We’re Back!

Has anyone seen this movie? I used to watch it all the time when I was a kid.

Welcome back to Well-Fed Redhead! I took a rather lengthy hiatus to get my behind in gear after finishing culinary school and my internship in San Francisco. To briefly summarize the last three months of my life:

1. I moved back to NYC.
2. I got a low-paying job at a well-known international vegan restaurant that never had any customers.
3. I quit that job because it couldn’t support living in the city.
4. Upon realizing I was destitute and that my lease was up, I packed up my apartment and moved back to my parents house in NJ.
5. I got a new job in my hometown at a super meaty restaurant that cures its own bacon.

Now that my life has settled down a bit I want to get back to blogging and plan to use this blog for recipe development and as a wellness journal. My job keeps me pretty busy so I will probably only be posting a couple days a week, but the great part of having practically no audience is that I have no pressure to blog every day!

What has been on my mind lately:

1. Running! I finished physical therapy in April after a whole year of not being able to run. Now I have ran 3 5K’s and 167 miles! I’m kind of obsessed now and think about running all the time. Yet somehow when I’m actually running I still can’t wait for it to be over… (pic from Dailymile.)
2. HENRY. Is Henry ever not on my mind? I plead the fifth but it should be known that I am obsessed my cat. In the best cat-lady way possible. Since we last spoke I have had a failed experiment with making raw cat food from scratch. I have also spent hundreds of dollars on vet bills because my precious feline so selflessly took it upon himself to develop chronic asthma while I was away in San Francisco. Yes, cat inhalers do exist. On a positive note, Henry has lost two pounds!
3. Coffee. I am officially re-addicted. What is your Starbucks order? Recently I am all about iced coffee with soy milk and one pump of pumpkin spice. It’s a mouthful to say but I love it!
4. Pitch Perfect! I just saw this last night and it is my new favorite movie. Everyone go see it immediately or we can’t be friends.
5. Pancakes! (Hint: this may or may not be related to tomorrow’s recipe)

I have a delicious fall-inspired recipe to share tomorrow. GET EXCITED!

Hangover Run and Resolutions

Happy New Year!

How did you all celebrate the beginning of 2012? I rang in the apocayear with a Hangover Run in Westfield, NJ. I wasn’t hungover but I was certainly sleep deprived from a late night partying with my boyfriend’s family last night. I walked the entire race with my dad and we finished in 47 minutes and 17 seconds! We did jog the last 0.2 miles but other than that we kept a good walking pace because I didn’t want to interfere with healing my runner’s knee. Walking is harder than it seems, I was definitely feeling it in my hips by the end of the race and getting a little out of breath when we went up the hills.

I wore the new shoes my boyfriend gave me for my birthday, Nike Free Run 2’s. I really like them; they are adorable and comfy as anything. However, they don’t offer a lot of support and are probably not a good choice for running for me personally because of my knee issues. I love them for strength training and other gym workouts though since they are so flexible and light. They honestly feel like slippers!

My dad watches a lot of soccer (or as he calls it, football) and he told me that soccer players only really suffer from three ailments, hamstring twang, groin-gah!, and knee knack. So I guess I have knee knack!

I had a lot of fun with my dad! I was originally going to do it with my mom but she broke her ankle 2 weeks ago, so I was pleased when my dad agreed to take her place! We chatted the whole time and plotted to overtake other walkers ahead of us. He said that maybe this could be our new father daughter thing, and we already made plans to do it again next year running the whole time. Running a 5k is a good attainable goal and as long as my knee gets better I don’t see why I won’t be able to do it! I would love to be able to train for a half marathon but I don’t want to set my sights on that until it looks like my knees are getting better. It’s tough having my goals limited by my body but hopefully patience will pay off!

My other fitness goals for 2012 are:

• To do at least one unassisted pull-up
• To be able to do regular push-ups (not girly ones)
• To do yoga at least 3x week

Instead of New Year’s resolutions, I like to do monthly resolutions. This way I can reevaluate my progress each month and adjust my goals as I see fit.

So without ado, my January resolutions are:

• Blog at least 5 times a week
• Try a new recipe every week
• Swim twice a week
• Practice yoga twice a week
• Stick to my budget (this might be hard since I will be traveling for 2 weeks!)

I feel that these resolutions are within my reach but not entirely without a challenge. It will be interesting to see how I feel about them come February!

