Good Mornings, Garmin’s & Green Monsters!

Who doesn’t love a Summer’s Sunday morning? The sun peeks through the tree branches and the air is crisp. It’s completely relaxing, if I don’t say so myself!

I don’t own a Garmin or Stopwatch or a timer of any sort. Now, that doesn’t make running harder, but it does leave me estimating my distance/time. I have been running the same course for about a year. (I need change, I know) My point is, I know how long I usually take to run circle this course. 20 minutes in roughly 2 mile (I’m positive). But, for the past several weeks, I’ve been doing what I call, Quick-Runs. Otherwise known as Fartlek running. Yeah, great name…but Fartlek has helped me understand my ability to push myself. My mind chants “do it, do it, do it. (because you can)” and eventually, my time has gone from 20, to 19 and 18 and now, it’s at 17 minutes since yesterday. 17 minutes, 2 miles-ish. I’m awesome with distance running, but not speed.

So, I am hoping to own a Garmin watch one day, just one day. Especially if I want to train for a 5k next summer, but for now, my iPod will suffice!…Moving onto breakfast. I have for you just two simple words. Green Monster, created by the inspirational Angela.

GM topped with Toasted Oats

I know there are plenty of GM recipe’s out in the Blogworld, and I’m eager to try them all, but this is one I’ve loved just about every morning.

So Simple Green Monster. Oh yes, Simple indeed.

1 Tsp Flax seed (I’ve never tried Chia, but you certainly can!)
1 Frozen Banana
2-3 Cups Packed Spinach (Raw & Fresh, just like breakfast should be!)
3/4 Cup of ____ milk. (You fill in the blank, I use Almond)

Place everything in blender in that order & blend away. Blend until you don’t see large specs of Spinach. Top it with 1/2 Cup of Spinach or blend the 1/2 Cup Spinach right in there! I prefer the latter. It makes the GM thicker, without needing ice. Ice makes the GM too cold and….icy for me. haha!

I’m off to tackle the day with editing papers, eat good food and relax with a book or boy meets world, the good ol’ 90′s show.

You Magical Saturday, You

I wake up 5:45 every morning. I then jump…well, more like roll out of bed and happily stroll straight into the bathroom with my ipod, sock-roll and Chapstick in hand ready to conquer another run. Yes, right after I slip on my socks and lace up my sneakers, my legs pound the ground for an hour. Sometimes less, sometimes more. It all depends on how I feel, right?

Right. I run less if something is wrong. For example, my IT band pains and signals me to stop and walk home. I run less because my body needs rest, but my mind just doesn’t know it. Sometimes, it’s a slump morning and I just somehow can’t seem to do it, no matter how hard I force myself. Yes, force. Well, running less is not what’s on my mind for today’s post. It’s quite the opposite. Running more. More. More than I planned. More than I thought I could. More than I ever could imagine myself doing. It’s as if something magical happened inside my body. In a sense, if you think about it, something magical did happen. That magical sense that sparked my mind pours positive thoughts. “I can do this! Holy smokes, this feels so awesome! Where the heck did this spurge of energy come from?!”

Amazingly, this happens to me every Saturday morning. At least for a while since I picked up running after my knee injury. Though, I want to touch base on this note. Running (or any challenging physical activity) for that matter, is all in the head. Your mind. So long as you remind yourself that you can do it, you eventually will. You will eventually run that 5k or complete that triathlon if you keep telling yourself that (on top of practice and appropriate training, of course). It is all willpower, being optimistic with positive thinking.

I tried overnight oats again this morning. I did not enjoy it the first time, which was more than a year ago. But I decided last night to give it another try because I love Quaker Oat’s Strawberries + Cream, but wanted to make my own version of it. I’ll just say, it was okay. I don’t think I added enough milk, so it was dry like Las Vegas on a summer’s day…..Oh yeah, I forgot to snap a picture of it, sorry!