Hello everyone hope you are having a wonderful Sunday! This weekend has been brilliant but a bit weird to say the least, perhaps its because Halloween is approaching…

I couldn’t resist getting a pumpkin to carve! I just went with some simple stars – it looks so pretty :-)

I started my weekend on Friday night. When got home from work I made myself a gorgeous smoothie:

Purple kale, chocolate sun warrior, raw almond butter, raw cacao, water, ice and stevia, it was delicious – I’ve had a few smoothies like that over the weekend using the purple kale. Then I did some tidying up and got ready to go out and see the family, OOTD:

Leather hoody: Topshop, fake fur stole: New Look, loose fit cream jumper: H&M, bag: Oasis, red pants: New Look, ankle boots: New Look

Notice the sun shining through the flat in that pic? Well a few hours later we had this:

That would be snow, and quite a bit of it! I don’t mind snow but it is rather early in the season for me! It continued to snow during the night and there was a white blanket over everything come morning. I had already decided that yesterday was going to be a pyjamas and no make up day so when I eventually got up I thought I’d make some muffins!

I had an idea around flavours so made up a recipe based on my Courgette, Date and Pecan Bread. These turned out very well and in addition to tasting good they are pretty low in calories:

Courgette, cranberry and pistachio ‘skinny’ muffins! Made ‘un skinny’ by loading them up with a mixture of softened butter and maple syrup. Oh yeah. Accompanied by strong black coffee and a large sliced organic apple. Recipe coming up on those babies!

The cooking didn’t stop there as I also boiled some chickpeas and black beans to stock up the freezer, a wonderful soup with the innards of that pumpkin (recipe coming tomorrow!), these sweet and salty pumpkin seeds (I used coconut sugar) and a Thai Red Butternut and Lentil Curry:

I served it with steamed broccoli and a half arsed attempt at cauliflower rice (i.e I couldn’t be bothered to chop it in the food processor so did it by hand instead). It is so tasty! I’ve made that curry a few times in the past and I know some of you have asked for the recipe so consider that one on its way as well!

Alongside bowls of sheep yoghurt (my new love!) with berries and chocolate peanut butter protein ‘ice cream’ I’ve enjoyed some banana cake my best friend and her little girl had made:

She had grated fresh coconut into the cake and in the icing. It was heavenly!

This morning I work up slightly earlier than usual due to the clocks going back so had time for a more decent breakfast before the gym and kettlebells class. I had some plain oats cooked in water topped with tahini and dark chocolate chips:

Then this lunch time I have roasted my first chicken!

I just roasted it plain with some olive oil. James took all the meat off it and the leftovers are simmering into a stock as I type. I had a breast with some thyme honey roasted parsnips, cauliflower mash with butter and steamed broccoli. It was really good! To make the cauliflower I just blended it up with a little almond milk. I honestly think I like it better than mashed potato!

Right now I’m just trying to get my head around the time change, it always leaves me feeling slightly off kilter! Do the clocks going back affect you? How has your weekend been? Do you have any plans for Halloween?

Happy Thursday everyone! Not long till the weekend now thank goodness. Seems that we all have a similar idea of what would be our perfect day!


Today has been a bit different as I’ve been able to work from home to get a few of pieces of work wrapped up. Of course, my day started with an awesome breakfast – toasted hazelnut rye bread with cashew butter and banana plus fresh strawberries.





Extremely yummy!


I worked away until the gym opened at 9 and then went and did my workout – 45 minutes of cardio intervals followed by abs and a few half push ups and tricep dips. I came home and made myself a tasty vanilla protein frappe with a scoop of vanilla whey, soy milk, ice cubes and a little decaf coffee. I also had an apple.

 


I always seem to work much more effectively from home for some reason, I managed to blast through my tasks for the day! Check out my little makeshift desk:





I love my inspirational desktop wallpaper!


Lunch was some turkey, hummus and lettuce wraps with some carrot and cucumber on the side. I do realise that this plate looks like something you would take out to give to your pet rabbit but turkey, hummus and lettuce wraps are great!

 


I followed that with this amazing bowl of 2 chopped peaches and some blueberries.





Mid afternoon I quickly snacked on another apple and a couple of babybel light to keep me going.





I also snacked on another apple and a few soya nuts, that’s the downside of working from home – too much food available for snacking!


For dinner I decided to get creative and make a big stir fry but with cauliflower rice and veggie noodles. This took a bit of prep but was good fun! To make cauliflower rice you just finely chop some cauliflower (or pop it in a food processor, but I didn’t want the extra dishes) then steam it for a few minutes and serve in the same way you would rice. My veggie noodles were made from carrot and courgette with my spiraliser – I also added some more quorn pieces, red pepper, spring onion and cauliflower leaves to the stir fry then topped it all with my favourite soy sauce and ginger.




