Loose Ends

No specific deep thoughts for today's entry...just a few things that I have been meaning to post about.

Frequently in my posts, I mention my affinity for my Coffee Protein Shakes.  I've had people inquire about what that is, and how I make it.  Disclaimer, the name "Coffee Protein Shake" is slightly misleading.  Its really not all that glamorous.

I use Life Time Fitness Whey Isolate, (1 scoop, 22 g protein) with only about 6 oz. of cold water; shake in Blender Bottle (often times without the little mixer ball), then top it off with about 16 oz. of fresh brewed coffee.  

Essentially I use a little bit of a protein shake as creamer in my coffee.  I have however perfected this concoction, as you need to make sure to mix the whey isolate in cold water, and you can not put the powder whey directly into the hot (delicious) coffee...it doesn't mix.  There it is.  My SECRET recipe for morning bliss.

Two weekends ago, the Andrus family and I had "Flamly Fun Night".  We got together and all assembled our own mini (or not so mini) Pizzas, and attempted to grill them.  Most of them...all of them ended up going into the oven to bake.  It was a fun dinner time activity, and then we all sat down and watched a movie.  Was nice to have almost everyone accounted for (Kate was at work), and just spend some time together.  I got to finally dabble in some non-conventional Paleo cooking (meaning more intricate than chicken and steamed broccoli).  I made an Almond Flower Pizza Crust.

1.5 Cup Almond Flower

1/2 Tsp Salt

1/2 Tsp baking soda

1 Whole Egg

1 TBSP Grapeseed Oil

Mix the Dry ingredients together.  Mix the Wet Ingredients together.  Mix the wet & dry.  Roll out between parchment paper, and cook at 350* for 15-20 Min.

I topped my pizza crust with ground turkey, red onions, peppers, green olives, black olives, and some herbs.  It was DELISH!  Definitely a keeper, and it gave me my pizza fix that I had been hankering for for a few weeks.  NOM NOM NOM.

Lastly, grilling season is upon us, and I'm oh so happy about it.  Said in my best Forrest Gump voice: "That's all I have to say about that."

Have a great FIRST DAY OF SPRING!

Cup of HonesTea

Cup of Honesty


Blog topics pop into my noodle throughout the day, but I have to say
that majority of my deep thinking and creative thoughts occur when I'm
working out.  Yesterday was no different.  I started a new workout
plan (try to do this every 6 weeks or so to keep things fresh and
productive).  My dear friend and personal trainer Jen Ahlberg never
ceases to amaze me in producing just that, something fresh and oh so
productive.


Yesterday, starting the new program I was served a big cup of humble,
with a splash of Honesty.  The new program challenged me unlike
anything in the previous 6+ week, and weaknesses were exposed.
Especially in the area of alternating front lunges.  Oye.  Although
slightly "painful" or uncomfortable not only in that hour of lifting,
but now today with any lower body movement, stairs, using the
bathroom, etc...I experience pretty significant discomfort, but I find
happiness in the humbleness it delivers.


In order to improve, we must be able to be down right, brutally honest
with ourselves.  Exposing weaknesses, although scary for some, is a
necessity.  In the workout world, I embrace these opportunities and
get excited in the days and weeks to come where I can watch these
weaknesses flourish (hopefully) into strengths, or at least
improvements.


Many times in my life I have experienced adversity, mostly in the
physical aspect. Due to this, combined with a work ethic that my
parents instilled in me early on, I have complete and utter faith that
anything is possible, and that through hard work, determination, and
patience results ARE A SURE THING.


Okay, back to the main premise of this post...Honesty.  My workout,
and some other things, got me thinking.  Not only is it important to
be honest with ourselves, I think that we need to start to be more
openly honest in general.  An area that I sometimes struggle with is
in trying to avoid comparing myself to others.  Now, I wish this
wasn't an issue, but it happens, and I think that by being honest the
issue dissolves a little bit.


I could dive into this topic, head on for miles and miles, but I'm
going to fast forward to the 2 cents that pertains directly to me.  My
honesty for the world and myself is, I'm 5-11, 207lbs, 24% body fat,
currently a size 14, my alternating front lunges are week, my core is
slowly improving, my right arm is stronger than my left, my traps and
shoulders are the size of a grown man's, and I continually work on
self acceptance, wherever I'm at physically, mentally, and
emotionally.


