I tried to make myself a wrap on Monday but it was less than stellar. I managed to get through half of it, but then put the rest back in the container.

My wrap consisted of:

• Tomato Basil Tortilla Wrap
• Sabra Hummus (as a spread)
• Alfalfa Sprouts
• Roasted Red Pepper
• 1/2 Avacado
• Lemon Juice (added when I went to eat it

It seemed to be lacking flavor, I tried to add lemon juice to make it a bit tastier but I think I should have actually used more roasted red peppers.

Today’s wrap was quite a bit tastier. This is what it consisted of.

• Tomato Basil Tortilla Wrap
• Sabra Hummus (as a spread)
• Alfalfa Sprouts
• Roasted Red Pepper
• 1/2 Avacado
• Couscous with Pine Nuts
• Cannellini Beans

I’m thinking of trying some seasoned tofu in my next round of experiments along with getting better at actually wrapping up wraps.

A big issue for me going vegetarian or vegan, is I do not love beans. Granted I like Tofu, even though too much of that doesn’t really like me. Great, the story of my life. So I’m wondering about some alternative protein sources. My sister in law pointed me toward cannellini beans which I like a lot more than kidney beans. But outside of those I’m not sure. I do eat tofu on occasion, had some Tofu Pups the other night and I like Boca Burgers. But what else is out there?

Tonight’s dinner was quite yummy as I’ve rediscovered couscous.

I got The Kind Diet for Christmas, along with Chef Keith Snow’s book Harvest Eating. I’ve flirted, as Alicia would say, with vegetarianism for probably 11 years. I’ve never stuck to it. My own laziness and lack of commitment is what usually has me faltering. The Kind Diet is a step further with going vegan. I grew up in a family that loved their milk, cheese and eggs. I stopped drinking cow’s milk about 8 years ago. I’ll have it in a hot chocolate or coffee, but that it. Cheese on the other hand is my Achilles’s heal. I love it! But I also know it doesn’t always love me and my sinuses always clog up after having too much cheese.

My schedule is still a bit crazy to get into cooking big meals. This past weekend I decided to simplify, choose only meals that could be quick, not even heated and still fall under the vegan and healthy guidelines.

I made home guacamole for the first time. It was awesome! I’ve been eating oatmeal and fruit for breakfast. I cooked up crispy orange tofu from the Kind Diet cookbook. Tonight I made couscous, which I haven’t had in a very long time. I also attempted to make a wrap for lunch. I used a tomato tortilla, hummus, roasted red peppers, avocado and sprouts. It was…ok…I need to figure out something to first add more flavor, but also make the avocado a bit smaller. I used chunks and I wasn’t really loving it.

I’ve also gotten into the habit of impromptu exercising. My Mom called me up on Saturday and gave me a 20 minute notice if I wanted to go for a walk. I was in the middle of working on some projects, but I decided, this nice weather doesn’t come along that often and I need to get out from behind the desk. So off I went for a good walk. Tonight, I was waiting for Craig to be free but he got busy with a few different things. I watched as the sun went down more and more, and said, screw it, I need to take advantage of this weather. So I took myself out and went for a walk. 45 minutes later and my heart pumping I feel much better.

I’ve always made the excuse of not enough time, energy and being too busy as to why I didn’t just get out and exercise. It’s fun… you only live once right? and I’m sick of not being able to take off my rings and not being as flexible several years ago. I’m only 31, not 61.

Well maybe not entirely. I used to love the winter, but that was when I lived in a house that actually stayed warm. Our apartment when the wind kicks up can be very hard to keep warm. Thus I’m kind of missing those days of basking in the sun and feeling warm all the way through. I took this photo over last summer on our only visit to White Memorial that year. I’m determined to get out and enjoy the outdoors in 2010. It seems like so long ago but in 2006, I was biking at least once a week and doing all sorts of other things outdoors.

In the spirit of getting in better health

This past week I ate vegetarian from Sunday through Thursday. Friday we started running out groceries, time and I caved and picked up Starbucks for breakfast, Subway for lunch and pizza for dinner. Lesson learned though, as my stomach was none too happy with my meal choices and I spent the evening in a lot of pain. Which leads me to thinking, maybe I do have some level of lactose intolerance. The weekend was filled with lots of out and about activities, and I made decisions that were fairly good.

I’m looking forward to going back to eating simpler, not so rich foods this week. My goal for this week is to continue with primarily vegetarian meals and get in at least two days of exercise. I have to work on my core to help my back, which has been bothering me again. I am also planning to map out different places to mountain bike between home and work. Along with that, I’m putting together a shopping list of winter bike gear; booties, pants and a bright orange fleece jacket (I like my life).

