Horseback Riding Lesson (thanks Groupon)

I recently bought Sofia a coupon for some riding lessons and yesterday was her first. She knows how to ride, but needs actual instruction. This was an awesome deal too! $59 for 4-60 minute lessons! Don't you love those internet coupon sites?

Winter Gymnastics Recital

Saturday Sofia participated in the gymnastics recital at her gym. It was a short performance (just a floor routine) but she had fun none the less. She has her first official competition coming up in March. She is very excited!

With her friend, Bailey. She is on the cheer team and an amazing tumbler. So of course, Sofia wants to do cheer next fall - I'm just fine with that!!!

Five on Friday - Whole30 and not a whole lot more

So happy to link back up with The Good Life, A. Liz Adventures, Carolina Charm and Hello! Happiness for  Five on Friday!

One - Today I am officially on Day 20 of Whole30! It has been so easy! I told you all about our decision to go Paleo and unprocessed with Whole30 here.  We've been eating yummy, unprocessed foods and loving them! I can't believe it has already been 20 days. No coffee, no Coke Zero. Best of all, I don't miss any of them!

Two - Justin Bieber. I gotta admit, I am so happy with his continued downward spiral. I'm glad no one was injured in his little escapade down in Miami but I must admit I wish he would just go away. For good!

Three - Running. So happy I've built my running back up to 7 miles for my long run. I have a half-marathon at the end of March and hopefully I'll be able to get stronger and faster between now and then. Right now my pace is around 9 minutes which is slow for me. I've got at least a minute I need to take off my race pace.


Four - Gymnastics. Sofia is officially on the gymnastics team now. She will have her first competition in March. She's improved a lot of the last few months. I'm very proud of her!

Five - HIIT - High intensity interval training continues to be my favorite workout. Especially during the Whole30. I've upped my schedule to 5 Orange Theory Fitness classes per week as well as running 15-20 miles. I'm trying to maximize my results of the Whole30. What's your favorite workout routine?

Have a great weekend!!

iPhone Picture Dump

I spent plenty of time at OTF this week and I'm getting stronger thanks to less carbs!

 #TBT was Sofia waiting for her first ballet class when she was 5 maybe?

 I learned a use a whole lot of baggies with my lunch and snacks

 I never thought I'd be searching all over Whole Foods for Ghee...

 ...or Kelp noodles.

 I got myself some new Brooks light weight runners for the treadmill workouts at Orange Theory Fitness.

 I did the final pantry clean-out before Whole30 started.

 I dusted off the heart rate monitor to do a comparison between the running app I use on my phone (Nike) and the actual results from the heart rate monitor. Good news! The app was only off by 30 calories and dead on for everything else!

And then I saw this and it motivated me!

Have a great week y'all!

Whole30 - Week 1 - Complete!

I think I mentioned this in my New Year post, but Honey and I made the jump to the Paleo way of eating for the new year. After further research, I decided to step it up to start off the day with Whole30.

What is Whole30? Well you find out exactly what it is by reading this. But basically, it is ZERO processed food for 30 days. Yes, I said ZERO.

What do we eat? We eat meat, eggs, veggies, some fruit, nuts and healthy fats. I try to buy organic or grass-fed when I can but I am not getting hung up on that factor.

We started on Sunday, 1/5. So far, things are going great! No cravings, no cheats and no side effects that sometimes go along with Whole30. It's a lot like Atkins, (with fruit but no cheese) and well...I'm very familiar with Atkins.

We took our measurements when we started the diet and we weighed ourselves. We will not do either of these again until the 30 days are up. This is hard! I can tell I've lost some already but I'm NOT gonna weigh! I'm also not going to get hung up on the scale and will use the measurements for the main measure of success.

Additionally, I feel better! Running is getter faster, I'm sleeping better, no bloating at all.

It makes it a lot easier having Honey on board with me! Keeps me honest and motivated to move forward!!

Below is what we had for dinner this week. Most lunches were leftovers and breakfast is usually eggs with some spinach and leftover meat from the night before.

