{late} WIAW + New Workout Gear!

hi guys! happy WIAW!

today i have some recent eats (despite being a liiittle late to the party) & some other new (random) exciting things to share with you. first, the food!

coconut flour pancakes with vanilla almond butter

eggs with spinach, goat cheese, and sriracha

greek yogurt with frozen berries, vanilla almond butter, and unsweetened coconut

eggs with goat cheese, bacon, brussels sprouts

new-to-me Larabar that was pretty good! 

coconut flour pancakes with vanilla almond butter and defrosted frozen berries

egg scramble with quinoa, spinach, bacon, & goat cheese with iced coffee

first bowl of oatmeal in months! plain oats cooked in almond milk with chia seeds, topped with vanilla almond butter, unsweetened coconut, and brown sugar. 

basically i've been eating a ton of eggs, bacon, coconut, and vanilla almond butter, haha! there's also been a lot of chipotle (for some reason i've been really lazy about packing dinner for work) & froyo happening around here. i need more green in my life, stat!

and now onto the new stuff happening around here! i ripped two pairs of my nike frees doing rope climbs at crossfit (they are currently taped with duct tape), so i decided to splurge and get myself a pair of Reebok Nano 3.0. they just recently came out and were only $10 more than the 2.0 so i decided to just go for it. 

BEST DECISION EVER. all caps were completely necessary, these shoes are the best! i have done two WODs in them with a variety of different movements including running a mile and all around they were fantastic. i don't have much to compare them to since they're my first pair of shoes designed specifically for this activity but they're freakin' awesome. 

{side note: weekly workout recap is coming at the end of this week!}

i also got myself some new workout gear since i just got my first paycheck of the summer & am in desperate need of some more workout tanks!

i bought the lululemon power y tank (it is supposed to be for yoga but i fell in love with it at the store & it did great in crossfit), champion c9 seamless cami bra for extra support, and lululemon wunder under crop.  i'm really happy with everything that i got! to me, some things are worth splurging on, and i always end up buying nice workout clothes instead of nice normal clothes (sorrynotsorry). 

other things i've done recently:

started my internship at the physical therapy office! i'm loving it so far.

annoyed the crap out of ginnie. this picture makes me laugh so hard every time i see it. she is such a primadonna and doesn't like being held! 

went to an A's game with my parents & one of my best friends! 

went to the farmer's market with my mom last weekend.

other than that, i've been wasting my life away watching how i met your mother. i just started watching a few days ago and am already on season two! halllp. but not really because i need to make it through like eight more seasons before the summer's over. 

have you gotten and new workout clothes lately?

HIMYM... love it, hate it, or haven't seen it?

Five (+1) Things Friday

1. I DID A PULL-UP this week!! 4, to be exact :) That was my goal for the end of this school year and i'm so stoked to say that i CRUSHED it. and i know that i could've done more so i'm really excited to see where i'll be at the end of the year!

2. my mom sent me the cutest valentine's care package with coffee, brookside chocolate, a little burt's bee's kit, a few other things, and a little card that made my day.

3. a shirt that i ordered myself from fashletics finally came! i have had this shirt on my pinterest board for the longest time and now that i have a part time job again i finally justified buying it for myself. it's so comfy and flattering and makes me feel like a total badass!(the back says i choose strength)

 

4. another reason my mom is the best: texts like this.

5. when you get chocolate covered strawberries in the dining hall on valentine's day, a food baby is totally unavoidable. i'm pretty sure i ate like 6.. and i am perfectly okay with that because food was my valentine. duh. ;)

5+1. CHEM MIDTERM IS OVER. it was awful, but it's over!! and i'm so glad it's the weekend!


any fun plans this weekend?

Christmas 2012.

i hope you all had an amazing holiday celebrating Jesus' birth (if you celebrate)! i had a wonderful time with my family.

my Christmas Eve was full of the usual traditions, which i love!

pictures with Santa... at 18 and 20 years old. we're just cool like that. ;-)

lunch at in-n-out with daddy

and then my brother and i baked a batch of my grandma's sugar cookies - they're the best sugar cookies in the world! they disappeared so fast that they evaded my camera.

after that i went to church with the fam

and then we came home and had our (unpictured) traditional crackers + cheese + meat tray for dinner!

