My Week in Salads

After the stress-eating debacle of last week, I decided that I should make an effort to pack myself with nutrition. One of my favourite ways to do this is via a big salad filled with chopped up bits of everything that catches my eye. I love how nourished but light and and energetic I feel after eating a meal-sized salad, especially when I have it for dinner before an evening workout.

However, I frequently fall out of the habit of having a salad for dinner or lunch, so this week is dedicated  to reestablishing a good habit. And I thought I'd better take a daily picture to encourage myself to actually do this, but also make sure that I have enough variety in my bowl, rather than throwing together the same mix every day as I tend to do...I'm a pretty lazy cook, unfortunately. 

So - here's this week's exercise and salad recap:

Saturday - Stella and I reran C25K W2 Day 2 (2.4K), and later went for a walk to the dog park (2K round trip).

Sunday - Reran C25K W2 Day 3. Salad for lunch:

Sunday: 4 packed cups of baby greens, brocolli stalk, cucumber, tomatoes, dried cranberries, almonds, apples and a wee bit of cheese

Later - out to my inlaw's for dinner and a 2.4K dog walk down by the lake.

Pretty. Extra points if you can spot the CN Tower.

Monday: Curves workout + boot camp #11 for the year (230 assorted crunches + 100 side leg lifts + 50 pushups) + 300m in the pool + walk the dog 1K. A very slow & tired 1K. Today's lunch:

Monday: baby greens, chick peas, carrots, celery, tomatoes, almonds and a wee bit of cheese.

Tuesday: Rest day! Very short dog walk. Today's lunch:

Tuesday: baby greens, veggie chick'n strips, celery, brocolli, apple, orange and peanuts. No cheese today.

Wednesday: Dog park (2K round trip), C25K week 3 run 1. Run 90s, walk 90s, run 3 min, walk 3 min, repeat. Oh my. Running for 3 minutes non-stop was OK. Doing it a second time a few minutes later was tough. Doesn't help that I'm still fighing the tail end of my cold and that breathing in cold air was uncomfortable. Today's lunch:

Wednesday: baby greens, strawberries, chickpeas, almonds, cucumbers

And today's sunset. Which pleasantly was happening after 6pm. Days are getting longer!

Thursday: Dog park walk (2K), Zumba + Curves + boot camp (300 crunches, 40 leg lifts, 3 mins on stairstepper, 50 pushups, 35s plank). Tonight's dinner:

Thursday: baby greens, tomatoes, cucumber, veggie chick'n strips, pumpkin seeds

Friday: C25K week 3 run 2. Haha - I didn't even need to tell Stella that we were going out - she flew to the front door as soon as she hear me zip up my running jacket. Good news - this was a much better run than two days ago. My cold must be getting better! Tonight's dinner:

Friday: baby greens, apples, celery, blueberries, beets, pecans and pumpkin seeds

I have to say - I did find that committing to having a salad for a meal every single day felt a bit restrictive in terms of meal planning.

But I feel fantastic - I lost the donut weight that I put on last week, I have a ton of energy, and I really enjoyed the challenge of seeking out more variety than I typically put in my salad bowl. And this was just with what I had on hand. It's got me thinking about what I can put on my grocery list this weekend to make next week's salads even more varied.

I also feel like this was the first time in a long while that I consisently achieved 7-10 servings of fruit & veg every day. Good all around.

Anyone have favourite (vegetarian) combinations to recommend? How is your nutrition these days?