Filed under Fitness …

Jan 26 2012
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Books, Crafts, DIY, Fitness, Recipes, Upcycling

1.26.12 – Pinterest, it was only a matter of time…

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Who hasn’t found themselves getting a tad bored with the internet from time to time? It happens all the time – your Facebook feed has just run out of new stories for you, you’ve checked, deleted, and replied to all your e-mails, snooped on your ex’s Facebook page… what’s there left to do? Your logical brain will tell you that with as vast as the internet is, there is a world of funny, interesting things you could be checking out now that your essentials are out of the way. But who wants to do all that searching!? If only all the interesting stuff was collected in one place…

Well, it is!

Well, maybe not all of it, but I guarantee there’s a place so chock full of internet gems that you’ll have to pry yourself away due to lack of time before you run out of great stuff to find. Those who are already happily addicted like myself already know what I’m talking about.

Pinterest, you’re a cruel mistress, but you sure have a whole heckuva lot of interesting things to check out…

To everyone who checked out the clothing-finding/outfit-building website featured in my last post, be warned, Pinterest is an even larger time suck. But admittedly, the things that you will take away from your Pinterest ‘pinning’ may actually save you money and really shake up your day to day. (Which is more than I can say about Polyvore since it had me seriously considering expanding my clothing budget!)

In the thumbnail here, you can see my current front page at Pinterest. At any given time, it is populated by an endless supply of cool internet finds that your friends have “pinned” to their own Pinterest profiles – ideas, recipes, photos and such that they would like to save.

In short, Pinterest is a super easy way to save and share the interesting things that you find online with your friends.

In the image here, you can see that my friends have found an awesome chocolate chip cookie recipe, an upcycling idea for turning an old wine rack into an awesome bathroom towel rack, a romantic bedroom decorating idea, and even an idea for newborn baby photos. There are music suggestions, travel ideas, unique articles… the categories are endless! There’s even a nice search feature. If you’re wanting something new to do with the avocados you just bought, you simply type “avocado” into the search and prepare to be bombarded by avocado recipes, art, and craft projects involving yours truly’s favorite fruit.

Men, don’t feel left out! The reason my board looks so feminine is because my Pinterest friends are nearly all female and that just happens to be what we’re into. The entire web is open to pinning so with the right search options, you can fill your board with sports cars, motorcycles, video game reviews, bikini babes, or whatever it is that men find more interesting than recipes and home decor. ;)

If Pinterest is new to you, you’ll be pleasantly surprised to find that MANY of your Facebook friends are probably already there, pinning away. Even if you’re alone at Pinterest, the board can be easily populated by things you’ll love simply by entering a word of interest into the search bar in the upper left hand corner.

So what are you waiting for?

Head on over and check it out. When you figure out how to follow friends, you can add me while you’re at it! Over at Pinterest, I go by rikkirogersblog and I would love to see what kind of interesting things you’ve found there. Just make sure you have a big ‘ol block of time put aside – it’s easy to lose track of the clock while you’re busily pinning your life away!

Visit Pinterest!

Oct 27 2011
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Fitness

10.27.11 – Strength

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This month I have encountered many a friend and family member who needs strength. I add myself to that list, sometimes you just feel a little bit beaten down by the world and need a little encouragement. After encountering a similar image on the internet, I was inspired to put this graphic together for both those people I know who are struggling and myself. I posted it up at my business Facebook page in hopes that it will spread to someone who needs to see it.

This quote was floating around in my head and I tried to find it on the internet but I simply couldn’t – I know there’s one out there similar to this that has really touched me in the past. But for everyone dealing with something today that maybe feels like a little too much to handle, hopefully this gives you the boost you need to make today great.

Feel free to copy and share with whomever you think might need this! :)

 

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Oct 03 2011
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DIY, Donating, Fitness

10.3.11 – How to Donate on a Budget! / Cheap and Charitable

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Few things can make us feel as good as giving – and who doesn’t feel great at the end of the night after having given a charitable donation to a worthy cause? But chances are, you probably feel like you are struggling to make ends meet as it is – who has the extra cash to give away?

