How do you do ALL that you do?

Posted on April 21, 2016 by Jasmine

This is my visual response to people who asks me this question including the end.

Quick rundown of the things I have going on right now:

Full-time Turbine Test Engineering Career
S.T.E.A.M. Education business owner and entrepreneur
Women’s Church Ministry Leader Ages 18-35
Middle school girls robotics coach
Applying to M.B.A. programs (and GMAT Prep)
Meetup Social group organizer
Planning our first family reunion
Liturgical dancer
Styling my hair
Traveling Often
Dating for Marriage
Artsy fun with painting and theater
Re-gaining beach body fitness
20s Living with my girls

Starting this summer, I’m actively going to do better with free time. I will be on travel most of July, so that will help me transition quite nicely. One major time management and stress reduction technique that I use is to make a checklist everyday. I list 2 things that I want to complete for work, and 2 things that I want to complete outside of work. For major things that may roll over, I list them at the top of my planner page as 2 goals for the week. Also, I can only commit to one after-work event per day, reserving one weekday as a chill day at home.

For lifestyle items, I cook 1-2 meals per week with leftovers, I clean 1-2 load of laundry per weekend start to finish, and I clean one area of my place (bathroom, bedroom/linen, living area, dining area) every Sunday.

I seem to manage everything pretty good, but I know stress is on the horizon when I double-book events on the same day, don’t wash any laundry that week, stop exercising/ dancing, or stop writing. These are my warning signs before the physical ailments of sleep-deprivation, vocal cord dysfunction, or a sinus infection.

Pray for me yall! While I love being busy, it’s not good for my health, and I’ve learned that it distracts me from my purpose. We are all here “just enough time to do God’s Will”. I never want to be too over-worked and over-stressed to be winning at this thing called life.

Jazzy vs. Food

Posted on September 13, 2013 by Jasmine

Recently, I stopped eating RED MEAT and PORK for about a month. These are my lessons learned…

1. I love me some hot dogs! Still my favorite food to date.

2. Barbecues happen during the summer. Red meat is typically barbecued. I couldn’t have any.

3. Grilled black bean burgers were surprisingly good. However, they still don’t taste like real ones, no matter what they tell you.

4. It’s almost easier to be a full vegetarian instead of denying yourself certain meats.

5. Bacon IS in broccoli salad. Don’t be bamboozled.

6. Only do this if you don’t mind losing your appetite for bacon. Including bacon bits. I don’t even order it anymore.

7. My bod stayed slim with little to no cardio. But I gotta start weight training and lifting again. (Let me know if you need tickets to the gun show)

Still smiling and full tummy during pool party.

8. I feel like my sodium level went up because I have to season the life into some turkey meat.

9. I would do it again. Maybe go strictly veggie, and work back in chicken, fish, turkey.

10. Again, I love hot dogs. My first cheat after a month was the Pretzel dogs from Dave and Busters. MEATY beef hot dogs, gently browned pretzel with a delicate hint o garlic, with a spicy mustard that I have to dilute with heavenly tart yellow mustard.

Pi in the sky

Posted on March 14, 2013 by Jasmine

Happy Pi Day! Today is March 14 = 3.14 = Pi

In honor of this fabulous holiday, I’ll explain a little about Pi in my own words.

The most simple explanation of Pi is the Circumference divided by the Diameter. All of which will only be used when there is a Circle involved. Speaking of circles, check out the one below:

Diameter = length of the line represented by cutting the pie in half.

Circumference : Circle :: Perimeter : Square. Ie. length of the border.

Circumference = the length of the crust. It’s kind of hard to visualize it when it’s round. So just take the crust, snip it, and roll it out in a straight line.

If the diameter of the circle is 1, unroll the pie crust and it equals Pi

I don’t think in the BC days they had delicious pie crust (nor peach cobbler), so all they could do is continue to keep proving it with different sized circles. If you believe the bible is true, then you have to believe in math, and vice versa. 2 Chronicles 4:2 talks about them approximating Pi = 3 while constructing Solomon’s Temple sea of cast metal. Math back in the BC times had to be exciting. Archimedes narrowed down 3 1/7 < Pi < 3 10/71. It is presumed that Zu Chongzhi started with a shape with 24,576 sides to determine his approximation of 355/113! That’s impressive.

Tonight, I think I’ll celebrate with a Pizza Pie and some Chocolate Silk Pie, yum.

Navigating Indianapolis like a Pro

Posted on January 31, 2012 by Jasmine

This is written with the intention of preparing those coming to Indianapolis for the Superbowl 46. It’s a really great city, and now that I’ve lived here for a couple days over 2 years, I’m pretty much an expert!

1. Nobody can drive. Like nobody. Seriously though, many people run red lights around here. Definitely look both ways before driving through an intersection. There are lots of impatient drivers that will go in the off-ramp to pass you, that will cross over double-yellow lines to pass you, and go through an intersection although your light is bright and green.

