My First Race Expo

Posted on May 5, 2012 by Morgan @ Life After Bagels

WHOA!  The 5k is tomorrow.  That was fast eh?  Probably because I only signed up for it two weeks ago.  I obviously don’t recommend doing that because that’s not enough time to train if you’re not a runner, which I’m not.  But since my expectations are reasonable for tomorrow and I’m going to be careful about listening to my body, I know I’m going to be okay.  The MOST important thing for me right now is my Ride for Heart training.

I was over the moon yesterday at the race expo.  I just kept repeating “my first race expo!!!!!”

Picking up our race bibs was so exciting.

Brad’s trying to use his cool face, but he’s excited too I promise :P

We rode our bikes down to the expo and back.  On the way home we stopped at Trinity Bellwoods park for some apple snacks.  (Apple snacks are just sliced apples but eating an apple whole is in fact not an apple snack.  Just an FYI :P )

We’re spending today doing outdoor chores.  Hooray for spring!

Thanks again to Chobani for the race entries!  If you’re running at the Goodlife Marathon tomorrow look for the CHOmobile at the finish line and grab a cup of delicious yogurt!.

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Running And Riding And Juicing

Posted on May 4, 2012 by Morgan @ Life After Bagels

I’ve got a jam packed post y’all.  Yesterday I went over to my friend Kate’s house to blend things.  Seriously!  Brad had to chuckle and roll his eyes when I told him my plan.  But hello, she just got a Vitamix.  Vitamix is the cadillac of blenders.  I had to see it in all it’s glory :P

Behold the magnificence:

We blended a zucchini.  I’ve never even thought of that.

Now rewind to Wednesday night for a second.  I made a video of my training.  It’s kind of a double training because I rode and ran.  I met Krysten, Robyn, and Jess for a run.  They’re training for a Warrior Dash in July.  My total workout was:

  • 6 km ride
  • 3 km run
  • 6 km ride

LESS THAN A MONTH until my Ride for Heart.  I have so much riding to do and so much fundraising to do before then.  If you check out the sidebar of my blog I’ve added a Daily Mile widget.  It’s going to track how many kilometres I ride from May 1st to June 3rd (ride day).  (Plug for DONATIONS pretty please click here!)

Back to running for one second.  Only two days until my first 5k!  Whoa it’s coming up so fast.  I’m going to be heading to the race expo today to register.  My first race expo :D

Who has a Vitamix?  Who wants to gift me a Vitamix, okay just kidding.  Ever blended a zucchini?

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Time To Talk About Gardening

Posted on May 3, 2012 by Morgan @ Life After Bagels

I’m going to take down the excitement level from getting my bike out for a second and turn UP the excitement about gardening season.  Last night I hosted a Twitter chat on behalf of @CultivateTO and it got me amped about getting started on my veggies.

Here’s a pic of me tending to last year’s garden.

I’m in planning stages right now and I’ve got a billion ideas hovering around in my head.

Such as:

  • I’m taking over part of Brad’s part of the yard (yes we do divide the yard into mine and his) and I’m wondering what plans deserve this super sunny area.
  • Who is going to lug home all of the soil I need? I think we all know who, and it’s not going to be me is it.
  • Where did my mini green stool go over the winter?
  • How can I build my own worm farm?  Gardening on a budget y’all.

You know, important stuff.

Are you growing veggies this year?  Any first timers out there?

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Jason Bourne Is Back

Posted on May 2, 2012 by Morgan @ Life After Bagels

Ohhhhhh friends yesterday was an exciting day.  I picked my bike up from it’s pre-season tuneup and it’s officially back on the road.  On the way down to my bike shop I was so excited that I texted Brad this: “bikes!!!! bikes m***** f*****! biiiiiiiiikesssssssssssss!”  I have no idea why I needed to use swear words but my brain was only focused on one thing – bikes, obviously ;)

Want to check out the fine specimen of a thang?

Thankfully I can get on the road for some REAL HARD training for my Ride for Heart.  I have 32 days until my ride.  It’s a 75 km course and I have to raise $1000!

Help!  Please DONATE!

You are going to hear ALL about my training efforts for my 75k ride.  PLUS I have a fundraising event coming up on May 14th.  Lots of Ride for Heart stuff happening up in here friends!

