Rev (up)

I continue to forget that nothing gets me out of a bad attitude toddler slump than a solid ass-kicking workout.

I remembered that tonight though, don't worry.

Last week one of my friends asked a few of us if we had any interest in doing a charity spin class at the new cycle studio that she works at. The event was to raise money for a Team in Training fundraiser to support the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society in the fight against cancer.

90 minutes of sweat and yelling to beat cancer's ass? Sign me up.

The class/studio had everything I look for in a solid spin sesh - good music, good atmosphere, and a fantastic instructor. Since this class was a solid hour and a half they actually had two spin instructors up there.

The first - Esther - took the reigns for the first hour and got me so pumped up I wanted to head butt the girl on the bike next to me.... which happened to be my good friend Megan, so I restrained myself.

Any female spin instructor who has the balls to call the entire class the P word and consistently drop phrases like "Let's do this sh*t" is A-OK in my book.

The second - Jessie, was a little less intense but much more encouraging - exactly what we needed to finish out those last sweat-drenched 30 minutes.

All in all I was thoroughly impressed by Rev Spin Studio and am so glad that I went - check out their website here if you're an interested Baltimorian.

Now I promised you guys a recipe, and I'm going to share it because I don't break promises. These cookies are amazing, are (almost) paleo, and I may have housed two immediately after getting home from Rev.

I'm not even close to sorry.

Blueberry Lemon Yogurt Cookies

- 1 cup coconut palm sugar
- 1 cup greek yogurt
- 2 large eggs
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 cup coconut flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 cup fresh blueberries

- 1 freshly squeezed lemon

Preheat to 375. Grease pans. Mix sugar, yogurt, vanilla and eggs in a bowl. Slowly fold in the coconut flour, baking powder and salt, followed by the blueberries.

Spoon decent sized blobs on the pans, take half a lemon and squeeze it over the uncooked cookies before popping those bad boys into the oven. Bake for 10-15 minutes, keep an eye on them.

Flatten em down with a fork, eat, you're welcome.

Last but not least, I'm linking up with Whitney over at I Wore Yoga Pants to Work for #Backthatazzup Friday. Here's on of my favorite jams of the week.




Cheers!

K

Crafty Kait

I have personal rules when it comes to the celebration of seasons. Fall begins in September, winter begins in December. I don't care what the official dates are, that's just how I operate.

Christmas music cannot start until Thanksgiving. However, my roommate is going to break the rules and start decorating our house for Christmas this coming week. So yesterday I broke my own rule and pulled out my snowman mug from hibernation. It had been a long week, and I needed some joy at work.

Wednesday was a particularly rough day for me, one of those a whole bunch of little things added up to a slight meltdown at my desk. So when Thursday rolled around our highschool intern strolled in and handed me two bags of these:

and offered apologies for my rough day yesterday. He sits kitty-corner from my desk for the few hours a day that he's in the office, and most likely thinks I'm a nut job. I am. Regardless, the gesture was precious and brightened my day.

seriously though.

Changing subjects, remember how I have been gym-less since moving to Baltimore in July, and have just been bouncing around on free trials like a sneaky little weasel? Well I scored a 30-day pass to Canton Club about two weeks ago, and have been LOVING the 5:30 AM Friday morning spin class.

The instructor has the potential to be my grandma's age, no exaggeration, and she kicks our asses. Repeatedly. Gets up there, plays some awesome jams, and screams motivation until my gluts are on fire.

Another awesome part of the class is that the studio overlooks the harbor, so we got to see a beautiful sunrise. I wasn't able to snap a picture of the sunrise itself as I was too busy sweating like a madwoman, but hopefully these help you get an idea...

My roommates and I are hosting a Bears/Ravens party tomorrow paired with a Friendsgiving (it's likely I will be the only Bears fan present) and therefore we felt the need to be domesticated and crafty last night with a few glasses of wine. Here's what we came up with:

Pinecone turkeys!

While I sat at the table tracing my hand I realized it had most likely been about 20 years since I had last made a turkey out of my hand. We all did it at some point in elementary school, and there was an odd level of joy that I found in the simplicity of doing it.

Or maybe it was the wine, I don't know.