Sunday - Roasted chicken with root veggies, sweet potatoes and roasted broccoli

Thai/Curry Chicken with stir fry veggies and fresh basil

Pot Roast, green beans and roasted broccoli

Spaghetti squash and homemade meat sauce with (fresh) green beans

Curry Hake with Cauliflower Fried Rice

Pan-seared Salmon with a HUGE salad

Bunless Burgers with homemade guacamole, homemade sweet potato fries, brussel sprouts with bacon and grilled onions and jalepenos (my fave meal of the week)

Chili Lime chicken wings, roasted kale and more sweet potato fries!

You can find any recipe I found on Pinterest on my Pinterest Whole30 board.

We also had a few yummy snacks. Now technically we are supposed to have 3 meals a day and no snack. Well, we've stretched that a bit. We enjoy or healthy snack but we've backed it up to be closer to dinner and less of a snack as a dinner fruit course.  This week we enjoyed smoothies with coconut milk and fruit bowls with fresh fruit, unsweetened coconut flakes, cinnamon and a splash of coconut milk. YUM. (and yes, we share one bowl and I feed Honey his fruit - lol) We've also shared an apple with some almond butter too.

So that wraps up week 1! How is your New Year going?

Five on Friday - 2014 edition

So happy to link back up with The Good Life, A. Liz Adventures, Carolina Charm and Hello! Happiness for the first Five on Friday of 2014!

1. Whole30 - at our house we are starting the Whole30 on Sunday. Super excited to clean our diets back up and I hope to see some real improvement in the inches and pounds department as well as other benefits of Paleo. Have you done a Whole30? Any tips?

2. Headbands - why won't headbands stay on my head while I workout? I bought these awesome Under Armour headbands and the slide right off. Any suggestions for headbands that truly stay put during workouts?

3. Half Marathon - I've signed up for my first half of the year. March 29th. My current pace is a little under 9 minutes and my goal will be to run the half at 8 minutes per mile. We'll see. My half PR is 1:50:50 so I hope to get back as close to that as possible.

4. Orange Theory - Honey bought me a membership here for my birthday back in September and I've been going ever since. For Christmas I asked him to up me to unlimited visits. He of course said yes! I'll be going here 4 times per week in addition to my half training.  

5. Isabelle - Yes this is random, but if you have American Girl loving daughters, the new Girl of the Year for 2014 is out, Isabelle. She will be joining Sofia's ridiculous extensive collection next week. Do you have girls that are fans of AG dolls?

That's it. Happy New Year!! Oh and don't even get me started on the Sugar Bowl. 

Happy New Year

Well, we celebrated the New Year low-key at home with a yummy steak dinner, some fireworks and s'mores! We made it till about 11:15 before falling asleep so we celebrated with the East Coasters! Hey, I had been up since 4:20 - I was DONE!

Now, it's time to get serious. Yes, I stay active all year and eat pretty well most of the time, but I always use the New Year as a chance to start fresh. 

This year, we are starting fresh in a big way! We are going Paleo and/or gluten free.

We are starting with the Whole30 and then after the 30 days, will continue with Paleo but add in a few Gluten-free options. I continue to struggle with weight-loss, despite working out 8-9 times per week. So there must be another way to help. Having read Wheat Belly and with the knowledge that I already respond best to diets that cut out carbs, I feel like the Paleo will be the best, healthiest bet for myself. Honey is on board cause he wants to get back to his Summer 2012 weight - which is the same as me! I have about 25 lbs I am looking to lose and I think honey is hoping for about 20. I've been reading tons and pinning tons (thank heaven for Pinterest) and I think I am ready. 

What about Sofia? Well, she will be offered Gluten-free options of some of her favorites and will also see a decline in carbs.  Breakfasts will be a lot of eggs (which she loves) and some fruit (this will be a problem) and her lunch will be healthy versions of lunch meat and some Gluten-free options. 

While none of us have any medical problems we hope to see turned around by going Paleo/Gluten-free, it will be interesting to see how different we feel after the first 30 days. We've cleaned out the pantry and I'm grocery shopping tomorrow. We officially start on 1/5/14. Yes, I wanted to wait for bowl games to pass, lol! 

As far as fitness goes, I will attend Orange Theory 4x per week and I've already signed up for another half marathon in March. So I'll running 4-5 days per week in addition to OT. 

Here's to an active New Year!

What about you? What plans are you making for the New Year?