Running Faster and Lizi's Granola Giveaway WINNER!

As I get closer and closer to this design exhibition, work just gets crazier and crazier.  Without giving away too much, we are basically working with a theme which includes my boss and I having two vintage style dresses made - this has been our only light relief in an otherwise chaotic environment.  Today, I went to try on one of my headdresses (I will post loads of photos - promise!) and was literally blown away, I cannot wait for Sunday!

In addition to working full time, I have also sold some of my "fat clothes" on Ebay and it was getting to the point where I'm sure I would get emails from people saying "hey where's my stuff?!", so when I got home from work tonight it was a case of throwing together the ingredients for braised meatballs - shoving it in the oven, packaging up the remainder of the clothes I had to send, literally ran over to the post office (thankfully just around the corner from my house), post those, come back home, check the final proof of our new pricelist for work - email it back, put the linguine on - and then serve the food (keeping mine aside for post-run) before getting changed into my running clothes.  My daughter has Girl Guides on Thursdays (that's the British version of Girl Scouts), so after I dropped her off I did my 2 mile run.

Frankly, I was happy to be running to try to melt some of the stress of the day away.  I honestly think I just switched off during tonight's run and that's exactly what my brain needed - some downtime!  Now the past two runs I have had an annoying side stitch just after the first mile - on Tuesday it was quite painful, so much so that I had to walk briefly twice (which I hate!).  Tonight, thankfully, I just kept the pace steady and slow (when needed) - but when I finished the two miles I was TOTALLY thrilled to see that for the first time since I started running on 17th June, I have busted the 5mph average speed barrier!  OK - this may sound slow to some of you more seasoned runners, but when I started running my average pace was 3.95mph - yep, that's barely faster than walkin!  So to see my speed improve like that is really encouraging!

My next run is actually scheduled for Sunday, but of course I will be at this design exhibition, so I'm going to do this week's long run on Saturday.  Next week will require a bit of juggling too and I'm toying with the idea of taking a Jillian Michael's DVD with me to the hotel in London - I may not have any energy but at least if I have it with me, I will have the option of doing it.  I have a feeling that my running next week might have to be three days on the trot, which isn't ideal, but needs must.

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So - thank you to everyone who entered my very first GIVEAWAY!  Thanks again to Lizi for giving me the opportunity to share her wonderful granola with one lucky reader!  Without further ado, the Random Number Generator picked comment number 14:

Which was:

Congratulations!  Please can you email your name and address to me: pilliepop@aol.com within 24 hours and I will make sure that lovely granola is on it's way to you by Saturday!

Lizi's Granola GIVEAWAY!

I am THRILLED to be hosting my first ever GIVEAWAY and even more excited that it is the FABULOUS Lizi's Granola!  I have blogged previously about my love for this granola (you can read about that here) and Lizi has generously agreed to give one lucky reader 3 boxes of her yummy granola (that's 36 individual servings!)!  Thank you, Lizi!  If it is possible - I love your granola even more now!

So - what is so fabulous about Lizi's granola?  Where do I start?!  Not only is it literally the most delicious granola I've ever tasted, but it is low-GL (that's Glycaemic Load), which means that it releases its energy slowly making sure you stay filled up until lunch.  In addition to that, the ingredients are all natural - there's no rubbish (or anything unpronounceable!) in this granola!   And my favourite part?  It's packed neatly in individual serving sachets of 40 grams each - which means that you can confidently open a fresh pack every morning knowing that all that weighing and measuring of portion sizes has been done for you!  I am utterly convinced that a large part of my weight loss success is due to Lizi's granola and this ingenious packaging solution (for greedy little piggies like me!).

Lizi's Granola is available in five utterly delectable flavours: Treacle and Pecan, Pink Apple & Cinnamon, Belgian Chocolate, Original and Organic.  I have tried every single flavour (apart from the Organic) and love each one!  My personal favourite is the Treacle and Pecan.  I have this every morning with a big dollop of natural organic yogurt (or organic strawberry yogurt, whatever I've got in the fridge) and it honestly fills me up until 1pm when I have my lunch.

One lucky reader will receive one box each (that's 12 individual sachets per box) of Treacle & Pecan, Pink Apple & Cinnamon and Belgian Chocolate.  You're basically going to be set up for breakfast for over a month - you lucky duck!  All you have to do for your chance to win is:-

1. Be a follower of my blog.  If you're not already a follower, it's easy to join, just click on the 'Join this site' button up in the right hand corner.
2. "Like" Lizi's Granola page on Facebook.  That way you'll be kept up to date with granola news!
3. Finally, leave a comment below telling me how you enjoy eating granola (with milk, with yogurt, standing on your head, etc!).

I will choose a winner from the comments below using a random number generator on Thursday, 20th September 2012 at 20:00hours (British Standard Time) and the winner will be announced that evening.  The winner will then have 24 hours to email me with their postal address.  Good Luck!

Here's the facts: I am a loyal Lizi's Granola customer, so much so that I contacted Lizi and asked if she would agree to donate some of her wonderful granola for a giveaway on my blog.  Lizi kindly sent me the three boxes of granola to post to one lucky reader.  I have not received any payment or free granola for hosting this giveaway, all opinions expressed are purely my own.  I simply want to share the granola love!