Mini-Cleanse Day 1

So it seems like the entire raw food blog world is on some form of cleanse/detox/challenge to begin the New Year and I clearly failed to jump onto that bandwagon, giant pieces of galette and all... Now that I feel that I've finally settled back into our home now after all the holidays, traveling, etc. I decided to make up my own little cleanse to try to get back on the track I've slightly derailed from since getting back from Salem (that's what happens when you get back to your own kitchen I tell you! It does things to a woman!).

Once again, I have to rant and rave about the benefits of the raw diet though. Last night, I just didn't feel like sleeping so caught up on some raw recipe reading until about 2:30 am, and bounced out of bed at 9am... It feels pretty good when little things like that happen. Anyway, here's what I did for my first day (all recipes were of course for 2), nothing two fancy, but just trying to keep myself in check :)

1. Waking up started with a glass of water at room temperature (9am-ish)

2. I followed that at 9:30 when I actually got up with some herbal tea (mint, stevia, nettle)

3. Breakfast at 10am was a tropical smoothie of papaya, pineapple, 1/2 a banana, mesquite and macca powder

4. My 1:30pm lunch was a green juice of 1/2 cucumber, celery, parsley, two kinds of Kale, Ginger, Lemon, 1 tsp. raw honey, a couple of Alissa Cohen's seaweed crackers, and a mini-dessert of 2 chocolate squares

5. As I made up dinner I snacked on my 2 daily dried apricots, 1 tbsp of my superfood mix (goji, cacao nibs, pistachios and turkish mulberries), and some pumpkin seeds

6. Dinner was a huge salad with mixed greens, spinach, cherry tomatoes, brocoli, cauliflower, red cabbage, 1/2 an avocado, portobello mushroom w/ ginger-almond miso dressing

Throughout the day I drank tons of water (like every day in fact, it's always more than 3L so I just stop counting after a while).

Because, I've been staring at a computer screen for a major part of the day wrapping up PhD applications, I think my capacity for intelligent blogging today is pretty limited so I think I might as well stop when I'm ahead.

Workout of the Day:
10 minutes of cardio warm-up on the treadmill
4 x 12 leg raises (target area: lower abs)
4 x 12 'normal' crunches (target area: rectus abdominis)
4 x 12 crunches w/ legs extended (target area: I have no idea, but they feel good)
60 second plank (target area: core)
60 second side planks (30 seconds each side x 2)
3 x 12 lying dumbbell chest press (target area: chest)
3 x 12 shrugs (target area: shoulders)
3 x 12 bent over one-arm dumbbell row (target area: back)
1 x 20 very light weight kickback (target area: triceps)
1 x 20 very light weight curls (target area: biceps)
4 x 12 torso rotation machine (target area: obliques)
3 x 12 leg raises (target area: adductors)
3 x 12 calf raises (target area: calves)
60 second plank (target area: core)
10 minutes of stretching

Tomorrow... Acro-yoga at Flow is going to kick my a$!

Also on a workout note, I think it's really important to have people to look up to for inspiration when working out and trying to reach or maintain goals. As I mentioned recently, I've been looking into the way Tonya Kay both stays on a raw diet and is so incredibly fit, capable and beautiful through her Raw Analysis II ebook, and aside from developing a total girl crush on her, the woman is t0tally impressive and such a fitness motivation.

I'm also seriously flirting with the thought of starting bikram yoga because I've found a student-budget friendly studio nearby. I've only done it a couple times, but I remember loving the way my muscles and joints felt lubricated afterwards.

Really, I'm trying to increase my non-gym related physical activities. Dance is one thing, but I think starting up some other kind of class might give me more discipline. Though it's not really in my nature, I do find that I can sometimes be very hard to motivate!

Recipe of the Day:

Inspired by, this post on Rawdorable, I made Andrew a raw coconut milk-chia tartlet featured in the pic above in the awesome new push-pop tartlet pans we found in Salem. I also served up a piece of my raw berry pie w/ ginger ice cream for dinner dessert, which I just got to ogle (okay, I had a bite...).