Garlic-Basil Tilapia

Today has been a fantastic Monday!

Whenever the week starts with a good night sleep and a early morning run with friends you know its going to be a good day!

We did a quick 3 miles in the cold and dark. I have come to the conclusion that whether your plan is to do 3 or 15 miles, they always go by faster when you have a friends. I used to be a “lone” runner because I thought that was what I preferred and or I was nervous to run with others because I was unsure I would be able to keep up with them. It turns out, that our group running, we stick together pretty well and if someone is faster its not a bad thing, you just have to push yourself to go a little harder.

For example: My weakness in running is HILLS! There is no talking for me while running up hills because I am silently dealing with this hill in my head.. “get to the top”, “don’t stop”. “keep going”… maybe a curse word or an edited version (depending on what mile I’m on..) Say what you must to just get to the top! The faster I go the faster I’ll get to run down!  (who really actually likes hills?)

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I also did this workout and taught body attack today. Along with some gift shopping, and a Costco run! (BUSY day!)

When we finally got home from running crazy all day, I was more then ready for dinner!

Dinner came together quickly due to my grumbling bellies demands.

Garlic-Basil Tilapia

• 3 filets
• 3 tbs of chopped fresh basil
• 1 tsp. of garlic
• 1 tbs. olive oil
• Mrs. Dash seasoning

Directions:

Heat skillet on stove

Spray with a little olive oil (or non-stick spray)

Lay filets on skillet

Drizzle olive oil over the top

Add basil and garlic and sprinkle with Mrs. Dash

Let cook for about 5 minutes before flipping

Cover and let cook on low heat until cooked thoroughly

I served it along side of some roasted sweet potato and brussel sprouts (I made extra for leftovers throughout the week!) and some asparagus

nom-nom!

I love, LOVE tilapia, its not to fishy and is light and packed full of protein!! It is also a good source of omega 3 and it cooks quickly and easily!! Although, I could of eaten two filets.. I was still hungry after and resorted to picking at the whole pan of sweet potatoes until I was sick.. or maybe that was my way of procrastinating cleaning the dishes.

It’s way past my bedtime!   

G-night my friends!

Q. What is your favorite fish?

Alaskan salmon! (hoping maybe this cool chick will hook me up one day?)

Q. Do you prefer to run by yourself or in a group?

I used to be solo but now I’m all about the group.

Outsiders 2012

This weekend Brent and I left the babes and got a little getaway in with some friends. You may call it a trip, rather then a vacation.. but actually, the perfect vacation for me involves no kids, my husband, close friends and sweat. So, I’m classifying it as a vacation.I mean, when else do you make human pyramids,
Make a whole new meaning to a “ice bath”.

(yes, I have crazy friends.. It was probably 5 degrees outside.. so note: I’m in the car taking this photograph..)
Leg wrestling, games, laughing and chatting way past my bedtime. I think I was actually the first one to crash. My eyelids automatically shut at any moment past midnight. 
We woke up late (8am ish) enjoyed some oatmeal –
steel cut oats, berries and bananas. SO yummy.. pretty sure I had 3 bowls. But I was totally carb loading for what was about to come…


After breakfast it was time for the epic relay.
The inside-outside-upside down relay!
We were first separated into groups of 5 or in our case.. 4.
We were given a list of exercises that we had to strategize through to accomplish “for time.”
As a group we were to do the following: (from what I remember)

• Run 20 miles
• 400 high sumos next to a red vehicle
• 500 lunge steps next to a fence
• Hang upside down
• 1000 jump rope next to a gas pump
• 500 situps by a pine tree
• 300 burpees in snow
• 300 bicep curls per arm in front of a sign with a  “P” on it.
• 600 air squats 3 ft high
• 500 KB swings with a cow in a background
• 500m swim with 10 pushups after every 50 m.
• 15 min. plank
• 150 pull ups
• 3 people had to do the macrena in a place of business
• Random dance party with at least 5 spectators

There were a few rules we had to follow:

• You could do it in any order.
• You must take a picture of each event.
• The 20 miles must show on only 1 Garmin.
• Only 2 people could be performing a movement at a time
• Once you started an exercise you had to finish it.
• After gathering our thoughts and our plan of attack we all hit start on our timers and jumped were off.

Here are a few pics from the relay-


Brent, Chelsea and her husband nick hanging upside down!

Bicep curls next to a street sign with a “P” on it..(Notice the nice placement of my scarf? Haha!!)