I'm off to the gym. Today calls for the elliptical and a solid lifting session, I really haven't been giving my muscles enough attention lately. Hope your weekend is fabulous, Go Bears!

Cheers - 

K

Heating up

I have a small confession to make.

I’ve become slightly addicted to ABC’s TV series Revenge. My CO friend wolf has been riding me to check it out for about two months, so one night I finally caved and checked out the pilot. 
I was hooked.

Luckily there are currently only two seasons, so I don’t have toooo much to catch up on. It still peeves me a bit that I found a new series to love, as I would rather spend my time doing anything else in the world than have my face glued to a screen.

No more new series this summer, you have my word.

I discovered this guy at Safeway the other day:

I’m not sure if you’re a dried plum/prune fan or not, but I am. And listen to me when I say a handful of those chopped dried plums and a dollop of almond butter thrown into my overnight oats is one of my new favorite on-the-go breakfasts for summer. Throw some cinnamon and almond milk in there, let it soak overnight. It’s good stuff.

Have you heard the news? It’s summer, and it’s hot.

What my week has looked like

Moving on. I’ve only gone to my new trial gym, Canton Club a handful of times thus far but as of today I’m giving it a thumbs up. It’s smaller, much less crowded, and has a simple lay out. I tried a one hour spin class the other evening, and left sweaty and not angry – those are really my only two expectations when it comes to spin class.

Speaking of spinning, I did my first brick of the summer last night. I rode a couple of miles on my bike around Patterson Park, and then hopped off and ran a 5k along the harbor. It felt pretty good considering the heat and humidity. In the process I realized there are way too many bikers out there who aren’t wearing helmets. Listen, I don’t care if you’re biking for transportation or training competitively - strap that b*tch on. Don’t make me post that picture from I left half my face on a Colorado bike trail.

There’s your public service announcement of the week: Wear your freaking helmet. I don’t care how cool you think you are.

Sometimes I even wear it around the house for extra precaution. Am I kidding?
You can decide that.

Ummm let’s see… I went to see my orthopedic doctor today. I figured it’s been a few months since our last visit and she probably missed me.

In all seriousness, I had her check out my right knee. Going into the appoint I was lacking the correct medical term, so let’s just say that it’s being weird.

The diagnosis can be discussed tomorrow, but I'll leave you with the fact that I DON'T need to stop running, as long as things continue to get better.

WHAT!?! A doctor who supports running? I know, I found a keeper.

Alright, wrapping up… this girl has some miles to knock out. And (hopefully) a marathon to continue training for.

Cheers!

The Gym Hunt

There’s this toilet at my work that is an overactive flusher. Any time that you move at all, to wipe, shift a butt cheek, etc., it freaks out and flushes on your ass butt. Literally. Yet I continue to go into that stall because I like the last stall, it feels safe and I may be attached to it.

There’s your weird Wednesday tidbit for the week, I know you needed it, it’s been too long.

Now I want to discuss my least favorite part about moving into Baltimore so far - finding a new gym. I was lucky enough to be added to Andrew's existing gym pass when I first moved out here, so the original relocation didn't involve any kind of search whatsoever...

Technically this picture has no relation to the topic aside from the fact that it was taken this past Sunday from my new house's deck. Pretty huh?

I tried out the Canton Merritt Gym last week, and ended up going about 5 times, to two different spin classes. Final verdict: Sorry current Merritt users, I was not overly impressed with the Canton location.

source

It was fine, as gym standards go. But it’s very much a ‘scene’. Every other girl is decked out in her LuLu Lemon, which let’s be honest I would be too it I had the money. All of the weights areas were extremely 20-something male dominated, most who wanted nothing more than to gaze at their beloved muscles in the mirrors.

It was annoying.

But hey, it was a free week of working out, and now I know that I don’t want to join there. The spin class that I attended there on Monday also rubbed me the wrong way, per the instructor getting off her bike, jumping frantically around the room from bike to bike, yelling in our faces.

That’s just not my cup of tea. I’m a self-motivator, I realllllly don’t want your sweaty face in mine while I’m on the bike. No hard feelings OK?