Just so amazingly fresh and healthy tasting!


I must have been in a good ole fun loving mood this evening as I decided to get creative with my desert too. I made a layer up with some of my peachy tofu ‘yoghurt’ and blueberries then topped with some flaked almonds and a little of my honey comb.




I believe pretty food is good for the soul!






This week it is the launch of fellow blogger Caitlin's book – Operation Beautiful and to celebrate she has invited bloggers to write a post on the theme of ‘Change the way you see not the way you look’. I though it would nice for me to write a short piece on my big transformation – and that’s not what you might think!
Yes, I have lost a lot of weight, but I see my big transformation not in this weight loss, rather in the change from wanting to be ‘skinny’ to wanting to be healthy. This change in mindset happened after I had lost most of my weight and when I first started reading blogs.


Up until then I had been existing on lots of ‘fake’ foods – processed cereals bars, powdered cuppa soups (I shudder at the thought that I used to eat those!), frozen convenience foods and so on. Although I also exercised, the aim of the exercise was just to burn calories to lose the weight. I never really enjoyed my workouts when they were solely focused on weight loss. They were also always just cardio workouts with no resistance training at all.


When I started reading blogs, and blogging myself at the beginning of this year, it was like a light bulb had suddenly switched on in my head – here were other people – who were healthy, running marathons, eating real delicious food, keeping to a healthy weight, not comparing themselves to unrealistic standards. It was amazing. I had my eyes opened and decided that my quest to become skinny was pointless, I would never ever be satisfied or successfully maintain my weight loss while that was my focus.


Since I have changed my perspective from the pursuit of ‘skinny’ to that of healthy I can honestly say my life has been transformed. I have discovered a passion for eating and preparing delicious and nutritious food which satisfies me on a level that I never though possible. I have a new enthusiasm for exercise, I love my workouts and I see real results. Since starting on this new path I have lost even more weight and reached a truly healthy happy weight.


Although I still hit bumps in the road (such as excessive snacking, the associated guilt, and the occasional holiday related 5lb gain!) I feel for the first time ever that I won’t re gain the weight and that I will be able to maintain this healthy weight for the rest of my life.


Another added bonus of this change in perspective is that I’ve become more immune to the photo shopped images of women in magazines that used to make me feel so bad about myself. I now look at these images with a critical eye, and remind myself that being healthy is what is beautiful to me now.


Healthy isn’t a number on the scale.


Healthy isn’t a dress size.


Healthy is feeling great about yourself.


Healthy is filling your body with nutritious delicious food.


Being healthy is having energy and being able to use that energy.


I used to feel like my body didn’t belong to me. I had no connection to it because I felt uncomfortable in it, I abused it. Now I own my body, I feel connected to it and I value it.


Take a moment today to remind yourself that you are beautiful on the inside and out, just the way you are x

Yay for Friday! So glad that the weekend is here :-) Hope you’ve all had a good one.

I’m going to apologise in advance at the number of pics of smoothies in this post, with the hot weather we’ve been experiencing alongside my general green smoothie craving I’ve had one everyday this week!

Spinach, 2 celery stalks, 1 large raw beet, 1 frozen banana, 1 cup of home made almond milk, hemp protein powder, maca, barley grass, purple corn powder, msm crystals, stevia, ice, xanthan and guar gums plus sunflower lecithin for added thickness and creaminess topped with fresh strawberries, pistachios and coconut:

This was absolutely gorgeous, raw beet adds so much sweetness along with that gorgeous berry colour. Yum!

Little gem lettuce, celery, persimmon, frozen peaches, home made almond milk, mesquite, spirulina, msm crystals, ground flax, hemp protein powder, stevia sweetener, xanthan and guar gums for thickness and topped with some strawberry and coconut rawnola and mixed seeds:

The ‘rawnola’ was actually made from some failed cookies! I had been trying to make some raw cookies in the dehydrator with leftover almond pulp from making milk (plus agave, coconut, dried and fresh strawberries), they didn’t quite turn out right so I just crumbled them and dehydrated a bit longer to create a granola type mix that will be perfect for topping smoothies and yoghurt bowls. Even James has been eating this on his porridge! Speaking of James and coconut:

39p what a bargain! James adores fresh coconut so we cracked open this baby, I drank the delicious milk and had a few pieces of flesh while he enjoyed the rest, so so tasty!

