Home

Man it's good to be back. Back on my blog, but also back home.

I've been thinking about the word home a lot lately, and what exactly it means to me. It's a word we all throw around a lot - "We are heading home for the next two weeks" - or - "It's good to be home" -  etc.

Since moving to Tel Aviv, I have struggled with the definition of home. When people here ask where I'm from, in my mind I think, "Where from as in most recently, or where I grew up? Please clarify." I usually say Chicago. Yet we did live in Baltimore for the past five years - it's where we are most recently from, and where we will eventually move back to.

Baltimore - 4th of July - 2014

Sometimes in conversations as a couple, I just roll with Andrew's response of saying that we are from Colorado. It's easier - I did live there for almost two years - and it's where eventually we want to end up. The Colorado flag still hangs over our bed as I put minimal effort into home decor and we both dream of the days when we will live next to the Rocky Mountains again.

Estes Park - December - 2013

I think home can mean a lot of things. Ultimately, my home in regards to my roots will always be the Chicago area, my favorite city in the world and where my awesome family lives. Yet my home is now Tel Aviv, where my husband and I reside, and it took up until the past week for that to really hit me.
It was interesting going home the past two weeks - and by home, I guess I mean the U.S. We hopped from Chicago to Colorado to Mexico and back to Colorado, and saw almost all of our good friends and family in the process; it was a fantastic time. Yet it was the first time when meeting someone new and asked where we were from, we both smiled and said Israel. Tel Aviv.

But to be honest I was kind of dreading coming back. I was being a huge whiny baby and was afraid to fly back without Andrew, acting as if I was being sent off to a third world country with no connections or friends. When in reality, I was coming back to our cozy apartment and some super supportive and amazing friends.

I was wheels down here last Wednesday evening - JFK to TLV is an 11ish hour flight - followed immediately by a three day competition that I'm really excited to write about next. And what I was sure would be a tearful, mopey return on my part absolutely wasn't. It was easy, comfortable, and above all else made me realize that Tel Aviv is now truly my home.

Tel Aviv - Yom Kippur - 2016

I'll wrap up by getting a little mushy. This spring has been absolutely insane - in both good and bad ways. We lost our dog daughter which will forever make our souls ache, but have figured out how to work through hardships together while friends and family rallied around us. We had several visitors come explore Israel with us, followed by a fabulous time back in the States. We have tallied 15 total flights between the two of us since March.

Fort Collins - May 2015

Today is our two year anniversary today and while at this point a low-key night of wine and sushi sounds perfect, I don't want to downplay the celebration of the past two years. It's been nothing and everything that I could have imagined, and I cannot and would not trade a single second of it - I think he would say the same.

We aren't necessarily following the cookie cutter timeline of how things should look for married couples... we won't own a house for awhile still, and don't plan to start a family while living overseas.  But I've really never been a cookie cutter, follow the recipe/instructions type of girl. I prefer to make my own odd, unique cookies. Even if they sometimes get a little bit burnt.

Cheers -

Kait

Springtime Madness

Disclaimer: this is an opinion post, based entirely off of the heaps of research I've read, and my own life experiences.

It's that time of year. The sun has finally started burning through those dreary winter clouds that lingered around for way too long, the snow is long gone, and we are all starting to get antsy to shed those coats and pull out our flip flops.

It's an exciting transition, from winter into spring. Everyone seems to have a little more pep in their step, and the sun is finally staying up past 4 pm. We’re all dreaming and planning and starting to make epic summer plans.

The summer plans then lead to the reminder that warm weather = less clothing. It's pretty standard to sometimes pack on a few extra lbs during winter, I know that I do. And I also know it's not the end of the world; I typically start logging more miles come March/April due to weather changes, put the holiday/birthday binges behind me, and eventually return to normal.

Here's my soap box.
Because of this seasonal cycle, I've also noticed that March and April are the times when I see the most bullsh@t out there in regards to "quick fixes".  "Here's how to get flat abs fast"... "Drink this a week straight and you'll drop ____ lbs" .... "The best workouts for a beach booty.”