Next on the list to try is the Canton Club, which looks to be a bit smaller and doesn’t have a pool. Hopefully it's less bro-ish. A pool isn't the deciding factor for me when it comes to joining gyms, but technically I should be swimming right now as part of my training… I will probably hit up the public pool a couple times prior to August 11^th.

 Last but probably most importantly... I tried out the local Canton Froyo shop last night. Great news – they had crumbled up cupcakes as a topping option.

Life is good.

We’re sitting on the hump you guys. Is that the weekend I smell?

Cheers to gym hopping!

Rainy Days & Sweaty WODS

Man, I seriously feel that rainy Fridays should be illegal. This weather is putting a bit of a damper on my mood.

Thanks tropical storm Andrea, or whatever it is that you are.

This morning was the first morning that I wasn’t able to get into my spin class because it was full. It caught me off-guard because I love my Friday morning spin class more than most things… and I retreated to the stairmaster & eliptail with my tail between my legs. To distract myself, I watched the show “Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss” on my phone... have you ever watched it? I would be lying if I denied that about half the reason I enjoy watching it is because of the trainer on the show, Chris Powell…

there's some eye candy for ya

Did you celebrate National Donut Day? You bet your pretty face I did…

YUM

Even better was on Thursday, when my coworkers and I decided that we needed a means to have iced coffee that afternoon. So we wittingly poured a pot of warm coffee into a pitcher that morning and stuck it in the freezer… and had ourselves some excellent iced coffee later that afternoon. I even added a dash of chocolate milk to mine, and was in love.

2 PM never looked so lovely

In contrast, my oatmeal has really been letting me down this week. I had some horrible mixed berry overnight oats this morning that I literally had to gag my way through post-donut. I guess not much can compare to a blueberry cake donut…

I swung by the gym on my way home from work today (again) because I was itching to lift some weights. My cross fit master friend, Greg, sent me the below workout awhile ago, and I've been carrying the post-it around saying I need to do it. Welp, it was time to put my money where my mouth was... and the result was A LOT of sweat.

 8 mins, AMRAP...

-Hanging knee raises

-Lunges with 25 lb. plate above head

-Burpees

Start with sets of 5, increase by 5 every time a set is complete... 5, 10, 15, 20...

I got to 20 reps by the time the 8 minutes was done. It was a sweaty beautiful mess.

My fingers are crossed that the rain is done by tomorrow, and we can get into some trouble this weekend. I rented some paddle boards for the day tomorrow, as Andrew and I have been wanting to try that out for awhile in Annapolis. Any tips from the pros out there on paddle boarding?

That's all she wrote. Have a wonderful weekend, keep it classy.

Cheers!

Spin Snob

Hi! It's your favorite 5'11" blogger coming to you from Chi City.

CHECK OUT our sweet ride this week:

i'm the chauffeur and i love it.

My life has been a whirlwind since Saturday night. I haven't slept in the same bed two nights in a row- luckily that will change tonight with my second night here at a fancy-schmacy boutique hotel. My sister is staying down here with me as well so that she has a shorter commute to work. We found creepy robes in the closet last night and had some fun with them.

This message is brought to you by my favorite lululemon shirt as I sweat away on the elliptical, writing this post on my phone. Started off today’s workout with a plank, it’s been a staple this trip for sure:

During our stay in Tinley Park, we had full access to the LA Fitness across the street from our hotel.  When I was told the news I did a fist pump and gave the hotel lady a kiss.

Funny story though: I tried out their spin class on Tuesday. It suckkkked.

Don't get me wrong, I sweat and all. And I'm no fitness professional, yet, but I'm pretty sure you're never, ever ever everrrr supposed to tell the class to put all your weight on the handles. Ever.

Because spin is supposed to simulate actual cycling right, like on a bike. So tell me, what happens if you're riding your bike outside and you choose to put ALL YOUR WEIGHT on the handles?

The instructor was dressed super unprofessional - aka her girls were hanging out big time- and I left after 40 minutes and hit the weight rack instead. I'm not going to complain about a free gym pass, but, wait yes I am.

Despite that small hiccup, I'm in an excellent mood. It's Thursday  I'm in my home state in my favorite city, and we have another great day of training ahead of us.