Chances are, you do. You just don’t know it yet!

Well, first a look at where your paycheck is going. You may be surprised that you have a lot more to give than you think!

I found an article at TheNest which breaks down the average American’s spending:

  •  34% – Housing (Mortgage, Rent, Taxes, Utilities, House Insurance, etc.)
  • 20% – Savings, Insurance, Healthcare (Retirement, health insurance, etc.)
  • 17% – Transportation (Vehicle, Insurance, Gas, Maintenance, Public Transit, etc.)
  • 16% – Entertainment (Clothing, Personal Services, Movies, Games, Alcohol/Tobacco, Events, etc.)
  • 13% – Food (Groceries, Restaurants, Fast Food, Snacks, etc)
You should read with some alarm that we tend to spend more on entertaining ourselves than on food!

I don’t believe that you should cut your entertainment expenses out completely. Who could, anyway? Taking some time off to do what we enjoy doing and buy things that do nothing more than make us happy are good for the economy and help combat stress. What every one of us could probably do, though, is curb this spending greatly. While I have read entire books on why we need to spend more of our income on food (for health and quality reasons, to name a couple!) I would like to take this time to recommend that you consider a charitable donation with some of that excess entertainment money.
Here’s a challenge for this month: instead of buying a new sweater or video game, make do with the old one for the next 30 days. Take the money that you would have spent on that luxury/unnecessary item and consider donating to the following charities, instead!

[ Note: I've done a little research and found some VERY worthy charities and causes that will allow you to donate without breaking the bank, too! ]

I donate: about $6.60 per month ($16.60 so far)
Cost to me: $0.00
This has got to be one of the coolest organizations I’ve found yet! What Plus 3 does is team up with sponsors who agree to donate money based on the amount of exercise that Plus 3 members log. There’s absolutely no catch – it’s 100% FREE to become a member and log the exercise that you do. You even get to choose which sponsor and cause you’d like to support with your efforts. There are leader-boards so you can see where you fall amongst the other athletes, and free prizes and incentives for reaching certain exercise goals.
Since I started my exercise routine in July, I have raised $16.60 for the Humane Society of Silicon Valley, logged 86 hours of exercise, traveled over 271 miles on my own two feet, and am 1/10th of the way toward earning a free pair of socks for all of my logged yoga activity. Not only does it help motivate me to keep up my exercise routine, but I enjoy knowing that every time I exercise, I’m helping the humane society as well!

Friend me on Plus 3 by searching for Rikki Rogers. I’d love to see your exercise progress, as well!

 

I donated: £1.00
Cost to me: $1.56
Own a Colour is the joint effort of an international paint company and the United Nations Children’s Fund to help donate money to UNICEF. UNICEF protects children’s rights in more than 190 countries and works with families, governments, businesses, and communities to make sure that the health and well being of children is upheld.
The way it works is, you head over to the [ stunning! ] Own a Colour website, browse to the color that you’d like to “purchase”, and you get to name that color and leave a small note about it. You may donate as little as 1 pound, or as much as you’d like! The donation page gives the following breakdown, too, to help you decide your contribution amount:
  • £1 - can buy enough polio vaccines to immunise ten children
  • £3 - can buy 400 water purification tablets, enough to filter 2,000 litres of drinking water
  • £5 - can buy 100 sachets of oral rehydration salts to combat deadly dehydration and diarrhea
  • £10 - can buy three mosquito nets, vital protection against malaria, which kills an African child every 45 seconds
  • £20 - can buy enough vaccinations to protect 50 children against measles, one of the biggest killers of children worldwide
Above, the orangey-yellow triangle is Rikki Rogers Goldenrod, hex code #ffc601 for you fellow nerds out there, and is the color that I named and purchased for UNICEF.

