I am passionate about what I am writing, and I really enjoy writing, receiving comments and interacting with all of you. It’s so fun. And I like the style I’ve developed and the blogging schedule I am following.

But… I have this itching feeling that I could be more personal here. I just worry about doing that without comprising my “in real life” relationships.

I suppose most bloggers struggle with this.

Have you ever felt like you were having a blogger identity crisis?

Maybe I will work on a “FAQ” page or update my About page in the meantime. Do you have any questions for me? Is there anything you would like to know about me? Me, me, me, me, me. It felt weird asking you guys that. But I have always wondered!

I have a non-traditional giveaway for you. It is more of a “pay it forward” giveaway, but I didn’t just want to say “whoever comments first gets it!” So I will do a traditional giveaway and draw a name.

Have you heard of the book Such a Pretty Fat by Jen Lancaster? The book is about Lancaster’s weight loss journey (warning: if you have/had an eating disorder, this book may be triggering). She tells her story with a sense of humor and does not apologize for who she is. And bonus! The story is set in Chicago. Leah wrote about the book a few weeks ago, saying how much it made her laugh, and I thought, “Jeez, instead of letting this book sit on my shelf never to be read again, I should pass it on!”

So, I decided to. Let me know if you like this idea, because I used to have a book purchasing problem and could probably find a few more to pass on!

If you are interesting in having my meticulously well taken care of copy of Such a Pretty Fat, you’ll be excited to find out there are three entry possibilities! And, I decided to throw in some LastLine bookmarks for fun!

Contest Rules:

1. To enter the contest, simply leave a comment below recommending a fiction or non-fiction book to me.
2. To get an extra entry, link to the giveaway in your blog, and leave me another comment linking to your post.
3. And for the bonus extra entry, related to the first half of this post, leave me another comment below telling me something you like or dislike about this blog. Example? I dislike how RIDICULOUSLY long my posts have been lately. (And while I do write for me, but would love some feedback.)
4. This contest is open until 5:00 PM CST on Sunday, January 17th. I will probably use the old “name out of a hat” drawing to select a winner on Sunday evening. I will announce the winner on Monday, January 18th.
5. This contest is open to readers everywhere.

Nothing, really.

When I arrive home and Steven has a warm dinner on the stove, ready for me to eat, I feel like a pampered princess.

Do you like it when someone else cooks for you? Whose cooking is your favorite? Or do you prefer to make your own food?

Last night, Steven made a modified (because we were missing a few ingredients) version of Anna’s (newlywednewlyveg) Black Bean Fiesta Soup.

Here are the original ingredients, crossed out with what we substituted. Check out her site for the full recipe! I hope you don’t mind that we changed it up a bit, Anna!

• 1 onion, chopped
• 1 3 clove(s) garlic, chopped
  
• 1 tsp. olive oil
• 1 red bell pepper, chopped 1 1/2 T. Dried Red Pepper, 1 1/2 T. Dried Green Pepper
  
• 1 4. oz. can green chilies, chopped 1 1/2 Tsp Dried Jalapeño
• 1/8 tsp. cayenne pepper
• 1/2 tsp. chili powder 1/4 tsp. Ancho Chili Powder and 1/4 tsp. Chipotle Chili Powder
  
• 1 tsp. cumin
• 1/8 tsp. turmeric
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. lime zest
• juice of one lime 1 Tsp. Lime Juice
  
• 3 2 15. oz. cans black beans, drained and rinsed
• ADDED: 1 15 oz. can pinto beans, drained and rinsed
  
• 3 cups 2 cans vegetable broth
  
• 1 15 oz. can corn
• ADDED: 1 15 oz. can diced tomatoes
  

Also, our favorite cornbread made a guest appearance. It went deliciously with this soup! I recommend trying the soup (either the original or our version). It was so tasty – perfect for a cold evening, and not too spicy!

Crap. I better be careful. I don’t want to turn into a food blogger. Stop making such tasty eats Steven! (no really, please don’t stop)

Time for another meme! Ayla (dainty vegan), Leah (why deprive), Kim (Adventures in Wanting) and Trayn Harder all gave me the Happy 101 award. Thank you! I am supposed to list 10 things that make me happy. Making this list was fun (I could have kept going past 10). I think I could do this everyday! Give it a try! Click “more” to read on.

Well, obviously, friends and family make me happy above all else (that includes all of you, my blogger friends!). So I am not going to list them. Ha!

10 Things That Make Me Happy:

1. Arriving home to Steven making dinner
2. Getting the new issue of Runner’s World in the mail
3. Taking silly photos
4. Receiving an email from a friend
5. My blog-reading time on the train
6. Being healthy enough to exercise
7. Making ridiculous jokes with people
8. Having every other Friday off
9. Snorgling Data
10. Having regular poos

I received the first gift was from my blogger buddy Gina on Monday. I have been blogger buddies (well, we call each other blogger sisters) with Gina and Courtney for over three years. We write group emails almost every week, exchange holiday and birthday gifts and cards, and hope hope hope that the three of us can meet up someday (Gina is in New York and Courtney is in Texas).

