Category: Holiday/Special Occasion

2015’s First New Balance Girls Night Out (NBGNO) Event

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In case you’re new to the New Balance Girls Night Out (NBGNO) events, let me give a little background on them: New Balance hosts these “girls night out” events about once a month as a way to get women together for a night of fitness, inspiration, empowerment and healthy eats and clean drinks. They range in topics and I’ve been to the #Laceup365 one in honor of breast cancer awareness month and the “healthy while on the road” one featuring the Westin’s fitness programs. Those recaps are here:

My first New Balance Girls Night Out event
NBGNO Event- How to Stay Fit While on the Road

This most recent 2015 kickoff event was something I was really looking forward to, not only because of the theme of the event, but because my gym/blog/in real life friend, Athena, was the host/emcee! The theme of the night was “Body Breakthrough” and as I’ve had a lot of discussions with Athena on this and ones she’s been having over the past couple of years, I knew she would do an absolutely fantastic job leading the event and sharing her story.

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Added bonus of the night? A bunch of our gym friends came!

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Nikia & Kyle’s Snowy Spring Wedding

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It seems as though I say “that was the best wedding ever!” after every friends’ wedding. Waking up the morning after Nikia and Kyle’s wedding, my mind was thinking that same exact thing. We danced, we laughed, we cried, we loved. It was such a beautiful, wonderful wedding with so much love that it was hard to not think it was perfect!

RM and I got stuck in massive amounts of traffic when we left on Friday afternoon, but we finally got to Chittenden, VT around 8pm. Lucky for us, most of our friends had just arrived and we were greeted with a big ol’ glass of wine! The wedding festivities were held at the beautiful Mountain Top Inn, which was perfect since they had large houses for renting in addition to normal hotel rooms. Since there were 11 of us in our group (SMC girls plus some of our significant others), we opted to rent a house. The house was HUGE and could’ve fit probably 5 more people comfortably! There was a nice, big kitchen/living room/dining room area, 5 bedrooms and bathrooms, a whole separate living area downstairs including a kitchen. It seemed like it just went on and on!

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After we finished catching up, we sat down for “family dinner”. My friend Jess picked up some chicken parm and eggplant parm from Bricco and it totally hit the spot!

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Kia’s North Conway Bachelorette Weekend

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I love celebrating my friends, and this past weekend was such a wonderful way to do so. My college friend, Nikia, is getting married this weekend so we all headed up to North Conway last weekend to celebrate her last weekend as a “single” lady. It was a mix of college girlfriends and some of her other girlfriends from different parts of her life. We all got along so well and by the end, it felt like we had all been friends for so long!

We arrived at various times on Friday night and took that time to drink wine, hang out and relax. The house that we rented was amazing!!! It was perfect for us because there were so many bedrooms and bathrooms- a must for a group of girls! It slept 14, had 6 bedrooms and 5 bathrooms, huge kitchen, 2 gas fireplaces, a game room and a hot tub with views of the nearby mountain. The Maid of Honor found the house on VRBO if you’re interested in checking it out!

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On Saturday, we got up and I led a 45 minute bootcamp. I did this at Sheila’s bachelorette weekend and was pumped when Kia asked if I would do it for hers. I’m all about drinking and partying and straying off of my normal healthy eats for a weekend, but I really like when I can still get in a workout and some movement because it’s something that makes me feel so much better! So, when you have a group of girls willing to do it with you, it makes for a fun event. I’ll post the workout on Wednesday, but it was a good one and it was so funny to listen to everyone grunting and groaning!
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Weekending: A Valentine’s Day Blizzard

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Good morning, friends! I am so happy that I have today off, and I hope all of you do, too! My plan today is a workout and then going up to Kittery to meet my parents for lunch since I won’t be around this weekend when they come to help my sister move. I wanted to go spend a few nights up there, but with the snow and parking, I just couldn’t make it work 😦

I’m sure you’re probably so sick of me (and a lot of other Boston bloggers) venting/complaining about the snow- I get it. It’s totally annoying, but somehow talking about it makes me feel a little better. Misery loves company, right? Anyway, with the way this winter has been over the past 3 weeks, it’s really no surprise that another blizzard would hit the city over Valentine’s Day weekend. I honestly felt so bad for all the restaurants because it’s no doubt they all suffered from people cancelling their reservations. I’d love to say we were different, but once we heard about the storm, we opted to stay local and just bar hop by foot (in boots!) rather than get dolled up for a fancy dinner. It ended up being perfect.

Friday night, I had plans on heading to the gym after work, but I did something I rarely do: skipped it. My bag was packed and it was in my plans, but as the day wore on, I realized I was really sore from Thursday and just wasn’t feeling it. I’m so happy I skipped it because traffic was insane and it took me over an hour to get home from work as it was. I was picturing a hungry, tired, post workout Monique in that situation and it just wasn’t pretty 😉

Roberto picked me up and we ended up throwing together a really great, simple dinner: gluten free panko coated fish, sautéed veggies and millet . Everything about it, especially paired with a few glasses of wine and some good catch-up convos with RM, was perfect!

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And, just when we thought it couldn’t get better, it did! I came across this post from Athena’s Friday Favorites and knew I needed to make it for RM. As you know, we try to eat *mostly* paleo, so this seemed like a great addition to our Valentine’s Day weekend. While they were good on their own, I decided they needed (yes, needed) frosting, so I made a simple one of unsweetened bakers chocolate, water, peanut butter, vanilla and confectionary sugar that made the dessert!

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Wednesday Workout {Valentine’s Day Edition}: The Love Your Body Workout

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Good morning and happy hump day! I hope you’ve all gotten yourself shoveled out and prepared for another storm tomorrow 😦 I’m REALLY hoping it passes and doesn’t really amount to anything.

Since Valentine’s Day is around the corner, and since I love themed workouts, I’ve dedicated today’s workout to the theme of this month: Love. My first year of blogging I posted this core workout and last year I posted this full body workout (which, looking back on looks tough… and one I want to try again!). This year, I’m focusing on exercises I’m loving these days. They are exercises that make me love and appreciate my body for all it does for me and these moves make me feel strong, yet challenge me and show me areas open for improvement.

Loving your body for all it does for you is SO important. I’ve spent too many years looking at myself in the mirror and pointing out all my flaws and giving myself everything BUT love. Over the years, and as I’ve started strength training, I’ve realized how my body is so much more than just how I look in the mirror; this has been one of the best mental shifts/changes I could have ever made. I may not have “perfect” legs or arms or a butt without dimples, but you know what? I have a strong body and am so proud of the work I’ve put into making myself healthier and fitter and stronger and that is worth more than an image in the mirror.
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