Christmas morning was i was up bright and early to get cooking on a special breakfast. i LOVE breakfast so Christmas morning breakfast is always one of my favorites! i made Martha Stewart's Mushroom-Cheddar Fritatta with a few modifications. since my dad & brother aren't so keen on broccoli in the morning, i split the recipe into two square pans and put all the broccoli on my side. i also added 2 eggs and 4 egg whites, and 1/4 cup milk to the egg mixture, as well as crumbling in a few pieces of bacon into each pan.

they turned out really well (minus being *slightly* overcooked - while they were baking i was working out in our little home gym with my momma so I didn't pull them out quite on time)! we also had Pillsbury cinnamon rolls and pigs in a blanket - Christmas morning staples in our house - as well as pomegranate arils and OJ.

not to mention this bomb-diggity coffee creamer... the stuff is so good!

after breakfast it was time to open stockings, which is what i was most excited about because this year i was in charge of the stockings. my family has always had most food-based stockings so i had a ton of fun shopping and picking things out for everyone - food shopping is the best! 

everyone loved their stockings & i'm quite excited to dig into all of my goodies. lots of nut butter, protein bars, coffee, chocolate, granola, TJ's treats, and a few other things! 

after stockings we opened some presents and then headed over to visit my grandparents in their assisted living home. [insert yogurt + granola snack here] we chatted with them and my aunt, uncle, and cousins for a few hours and then made the drive back home to finish up presents. 

[insert leftover fritatta and baked pumpkin oatmeal here]

i think one of my favorite presents was the cat toys we got our kitties because watching them go crazy was hilarious! 

some highlights of my Christmas were getting a baby coffeemaker for my dorm room (so excited about this, even though it's not exactly allowed ;), a replacement iPod shuffle for working out, some new music, a few cute tops, and workout gear from Lululemon! my mom picked out a few things for me (run for your life crop, heart opener tank) and i had picked out a pair of wunder under pants because i've been oogling those for a long time. i'm currently wearing them and they're so unbelievably comfy i don't think i'm ever taking them off! i also got this awesome water bottle:

if you can't read it, the back of the water bottle says "because i like muffins (not muffin tops)". makes me laugh :) 

after we finished up presents, it was time for dinner! my dad smoked a turkey (he makes the best turkey, hands down), i made mashed potatoes and gravy, and my mom had made my grandma's homemade rolls. these rolls are my kryptonite. but seriously. i have never had anything that compares - so fluffy and doughy and just freakin delicious. 

no room for veggies on my plate because a) i was too lazy to make them and b) i needed more room for extra rolls in my tummy!

just look at that fluffy deliciousness! 

my plate:

plus three more rolls because they're just THAT good. hey, i only get them once a year, so it's go big or go home! 

i also had some see's candy and a small bowl of ice cream for dessert because no day is complete without dessert in my world. 

& in the spirit of WIAW (and since i have some eats i haven't gotten the chance to show you guys yet) i thought i'd share some yummy eats from the past few days. 

salad with rotisserie chicken, lentils, mushrooms, and white bean hummus

vitality bowl (acai strawberry banana smoothie base topped with granola, strawberries, and bananas)

starbucks gingerbread latte... times like 10. these are so good!

quinoa, lentil, and broccoli bowl with cheddar and parmesan

bowl of ice cream while watching a Christmas story

amy's vegetable barley soup bulked up with spinach, quinoa, and cheddar cheese

a huge froyo while out shopping. marshmallow & cookies and cream flavors with graham crackers. HEAVEN.

homemade cheese ravioli (with mushroom and alfredo sauces) that my dad picked up as a special treat! 

sticky fingers pumpkin scones with a drizzle of honey. 

today has been spent mostly relaxing, getting a good workout in (BodyPump and the stairclimber), and eating up delicious leftovers :-) later in the afternoon i'm going to go to the movies with my family!

what was a highlight of your christmas? 

favorite holiday treat?