I heard about this site back in college, so it’s been around for a few years now! FreeRice.com is a free vocabulary building game – you don’t even have to sign in to play – which donates 10 grains of rice for every correct answer you enter. There’s no catch whatsoever – you just head over to the site, define a word by clicking the correct definition from a four word multiple choice box, and bam! 10 grains of rice are donated by the World Food Programme. It’s pretty easy.

Actually, it’s not super easy – the words get more difficult with every other correct answer.At level 13 I started encountering words I don’t know, got my first word incorrect at level 22, level 25 saw my first total guess, and by level 32 I was feeling rather dumb and headed off into the internet to do something else. However, I did bookmark the site and plan to hone my vocabulary and make a free donation whenever I find a lull in my workday. :)

I donated: 2180 grains of rice / 1/3 cup
Cost to me: 10 minutes of my time and a little bit of brain power
Donating to charities doesn’t have to break the bank – and it can enrich your life in more ways than just that fuzzy feeling you get after donating. Since mid July, I have donated
    • $18.16 and 1/3 cup of rice to the Humane Society, UNICEF, and The World Hunger Programme
all for a grand total of $1.56 and ten minutes of my time.

In exchange for all of this donating, I have lost around 5 pounds and gained some serious muscle from all of the exercise, scored a little bit of free marketing by leaving my web address on the color I donated to UNICEF, and improved my vocabulary a bit, too. Not to mention, I feel a whole lot fuzzier than I did before all of that.
I plan to make this a semi regular post, so I encourage you to check back in the future for more ways that you can donate and make a difference, while improving your own life and not making too large of a dent in the old piggy bank. ;)
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Sep 28 2011
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Fitness, Recipes

9.28.11 – Greek Yogurt Vegetable Dip

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For most of my life, I have hated yogurt.

Don’t get me wrong, it tastes great! I find myself amazed almost daily at the creative yogurt flavors I see on TV and at the grocery store. The problem is that runny texture. When I was little, I remember someone telling me “yogurt is alive” (I could swear it was my brother, but I can’t back that up!) and I hadn’t been able to eat it since. I imagined little microorganisms swimming around and multiplying in the runny, yogurty goo… which, while probably to an extent is true about a lot of foods, was a gross exaggeration.

Enter Greek yogurt!

I had been hearing it here and there from friends and family, raving about how much more they liked it than regular yogurt. I wasn’t even tempted to try it – it’s still yogurt, I thought, how different can it be? But it wasn’t until my Mom challenged me to just give it a try that I finally put one of those spendy little containers into my grocery cart.

I was converted from the very first bite from a yogurt-hater to a fanatic.

It’s only fair, readers, that I provide you with the same warning that I was given. Thank goodness Mom told me ahead of time that the flavor is quite different from regular yogurt – which actually scared me a bit as the flavor of yogurt is the part that I like. Greek yogurt is tangier, quite a bit more like sour cream than yogurt. You shouldn’t let this be a turnoff, though. Think about it – who hasn’t been dolloping obscene amounts of sour cream onto their baked potato wishing it were healthier? You know that sour cream tastes wonderful – and its healthy cousin Greek yogurt does, too!

To make Greek yogurt, milk is fermented – this is the point when sugar is usually added and regular yogurt is born. But Greek yogurt takes the process one step further. After the milk is fermented, the yogurt is then strained so that the liquid whey is left behind. What results is a SUPER thick, kind of tangy yogurt product. The higher protein result is thicker, healthier, and in my opinion, a lot tastier.

It’s also usually a lot more expensive – sometimes twice as much as regular yogurt. But I didn’t buy that stuff before so I’m not really missing that cheap, sugary goo much. ;-)

Did you know that regular yogurt (even low fat) is often PACKED with sugar and unhealthy additives? Yep.