2. Remember how to get to I-465. That’s one of the things that makes Indy the “Circle City”. It’s the main freeway that is close to everything, yet close to nothing. You can get anywhere in the circle in 20 minutes. If you’re anywhere outside of that, give it 30 minutes.

3. Don’t be fooled by the JW Marriott. It is gorgeous, a good place to meet up and socialize, and the staff is really great. However, the food and drinks are awful. Just really, don’t even risk it unless you are really just going to chill or get a cup of cafe americano (espresso and water) because they don’t have coffee at the bar 🙁 Which leads me to #4.

4. The private/non-chain restaurants are awesome! My favs are: Maxine’s Chicken and Waffles (near downtown) – only get the chicken and sweet potato waffle even if it sounds scary. You can also branch out with the sides of Fried Green Tomatoes and Grits. Papa Roux (east side/downtown) – I always get the Smoked Sausage Po’Boy. The east side location has bottomless sides. I always get the bread pudding and red beans and rice, but you can taste all of them free of charge. Monon Food Company (north side) – the BEST (strong statement) mac and cheese I’ve EVER had! You have to get the side of it. I pair that with the Chipotle Fish tacos. They also feature Micro brews along with Imports, Domestic Beers and Wine.

5. Alcohol is not sold in stores on Sunday. Not a fan of the hard stuff, but I do like a fine wine with my Sunday dinner. Shoot, you have to plan dinner and all beverages ahead of time so you won’t be stuck out in the cold. For those that really need that fix, most restaurants do serve liquor, but you just can’t go to the stores or gas stations for your libation.

6. The downtown mall has the best parking, but nothing inside. I’m not sure why the Circle Centre Mall was designed the way it is, but the aisles are small with a huge opening in the middle where you can see to the floor below. It’s nice looking, but it is always packed on the weekends. It’s not because there are that many people, but because there is no space to walk. Event Parking is usually $20, but if you can find $20 of stuff to buy in the mall (mine is usually spent at Chick-Fil-A), they charge you the normal rate of $1.50 for 3 hours.

With all of that being said, it is really a great city. My favorite pastimes include the museums and the parks. There is so much information and they are beautiful. Welcome to my new city, have a great time, and come back soon!

Octoberfest

Posted on October 31, 2010 by Jasmine

I had a date weekend with the boo! We’re still long distance and instead of driving the 4 hours, we sometimes meet in the middle. We’ve met in Fort Wayne, IN twice, but this time it was a city equally as ‘unique’, Dayton, OH. It was a 2 hour drive for me. I recommend it to anyone in a semi-long distance relationship and we highly recommend Priceline for hotels under $50 a night. We’ve had the best luck with 3 1/2 star rooms. The only difference between 3 and 3 1/2 is a flat-screen tv. I don’t like to spend much time in a hotel room when I visit a new city so I really don’t need anything spectacular.

The first night we got in and visited downtown Dayton for dinner at The Spaghetti Warehouse. We won’t be back there to eat. The best things about the place were the decorations and the train that had dining tables. The complimentary bread was bland, and the spaghetti AND meatballs weren’t seasoned at all. I had the lasagna and it was just a step above the spaghetti (bland.3). It really seemed like it was a local favorite though because there were a couple of large birthday parties while we were there. We also ate at The Waffle House (personal fav) and Chick-CanDoNoWrong-Fil-A.

We went to the movie theater Friday and Saturday to see Hereafter and Paranormal Activity 2. Hereafter was aight. I wasn’t a big fan of the ending, and the previews gave away a little too much information. It basically tells the entire plot and nothing in the movie really surprised me, so don’t watch the trailer… unless you don’t want to watch the movie. I really liked Paranormal Activity 2. I’m a huge fan of sequels especially when they connect in a great way to the original. The movie definitely connected to the original in a way that no one expected! Corbin hasn’t seen the original so I did have to fill him in on a couple details.

The other highlight of the weekend was the Majestic Nursery & Garden Corn Maze. It took us about 30 minutes to get there, but it was well worth it. It really gave us time to bond and I think it really help us understand our roles in our relationship. I let him take hold of the map and guide us through. I would give my opinion, but it was definitely a task for me to just follow him. 😉 The maze was a lot more difficult than we thought because we had the added task of finding 5 different scarecrows along the way. After about an hour, and much exercise, we found all 5 scarecrows, but only 4 of them had cards to prove it. :/ Corbin was the navigator keeping us on path, and I scoped out the scenery finding the scarecrows along the way. We made it to the end to get our surprise gift (see below) lol. I highly recommend taking a random vacation just to season your relationship or spice up your life! #spicegirls

My first week at Veggie-ing

Posted on October 4, 2010 by Jasmine

Actually I’m going to coin this term “vegging” pronounced ve-jing.

