I can hardly believe I actually did yoga this morning at 6:30am! I usually don’t even wake up that early!

Yoga was one of the best decision’s I made all day. I’d forgotten how yoga puts me in the THE BEST mood for the REST of the day. Even a Monday work day couldn’t take the happiness away. I was so cheerful and smiley all day! lol

Yoga with friends = best part of day (except for maybe zumba which may tie) – so glad I went!

Saying “see you later” (you guys know I don’t like “goodbyes”) to Kath who’s moving this week = worst part of day. I hate farewells, and I’m going to miss my friend! Hopefully, she visits us again soon!

I celebrated Starbucks Monday and got a spinach feta wrap and grande vanilla soy latte.

My last fancy green tea in my desk. Guess it’s time to re-stock.

Lunch was leftover Lemony Lentil Soup and a piece of GH Whole Grain Goodness.

PS I had lots of leftovers of that soup! I stored 2 medium sized containers in the fridge for lunch this week. The rest are going in the freezer to be meals when I need a quick, convenient, but healthful meal at a later time.

Plus vegan chocolate cat cookies leftover from the vegan homemade ice cream I made this past weekend (and boy are there a TON left!).

Larabar in Cherry Pie was my pre-workout snack of choice.

***

Post work I decided a second workout for the day was in order – ZUMBA! Yes, I pushed my way through a fun-filled hour of zumba the same day I already did an hour of yoga. I’m not normally a fan of multiple workouts in one day since I like to give my body plenty of rest, but what can I say….I really wanted to zumba and my body felt up to it. Guess I was just owning my strength.

***

Post zumba I had a date with some friends.

These friends: L back to R: Michelle, Jessie, Katie, Kelly, Jen, Jen, Brittney, me.

We met up at Dandelion Market thanks to a Groupon we all purchased to try the restaurant out. We paid $10 for $20 gift certificates! Score! Click here to check out Groupon for yourself – it’s all over the country.

Loved their table water pitchers.

I tried the Blue Point Toasted Lager. The beer was served a little warm but the flavor was really nice.

Michelle and I split 3 tapas:

Aged Cheddar + Ale Fondue.

Stuffed zucchini.

Flat bread with caramelized onions and truffle oil.

We chatted and snacked and chatted some more.

I love my food blogger dinners!

Apple crisp. The topping was a puff pastry like topping, not so much a crisp. Perhaps the menu had a different name and I’m remembering it wrong, but it was a lovely, hearty dessert. I ended up saving some for hubby to try later.

Btw, if you check out Dandelion Market, be sure to ask for Rick – he’s very nice and will take great care of you!

Back home, it was treat time for Bailey.

Gimme five!

Booyah!

Nom nom nom time for Bailey.

Remember to tell me your strength story!

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m not really a fan of running, even though I’d like to be. In fact, the idea of running a race terrifies me!

But the fact that a race terrifies me also really makes me want to challenge myself to rise up to the occasion. Heck, at one point I was afraid to do zumba and now look how things turned out!

As Eleanor Roosevelt said:

“You must do the thing you think you cannot do.”

So today, with the encouragement of some really fantastic friends, I did something I thought I couldn’t do.

I ran.

Here’s my support group: Michelle, Kath, (me), and Caitlin. (Caitlin’s photo) Talk about a great group to be there for my first big running adventure!

These wonderful, running-expert ladies were kind enough to take a break from their fast-paced running to do a Couch-to-5K style of interval running (2 minutes running and 1 minute walking) for 3 whole miles – probably the farthest I’ve ever gone running…EVER! Not one mile. Not two miles. THREE!

Stepping back, I woke up 2 hours before run time to get some fuel in my system and give my body time to digest.

Hot coffee.

Banana oatmeal in my fantastic new bowl!

Pre-cooking ingredients:

• 1/4 cup coconut milk (carton kind this time, not can)
• 1/4 cup water
• 1/4 cup rolled oats
• 1 tsp chia seeds

Cooked stovetop till thickened up.

Post-cooking:

• 1/2 sliced banana (stirred in at end – I ate the other half, minus a bite for Bailey)
• ground flaxseed on top
• sliced almonds on top

Nom!

After breakfast, I decided it was a good idea to make my trial batch #2 of my Green Monster muffins. If you read earlier, you probably already saw the recipe because they were a success!! Hazzah!

Click here for my Green Monster muffin recipe.

Anywho, I pulled these babies out the oven just as it was time to leave the house. Cutting it close time-wise!

Then, it was off to Caitlin’s place to meet up for our run. It was suuuuper hot outside! Eeks!

