Track & Thanksgiving

Yesterday I went grocery shopping for 95% of my Thanksgiving menu. I still need to pick up my turkey (I ordered it) and some fresh produce on Wednesday. Not sure if I've mentioned this but for the third year in a row, Dave and I are hosting Thanksgiving. However this year, my aunt and uncle, cousins and grandparents are coming as well. So with our combined families, we are having 14 adults and one adorable baby. I've been planning my menu over the last month and have finally locked down whats for dinner. My Aunt Dede is a huge foodie as well so we worked together to come up with this plan. Here it is!

2009 Thanksgiving Day Menu:

Appetizers:
Smoked Salmon on Pumpernickle Toast with Cucumber Cream Cheese (Bon Appetit)
Crostini with Kale & Parmesan (Everyday Food)
Sausage Stuffed Mushrooms (Barefoot Contessa)

First Course:
Sweet and Hot Butternut Squash and Chipotle (Tyler Florence)
Main Dishes:
Brined Turkey 23 pounds (Dave and I are making)
Brined Turkey 13-15 pounds (my mom is making)
Rolls
Creamed Corn Pudding (Bon Appetit- made here, adding in chipotles)
Red Bliss Mashed Potatoes
Squash/Kale/Cheddar Bread Pudding (Bon Apetit, made here and here)
Cranberry Sauce with apples and orange peel
Potato Challah Bread Stuffing (Family Recipe)
Green Bean Casserole (mom's recipe)
Mushroom Gravy (Cooking Light)
Spinach Souffle (Cooking Light)
Candied Sweet Potatoes (Nana's favorite recipe)
Roasted Potatoes (for my father-in-law, can't eat dairy)
Mashed Squash
Cranberry Jello Mold (mother in-laws favorite recipe)
Peas & Carrots (Dave loves his peas : )

Desserts:
Apple Pie (My mother in law makes an amazing apple pie)
Pumpkin Pie
Black-Bottom Peanut Butter Mousse Pie (Bon Appetit, made here)
Cranberry Cake (Cooking Light)
Pumpkin Blondies w/ icing (made here)
Ice Cream

I think we will definitely have enough food! Seriously though, Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. I love trying new things and I'm really excited to share the day with my entire extended family! We are going to have a full house!

Today, I woke up late and then my brother came over. He wanted to do a track workout; something we both haven't done in many years. We drove to the track and decided to do a warmup in the local state park. This probably isn't the smartest place for me to run with all the leaves covering the roots but I went with it. We didn't run fast and I felt pretty good with my injuries. But I felt like it was harder than yesterday (maybe the four vodka, sprite cranberries from last night weren't helping.) We went back to the track and did a couple laps and I decided that was enough for me. 3.5 miles in just over 9:30 pace (this includes when I had to stop to let dogs pass since I'm still scared of most animals, such a wimp, I know.) Mike decided he was going to run 1 mile as fast as he could. I wanted to time him and I started my Garmin then quickly realized it doesn't work if I'm not moving. haha. He had a watch and he ran pretty even spilts, 70, 2:33 and finished his timed mile at 5:09. Pretty freakin' impressive!

Once I get healthy, I would like to do a timed mile as well. My fastest mile was 5:57 and it was the only time I ever ran the mile. My college coach made us all run the mile during practice one day. He tried so hard to turn me into a distance runner. But my idea of distance was the 800! I do miss the track and I'm looking into running clubs in the area that have an Indoor Tracks that I would be able to do some speed workouts this winter.

The rest of the afternoon was pretty lazy. I've decided I don't want to do a lot of cooking between now and Thursday so I bought a Boboli pizza and Annie's Mac n Cheese. On the pizza I put tomato sauce, mexican blend cheese, proscuitto, red, orange and yellow tomatoes, green onions and feta. I also put together a salad. Great quick, barely cooking meal!
So, this week I worked out 6 days and my achilles are feeling a lot stronger. I have PT tomorrow so I want to talk to him about my hip, but I think he will be pleased that I ran pretty much pain free. Hopefully he will be pleased, he hasn't exactly approved me to run outside yet, oops!

Here's what I did this week:
Mon Nov 16: PT, eliptical, step, running backwards on treadmill, lifted legs
Tues Nov 17: Boot Camp
Wed Nov 18: Ran 2.5 miles, lifted legs
Thurs Nov 19: Muscle Conditioning (best class ever! I used to take this all the time and have to get back into it- we work ever muscle!)
Friday Nov 20: OFF
Saturday Nov 21: Ran 3.78 outside
Sunday Nov 22: Ran 3.12 + two cool down laps (800 meters with big bro)

Plans for this week:
Monday: PT
Tuesday: Boot Camp or off (not sure I will be able to get out during lunch because I have Wed, Thurs and Fri off of work so I assume it will be a busy day!)
Wed: Run 4 miles, lift legs
Thurs: Run Turkey Trot 5K or 5 miles
Friday: Run 3 miles, lift legs

Have a great week!