Rock That Body - Clean Eating Challenge Day 7

It's Friday, Friday, getting down on Friday!

Wohoo - made it to the end of the week.  Today, I am home "sick."  Honestly, I needed a mental health day and it feels so good.  But just because I gave myself an extra long weekend doesn't mean there's room to slack off.  I started my day by getting up at 6:30 and immediately putting on my work out clothes.  I headed out around 6:45am to go over to the Lochmere neighborhood near us to go run.  It's a beautiful, older neighborhood that is very popular for all sorts of active people.  Plus I knew going out there at 7:00am would be safer than going to Lake Johnson at that time (hello woods for Balt Salt Creepers to lurk!) and I had to go to Whole Foods anyways which is right down the street from Lochmere so you know, win-win, go me.

My run felt SO good.  It was gorgeous out this morning.  The sun was just coming up and it was a crisp 66 degrees (and not too humid).  Could I even dare to say it felt a slight chilly when I started running? But it was such a welcome change to the heat and humidity that we have been experiencing this summer.  Blah is an understatement.  I completed a 3.76 mile run in 34 minutes.  I ran my first mile in 8:04!  Holy cheeseballs that's amazing!

I hit up Whole Foods on my way home to pick up the rest of my groceries and came home to make PANCAKES!  I tweaked my clean pancake recipe and OMG it was perfect.  Here is the recipe:

Clean Eating Pumpkin Pancakes
1 1/4 old fashioned oats
1/2 cup ground oats (I took my old fashioned oats and ground them up in my ninja chop!)
1 TSP of baking soda
1/2 TSP of salt
1/2 cup water
1 cup organic pureed pumpkin
Cinnamon to taste (I love cinnamon so I use a lot)

Mix and make you some pancakes.

This yielded 8 pretty big pancakes and I ended up eating 6 of them.  Well I started with 4 pancakes, waited 30 minutes, and I was still hungry so I had 2 more and it was just enough.  I only used 1 tablespoon (which is a serving) of agave nectar.  I poured the exact amount on my spoon and then drizzled it all over my pancakes.  It was a very nice treat.

I jumped a quick team call for 30 minutes and then took a nice relaxing bath (I'm getting my hair did later today so I didn't want to wash it.  Lazy alert!).

My husband was then nice enough to pay for me to get a pedicure so I hit up the local nail salon.  It felt so nice especially after the run this morning.

I came home and made some lunch.  Today I had 1/4 cup quinoa, some sweet potatoes, and my tilapia avocado salad.

Tilapia Avocado Salad
Grill tilapia with salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper to taste.  I have one of those flat griddles that goes on the stove and it's awesome - I recommend it.

While the tilapia is grilling, I cut and scoop out an avocado and mash it up.  Once the tilapia is cooked, chop it up and then mix it with the avocado.  Add salt to taste as needed.  Scoop mixture back into empty avocado shells if you like.  You end up with 2 servings which is perfect for 2 lunches or a lunch and a dinner or whatever!

I'm going to head out and relax some more (in bed!!) before I head to my hair appointment.  Pictures to follow.

Happy Friday friends!

It's Friday Friday Getting Down on Friday

Happy Friday!  Can you believe it's June?  This means that not only is it my birthday month but I also get married this month.  Craziness.  I don't know of any married folk read this (or if anyone reads this blog at all) but I have learned that although I am very much a Type A, I am not cut out for wedding planning.  I was seriously disillusioned into thinking it was an easy and quick thing to do and those that carried out the painstaking process did so because they enjoyed it and wanted to hold onto every second of it.  I have known people like this - who devote an entire year to nothing but every minute detail of one day.  In my honest opinion, it's pure silliness.  I feel like years from now people are not going to remember the decorations or what color my linens were.  They'll remember three things: if the food was good, if the party was fun, and if there was alcohol involved.  The third is a definite yes and I'm hoping the first two follow suit.  I am excited to not have to worry about scheduling meetings and trying to make decisions and harassing people to send me in RSVPs.  But moving on...

Back to Friday, which I have dubbed Forward Friday.  Things I am looking forward to this weekend: my good friend from high school's bikini boot camp class on Saturday morning.  It's a lot of fun, mostly because my good friend is a lot of fun and her boyfriend comes and me and him are uber competitive so we go head to head on a lot of the work outs.  I haven't been able to take a class in close to 2 months so I am excited to get back into it again.  I definitely prefer to work out alone about 80% of the time - it's my "me" time where I can listen to music and focus all of my energy into busting a serious sweat.  During the week, I normally do Bodyrock or the Zuzana Light ZWOW's.  Sometimes I make up my own little work outs incorporating moves from both.  About once a week I go for a run around the lake next to our house.  It's just under 4 miles to run to the lake, around the lake, and then home from the lake and on days like today when it's hot (90 degrees!) and muggy, you definitely work up a sweat.  It's such a rush to come home with my body screaming WATER MUST HAVE ALL THE WATER and I immediately crawl over to one of the floor vents in the living room to stand on.  Don't lie - I know you all do that too.

Other than boot camp, there isn't much else going on.  Usually I clean up the house and do some grocery shopping.  I plan on getting a manicure and pedicure, not because I need one (well I actually desperately do) but because I have my bridal portraits on Tuesday and I want to make sure I can disguise my half chewed up nails as much as possible, so that is reserved to Sunday with possibly one of my friends tagging along.

What are you getting into this weekend?

I would like to end this post with a thought about LuLu Lemon.  Have you been on their website recently?  Every once and a while I check them out.  I've been too scared to actually purchase anything because their stuff is expensive but I have friends who swear by them.  I took a gander last night and ZOMG I want all the things on their website!  They have tons of cute sports bras and running shorts and tank tops (which I really need with this heat - I can no longer run in t-shirts).  So if you have some money to spare, or you like to look at stuff and drool and dream like I do, then I would suggest hitting them up.

Have a good weekend!