Monday, 27 February 2012

3 days to go

3 more days and then i'll start my vegetarian-no-alcohol-no-nothing-smokeable(just to include for example water pipe) month of March.

As promised, here's my list with 31 really good things that dont include meat or fish. So if I feel like it, I could make something I really like every single day :). 

1. Blueberry Milkshake
milk and blueberries
2. Pineapple-mango-lime smoothie
3. Fruit salad
(slice favourite fruits, put on top of eachother)
4. Tacos (soft or hard) filled with beans, salad, tomatoes, cucurber, corn etc etc
5. Tomato with mozzarella and pesto
6. Tomato with cottage cheese
7. Bananabread
8. Omelette with broccoli, carrots, tomato, cucumber
9. Hummus
10. Pancakes with jam 
11. Vegetable pate (smash vegetables – for example, carrots, seller and broccoli, mix separately with eggs, salt, pepper, natural yoghurt and potato-starch;  put into a baking form – first seller, then broccoli and then carrot – mix, bake with 175C about 1 hour ; let cool down and eat with ryebread)
12. Oven vegetables – put vegetables in the oven, bake and enjoy 
13. Mashed potatoes 
14. Carrot – pineapple salad
15. Potato pancakes /vegetable pancakes
16. Fresh berries
17. All kinds of soups made of smashed vegetables with cream cheese 
18. Baked slices of aubergine with carlic-nut-nathural youghurt sauce. Eat with crispbread
19. My favourite dessert:
pieces of dried ryebread
natural yoghurt
(plum) jam
sugar
put layers into a cup, keep in the fridge for a while
eat
20. Nuts, seeds and fruits in yoghurt
Put into a glass in the evening, keep in fridge overnight and eat for breakfast
21. The best salad ever
peas, tomato, onion, natural yoghurt (cucumber, shrimps or crab sticks)
22. Filled eggs
23. Champignons with blue cheese
take the caps(?) of champignons, fill with bluecheese, bake in the oven 
24. Carrot pineapple salad (L)
25. Mushroom risotto
26. Avocado-smoothie
avocado, honey, pear yoghurt, nuts/seeds
27. Ice-cream
28. Spinach wok
spinach, onion, garlic, beans, (sour cream). Put everything on the pan, heat, mix with sopur cream, eat 
29. Lens soup 
spinach, onion, garlic, different spices, smashed tomatoes, lenses. 
boil lenses in water, heat everything else on pan, mix with lenses 
30. Potatoes with tomato-cheese sauce
boil potatoes, on a pan fry onions, add unwhipped whipped cream :D (medlavningsflödde), spices and cream- or melted cheese. Eat with potatoes .
31. Chocolate dessert
mix melted chocolate, condensed milk, ricotta/yoghurt and cacao powder,  put into glasses. 
Add a cherry on top and enjoy :)
I’ll do it on the 31. March.


Can't wait for March to start :)




Sunday, 26 February 2012

Easy like Sunday morning :)

It's such a nice day - no wind, no clouds, just sun and Sunday (it's probably not a coincidence they sound the same)
It's one a clock in the afternoon and there's absolutely NOTHING I have to do today :).
The baby shower yesterday was really really cool :). I was a  bit surprised as it wasnt just us girls and the mom and the baby in their home as I expected, it was a proper party instead :D. With oh so many sweets and snacks that afterwords I felt kind of sick and decided to go on a bike ride. I have been biking SO much this week. Then this morning woke up at 9:40 and went for a long run to and at and back from the beach. 'i was wearing a T-shirt and a random hoody and was so warm, amazing :). After that decided to well-spend my last money and went to a bakery, then had a shower and breakfast (buns with boiled eggs and jam :)), got dressed and now can just enjoy myself the entire day. I dont have anything I need to do and to be honest. I dont feel like doing anything either.
The week has been good. Sportswise and schoolwise and..just good :). And now I have three more days before starting my whole new month.
I got a new cool idea from Heidi-s blog (which is here for those who read Estonian: http://heidi.tarkpea.ee/) to write down my menu every week. I thought I'm gonna do it every Wednesday but as I always always have trouble with my Sunday menu, I'm gonna start posting it twice. On Wednesdays and Sundays :).

The coolest thing I've been doing lately is this little attempt to get a regular male student who's 22 and has a job and now time and beer-drinking-smoking friends, to eat as healthily as possible. So I've been calculating his energy needs, using all of my best creativity to find as many healthy-goodtastyng-easytomake-and transportable meals as possible. Plus as he is so physically active and needs to eat a lot, the challenge is also to make it all as cheap as possible. It's been taking some time and research and thinking, but now the plans are finally ready and we went grocery shoping together yesterday. So now all we can do is see how it goes, hope for the best and prepare for the worse :).

What I've been doing for myself is a list with 31 good vegetarian meals, so I could make something good for myself every single day of March if I want. I'll post it as soon as it's done :).

I haven't decided about next week's training plans yet, cause it's gonna be a really busy week, but I can post the crazy numbers from my watch for this ending week:
Total duration: 20:31:52
calories: 6883kcal
but I've gotta admit - I cheated a bit as well as I counted almost all my longer bikerides f ex to uni and downtown and so on that I usually never do.
Biking average of the week: 29km/day
I only have one word for that: DENMARK :D.

