TGIF!

Hey All!

Greetings from Maine! I am here for a girls weekend with my mom and my bff!  Yay! I am going to stick to posting my Friday Faves, but I will be back later today with those!

For breakfast yesterday I made an amazing little feast. I have seen the recipe posted on pinterest and various blogs for a while now, and I was always intrigued.

 Overnight Oats

Adapted from "oh she glows"

http://ohsheglows.com/2010/04/08/easy-vegan-overnight-oats/

PM Ingredients:

• 1/3 cup regular oats


• 1 cup almond milk, and more if needed


• 1-2 tablespoons chia seeds


• 1 ripe banana, peeled and smashed


• 1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions: Mix together the above ingredients in a bowl and place in fridge overnight.

In the morning, remove bowl from fridge and add your magical toppings…

AM Ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon nut butter


• Pure Maple Syrup

Directions: Serve nut butter in a spoon and drizzle Maple syrup over top. Serve overnight oats cold.

**Note** You can make different variations of this dish by adding seasonal ingredients! For example, pumpkin in the fall! Also, if you want an extra protein punch, you can mix in some protein powder! I didn't have any vanilla extract in my pantry so I went without it. I think it would have added to the dish, but it didn't impact the flavor much in my opinion.

My Oats!

In other food news, yesterday for work I was on Arthur Avenue in the Bronx (aka Little Italy!) I love going to this part of my territory, however I feel as though my productivity is not very high as I spend most of my time perusing the various bakeries.

I stopped at Borgatti's for some fresh, homemade ravioli and pasta! Remember your wallet as most of the bakeries in Little Italy are cash only! Those Italians... :)

Yum!

So excited to try this.

Since this is a blog about healthy living and ultimately MY path to living well, I figured I would share with you a recent "experience" I had because I feel like many people have been in the same situation.

Here it goes. So, yesterday I started the day with a web-based yoga class. It was only 30 min but left me feeling energized and refreshed. I started thinking about my previous mentality towards "quick" workouts and how much my attitude towards exercise has changed. What I now know is that workouts don't have to be a certain amount of time to be "worth it". I have struggled in the past with feeling that a 20 minute workout ( no matter what it is) isn't worth it. My thought process was "it won't do anything." However, I now know this is untrue. On Wednesday evening, I didn't feel like going to the yoga class I had planned on and spent the night vegging out and catching up on work in front of the tv. In the nature of full disclosure, I will say that there was some of that old "noise" in the back of my head saying "You should have gone to that class.You are going to be away this weekend and wont have the opportunity to exercise.You're being lazy." Truth be told,I felt like being lazy and despite some of the thoughts that came up I managed to be ok with my choice to just hang out.

When I woke up yesterday morning and was in the mood to do some yoga, I realized I only had about 30 minutes. In the past ,I would have beat myself up for not taking the class the previous night when I had more time ( I mean, clearly I gave myself a light beating the night before but nothing like what I would have in the past!). Guess what? I did thirty minutes of yoga( which is short for a yoga class) and it totally changed my mood! I felt strong,centered,and ready to conquer the day.  So there you go my friends. Twenty or thirty minutes of movement DOES do something more important than shrinking your thighs,  it changes your outlook! :)

Something to think about
Although I do love a high intensity sweat sesh once or maybe 2x per week, I have made an observation about the way these workouts affect MY body and MY appetite ( I say this because everyone is different). If I do alot of high intensity cardio, I find I am much hungrier. This isn't rocket science,people. Just like a car, it needs more fuel if you are driving it longer and faster. I find that I have trouble being mindful about what and how much I am eating if my appetite is raging. Now this is just me and what I have learned works for me. I only throw this out there because I'm sure I'm not the only one that feels crazy hungry(and tired) when they go cardio crazy.

Alright! I am on vacation so naturally I am going to go and get a massage :) I will be back later with my friday faves!

xo

Sarah