Excited!

First things first, my exciting news – one of my best friends and I just registered for the Disney Princess Half Marathon in March!  I am super excited but very nervous.  I am sure you will hear lots lots more about it in the upcoming months, especially once I start my training in September.

My parents had lots of excitment for us at the post office –

HPIM4131

They sent magazines, books, bath products, and a huge stack of cookbooks I’ve stored at home for the last few years.

HPIM4132

That isn’t even all of them, some didn’t make the cut!

They also mailed the two adorable vases I bought an Anthropologie years before I had anywhere to put them.

HPIM4133

Now they are right at home on my cookbook shelf 🙂

Adam and I spent some time talking about his first day and looking over his schedule and then we got started on dinner.  We made a recipe from the March issue of Fitness in under 30minutes!  I’ll post the recipe below but just to warn you, I’m not so big on measuring – I used way less cilantro and peanuts than called for, and more chicken because the husband scoffed at the suggested portion.  Also, where it called for sesame oil and red pepper I used 1t of the chipotle oil* my mom sent instead.

HPIM4134

Here was my portion –

HPIM4135

It was pretty darn delicious.

HPIM4136

Cilantro Chicken with Peanuts, serves 2, from the March ’09 issue of Fitness

  • 8oz skinless, boneless chicken breast, cut into strips
  • 1t cooking oil
  • 2t reduced sodium soy sauce
  • 1t rice vinegar
  • 1/2t roasted sesame oil
  • 1/4t crushed red pepper flakes
  • 3/4C fresh cilantro leaves
  • 2C Chinese cabbage, finely shredded
  • 2T dry roasted peanuts
  1. In a medium nonstick skillet, cook chicken over medium-high heat 3-4minutes, or until chicken is tender and no longer pink.
  2. Add soy sauce, rice vinegar, sesame oil, and pepper.  Stir and cook 1 more minute.
  3. Remove from heat.  Stir in cilantro.
  4. To serve, spoon mixture over cabbage and sprinkle on peanuts.

If you follow the recipe the nutritional stats per serving are: 231calories, 30g protein, 6g carbohydrates, 10g fat (2g saturated), 4g fiber.

After dinner I ate a serving of Lindt mini truffles (180calories for 3, in fantastmic flavors like cappuccino, caramel, and hazelnut) before I got ready to go out.

HPIM4137

Adam had a first day of medical school mixer at a bar nearish our apartment.  I wore my new perfume – how cute is that packaging?

HPIM4138

And my new favorite shirt.

HPIM4140

I met a lot of neat people, it seems like he has a pretty great class.  We stayed until almost 10 playing pool and chatting.  I drank this x2 –

HPIM4141

The bar made its own microbrews, I had a Blueberry Blonde Ale and an Irish Oat Stout.

My goal is bedtime by 11 again, especially because I’m hoping to get up and cook Adam breakfast tomorrow.  Sweet dreams all!

Have you ever run any sort of race?  How did it go?

Monday Afternoon – Tuesday Evening

Our trip is coming to an end, this is our last evening in St. Thomas.  Right now the husband, my mom, and I are heading to dinner so this will be a quick post.

After my last post Adam and I headed to a late lunch at Iggy’s.  We decided to split two things –

HPIM3864

HPIM3865

Grilled Mahi sandwich and chicken tenders.  Here was my portion –

HPIM3866

The food was pretty bad, I ended up leaving a lot on my plate –

HPIM3867

It was ok though, we knew that the food is almost never good there, we went for 3 big reasons –

HPIM3868

location, location, location!  We even got a visit from an “Iggy.”

HPIM3863

After some freshening up and relaxing at home we did dinner with my parents.  At my request we had turkey burgers with turkey bacon.  I topped mine with a slice of cheese and instead of buns we used focaccia my dad made.

HPIM3869

Alongside I made a bunch of roasted veggies – radish chips, cauliflower, oven baked okra.

HPIM3870

All together.

HPIM3871

I also munched on a slice of cantelope.

HPIM3872

For dessert my mom made me an early “birthday cake,” Lemon Icebox Pie from my Serendipity cookbook.

HPIM3873

HPIM3874

It was delicious.

HPIM3875

And then we played more games, of course!

Tuesday – Sun day

We headed out early to get in some time at the beach.  It is possible that for breakfast I ate a slice worth of bites of pie, straight from the pan.  Adam caught me and said I looked like a raccoon but I have no pictures 🙂

We went to Saphire, which was gorgeous but super windy.