Okay. I guess that's it. Im gonna go and ask my neighbors if they wanna come and play some football outside. And I dont think the answer could ever be no as they're boys. :D.

Have a nice Sunday and enjoy yourselves :)

Tuesday, 21 February 2012

just to be clear

I am not gonna give up coffee. Never :). Or not at least soon.

My clean March

Wouldn't it be nice to start the spring just as fresh as it is itself? I have decided to become clean. Actually, that was decision number two. Decision number one was that I'm going to become a vegetarian for a month. There are several reasons behind that decision. First, spring just always makes me wanna do something new and cool :). Second I could use some more knowledge about protein and amino acids, that I now have to get from different sources. And I do wanna know more about vegetarians and their challenges. Plus I'd get so much less saturated fat from my diet and I oh so much just wanna know how would it feel not to eat meat. But I'm sure in advance that I could never become a vegan, therefore I'm not gonna try that. I am gonna keep on eating shrimps and fish as well, just because excluding fish would probably make it too much of a challenge for me to keep my protein intake fine and (the real reason :D) I just couldn't give them up. I am going to start on the first of March and finish on the 31st. 
That decision, however lead me to the next one. I decided not to consume any alcohol what so ever, not stay in smoky rooms and definitely not smoke any cigarettes for a month as well.
I wonder how'll it feel? And how's that going to affect my social life? Will I have more energy and actually feel fresher, cleaner and better or are all them limitations gonna make me depressed and all cranky?
I do not know. A week to go and then I'll start. Im so looking forward and gonna keep you posted :). 

Change in exercise plan: no running or outside workout on Friday, gonna go to gym with my classmate before uni instead :). Looking forward to that as well (they do have free breakfast :P)

Ses :)

13.02-19.02

I had an amazing week :).
Followed the exercise plan almost from Monday to Friday...or even Saturday, because Saturday was a resting day anyway :D and the only change I made was adding some workouts. So Monday was uphill/downhill and stairs running, Tuesday running and gym, Wednesday 1,5h gym and running, Thursday gym and a lot of biking, Friday 5km, time 26:02 + uphill runnings + jogging and trying out some machines I found on an outdoors work-out field and Saturday rest.
On top of that I found myself a really cool work placement. Gonna work with a trainer training elite athletes in Aarhus, working out with them and making dietary plans :P. The internship is going to start in May, but before that he's going to train me, so that I'd be strong, smart and ready by the time we start in May. Is life so cool or whaat? :)
But back to my last week exercise plan and the Saturday...after spending a day home studying until my brain couldn't function any more, I got awfully..restless in the evening :D. And could not resist going out with friends and later joining a fastelavns costume fest..and so it went..ended up spending the night in town at a friend's place, skiping breakfast, arriving home awfully hungry, eating a superbowl of everything: broccoli, carrots, beans, germs(?), pepper, tomatoes, ice salad, nuts and onion :D and then instead of a workout (planned 3km and intervalls) ended up staying home, cleaning and doing my homework. Crazy student life ;). But I guess after that kind of a week, I deserved two days to rest and I had already proven that 3km under 15min is obviously not a goal at all, as it is so easy. And I did really enjoy the night out and had loads and loads of fun :).

So this week's plan:
Monday: jogging 1km to a workout place, strength and balance exercises (squats, hands, stomach, back, 4 different balance exercises), 1km fast run back to  home.
+biking 45 km (throughout the day),
done :)
Tuesday: gym
Wednesday: gym+jogging
Thursday: 7 km interval running, up- and downhills, 5km jogging back home + stomach and arms
Friday: workout outside, 1km jogging, 1km fast (happy birthday Estonia :))
Saturday: morning jog (+ babyshower with cake in the afternoon:))
Sunday: running to the seaside (ca 14km), light workout

Other than that I have to study so so so hard, read a lot and remember to do my Danish. Mmm..and as well I guess it's necessary to eat at least one bun with whipped cream, after all it is a week with fasteavns, vastlapäev and Estonia's birthday, yum :)).

And to finish up..I've been thinking lately and I guess it is always like that that great guys are friends with great guys. And therefore it is absolutely necessary to meet the friends before things get serious. Anything else just might end up craaazy.
(i'm not sure if I should say 'remember that' or just classify it as a note to self)

Anyway. Have a great week everyone and enjoy yourselves. Life is cool :).