As I’ve come to find out recently, I’m eating too few calories. As well as too little protein. Sadly I seem to have no issues getting sodium, which is the one thing I need to lessen. I’m back to logging my meals into Daily Burn, at least until I get a better grasp of what it takes to make up a healthy balanced day of meals.

This week will be an experiment, and hopefully next week will be the positive results of this week’s logging.

While doing errands this morning in the bitter cold, the ideas going through my head were the different items I want to service on my car. It frustrates me to no end that I slacked on keeping the wheels clean over the past 4 years and because of that, brake dust has become caked on.

I look under the hood and there’s definitely surface rust on strut bolts and my air horns need to be polished and other items need a coat of armor all. These little things irk me. To add to it, my hood has some chips (8 years of highway commuting, it’s a miracle it’s not worse) and this past fall an acorn tree did some dent damage.

I want to bring my wonderful 8 year old vehicle back to new. Ok, well maybe not brand new, but looking good and feeling tight again. Of course this will take some money and definitely time on my part.

This got me thinking about how much my father’s meticulous attention to detail and care for all items in our home has carried on to me. When I was younger this was a bit insanely stressful. I was always in fear of things not looking exactlyas how I borrowed them.

All of this led me to realize, I am willing to take ridiculous measures to keep things looking new, in pristine shape and thus the ability to last a long time, except my own body. Most celebrities musicians or actors have to treat their bodies as a product, because it is for their professions. I have never really looked at mine like this, instead it was the one item hindering me from just getting things I wanted to get done. Ironically enough, my thought process has been more of a, “When is someone coming to take care of this thing”.

That thing is my own body, so no one else, other than me is going to be taking care of it. For most people this is pretty obvious, but I’ve spent the last 10+ years doing most of my living in my head; reading, studying, creating, analyzing, philosophising. Much like my car, with time and money it is possible to restore my body to a better state, looking “new” again.

I can’t remember exactly when I discovered Colin Devroe’s The Diet page, but at one point I joined and after sharing my progress with my friends, they wanted to join in too, but didn’t want to use their regular blogs.

I decided to create our own site to log our progress, keep up motivation and keep it semi-private. As you can see from the Archive dates, we’ve had some starts and stops along the way.

This year I decided to record videos of my progress. Also joining in is my sister in law and my mother in law. My best friend Kelly, who is much more on top of nutrition and exercise regimens is writing full blown articles for us and keeping us motivated. Late last year she did the P90X and had great results. Craig and I picked up a copy of Power90, which was more our speed.

A year and several months later after putting my back out quite severely I’m feeling well enough to take on a consistent exercise routine. Turning 30 also put a bit more fuel on the fire as well.

Life’s too short to not enjoy every bit of sunshine I can get, breath fresh air and do it in a body I vaguely remember. I am happy I am able to recall the feeling of being very limber and having done gymnastics when I was younger. I used to be pretty coordinated. I can see myself now doing things in a body that is yet to be discovered.

I’m beginning this journey again, not with a sole focus on the end, but enjoying the trip. Discovering new foods, learning new exercises, pushing my limits and breaking out of the box.

My good friend inspired both Craig and I with her dedicated work doing P90X. She stuck with it for the 90 days and did see great results. Craig and I purchased the Power90 system and did do a few days of it in December but fell out of the routine. We do like the system and are going to start back up, along with bicycle riding.

I’ve got the bike rack on my car, I’ve mapped out several trails on my commute route. My goal is to get 2-5 miles in each night after work. I ride mostly dirt roads or dirt trails. I’ll work that number up as the season goes on.

I’m using LoseIt on the iPhone to track everything I’m eating and when I’m exercising, and when I can, I’ll make a video of the progress.

Let the journey begin!

I haven’t been the first person to get excited about working in the kitchen. In the past I have not been very adventurous. A client of mine though has made two delicious meals from scratch and my mother in law makes these incredible meals all after a day of work. They’ve inspired me.

The other night I made meatballs from scratch. We had ground turkey, we did not have bread crumbs, so I used the magic bullet we have to crumble oyster crackers. They came out delicious. Tonight I decided to do something different with our kielbasa. I bought red and green peppers, a sweet onion and some French bread. I sauted everything in a large frying pan. It too came out really good and pretty healthy. I’m hoping to do more cooking and start thinking outside the box
.

While laying in bed last night, I was browsing around the app store and discovered the All Recipes iPhone app. I’ve been a fan of the AllRecipes.com website for quite a while. Their app is called DinnerSpinner, the concept is you spin the meal choice, then an ingredient choice and finally a preparation time choice. Ironically enough my day job has a client who wants to do something similar to this for their next website.

Here’s a sample view of the spinner. I’ve selected Appetizer, Cheese and Slow Cooker. You can also click a button that says, “Spin Categories”. That button is currently replaced by the “View Matches” button.

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