And to be fair, certain brands of Greek yogurt have this problem, too. It’s important to check the label on any kind of yogurt (Greek or reg.) that you buy and to always, always opt for the low- or non-fat versions. You’re looking for the best combination of the following:

  • lowest amount of sugar
    For flavored yogurts especially, there’s going to be some sugar in the fruit and sweet additions. If you must have flavored yogurt, try to find the least sugary!
    Eat non-fat yogurt when you can, it usually has about HALF of the calories of the low-fat stuff and keeps you just as full.
  • highest amount of protein
    Even if you’re not a body builder, protein helps keep you full, gives you energy, and helps to maintain muscle mass!
  • simplest ingredient list
    Truly, this is a good rule of thumb of any food item that you buy. The simpler the ingredient list, the more confident you can be about what you are actually putting into your body.
    Unless, of course, you’re some kind of chemist… I, on the other hand, can’t even pronounce most of the ingredients on packaged food items I buy!

If you’re really hardcore, try buying plain Greek yogurt. It’s excellent for cooking with because it is so crazy thick – it makes wonderful sauce for chicken dishes (especially Indian recipes!) When mixed with a little honey or sugar, it’s ideal for a healthy smoothie. Mix in a teaspoon of brown sugar and it makes an excellent fruit dip! And you can even use it as a straight up sour cream substitute! Below is a recipe for some super thick and seriously healthy vegetable dip with a plain Greek yogurt base rather than the traditional sour cream.

 

Greek Yogurt Vegetable Dip

  • 3/4 cup greek yogurt
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
  • 1 teaspoon dijon (or regular) mustard
  • 1/2 teaspooon onion powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
  • 2 tablespoons chopped chives
  • 1/2 teaspoon dill
  • 1/2 teaspoon parsley
  • salt and pepper to taste

Mix ingredients in a food processor or by hand. Best when refrigerated for a few hours!

You can also chop up onions and celery (SUPER fine) and add it to this for a little extra texture.

Sep 27 2011
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Fitness, Recipes

9.26.11 – Salsa Chicken Rice Casserole

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Happy Monday, readers!

I can’t sugarcoat it – Fall is definitely here. Southern Illinois has been downright cold! So what’s better for dinner on a crisp Fall evening than a nice hot casserole? Well, how about a casserole filled with cheese? Probably the least healthy thing we’ll be eating all week, I still managed to infuse quite a few veggies into this dish and made some important omissions to cut calories.

Even with my cheese reduction and veggie boost, I still got a glowing review from hubby who felt full and satisfied and is looking forward to having the leftovers for lunch tomorrow.

This hearty, filling casserole will be a hit with everyone in the family. It has a very American, classic, and kid-friendly flavor to it that I can’t imagine anyone disliking!

Read on for the recipe and consider my healthy substitutions below!


Salsa Chicken Rice Casserole

Ingredients

  • 1 1/3 cups uncooked white rice
  • 2 2/3 cups water
  • 4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
  • 2 cups shredded Monterey Jack cheese
  • 2 cups shredded Cheddar cheese
  • 1 (10.75 ounce) can condensed cream of chicken soup
  • 1 (10.75 ounce) can condensed cream of mushroom soup
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 1 1/2 cups mild salsa
[ Healthy Substitutions! ]
That’s a lot of cheese, isn’t it!?
Thankfully, we only had 1 cup of cheese left so I really had to add to this recipe to make up for the missing 3 cups. I wouldn’t recommend cutting the cheese that far down, but you’d probably be just fine with 2.5 cups.
To make this recipe a little bit more healthy, I chopped up 1 green pepper and added it to the onion.
I also omitted the cream of mushroom soup to save on calories.
I added half a can of black beans to give this casserole a little more flavor, texture, and fiber.
I sprinkled about 1 tsp of cilantro and garlic powder into the salsa to give it a little more of an adult flavor.
[ Okay, back to the recipe! ]

