Latest inspiration!

I had a fantastic day today! I'm not sure why, but I've had a ton of energy lately and had some good, if long, days! Today, I played racquetball in the morning for an hour with my boyfriend and then taught/played from 2-10pm! One on my students is a young girl who reminds me A LOT of a younger me. She's INCREDIBLY smart, naturally musical, and a curious about everything. She's also hard on herself, a perfectionist, and gets frustrated easily. She also tells herself that she can't do it, isn't good enough, etc. Hmm, why does that sound familiar? Anyway, last week I spent a lot of time talking to her about how I want her to try to be positive and I outlawed the use of the C word (can't). This week she came back and had improved by an unrecognizable amount! It was absolutely staggering! I could not have been prouder! And it was a good reminder for me that our minds are EXTREMELY powerful! They absolutely have the power to affect what we "can" and "cannot" do. I fully believe that almost all of any battle is mental. On a similar vein, when I was in gymnastics, a long time ago, I looked at the more advanced girls doing back handsprings on the balance beam and I said, "Wow, I'm never going to be able to do that!" And my coach looked squarely at me and said, "You're right. If you convince yourself of that, you'll never be able to do it." I NEVER forgot that, and it still inspires me to stay positive about things to this day. (Example: running!) And by the way, I definitely learned my back handspring on the beam before I had to quit gymnastics! :)

Anyway, onto my eats from today. I don't have pictures of everything, but I had an awesome salad at Whole Foods for a late lunch.


Before that I had eaten a bagel with veggie cream cheese. (And another one yesterday!) I bought a dozen yesterday (half honey oat and half cracked wheat) and the cream cheese had pieces on carrots, tomatoes and peppers in it. I really like it and you'll be seeing more bagels soon and frequently. :)


I decided to sprinkle some FF cheese on for extra protein. Pretty good actually.


I started today off with a great bowl of oat bran:

(banana, carob chips, raisins, PB, cottage cheese)

Yesterday I tried my first Pistachio Larabar and I actually really liked it. I'd probably by it again at some point.

Finally, I made a big bowl of sauteed veggies since I had been severely lacking them yesterday. Zucchini, onion, bell pepper, garlic, EVOO...the usual.

(Rockin' the camera flash and the yellow bowl!)

Here's some more giveaways...pick me, pick me! ;-)

Food Cents is giving away some of her favorite things.

Rebecca is giving away many delicious Newman's Own products!

Amanda and Andy are giving away more Chobani love!

Allison is giving away Nature's Path Products. I love these cereals!

Missy is giving away Halls Refresh, Silk milk and other goodies.

One Fit Foodie is giving away coupons for a free Nasoya product.

Jen is giving away Naturally Nutty Peanut Butter. Umm, yeah--I want these. :)

Wow, that's a lot of awesomeness!

I'm heading off to bed! It's after midnight and I'm waking up at 7:45 to go to the gym with my boyfriend again (workout + another game of racquetball) and then hopefully going to a real running store to get fitted for good running shoes! I want the shin splints to go away! I'll let you know if and what I buy!