Yoga

Yoga Cures Everything

Posted in Dinner, Eating Out, Lunch, Positive Thinking, Sweets, Yoga on April 30th, 2010 by Karin – 10 Comments

 

When I was walking to yoga after work I was completely stressed out. All I wanted to do was to curl up in bed and hide from this world for a couple of weeks.

And then we did all sorts of poses that I absolutely hate and I was cursing up a storm on the inside but pushed through it.

And in shavasana I felt pure bliss.

Life is like yoga: there are a lot of things that get in your way that you don’t like but you just have to suck it up and go through it. And you know what? It’s not too bad.

As I was walking to the open air cinema site after yoga (yes! open air cinema in April!) to go and see “The Big Lebowski” with my friends I realized that I was the one who put unnecessary stress on myself.

First of all it was all for pleasure. It’s not like I had to study hard for an exam! I played squash with my friends, had great dinners, went to a runner’s event with my dad and so on.. it’s all things that I wanted to do!

So why the heck was I complaining? Well I guess I just often wish that I wouldn’t want to do so many things at once. And to be honest, I just wanted a night off for myself for some blogreading, hehe..
But again, I wanted to do these things or else I would have been a bit annoyed.

 

Sorry for the rant but maybe I’m not the only one who sometimes feels like that.

 

I set my alarm for 5am though it’s nearly 00:30am. Guess that sleeping in for an other hour is ok ;) .

Tomorrow we’ll spend the day with Silvio’s family and I have no idea what we’ll do. Hiking was planned but it’s supposed to rain like crazy. So we’ll see.

 

Despite my whining there has been some amazing stuff going on. Like the chocolate banana cake that I made for my friend Simone on Wednesday (which was my secret mission – she sometimes reads the blog so I couldn’t write about it. ;) )

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Also.. I think I found the best sandwich ever. Tibits makes a great one with asparagus, sundried tomato paste, bear’s garlic pesto (with tofu), tomato and lettuce. (I had it before but fell in love again hehe)

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To. Die. For.

Too bad that it’s only a spring-offer. Good that I ate the exact same sandwich today for lunch again. ;)

It tastes especially well with a green juice and some magazine on the side..

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For Simone’s birthday we went and had dinner at an Indian restaurant yesterday! We started with samosas and something else… Ha! I ordered it but forgot the name. Too bad..

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I had a veggie curry with garlic naan which was heavenly.

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My camera’s battery died right after taking this photo.

 

So you see, life isn’t all too bad. Though I must say that too much good stuff often sometimes put unnecessary stress on us too..

I guess it’s time for bed. Or better: my yantra mat!

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I read so many good things about it and decided to order one. It arrived today and I can’t wait to try it and loosen up my neck and back muscles.

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Whoooo party time!

 

Have a wonderful weekend! I just realized that it’s already May now. What the eff?? Where did the time go?

Workout DVDs + Other Things.

Posted in Breakfast, Dinner, Lunch, Working Out, Yoga on April 9th, 2010 by Karin – 14 Comments

 

So according to you wise people the following places should be visited:

  • Vienna (agree! Such an underrated city!)
  • Paris (me likes it too. Especially the Marais)
  • Salzburg
  • Krakau
  • Porto
  • Barcelona
  • Key West
  • “Tons of odd little towns in Northern California” (said Christine ;) )
  • Mijas (never heard of this place. Need to google it)
  • Leipzig

Well that should give you some travelling inspiration ;) . (+I should probably start saving more money)

 

It’s weird that today’s Friday. Not that I’m complaining (not at all!!!) but short weeks are always a bit weird to me.

Tonight I really wanted to go to yoga class but for some reason no one was around!! Weird weird. Well I then went back home and made dinner. Will get in some rocking yoga session after I hit publish :)

 

Before talking about food I want to show you all a t-shirt that my amazing friend Karin (yes, the name-sister) gave me yesterday…

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Seriously, no one would uenderstand “PB&J” over here but you guys get it right? I think it’s so cute!! I can’t believe what amazing friends I have (in general – not because they give me funky t-shirts ;) ).

