Nerd Alert: I love book club! <3

January 30, 2015January 30, 201516 Comments

My girlfriends and I have always talked about starting a book club, but for one reason or another, nothing ever manifested from those discussions. That is…. until about 6 months ago. After too many glasses of wine, we picked our first book and decided to officially start our book club. To be honest, I wasn’t sure how it was going to go; I imagined us reading one book then switching to just a wine club- sounds about right for most book clubs, right? However, I’m pleased to say that we have actually made it quite a serious little book club: we all bring book suggestions with descriptions for the next book, we vote on the next book, pick the next time/date/location for the book club meeting and then we discuss the book we’ve read with actual discussion questions. Granted we always do have a lot of wine and food, but still… Total nerd status, right?!

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Weekending: Feeling really blessed

November 4, 2014November 3, 201412 Comments

As I poured myself a glass of wine on Sunday night (it helps make meal/food prep easier…), I found myself reflecting on the weekend… and I just felt so blessed!

Between drinks and dinner with my friend Liz on Thursday night,

to spending Halloween with RM and his family, gushing over the babies, handing out candy and enjoying festive food and drinks,

to having my parents down to meet RM’s family

(but really, though, can you get any cuter than these two?! I nearly died when the hugged goodbye. So cute!)

to book club with my girlfriends, delicious food and lots of bubbly on a snowy Sunday afternoon

to having a quiet Sunday evening in my kitchen with a glass of vino, Miranda Lambert Pandora and lots of healthy and delicious food,

I really just feel so blessed! It’s so easy to get caught up in all the negatives (I didn’t sleep well, I am stressed at work, I have too much going on after work, I didn’t have a good workout, I don’t feel good, etc.), that it was a really nice change to have nothing but GOOD feelings last night.

I challenge each of you to list out 3 things making you feel blessed right now. Could be as small as not being in traffic on your way to work or finding a penny on the ground.

I challenge each of you to try and be present in the moment. To reflect on all the GOOD aspects of your lives. To say “I love you” more. To hug for a few seconds longer. To smile more. To listen. To forgive. To laugh (at yourself, too!).

… and then think about how you feel when you’re doing those things. I’m pretty sure you’ll find that thinking/feeling/living like that gives you a sense of peace and calmness that stressful/anxious/angry doesn’t, right? We spend so much of our days being angry or upset or pointing blame when we should really be focusing on everything good in our lives. I know this is something I need to work on, what about you?

Questions for you: What was the best part of your weekend? Do you tend to dwell on negatives or focus on the positives? What do you feel blessed for?

#BosFIT Review/Recap & Other Weekending Things

September 30, 2014September 29, 20149 Comments

As I mentioned yesterday, the #BosFIT event I attended over the weekend was amazing!!! I kind of knew it would be, because anytime you combine fitness, friends and free stuff, I’m a pretty happy girl, but I have to say that it exceeded my expectations.

Since I knew I had to be up and out relatively early for a Saturday, my Friday night was spent much like this:

Saturday morning, my sister and I headed to The Club by George Foreman III for the #BosFIT event.

My gym friend (and most loyal class-goer everrr) Dana won my tickets since Julie ended up buying her own. Another BSC member, Caroline, also bought tickets, so it was fun to workout WITH some members rather than teaching them. My YMCA gym-friend, Steph, was also at the event, so it was a blast!

The event offered 4 classes to everyone and you could pick from Bags and Beats, Boxing Bootcamp, BollyX, Suspension Training, Core Fusion Barre, Barry’s Bootcamp, and Turnstyle Cycle. I think the hardest part of the day was deciding what class to take at what point in the day… ok, that’s a lie. Barry’s for the last session was the hardest part of my day!

My first class was Bags and Beats. George introduced himself and gave us a high level overview of the punches. What I liked about this class was that you were punching to the beat of the music, very similar to how I teach, except it wasn’t cardio like I do. Anyway- we had our hands wrapped and wore boxing gloves and got to it for a bunch of songs. The combos were easy to pick up and I liked that we altered our tempo and added in squats, lunges, push-ups and planks throughout.

Steph and I tried to do Barry’s next, but it was already full. From there, we tried to do a suspension class, but that was also full (I think if they do it again they should have people sign up for classes before the event rather than on a “first come first serve” basis). We ended up taking a BollyX class, which is similar to Zumba in that it’s a dancing workout, but different in that you’re supposed to “strike a pose” at the end of each song. It was a little weird, but my heart rate was up the whole time and it was fun to dance.

There was a break after this where you could “ask the experts” questions on nutrition and training and things like that. Caroline did a fantastic job moderating the panel- proud of you, girl!

My sister and I headed to a Turnstyle Cycle class after the speaking session and it.was.awesome!! We were both drenched by the time we left. I really need to get there for a class.

Steph signed us up for Barry’s as our last workout of the day. Holy moly. I don’t know how I survived! Running at a 12% incline and running backwards and sprinting after 3 other classes was rough, BUT we did it and felt amazing after!!

Check out this calorie burn for the day- solid start to my Saturday 😉

All in all, it was such a fantastic event! I loved working out with so many friends and getting to see Caroline in her element.

Thanks to some pretty sweet swag bags, I get to go BACK to many of the studios who participated in the event.

Post #BosFIT, I headed to Charlestown to have a late lunch and drinks with Jessi and Amy at Pier 6. Man, it was HOT, but the view was worth it!

Jessi and I continued to drink throughout the afternoon and evening (her place, Tia’s and then dinner and a glass of wine at Sterling’s) and between that, the sun and being dehydrated from the morning’s workout, I woke up with a wee bit of a headache on Sunday. Whoops! Such a fun night, though.

Sunday was spent cleaning, running errands, grabbing a quick lunch with my sister and then heading to Jessi’s for our first book club meeting.

Check out that spread! I made 2 Stromboli’s and they came out SO GOOD! Seriously, look at these beauties:

Anything with ooey, gooey, cheesy goodness cannot be bad in my book! The next book we are reading is Sharp Objects, by Gillian Flynn- anyone want to participate? If you do, leave a note in the comments. We are meeting on November 2nd and after that date I can put together the questions and discussion topics we went over if you’re interested? Let me know 🙂

I hope you all had a great weekend, too! I hope this one goes by slower than last weekend- I feel like I blinked and it was over.

Questions for you: For those of you who went to #BosFIT, what did you think?? What was your favorite part? Has anyone else been to The Club for a boxing class? What was the best part of your weekend? Did you do fall or summer things? Have you been in a book club before?