Nick pounding out burpees in the snow!

Chelsea on the run!

Brent and I attacking high sumos in front of a red vehicle

Brent jump roping in front of a gas pump.
****Most of the pics were taken from Chelsea’s camera so Ill be sure to post more later.
**Props to all who planned and took part this weekend especially Katie for taking the time to organize, cook and clean and entertain all of us crazy cats up at her families cabin. THANKS KATIE!!
I think everyone will agree that it was a great weekend!!

Chocolate and PB.

This morning breakfast came by in the form of a chocolate, PB kind of shake.—Shakes have been my breakfast everyday this week because I have been getting my workout done first thing in the morning.

Good thing protein shakes are so versatile.. I don’t think I could ever get sick of them. Ever.

In the mix.

• 1 3/4 C. Almond milk
• 1 scoop chocolate protein powder
• 1/2 frozen banana
• 1 tbs. Ghirardelli cocoa powder
• 2 tbs all natural PB
• 7-10 ice cubes
• Handful of spinach (optional)
• 

After the gym I came home and whipped up some GF old fashioned rolled oats

• 1/3 C. Oats
• 3 egg whites
• 1/4 C. water (for thinner oats add more water)

Heat in microwave for 3 minutes stirring each minute to prevent over flowing

Mix in

• Cinnamon
• 2 tbs vanilla protein (or you could use 1 tbs of desired sweetener)
• Sprinkled with chia seeds
• Topped with frozen blueberries

And I have been so busy crossing of some to-dos its time for LUNCH!

Q. Do you put spinach in your shakes?

Q. What is your random Oatmeal mix in?

Sweaty hot mess + movie review

BEEP,BEEP, BEEEP…… Back it up. I have been a bad blogger this week. So sorry. I have actually been playing around in the kitchen a lot but haven’t quite come up with a blog-worthy recipe. Patience my friends.. because we all know I have already lost it and I have the worlds messiest kitchen.

Yesterday, I took part in one of the funfest workouts of all-time. And by “fun” I mean the most challenging, sweat in the eyeballs, this is going to hurt tomorrow, kind of workouts.

If you need a workout to do today- I got that one in the bag! For full detail of the workout check it out here! Watch out.. those power squat cleans bite!

 

http://gppfitness.com

 

For warn- you may have many curse words flying through your head mid workout, but you will be one HOT mess afterwards.

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Last night we continued our celebration of the Chinese new year at a local restaurant- JOY LUCK. They put on an amazing show to kick of the new year, loud drums, dancers and a dragon that made its way through the restaurant.

We ordered stuffed eggplant with shrimp cakes in a spicy garlic sauce.

Phew! They weren’t joking around with that sauce! It was SPICY!! Brent loved it! I guess I’m just a bit weak when it comes to spicy foods! It was still good and I enjoyed the meal along with the show. T was a little worried about the dragon.. and B held this face whenever it came by.

After dinner I hurried home and jumped in the shower and into some cozies and headed out to a movie with some friends from the neighborhood.

We went to see WAR HORSE

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To be honest, I have the attention of a 5 year old and due to the heart felt, slow kind of moving movie and to prevent embarrassing myself by falling asleep and drooling on my friends shoulders.. I played words with friends..(we were pretty much the only people in the theater so I didn’t feel half bad about having my phone out.) Overall, it’s a okay movie but I wouldn’t waste your mula on it in theater.

Q. What is your favorite Animal movie?

Milo and Otis. Hands down. I cry every time.

Q. What was your hardest workout this week so far?

SPECTER.. followed closely by the 10 mile run I have scheduled later tonight..

Classic Sunrise Smoothie

Hope your all having a good day so far!

This morning I woke up to a classic sunshine.. before the sun even was up.

In the mix

• 1 1/2 C. Almond milk unsweetened vanilla
• 1 scoop vanilla protein
• 1/2 packet crystal light classic orange sunrise
• 
• 1 clementine
• 10-12 ice cubes
• 2 handfuls of spinach
• Pinch of xanthan gum

This was the perfect little breakfast right before my workout.

Today at GPP the workout was a tabata! To check out the whole workout go here.

I have to admit these are my favorite types of workouts.

They consists of 8 rounds of 20 second work with a 10 second work the exercises today were

• Row
• Jump rope
• Bicep curls
• KB swings
• Box jumps

You are to stick with each exercise until all rounds are done before moving on to the next exercise and you keep score of reps completed. At the end find your total and there is your score!

my total was 1606. Not great but not bad.. I was having issues tripping over the jump rope today..