Michelle and I made friends with Caitlin’s “new cat” till Caitlin and Kath showed up to for our group run.

I still can’t believe how patient every one was with me. I was worried about slowing them down, but everyone was so encouraging, it was great!

We did running / walking intervals for 3 miles. I felt pretty good when we started out but started feeling tired around mile one. I pushed through the rest of the way and it seemed like it was over before I knew it! I thank zumba for keeping me in good cardio shape.

Caitlin used her Garmin for some lap stats:

• Mile 1: 12:28
• Mile 2: 12:53
• Mile 3: 12:38

I’ve never tracked miles time-wise before, so I don’t really know what they mean, but Caitlin said they were pretty good for both running and walking the miles.

Future runner? Future racer? Either way I was just proud for running today. I had a great time! I think I need to hire Caitlin or Michelle to be my running coach! I’d hire Kath but she’s moving!!

Michelle and I toyed around with the idea of running a 5K later this year on the car ride home. I’ve always thought it would be cool to run in a costume so I suggested we get a group to wear matching tutus (any takers?). Then Michelle said we could get shirts made too! Sweet! Hey, I am a sorority girl. Give me a costume party and event shirts and I’m in!

After heading home, showering and changing, a few of us met up at The Flying Biscuit for brunch.

We had a pretty long wait in the heat outside, but it was worth it! I brought green monster muffins with me to help tide everyone over during the wait (which was like an hour!)

Hot coffee (what? it was cool inside) with sugar cubes and creamer.

I got the high flyer: 2 fried eggs over medium, creamy grits and potatoes (you can get 1/2 and 1/2!! neat ordering trick for TFB), chicken sausages (I don’t normally like meat sausages but they’re pretty darn tasty here), a famous biscuit and apple butter.

Oatmeal pancake and peach topping.

So freakin good!

I worked up a sweat and appetite this morning and guzzled a lot of water at brunch and ate quite a bit of my plate. More than normal at least, though I did end up taking some home to hubby.

Michelle, Ben, Kath, Matt and me headed out to IKEA post-brunch. I brought a coconut water with passion fruit to help recover from the hot run earlier. I got these coconut waters with fruit flavors to test out because I saw them on sale at Earthfare but I definitely prefer the taste of just coconut water.

Michelle and Ben got cinnamon rolls!

They shared a bite with me!

The goods: a laundry basket for our towels/linens, stools for our outside patio (inspired by Caitlin’s), plus some curtains (not pictured).

Poor Bailey was kind of bored today with me running all around.

I broke out a fave vegetarian ingredient for dinner. Both hubby and I were feeling something “light” so soup sounded good to me.

I loved the big bunch of kale added to this soup.

Dinner = Ellie Krieger’s Lemony Lentil Soup from her So Easy cookbook.

Lucky you I found the recipe online here!

Plus some Great Harvest Whole Grain Goodness toast with real butter.

And for dessert – Yoforia!!

Hubby and I met up with Karen, Matt, and Kath for dessert. We even brought Bailey for some fresh air and socializing. That ham!

I got some tart plain and some taro. Toppings = coconut, kiwi, strawberries, blueberries and pineapple.

Is this stuff addicting or what?!

***

Another fabulous day guys! I feel so lucky to have such great friends to play with all day!

***

I think I’ve signed myself up for 6:30 am yoga with the girls tomorrow. Eeks! This means 2 back-to-back morning exercises for me and I never work out in the morning! I must say, while post-work workouts seem to work better in my schedule, I think morning workouts are a great way to start the day! Guess I’d better go dig out my yoga mat…get to bed! G’night!

Do you prefer morning, afternoon or post-work/night workouts? Why?

Hiyas from the Chic house!

My basil plants are finally growing back after being attached by slugs. I managed to harvest both some green and purple basil leaves. Woohoo!

I used them in lunch today.

Leftover cooked pasta = pasta salad lunch.

I added chopped spinach, cherry tomatoes, feta cheese, basil…

…plus a balsamic vinaigrette.

Plus toasted pine nuts on top. Yum!

Guess what I got today?

My zumba instructor gear! I got my sign in sheets, class cards, and all that fun junk.

My first class starts next Tuesday! Can’t wait!

Lookie what I tried for a pre-workout snack today! A carrot cake Larabar (*)!

The bar looked just like the others and had a similar texture. I liked the chewy bites of what I presumed to be carrots.

I thought the flavor was not quite as spot-on as some others they have. It didn’t quite taste like carrot cake to me. It had a lot of spice and just didn’t remind me as much of the flavor as some others do. Don’t get me wrong, I really enjoyed the bar, I just didn’t think it tasted like “carrot cake.”