 

Break faster. Erm. Breakfast.

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I’m actually not too thrilled about OIAJ, I’d rather have some creamy almond butter on my oats but it’s a nice way to finish a jar of nut butter anyway.

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Especially with millions of toppings.

 

I finally got some groceries shopping done on lunchtime! Again it felt like my bag would rip off my arm because I always tend to buy extremely heavy stuff (what?? Some rice milk, quinoa and produce isn’t heavy, right??)

Pre-shopping I had a small wrap with sunflower sesame paste and cucumbers…

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…as well as some cooked quinoa (prepared last night), black beans and a raw carrot.

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When I was almost done with my lunch I remembered my fancy tupperware I packed. It contained nutritional yeast, sesame seeds and sunflower seeds. Well I added it to the measly rest and got kind of a dusty meal..

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Still good though. :)

 

After I cried in front of my yoga school’s door (kidding ;) ) I rushed home and got to work on dinner.

I soaked some dry chickpeas overnight (last night) and cooked them this morning while I was eating breakfast and getting ready. So easy peasy! For dinner I roasted them with a bit of olive oil and garam masala. Fabulous! (They shrank a lot though. Hmmm..)

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I also had some daikon with shoyu on the side.

 

As well as a salad (ice berg lettuce, radish, 2 grape tomatoes, 1/2 avocado and balsamic vinegar + walnut oil)

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Five seconds later I needed carbs. Pasta. Ha! As if I didn’t enough pasta last weekend..

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That small bowl of whole wheat pasta with pesto hit the spot though.

 

I have to tell you a secret: I LOVE silly workout DVD with even sillier titles. Sigh, I can’t help it. Unfortunately I don’t have too many (yet! hehe…) However, DVDs with super silly names are often totally kick-ass (“No More Trouble Zones” anyone??) which is the reason why I started to like them – not because I’m a name-fanatic. So today I ordered some since the last time I got a workout DVD was.. many moons ago. I also ordered a couple of yoga DVDs (one with the title: “Yoga for Indie Rockers” haha).

Practicing for myself is great though I sometimes also just want to “switch off” and do whatever the teacher tells me to do. It also makes me try harder. There are also some great yoga podcasts on iTunes that I like too. :)

 

Q: Do you workout with DVDs? Any favourites? I don’t own many workout DVDs but I like No More Trouble Zones (despite the title) and was actually a bit surprised because I couldn’t really stand Gillian anymore after the 30 Day Shred.. Yoga DVDs.. Hmm.. Shiva Rea’s Yoga Shakti is great. Also the Jivamukti Yoga one by David Life and Sharon Gannon. For yoga I generally prefer podcasts/audio guides though.

 

Have a fantastic weekend!!

A Day Of Eats And No Internet

Posted in Breakfast, Dinner, Films, Lunch, Snacks, Yoga on March 10th, 2010 by Karin – 17 Comments

 

It’s official: Technology hates me. Yesterday I was all excited about blogging from home because my sister bought this super cool laptop off her boyfriend and I thought that setting up the internet was easy peasy. Well, I was wrong.

I tried to be all zen about it but I was swearing up a storm on the inside. In the end I gave up and did  lunar flow yoga à la Shiva Rea. 1 hour 13 minutes later I was a relaxed person again ;) .

(Though I was secretly still a bit pissed that things didn’t work out the way I wanted them to.) ;)

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Sorry that I’m being such a horrible blogger. :(

 

On an other note: Thank you for all the lovely comments! You are the kindest people on earth :) . Things are back to normal and I’m somehow glad that this happened. Is that weird? “Bad” experiences always remind me to live my life at the fullest – which includes fun times, as well as solving problems and dealing with issues. Only this will prevent me from getting stuck. I never want to stop learning new things – no matter how big or small they are. The thought of becoming a grumpy, narrow-minded grandma scares the hell out of me.

