Where's the Beach?

Saturday was all about family time. It was a miserably rainy day, kind of the perfect day to stay inside and bake cookies though. Cookie baking (and decorating) was something my sister and I had grown up doing, and continued the tradition up until about two years ago. Well, this year we brought the tradition back. My sister and her kids showed up around 11. We started working on some of the cookies while Jason and C ran to the store to pick up a few things I had forgotten. Jason's brother, sister-in-law and their 2 kids showed up closer to 1. Let the party begin! They have a girl (J) who is one year younger than A and a son (N) who is one year younger than C. But they all got along fabulously. They played and the ladies finished up most of the cookies. My niece had initially started off assisting Sarah and me with making the dough for a few of the cookies and the icing as well. Then she got side tracked playing with J and the boys. I took the easy way out for sugar cookies ...

My friend and running buddy had been really sick Friday with a stomach flu going around. I know she's sick when she told me she wouldn't be getting in her long Saturday run. Somehow we ended up chatting about pumpkin, pumpkin bread, muffins...that sort of thing. I think she was hungry, what do you think? I started looking around on Pinterest and shared several recipes with her. Then I found one I had pinned a while back and decided I would make that for her. You know, a get well gift. Plus all the recipe searching had gotten me in the mood to bake. So, Saturday morning I made this High Protein Pumpkin Bread by The Iron You . I did make a few substitutions and additions. Coconut Oil: The recipe called for vegetable oil, which I did not have. So I used coconut oil instead.  Baking Stevia + Molasses: It also called for brown sugar, again, out of. So I tried making my own using the NuNatural Stevia Baking Blend along with a drizzle of organic molasses.  Vanilla Stevi...

Spin & Weights  Today Jason and I hit the gym together. The plan was to do weights and then try out a new Cathe Friedrich DVD - Cycle Max (Thanks Jo !!). Of course, this was the plan in my mind. Jason thought the plan was to just do the spin workout. I had jumped on the elliptical to get in a 10 minute warm up before weights, thinking we'd try some of the spin after weights. Jason, in the meantime, was apparently setting up the laptop and DVD in the spin area. He came around the corner looking really confused, and I looked confused right back of course. So, today's workout started with spin. I only did about 30 minutes of the workout (Jason did the whole disc) before moving on to weights. I will say, that if you are in the market for a spin workout you can take to the gym on a day when there are no classes or to do at home, this is a good one. Of course. I don't think I've done one of Cathe's workouts that aren't awesome. I went with chest, shoulders...

Baking Night Yesterday was a nice, relaxing day. We enjoyed pizza for dinner since we didn't get to have our normal Pizza Friday. I think I may have a pizza addiction perhaps. Do they have groups for people like me? Last night I ended up playing around with the base recipe from the fabulous Kristina (spabettie) for Garbonzo Cookie Balls . I have made a version using cranberries and another using vegan chocolate chips. She recently made a Mint Chocolate chip version that got us into a little chat about other awesome flavor combos. So, last night I decided to play around a little bit. I think I kind of upset Jason because we were supposed to play pool. Instead I was wanting to bake. We had just finished watching What Happens in Vegas and I was a little antsy. The oven was still fairy warm from the pizza, and I thought I could make the cookies quickly. I know he gets annoyed with me sometimes for just not being able to stop going, doing, thinking. But, back to the cookies. I ...

Spinning & Lifting  Today I decided to try spin class. It's been ages since I've gone. I just couldn't stand to do the elliptical once more. I did use the elliptical to warm up for 5 minutes before hitting the weights for back. Today was exercises from STS Meso 2, Disc 18 . It is supposed to start off with 3 different exercises using a resistance band. I opted to not use the band, but start with the pullups/chinups and add pullovers. I did use the assisted pullup/chinup machine. Pullups - 12 Medium grip chinups - 12 Chinups - 12 Underhand barbell rows: 12,10,8,TF 1-arm horizontal row: 12,10,8,TF Pullovers: 12,10,8 After weights it was on to spin. They didn't have the newest track yet, so that meant an old track, but I admit I like that one better than the last one they were using way back eons ago when I went.. It was a good, sweaty class, but my IT band is definitely achy now. Too bad it isn't summer and I could just jog in my pool, because apparently...