HPIM3880

HPIM3881

We did hang around long enough for a beer though.

HPIM3882

After we cooled down at home we headed out to Petersburg with my dad to visit The Point.  The Point is a rocky area of cliffs that is beautiful (but dangerous – several people have climbed into the tide pools there and died).  I took some great pictures.

HPIM3884

HPIM3888

HPIM3889

HPIM3890

HPIM3892

HPIM3893

HPIM3896

HPIM3897

The husband and I did lots of climbing, it was definitly my cardio for the day!

Now we are going out to dinner with my mother.  After that we have plans to meet up with a high school friend and early tomorrow we are heading to the airport and back home.  It’s been a great vacation. Your reguarly scheduled programing will resume tomorrow evening.

Friday Afternoon – Saturday Afternoon

Well, I am still enjoying my vacation.  How are you enjoying your weekend?  After my last post the husband and I headed to a local favorite for some lunch.

HPIM3814

If you ever visit St. Thomas, Shipwreck is actually a bit overpriced, but we had a coupon.  I ordered the Buffalo Chicken Sub, which came with fries.

HPIM3815

Spicy buffalo chicken tenders with pepperjack cheese and blue cheese dressing, count me in!

HPIM3816

I let Adam eat 90% of my fries but I demolished my sandwich.  I have a serious weakness for buffalo chicken sandwiches (good thing I’m moving to Buffalo NY, eh?).  In general I am able to make healthy choices at restaurants, except when I am choosing to indulge, but no matter what my intentions I am powerless when I see this option!  The annoying thing is that it doesn’t even have to be so unhealthy – I would probably like it better with grilled chicken!  My problem in recreating them is that I’ve yet to find a sauce that tastes like “buffalo” to me.  Any suggestions?

After lunch we headed home for some showers.  Adam spent the rest of the afternoon playing chess with my dad but I drove back to school to do some work.  I spent 4 – 5:30 doing chemistry studying.

Next the family headed out for a fun dinner at Enkai, a new sushi spot.  It was right on the water so husband and I posed for some pictures.

HPIM3817

HPIM3819

I love my hometown (duh, it’s an island!) but I had to do some Brooklyn representing!

HPIM3821

The restaurant was super cute,

HPIM3823

I love it when tablescapes are mismatched.  But the lighting was really dim so my pictures are all terrible.  I also have zero description because I couldn’t take my usual close-ups of the menu descriptions.  We started with some edame,

HPIM3825

which I pretty much polished off by myself, sorry guys!

My parents don’t really eat real sushi, as raw as they get is smoked salmon (because they are used to lox and bagels) so we stuck to tempora shrimp, lobster, crab sticks, and smoked salmon.  My mom dad and I split 4 rolls,

HPIM3827

here are my pieces –

HPIM3828

HPIM3829

HPIM3830

HPIM3831

Everything was delicious!  When I looked at my camera later I realized I only ate 11pieces (aka 1.5rolls), no wonder I was still a little hungry.

After sushi fun we came home for more games 🙂 We are definitely trying to rope my parents into playing at least one game a day while we are here.  I made my mommy and I frozen coffees (4C cold, strong, coffee; 1tray ice cubes; 1/2C skim milk; 3/4C coffee chip ice-cream) while we played.

HPIM3832

They weren’t all that sweet, but they were super icy – perfection.  I also ate 3 more chocolate chip cookies.

HPIM3833

I’ve decided I’m done with the cookies, I physically cannot stick to just one.

After game time Adam and I headed out to meet up with some high school friends at Mojos, a new bar.  They had some good drink specials so I got a $2 strawberry mojito.

HPIM3835

I was driving so after that I stuck with small sips of the husband’s Cruzan Dark with Cokes.  We stayed out past 2 though so by the end of the night not drinking I had eaten most of this pack of Newman’s Own Organic mints.

HPIM3834

Peppermint tummyache was more than worth the good time we had with our friends though.

Saturday – dining delight

Our late homecoming only slightly effected our wake up this morning, we made it out the door before 8:30.  We had plans to meet some friends for lunch and I wanted to get some studying done so we decided to park ourselves at my favorite spot on earth – Barefoot Buddha Cafe.  We timed it so we could have both breakfast and lunch there, it is that good!