Anyway. Yesterday I wanted to write a good old traditional food blogger post and show you every little thing I ate. Too bad that the laptop was on strike. Do you mind seeing everything today? I hope not ;)

I decided to go to the gym first thing in the morning because I did no strength training last week. (Cough). I grabbed a almond butter & fruit spread whole rice waffle on the way out.

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The entire workout took me 1h 15 min (10 minutes on the cross trainer & 5 minutes of stretching included) and afterwards I had a hard boiled egg & a shake.

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Behold.. The prettiest shake EVER:

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I was out of non-dairy milk so I used regular 2% milk and protein powder.

Afterwards I headed to the health food store because I still had some time before work. I was in the mood for some earthy teas and so I bought some rooibos and pu erh tea.

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My tea stashes at work and home are getting out of control.. but I like variety!

Mid morning I snacked on a banana that looked super beaten up.

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Lunch was a fabulous salad and some black sesame crackers & a hard boiled egg

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And then I ate more crackers. They’re incredibly addictive and I have no will power at all.

Work was good and busy and I managed to get a lot done.

At one point I had some apple and peanut butter.

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After work I basically flew back home because I was starving. I had some tomme and edamer cheese while I was washing the dishes.

For dinner I was craving breakfast. Porridge, to be precise. However, I wanted to use the buckwheat flakes instead of oats that I got from the health food store in the morning.

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The porridge turned out to be bran-like and I loved it!

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Of course I couldn’t miss the usual toppings..

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For some reason I was still hungry afterwards and so I also had a piece of toast with vegan margarine and some chocolate.

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I skipped pilates because of the computer troubles but it was good to get some yoga in. I love lunar flow yoga and the one of Shiva Rea’s Yoga Shakti DVD is so relaxing. Shiva Rea’s classes need some getting used to at first (if you’re not very used to creative movements and “letting go”) but I like them. I haven’t done any yoga with DVDs in ages but today I dug out an other yoga DVD of Shiva (Creative Core Abs) and flowed for 35 minutes :) . Today isn’t going to be much of a work-out day but it was good to get some yoga in.

Oh I almost forgot.. I also made some protein bars à la Averie last night! I changed the recipe a bit because I had to work with what I had on hand.. (No major changes though. Only dates/apricots instead of raisins and no chocolate chips…). Check out her blog for the recipe :) .

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I just had one and I highly recommend them. :)

Xanthan and Guar Gum seems to be quite popular in the blog world but I knew that there was no way we could get them over here. We’re lucky enough to have goji berries and hemp seeds!! ;) It was a huge surprise when I saw Guar Gum at the health food store yesterday..

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Of course I had to use it for breakfast. I’ve never made smoothie in a bowl before and so I knew that I had to make some for today’s breakfast.

In the blender went:

  • 1 cup soy milk
  • 1 banana
  • 1 scoop chocolate whey protein powder
  • approximately 1/4 cup frozen blueberries
  • 1/2 tsp guar gum

Tadaaaaa…

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I can’t believe that it made such a difference!! It was like eating a runny mousse ;) . Unfortunately I couldn’t finish it all – it was way too much.

But now that I’ve tried it with guar gum I wonder what a difference some added xanthan gum would make…

Tonight I’ll meet up with my friend Daniela and we will go and see “An Education”. I adore Nick Hornby books and I’m looking forward to seeing the film. God, there are so many great films at the cinemas right now.. I also can’t wait to see “The Men Who Stare At Goats” – Jeff Bridges and Ewan McGregor are such cool dudes ;) .

Q: Have you seen a good film lately that you can recommend? The last film I saw was “A Single Man” which I really liked. I was a bit sceptical at first because Tom Ford (yep, the former fashion designer) is the director but the film was beautiful and very artistic. Colin Firth was also fantastic in it and he truly deserved his Oscar nomination.

Q2: Have you tried xanthan / guar gum? And to those who did: what exactly does xanthan do to the smoothie? I only see bloggers using both guar gum and xanthan gum but I wonder if that’s “necessary”.

Chocolate For Breakfast

Posted in Breakfast, Films, Running, Yoga on January 29th, 2010 by Karin – 16 Comments

Something extremely groundbreaking happened today.