Directions

  1. Place rice and water in a saucepan, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer for 20 minutes.
  2. Meanwhile, place chicken breast halves into a large saucepan, and fill the pan with water. Bring to a boil, and cook for 20 minutes, or until done. Remove chicken from water. When cool enough to handle, cut meat into bite-size pieces.
  3. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease a 9×13 inch baking dish.
  4. In a medium bowl, combine Monterey Jack and Cheddar cheeses. In a separate bowl, mix together cream of chicken soup, cream of mushroom soup, onion (and green pepper), and salsa. Layer 1/2 of the rice, 1/2 of the chicken, 1/2 of the soup and salsa mixture, and 1/2 of the cheese mixture in prepared dish. Repeat layers, ending with cheese.
  5. Bake in preheated oven for about 40 minutes, or until bubbly.

This was an easy recipe, and it turned out absolutely delicious.

To counter the calorie-heavy meal, I drank a large glass of water with it and enjoyed a banana for dessert as opposed to my usual sugary treat.

Give this easy casserole a try, you won’t be disappointed. :)

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Sep 20 2011
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Fitness, Recipes

9.15.11 – Rikki’s Stuffed Green Peppers

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Hello, readers!

Our store had a big sale on green peppers so naturally, I snagged a few and mentally prepared myself for the joy that is stuffed green peppers. :)

Now, I’ve been making this dish without a recipe for some time now, but knowing that I wanted to share it on the blog, I set out on the internet looking for some directions that came close to the way I like them prepared.

Strangely, it either doesn’t exist or is just extremely hard to find!

It seems like most people prepare them quite differently than I do:
They include browned ground beef – mine are vegetarian (but you can add ground beef if you want!)
They use white rice with tomato paste – I use brown Spanish rice full of veggies.
They stuff the rice in the pepper and bake it – I layer it with cheese and top it off with a sliced avocado.

Come on now, doesn’t that just sound tastier?

What I did find was a great recipe that I adapted to my taste for brown Spanish rice, which I’ll share, along with continued (easy) directions on how to take the rice beyond the pot!

Brown Spanish Rice

  • 2 cups Water
  • 1 ½ cups Brown Rice
  • ½ cup Celery
  • ½ cup diced Green Peppers
  • ¾ cup diced Onions
  • 2 tsp. chopped Garlic
  • 2 tsp. Chili Powder
  • 1 tsp. ground Coriander (Cilantro)
  • 1 tsp. ground Cumin
  • ¼ tsp. ground Hot Red Pepper
  • 1 can diced Tomatoes

Directions:

  • Place the water in a large covered pot on the stovetop and bring to a boil. 
  • Add the rice and seasonings and stir. 
  • When the water begins to boil again, add the remaining ingredients and mix well. 
  • When the contents begin to boil, stir again and cover, lower the heat to simmer. The Rice should be done in about 30 minutes.

Stuffed Green Pepper Directions:
  • About 15 minutes before the rice is done, preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
  • Cut the tops off of two green peppers, and reach inside to pull out the seeds.
  • When the rice is finished, fill the peppers with spoonfuls of Spanish rice, alternating with thin layers of shredded cheese inbetween (skip the cheese to save calories!)
  • Add a thin (OR thick!) layer of cheese on top of the stuffed green peppers
  • Set your stuffed green peppers in a baking dish and back for approximately 25 minutes
When the cheese is melted and bubbly and the green peppers are soft and cooked, you’re done! Slice up an avocado, lightly salted, and enjoy it with your stuffed green pepper. :)
Admittedly, this is not the easiest recipe I’ve posted, but the presentation and taste always turn out great for me. As accident-prone as I am in the kitchen, I haven’t screwed these up yet. They always turn out nice and moist and a little bit spicy, and draw compliments from our dinner guests.
(If you go light on the cheese and salt and skip the ground beef, it’s an extremely healthy meal, too!)
Enjoy, readers, and I will be back tomorrow!
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Sep 20 2011
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Fitness

9.12.11 – 13 Miles in under 3.5 Hours

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Distance Walking for Health and Weightloss

Before I launch a bunch of numbers at you, let me start at the beginning.