For breakfast I ordered the Bigfoot Bagel.

HPIM3836

HPIM3837

Holy frick, I cannot even describe how good this is!  It has turkey bacon, egg whites, tomato coulis, spinach, aioli…..drool. 

We ate breakfast around 8:45 and then I spent 9 – 12 deep in chemistry.  When it was time to come up for air our lunch date had arrived.

I was in the mood for hot coffee so I ordered a vodoo latte; it has espresso and coconut milk.

HPIM3838

It was gorgeous, look at the heart –

HPIM3839

And for food I got a sweet potato wrap.

HPIM3840

It had sweet potato, chipotle sauce, goat cheese, and was pretty fantastic.  Not as good as my breakfast but pretty damn close!

After lunch we ran some errands with my mommy and at some point it seemed like a good idea to go to Wendy’s for a cookie dough twisted frosty.  {for which I magically seem to have no picture} This put me over the edge fullnesswise.  Looking back on this post there has been a lot of indulging in the last two days (I feel like that’s been the norm these last few months, that is good for fun times but not as a norm!).  I want to assume that it’s time for some leafy greens and light choices but being realistic we are headed to a fancy French spot tonight and I don’t see that happening.  Tomorrow (maybe!).

We will probably meet up with friends again after our French dinner but I’m not sure what the plan for tomorrow is.  Just in case anyone is wondering about the lack of beach time I wanted to address that: even though I grew up on an island I do love the beach, it is gorgeous even if you’ve seen it a billion times.  However, I am very careful with my skin – growing up on an island means even without tanning I’ve already had way too much sun exposure – so I don’t tend to calmor for the beach.  And right before this trip my husband had an abnormal mole removed from his back so for now I’d mostly rather keep him out of the sun.  How do you take care of your skin?

I was born and raised in St. Thomas, here are some fun facts about my island childhood –

  1. Down here we drive typical American cars (steering wheel on the left side) but we drive on the left side of the road.  The first time I had to drive on the right in the states it was pretty scary for me!
  2. I graduated from a private prep school in a class of 40.  I was very fortunate to be at private school (my mom is a teacher so we had tuition credits) because the year I graduated all of the local public schools were deemed non-accredited.
  3. I am a US citizen, but I can never run for president.  People born in commonwealths or US military bases outside of the US can, but people born in territories can not.
  4. Similarly, I could not vote in a presidential election until I established residency in the continental US.
  5. (Partly due to the lack of voting rights and partly because of the lack of highways) Even though we are a part of the US the drinking age here is 18 years old!!!

What are some fun facts about your hometown?

Wednesday Morning – Friday Morning

Hello, vacation-style!  I hope everyone is having a good week, the vacay has been nice and relaxing so far.  I’m in a bit of a time crunch today so I’ll try to keep this recap pretty brief.  Just fyi – I only have internet when I go to work with my mommy so I’ll be doing a recap every few days until I get back home.

Wednesday – travel day

Our flight was at 8:15am so we had to get up nice and early.  We had to leave our car in long-term parking so we actually drove to the airport.  Thankfully, Mapquestgot us there in time to get breakfast, of sorts.  There were not many restaurants and those that were there didn’t have full menus.  I ended up with a Wendy’s Maple Baked Frescuit with egg and cheese.

HPIM3777

It actually tasted pretty good; I love the sweet-savory combo so cheese with maple syrup was nice.  And when I looked up the nutritional information online this morning I learned that it only had 390calories.

Being at airports always makes me think about having kids (not that it isn’t on my mind anyways!).  Adam and I have always discussed how important it is to make exercise fun for kids – the more you make movement into a game the better.  Even now, when we come to a moving walkway one of us will ride and the other will walk alongside and we will race!

We had a straight flight, which meant we were at my house before 2pm!  My mom always has a gift waiting for me on the bed.

HPIM3778

I wanted to get right into reading but Adam needed to go to his old doctor to do some forms for medical school so off we went.  I ate a baggie of baby carrots during the ride.

HPIM3779

The husband took forever so my father and I ended up taking a long walk on the boat docks.  I drank a Ting.

HPIM3780

My parents cooked us a great dinner.

HPIM3781

WW pasta with parmesan cheese,

HPIM3782

spinach and tomatoes cooked in toasted sesame oil,

HPIM3783

and broiled salmon.

HPIM3784

I also ate a slice of dry sourdough toast.