Appropriately, Gina sent me Julie & Julia - the movie about Julia Childs and the blogger Julie Powell! I had not seen the movie, and I was so so excited when I opened it! She sent it along with vegan popcorn and a thoughtful card. How lucky I am to have a friend like that?! Steven and I really enjoyed watching the movie. It made me hungry though!

What does Data think of Julie & Julia?

He likes it!

Then on Wednesday at work, one of my team members brought in holiday treats for us all. She was thoughtful enough to make me vegan gingersnaps!

Isn’t the packaging cute?

Nom Nom Nom. Looks like something you’d buy in a store!

On Thursday, I received Lindsay’s copy of The Reader, which she is loaning me. I sent her a book of mine to borrow, so we are doing a fun little exchange.

And then Friday a holiday package from Lauren arrived (we participated in Morning Runner’s blogger gift exchange). WOW. Lauren HOOKED ME UP! DUH! How could I have forgotten she works IN a running store???!!! She sent me Saucony socks, Adidas headbands, a “run” keychain, and some prickly pear cactus candies which I am super excited to try. Isn’t that the best gift ever?! I really got lucky in drawing Lauren’s name. I have been having a lot of fun getting to know her through her blog. I love how down to earth she is and the great attitude she has. Check her out if you don’t already read her blog!

On Saturday, there was yet another package, from Courtney, wrapped in adorable “Meowy Christmas” paper!

And inside of an adorable Santa tin! What could it be, Data and I wonder…

Homegrown pecans! WOW! I cannot imagine how long it took to shell all of those! What a thoughtful gift! Steven and I are thinking about using them to make baklava!

Yes, I show Data all of the packages. He is curious.

We also received a ton of holiday cards this week, many from thoughtful bloggers, along with those from family and friends. THANK YOU EVERYONE!!!

How lucky I am to have received all of this? Who am I to even consider ranting about the small things in life when I have such a wonderful network of supportive friends? I am so grateful for these relationships! And I am grateful for each and every one of you who take the time to leave comments and develop an online relationship with me. It really makes my day to read your insight and feedback to my ramblings! Thank you!!!

Have you received any surprises lately? Does this time of year make you stop and think about the things in life for which you are grateful?

I love having a lot of blogs to read. I spend 2.5+ hours on the train on weekdays and it keeps me entertained.

And I feel like I have been finding a lot of great ones lately! My method on finding new blogs is by reading the comments on the other blogs I subscribe to (when I have time or the topic is really something I want to see what people are saying about)… if someone is saying something I can relate to, I go check out their blog. And often, when I am there, I may find links to other blogs I may enjoy. Sometimes, I can’t even remember how I ended up at a blog in the first place!

The first thing I do when I go to a new blog is check out their “About” page. Then I usually check out their writing style and see if the topics they talk about interest me. If they do, I put their blog in a “TBD” folder in my reader to check out for awhile and see if enjoy their blog.

Of course, from time to time, I get new commenters, and I always go check out their blog as well, and often, I end up subscribing.

I go through phases where I am looking for new blogs to read, just for fun, and then I go through phases where I cannot stay caught up with reader, and am not looking at all. And of course, I continually purge – I unsubscribe to those that ended up not suiting my taste. If I didn’t do that, I would get way too overwhelmed. Reading blogs is supposed to be fun, after all!

I have been continually updating my blogroll, and may move it to its own page at some point in time. I’ll keep you posted. (Does anyone else look at blogrolls besides me?)

The Sous Chef and Chef

The main dish: Stuffed Acorn Squash

Your choices are lentils and rice or…

Dressing!

We also had lentils and rice

and dressing on the side!

A delicious new Green Bean Casserole recipe! We used the leftover sauce as gravy for…

… the potatoes! Nom nom nom.

Of course, we had to have Cranberries. We just bought the canned Ocean Spray kind, but I may make a fresh cranberry dish for Christmas.

And you can’t forget the rolls (from ALDI)!!!

The fully set Thanksgiving Day Table…

and the fully set table with peeps!

My plate (this is all I ate – I knew we would have LOTS of leftovers)

Christina makes the classic mashed potato sandwich!

There were just a FEW servings of leftover mashed potatoes

We waited a few hours (Christina and Will played Wii the whole time) until we got out the DELICIOUS vegan pumpkin pie (new recipe here)

My plate

Everyone else’s plates!

The only thing that wasn’t vegan at this meal was the butter for the rolls, the whipped cream, and ice cream.

