Weekending: Drinks, Booty By Brabants Class, Christmas Partying & Home to Maine

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Good morning! Is it just me or are the weekends/December FLYING by?! This weekend was no different… except for the fact I’m in the office today instead of working from home 😦 Oh well- I’m traveling to South Carolina for a few days this week so it’s not a big deal! Let’s recap the weekend, though 🙂

Friday

After work on Friday, I went to the Legal C Bar at the M Street shops with a work friend. We had a blast chatting and sipping on some vino. Once we parted ways, I headed home and realized that RM would not be around for dinner. I was in no mood to stay in by myself- and we had no food- so I walked over to Social Restaurant for dinner and drinks… by myself! It was actually nice- I ordered a pizza, kale and bubbly. Always bubbly. And, since I posted a photo on Instagram, the manager gave me another free drink. I’ll take it!

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RM and his cousin ended up joining me and then our friends Bob and Kristen randomly popped in, too! Kristen and I have recently connected through blogging and it’s been so fun. She writes an awesome blog highlighting on restaurants and travel and her posts are so beautifully written and have really nice photos. You need to check it out!

Saturday

Rm and I took our time getting up and then puttered around the house and took a walk before I headed into the city for a Booty By Brabants class at the BFX Studio. I had heard so much about Kelly’s class and about the BFX studio so I was pumped to get invited to check both out! BFX is a beautiful studio with nice locker rooms and class space and Kelly’s class was FULL of energy, smiles, sexy dancing and sweat! Remember how I talked about getting out of your comfort zone and getting comfortable being uncomfortable? This class was a great example of doing this! I want to do a full review of the class in a separate post so I’ll leave it at that. Such a fun Saturday!

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After the class we had a chance to try out juices and smoothies from Nourish Your Soul and paleo meals from Paleo Life. The juices & smoothies were fantastic and I was so excited when the founder of Nourish Your Soul gave me a free smoothie to take home. It was the perfect post workout treat. I also really enjoyed the food items that I sampled from Paleo Life. If you’ve never heard of it, Paleo Life is a healthy meal planning & delivery service which is great for those who are “too busy” to eat healthy. They seem pretty affordable and deliver to all around Boston so if it’s something you’d be interested in, check them out!

After the event, I did some Christmas shopping and then baked a batch of the most delicious Hidden Avocado Brownies from Lexi’s Clean Kitchen to take to Jessi and Chuck’s party. It’s the second time I’ve made them and I’m totally obsessed. Not only are they easy, but they taste so rich & moist you’d never know there was an avocado in them!

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The party was a blast! It’s always so fun getting dressed up, laughing and chatting with friends, drinking wine & eating fun party food. Thanks for hosting such a fun party guys!

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Sunday

I woke up on Sunday and packed up to head to Maine for the day. I hadn’t been up there for a long time and was in need of a little quiet time with my parents. I stopped at Kittery for a little shopping before meeting my mom for lunch at the Springvale Publick House. I enjoyed a locally brewed beer and homemade turkey chili. Both were unbelievable!

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Once I got home, I helped my parents bring in and decorate the tree, squeezed in a workout and relaxed with some vino and blogging. It was such a nice Sunday!

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For dinner, we had Pork Tenderloin Medallions, baked sweet potatoes and roasted broccoli and everything was great!

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One last thing before I sign off for the day… my friend Kelly works for a company called Schoola which collects & resells gently used clothes to help provide schools with funds for various things. Right now, they have an incredible sale going on where you can buy BRAND NEW Athleta clothing for super discounted prices and the best part is that a huge portion of the proceeds go to the Mala Fund. I recently requested a bag so that I could send them some clothes I no longer wear. You can use that same link if you’re looking for a good place to donate your gently used clothes! And, if you want to shop some brand new Athleta clothes for a great discount, check out this link. I just bought the black sweater!

Questions for you: What was the best part of your weekend? Did you have any holiday parties? Have you ever grabbed dinner at a local bar by yourself?

Five on Friday {12.11.15}

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Good morning! How has your week been? Mine has felt long… I am so ready for the weekend to be here! In case you missed anything from B2B this week, you can catch up here, here and here. For now, though, let’s talk Friday Favorites!