…..

..

.

 I made different oats!!! Seriously. I’m not kidding. I know it’s a shock to you all.

This morning I got up super bright and early and rushed back home (stayed the night at the boyfriend’s), changed clothes, yadda yadda and decided to be experimental.

Ok, maybe not that experimental because I made these oats all the time when I was blog-less. Anyway, I present you all a change from the usual oatsies that was pretty darn fab.

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Chocolate oats! (1/3 c oats, 1 1/3 c water, 1/2 banana, 1 scoop chocolate protein powder) Topped with some Crunchy Quinoa mix and drizzled with almond butter.

PRETTIEST BROWN BOWL EVER!

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Seriously. It was awesome.

~~~~~~~~~

 

Post-breakfast I went and played with my Hello Kitty snow globe. Just like any other 22yo would do.

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And at work I injured myself.. Whoever said that working in an office isn’t dangerous was completely wrong. Ever heard of paper cuts? Huh?

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I’m sure Bella has.

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So maybe you’re one of those poor people who have to work on Saturdays but I’m a super normal Monday-Friday employee and am SO glad that it’s Friday. I stayed at work until 9 PM yesterday which simply wasn’t that sexy.

But tonight is all about playing! I’ll meet up with my friend Christine and we’ll go and have a fab time with these guys:

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Jude kinda looks like a hyena in this picture…

The thing is.. The film starts at 8 PM. And yoga ends at 7:30 PM (although it’s usually 10 minutes longer). I would make it in time but I would be without dinner (gasp!) and couldn’t take a shower (GASP!). So I think I’ll skip yoga class today but go on a run instead and do some yoga after my movie-date.

That’s all for now. I will save my superbe news for my next post. Muahahaha.

Q: What’s your favourite film? That’s a tough question, I know! As you all probably know, I love going to the movies / watching DVDs… And so it’s pretty difficult to choose my favourite film of all times. But some of my faves are: Star Wars (I’m a nerd, I know), Amélie, Girl Interrupted, LotR, A Knight’s Tale, Shaun of the Dead, The Boat that Rocked, As It Is In Heaven, Across the Universe, … and approximately 3984298 more.

Change Is Good

Posted in Dinner, Yoga on January 28th, 2010 by Karin – 5 Comments

So yeah about that title.. I am going to change things a bit with this blog. Now, don’t sweat, I’ll still post daily but it won’t be a “I ate this and that…” blog anymore. Not that I don’t love reading blogs like these, (I do!!!), I just think that focusing more on good meals and other health related stuff would fit better (for me). But I’ll probably sometimes also post about daily eats – I’ll just go with the flow and do what suits best.
Plus: I just changed the font size as well because seriously, who can stand Arial 12? ;)

I hope you guys are ok with this but if you now want to come after me with a butcher’s knife.. That’s ok too because most readers are from the States anyway. Ha! CATCH ME IF YOU CAN!

You know, maybe I’ll crawl back and bug you all with my daily eats again next week but this baby banana is still pretty young and I have to see what works best for me. Sorry if that’s a pain in the a**.

So, with that being said.. There’s going to be more ranting!

  • Michael
  • Jamie
  • Lentils
  • Yoga
  • Planks

Now, the first two guys aren’t potential boyfriend candidates (I’m still happy with you, daaarling! ;) ) but two of my favourite foodies.

 

Michael Pollan

Ok, it’s almost embarrassing to say but I haven’t read any of his books! *blush* I have had “In Defence of Food” at home for over a year but I’m terrible when it comes to reading.. I have at least 30 “must read!” books at home and I’m currently reading 3 at the same time. But I’ll definitely get to “In Defence of Food” as soon as possible. Despite the fact that I haven’t read his books I have read a ton about him online. When I checked my e-mails this morning I saw the newsletter of Epicurious and there’s a fabulous interview with Michael that you should all check out.  Also: I saw on The Kind Life that Michael Pollan (and Alicia Silverstone) was (were) on Oprah yesterday. Did anyone watch it? I still need to find it online because, well, we don’t get Oprah over here. Duh.

 

Jamie Oliver