Another green smoothie! Kale, celery, frozen banana, pink lady apple, vanilla sun warrior protein powder, cinnamon, maca, spirulina, msm, almond milk, ice, xanthan and guar gums for thickness topped with almond butter sauce, raw buckwheaties and gojis:

The buckwheaties were another raw kitchen experiment. I just soaked some buckwheat over night, drained and rinsed and dehydrated for a few hours. These are wonderfully crispy and crunchy, I’m looking forward to eating them like a cereal!

I also made up this lovely simple smoothie one very hot evening:

Watermelon slushie (just frozen watermelon blended with a drop of stevia and water) topped with a sliced persimmon and goji berries, simple and perfect :-)

Cooling and fresh meals probably best sum up my eats these past few days. When I picked up a cauliflower on the cheap at the green grocers I decided to make a cauliflower ‘rice’ salad!

Raw Cauliflower ‘Rice’ Salad (makes 2 large servings, vegan)

• 1 head of cauliflower
• 1 red pepper
• 1/2 cucumber
• 1 red onion
• 1 small bunch of parsley
• 3 tbsp of raisins
• 4 tbsp of apple cider vinegar
• 2 tbsp of hemp oil (or oil of choice)

Break the cauliflower into florets and add to a food processor, processing until the mix resembles rice. Finely chop the onion, cucumber, pepper, cucumber and parsley and mix into the cauliflower rice adding the raisins, vinegar and oil and mixing well. Serve!

I enjoyed mine on top of a mixed leaf herby salad. This is so so good! The sweetness of the raisins and fresh herby taste really are key in making this extra delicious. Such a perfect summer lunch! Obviously if you wanted to make this more substantial you could make it with actual rice either in place of or in addition to the cauliflower, but I really enjoyed how light and zingy it is with just the cauliflower.

In addition to the other dehydrator experiments I also had a go at making some juice pulp crackers! They turned out perfectly:

I enjoyed them with some raw carrot and ginger dip and lots of veggies. To make these I just combined 1 cup of green juice pulp with 1/3 cup of ground flax, garlic powder, onion powder, Italian seasoning and a dash of water then spread out on a lined dehydrator sheet, scored into crackers and dehydrated for 5 hours, flipped, and dehydrated for a further 4 hours. The carrot dip was absolutely divine! The recipe does need a little tweaking before I share it though but I will be making it again for sure!

Dinners have included a twist on my Fresh Asian Salad:

Basically the salad recipe but with added soba noodles, leftover courgette noodles and smoked sesame tofu instead of the edamame, plus a sprinkle of gomasio. This rocked my socks off, the dressing is just so full of flavour! Another ideal warm weather meal.

Tonight I really fancied a big plate of comfort food, enter my quinoa risotto:

I added peas, courgette and sugar snap peas to this recipe along with a side of lightly steamed broccoli. Hit. the. spot :-)

Ok, so I’m about to have a little pity party so please bear with me…

I had a bit of a crappy run this week. On Wednesday morning I did my usual hilly 7 mile route. I actually felt really great and felt like I was going reasonably fast. When I checked my time at the 5 mile mark I realised that I was actually quite slow, slower in fact than the last time I ran that route when I had been feeling really rubbish. I did the 7 miles in 1hr 04 with an average pace of 9.10, the last time was 9.07 and the time before that 9.05. It really knocked my confidence, not so much being slower, but the fact that I had thought I was putting in a really good run!

Insert OOTD from this weeks liberating my wardrobe challenge! Silver hoop earrings: Accessorize, blush blazer: Next, striped top: Zara, harem pants: New Look, gold sandals: Next

It really got me down for some reason and really knocked my confidence. I don’t usually keep an eye on my pace when I run as I like to focus on just enjoying it, but after weeks of progressing so well I don’t want to start going backwards. I know it could have been due to tiredness from the weekend, and perhaps I wasn’t as well fuelled from the day before as I should have been. Anyway, I have long training run scheduled for tomorrow and by god I am determined to make it a good one!

In addition to that workouts have been the usual stuff, yoga podcast, cardio based gym session with abs and core and my amended NRoL workout this morning, all of which were way better than that run!

I’m so looking forward to this weekend, I need some serious relaxation and catching up! I’m hoping to get that long run done first thing then I can get on with the rest of the weekend, seeing friends and family and getting caught up with stuff around the house. Have you any exciting plans for the weekend?

I’d also like to say a quick hello to my first ever blogger sponsor the lovely Cat from Knitting, Running, Eating! Please head on over to her fab blog and check it out! If your interested in promoting your blog with me just drop me an email: laura@keepinghealthygettingstylish.com

How do you deal with a crappy workout? I guess I’m just more determined to make my next run a good one!

Hope you have an awesome weekend!