Two months ago, in mid July, I started to walk.

It all started when I received my new smartphone (The Droid X) in the mail and began to discover all of the crazy things that it could do. I fumbled around with it for the first two weeks and then came across an app for my phone called “Noom.” Noom is a combination food logger (Calorific) and exercise logger (CardioTrainer), a powerful fat-fighting pair, indeed! I decided to give it a try.

The very first thing that Noom has you do is set goals. I decided that I would like to lose 7 pounds in order to attain what I considered my ideal weight in 6 months. Based on my Body Mass Index, Noom decided that my goal was not lofty enough. It suggested that I lose *12* pounds in that six months – a weight that I honestly have not seen the scale say since I was 15. I’m rather short and petite anyway, and I knew that peeling 12 pounds off of my already small frame would be quite a feat. Rather than starving myself like I did for my wedding, I made a promise to myself that I would use this program to achieve my new ideal weight the old fashioned way – with a good diet and exercise.

Noom made all the calculations for me:

  • Eat 1500 calories per day
  • Burn at least 300 calories per day

In the beginning this seemed especially tough. I thought that 2000 was the recommended calorie intake per day and back in my college days, I would have to run (and I mean RUN) on a treadmill for a solid 25 minutes or so to burn those kind of calories! I admit, I was nervous. I imagined days of going to bed hungry and tortuous workouts which would result, ultimately, in my abandonment of the program.

The truth of this program could not have been more different!

Noom breaks foods into 3 categories:

  • Green (Healthy food, eat in abundance)
  • Yellow (Healthy but fattening, eat in moderation)
  • Red (Fattening food, eat only as a treat)

And Calorific (the food logger) also uses super vague and easy measurements for your meals (one handful, half a handful, half a glass) so I didn’t feel like the food Nazi was breathing down my neck checking everything I eat!

The program rates you on a 5 star scale on how close to the “ideal” food ratio you get everyday:

  • 50% Green foods (veggies and fruits, fat free milk, cereal, whole wheat bread…)
  • 35% Yellow foods (nuts, starchy foods, white breads and pastas…)
  • 15% Red foods (ice cream, butter, whipped cream, sauces and jellies…)

That’s right, dieters, I am rewarded for stuffing 300 calories of pure sugar into my face every day!

In less than a week, I was delighting in achieving the perfect harmony of Green, Yellow, and Red daily and enjoying my sugary snack allowances even more than before because they were condoned by my diet program.

I found new things to buy at the grocery store to help achieve my daily diet Zen and even my husband has enjoyed the healthy detour our meals have taken (like, more fiber and nutrients!)

Anyway, I stumbled upon this “walking” thing almost accidentally.

Noom required that I burned 300 calories a day, and after a couple of tortuous treadmill runs I decided to just take a quick walk outside and see how many calories that burned.

Sadly, it wasn’t many.

“What if I walked a lot farther?” I thought, and made the long trek down our country road and back.

Voila! The calories I burned distance walking (even at a rather sluggish pace) for about an hour or so really added up. It didn’t feel like exercise at all. I ambled along down our road day after day enjoying the birds, squirrels, rabbits, cows, dragonflies and butterflies, and adding daily to an increasingly darker tan from all the sun I was getting. It hit me shortly after I started the program: I could really keep this up pretty easily.

Two months have gone by since I started “Nooming”, and here are my stats:

  • Distance walked: 228 Miles
  • Energy burned: 18,548 Calories
  • Weight lost: 5 Pounds

Yep, just two months in and I’m already about halfway to my high school weight.