1. Wellcoin– I’m excited to announce that I recently became a Wellcoin Ambassador! New to Wellcoin? Basically, it’s an app that pays you to live a healthy life! No joke- you get points for all sorts of “healthy living” things from working out to buying healthy groceries to choosing a healthy drink to doing something fun, and then you can “shop” in their marketplace for lots of different things like Whole Foods gift cards, free class at a participating studio, items at Thirst Juice Co. and more. I plan to do a whole post on it, so I won’t share all the details here, but if you’re interested, head on over to Wellcoin.com and check it out. Also, if you sign up, be sure to use the code “burpeestobubbly” which will get you 250 points right off the bat! I’ve only been using it for a few weeks and I already have about 6000 points. When you join- give me a follow so we can cheer each other on because that gives you more points, too 😉

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2. Christmas Decorations/Movies/Music/AlltheChristmas- I love, love, love this time of year and it’s been so fun decorating OUR home- getting our first tree, hanging up lights, watching Christmas movies, etc. RM laughed at me the other morning when I was WFH and had the tree lit at 7am… hey- it’s the little things 😉

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3. Free sweetgreen lunch– sweetgreen recently opened up a new store location in the M Street shops near my office and the lovely Rachel of Healthy Chicks has been spoiling my group with free lunches. She brought us some delicious salads yesterday for lunch which was perfect timing since I had gotten home late on Wednesday and was in no mood to pack a lunch. Thanks girl! (ps they also opened up a new location in the Prudential Center- it’s amazing to see them growing so much!)

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4. Dealing with no internet- This was a busy week and I had a hours of blogging planned for Tuesday night, so imagine my frustration when I realized we did not have internet. My initial reaction was “ugh omg how am I going to get my Wednesday Workout post up? I can’t post my recipe on Thursday because I won’t even have time on Wednesday night to blog”, etc. etc. I’m happy to say that I took a few deep breaths and just let it be. It’s sad to realize how much I depend upon and use the Internet- for trivial things like checking facebook and Instagram. I mean, common Monique. It shouldn’t be that hard to just sit and watch TV! But this day in age, with technology and social media as such a huge part of our lives, it’s just second nature to be on our phones… and I’ll be the first to admit that I’m on mine way too much. Tuesday night was a good reminder to just leave the phone be for a while.

5. Little words that mean so much– While I love blogging SO much, I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t a lot of work… and sometimes frustrating. Sometimes I wonder if anyone is even reading this silly thing and whether or not I’m actually inspiring and motivating people, so when my friend Meg sent me these texts today, it made me feel SO GOOD. Knowing that I can provide tips, share my experience and motivate/inspire even just one person makes my hard work on B2B so worth it. Thank you, friend. You made my day!

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And that does it for me today! I’m excited for this weekend- I think I’m going to a fitness event on SaturDAY and then Saturday night my friend Jessi is having her Christmas party and then Sunday I’m going to head up to Maine to spend some time at my parents house…. but not without a stop at the Kittery outlets first 😉 What about you guys? Do you have anything fun planned? What are you loving right now? Anything from the week you want to share?

Wednesday Workout: 2 Part (or partner) Stations Workout

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Good morning! These days I don’t tend to share workouts that I’ve taught, mostly because I teach a Burn class with a standard format that isn’t supposed to change week to week so that would get pretty boring 😉 A few months ago, I subbed for Athena’s 6am Total Body class and I was reminded of how fun it is to create different workouts and formats every week. There are so many options between how you want to set up the class, what equipment you want to use, etc. Totally loved it!

I wanted to share this workout with you because there are two ways you can complete it: solo or with a partner. I had the class partner up so that each partner did both moves at each station, but you could certainly do it on your own if you didn’t have a partner or workout buddy handy. You’ll be at each station for two minutes- 1 minute per move. Halfway through the circuit and at the end of the circuit you’ll complete a lovely little cardio blast- doesn’t get much better than that!

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Here are some explanations and/or demos of the exercises:

  1. TRX Row/Burpees– For the rows, you can make them easier by putting your feet closer to your body so that you’re at less of an angle. To make it harder, walk your feet out further away from you. Engage your core and pull your elbows back and squeeze your shoulder blades together. Remember to keep your shoulders pulled down away from your ears. Check out this video for a TRX row demo. For the burpees- you can either jump your feet back, walk them back, drop your chest to the ground, do a pushup… whatever version of the burpee you want to do- rock it!
  2. KB Goblet Squat/Jump squats- Here’s a video for Goblet Squats. For the jump squats, you can either go for depth and make sure to touch your hands to the ground each time or you can go for speed and do rapid fire baby jumps.
  3. Squat hold/Battle ropes- If you have a partner, one partner will get into a squat hold while holding the rope, acting as the anchor. Make sure to brace your core and position because it gets challenging to hold this as your partner does the ropes. Check out this video where I demo the battle ropes. If you don’t have a partner hopefully you have access to the standard rope setup!
  4. Dynamax ball Russian twists/cross body mountain climbers-With a Dynamax ball you’ll perform the standard Russian twist exercise (in a seated position, with your feet either in the air and bent at 90* or on the ground and moving a weight/ball from one side of your body to the next). For the mountain climbers, instead of bringing your knees straight forward to your chest, you’ll bring your right knee to your left elbow and your left knee to your right elbow. Go as fast or slow as you want/need.
  5. Forward lunge & twist/jumping lunges– As you step forward into a lunge on your right leg, lift your arms and extend a weight out in front of you. In your low position of the lunge, twist through your core and move the weight over to the right over your right knee. Repeat on the left & alternate right & left for the 60 seconds. Jumping lunges should be pretty standard 😉
  6. Push-up w/frogger stamp/in & out plank jumps- Perform a  push-up (either on your knees or toes) and then jump your feet up to the outsides of your hands and then back to your high plank/push-up position. If you’re doing the push-ups on your knees, just drop down to your knees after you jump back. For the in & out plank jumps you’ll start in a high plank position (shoulders, elbows & wrists in line, neutral spine, shoulders pulled on your back, core engaged) and jump your feet straight up to your hands (not to the outsides like the first exercise) and then jump back into a high plank and jump your feet out like you would for a plank jack. repeat.
  7. Stability ball pass/Skier jumps– For the first move, check out this video– make sure you’re keeping your core tight and your back flat against the ground. If this is too hard, ditch the ball and either keep your legs bent, lower them not so far or do one leg at a time. This video demos the ski jumps well.
  8. Side lunge w/center press/TRX Push-ups- For the side lunge/center press, you’re going to hold a weight in both hands at chest height. You’ll step out to the right and do a side lunge (sitting your butt way back, keeping your knee in line with your toes on the lunging leg and keeping the other leg straight) and then when you come through center, press the weight overhead. Repeat to the other side. TRX push-ups are almost the opposite of the rows discussed earlier, except instead of pulling your weight up towards the straps, you’ll be pushing your weight away from the straps as you extend. Again, the closer your feet are to you, the easier it is; stepping your feet back away from you & making your body more parallel to the ground will make it harder

I think that should do it! I hope you give this a shot- everyone seemed to like it and my sister said she was a little sore the next day!

Questions for you: Do you  like partner workouts? Do you like using TRX straps or battle ropes?

Get Comfortable Being Uncomfortable

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Hi there! Remember how I talked about getting out of my comfort zone a few weeks ago when I went to Foster Fitness? It wasn’t comfortable. In fact, it made me feel quite uncomfortable. The gym and working out is usually a place and time where I feel comfortable, but I realized that’s only because I tend to stick to the same things: teaching, running, UXF area, KB’s, TRX, etc. Take me out of my “comfort zone” area? I felt humbled, and, well,  “new” to working out. While it was hard, it was also exciting because it ignited a spark that hadn’t been ignited for a while; Fitness instructors get in ruts, too!

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You see, I’ve gotten SO comfortable with the gyms I frequent, exercises I do and classes I teach that I had almost forgotten what it was like to be “new”. I wasn’t used to not knowing exactly how to brace my body for the exercises and heavier weights, I had to take multiple breaks on the last set, and I had to make multiple self-corrections throughout the various exercises. But, I didn’t let that get me down. In fact, I’ve visited the heavier weights section at the gym since that one on one session and have done barbell back squats, front squats and deadlifts multiple times now… on my own! I’m getting comfortable being uncomfortable.

And you know what? It’s not so bad!

I’ve been back to Foster Fitness for group ex classes two times now (maybe a third after work today) and I have to admit, I was faced with that same “uncomfortable” feeling. Most of her members have been going to her religiously since she opened her studio, so to say they all knew her and each other very well is an understatement. On top of that, they were familiar with the particular class, what weights they should use to execute the moves in a challenging, but safe, way and where everything was. And, they were SO STRONG!  In other words, I felt like a total newbie/outsider. But, I tried to put those feelings aside and do my best in the class. I asked questions and followed the lead of the other members.

And you know what? It wasn’t so bad!

After the initial uncomfortableness went away, I was able to focus on my workout and not about being the newbie. I realized that while my strength isn’t with the barbell- yet!-,  I was able to fly through the second half of the workout which relied more on speed and lighter weights. I even did 150 consecutive jump ropes…. on very tired legs! So, even though I experienced discomfort with certain parts of the workout and experience, I left there feeling proud of myself for powering through the hard stuff and for crushing part of the workout.

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Here’s the thing, though, I could’ve easily let the first part of class and feeling like a “newbie” get me down and discourage me from going back, but I decided to get comfortable being uncomfortable and go back for a second class. While I still felt new, challenged and uncomfortable at times, I felt more confident than I had the two previous times I worked out there.