Life is Crazy.

hello friends! happy monday! i hope you all had wonderful weekends :)

life has been quite crazy over here. ever since i got back from home a little over a week ago, i've been catching up on all the work i failed to do over thanksgiving (a girl's gotta get a break sometime!), catching up with all my friends, and most importantly, catching up on sleep.

recently i've been getting headaches a LOT more frequently than i used to. as in, every day kinda deal. i knew something had to be wrong and i started keeping a journal of possible triggers that could be causing the problem - workouts, food, caffeine (aka coffee), stress, sleep. i tried to fix the first three in the beginning, but when it came down to it, i discovered that i just needed more sleep. period. my body was used to having anywhere from 8-10 hours of sleep a night before i came to college and i just expected it to adapt to only having 6 or 7 without any problems.

i think it's crazy that it took me until 9th week to figure out the cause of the problem, but hey, at least i did eventually! ever since i've started going to bed earlier (i made a rule of 8 hours sleep minimum. don't care how much work needs to be done, going to bed is more important) i haven't had a single headache in over a week. big stuff, people!

in trying to figure out the cause of my headaches i've also tried to clean up my diet a little and eat more foods that energize me, and don't leave me in that post-meal slump. most of these eats are comin' your way tomorrow for a WIAW food dump post. haha :)






















on the workout side of things, last week i took things easy because i was nervous that doing high intensity workouts might have been part of what was causing my headaches. i went on quite a few runs with girls in my bible study, did the elliptical, and took a few rest days.

**just wanted to throw in a note here that if i wasn't able to figure out the cause of my headaches on my own, i was going to go to a doctor to make sure there wasn't a bigger problem**


but today i went back to my IFT class and did a totally kickass workout that i wanted to share with you guys! it was probably one of the hardest workouts i've done so far and it. was. awesome.

Source: Uploaded by user via Julianna on Pinterest

i used a 60# bar for my cleans, 2 15# dumbells for the thrusters, and the thickest resistance band for help on the pull-ups.

you could easily do this workout at home if you have a jumprope and kettlebells or dumbbells - just leave off the first exercise (cleans) and last exercise (pull-ups).

after the workout one of my instructors came over and told me that my cleans were looking really good (YAYYYY! i've been working on my form for so long now!) and asked if i was going to the competition tomorrow. IFT is very similar to CrossFit (not speaking from my own experience here, just what i've heard) and they have competitions here at UCLA at the end of every quarter to see how much you've improved since the beginning. if i'm not too sore from today's killer workout, then i think that i'll go tomorrow and see what i can do! i'm really excited for that.

post-workout fuel today: chicken caesar salad, milk, and a fruit cup. you gotta make do with the food to-go and this lunch was pretty good!

on that note i better get off to studying. 10th week = death week. quarter system peeps, ya feel me? i'm drowning in work over here and studying for finals is scary and overwhelming. i'm doing my best to not stress like crazy, focus, and get things done. but if i don't resurface until i'm home for christmas break, you'll know why! 11 more days of busting my butt and then i will be home and truly enjoying the christmas season. until then, michael buble will have to do ;)

what's the best workout you've done lately?

Giving Thanks & My 18th

I am so happy right now. I love my family, I love my hometown, I love fall weather, I love leaves that actually CHANGE color, I love it all. Everything about this weekend has been absolutely wonderful - I think that Thanksgiving is rising in the ranks as one of my favorite holidays. I never really was all that excited about it in the past because Thanksgiving food isn't my favorite, but this year was the first year that I truly realized that the food is not what it's about. Being away from home has made me cherish my time with my family (including the kitties) all the more and made me appreciate so many things I would've taken for granted before.

I didn't end up taking any photos of the Thanksgiving meal but I did want to share some of the things I'm thankful for this year (not in any particular order).


1. The Lord's crazy love that never fails, never runs out, and never gives up on me. No explanation needed. I am so blessed.
2. My parents and my older brother - I don't know what I would do without them! They never fail to make me laugh when I'm down, always have the best advice, and just get me like no one else.
3. Being able to attend one of the best universities in the country. Not many people have the privilege of saying that - I am so grateful for my education!
4. My kitties! These little balls of fluff always turn me into the 5-year-old that I am at heart and give me so much joy.

5. Coffee that doesn't taste like dirt! I came home and my dad had bought my favorite coffee (Starbucks Blonde Roast) and made it for me - I don't know how I've been surviving on that nasty dining hall coffee. Maybe adding all that hot chocolate helps ;-)
6. Fresh fall air. Every time I've stepped outside since I've been home, I just stand there and breathe it in. I miss the fresh air and the colder weather a lot more than I thought I would. 