***

Post work I was so excited to go back to ZUMBA! It had been almost a week. I expected it to be a bit rough since I hadn’t done it in awhile and it was but I pushed through and felt amazing and strong afterwards!

I worked up a real appetite for dinner tonight!

***

We had plans to go out to Brixx with Kath + Matt tonight. We have a lot of events planned with them since it’s their last weekend in town!

I started with a sampler – 420, Starhill Love, spaten, hoppyyum (that’s the best I can remember the names…lol).

Hubby and I split bruschetta over conversation with Kath and Michelle.

Also chatted with Kelly, but I forgot to get photos of everyone tonight!

Hubby and I also split a pizza – 1/2 BBQ Chicken and 1/2 Chicken Caprese on a whole wheat crust.

Both flavors were really good but I still love the BBQ chicken the best.

Post dinner we went in search of dessert.

I got a single scoop of half baked froyo. Woohoo, they actually let me have a kid’s size this time!

Post dinner, I hit up Ben + Jerry’s with Katie, Stew, Rachel, and hubby.

Such fun!

Lookie what else came in today! My business cards!!

The front.

The back. Look familiar? I just ate this cherry almond french toast recently!

You likey?

Remember to check out my OpenSky coupons (click) for discounts on organic body butter, Galaxy Granola and other goodies!

I used “uses for old bread” #5 to make lunch today (and use up the last of our old bread.

I had yerba mate tea with honey, a sunflower seed butter and strawberry jam panini, and a large baby romaine/arugula salad Operation Beautiful Signage

with more yummy cherry tomatoes from our garden.

I also dove into this Acai Pomegranate Mate & Hibiscus tea from Earthfare that I’ve been hoarding the last couple months. It was really, really good! I loved the flavor!

Post work I painted my nails again. I did a not-so-hot job the last time and it started chipping off near my cuticles already. Reeeee-dooooo!

Hubby picked up bread for the week and (this time a large) cinnamon roll. I snacked on half of this. Nomm

I found Bailey snuggling with “baby”. Poor little guy is zonked out after his big vacay.

***

I had phone conferences until 6:30pm tonight! This meant no zumba…

or did it?!

I actually was really in the mood for a workout, so I had zumba for one in my sunroom and practiced leading songs that I wasn’t as familiar with. I also worked on adding cue moves to the song I choreographed but have yet to debut in class! It’s a new bhangra…shhhh. Mum’s the word till I debut it.

I was short on time so I only did a 30 minute class, but I still was so glad I did it! I felt a lot more revitalized afterwards!

***

Dinner was spaghetti (WW) and meat sauce with fresh parsley from our garden.

Plus a couple bites of this garlic cheese toast, which was really more like a cheese panini. lol

Then, it was off to visit Caitlin and Kristien to watch So You Think You Can Dance!!!

I brought some 3 buck chuck and the rest of my cinnamon roll. Both so good!

And we also got to chat it up with Kath! We have lots of fun activities planned with her this weekend since it’s her last weekend as a local resident!

We also worked on Operation Beautiful signs for Caitlin’s race this weekend.

Ta-daaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!! They all looked amazing! So glad to be able to participate in such a positive activity!

Can you guess which ones I wrote?

I enjoyed my last breakfast at the lake with my Martha Stewart Living. It’s so nice to leisurely enjoy breakfast instead of scarfing down my eats in a rush to get to work. I really should take my time more often, not just when I’m on vacay.

Gonna miss this view.

All the tall trees.

Maybe even the bugs and bees.

The flowers

The outdoor seating.

Mismatched plateware and silverware.

The butterfly bush outside the house, just in front of the porch swing and all the beautiful butterflies that flocked to it.

The wooden porch.

Patches of shadows from the leaves.

Bathing suits strewn about.

The kiddos playing with Bailey.

Bailey running around.

I made more mocktails today, which I enjoyed lakeside whilst snapping some photos of the fam swimming.

Hubby’s sister and fam went for a dip today.

Hubby brought Bailey out for some fresh air.

I think he wanted to go for another dip.

Duckies!

Last meal al fresco!

Hubby’s “Uncle Bob” stopped by last night with a pork roast in tow. He roasted it low all night and it was perfectly tender for lunch today. I enjoyed it with some mac and cheese and a large serving of salad with cherry tomatoes from our garden and sunflower seeds.

Post lunch we finished packing up and hit the road.

One last view of the lake before we left.

Soon enough we were home sweet home! Bailey was ready to sleep on his own bed…or…couch. lol

I’m sad to leave the lake but happy to be home. Here’s to sleeping in your own bed!