Tuesday, 14 February 2012

I've always kept my faith in love...
As far as I can remember, I've always been dreaming about my wedding day, my future husband, known that it is so much better to be a happy poor man's wife than unhappy with a rich man and divorces always made me feel so indescribably powerless and disappointed. I mean, how can anyone promise to love and to cherish in everything and forever and then just..not. Marriage was like a goal for me, or a must-have..or just a logical ending. I knew all the stories with princes and princesses and how first you get married and then you live happily ever after. Those things just would not happen without each other.
But then, not so long ago I started to actually think about it. I had blindly and automatically believed in something for so long, that it just seemed the only right thing, but I had never ever in my life thought about why I believe in it. And there I was, realizing what serious relationships actually mean to me. Being in a relationship is like being a half of a whole, not making decisions but negotiating and discussing things, making compromises, being all like 'what are we gonna eat for dinner tonight?' 'what should we do in the weekend?' and so on and so forth.. As well the thing about how husbands usually talk about their wives... you know, whit the nagging tone and being all unappreciative. And I wasnt sure if it is something I could handle.
Of course I could also not become one of those wives who's been talked about like that and who is not appreciated, but that too would take some effort and being very conscious about how you act and what you say and do and how much and when and..WHY??  Wouldnt it be so much better just enjoy life, have fun while it lasts and never ever get bored and into a routine? Live for yourself and take care and love yourself? And so I concluded that I dont do love..nor real relationships..and marriage is not for me. It might work for some people and that I found great but not just for me. Obviously, as a proper scientist/philosopher I took into account the fact that I'm just 20 and that I might reconsider so I didnt put all that  much thought into all of it anymore for a while
BUT
I've never been more happier and satisfied and full of joy than I am when I'm in love; I find sleeping together with someone I love, even if it is awfully uncomfortable and too cold and too warm and too little blanket and too much snorting, being so much better than sleeping alone. I just love staying in on friday evenings to watch a movie or listen to music or to do nothing together with some one. I love how even on rainy days, with love, you still feel as if it'd be spring and always know everything is gonna  be just fine. And I dont think life without friends is a life at all. We couldn't define ourselves as individuals without other individuals. We couldnt be without others.
This year's valentine's day I'm going to spend without a boyfriend. But I do have great friends to be with and great friends who are not physically close to me, but who I know are there for me to love and to cherish and nothing will do us part. And I have my family.
I'll always keep my faith in love.

After all, if not scientifically proven, then in practice more than enough, there's no better way of being healthy than being in love. First you just cannot eat, because your stomach is too full of butterflies. Then you dont wanna eat, because you wanna look nice for your boyfriend and be able to pull your belly oh so in. And then you just have so many alternative activities to eating, that you dont even think about it. You get your amount of physical activity and your body is full of endorphin :).

As mentioned, I do not have a boyfriend and therefore I have an actual plan and defined goals. Goes like that: Monday - uphill/downhill +stairs running; Tuesday - gym(with special focus to all the exercises I feel like - it is a Valentine's Day:)); Wednesday - jogging (with 2x1km running on time); Thursday - gym (with special focus on arms and stomach); Friday - chillbill downhill jogging for fun; Saturday - rest, but be sure that I do 10 000 steps at least; Sunday - 3km run to find out if a goal to do it under 15 min is suitable or too easy/difficult + jogging. And every run is followed by some exercises for arms - after all I am planning to one day do at least 2 push ups :D.

And as I have once again proved the fact that if you wanna buy all the books school wants you to buy, pay all your bills on time, look decent (even if you do not give in to the crazzzzy temptation and wont buy any new clothes), eat just enough to stay alive and be socially acceptable - going out for a coffe (and you do limit the times only to twice a month) and be qualified as a normal student -attend at least one party a month  ( i know its awfully few), it is impossible to ever have any free money. Therefore the rest of the month's menu should be just fine as well, as I just dont have the money to buy anything I wont need.
So to all of them, who'd like to know how to eat cheap and healthy - I have a feeling this blog might be a good source of inspiration in February ;D.

And to end this post, a song that a guy once showed me. It's a song sang by a guy who promised to marry a girl. Just before their marriage day the girl had an accident and got a serious brain damage. The guy is still with her :).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQY4dIxY1H4

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone :)

Sunday, 12 February 2012

20/80

The week has been good. I'd say I've been at least 80% healthy, 20% not so much..and if we could exclude the weekend then the healthy-percentage might even be 90.. And higher than that I'd rather not even try to get, because that might affect my mental health :D. 
I've discovered three really good things to make

1. vegetable beefs 
I made mine with selleri, carrots and apples. First chop/grate all of them into small pieces, mix with eggs and seasoning and then  either fry them on pan with a little oil or just bake in the oven. 

2. carrot cake/bread (=keeks noh :D)
Really easy to make - needs eggs, flour, sugar, a little oil, chopped nuts/seeds/almonds/whatever, carrot and baking powder. Mix it all together, put to a bread form, bake with 175 degrees about 50 minutes and ready it is :). To make it better, let it cool down, cut to halves horizontally, melt some white chocolate and put in the middle and on top, yum :)

3. any kind of mashed vegetables in the oven
take your favorite vegetables, steam them, mash them, i added some nuts and pieces of fresh broccoli and carrots to make it crunchy, put into a baking form, add some cheese on top and bake until it looks nice. Amazing to eat with toast :)

I also have a goal for working out now - as I discovered (weird to admit) I cannot do even one push up when being on my toes and not knees, my new goal is to be able to do at least 10 by the end of March and then maybe 20 in May. Hello, gym

But as it is a Sunday and Im sitting in my favorite caffe and my friend just arrived, then the post is going to end here and I am going to turn to my friend and hot chocolate with loads of whipped cream on top :). 

Hygge