Long Run Saturday

September 17th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Fitness - (5 Comments)

OK baby girl, enough with the bike riding birthday breakfast bonanzas – you’ve got a marathon you’re supposed to be training for.

Steamtown Marathon Letter

Oh shoot, you’re right!  Well, it’s Saturday, so I guess that means we’re running long today, eh?

A few weeks ago I made my own version of Brendan Brazier’s Direct Fuel Bites for long runs. This batch was made much like the one I made last year – with dates, coconut oil and cocoa powder. This time I threw in a little dulse (for electrolytes), hemp seeds (for protein), chia seeds (for kicks) and shredded coconut (for fun).  Read more...

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Lose Weight Without Counting Calories

September 16th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Weight Loss - (1 Comments)

This is the third post in a three part series about measuring the various aspects related to weight loss to more effectively achieve weight loss success.

This series began with the line “what gets measured gets managed“.

Part 1 was about counting calories.

Part 2 was about keeping track of your work out stats.

Part 3 is going to be about measuring your weight in order to manage it.

I am of the personal opinion that if you want to get serious about losing weight, calorie counting is the best approach for real results.  Read more...

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How to Make a Rockin’ Birthday Breakfast

September 15th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Party Time - (7 Comments)

September 15, 2011 started out a lot like September 15, 2006.

Everyone asleep.  Everyone but me.

Waking up Zak and telling him it was time to go.

Getting dressed and moving around with hushed voices, get ready to leave the house in the wee hours of the morning.

The cat meowing and meowing and meowing as I tried to make my way to the door.

Except this year it was 5:55 AM, not 1:45 AM.  And this year we weren’t headed to the hospital, I was headed to the grocery store.  (The cat was still meowing and meowing and meowing though.)  Read more...

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Retrace Your Steps

September 14th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Lunch - (7 Comments)

Have you ever found yourself eating a grilled hummus and coleslaw sandwich for lunch and wondered how on earth such a concoction happened to land on your plate?

Coleslaw and Hummus Sandwich

Oh right, I think it started because I was making soup.

Soup and Sandwich

Soup that began with potatoes.

White Potatoes

And then some beans were added too.

Cannellini Beans

And then Bean and Potato Soup turned into Bean Potato Onion Carrot Cabbage Soup as I went pawing through the CSA produce to find more soup ingredients.

Onions, Carrots, Red Cabbage  Read more...

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Homeschool Lessons for All

September 13th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Fitness - (1 Comments)

Now that Maxine can ride her bike, Homeschool Phys Ed class is officially in session.

Riding Buds The Claw Over My Shoulder Ready to Ride

Is this really Phys Ed? Or is this just a morning run in disguise?

Whatever you want to call it, a bunch of lessons were learned on our group outing this morning – lessons for both young and old.

A Lesson for Mom

When Maxine says “Whoa, whoa, whoa!!”, that means she’s about to come to a sudden and complete stop in the middle of the sidewalk.

This lead to the discovery that I run too closely behind Maxine.  Read more...

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The Easiest Way to Teach Your Kid to Ride a Bike

September 12th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Parenting - (8 Comments)

Last summer I wrote about Ava learning to ride a bike with the “balance bike” approach.  I’m here now to sing the praises of this method once again.  It’s worked just as well for Thing 2 – but this time two years sooner!

The balance bike approach is exactly that; no training wheels.  It’s about learning to balance first, pedaling comes later.  A “real” balance bike has no pedals – but we just used a regular, very small bike for Ava.  You don’t need a special bike, what matters is that they can easily catch themselves when they lose their balance.  Ava was 6 when she learned, so her legs were long enough that the pedals didn’t get in her way while she was learning to balance.  Read more...

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Cookies, Finally

September 11th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Party Time - (4 Comments)

A week or two ago, the PR folks at Newman’s Own Organic asked me if we’d be interested in trying out the newest additions to their Family Recipe Cookie line.

Newman's Own Organic New Ginger Snap and Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

And given I’m not the kind of girl who typically says “no” to cookies made with organic ingredients and real sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup – not to mention cookies from a company who’s products I’ll happily toss into the shopping cart anyway – it was easy to say,

Why sure! Of course we’d love to try your latest cookies!  Read more...

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Track Your Workouts, Lose Weight Faster

September 9th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Weight Loss - (19 Comments)

This is the second post in a three part series about measuring the various aspects related to weight loss to more effectively achieve weight loss success.

I want to start by saying that when it comes to losing weight, I use to put WAY more emphasis on exercise than I do now.  Being active is certainly an important part a healthy life – but studies suggest (and from what I’ve found in my own experience as well), improving the quality of your food and being mindful about how much you eat can have a much bigger impact on weight loss when compared to exercise alone.  This is why the calorie counting post came first and a post about keeping an exercise log came second.  Read more...

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It’s Not Peachy Being Green

September 8th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Breakfast - (5 Comments)

Right Kermie?

Kermit the Frog

(something like that.)

Random fact: my kids never took any interest in Sesame Street. I WAS TOTALLY LOOKING FORWARD RELIVING MY CHILDHOOD, GIRLS! That was part of the reason I had kids in the first place.

Anyways.

Peaches! More peaches! Peaches are turning out to be one of my new favorite smoothie additions.

Ginger Peach Green Smoothie

They are just so… peachy?

Load Up Smoothie Ingredients

Layered with frozen banana slices and some spinach, they make a great smoothie trio.

My other new favorite smoothie additive –

Grind Your Ginger  Read more...

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Stuff It, Quinoa

September 7th, 2011 | Posted by Alison Spath in Lunch - (1 Comments)

When I bought my bag of flax seed over the weekend, I snagged a bag of another now-infamous pseudo-grain/seed –>

Arrowhead Mills Quinoa Black Bean and Quinoa Stuffed Peppers

oh, Quinoa – it’s been a while!

And with quinoa in my cupboard, suddenly I had quinoa stuffed peppers on the brain. That meant digging through the blog archives to remind myself how I made Quinoa Stuffed Red Peppers in the past.

Ummm, that was like my second post. Ever.

Nostalgia rules. Stuffed peppers make me drool.  Read more...

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