A big ol' cup of HonesTea is refreshing, invigorating, and can only
help things prosper. (Both within yourself, as well as society).
Serve yourself up a cup and enjoy.  Just lay off the scone and
biscotti.  ;)

Unplugged

Today started off pretty solid.  Got up when Peter got up to get ready for work, grabbed my protein coffee and headed to get a SHOULDER workout in.  Got a good cardio session in after my lift.  All before 9:30.  As I meandered through the locker room and entered MY shower stall (I shower at work 99.9% of the time, in the very first stall), reached to turn the water on and BAM.  Pitch Black-ness.  Like darker than the inside of your eyelids at night.  There were a few women in the near by locker area, and it didn't sound as though their voices changed or anything peculiar was happening.  So for about 45 seconds, I started to panic thinking I had 1. gone blind, 2. was about to black out and faint, 3. Again was blind, or something of the sort.  After trying to feel my way around towards the door (like I said, I shower there pretty much daily, so I know my way around), I realized that the power in the building was out.  I debated for a few seconds what to do, and honestly I needed to shower.  So I took an abbreviated version of my shower, ended up running into part of the stall wall...ouch...but successfully found my way back to my locker, got ready super quick and proceeded to the lobby to see what the issue was.  Apparently the entire area around the club (a Darque Tan, a Jimmy Johns, and a handful of other stores in a strip mall near by, was with out power.  Luckily this happened in the middle of the day, so the windows surrounding out workout floor let in enough light that we could see where we were all going.

It was such an eerie weird thing.  A place that is always bright, energetic, and noisy, was now peaceful, dark, and creepy calm.  Management decided for safety reasons to evacuate the building of any members and close the club (which we are a 24 hour club, so that rarely happens).  "Luckily" the power was up and running not an hour later, and we were back in business.  It was very interesting however, to realize how much we depend on energy and power.  Our hands were tied, no phones, no computers, no schedules, no nothing.  Honestly, it was AWESOME.  And I don't think there wasn't one of us (that seems like a grammatically horrendous phrase...) that was relieved to have a break.  Many of the trainers had clients back-to-back-to-back, with no break throughout the day, some people had paperwork and deadlines to meet.  But there was nothing we could do.  Again, it was great.  I won't lie, I was bummed to get the call that we were back in business.

Lesson.  We are so deprived of Unplugged Time.  Even if we turn our phone on silent, its usually vibrating every few minutes, or we have the TV on, or lights on all over the house, or the laptop going, or Ipad, or Nook.  Oye.  It makes me want to go camping.  Quiet ambiance of nature, leaving the world behind.  The sound of a tent zipper in the morning.  *ahhhh*  Bliss.

Anyways, I just wanted to share this happening from today, and I took the opportunity to take some pictures of the dark club.  It really was eerie.  I almost feared that zombies or vampires were going to come crawling out and start looting the vending machines or some thing.  Bizzare :)

Women's locker room, the side with emergency lights.

Looking into the Hot Tub area...

Workout Floor/Walking Track...

Me + Sleep = Domination

Yesterday, my Smartphone went without seeing a charger all day.

Therefore, come bed time, it was completely drained and needing a

charge.  When I crawled into bed, I plugged it in to the charger not

far from my pillow, as my phone serves as my alarm clock (I’m sure

that is also the case for at least 90% of Americans).  Since it was

already drained and no longer responsive, I just decided to leave it

off and let my mind and body wake up when it was ready.  Which is kind

of an uneasy and questionable thing to do, but since I start a little

later on Tuesday mornings, it wasn’t much of a gamble.

Sure enough, 6:15am rolled around and my internal charge was complete

and I departed my dream state.  I’m sure Peter rummaging through his

clothes, not so enthusiastically after his long weekend at the cabin,

and his Monday off as usual, didn’t exactly make it difficult to leave

dream land.  None the less, I had a solid night’s sleep; I don’t

recall stirring at all, or even moving for that matter.

I decided to get up and get my day rolling.  5.5 out of 7 days, I wake

up and get to put my workout/gym gear on as my workout is usually my

first destination of the day – which I’m so grateful for and know I’m

lucky for as well.  This morning was no different.  I got myself my

usual Chocolate Whey & Coffee breakfast (with a side of almonds), my

sweet potato has actually been patiently waiting for me in the

microwave for the last 30-40 min.  Whoops. I decided to crank out the

Bridal Shower Invitations for one of Brianna Joy’s Showers coming up

this spring.  My goal is to get the invites printed and in the mail by

Monday.  I did a excel spreadsheet mail merge yesterday, and the

guests address labels are all set to be printed as well.

