I choose to be Spectacular!

Hey guys!

I hope everyone had a fantabulistic (a good friend recently introduced me to this new word!) Wednesday. PJ and I finally decorated our tree last night, which among a few other things was probably the highlight of my day.
I love my little tree and the uniform ornament pattern. I have some unique ornaments hidden on the side of the tree, but unfortunately they disrupted the look I was going for!

Perdy :)

My love  decorating the tree. Someone very smart and insightful once said to me "To love another person is to see the face of God." She didn't invent this quote, Victor Hugo did that, but I absolutely LOVE this description.

I digress, and  I would like to note that we listened to Christmas music while  RAW (wrestling show) was on mute for some background ambiance (or not?). This is my life.

Bobbles and candles :)

Toby is pissed off as the tree is blocking his toy box. Whaaaa.

Gorgeous display of lights down by Goldman Sachs in Jersey City.

So there you have it. We are fully prepared for Christmas!  In other news, I had a pretty delectable breakfast yesterday.

Rolled oats with nanner, almonds, and a scoop of vanilla protein powder. I do have to say that the protein powder made the oatmeal a tad to vanillaish, but this brekkie stuck with me almost all the way until lunch. Sometimes with oatmeal I find that I am hungry about 20 minutes after eating, so the protein powder did help in this case. I did chomp on a granny smith apple around 11:45 to hold me over until lunch.

 I made this colorful and tasty salad for lunch. It included greens, tons of veggies, sweet potatoes, chia seeds, and leftover salmon from Monday night. I made a dressing with balsamic vinegar, olive oil, and a little truffle oil. I proceeded to drop the dressing all over my car which now wreaks of truffle oil. EEW. I also had a kind bar after because I was hungry and it was calling to me from my glove compartment!

Nom. Nom. Nom.

I may have stated  before that I work in the boogie down Bronx. You may not be aware but the Jersey Shore's (RIP) own Ronnie is from the Bronx, and he recently opened his own store in the Bronx. VERY creative name, right? Despite my ridiculing, I do think it's great that he gave back to his hometown.

So this is random, but next to Ronnie's Shore Store is my FAVORITE restaurant in the Bronx. They have a few locations, but the food is amazing. If you ever find yourself on Morris Park Ave in the Bronx, you should definitely visit this little gem.

I love my job, but yesterday I loved it even more when I went to visit one of my customers for a meeting over coffee. We got our business done, and we  then got to chatting not only about how we both are dying to see Les Miserables, but our mutual LOVE for show tunes. When I trained my co-worker Katie, during our first ride along I made her listen to me sing  RENT while driving around. Don't worry, she still loves me.

Anyways, we ended up dimming the lights and watching the 25th edition of the song " Bring Him Home" on my IPAD. Needless to say, the two of us were all misty discussing the story line of the show and from the sheer power of the performer's voices. It gives me chills just thinking about it. I have added the link for your viewing pleasure. PLEASE WATCH :)

Bring Him Home 25th anniversary edition 

As luck would have it, my wonderful friend Michelle invited me as her plus one to an advanced screening of the movie next week! I. DIE.

In addition to weeping over show tunes, this customer and I discussed her role as a girl scout troupe leader. On a side note, I always wanted to be a girl scout :( . I loved their little uniforms, and let's be honest, I loved those cookies. Unfortunately, I never had time to pursue my dream  due to my intense dance schedule. Anyways, my wonderful customer has a 10 year old daughter, and I commend her for raising such a self-assured and confident young lady.  I have to share with you a story that had me in stitches all day. So, this particular customer is Jewish, and one Christmas eve she was going out. She was not doing anything Christmas related, but her daughter wanted to know why she was going on Christmas eve.  My customer said, "I'm going to help Santa". She said, "Mom, but we're Jewish?".  Mom said, "Exactly! Who else can Santa get to work on Christmas eve?!".  How hysterical is that?

The last thing I will mention about my coffee meeting (clearly I was in this account for a long time!) was our discussion about bullying and the lacking self-esteem of young women these days. My customer said to me, " Listen, I can choose to be and view myself  anyway I want, and I choose to see myself as spectacular." She communicates this to her girls every chance she gets. I think we can all take a little something from this statement. Now, I may not be a 10 year old in a girl scout troupe, but even as a 28 year old woman, this comment was something I needed to hear and honestly changed my outlook for the rest of the day. Thank you, Debbie :)

Although this transition is anything but fluid, I wanted to share my simple but delish dinner last night.

While decorating the tree, I enjoyed baked Baramundi (fish) seasoned with garlic salt, pepper, and thyme. I drizzled it with a bit of olive oil and roasted some fennel and zucchini on the side. I served the dish with lentils drizzled with balsamic vinegar for some tangyness. Yum.

Ok, I'm off to work, but I'll leave you with a couple extra nuggets.

Hilary Duff and Her Skinny Jeans

(Blisstree)

 Alright Duffster, while I think it's great that you didn't starve yourself to lose your baby weight in 2 weeks, we don't need to see a pic of the label showing that you are now wearing size 26 jeans. Who gives a flying fig what size jeans you wear. For the record, size 26 is pretty damn tiny. I am a rather petite girl, and for the record, my jeans are NOT a 26. Most of the time I am completely fine with it :)

Check out this great article from my fantastic nutritionist about weight gain and loss during pregnancy.

37 pounds of love 

xo

Sarah