After running some errands and getting the babes down for naps I made myself some lunch with yesterdays leftover veggies and some chicken in the form of a salad beast.

 

Tonight, we are launching Body Attack 75 at one of the gyms I work at.  So excited to get that sweat in my eyeballs… seriously the hardest release so far. But always know that Body Attack is for everyone. There are different levels for everyone to be part of this sweat fest. Now.. with that said.. I have to go practice Launch is in t-minus 1 hour.

Q. Have you done a tabata workout before?

Q. Any Body Attack lovers out there?? What is your favorite body attack movement?

I have a love hate with switch lunges…

Chinese New-Year

Happy Chinese New-Year!!! Last night we celebrated accordingly. We had a few guests over last night for dinner.
For dinner we had salmon, roasted veggies and Mindy made a spinach salad.

The Salmon was prepared quickly and simply!
I placed the salmon in tinfoil, squeezed a little lemon on it and sprinkled with lemon pepper and baked for 20 min.
My favorite part of the meal was the roasted Brussels sprouts and yams.

To prepare the veggies I halved the sprouts and chopped 3 yams into cubes and sprayed with olive oil .

Then sprinkled with some Mrs. Dash.
It was at this point I realized I need two ovens. I roasted them at the same time the salmon was cooking. I baked them for 30 minutes- tossing every 7-10 minutes until potatoes were softened.

After dinner we just hung out and Mindy had the idea for a little Chinese new year craft..
We looked up Chinese symbols and got our craft on.
Rumor has it if you hang the Chinese symbols in your window it will invite the good fortune into your home.
We copied the symbols on a small piece of paper then traced it with glue and dumped fancy glitter on top of them.


I now have red glitter all over my kitchen floor.. I wonder who was responsible for that one?
Out of curiosity we looked up our Chinese horoscope-
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We are all tigers! That makes for a fun household . 
After reading through the description of the tiger it was funny how closely it really explained our behaviors/personalities and expectations in life.
We decided to take this Chinese new year as a second chance to refocus on our new year resolutions.
A few of my new goals are:

• Drink more water! – I have been not so good at this lately..And can tell I’m a little dehydrated some days. So I’m going to try and consume at least one gallon a day!
• Take my vitamins!- I’m pretty good at taking them in the morning but often forget as the day goes on.
• 30 days NO SUGAR!- .  My friend Mindy set me up on this one and I hardly ever say no to a challenge. Its going to be TOUGH since I have a love for chocolate chips and valentines day is coming up… Wish us luck!
• Swim 2x a week! I set this goal at the beginning of the year and didn’t do so hot. Because it requires a 4:30 am alarm clock..

Q. What is your Chinese horoscope?
Q. What is your Chinese new year goal?

Running in the rain

 

This morning I headed out on a early morning run with the same group of girls from last Saturday. We met about 7:30am for a 6 mile run.

On my way to our meeting spot it was absolutely POURING rain! I don’t really have any waterproof running gear… But everyone showed up and we headed out to tackle our 6 miles that we had planned. Once we started running the rain stopped! It was perfect running weather, and I even was starting to think I wore to many layers.

When we hit mile 3 the rain picked back up again.. It was coming down fast and hard and the wind that picked up was fabulous to! Needless to say, by the time we finished we were all soaked to the bone. I had so much water in my shoes from running through the puddles, but that’s 6 miles down that I can cross off my training calendar! (I get some kind of weird satisfaction from doing that.) I don’t mind running in the rain. It was nice for the first little while but once the wind picked up I was ready to be done!

After the run, I had to teach Body Pump.. with no time to change into clean dry  clothes. I had crazy beanie hair and mascara running down my face to. (Yes, I wear makeup to the gym when I’m teaching don’t want to scare people! )  My clothes dried pretty fast but the wet shoes were driving me crazy through class. After class a friend talked me into running just 1 mile with her. Who would I be to turn that down?

I came home and made a shake

In the mix

• 1.5 C. Almond milk
• 1/2 C. Strawberries
• 1/2 C. Blueberries
• 1/2 banana
• 2 handfuls of spinach
• 1 tbs. Chia seeds
• 1 scoop vanilla isolate protein
• ice

 

After a nice shower and tackling some chores around the house I whipped up a quick egg scramble.

 

That looks like a big mess.. but that’s just what it was, and it was good.