Upon putting the finishing touches on the made from scratch

Invitation, I thought, wow…I’m going to dominate this day.  Its only

7:30am, and I am taking my To Do List by storm.  It dawned on me that

without a solid night’s sleep, I wouldn’t be able to confidently

tackle the day like I frequently do.  Sleep is so incredibly important

to our vitality.  It wasn’t too long ago that I was someone who burned

the candle at both ends, and ran myself ragged between three jobs,

workouts, family, friends, boyfriend, etc.  How did I ever think that

was productive, or more importantly healthy?  Instead of valuing being

insanely busy, constantly productive, and mind numbingly tired – I

truly value the experience of GOOD SLEEP.  Which in turn allows me to

be intelligently occupied (vs. insanely busy), consistently productive

(vs. constantly), and sharply in tune to the day and its events (vs.

mind numbingly tired).  I can’t tell you how pleasing it is to (when I

do use my phone for an alarm clock), see it tell me “alarm will go off

in 8 hours and 15 min”.  That truly is a beautiful thing.

“Sleep is the golden chain that ties health and our bodies together.”

–Thomas Dekker

I will leave you today with a wish that you too experience the

vitality and bliss of dedicated, rejuvenating, and enriching sleep; as

well as some wicked facts on sleep.

1.      Sleep loss has a major impact on decision-making processes,

especially those that require emotional and mental ability. (hmmm like

food/diet perhaps!?)

2.      People who sleep fewer than seven hours a night are nearly three

times as likely to develop cold or other respiratory symptoms when

exposed to others who are sick, compared to a well-rested person.

3.      The effects of poor sleep may seem to be nothing more than a

problem that we cope with successfully – but in truth it represents a

real, measurable loss that affects us all.  Studies estimate that

sleep-deprivation costs U.S. businesses nearly $150 billion a year in

absenteeism and reduced productivity.

The following is a great article on the relationship between sleep and

weight. *(The Dream Diet: Losing Weight While You Sleep)

I wanted to select a few tidbits in there to include in my list of

facts, but the entire article was just far too good.

Happy Reading, Happy Tuesday and Happy Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz’s :)

Girl's Weekend and Gratefulness

Yesterday evening I ran an errand with Maggie, and afterwards, Barb, and I lingered around the kitchen enjoying some quality chick talk.  All night I was able to sleep under as many blankets as I needed, and sprawled across the entire bed.  I slept in way later than originally planned, but bed just felt too damn good.  I was able to stay at work late this afternoon and get a ton accomplished.  Barb and I made a Sam's Club run, followed by Byerly's for some specific items and a Redbox (we rented "How Does She Do It", an SJP chick flick).  And are having a quite relaxing evening, Tomorrow morning we are planning on heading to Woodbury to meet up with my two favorite cousins to do some browsing, shopping, at Charming Charlies, and various other retail locations. :) My cousins, Leah and Brianna, are coming to town to do some shopping, wedding/shower planning, and catching up.  I'm SO excited to spend time with them.  I'm actually going to be sad come Kraft wedding day.  It's been so much fun having an excuse and reason to get together with these two amazing women.

This Girls weekend, amazing sleep (sorry Peter), shopping, and To Do List tackling is all happening, as Peter and his father left Thursday evening to go up north to capitalize on the snow that we/the Crosslake, MN area got this week.  Just as I am happy to have some time to get somethings on my to do list done, and spend some quality girl time with some of the most fantastic women in my life, I'm happy that Peter gets to enjoy this one-on-one quality time with his dad.  I talked to him briefly last night, and he said they chatted the entire ride up to Pinewood.  Barb and I haven't heard much from either of them, which probably means trouble, but I know they are enjoying not having us tag along - as fun as we are.  Without us they are able to ride as hard and fast as they want, and probably go on some trails that they otherwise wouldn't.  Do quality father-son bonding.  But like I said, I know that these times together are making FOREVER memories for Pete and his Dad. That makes my heart smile.

I also wanted to note how fortunate I am, and how lucky I feel that Peter has such an amazing family.  Most people would shutter at spending time with their In-Laws.  Especially as much time as we spend with them.  Hell. Living with them.  But I truly enjoy being part of their family.  Even if I'm not officially in the Andrus family, I consider them my pseudo-in-laws. Good people.  Stay tuned for updates on all our pretty purchases, and plentiful planning (yay for alteration).

Picture Peter sent from their Ride today.  (Clint on the Left)