Speaking of Chi sports, a little bird on the street in the office told me we are attending the Bulls game tonight with some of our Chicago office colleagues.

Free tix to a Bulls game is something I will never complain about.  Ever.

Great talk. Any LA fitness goers out there? Would love to hear thoughts on the classes they offer.

Tomorrow I think I will do a short jaunt on the treadmill before checking out of my hotel and heading back to my second home, Chicago’s Midway Airport. From there back to Baltimore?

No. From there onto Colorado. Leg 3. I can’t talk about it too much yet or I will get too excited.

Cheers to free stuff and good times!

The Return

Noooo this isn't a post on DRose's upcoming return to the court for the Chicago Bulls... although I would have no issue writing a post about that because I love him.

What a beautiful Friday morning, don’t you agree?

It may still be chilly, but waking up to the news of a Colorado State win in the NCAA Tourney warmed me to the bones. Alright that last sentence was cheesy let’s pretend I never wrote that. But seriously, it got me pumped and I threw on the first CSU shirt I could find for spin class this morning.

Ramstrong B*tches

My spin instructor took us through his first marathon experience this past weekend and literally told the story mile by mile, split by split. I sat on my bike drooling and crying and simultaneously feeling hopeful. It got me so jacked up that when he asked if there had been any upsets last night in the NCAA tournament, I screamed out that Harvard beat New Mexico… which is extremely odd because I never say a peep during spin.

Serious question. Do you guys ever feel like this when reading my blog?

 If so, I’m sorry. But not really. Especially since running looks like it’s about to start working it’s way back into my life again YAY!!!!

I’ve been in the process to talking to several runners & medical professionals, all who I trust, about the best way to come back from a stress fracture. As I mentioned earlier this week, this past Wednesday was the 6 week mark for resting my foot and having ZERO amounts of running in my life. 

Per recommendation of the people mentioned above, this week is actually just getting back into walking for extended periods of time. So last night I hit the treadmill for a half hour. Aaaaand if we are being honest with each other, I may have lightly jogged for 5 of those minutes. Next week I may start working in some more running on the treadmill, for really short distances, depending on how I feel. What I’ve been told is that the key is making sure there are days in between for my foot to rest. The stress fracture is mostly healed at 6 weeks – but not completely – and therefore still needs days to continue to rebuild.

The things I have learned about my body in the past 6 months, between my IT Band and my foot, have been pretty amazing.

LOVE THIS

There’s no point in rushing back to quickly, or amping up mileage like a crazy person, as I still have a few months to get back to neutral before crazy ass-kicking marathon training starts mid-summer.

What fall marathon are you running Kait? Let’s chat about that next week, mark it in your calendars and put a countdown in your phone.

Enough babble about running, it’s getting me way too amped up. Oh, I wanted to show you all this:

Look at how my coworkers treat my giraffes when I’m not in the office! Offensive.

Hot yoga’s on the docket for me this evening, followed by way too many hours of watching basketball.

Whose your March Madness Team? Anyone else have tips for coming back from a stress fracture? The more the merrier!

Cheers to the Madness!

Take a stroll

I have some fitness updates for you, as well as a recipe. And some other things too I think. Depending on where my crazy typing fingers take me. Let's take a little stroll, shall we?

Friday morning, 6 AM: My spin class instructor announced that he's running his first ever marathon tomorrow. He proceeded to have everyone who has ever run a marathon in the class raise their hand. I felt like a cool runner again for 5 seconds until I put my hand back down and remembered that I'm injured and have no purpose in life. JUST KIDDING. But seriously, that happened.

Friday afternoon, 12 PM: I decided that after a long hard week my body deserved something awesome. I settled for a Veggie Burrito Bowl from Chipotle, my favorite on-the-go restaurant in the entire world.

Food Porn.

Friday evening, 5 PM: Attempted to complete the Crossfit Open workout of the week, the 13.2 WOD. I realized my health club didn't really have an adequate space to do so, but still kind of half assedly did it. The dead lifts left my hammies burning, there's no doubt about that.