We had a lot of fun yesterday. Steven and I did the food prep while Christina and Will chilled, then we just played Wii all day and hung out. Sometimes, it’s good to spend a day indoors!

I didn’t do a thankful post this year. After reading many of yours, I can say I am thankful for the same things. But one unique thing I have to mention is how thankful I am too have a supportive husband who loves to experiment with food. I became vegan on June 15, but Steven is still a vegetarian. However, he fully supports my decision to be vegan and is always “veganizing” dishes we used to make with animals products, and trying out new recipes that I can eat. What a sweetie! Being vegan is not impossible, but Steven makes it much easier.

Um, uh… um…

I’ve actually been borrowing Nilsa’s idea and calling this a “life blog,” at least, over to the right in my intro*. And duh, she even mentioned in point #2 of that post to be prepared to talk about your blog! But I sure wasn’t.

I said I talk about exercise, a little bit about food, a lot of rants… I explained that I started this blog the summer before I went to Rome to keep in touch and that it has kind of expanded off of that…

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz………..

Sometimes, it’s just really hard to define who you are. That reminded me of when I had to come up with three interesting facts about myself for a class I took back in May. It also made me realize that I am more likely to be the one asking questions when I meet new people. I usually don’t do much talking myself. I do more probing. Ha ha.

So… I think I should work on that – being able to talk about me, intelligently, that is.

Do you ever get the question, “What is your blog about?” How do you answer? Or if you don’t blog, are you prepared to answer when people ask you what your hobbies are?

*As a side note, I think it’s REALLY important to have an intro or “About” page on your blog. That’s the first thing I look for when I am checking out a new blog!

Can you tell I am pumped?

I created a new category, “Marathon Training,” to keep track of all posts marathon training (duh) related. My plan is to write a weekly recap of my training on Sundays, but knowing me, a few details may slip in to other posts before I get to the end of the week… like today!

I got to do my first training run with Erin today during lunch. It was 1000x better than my lame-o lunch run last week. We met up in the loop, in front of her office, then started running when we got to Michigan and Jackson. We ran a fast pace to Navy Pier and looped back – 3.07 miles in 26:42 (I will provide a link to the Garmin stats on Sunday’s recap). According to my training plan, I was actually supposed to make this a “comfortable” run and not “push the pace.” Oops. I’ll work on that. I think we just got so caught up in talking that we didn’t realize how fast we were going until it was too late… then I didn’t really want to slow down, of course, even though I knew I should.

This was actually my first time meeting Erin. I was super excited to meet her and was not disappointed. She is fun to talk to, an interesting person and a good listener. I can’t wait to run with her more! Because I had someone to talk to, I didn’t stress out about work or getting back in time at all. It actually helped me relax during the middle of the day, and I felt great when I got back to my office. I was a bit hungrier than I expected to be though!

Since I got my run done during lunch, I have a free evening. I never have a free evening. I am so excited to go home and relax! Okay, I do have to review my second quarterly panel report, but I can easily do that on the couch. Maybe I can even go to bed early. Yay!

I have to be honest. I usually skim memes. Or just mark them as read. So if you do the same for me, I understand.

Although, this one was interesting to fill out, because I really had to think hard about what to put on these lists! And I am sure as the day goes on, I will think of even more things to add.

8 Things I am looking forward to:

1. The Kenosha Half Marathon this Saturday!
2. Seeing my parents this weekend.
3. Going to SELF’s Workout in the Park with Diane on 5/16.
4. Spending time on the Mississippi River this summer.
5. Going to Disney World in January.
6. Doing the 30 Day Shred for 30 consecutive days (starting 5/1) and getting shredded!
7. Trying a vegan diet.
8. Seeing X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Star Trek, Angels & Demons, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, Terminator Salvation this summer.

8 Things I did yesterday:

1. Got caught up at work!!!
2. Blogged. Read blogs. Added new blogs to my reader. Felt guilty for being addicted to blogging.
3. Talked to my coworker about doing a sprint triathlon.
4. Listened to Jillian Michaels’s podcast.
5. Ran 4 miles with Steven.
6. Ate homemade Mexican Food for dinner.
7. Got sick and spent a lot of time on the toilet.
8. Started watching Lady in the Water and wondered, “Is this lame movie going anywhere?!?!”

8 Things I wish I could will do*:

1. Run a marathon in 2009.
2. Finish logging in my IDP** credits.
3. Learn how to style my hair.
4. Work harder at communication with Steven.
5. Experiment more in the kitchen.
6. Try yoga. Try slowing down.
7. Maintain my weight loss.
8. Get more sleep!

8 Shows I watch:

1. I don’t watch television, but I do own all 6 seasons of Sex and the City.

Play along if you want!

*Modified that one a bit!
**It’s an architecture thing.