This week was about as challenging as expected. I arrived back in Indy from my cruise on Monday and scooped up Cooli from my friend’s place. They were already making dinner so I just opened a bag of the salad in a bag and threw on some ranch. This was probably the worst food day because I just felt like the stereotypical veggie because I was really eating rabbit food! Tuesday, I grabbed a footlong Tuna sub (toasted) from subway. I always pile up the veggies <sans-tomato so I can eat it later without it being gross and soggy>. I ate 6-inches at work and another 5.5 before going steppin that night. It was a much needed stress reliever!

Wednesday, I had a lunch meeting at work where there were plenty of veggies on the menu. We had steamed carrots and flat beans, mashed potatoes with chicken gravy, mashed sweet potatoes, salad, and apple cobbler. I just left the pork in the tray, which wasn’t difficult. Right after work, I went to the grocery store. I had to be quick because I knew Cooli was waiting on me. I invested in a few more boxes of 100 Calorie packs where apparently I can “Diet like a Diva“. They have a lot of their cookies and chocolatey treats in portion sized packs, which are really great for after lunch or that 3:00 snack. For the morning edibles, I bought apples, bananas, a cantaloupe, and yogurt for my 10am growlfest. That night, I made Sloppy Joes [I was told that they can’t have that name without real meat]. So, below is a pic of my Messy Susans.

I first got the idea from my line sister Monique who has been vegging for a little while now and makes the best homemade biscuits (fyi). It’s similar to her recipe, except I am much more lazy and not as intense about what I eat. I bought Yves Meatless Ground. It has the same main ingredient as her recipe, which is Textured Wheat and Soy Protein. It comes frozen and already seasoned. Instead of making the sauce from scratch… Manwich has never failed me!! It ended up being really good after I got over the mental aspect of it all. I also added some tortilla chips on the side with the salad. Thursday for lunch, I ate the leftovers with a slice of cheese and scooped it out with the chips, yum!

Thursday night, I had pizza from Donatos. It’s usually super delish, but they only had a couple people working. And no one really watching the oven. It was a big hot mess. Although we ate there, it still took an hour from start to finish and it was NOT good. Similar to the crazy street pizza in Baltimore, I got food poisoning again #fail. I was nauseous all day at work Friday. It ramped back up before eating dinner, and climaxed at the club when I fainted for like 30 seconds <Scary I know!!> I’m going to get checked out this week. I think I may be intolerant to something that both places put in their pizza.

Yesterday, was the toughest test when I was with friends for the Circle City Classic and they all wanted to eat Chik-Fil-A. I kept going back and forth debating. I was so ashamed when I broke down and got a fabulous #1. Thinking back on it later, I remembered that I gave myself 1 day a week of freedom so I was still good!! Go me. After all, I realized the best way to stick with vegging is to make my food myself. If I depend on going out to lunch or the cafeteria at work, I’ll end up hungry!

Random Link of the Day: Veggies go way too hard!

Eat Pray Love –my way.

Posted on September 20, 2010 by Jasmine

The day before leaving Hong Kong, my friend an I exchanged books that we had been reading. I gave her my Wicked for her Eat Pray Love. I have yet to read it and don’t even know where it is. I plan to eventually see the movie too. Anyway, I’m trying to make some major steps in my life over the next 6-12 months and I figure I have to be the change that I want to see I’m gonna change the game.

When I return from my cruise, I am starting a new eating plan. It’s geared towards making me a healthier person on the inside. 1. I am going to become more strict with my Portion Control plan by eating amounts closer to the recommended portions. 2. I am going to work more towards being a vegetarian. I’ve always wanted to try it, but never have. The plan is to start by allowing myself 1 day per week to eat meat. If this is too easy, then I’ll cut out the meat altogether. I started to research the Blood Type Diet again, but I just love too many of the foods that it suggests that I shouldn’t eat.

Next, I’m going to set aside some God time everyday. My plan involves spending my evenings researching and acting on “my bIg plan” <which hasn’t been announced to most>. Before and after that research time will involve prayer for guidance and praise for whatever progress was done. I was considering combining the prayer with my eating into some sort of fast. Of course it’s not going to be something super intense or anything to make me lose weight. I will still use many of the principles of fasting, but I compromised and decided the veggie thing was best for me and my lifestyle. Instead of me continually praying for what I want, it will help to show me God’s will.

Regarding love, I’m taking this step the slowest of all. I found love with my boyfriend, but we had to work on ourselves separately from each other. Hopefully, love will find its way back to me and will slither in and align itself with “my bIg plan”. I have started living the way I want to live and actively attempting to reach and succeed at my goals. I know all of this will be difficult, but I am excited for the journey.

Quote of the day: “If you always do what you always did, you’ll always get what you always got.”

Jasmine L. Sadler

Experiences ~ Growth ~ Thoughts

Category Archives: Food