Don’t worry I am still getting ready for my 5k run this weekend.  Yup I’ll be out running again soon :)

Before I go let me leave you with the most delicious idea I’ve had in a while.  Last night I made shepherd’s pie.  I always make it with lentils on the bottom, carrots in the middle (+ either peas or corn, last night was peas), and mashed potatoes on the top.  But I had a cauliflower kicking around in the fridge from last week’s groceries and no plans for it.  You see where this is going right?

I used one head of cauliflower and three white potatoes to mash up for the top.  The cauliflower was just fabulous as an addition to my regular shepherd’s pie.

DO IT!!!!!!

DO THIS!!!!!!!!!!!

SO GOOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

DON’T MAKE ME USE CURSE WORDS!!!!!!!!!!

Who’s got their bike out?  Where are you biking these days?  Are you a cauliflower mash fan?

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Mish Mash It’s May!!!

Posted on May 1, 2012 by Morgan @ Life After Bagels

Happy May 1st all :)

I’ve got a huge mish mash post for you today.  Let’s begin.

TOMORROW I am hosting a Twitter Chat with @CultivateTO.  We will be chatting about urban agriculture, gardening, growing your own food, etc.  Please join me!

  • follow @CultivateTO and the hashtag #CultivateTO for the chat
  • 9pm EST
  • Wednesday May 2nd
  • you can use the search function on Twitter.com, Tweetdeck, or BEST option – tweetchat.com
  • email me morgan@cultivatetoronto.com if you have any questions

Next mish mash, I had a super delicious dinner yesterday.  I’ve been trying to add more variety to my meals.  Last night my dinner was baked beans (homemade), sweet potato, parsnips, broccoli, and avocado.

I ate the broccoli and the avocado together, ohhhhhhhh it was good.

After dinner I made pumpkin muffins based on this recipe from fitsugar.com.

This was the perfect bedtime snack after my kind of work out.  I say kind of because I only did 20 minutes of pilates and then switched to 20 minutes of stretching.  Brad was working late again and I convinced him to come home and try a quick pilates workout.  He wasn’t a fan and had me giggling through the entire thing.

Last mish mash – I’m currently obsessed with Instagram.  I know, late to the party as usual.  You can find me as lifeafterbagels if you want to follow me and feed my obsession.  I’m going to participate in that photo a day thingy everyone’s been doing.  Do it with me!!!

Hooray for a new month!!!

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It’s Monday

Posted on April 30, 2012 by Morgan @ Life After Bagels

Original title?  I think so :P

Last night Brad and I went to see 21 Jump Street.  Channing Tatum.  Be still my beating heart.  I don’t mean to spoil it for you but he was not shirtless at any point.  Even still, the movie was hilarious.  I was laughing so hard the entire time.

Before the movie we had a protein packed dinner.  I had baked beans, scrambled eggs with peppers, sweet potato and toast.

Before THAT we went out for another 5k training run.  We did the entire distance this time and ran more than I thought I could.  There was still some walking.  With exactly one week until the race I’m still excited!

My weekend was obviously way too eventful for me because I slept in this morning.  Luckily I had a delicious and quick new breakfast to try.  I bought coconut milk for the first time and grabbed this cereal from my health food store too.

I’ve got one more week off and I’ve still got a bunch of stuff to do before I go back to school, such as:

  • apply for student loans
  • a handful of work for Cultivate Toronto
  • writing a few freelance articles
  • training for my 5k
  • picking up my bike up from my bike shop
  • buying next semester’s books
  • a whole bunch of little errands like buying a new dish rack
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Picasso Pie

Posted on April 29, 2012 by Morgan @ Life After Bagels

Alternatively titled Picasso AND pie :P

Yesterday Brad and I had preview tickets to see the Picasso exhibit at the AGO.

We’re often asked if our membership fees are worth it.  YES definitely!  I’m not sure the exact price of the special exhibits but I know they’re somewhere around the $25-$28 range and members get in for free.  If we see two special exhibits during the year then our membership is worth it.  Plus, we like looking around at the permanent pieces as well.  We liked the Picasso exhibit so much we’re going to go back and see it some time over the next month or so before it leaves.

After the exhibit we walked over to Kensington market.  Neither of us had ever been to Wanda’s Pie In The Sky before and it was my idea to grab some coffee and a snack.  It was also my idea to get two pieces of pie.

That was one piece more than we needed.  But how could I decide between pecan and peanut butter cheesecake?