Now its time to actually get ready for the day! I think we are going to head out for a fun family date night!

I took one look outside and it finally decided that its winter.. I better dress warm.

Check out the size of those snowflakes!! Now I’m glad I got my run done earlier!

Have a great Saturday!

Q. What is your perfect running weather/conditions?

Early morning.. at dawn, 60 degrees, mildly flat, no stoplights,and  NO WIND. – thank you.

Secrets of a Salad

 

For lunch today I made a salad.

Its been a long time since I have had an actual salad for lunch.

Weird? But yes.

It was delicious. And this needs to happen more often.

But let me tell you why making salads are so dang hard sometimes.

You have to wash your veggies.

Spin your lettuce

Then you have to chop that all up.

You have to decide if you want a sweet and fruity salad or a tangy veggie one.

Decide on a protein- Chicken ? Turkey? Tuna? or Eggs?

You have to freaking cook and cut that to.

It can take a lot time for just a measly salad. Who has time for all that? AND clean all the dishes in the meantime.

But do you want to know a trick? I’ll let you in on my little secret….

Do ALL of this once.. and then some. Just do it on your day off. Cut all your bell peppers, cucumbers, lettuce (or just buy the fancy pre-washed lettuce), mushrooms, cook your chicken, boil eggs.Whatever else you want to use.

Store it in containers, then come Breakfast, lunch or dinner you have all your veggies chopped and stored.

I don’t know about you but for some reason veggies are the hardest for me to get in during the day. Fruit just seems to be my go-to once I open the fridge, but if I have my veggies cut and ready to go it makes it much easier to prepare my meals.

Lunch was ready in 2.2.

You want to know what else.. I threw some frozen green beans on this plate and cooked them in the microwave for a few before topping the greens on.

AND I found a new favorite dressing..

 

I have been using the balsamic vinaigrette made by the same brand but decided to switch it up. I also have the ranch but that one is not my fav. I also use a bit of olive oil for some healthy fat.

When you make a salad make sure it includes the following

• Lettuce. (I’m sure that’s a given) But make sure its not Iceberg. Shoot for Spinach, romaine, kale or a mixture.
• Veggies. I don’t care what kind, give it color and it will make you happy- I promise. Even fruits, if you want a little sweeter salad.
• Protein- Chicken, Tuna, Turkey, Tofu- I have even used cottage cheese as my dressing and called it good.
• Healthy fat: Avocado, olive oil, pecans, sliced almonds.

If it includes all of these it will sustain you a good while.

So now you know what I’m having for lunch all week.

After I devoured that beast, I opened the fridge and grabbed an apple.

Cool.

Quote of the day:

Via coach lemon.

“Great self esteem comes from great self control.”

 

Q. What is your favorite salad topper?

Q. When you open your fridge what do you almost always reach for? A fruit? or veggie?

Blueberry Shake it.

Happy frigid Monday.

Last night I set my alarm for 6 am with a early run in mind. Then when I actually climbed in bed around midnight I wasn’t to sure about it. But when the alarm went off I jumped out of bed took one look outside.. to find a blizzard.. covered roads, 10 degrees. No thanks. I climbed right back in bed. If one thing trumps my motivation- its snow.. in the dark. I know a lot of people that just run right through it and love it. However for me that is not the case. Frozen snot face is not my style. And sometimes you just need the extra Z’s.

I made it to the gym a little later for a crazy-hard squat circuit.

Phew! Now, I’m really glad I pressed snooze earlier.. my legs probably couldn’t have handled that after a run. I’ll have to get my training run in later today though.

Post-Workout I still loaded up the blender with a recovery shake. Blizzard or no Blizzard.

Blueberry Shake

In the mix:

• 1 1/2 C. Almond Milk unsweetened Vanilla
• 3/4 C. Frozen blueberries
• 7 ice cubes
• 1/2 banana
• 1 scoop vanilla protein
• handful of spinach
• 1 tbs. Chia seeds

Spinach + Blueberries makes a pretty grey lookin’ shake. But I like to always throw a bit of spinach in my shake because it’s a sure fire way to get some veggie love in for the day. P.S (You can’t taste the spinach). Just do it.

The vanilla protein I used, was this whey isolate. Its one of my favorites- not chalky, sweet and blends well with anything!

If you missed the protein Q&A check out round 1 and round 2

Off to knock out Mondays to-do list!

But I think someone wants to go play in the snow.