Friday evening, 6:30 PMish: I got bored and wanted to play in the kitchen. I remembered that I had a bag of Almond Flour that I had compulsively purchased from Trader Joes a couple weeks ago... and decided to bake. I did some chopping:

 Some mixing:

And some baking, and came up with...

Almond Flour Peanut Butter Chocolate Balls:

- 1 cup Almond Flour
-1/4 cup of oats
-1/4 cup coconut
-1/4 cup chopped dark chocolate
-pinch of baking powder
-1/4 cup honey
-1 egg
-3 Tbsp. coconut oil
-2 Tbsp. peanut butter
-1/2 Tsp. vanilla extract

Mix all of the dry ingredients into one bowl. Beat the egg in a separate bowl, add the melted coconut oil and honey, and then beat in the peanut butter and vanilla. Combine all ingredients. Form into little balls, put on greased baking tray, bake at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes.

Voila. Healthy little almond balls. You're welcome.

Saturday morning, 8 AM: Successfully attended my second hot yoga class. Did not throw up, and actually felt fairly good for most of the class. Well, as good as one can feel in 100+ degree heat. I may even go again this week.

Saturday late morning, 11AM: Spent a little too much on new jeans. I love them and they make me happy. I haven't bought a nice new pair of jeans for over three years, so I figured I deserved them. Right?

Saturday afternoon, 1 PM: Failed to get a passport after learning the line was 2.5 hours long. I'll try again later this week. Proceeded to head to the gym and swam for about 30 minutes.

Here we are, Saturday evening. Laying here in all green writing to my favorite readers. 

And tomorrow? Hopefully some green pancakes, if I play my cards right. Happy St. Patrick's Day, hope you are all having a fabulous weekend!

Cheers! (with a green beer)

Mega-thankful March

Well well well, what do you know. It’s March! And in my mind...

March = Spring

Or at least pretty dang close.

Raise your hand if you’re ready for spring?

I read several blogs that take the time every day or week to acknowledge things they are thankful for. I like it, and decided that I’m going to take the month of March to acknowledge more things that I’m thankful for.

have i used this pic yet? i don't remember.

Let’s kick off this beautiful 1^st of the Month with a few things, shall we?

I’m thankful for my Friday morning spin class. At first my 5 AM alarm made me want to throw my phone against the wall and throw a fit like a small child. But now that I've consistently been going, and know the instructor, I definitely embrace it. I look forward to the instructor’s wacky stories about his wedding planning, and marathon training. I live vicariously through him while running is still banned.

He even throws a few random country songs in the mix during class. Love it.

My Friday morning home.

I’m thankful that I took the time to paint my nails last night. It’s part of my effort to stop chewing my cuticles to a bloody pulp, which I mentioned in my past post.

First time doing an accent nail! Thoughts?

I’m thankful for our awesome mail room peeps who so often help me out at work. So thankful in fact, that I brought them a little DD treat this morning. I also snagged a breakfast egg white sandwich for myself.

I’m thankful for my dentist appointment yesterday, where they sawed off my old fake front tooth, and gave me a crappy quasi-ugly temporary cap while my ‘real, forever crown’ gets made in the lab.

Oh wait, no I’m not. I’m not thankful for that. And I won’t be smiling for the next two weeks until I get my forever tooth.

I AM thankful that my foot is healing. I can feel it. I haven’t felt it yell at me for almost a week now.

#Score

Lastly, I’m thankful for my Chicago teams currently just tearing sh*t up. Do you know how happy it makes me to more often than not wake up to ESPN alerts telling me that both the Bulls and the Hawks won? I even wore my Black Hawks t-shirt to spin this morning.

That’s all I got. It’s Friday, it’s March. March Madness, baseball season, warm days, and miles of running trails are just around the corner. I can almost smell it.

Tell me a few things you're thankful for, in this very second!

Cheers!

Lessons Learned

Typically I keep my posts fairly short. This one, not so much. There's my disclaimer.

I wrote this in my head on a run a couple weeks ago. I got home and jotted down everything that was bouncing around in my brain on the first thing I could find, and have been scheming the publication of it ever since.

i'm a dork.

Being the somewhat superstitious runner that I am, I told myself I wouldn't post this until I was able to run 10 miles again without any issues.