An other guy that I think is pretty amazing is Jamie Oliver. Mum and I used to watch his show all the time and I love how he made British schools serve healthier food and generally makes cooking fun and even cool. In the same Epicurious newsletter I saw Jamie’s Valentine’s Menu. I know the day is still weeks away but if you want to get some inspiration.. here’s some good stuff! :) Valentine’s Day isn’t very important to us but this year we’ll go snowshoeing and snowboarding on that weekend. (Only because that weekend fits us, not because of V-Day.)

 

Now.. On to food pics!

We had quite the discussion before/after yesterday’s swimming session. “I’m craving quinoa” – “I’d rather fancy corn” – “Alright so let’s make both” – “No if we cook together, then we should also eat the same stuff” – “But I don’t eat meat” – “Yeah but that’s not the same”.. And it went on an on. I was on Team quinoa by the way. We then settled for sweet potatoes that sadly went unpictured…

We had them with a side of broccoli, roasted tomatoes and lentil curry! Oh how I’ve missed my lentils! We made them a bit pseudo-Indian because we added a curry mix and some ground coriander.

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And then we tried this little piece of magic:

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Yoga

I’ve been working in this office for 2,5 years and always wanted to take my yoga mat to work and do a quick session on lunchtime. I never made it. Until yesterday. Hooray! It was so refreshing and fab, will do that a lot from now on!

 

Plank challenge…

…is going good now. 1:20 was hard but not as hard as expected. It’s all mental, me thinks. 1:25 awaits me today! Woooo!

 

Alright that’s all. For today. I have something super exciting to share but this post is already super text heavy so I’ll leave it for tomorrow.

Also: I didn’t forget about the missing Japan recaps!! I will post them this weekend.

 

No Q for today. Just let me know what you think of my blog change. Cheers!

Salads. Not Diets.

Posted in Breakfast, Dinner, Yoga on January 23rd, 2010 by Karin – 11 Comments

Hey guys!

So yesterday I decided to go to yoga despite my super sore legs which turned out to be a good idea. My teacher was away and an other taught her class. Now, I said it was a good idea because she teaches Ashtanga yoga which means lots of crazy arm poses that reminded me of break dancing. It was super fun even though I couldn’t manage to do the difficult poses. I like getting better and seeing improvements in my practice which is why I like poses that seem completely impossible.

Anyway, I got back home, showered and had dinner and ran out of the house again to meet my friends for a drink. I ended up being the only one who drank water but I just wasn’t in a beer or wine mood yesterday.

But let’s quickly back up a little.. Oh no, wait! Before I get to breakfast: Some of you have asked what quark is. Well wikipedia knows it all gives us the answer. Quark is actually also called curd cheese and even though it’s considered as cheese it reminds me more of greek yogurt.

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Breakfast was stellar. Seriously that hemp-nola is SO good! It’s worth buying the book only for this recipe, I swear!

 

Work was a bit slow yesterday and for lunch we all went to that local restaurant where I had a huge salad because the veggie option (veggie pie) didn’t really appeal to me. My colleagues asked me if I were on a diet. (???) Why do people always assume that you’re on a diet when you “only” eat a salad for lunch? Have people asked you the diet question as well because you stuck to lettuce?

My diet salad (ha!) kept me full until 4 PM but I knew that I had to eat something or otherwise I’d starve during yoga so I grabbed an apple and a hard boiled egg.

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After my arms became jelly I headed home and only had one thing on my mind: Lentils! We ate a ton of lentils on our canoe trip in Sweden because they don’t go bad and are a great source of protein.

I simply cooked 1/2 cup of dry lentils (I almost wrote oats. Oops!) with 1 cup of water and some salt. I swerved it with fennel and broccoli that was topped with salt and cayenne pepper.

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I forgot how much I missed fennel. Sigh. Apparently some people don’t like it. Silly. Oh and I missed lentils too. Sigh no. 2

Then I got Americanized and had a PB&J bread, two chocolate chip balls and a waffle biscuit thing that Selina bought and I had to try of course ;) .

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Good dinner. Happy Karin.

 