Just saw this on my Twitter feed....

If you're on ANY form of social media, you know what I'm talking about. The list goes on, and on, and on.

I called it bull because that's what it is; there is no quick fix, that term is garbage. I mean, TECHNICALLY it may be a quick fix, but if it is, it's not sustainable. If you want a healthy body, then you must be healthy. Clean up your diet, and get off your butt. Refuse to accept excuses: go for a run, ride your bike, do a cardio circuit in your living room, go to your gym.  “I don’t have time” just isn’t going to cut it.

Furthermore, there's really no such thing as "targeting problem areas"... It's another garbage phrase. You don't lose love handles from obsessively doing side-crunches, you lose them by doing fat burning, full-body workouts.  Odds are, you're going to have to sweat to see results.

Even more importantly, stop eating processed garbage. And if you do (I sure do) which we all pretty much do let's be honest; do so in moderation. The less ingredients on the label, the better. And remember, the phrase "you can't out-exercise a bad diet" is so, so true. Pizza for dinner five days a week, no matter how much you may be working out, will always catch up with you. Abs are 75% made in the kitchen, and that's the truth.

And last but not least, drink your water. Lots of it. It keeps your crazy awesome body really happy.

That's all. Believe me; this rant was just as much for me; I'm far from perfect. Just figured we could all use a little bit of Spring motivation. And remember, if it doesn't seem sustainable, or reasonable... Well, that probably means that it isn't.

Cheers -

Kait

Punting

You guys, I have some great news – it’s officially spring!

Baltimore weather cleaned itself up a bit yesterday and today, we pushed 60 degrees and are supposedly doing the same today. I enjoyed a solid 7 miles around the park after work, soaking up all the sun I could get.

I don’t talk about my boyfriend/best friend/better half too much on here, as he is boring prefers to stay out of the spotlight like the coy fox that he is. But I realized a fascinating trend this week, and just had to share.

I like to eat, a lot. We know this. I snack pretty consistently throughout the day at work – probably eating about every 90ish mins or so. I’m not talking like meal sizes, but snacks such as this –

dried cranberries, plantain chips, almonds

I feel pretty confident that I eat more than Andrew – he’s told me his ‘feeding schedule’ before, and he basically eats 3 simple meals, nothing in between.  He’s even told me before that when he’s busy he sometimes forgets to eat lunch, which will forever be a confusing statement to me…

After returning from Chicago last week, I vowed to clean it up a bit. Eating habits in regards to sugar/pizza/alcohol had basically been lax since the holidays, and my work pants were beginning to get angry with me. If we’re being honest, I can’t afford to buy bigger sizes in all colors of my pants, so I opted for the ‘stop eating like a truck driver’ option.

I was serious. I even pulled Andrew aside one night and told him not to tempt me with crap during the week. I EVEN TURNED DOWN HALF PRICE WINE ON DATE NIGHT LAST WEEK.

Food prep is and always will be key for me. The boy is slowly getting on board with that as well.

red pepper with egg/spinach baked into it, paleo pumpkin muffins. breakfast yesterday.

We often call each other Pete. He hates it but can't stop.
 He is also going to hate that I showed this to the world.

Anyways, rewind a few days to this past Tuesday. Weather was cold and crappy, work had been a handful, and the only rower at the gym was broken. On top of it all, traffic was a real gem driving home, and so in the midst of my fury I basically snapped and text Andrew –

‘Pizza tonight?’

He called shortly after, suggesting pizza on Wednesday instead, as Wednesday is typically our date night.

‘No, I want it today, today is officially a cheat day, I just decided.’

Needless to say, he caved without much further argument.

 

buffalo chicken pizza from Saute. so. good. so. bad.
the sauce honestly may or may not be butter?
ignorance is bliss.

I’ve read a few different articles basically stating that being in a relationship can cause weight gain. I mean, it's nothing earth shattering. You form new habits, you feed off of what the other wants to do, you get comfortable, easily cave in, etc. Yet the concept definitely became clearer than ever to me on Tuesday night.

