fast, I have bags under my eyes and I can see some wrinkles. What I find hard to swallow is the realization that dying my hair isn't the answer to a "I need a change" blues but more like holy crap I have a lot of white hair and I need to do something!

On that note I will put away the laundry I folded woot woot and put my head on the pillow.

Why do we do such crazy things

Last night I sent an email to a friend to wish her good luck for her half marathon. She emailed me back at 3am saying, look at me getting ready at 3am why do we do such crazy things!

I have no idea but we do it and once we are done, we do it again!

The other day at daycare I was talking about my training with a dad and how I bailed after going up Torrey Pines 3 times when I had to go 5! Another mom said that I must feel so empowered after I'm done! I guess so most of the time during though it can be tough.

Today my coach wanted me to do a 3H00 ride, with 4x10 min hill repeat (90 sec in saddle, 30 sec standing) as HARD as possible, then 1 30 min interval (15min 70rpm harder gear low tempo straight into a 100rpm easier gear high tempo).

B went surfing so I lazed around, posting some pix of the remodel. I had two toasts for breakfast and a cup of coffee. Probably not enough for a 3H00 hard ride. I started getting ready at 11am... As I was getting ready I remembered that my cadence/speed monitor didn't work anymore. This was going to make the second part of the workout hard. I decided to stop by Performance Bike on the way to Torrey Pines. My legs felt tight and being blind is a little tough as I always feel I'm as slow as a turtle!

Anyways they could not fix my cateye but I changed my cleats.... Once I got back on my bike I realized that it is tough to unclip new cleats pedals. I started panicking not being able to unclip my shoes... I stopped for a little bit almost giving up on my ride and practice unclipping several time...

I went diligently to Torrey Pines and up I went.... and it was hard and I was wondering why I wasn't interested in going to the spa or walk... But no I want to be fast and I want to be good and so that's why you'll find me suffering most sunday afternnon on my bike. Sometimes I'll have a big smile sometimes I'll be grunting other blubbering!

Today was blubbering day.... I made 2:30 hours out of the 3:00 because we had to go to a birthday party and because well my legs were just done! Maybe just maybe two pieces of toast are just not enough fuel for a mid-day ride. The nutrition is still quite a work in progress.

Yesterday's run was good though... The low HR was a bit slower than I wanted but I was really pleased to see that I was able to run at threshold (so not all out) at 7:30 min/miles a bit downhill for 2min ;) I don't know at all how this translate on race day but it is always nice to see...

Master Bedroom

So the floors have been done, a new chair has been bought as well as a new rug. Most of the furniture is back but not the clutter... I hope we can keep it that for a while although I can see some pile of crap creeping on the dresser.

Sitting area before

Sitting area after... Both of the chair can fit but the style and color clash big time. B baptized the new chair "vagina color" color and the IKEA chair is just plain. I'm hoping that a white slip cover and a nice accent pillow will bring them together. The new chair is super comfortable and exactly what I was looking for. The kids love it too. Hopefully I will tackle those slipcovers shortly.

Desk with no computer before

Desk area after... We totally fell in love with this Pottery Barn rug and we bought 3 so far! One for the family room, one for the dining room and finally this one. It works it priced OK, not cheap but outrageously expensive either.

Things left to do:

• Figure out a dirty laundry system that works
• Make a white slip cover for the new chair and the IKEA chair
• Make a bed cover
• Maybe make a bookshelf for the wall behind the IKEA chair.
• Keep the bedroom clutter free if possible.

But I have to say now the bedroom is also a place to spend some quality time.

Connected at last...

Hubby's back and so is the Internet! I know isn't it lame for a girl who would like to be oh so independent to rely on her better half to connect to the Internet!
So anyhow we are having quite a problem with the movies... I have no idea what causes it but basically every once in a while the voices are all muffled! The background music and the image are quite fine but then the dialog just doesn't go through! It happened to me yesterday while watching "Sweet Home Alabama". I thought it was due to the age of the movie. Especially since I watched Sliding Door with no problems.

Then today we were watching Leap Year and it did it again with a brand new blue ray movie! How annoying. I hate it when technology betrays us. We strive on technology!

Anyways I cooked a lot these past few days. It started super duper healthy and then well it was so healthy anymore....

On Wednesday night I made some red quinoa chicken salad, followed shortly by another quinoa salad this time with a bunch of veggies.
The next day I cooked small potatoes, fried some bacon and shitake mushrooms, then sprinkled some blue cheese. I had some green salad to go with it! But then I had the remainder of the potato mixture and some ice cream oops....
Lunch today was also quite healthy big salad but that left me quite hungry... so it was shortly followed by a small bag of Cheetos (oops). Then it was the beginning of the end, I gorged on mozzarella cheese then a bit of homemade pizza from the kids and finally dinner! Lets blame the periods for the binge and hope it will be short term thing because I really really would love to lose those 5lbs!
B wanted something good and healthy. I made some pork loin with some Asian sauce, baby bok choy, shitake mushrooms and some rice.
So I have a bunch of pictures for all those meals well for some of it but then I need to figure out how to get the pix out of my iPhone first!
Anyhow we have sooo many projects to do this week end. At the top of the list, laundry, getting my wing back chair, training/exercise, cut a whole in the back of the entertainment center, fix the kids bed, organize the house just a bit then maybe we will have time to start making a shoe rack for the downstairs bedroom!

Dilemna dilemna

So when I saw this transformation in that post I decided that our IKEA chair in our bedroom will disappear and I will tackle the following transformation project.

I stumbled upon this chair on Craigslist but it is quite far away and is 75$. There is something about it I love. The feet the overall feel of the chair really appeal to me. However after buying the fabric etc... the project will be about 150$.

Thunderfingers found this one which is half the price. I don't like the overall shape as much. I really don't like the bottom. However the price is tempting since when all done I'll probably be under 100$.

Will it matter once covered???

Disconnected

Since IT guru was out of town for a bit and that the floor guys decided to unplug the cable modem to do the floor in the guest bedroom... I was left disconnected! You might think well how come a software engineer can't figure out how to reconnect her internet! Well I find comfort in being a completely IT retarded software engineer! There is also only enough room in our household for one full geek and B got that title ;)
So here I was by myself with no internet and lots to blog about!

In brief the house is done well the floor that is. It is absolutely stunning! Now we just have to put it back together get rid of the stuff that cluttered it all. I also have to tackle the highest pile of laundry I have ever accumulated in my entire adult life! I am not looking forward to that.

I need to sell a bunch of things on craigslist I need to buy a few items although thunderfingers is really helpful in that arena! She will teach me how to be a good bargain shopper something that I never had time to be!

More on the projects and the house in a later post...