I’m actually going to spend the entire weekend with my boyfriend. It’s going to be fun as we have a lot planned. Brunch, run, dinner at a restaurant to celebrate my aunt’s and uncle’s birthday and a house party at Selina’s boyfriend’s place today and bodypump tomorrow. Yes, bodypump. With the boyfriend. HA. It’s going to be hilarious.

Got to go and prepare brunch now! I see an other ED&BV recipe in the very near future! Have a great day you all! :)

 

Random Q of the day: Do you work out with your significant others? Yep I do. We go for a run / swim on Wednesdays but also sometimes work out on the weekends (mostly running). It’s fun to spend time together but get some activity in at the same time! :)

Tangerine Or Clementine?

Posted in Breakfast, Dinner, Lunch, Sweets, Yoga on January 18th, 2010 by Karin – 8 Comments

I just got back from yoga and I am pooped and my arms are shaking and I’m SO ready to go to bed but I just had to stop by and say hi.

How was your Monday? Didn’t it seem like the weekend flew by? It was fun to hear about your snowboarding experiences (or the lack thereof).. I wonder what it would have been like to grow up in a “hot” place. I probably would have become some surfer chick or something. ;)

 

The Empty Nut Jar asked how I made my oats and I definitely see some porridge action in the very near future so I’ll take step by step photos then. Stay tuned!

Today’s breakfast missed some oats but I have to improvise when I’m at my parent’s place. I had some cereal with regular milk and a banana. I’m not complaining though. I love cereal :) .

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Work was very Monday-ish and I was happy to take a lunch break around 12:30 pm and read a bit. And eat my lunch of course.

LEFTOVERS GALORE!

The ugly:

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The pretty (on Sunday evening):

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I fell in love with that veggie curry! Plus those tofu patties weren’t too bad either.

 

TODAY was a very citrusy day. After lunch I had an orange..

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And then I snacked on a grapefruit 2 hours later

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Plus afterwards I also had an apple with PB and a tangerine (clementine??)

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Can someone please tell me the difference between a tangerine and a clementine? Thank you. ;)  

 

Dinner had to be eaten super early because I wanted to go to the 7:45 pm yoga class (and am no fan of having dinner at 10 pm..) so I had some broccoli, eggs and a WW wrap with light laughing cow.

By the way I never knew what laughing cow cheese was until I realized that over here it’s called “La vache qui rit” which means (guess what!) LAUGHING COW! What a coincidence. ;) Ok it didn’t took me that long to figure it out (I’m not that stupid. Seriously!) I used to hate that cheese but really like it now.

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Unfortunately I was still full during yoga so some poses were a bit uncomfortable. I swear it’s not because of the dark chocolate I ate after dinner.

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Of course it isn’t. Gotta love my chocolate. I actually have some almost every day but for some mysterious reason they’re super camera shy! (Not my fault!) :)

Anyway I really need to get some beauty sleep in so I can get up bright and early and tackle the day!

 

Q: What’s your favourite day of the week? I’m all for Saturdays!

Lack of Motivation

Posted in Breakfast, Concerts, Dinner, Films, Yoga on December 3rd, 2009 by Karin – 3 Comments

 

Howdy people! Please excuse my absence yesterday but I didn’t really have the time to sit down and write a post.. I got to work early this morning though so I hope I can publish this post before 9am… which is in 10 minutes. Ah, I doubt it. Well maybe I won’t be too busy today and can use a few minutes or so for blogwork, muahahahaha. I also really need to catch up with everyone’s blogs, I feel so bad for neglecting them. Anyway, let’s back up a little.

 

Tuesday night (so long ago!)

..Rushed back home and made a super quick dinner. While cooking I nibbled on some rice cracker.

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Dinner was a very weird combo. I also cooked too little pasta. The serving sizes were ridiculously small which is weird because I generally always cook too much.

Pasta + 2 scrambled eggs + Cheese. Told you it was a weird.

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Served with a side of bad lightning.

My sis and I met up with Christine at 7pm at the concert venue where we steered to the bar and got some beer. Now that’s my kind of evening ;) .