Did I mention that muscles are starting to pop up in places I’ve never noticed them before, as well? I always wondered what people were talking about when they mentioned their “hamstrings”, now I definitely know! My arm flab is slowly disappearing and I love asking my husband to squeeze my “guns”…! He’s full of compliments lately, too, even going so far as to call me “athletic” (a label I’ve never been able to wear before.)

Thanks to all this newfound energy, in January, 2012, I’ll be doing a half marathon in Phoenix, AZ with my sister-in-law: 13 miles in under 3.5 hours.

Today, I reached that goal!

This morning it took me exactly 3 Hours and 25 Minutes to walk 13 miles, and only required about 1 mile of (very light) jogging.

In two months (Nov 2011) I plan to walk this distance again and see if my time has improved.

The photo above is the end of the country road that I walk on, and I can’t stress enough how this beautiful country road has helped me to achieve my goal. I encounter wildlife daily: deer often cross the road in front of me, I see skunks and groundhogs ambling off into holes in the ground, lizards and skinks skitter across my path, and Mourning Doves line the powerlines, twittering away when I get close. When I’m feeling restless I adopt a brisk 3.5 mph pace, and if I’m feeling lazy I shuffle along at closer to 3 or 2.5.

Anymore, I can’t even start my day until I’ve covered 3 or 5 miles of country road.

Want to join in on my journey? Download the Noom app on your Android smartphone and send me a friend request on the Plus 3 Network so that I can see your progress too – that’s where I log my walking online and my “sponsor” donates money to my charity of choice (The Humane Society) based on the distance I walk. It’s free, of course, and another great motivator.

At the top you can see the last stretch of my walk, a nice straight but hilly country mile or so, and below are some more photos along my road.

Enjoy, and I’ll keep you updated, readers, as I hit more milestones along my path to the P.F. Chang’s Half Marathon in Phoenix, Jan 2012!

Now enough of this “health” stuff! I promise that tomorrow, readers, I’ll post either a tasty recipe or a wildlife photo for you, instead!

Sep 20 2011
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Fitness

9.11.11 – Ferne Clyffe Hike

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Ferne Clyffe, Illinois
After the feast that we had last night (marinated dove breasts, oriental salad, macaroni salad, fresh veggies and a fruit bowl full of mango, kiwi, and peaches, not to mention the rest of the spicy oatmeal cookies) I needed to get moving! As usual, I walked my 5 miles in the morning, even managing to clock a 12 minute mile toward the end, but later that afternoon I still felt restless.
I looked around online for things to do in Southern Illinois and stumbled upon “Ferne Clyffe”.
After recognizing the name as one of my husband’s frequent hunting spots, I suggested to him that we go on a hike there. There was no asking him twice – we were off!
Here’s what I brought:
  1. Comfortable walking shoes
  2. My good camera
  3. A Fiber1 bar for the road

Thanks to these three items, we had an absolutely lovely hike. Ferne Clyffe, true to its name, was full of enormous rocks and cliffs sprinkled with wild ferns. It was absolutely beautiful and totally worth the 40 minutes it took Hubby and I to trek the one mile circuit. Check out the photos above and below to see some of the sights I captured with our camera.

I saw some great big dragonflies, a couple squirrels, and there were wildflowers everywhere! We found an empty turtle shell, and climbed down a large rock cliff.

Exercise doesn’t have to be a boring, endless hour sweating on a treadmill… this was a fantastic, beautiful trip that also got my heart pumping and brought on a fair amount of sweat on the uphill sections!

Now, all beauty and fun aside, here’s what I should have brought:

  1. Bug spray
  2. More bug spray

Would the bug spray have protected me from what we encountered on the hike? I doubt it, but I would have felt a little better…

Seed ticks (or turkey mites) are apparently immature ticks who huddle together in swarms and wait for unsuspecting hikers to brush past them. They glom onto you and crawl up your arms and legs with lightning speed toward your armpits, waist, and groin. Once they find a nice warm or moist place on you, they bite down and they don’t let go. Our neighbors have told us horror stories about how the bites itch for weeks and sometimes leave scars, so when we got back to the truck and hopped in and I happened to notice a lot of “tiny spiders” crawling up my hands, total freakout mode ensued.