HPIM3785

They did a great job, everything was delicious.  Also good was my snack.

HPIM3786

Huge cup of coffee with skim milk,

HPIM3787

and homemade chocolate chip cookies.

HPIM3788

We played Pictionary and cards and by the time we were done I had actually eaten 4 cookies!  My cookie control was down a bit because of booze 🙂

HPIM3789

My favorite drink on earth is oj with cinnamon Stoli.  They actually stopped making this Stoli, my mom and I have 2 of the last bottles available, but it is equally good with Goldschlager. We each had one, yum.

HPIM3790

Thursday – “it’s so hot!”

In spite of not staying up all that late playing games (my dad is pretty intense about bedtime, he is my sleep role model) we could not get going Thursday morning.  I was supposed to get up and work out but that did not happen.  I woke up 3hours later than planned, ate breakfast, and went back to sleep for the rest of the day.  The husband and I think it’s because it was so hot.  At least I did have a great breakfast.

HPIM3791

A small chopped nectarine, half a banana, and ground flax seed.

HPIM3792

Plus a Low Fat Pineapple Chiobani.

HPIM3793

This was the first time I ever saw this flavor and it was awesome, I hope this comes to NY!

After my intense napping session I managed to drag myself to the shower and get gussied.  We ended up eating at the restaurant right near where we got married so Adam and I had to take some pictures!  This spot is exactly where we said our wedding vows –

HPIM3796

HPIM3800

HPIM3801

We had a fun time, it is hard to believe it’s been so long since December 28th, 2007.  1.5years, we are not even newlyweds anymore!

After some rememberings we headed to dinner, I slept through lunch so I was pretty starving.  I started with a beyond fabulous passionfruit colada,

HPIM3804

and my dad and I split a sandwich and salad for dinner.

HPIM3805

Fire roasted chicken paninni sliced chicken breast, roasted red peppers, sun dried tomatoes, goat cheese, and a garlic and basil ailoi.

HPIM3807

Key Lime Caesar Salad.

HPIM3806

I ate half of everything.  The sandwich was good but a little greasy and I loved the salad, the lime cut through the usual creaminess wonderfully.

After dinner we went home for more board games and cards – Monopoly and Gin Rummy – we are serious nerds about game night!  I drank an iced coffee with skim milk, along with some desserts.

HPIM3808

First, two homemade chocolate chip cookies,

HPIM3811

and even better – Greek Gods Honey Greek Yogurt,

HPIM3809

frozen,

HPIM3810

oh yeah, this was so good!  Freezing Greek Yogurt (I’ve only tried it with flavored but I imagine that plain would be a lot like Pinkberry) turns it into slushy, granita-like goodness, I highly recommend it.

Friday– wake up!

Today, I managed to get my butt out of bed!  I went with my mom to an 8am spin class so we had to get up by 7.  We left extra early because we dropped Adam off at the beach, with a bucket of beer!  I ate this Luna Bar in the car for breakfast.

HPIM3812

The class was 60minutes of spin and floor work.  I don’t know if it was the sugary breakfast, that I was feeling sick yesterday, or that I’m out of shape, but my butt was kicked!  I felt so sick I actually had to sick down and skip the lunges.  I chugged some water and I’ve been sitting so I’m feeling a little better but it sucked at the time.

Now I’m hanging out at my mom’s library, hopefully headed towards some studying.  The husband and I are getting lunch soon so we’ll see what happens.  I will most likely be doing another post on Sunday, hope everyone has a great weekend!

For now, I will leave you with a list of the songs I played while I typed, found on my mom’s i-pod!!!

  • Viva la Vida – Coldplay
  • Single Ladies – Beyonce
  • Boom Boom Pow – Black Eyed Peas
  • Low – Flo Rida
  • Blame It – Jamie Foxx
  • That’s Not My Name – The Ting Tings

Long Weekend in 500 Words or Less

Looong car ride Friday night, chips and grilled stuffed chicken burrito at Taco Bell,

HPIM3727

HPIM3728

to-go applesauce, yum

HPIM3729

toffee coffee twisted frosty, ugh, should have stopped eating.

HPIM3730

Saturday morning in VA – 35minute run (with hills) with the husband, then 25 minute walk with sister-in-law, hills make me feel powerful.  Sun-protection is gangsta,

HPIM3731

Beer for breakfast,

HPIM3733

turkey sandwich, fruit, broccoli salad,

HPIM3738

HPIM3737

HPIM3736

HPIM3735

dinner at a steak house – frustrated with lack of choices, went all out unhealthy, felt sick.