The Editors had two supporting bands and I generally don’t really like it when there are two bands prior to the “main” band.. It just takes so much time until the main act gets on stage and I’m often a bit impatient at concerts ;) . However, both supporting bands were really good. It was a little bit strange though because the first band’s lead singer sounded like Placebo’s Brian Moloko and the second band’s lead singer like Elvis Presley.

 

The Editors were fabulous. I think there’s no way they would ever play badly live.. It was very stuffy in that hall though.

So we decided to go back to the concert hall to prevent some embarrassing fainting ;)

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Got back home at 11:30pm and slept until 7:30 yesterday morning. So much for my kick ass yoga practise in the morning.

Wednesday

I lounged around a little until I had to rush to work.. I had some bread & PB & apple there. Sounds familiar? Yes, I already had that on Tuesday..

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Oh and today as well. But with banana. Ain’t I creative?

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Work was a madhouse yesterday and I literally had no time to sit down. Ok, except for lunch when we had sushi. Mmmmm…

Busy days are good though – makes the time fly by at work. I got back home at 6:15pm and decided to squeeze in my missed yoga practise. I did 60 minutes of vinyasa yoga and it was brutal. I think I cried out loud a little as well. However, it felt glorious afterwards and I’m a bit sore today. If you fancy standing splits, crow pose and all the fun stuff check out 60 minutes Mixed Level Vinyasa of 10 march 2008 by Grace Yoga Podcast by Arlene Bjork on iTunes.

I then made a fab dinner that I haven’t had in a while..

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Inspired by this video by Tara Stiles. So good.

After dinner I met up with some friends for the Lady’s Night at a cinema – we saw Zweiohrküken which is the sequel to Keinohrhasen (I wrote about it some time ago..). It was good :) .

I actually wanted to go to yoga class this morning but couldn’t leave the bed. I was glued to it I swear! :)

Ok, I should really stop making excuses and get up earlier. What’s wrong with me? It didn’t used to be a problem.. I’m probably lacking discipline.

It’s 9:45am now and I wrote this post with a couple of breaks (I have to work after all ;) ) – not that you’d think that I’m a slow writer. My typing speed is super fast. :)

 

Question: When do you get up and how do you motivate yourself to get up early?
I used to get up at 5:30-6am every morning but am “sleeping in” (until 7am) all the time these days.. I also have zero motivation to get up early even though I want to work out and always have the best intentions before I go to bed (“Tomorrow I will get up early…”). Still.. I’m really lacking motivation over here.

English + Japanese

Posted in Travelling, Yoga on November 24th, 2009 by Karin – 7 Comments

I’ve got some very exciting news but more about that later.

My English course ended last night (well it actually ends next week but I’ll be at the The Sounds concert then. Shh!) and it was actually kind of sad because I really enjoyed class. In case you didn’t know: I’m currently studying for the Cambridge Advanced English exam (which will be on 9th Dec). But I will most definitely also enjoy my new freedom. Classes from 8pm-10pm weren’t always fun. However, my brain will probably turn into a raisin if I don’t study anything and I really hope that I can take up Swedish next January. We’ll see :) . (I love languages!)

Pre-English I had a lovely dinner.

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WW Spaghetti + Tomato + Pesto + Mozzarella

I actually wanted to mix in some kale as well but there were some funny white spots on it so I threw it away. I usually don’t throw away food that easily but I’m not very comfortable with eating something that has weird white points (+that look like tiny eggs or something). Maybe it’s just my paranoia. So dinner was sadly very veggie-less.

  

After class I headed home and did 20 minutes of Lunar Flow yoga. There was too little yoga in my life last week. I especially love this short class because it really helps me to rewind and relax. I do it quite often actually..

By the way this is my glamorous yoga studio. My room is extremely small but I don’t care. It’s enough space for yoga if you shove everything out of the way.

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Front + Back.

With a side of candlelight.