“I hate you for making me eat that, I’m pretty sure I just gained 5 lbs.”

“Andrew, you can’t gain 5 lbs from one meal. It’s fine, it was a cheat day, just eat healthy the week.”

Angry glare.

I rarely drag him down with me. It’s normally the opposite to be honest (love you babe). Yet for one of the first times in a long time, I had shoved mid-week pizza down our throats, and actually felt kind of bad about it.

There is no moral of the story, just me thinking/confessing out loud I suppose. Does anyone else notice the correlation between their eating habits and their relationships – I suppose it could even go as far as friendships as well? It’s interesting stuff; I feel it’s hard for one to stay on track if the other decides to completely punt.

In other news, this weekend we are doing a day trip up to the Big Apple on Saturday to do some sightseeing (I’ve never been to NYC, I know, I know) and to see my friend Les who is up there for work.  It’s a three hour bus trip both ways; I see a lot of reading and Pinterest in my future. The next three weekends I have a lot of travel - New York, Dallas, then Indiana for a wedding.

Speaking of Pinterest, I shall leave you with these two gems -

yes.

Not a fan of pants.

.

Aaaand some #Backthatazzup Friday - a new fav of mine - 

Hope your weekend goes swimmingly, and Spring pops in to hello. Or even better, permanently moves in -

Cheers!

Kait

Weird Wednesday - Banana Edition

Hold on tight, things are about to get weird.

First, let me quickly recap my workout yesterday evening, when it was – wait for it – 66 degrees. 

Amazing.

Workout = Run 20, circuit workout, bike 20, circuit workout, run 20, circuit workout.

(circuit workout = 10 push-ups, 10 squats, 10 sit-ups, 10 burpees, 2x)

Boom. This warmer weather is such a mood booster, and man did I forget how much I love doing circuit workouts in the park.

In case you are really into banana news (I know my coworker Cort is), Chiquita is going to to buy Ireland’s Fyffes Plc to create the world’s biggest supplier of the fruit for about 403 million euros ($559 million). Cool!

Bathroom squats are back in the picture for this girl. I forgot about them for awhile – I think I mentioned like two years ago that I used to do them – and I’m back on the bandwagon. Pee Use the toilet – 5 squats – wash hands – back to desk.

Does anyone else have moments like this?

(in reference to Steve Jobs)

Last weird fact – I’m trying out oil pulling with coconut oil. You can read a couple good articles/blogs about it – here and here. And here's one on coconut oil in general. In short, you swish oil (I am trying coconut oil, there’s also sesame and sunflower oil) in your mouth for 15-20 minutes, and it’s suppose to pull out toxins, whiten your teeth, and do a lot for your oral care in general. Make sure you spit it out. It’s interesting, weird, and I figured why not try it out?  I prefer to know firsthand my opinion on it, and it just so happens I have 20 minutes to spare every morning on my way to work.

I’ll report back if I find anything worth reporting.

I’ll leave you with this quote, because I love it.

And of course, a couple questions. Has anyone else notice a change in their commute with this Daylight Savings shift? It seems more people are jumping on my 7 AM – 4 PM hours, as traffic was crawling this morning, much more than usual.

Anyone else tried oil pulling? Thoughts?

Cheers to Hump Day – we’re halfway homies.

K8

Two Days

It’s snowing again today. I suppose I can’t really comment, as I’ve stated in the past that my personal rule is I can’t complain about snow until we hit March.

Two more days 'til March guys.

I realized that the combination of a beautiful weather weekend followed by three crappy cold snowy days of weather this week was been the perfect concoction for a bad attitude, and not feeling so hot. I have literally been a Debbie Downer to the point that I googled ‘things to do to make me happy’ … and super unmotivated to the point that I considered going to bed at 7:30 pm last night.

Instead, I went over to Andrew’s in full-fledged pout mode, and he did two things that I really needed.

