Happy Wednesday!

Hey everyone! Happy hump day! Thankfully today is my "Friday" and I have big plans for my days off.

So last night I got off work and then headed out to do my food shopping. I picked up some pork chops, boneless/skinless chicken breast, & pork loin for my meats. Veggie wise, I picked up some spring mix for my salads, tomatoes, cucumbers, green peppers, zucchini, mushrooms, carrots, & some red onion. I had wanted to pick up some avocado, but they didn't look so appetizing. I also picked up some Greek yogurt, apples, bananas, almonds, eggs, and some cheese.

Last night I was a busy girl. After my shopping, I made dinner and also prepped my chicken for the rest of the week. For dinner I cooked up the pork chops I made, along with some zucchini, red onion, green pepper, tomato, and some mushrooms. The veggies were sauteed in sun dried tomato bruschetta with Italian basil and extra virgin olive oil. I also threw in a little garlic powder. It was so flavorful and yummy! I'm having the leftovers for lunch today and I can't wait to dig in!

As for the chicken, I cleaned the boneless/skinless chicken breasts, put foil down in a baking pan, put in a couple tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil, placed the chicken in the pan coating both sides with the EVOO, seasoned them with some salt, pepper, and some roasted red pepper flakes and then covered the pan with foil before putting them in the oven. I baked them at 325f for about an hour. I'm sure they were probably done before that time, but the Blackhawks game was on and I lost track of time.. haha. Either way, they came out fabulously and I can't wait to eat them with some veggies or slice them to put on a salad. In the midst of this all, I also hardboiled some eggs for snacks.

Tonight for dinner I'm planning on making a quesadilla. I have multigrain tortillas at home and I think I'm going to shred up one of the chicken breasts I made. I'll throw in some chopped jalapeno & cheese and have myself a lovely dinner. I'll probably also chop up some tomato and cucumber and have myself a little salad on the side. My mouth is watering just thinking about it! :)

ALSO, my plan for the evening is to get a 45 min walk in and some weight training. I'm blessed to have two very awesome people in my life that help me out a lot with exercises. My dear friend Jenni is a natural body builder and has shown me before how to do some at home weight training. She knows a lot and shares a lot with me! There is also Russ at work who is our sales manager. He is a wealth of information regarding food and fitness. He's been really great at checking in with me and keeping me accountable. I have a weight bench at home and some dumbells, so it's time for me to put them to work. I found a beginners plan online to start incorporating weight work twice a week into my routine. I'm excited to start this. Right now, my main "cardio" is walking as I'm still on the heavier side and don't have access to a gym at the moment. My plan is to do a 45 min to an hour walk five days a week, and do weight work twice a week to start out with. I can't wait to see the changes even small steps will make in my body. I'm excited!

Another awesome thing that will be starting soon is The Central Station Biggest Loser Contest. Myself, Michelle, and Sandra (plus whatever other operators want to join) have decided to start a challenge. We haven't decided on all of the specifics yet, but what I do know is we will be contributing $10-$20 every two weeks to the challenge. We haven't decided if this should be a quarterly thing, or if we will make it a year long challenge. If we do quarterly, the person who loses the most weight at the end of the quarter gets the money contributed. If we do the whole year, the person with the biggest weight loss at the end of the year gets the money saved from our contributions. We have a lot of support on this from Russ (sales manager) in our front office. So this should be exciting!! I'll fill you all in more in depth when we have the whole plan worked out. Either way, I'm looking forward to diving right in and winning some money!! :)

I think that's all for now. I have a couple other posts I want to get out within the next week or so. One of which being my list of motivations to lose weight. So stay tuned and have an amazing day!