Weekend Update

We finally got a "relaxing" weekend here in Plankerville and I have to say I'm feeling quite refreshed as I type this on Sunday night.  

Yesterday morning kicked off with a fantastic run with my running buddy who is moving to Texas this week.  I'm so sad that I'll be losing her but I'm looking forward to our virtual running dates and can't wait to hear what her future has in store for her.

With my workout out of the way, it was time to feed the boys love meter a little with a trip to Lowes for one of our favorite Saturday morning activities...

...they made some pretty cute alien robot puppets.

We ran some errands, had some downtime at the house, and tackled some chores with the rest of day and then got to spend our evening out on the town having a blast with some great friends...

...nights like this one don't happen nearly often enough...

...and Jen, it was a great idea to split up the guys and gals...

It was so much fun to catch up, eat some yummy food, drink some yummy drinks...

...and spend time with great friends...

...I'll spare you the dance floor photos...haha....but I'll let you know it was a fun time.  

We had a lazy start to our day today and spent the entire day around the house which was completely fine with me.  Our entertainment included some sidewalk painting...

...bike rides, pool time, a movie, a great Piyo workout, some delicious BBQ ribs, and quality time with my kiddos and husband...pretty much perfection if you ask me.  Now I'm feeling refreshed and ready to tackle the week.  Bring it on!

Sunday Afternoon Already??

How is it Sunday afternoon already??  This weekend has gone so quickly it feels like a blur.  Guess that means its time to quickly pack in some more fun before it's over including a quick blog post of our weekend so far...

Friday night kicked off with a glorious date night with my husband.  Time alone without the kids is always precious and we enjoyed it to the fullest along with a couple delicious glasses of wine...

...and some yummy pizza from Carmelas.  It's always fun for us to go there since it's the scene of our first date and full of good memories of me telling my husband he's not my type :-)  Little did I know huh?

We were up and at 'em Saturday morning with a quick workout before tackling the day.  I didn't get started til after the boys were awake so they decided to join me in my fun...

...I love setting a good example of them and love that they think exercise is not only important, but fun too.  I hope they never lose that.

After working up a sweat, we cooled off for a bit in the pool.  We taught the boys a new word while we were at it...

....skinnydipping :-)  They thought it was hysterical and NO we did not join them in their fun.

We had some errands to tackle that took up the rest of our morning and before we knew it, it was nap time.  I joined the boys for nap time.  It was glorious!!  

We woke up in time to join our friends for a night of bowling.  Five families, all including 3 year old boys, bowling, and black lights....I don't think I need to tell you it was a very entertaining time :-)  

Most of us were bowling with at least one child attached to our side or spent our time making sure only one ball was going down the kids lane at a time.  It was hysterical!  Good thing we're a very non-competitive, family-friendly bunch.  Mason especially liked that when you get tired of carrying around those big heavy balls, you can just sit down and watch the giant TVs at the end of the lane... 

...what's not to love???  I can't wait til our next bowling night.  We might just have to get matching shirts haha.

After a couple of late nights in a row, our morning got off to a very slow start today.  I had every intention of getting my workout out of the way but somehow got sucked in to joining these boys on the floor watching them play cars while I drank 2 cups of coffee while they were still hot.  

It was FABULOUS and I didn't regret one second of my lazy morning.  My dad got that rug for the boys.  Isn't it cool???

We finally got our butts in gear an out the door to the beach for a little fun in the sun and fresh air this morning...

  

I'm glad we didn't let the little rain shower we drove through on the way there discourage us because it was a GORGEOUS day for the beach.  

I'm pretty sure the boys think one of the best parts of the beach is the shower that doubles as their "truck wash"...

It was a slow ride home when we got stuck following some kind of bike race home...

...it reminded me I still needed to get my workout in, thanks guys :-)  But before a workout, we had a little picnic and took a quick dip in the pool...

...followed by a quick outdoor shower to get that out of the way for the day... 

...once again, they had fun in the shower.  Why do they get so wild when they're naked??   Silly boys!!

And now they're napping which means its time for me to finally tackle that looming workout.  T25 Rip't Circuit here I come...good thing it's one of my favorites and it's only 25 minutes long.  :-)

Taking Daddy to the Park...and on A Date

Have I mentioned how much I'm loving having our family back together again??  We had such a fantastic day yesterday.  It started off with a family run to the park to show Dad all our favorite things...

...and Dad showed us a few things about tree climbing too...

It was pretty darn fantastic!

We came home to a leisurely, yummy breakfast and got to FaceTime with lots of family before nap time.  

Once the boys were up, it was time for them to head off to hang out with some friends while Mickey and I got to enjoy our first date night with just the two of us since he's been back...it was GLORIOUS!

I love my man and am SO incredibly glad he's home!!  After some wings, pizza and wine...and lots of good conversation and people watching...we headed back to pick up our boys who had been thoroughly entertained and loved as well.  Thank God for family and friends!!

The lovely family time continued today as the boys slept in which forced us to have a leisurely morning  before heading out for the late service at church.  It was great to worship with my husband by my side again.  We ran some errands after church before heading home.  Leftover pizza made for a yummy lunch!

Before we knew it, it was nap time.  Mickey headed to the yard, which looks like a resort again after just a week of his incredible green thumb, while I tackled this booty pump workout ...it's good one if you're looking for a good lower body burn. 

With some serious thunder going on outside, it appears to be the perfect night for a family movie with my three favorite people while enjoying the ceviche Mickey threw together this afternoon...YUM!  I'm off...

Soup's On!