• Got me a mini cheesecake from Whole Foods
• Told me to stop being a pansy

Fair enough. So I guess instead of sitting here being a crying pansy, I will do everything in my power to share positive things.

I’m feeling good about the workout balance that I’m finding over the course of this past month. Andrew and I recently bought a Bikram Hot Yoga Groupon, so that will now be implemented 1 – 2xs per week, on top of my twice(ish) a week spinning, running, and crossfitting. Pretty solid balance if you ask me.

source

Speaking of crossfit, here is my most recent WOD:

4 sets, for time

15 thrusters (45 lbs)

15 burpees over the bar

Total Time, 12:36. Shoulders are still feeling sore today.

I discovered a few challenging looking treadmill workouts on Ashley’s blog - I think I may try the one below out this week. I’ve been trying a little harder recently to find more blogger friends who I enjoy reading. Another is Becki over at Bites & Brews who is currently hosting a Craft Beer book giveaway if you’re interested!

original source

Last but not least, one of my favorite ways to stay positive is to find quotes on Pinterest and share them, set them as my phone background, write them down, etc. I find a lot of power in simple words, so I shall leave you with a few.

and my personal favorite - 

Cheers to being halfway –

Kait

Sunday Yumday

Winter decided to tease us this weekend - temps broke 60 both Saturday and Sunday, and it made me way too excited for Spring to officially get here.

Friday night myself, the boy and few friends made our way down the Fillmore in Silver Spring to check out a country concert. It turned out to be an entirely acoustic set with Joe Nichols, Chase Rice, Thompson Square, Craig Campbell and Eric Paslay and I think we would all agree it was a pretty stellar performance.

good times!

In other new, has anyone tried this coffee?

It's one of my new favorites.

Food prep has (nerdishly) become on of my favorite parts of Sunday. On top of my favorite crockpot sweet potato casserole, I also made my own healthy fruit snacks, and a spaghetti squash egg fritata bake for the week.

fruit snacks in the making

breakfast this week? yes please.

Dinner tonight was pizza from a local Baltimore restaurant, Verde. My pizza happened to be gluten-free, and we enjoyed it with some wine up on the deck before the sun went down and temps started dipping back down to cold.

YUM

I feel good about this week. Last week of February - March is on Saturday, can you believe it?? Let's make it great.

Cheers - 

Kait

Thanks

I’ve been letting things get to me lately. Things small and large. It’s stupid, and the buck stops here.

Thankful things Thursday. My pretend friend Ali over at Ali On The Run does it often, and she has inspired me in so many different ways. So, Let’s get thankful people.

I’m thankful that today started off foggy as crap, and ended up sunny. Sun makes me so happy lately. I wished my office had a retractable roof on days like today

AM

PM

I’m thankful for my honest friends, who always say it like it is.

If I’m not mistaken, I believe I’ve referenced this before…. But I’m super thankful for dry shampoo. On days like today when my morning workout consists of a quick jaunt on the elliptical and minimal sweat, dry shampoo is the way to rock it. No shame here.

To avoid obsessive music babbling on here like I resorted to last week, I’ll keep this topic to the minimum. It was hard to pick a favorite, but I’m definitely thankful for Scotty McCreery’s new single, See You Tonight.

HIS VOICE. Enough said.

Let’s get materialist, for just one sec. I’m thankful for my new purse from Target. It was on sale for $8 people. Can you say deal?

Giraffe's make me feel thankful too: 

I’m thankful for my awesome boyfriend, who puts up with a lot from me. And when I text him in the mornings to ‘Have a good day!’… I typically get some kind of abnormal response such as this...

Apparently I’m a bird? A lucky bird at that. I haven’t yet mentioned this on here, but he’s peacing out this summer for a while. So of course he wanted to fly home to Colorado to see family and friends before he leaves. And of course he wanted to bring me along for the ride… and bought my plane ticket without hesitation, or even really discussing it.

Love him. Colorado-bound for memorial day weekend in two weeks. Can’t wait!

I think you should tell me something you’re thankful for. Ready, go.

Cheers!