7. All of the little things I take for granted - always having food and water, a warm place to stay, safety, my health, and so much more.
8. Almond butter - Barney Butter especially!

9. The amazing friends I have, both old and new.
10. My Bible study at UCLA. They have made me feel so welcomed and and home which is a tough feat when you're making the tough transition to college. I love those girls so much!
11. My ability to run, lift, dance like a crazy person, and so much more. I am so lucky.
12. Music. Happy pop music to dance party to, down to earth country music, worship music, all of it.
13. Baking.
14. The blog world - the blogs that inspired me to create my own, the blogs that I read daily, and especially you guys. I love you all<3

I could go on and on.. I have so much to be thankful for! 

Anyway, I also wanted to share some photos of the past few days! :) 

When I got home on Wednesday night I stuffed my face with berries and pomegranate seeds, made pumpkin bread and dance partied with my mom, watched a random movie on an actual TV screen on my own couch while drinking pumpkin tea, and most importantly - was reunited with my babies!!

nose kissies! 

On Thursday morning I went to the gym with my mom and took BodyPump and BodyCombat. BodyPump used to be my favorite class, but since I started lifting heavy weight in my IFT classes at school, I wasn't as big of a fan. The bar constantly felt light and I'd rather do less reps with heavy weight than spend a really long time doing more reps with light weight. But BodyCombat was awesome! And just getting to workout with my mom made me so happy. 

We spent the rest of the day prepping for Thanksgiving - we had over 20 people over at our house - and then Thanksgiving night I got to go see the new Twilight movie. It was really good! I couldn't quite remember what was supposed to happen at the end but I was still surprised. Minus the creepy baby I give it a thumbs up!

Then Friday was my 18th birthday! I woke up to my baby girl snuggling with me, made pumpkin spice pancakes with almond butter and sprinkles and ate them while catching up on Glee, went for a run in the beautiful fall weather and ended at starbucks where I got a PSL. And then my brother came and picked me up<-- he's the best! 

I showered and then my mom took me to get foot massages, which were heavenly!! We came back home and cleaned up a bit and then went as a family to get a late lunch at Panera. I got broccoli cheddar soup, the turkey avocado BLT, and asiago bread as my side. So good! 

After Panera my mom and I got Peet's (my family always gets afternoon coffee together) - I ended up getting a pumpkin chai latte that I didn't snap a pic of, but it was really really good. Then we headed to Target (because I love that place!!), Whole Foods (more pomegranate seeds for meeee!), and came home to start making my birthday dinner. We made the Pioneer Woman's mac n cheese, and my dad made me steak. So delicious!

I opened presents after dinner and all I can say is that my family went above and beyond to make me feel loved on my birthday. I got some homey things - a kitty towel, two cute little bowls, a little decoration thing for my dorm room, and a super nice mattress topper for my bed at school! 

My brother got me a Starbucks gift card and the ZZ Ward album (love!). I love actual CDs. 

I also got almond butter, dark chocolate, and rainbow sprinkles (!!) and three new workout tanks. If that doesn't show you how well my family knows me, then I don't know what does. 

And to top my already amazing day off, the Christmas lights were up, the fire was lit, and I was snuggling on the couch with my man and a mug of sugar cookie tea. It's the holiday season!

I had a huge mug of mocha and peanut butter ice creams with some leftover chocolate cream pie crumbles for dessert - I think I've single-handedly taken down an entire half gallon of ice cream since I've been home! We also opened the ginormous peppermint patties that I got my brother for his birthday (it was earlier this month) and I had a few pieces of that too. It was so much better than a regular peppermint patty!

This morning I got up and made another batch of pumpkin spice pancakes (1/3 cup Kodiak mix, 1/3 cup pumpkin, a few shakes of pumpkin spice, a sprinkle of brown sugar, and enough water to get it moving) with almond butter and more rainbow sprinkles. Who says you only can have rainbow sprinkles on birthdays?? 

I'm sad that today is my last full day at home but I'm trying not to think about it too much because being sad will ruin the rest of this weekend and I don't want to do that. The sadness needs to wait until I'm actually leaving tomorrow! I'm going to just focus on how wonderful my mini-break has been already - filled with family, kitties, and good food. What more could a girl ask for?

how was your thanksgiving?