We had a great time on our date night last night.  Being the coupon queen that I try to be, I convinced my husband to go to Tony Roma's to use our Buy One, Get One Free Coupon.  I must say, my grilled salmon was some of the best I've had and the mashed sweet potatoes were quite tasty.  And since mine was the cheaper entree, it was free to boot!  If only we had sat in the bar to get the happy hour drink specials...next time!

We actually got dressed up for our date.  Check us out:

We weren't quite ready to call it a night after dinner so we stopped in Ian's Tropical Grill for a cocktail on our way home.  It's a cozy place to have a drink...if you have a coupon, which we did!

Today's a rest day on my half-marathon training schedule, so you'd think I would have slept in, but I was up and at 'em just after 5 am thanks to my new sleep pattern.  At least I got to read in bed for a bit before tackling the day.  

I also had time to play around with my blog a bit, as you probably noticed.  I've been thinking about changing the title for a while since my topics include way more than fitness and decided the best way to describe it was with the small tweak to the title.  What do you think?

Today's mission was to whip up a couple of soups for some go-to lunches using some of my organic produce.  I chose two different vegan recipes which turned out quite well.  I found the first recipe at Vegangela.com Her recipe for broccoli potato soup is just as satisfying as a bowl of broccoli cheese soup but much healthier.  You can find her recipe here.  

I also made a sweet potato and carrot soup.

Can you tell I've been playing around on picmonkey.com?  I'm not anywhere as gifted as my husband is when it comes to graphic design, but I can see why he loves his job so much.  It's fun!

The recipe is prettier than the soup but I promise it's delicious.  

After the soups were done, it was finally not too early to hit up BJs for some spinach, fish, mac n cheese and other necessities.  I can get carried away with the good deals there... like 12 boxes of organic mac n cheese for $7 with my coupons.  The boys will think they're in heaven with all the mac n cheese eating that is to come.  

We got home in time for a quick workout with my one and only client and then it was time for naptime for the boys and a little upper body workout for this mommy.  In my mind, rest days are for the legs when you're training for a half marathon and my arms had been neglected this week.  

I came up with the following workout and it felt great to pump some iron after almost a week off.

I used 20 pound dumbbells for the chest and back exercises and 15 pound dumbbells for the arms.  I ended up doing the last two rounds completely with the 20 pound dumbbells though since I was feeling pretty motivated.  

After my workout I enjoyed a yummy protein smoothie made by combining: 

• 1/2 cup pumpkin
• 1 cup unsweetened almond milk
• 1 scoop SunWarrior vanilla brown rice protein powder
• 1 cup ice cubes
• 1 tsp honey
• Cinnamon, to taste

It was DIVINE--like pumpkin pie in a cup, and healthy to boot.

I'm meeting some girls tonight for a quick cocktail then hoping to spend the rest of my night on the couch.  I still haven't finished watching The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo so maybe I'll try to stay awake for the end.  I'm hoping to call it an early night though because tomorrow's scheduled run is 10 miles--double digits finally.  I'm a bit nervous as my last couple of long runs have been a bit of a struggle.  My plan is to get out as early as possible to beat the heat and to take things slow.  Hope it works!

I'm off to do some yoga with Fit2B Studio.  Enjoy the rest of your Friday!

The Day I've Been Waiting All Week For...

Happy Friday!  This is really the day I've been waiting all week for :-) Mickey took a half day so we get to celebrate our birthdays "for real."  He's taking us all to lunch and then we get a private date night thanks to our wonderful friends who are babysitting for us.  I am SO excited about this day!

We slept in a little later than usual this morning and enjoyed some family time at home before Mickey headed to work and the rest of us headed to Publix.  Gina made our day as usual by surprising the boys with some balloons.  We love that place!  They are such good little shoppers and I continue pray they stay that way.  I actually look forward to grocery shopping with them.

The balloons entertain us in the car as well as the store.  In fact we get almost a whole day out of them each week. Score!

After unloading the groceries we headed to the YMCA SportsWorld for an open gym thanks to the Family Place at the Library.  The boys had a BLAST!  We will definitely be looking into signing up for more.  The employees there are fantastic with the little ones.

On the way home, we passed Starbucks and I decided to use a gift card that's been burning a hole in my pocket to get chocolate milk for the boys and a salted caramel mocha frappuccino light for myself.  (Try saying that order 10 times fast.  Haha!)  They  I love their fall drinks!  It was actually the boys first chocolate milk and they loved it.  They were big so we've got leftovers sitting in the fridge for another treat tomorrow.  Yay!

Colton's first Starbucks

Mason's first Starbucks

I had time to squeeze in a workout while they're napping before we go to lunch.  Since today is a rest day from running, I stucks to weights and avoided any pounding movements.  It was short and sweet but hit all the major muscle groups which left me a happy camper.  Looks like I earned an extra glass of wine tonight :-)  Here's how my workout looked...

Now I'm just waiting for my kiddos to wake up so we can go to lunch.  I'm one of those people who always scopes out the menu online before I go to a restaurant.  I'm planning to get some oysters and a goat cheese salad.  YUMMY!  Hopefully it's a big enough lunch that I leave satisfied but light enough that I'm hungry again for some pasta on my date night tonight.  

While I've got your attention, check out some more pictures of my kiddos to hopefully make you smile today.

"Look Mom, I can use two spoons at once!"

Colton being Silly.

Cutie Pie Mason

Colton practicing reading on the potty.

Mason would rather put his foot in the potty than pee in it at this point.  

Do something to make yourself happy today.  You won't regret it!