Saturday Morning Faves (Plus a K-Cup Tip!)

Saturday mornings are my absolute favorite.

While most people look forward to the weekend so they can sleep in, my internal alarm clock has me up bright and early so I take full advantage of it. And by taking advantage of it, I mean cuddling up on the couch with a warm blanket, a big cup cups of coffee, and my favorite FoodNetwork shows.

This morning I decided to change up my usual smoothie routine with a bowl of oatmeal topped with fresh blueberries and a sprinkle of chia seeds. It definitely hit the spot.

In addition to the oatmeal, I had several cups of coffee in my Epcot mug! I have a small coffee cup collection that would be much bigger if I had the space to store them all!

I have a few handmade ones, gigantic ones that Jon calls a "bowl of coffee" when I drink from them, ones with cute little figures in the bottom, and mugs shaped like different animals. They are just so much fun to find and they always bring back memories every time I use them.

Side note: this photo shows my third cup of coffee from the same K-Cup pod! I have a Keurig 2.0 but do not have a carafe. I experimented a few weeks ago and found that I can get 2 really good quality cups of coffee and 1 weaker cup from the same pod. I drink my coffee black so this is fine by me! I am always sure to hit the "Strong" button on the machine when brewing cup number 3 to get as much flavor as I can.

Jon's dad and uncle are going to be in town this weekend so I am off to do a little bit of light cleaning, finish watching my show, and run a few errands before they arrive!

Question of the Day

What is your favorite thing to do on Saturday morning?

Sweet Spot

Late Thursday evening my mom flew in from Indiana for a long weekend visit. Yesterday she was on her own as both Jon and I had to work all day so she took her time relaxing on the beach, enjoying a local coffee shop, and touring downtown.

Last night my mom and I headed downtown for some homemade ice cream.

We both chose to get one scoop of the coffee ice cream and one scoop of the salted chocolate caramel ice cream. This made for a delicious combination and satisfied our late night sweet tooth!

We decided to go on a walk through downtown, ice cream in hand, to tour some of the local shops.

Downtown was packed with people as there was an event going on. In Florida it seems that the cool thing to do is to take your dog with you everywhere you go. There were dogs in the wine bar and laying under the tables in restaurants while their owners ate! I wonder if they allow cats in places too...  ;)

No Equiment Needed Tabata Workout

Thank you for your kind comments after the loss of my grandfather. They truly mean a lot. He was a wonderful man and we are so thankful that we have so many amazing memories to remember him by.

When I woke up this morning I was just going to lay around for most of the day but I thought that it would be good to get moving around, especially because next weekend I am running in a little 5k race! I thought about doing a workout video but instead I made up a new Tabata workout!

It really got my heart rate up! I made sure to include legs, core, and arms in this 15 minute workout.

Afterwards I made a coffee protein shake. It was delicious. I used chocolate protein powder because I didn't have any vanilla on hand but I imagine that vanilla would be just as good! The chocolate flavor was sort of masked because of the coffee packet too. It was definitely delicious!

Shocked by the Generosity

Do you see those rosy red cheeks? Those aren't from a hard workout - they're red from the frigid air!

So since it was so cold today I thought I would stop by Starbucks between classes and grab some coffee to warm myself up. I ordered their new Vanilla Spice Latte and it was pretty good. I have been hearing some good things about the drink and thought I would try it for myself. It may easily become one of my new favorites.

I also got a piece of banana chocolate chip coffee cake. I don't have a picture of it because I already scarfed it down :)

If you are a dedicated reader then you should know by now that I have been raising money for my aunt. Today I checked my Paypal account to see how much I have raised to date and I have raised over $1,000! I am so shocked by the generosity of some people. I can not believe how generous some people are when it comes to helping out a great cause and a great woman. My aunt 100% deserves this and I am so happy to be doing this for her. My initial goal is for 100 people to donate one dollar for every  mile I am going to run for a total of $13 donated per person and some people have been exceeding this amount and have been donating up to $50 for every mile. I am in shock when I find this out from people and just want to give them a great big hug.

Thank you to everyone who has donated so far and thank you in advance for those of you who are going to donate.

Also, there are exactly 100 days until the race! 4 miles on the treadmill is on today's agenda.


Have you ever done a fundraiser before? Do you have any tips or tricks for raising money?

Drawing a Blank

*This giveaway is closed*

All day today I was trying to figure out what to post about today. I didn't want to leave you guys without a fun post before the weekend started but I seriously had no idea of what to write about. I know that some bloggers keep journals and write down interesting topics so that when they draw a blank they have something to fall back on. I should really look into doing this because I always think to myself "that would be fun to blog about" and then when it comes time to blog I can never remember what I wanted to say!

After my workout today when I was enjoying a protein shake, it hit me that I should share with you guys some of the great products I have received in the mail.