Amazing.  Delicious, etc, etc………

Oh and I have some super exciting news.  We FINALLY took our bikes in to be tuned up.  Hooray!  We had been so busy and our bike shop is kind of far from our house so it was on our to do list forever (along with our taxes).  We should have our bikes back within a few days and it will REALLY be time to get serious about our Ride for Heart training.

As for today, we’ll be doing a training run for our 5k.  Only a week to go!

What’s your favourite type of pie?

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A Tale Of Two Burgers

Posted on April 27, 2012 by Morgan @ Life After Bagels

Yo!  I posted twice yesterday.  If you missed it check out my 5k training run #2.

Brad has been working lots of overtime this week and you all know that I was studying overtime basically all month.  SO we’ve been trying to steal as much time as possible with each other.

Yesterday I met him at work and we went to do our taxes on his lunch break.  It was such a relief to get our taxes done.  It’s just one of the many tasks I have on my list while I’m off school this week.

Last night Brad had to go to the dentist and then he had a gallery opening to go to.  Since he didn’t have time to come home for dinner I suggested a burger date.  Burger dates are our favourite!  It’s easy to find a good beef burger, but finding a good veggie burger is difficult.  Brad took on the task last night and with the help of google and some recommendations from his colleagues he came up with BQM on Ossington.

Here’s the veggie burger:

It was a huge slab of tofu goodness.  It was marinated and grilled so it had a delicious flavour and was topped with cucumber, lettuce, tomato, garlic aioli, and bqm bbq sauce.  SO GOOD!

And since it’s Friday let’s be silly.  A friend of mine shared this video with me last night and I died.  He-man really knows how to groove eh ;)

“What’s going on?”

Tell me about the best burger you ever had.  Extra points if you live in Toronto and you recommend an awesome veggie burger to me.  One million points if you leave a YouTube video that’s equally awesome to He-man.

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5k Training Run #2

Posted on April 26, 2012 by Morgan @ Life After Bagels

As promised, here’s an update on my training.  Last night Brad and I ran another 3k for training for the 5k next weekend.  It was a bit harder for me this time.  I’ve explained it in the video:

When we woke up this morning we were both pretty sore again.  We realized we’re not in as good shape as we thought!  Actually we’re both in pretty good shape I think but it’s just that different training works different muscles.  Brad mentioned that we might have to keep the running in our regular training schedule even after the race.  I think we’ll wait to commit to that ;)

Ten days to go until the race.  I’m very excited!

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Broccoli Potato Soup Recipe

Posted on April 26, 2012 by Morgan @ Life After Bagels

Morning all!  Brad and I went for a training run for our 5k last night.  I shot a quick video afterwards with Brad’s phone but forgot to download the footage and he’s at work.  I’m going to have to go see him about our taxes later this morning so I’ll bring my laptop and do a quick download.

In the meantime I have some blog-worthy content for you, don’t worry ;)

I’ve been packing salads for lunch this week using spring mix.  Spinach has often been our go-to salad option and I usually drizzle olive oil on the spinach and add some salt and pepper.  But I knew the oil would make the spring mix soggy.  So I came up with this:

I wrapped up a lemon slice in cling wrap and put it in my tupperware.  Then at lunch time I just squeezed it on the salad.  Why didn’t I think of this sooner?!?!?

Now on the the piece de resistance.  Last night I made an amazingly delicious soup.  I had never made broccoli potato soup but I saw a recipe for it in my Veganomicon cook book.  The cook book recipe called for it to be seasoned with mint and dill but Brad despises dill and as much as I love mint I wasn’t sure about it in this soup.  So I went totally simple with only a few ingredients (because that’s how I like my recipes) and this is what I cooked up:

Broccoli Potato Soup Recipe

  • 1 medium onion
  • 3 tablespoons of oil
  • 1 head of broccoli (with stalks)
  • 4 small potatoes
  • 900 ml of broth

Take a large pot and heat the oil on low-medium heat.  Chop onion and add to heat.  Saute until the onions are translucent (approximately 10 minutes).  Chop and add potatoes.  Chop and add broccoli (including stalks).  Bring to a low boil and immediately turn to low heat.  Simmer for 40 minutes.  Then use a hand blender and puree the soup until close-ish to smooth (it won’t get totally smooth so don’t worry about trying).

Optional: top with cheddar cheese (a tiny sprinkle goes a long way, trust me)

Not optional: eat with a baguette ;)

I honestly can’t believe how simple this was and how tasty it was.  Brad loved it and told me to put it on my “top meals list” which he always thinks I have but let’s face it I don’t.

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