I’m exhausted from last night a so I’m going turn in early this evening. See you tomorrow Lovelies! 🙂

Masked Party Of One

Hey guys! Today was a really good day 🙂 I’m super tired and just doing a facemask before I get ready bed, but I wanted to give you a recap of my day first.

proof

I went for my first swim in years this morning! I was surprised by a couple of things, first how quickly I remembered how to do free stroke, and second, how completely out of cardio shape I am! I only swam for 15 minutes and I kept taking breaks to catch my breath; swimming is hard work! I totally forgot to count how many laps I did… oh well, next time I will. Anyway, I was super pleased with how swimming went; hopefully I can focus on improving my aquatic ability since running is a no-go for me right now (because I have runner’s knee).

After swimming I showered, did some errands and by the time I got home I was STARVED for lunch. I had the last slice of the veggie tofu potpie I made for Christmas dinner (from this recipe). So delicious! I didn’t take a picture of it today, but here is a picture of it when I took it out of the oven on Christmas Day:

I quickly inhaled my lunch and then had to head off to my first physical therapy session! I didn’t do any exercises today; it was more of an evaluation. Physical therapists treat two things: injuries and conditions, I have a condition. Guess which is harder to treat? -_- Apparently, my left leg is slightly longer than my right (caused by minor scoliosis) and I have tight quads, which is good to know. My therapist asked me if I was dancer and said I had a “modern dancer’s body.” I’m not sure what that means but whatever it is, I like it. I’m excited for when I go back on Friday and get started on a routine to hopefully correct some of my muscular imbalances and get back on track for running next year.

Then after PT I went to Lululemon (which is right next door, I can’t decide if this is a good thing or a bad thing…) and did some serious damage to my gift certificate. Then my boyfriend came over and we went for Chinese food and then watched Mean Girls (a classic). Before PT I was in a super cranky mood, but the combination of retail therapy and seeing Dan really helped with that 😉

With that, I am off to wash this crud off my face and get to bed. Goodnight Creeps!

Fi’s Knees

I had an awesome workout at the gym today. I did 15 fast minutes on the elliptical followed by an upper body workout. I already have spaghetti arms! I followed up my workout with a green smoothie:

Half a banana + Sunwarrior protein + chia seeds + spinach + soy milk = YUM!

If you checked out my previous post you know I got a Garmin Forerunner but I can’t use it yet 😦 This is because I have been struggling with Runner’s Knee since March. Runner’s Knee is also known as Patellofemoral Pain Syndrome and is basically an irritation of the kneecap caused by friction with the thigh bone.

I got RK in March when I joined the Lululemon Running Club near my apartment and ran 6 miles with no previous training. If I could go back in time and stop myself I would, since I can’t even run one mile pain-free.

But it’s December, you ask, how are you still feeling pain? Well my dears, I ask the same thing every day and I wish I had the answer. After not being able to run for a few months I finally went to see a sports medicine doctor in June, where I was diagnosed and given a prescription for physical therapy. I was feeling better by the time fall semester in September started (mostly because I wasn’t running, but I didn’t know that then) so I stopped going to physical therapy, but whenever I tried to run for more than a few minutes at a time my knees started aching again. I didn’t get a chance to go back to see my doctor until after graduation since I was so busy with schoolwork and two part-time jobs.

After inconclusive x-rays and an MRI, I had a talk with my doctor last week. He gave me the option of getting a procedure called Lateral Release, where he would go in and surgically move my kneecaps into proper alignment. I would like to avoid surgery if I can, and since my doctor said that there is no harm in waiting (I’m not going to get worse!) I decided to do three more months of intense physical therapy and then reevaluate my options then.

I would be lying if I told you there hadn’t been tears shed over this. I’m only 21 (going to be 22 on Thursday!) and being limited from even running one mile is so hard. I want to do whatever it takes to heal my body so that I can be as physically active as I want without limitation. That being said, I have my first physical therapy appointment at a new office tomorrow! You guys will definitely be updated on the progress of my knees in the next couple of months 🙂

I’m also going to take up swimming! I’m not a very good swimmer but I need to add some low-impact cardio to my life and I like the idea of being a swimmer. Now that Amazon finally delivered my Speedo, I’m planning on giving it a go tomorrow!

I’m off to bed, see you fools later!