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This morning I woke up to an other yoga session. It’s been so hard to wake up early lately so I was quite proud of myself that I managed to roll out of bed at 5:45am. I did 1hr of “Yoga for Weight Loss” (again from yogadownload.com). No, I don’t want to lose weight but that 1hr class was for free when it was new on the page (maybe that was a mistake but I’m happy nevertheless). I actually really like it because it’s hard without being too challenging and you work up a nice sweat. Afterwards I felt like jelly and was starving.

Almond butter with a side of oats was needed.

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1/3 C oats, 1 C water, 1 banana // topped with 1tbsp flax seeds, 1tbsp hemp seeds, 1tbsp AB.

 

(Insert work)

 

Lunch was rabbit food.

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(I’ve been eating my weight in carrots and hummus lately..)

 

 

To the exciting news

I’m going to Japan! Well the reason for our trip is very sad but I’m looking forward to see my grandma and spend some time at her place.

Of course I still miss my grandpa even though we weren’t extremely close but I really want to have a positive outlook on everything. I can’t think about “what if..” and “oh I wish I said this to him the last time I saw him..” because it’s simply impossible to turn back the time. I strongly believe that everything’s the way it is for a reason (even if it’s sometimes not right). Being sad won’t help anyone and I will continue to enjoy life and focus on the good stuff. Life is too precious to be wasted.

My wise words aside… I’m actually leaving on the 30th December and will return on 8th January.

I don’t know what to do blog-wise. I wish I could update daily but my grandma has no internet and I don’t know if I could get some in those hills.. (My grandma lives far far away from everything).

I don’t want this blog to be dead for more than a week so let me know what you’d like to read! I was thinking of a daily Japan special (if anybody would care about it..) and/or guest posts.

 

Question of the day: Do you speak any foreign languages? If yes: Which one/s? If yes/no: Which language would you like to be able to speak? (ok that was more than one question..)
Well, I grew up with Swiss-German and Japanese so they’re both ok for me. I also speak English and French fluently. Plus I could probably order something in a Restaurant in Spain as well. Now I only have to learn Swedish because it’s probably the funniest language on earth.

Are You Sick?

Posted in Yoga on November 12th, 2009 by Karin – 2 Comments

Morning pals! How’s life?

I woke up feeling süperbe & so I decided to go to the 7am Jivamukti Yoga class. Class was brilliant but toward the end I realized that I’m still sick. Thanks so much you stupid body!  Oh well, being annoyed is completely worthless so I just accept it and hope that I’ll be ok for squash tonight. I miss my squash buddies ;) .

Only this week I found out that there was a 7am Jivamukti class. It used to be at 7:30 which was way too late for me and so I was super happy to find out that it was pushed forward to 7am. I actually only have time for the class on Friday but once my English course ends (I’m taking classes for preparing myself for the Advanced English Certificate on Mondays from 8-10pm in case you wondered), which will be in only a few weeks, I can also take the class on Monday. I like practising on my own but classes are just the best.

Anyway, I was starving when I got to the office and had a breakfast of champions. Or something like that.

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Apple and almond butter on multigrain bread that I stole from Silvio’s place (thanks darling! ;) )

Of course I’ve also been drinking tea like a maniac.

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Do you practise yoga? If yes: Why & which style?

I started with hatha yoga about 3-4 years ago but wasn’t completely happy with the classes because they weren’t so challenging. I think that the old yoga traditions are important, as well as a physical challenging practise. I found it all in Jivamukti and am extremely happy about it because that community is extremely welcoming, kind and full of knowledge.

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I also do lots of podcasts at home but Dave Farmar’s podcast have started to annoy me a little because he thinks it’s great fun to first make people hold a not-so-super-comfortabe-pose and then start counting like “six, five, blablabla, four, four, four, four, four, three, two, one”. And all I can think about is how annoying it is which is really distracting and not what yoga’s about. If I have to suffer I want to know for how long ;) .