When we are in the midst of discomfort, I think it’s easy to feel like it’s never going to get easier. We like consistency,  comfort and feeling like we know what’s going on and what to expect. We don’t like  feeling uncomfortable, but the thing is- that’s where the change happens. It means we are doing something new and different and the natural result of that is change and growth, which is pretty awesome. Like the old saying goes, if we keep doing the same thing we can only expect the same results, so even though it’s hard to get out of our comfort zone, it’s so important to give it a try. I promise, although it’s hard and maybe a little scary in the beginning, it WILL get easier and better the more you practice and stick with it. And once you feel comfortable, you’ll know it’s time to change it up and get uncomfortable again- it’s a lovely little cycle 😉

On that note, get out there and make some changes- they don’t have to be big and they don’t have to be super scary, but I promise that if you give something new a try you’ll feel pretty awesome!

Questions for you: Have you ever felt like you needed a spark with something in your life? What changes did you make to ignite the spark? What’s the last scary thing you’ve tried at the gym or with a workout? 

Weekending: Birthday Celebrations & Decorating for Christmas

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Good morning! I hope you all had a great weekend. Although we did lots of Christmas-y things, it sure didn’t feel like Christmas with 50-60* weather all weekend. I’m not complaining, though, I’m sure we will have freezing temps and snow soon enough!

Before we recap, I want to wish my sister a very happy birthday!!! I hope you have a great day! xo

Friday

I really wasn’t ready to head right home after work on Friday so I texted my friend Jessi to see if she wanted to meet up for a drink on my way home. Lucky for me, she was around and willing to meet up! We met at Assembly Row and puttered through Home Goods before grabbing seats and some vino at the Legal Seafoods bar.

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I stopped at Whole Foods on the way home to get stuff for dinner: quesadillas! We had chicken we needed to eat and I was in no mood for a boring chicken and veggie meal. I feel like Fridays should be fun meals, not boring standard meals.

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We used Ezekiel wraps, chicken thighs I had baked earlier in the week, freshly shredded Gruyere cheese and veggies. I plan on writing these up in a post of their own because they were that good!

Saturday

It was my Saturday to teach and it was fun because there were lots of friends in class! I can tell winter is coming because each week my numbers continue to increase.

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We had a rare Saturday where both RM and I were around with no real plans. He took advantage of it by starting to study for his broker exam and I started to do some decorating. Since we loved the quesadilla’s so much, I offered to make them again for lunch!

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Later in the afternoon I popped over to Target to stock up on some household items… $85 later and multiple things I didn’t “need”. How does that store always do that to me?!

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We decided to get our Christmas Tree later in the afternoon. RM’s family always gets their tree at Russo’s in Watertown so we went there. I was totally impressed! The tree wasn’t cheap, but it just seemed to much healthier than the ones I’ve previously gotten at Home Depot so I didn’t mind spending the money.

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My sister was celebrating her birthday on Saturday night at The Brahmin so RM and I decided to head in a little early and grab some sushi at Red Lantern since it’s right next to The Brahmin. We got bubbly, spicy edamame, avocado salad, a spicy tuna roll and a salmon avocado roll and everything was fantastic!

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Once we got word that my sister was at The Brahmin we headed over. It was such a fun night- I definitely drank more than usual and more than I probably should have, but I don’t go out like that very often so it’s all good. We laughed, we danced and we took birthday shot shots- so much fun!

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RM and I were both craving pizza when we left, but we couldn’t find an open pizza joint so we ended up at Tasty Burger. I had never been and I have to say, although the burger was good, it wasn’t as good as Shake Shack! RM refused to share with me and made me get my own… two bites in and I decided I didn’t want a burger so we ended up taking it home, haha the fries on the other hand? Those were totally hitting the spot!

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Sunday

We slept in (no surprise there) and had a nice lazy morning. I whipped up some healthy pancakes and then went back to Target to get a new tree stand since the one I’ve had for a few years apparently had a big crack in it and leaked all of the water we added to it… so not fun!

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The rest of the day was spent decorating, food shopping and taking a stab at making Rosa’s sauce. I had a few bites and it definitely isn’t as good as hers, but it’s still pretty good!

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It’s been so fun decorating “our home” and getting our first Christmas tree together! We have so much fun living together that I sometimes still feel like we are playing house 🙂

For dinner, we had some paleo slow cooker wings that RM threw together- they were fantastic!

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And that about wraps it up!

Questions for you: Did you do anything fun this weekend? Have you gotten your tree and/or started decorating for Christmas? What’s the best meal you had this weekend? Any fun drinks or Christmas parties?