Earlier this week I had mentioned that when I went home on Saturday there was a pile of packages waiting for me. Some of the companies that teamed up with me for the New Years Resolutions Giveaway sent me some products to review and some other companies sent me some samples of their products just because! I love people. So here's my review of some of the products I received:

Chike Nutrition

Chike Nutrition is a company that makes high-quality protein supplements that are perfect if you are trying to lose weight, eat healthier, or want a protein-packed shake after a workout. Chike sent me some of their Iced Coffee in convenient single-serve packs.

They are a great way to start the day, as they have the caffeine equivalency of one cup of coffee or perfect after a workout because of the 20 grams of protein. Chike Nutrition is a company that is "obsessed with taste," and let me tell you - these are pretty darn good.

I had one of the Iced Coffees after my workout today. I added water to mine but you can use milk instead. It tasted great and mixed really easily in my Blender Bottle. I really like how convenient the single-serving packs are because then you don't have to deal with measuring and can easily throw a pack in your gym bag.

The Iced Coffee is great for coffee lovers but if you don't like coffee they have 5 other flavors including Chocolate Bliss, Strawberry Burst, Orange Creme, Banana Magic, and Very Vanilla.

Disclaimer: I received these products free of charge, however all opinions are my own.

Food Should Taste Good

Food Should Taste Good (FSTG) sent me four different flavors to try: Multigrain, Barbeque Sweet Potato Kettle Cooked, Original Sweet Potato Kettle Cooked, and Sweet Potato.

So far I have only opened up the Sweet Potato bag and have been snacking on them ever since. I didn't want to dive into all of the bags at once and have 4 open bags of chips. The Sweet Potato chips are simply delicious! They have the perfect crunch to them and have a slight sweetness to them. I haven't tried them with any dip but I imagine they would be good with fruit salsa or apple butter.

I love that FSTG believes that good food is made from real ingredients. All of the chip varieties are gluten free, cholesterol free, have zero grams trans fats, certified Kosher, and many varieties are vegan.

Once I eat up all of the bags I received I want to find the Lime and the Chocolate varieties as well! There are 23 tortilla flavors and 4 Kettle Cooked Sweet Potato Flavors. You can check out all of the flavors that Food Should Taste Good offers here.

Disclaimer: I received these products free of charge, however all opinions are my own.

Workout

I haven't done any abs in awhile and wanted to get in a good ab workout. I went through all of the different workouts I have written down and came up with a new one, that you can do anywhere. And when I say "anywhere" I mean it. I completed this workout in my dorm room, which is incredibly small and I'm pretty sure they thought munchkins would be living in it when they built it.

Do you like my red and black color combo? I thought it would be fitting since our school colors and red and black! Anyways, the 10-10 second planks are a toughie but a goodie. I also added on another set of them at the very end of the workout after the last set of crunches but forgot to add it in the picture!

Giveaway

Food Should Taste Good wants you to try some of their delicious flavors! They offered to give away a variety box of 4 flavors to one lucky reader! (I don't think you will be getting the exact same flavors I received but you never know!) I will be randomly choosing a winner on Tuesday.

How to enter

Mandatory: Visit Food Should Taste Good's website and let me know which chip variety looks best to you!
Optional: Follow Truffles n' Treadmills on Facebook
Optional: Tweet "I want to win a variety box of @FSTG_Chips from @trufflesntread www.trufflesntreadmills.blogspot.com"

Make sure you leave an additional comment for each entry for more chances to win!


Also, I still have three more giveaways coming up! I will also redraw for the Healthy Bites Giveaway if the original winner doesn't email me soon! 

That was a long post for not having anything to say earlier today ;) Have a great weekend!

Not a Fan

For Christmas one of my gifts from my sister was a Starbucks gift card. I put it to good use the other day before my hour and a half drive to Ohio to visit Alex for the New Year. I bought a peppermint mocha with an extra shot of espresso so I wouldn't doze off while driving (which seems to happen when I drive for a long time). It was delicious! Well I still had some money left on the gift card so when I was out doing some errands today I thought that I would try a misto from Starbucks. I have heard several good things about them from several other bloggers like Julie and Erica.

I heard from the other bloggers that the misto tastes really good and is cheaper than a cappuccino. It is half coffee and half steamed milk while a cappuccino is made with espresso instead. So when I went today I decided to find out what all the rave was about. I ordered a misto with a pump of caramel. I tried it after it had a few minutes to cool down and did not like it at all. Let's just say I will be sticking to the drinks that have a healthy serving of creamer and flavored syrup in them.

Workout

I don't know if you can call something a workout if there is no sweat involved because today's "workout" was super light. I waited for my mom to get home from work and we took the dogs out on a brief 25 minute walk. We would have went longer but the street we were walking on was really icy and we didn't want to risk the dogs getting hurt from falling on the ice or us getting dragged across the ice if they saw a squirrel or something.


Also, if you haven't entered the giveaway for the cereals from Attune Foods then head on over and do just that! Don't forget to look out for more giveaways through January!


Have you tried the misto? What did you think?