They were everywhere. We found them all over both of us and it was as if, as soon as I squished ten, twenty more would appear!

Neighbors aside, as soon as we arrived home we both stripped our seed tick covered clothes on the porch and made a bee-line for the shower. I can’t even remember the last time I scrubbed myself so thoroughly! So far, no bites on either of us – I think we caught them early enough – and our hiking clothes are in the wash now. But despite the seed tick catastrophe, it was a beautiful day and a lovely hike that I wouldn’t mind taking again!

And while stories of seed ticks can scare away even the most avid hiking enthusiast, I have to admit that we weren’t on an established hiking trail.

Next time, I think we’ll stick to the beaten path. ;)

I’m feeling fantastic after logging 6 miles today, and also ready for some well-deserved nighttime snacking. ;) If you’re feeling restless tomorrow, get out and get hiking!
In the meantime, check out some more of the gorgeous sights from our day in Ferne Clyffe, Illinois!

Sep 20 2011
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Fitness, Recipes

9.9.11 – Catherine’s Spicy Chicken Soup

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First, to all you skimmers, I know that the ingredient list looks intimidating, but I promise that 95% of the delicious components of this soup are things that you probably

already have in your fridge or pantry! In fact, I was only missing one ingredient and found an easy and tasty substitute fairly quickly.

That being said, this soup is hearty enough that even missing two or three of the ingredients listed would not detract too much from an amazing end result!

Also – if the ingredient list is still scaring you away from trying this recipe, check out the directions.

That’s right, budding chefs, TWO steps. Step one, boil the chicken and shred it. Step two, dump a bunch of cans and chopped veggies in a pot with the shredded chicken.

Done.

Dinnertime doesn’t get much easier than this. Unless you’re having a Hot Pocket for dinner… which, from my college days, I don’t recommend you do on any kind of regular basis!

Anyway, hubby loved this, and we will be happily eating from the ginormous pot of Catherine’s Spicy Chicken Soup for days!

Check it out!

Catherine’s Spicy Chicken Soup Recipe

Ingredients

  • 2 quarts water
  • 8 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
  • 1 teaspoon garlic powder
  • 2 tablespoons dried parsley
  • 1 tablespoon onion powder
  • 5 cubes chicken bouillon
  • 3 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 3 cloves garlic, chopped
  • 1 (16 ounce) jar chunky salsa
  • 2 (14.5 ounce) cans peeled and diced tomatoes
  • 1 (14.5 ounce) can whole peeled tomatoes
  • 1 (10.75 ounce) can condensed tomato soup
  • 3 tablespoons chili powder
  • 1 (15 ounce) can whole kernel corn, drained
  • 2 (16 ounce) cans chili beans, undrained
  • 1 (8 ounce) container sour cream
 Directions
  1. In a large pot over medium heat, combine water, chicken, salt, pepper, garlic powder, parsley, onion powder and bouillon cubes. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer 1 hour, or until chicken juices run clear. Remove chicken, reserve broth. Shred chicken.
  2. In a large pot over medium heat, cook onion and garlic in olive oil until slightly browned. Stir in salsa, diced tomatoes, whole tomatoes, tomato soup, chili powder, corn, chili beans, sour cream, shredded chicken and 5 cups broth. Simmer 30 minutes.
Hubby put a whole grain tortilla in the bottom of his bowl and poured the soup on top of it.

He said that it melted quite nicely and made the bowl a lot more filling, as soup doesn’t usually do the trick for him!

This is a wonderful fall meal and I hope that you all enjoy it even half as much as I did!

It is also, dare I say, quite healthy… as long as you’re not watching your salt intake. ;)

Again, not my photo, but gorgeous, isn’t it? I just love well done food photos!