HPIM3739

HPIM3740

HPIM3741

Early birthday celebration, cake and ice-cream with caramel, in-laws are so sweet.

HPIM3734

HPIM3742

HPIM3743

HPIM3744

HPIM3745

Saturday late night, ate way way too much chex mix, without photographs.

 Sunday morning, 1% chocolate milk, fruit, ww bagel with lowfat strawberry cream cheese, jelly, fancy pb.

HPIM3748

HPIM3747

HPIM3746

Turkey sandwich (with squeeze cheese) in the car,

HPIM3749

cookies x4,

HPIM3750

snacks,

HPIM3751

dinners seem to go downhill, ie: black and white milkshake, mini chimi appetizer, french fries, sandwich so gross I took only 1 bite.

HPIM3752

HPIM3754

HPIM3753

P.S. Word count = 152; reflection to come.

What did you do this weekend?

The Wright Stuff

Today was my parents’ last day visiting us and we packed as much in as possible!  I love how my family vacations, we try to see (and taste!) everything.  While today involved more indulging I would say that for a vacation day I did a pretty good job of balancing things out.  It’s seemed like we’ve had a lot of celebrations lately and it’s hard to know where to draw the line with fun foods.  Today was the right balance of fun without going overboard.

This morning Adam and I walked over to the train to meet my parents (they took a cab from the hotel because we’ve walked them a little too much!).  I did a train version of pb and j for breakfast.

HPIM3585

Peanut Butter Cookie Lara Bar with a Stoneyfield Lowfat Strawberry Yogurt Smoothie.  This was a great combo but a little too satisfying, I shared half of the drink with the husband.

Our first activity ending up being the most fun we’ve had this whole visit – a 2 hour bike ride through Central Park!  I’m not going to lie, I don’t really know how to ride a bike!  Growing up on an island it wasn’t possible very often and the last time I was on a bike at all was at least five years ago.  We had a wobbly start but I sucked it up and did my best and after 15minutes or so I was loving it!

HPIM3588

HPIM3589

We moved pretty quickly so we saw a lot in the 2 hours.  Our most fun stop was at the Hans Christen Andersen “Ugly Duckling” statue.

HPIM3596

HPIM3597

 HPIM3601

HPIM3603

HPIM3598

My mom is a librarian so she was right at home 🙂

After we dropped off the bikes Adam and I were starving so we hit up the other Subway.

HPIM3606

I got a 6inch turkey sandwich with cheese, lettuce, tomato, pickles, banana peppers, and chipotle sauce.  Yum.

After that we did some major city exploring.  We went to the Guggenheim Museum which was tons of fun.  My favorite artists were Van Gogh and Degas, but we also learned a lot of interesting facts about Frank Lloyd Wright (the architect who designed the museum).  We used the free audio tour and it really added to my enjoyment.

After that we went to St. John’s Cathedral.  Gorgeous!  While we were inside it started pouringso we ended up waiting out the storm for more than 30minutes.  During our wait the church was suddenly filled with what looked like peasants who used a time machine – they were extras from “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” (with Nicholas Cage!) that was filming nearby!

When the rain finally calmed down a bit we got only midly soaked getting to dinner.  Our destination was the Pacific Grill in South Street Seaport.  I was starving again by the time we got to dinner and I attacked this bread with butter.

HPIM3620

I ordered a diet coke to drink but Adam and my dad got a bucket of beer and I helped myself to one.

HPIM3622

For my meal I went traditional with fish and chips.

HPIM3621

This was tasty but way too heavy; I gave my dad 1 (of 3) of the fish sticks and shared my fries with Adam.

Afterwards we went back to my parents’ room to say goodbye.  We hung out for a bit just chillaxing (I’d be lying if I said I didn’t take a quick nap).  I ate some Goldfish crackers from my parents’ plane trip before my nap.

HPIM3623

Around 11 we said our final goodbyes and walked home.  It would be sad but we are seeing them again soon.  And I will see you again soon, in the morning!

A heads up, fun things on the summer agenda –

  1. Family reunion with Adam’s family in Virgina at his parents’ new home
  2. 1week visit to St. Thomas to see my parents
  3. Moving (to a soon to be announced location!)