Today that happened, with the help of 4 slow warmup miles followed by a 6 mile race at a 6:53 pace. I don't feel like talking about the race though. I'd rather talk about my IT band.

I realize that injury is something that very often comes with the territory of being an athlete. I had my fair share of injuries throughout my volleyball career in college, yet my IT band/hamstring issues in my left leg was my first big challenge as a runner.

Iliotibial band injuries are super common for us crazy runner folk - almost too common. During my extensive time spent at with my awesome Physical Therapist, Sean, this was something we often talked about. He was seeing SEVERAL other runners struggling with the same issue, all desperately trying to get it under control before their next big race.

If I had one word to offer to any one currently fighting with their IT band, it would be Patience... something that certainly isn't my strong suit. But I think patience has made me a more intelligent runner, and taught me a A LOT about my body.

You see, Sean and I went through just about every option possible as to what was making my IT band freak out. I am extremely inflexible, I have a fractured L5 vertabrae, I have a job at which I spend long periods sitting.... I don't didn't lift very much at all.... AKA I had poor muscle strength, specifically GLUTE strength. I also had recently switched into a more 'natural' running shoe prior to getting injured.

my babies. aka my brooksconnects

I think transitioning from a collegiate volleyball player who lifted pretty hard 3-4 times per week to occasionally playing with 10 lb weights in the gym mirror affected me a lot. I also think having a crack through  my lower vertebrae played a part.

I don't think my shoes were the issue. I think switching into them too quickly was stupid. But I still run in two pairs of the BrookesPure line today, and I love them.

Bottom line, I had to go back to the basics. Lateral movement/exercise was something that hadn't been present in my workouts for a couple of years, and that combined with a whole lot of sitting on my @$$ presented me with some pretty pathetically weak glutes, and even a weak core.

indoor skating. loved this thing.

Those muscles essentially had to be 'reactivated'. So I started 'skating' at Physical Therapy. I jumped around like a buffoon, and I had a long talk with the weight rack before deciding that we had to be friends again.

Outside of my physical therapy, I had to find other options. P90x plyos are great although I hate them. I also began to lock myself in my gym's empty raquetball court to shuffle and dash around like a wild woman. I have to keep all of those butt/hip/glute muscles guessing in order to keep rebuilding them.

my own personal crossfit box.

I have to give Sean a lot of credit. I spent a lot of time in that Physical Therapy office being bossed around instructed by him, but he also spent a lot of time outside of my appointment times studying the videos of me running on the treadmill, breaking down my every movement and pronaton. I owe him big time, and am grateful to have been paired up with him.

I don't think there is a quick fix to taking care of an IT band injury. ART may help it, it helped me to a degree. And I know for a fact it helps others more quickly and effectively than it did for me. But from what I experience and learned and research, that's not the permanent fix.

Lift weights. I'm serious. I'm not saying you have to get a weight belt and throw around 30 lb dumbbells. But take the time, at least twice a week, to give those glutes, quads, calves etc. some love.

Mix things up. I LOVE running, and there were periods of time when running was my only workout. 6 days a week, between 40-50 miles. I'm not saying high mileage weeks are bad... but you've GOT to throw some curveballs at your body.

That's why right now, during a 'non-training' period I'm making it a PRIORITY to not only run several times a week, but to swim, spin, lift, do plyos, and even drag myself to yoga. Because to quote my ever-wise PT, "The healthiest, most balanced runners that I've seen maintain a combo of running, some kind of strength training, and yoga."

Sidenote - I would also now consider my foam roller to be my best friend. In the entire world.

Getting back to a 'pain-free' place wasn't easy. It wasn't quick. It most certainly didn't go as I had envisioned it. From October 1st, the day I got hurt it took me 3 months to be able to run 60 minutes again. Add three more weeks to that and I'm back up to 10 miles.

OK, wrapping up... 

Getting hurt sucked. But rebuilding myself has made me respect running SO MUCH more. I don't take it for granted anymore, instead I constantly remind myself how freaking blessed I am to wake up on any given day and fly down a beautiful running trail. Being injured brought a ton of tears but has also (slowly) helped to show me so much joy.

Cheers to running!