Back on the Trails

There are a few things I want to talk about today, but I don’t think it’s time. It’s not quite marinated yet, ya dig?

I woke up this morning with scratchy, tired eyes. I felt like crap and would have paid money to stay in bed for another couple of hours. Unlucky for me, I’m poor and had no money to offer the sandman.

I hit snooze once but 8 minutes later Luke Bryan started singing to me again and I rolled out of bed. This is always where things get fuzzy because honestly, sometimes I find myself on the elliptical at 6 AM and wonder how I even got there.

But I was there, looking quite homeless I’m sure. I threw in my headphones and watched the recent episode of Nashville from last night. I daydreamed about running away and becoming a cowboy and living in torn up jeans and cowboy boots and dancing away my summer to the soundtrack of something like Eric Church.

pinterest

I snapped out of it around 7 AM and dragged myself to work, seriously lacking motivation. I set the background of my computer to the most recent picture of Jane that my mom sent me:

That made me happy. As I announced on Facebook, I discovered that Carlie Rae Jepsen sings more songs than just ‘Call Me Maybe’, so I plugged through my morning by listening to her cookie cutter happy album four times through. Sorry I'm not sorry.

The weather is absolutely beautiful here. Leaves have brightened to an electric green, and I can feel the sun soaking into my skin when I walked outside. Lunch called for a lap around the parking lots with a few of my coworkers, and the fresh air reminded me that summer is closer than I can really even hope. The conversation reminded me that I have people here who really care.

The afternoon brought about the discovery how amazing the new Macklemore and Ryan Lewis album truly is. Do I live in a hole? Maybe. But if you haven’t listened to the kid, you probably should. Macklemore gets life. And aside from the drug reference, the song Cowboy Boots is disturbingly accurate to my twenty-something what the F is going on kind of feeling that I’m currently fighting and wrestling with.

I may have recklessly bought the entire album, and wondered straight from work to a nearby state park. I may have pulled on my running shoes, for the third day in a row, and cranked out a couple miles on hilly Maryland trails while Macklemore whispered sweet nothings in my ear.

I don't normally bring my phones on runs, but today was to pretty not to document.

It’s been a weird week. I don’t really have a reason as to why. I’m not sad, or mad, or upset. Maybe a little flat? Maybe a quarter life crisis?

Or maybe it’s just life.

That’s ok.

Cheers to music, connecting melodies with memories, and the soundtracks to our lives.

Ramping Back Up

It's been a bit since we've talked running on here eh? Kind of weird. Have you been worried? Don't be. I think it's because things have been so iffy.

I've been feeling a little less iffy.

This past weekend, I ran 3 miles on both Saturday and Sunday. That's nothing, I know, but for me where I stand right now, it's something. My foot didn't yell, it felt good, and this is on top of being on my feet most of the day on Saturday while bar-crawling through Annapolis.

That's a whole different story.

Saturday morning Andrew and I ran in a local 5k put on through his cousin's school. It was small - small enough that we both finished right under 24 minutes with his younger cousin and each placed first in our age group. Hey I'll take it.

Especially seeing that my breakfast prior to the race consisted of this:

Tots. Sorry I'm not sorry.

Long story short, I feel good about my foot. Finally. For awhile I was back and forth, and super nervous to ramp up the mileage too quickly.

I will stay between 3-4 miles tomorrow and Thursday, and possibly try for 5 miles one day this weekend if things go well.

My goal is to 'comfortably' get back up to my normal 7-8 mile jaunts by June 1. In my mind, marathon training starts in June. 

Until then, I'll continue to stick with all my swimming/yoga/spinning distractions on the side. And of course, so many planks.

Spring = planks outside!

Andrew's out of town this week so I am getting back to neutral in many areas of life, as well as making plans for the month of May. Can you believe that May is on Wednesday? That blows my mind and makes me so happy.

On the music front, Mr. Kenny Chesney himself has a new album out tomorrow if you're a country fanatic like me. Just thought you may need something to brighten up your Tuesday!

Cheers to ramping back up!