WOD

Fake IT till YOU MAKE IT

I know we all have those days where you just want to stay in bed all day but you know you can’t. You gotta hit the pavement running regardless. Today is one of those days. My plate is full, there’s a LOT of stuff going on and mentally I’m just checked out.

Yesterday I skipped out on my post because my Dad had a heart procedure being done and I was out all day hanging in the hospital. Dad is good. All is well. I thought about blogging from my phone because I had a lot of down time but it just isn’t the same as banging away at the keyboard. A whole day off and I’m back! Aren’t y’all excited? NO? That’s what I thought.

So I’m already blah for the day but I gotta get up and get going to DO WORK at the BOOM BOX and I just am not feeling it. I slept fine, my body isn’t falling apart so I just had to FAKE it till I made it. And that’s what I did. And it worked out alright. Now if I can just get through the work day!

1/19/12

As you see the Skill/Strength wasn’t too bad. Ring Rows aren’t so much my enemy as other movements are but they do wear you out. I managed to do 16 of the 30 ring rows with my legs straight out. But I did break down and have to bend my knees to maintain full extension and what not. At least I’ve made some progress 🙂

The MetCon was a tiny but killer doozy of a workout. Burpees with Ground to Over Head using a 35lb plate. I thought it would take me longer and in reality it should have taken me less. I paused a couple of times as I wanted to just quit halfway through. Once I was committed I was hoping for sub 3 in time…. BARELY over 3 minutes. I should have never paused!!! There’s a lot of shoulda, coulda, woulda’s in my life lately. I gotta get that under control.

I almost forgot about holding a squat for time POST WOD and I sucked at it 😦 Although all day pain is gone my hip flexibility is still not super duper and it started burning about 30 seconds in but I managed to pull out over 2 minutes. I should be able to hold it forever but I can not. I am sorely disappointed in my lack of flexibility/tolerance, etc. I really do hope it’s just my hip that hinders me and not “my head” in general.

As far as foods go, I’ve been sticking to my standard meals. I had family in town to check in on my dad and I invited them over to my house for dinner. They all are unaware of Paleo and the whole lifestyle that we are throwing ourselves into but they are aware they need to step it up nutrition wise. I thought it’d be a perfect time to share with them how YUMMY the food can be and still be super good for you. I made them Paleo Meatloaf, Cauliflower Mash and Asparagus which I posted about the other day. They seemed and acted as if it were quite pleasant and I’m hoping they truly felt that way as well. Score 1 for spreading the good health to family members. Now I just have to get them the recipes so they can get to work 🙂

The night before I attempted to cook my first WHOLE chicken. I know I’m behind in the “cooking” game. Whole chickens… that’s nothing to most, but to me that’s WORK. I thought it would be so time consuming and complicated and I have no idea why. We always buy chicken breasts… organic, cage free, etc…. spendy! So this time we bought a whole chicken even ranked better than the chicken breasts in quality and it came out BEAUTIFUL in appearance and TASTE! I only took a before picture because I was so excited at how pretty it was when it was done that I forgot to take an AFTER pic. Plus the kids were ready to test it out as well! It was EXCELLENT and juicy and overall great 🙂

A little over 4lbs

Of course I had to google on how to cook it and Everyday Paleo was there to save me 🙂

I preheated the oven to 450°, Rinsed off chicken, patted it dry. Doused it with salt inside and out (could have scaled down on the dousing though) and then added a little white pepper. I only added pepper because I didn’t believe only salt would be sufficient. NOTHING ELSE! THAT’s IT! Throw it in a roasting pan, dish, whatever and bake it for an hour. Perfection! HOMERUN!

Chicken isn't so "pretty" but it tasted GREAT. Served up with some Sweet Potato Latkes and Steamed Brocolli

So that’s all she wrote today folks. I forgot to defrost meat AGAIN, so I don’t know what dinner will be but I’ll figure it out. Have a Happy Thursday. And I’ll be seein’ y’all tomorrow 🙂

Take That Tuesday!

1/17/12 WOD

Today feels like a rant and ramble kind of day. I kicked off my day with a kick my ass workout at the BOOM BOX. Holding Back Squats for 5 seconds at the bottom… SOMETHING I’ve NEVER done before and woowowowowow it was tough! But you practice full depth and learn to love it (kind of, sort of, maybe?), well love it enough you don’t want to come back up! I managed fairly well when I got my breathing down and stopped crowding my brain with thoughts of FAIL.

The MetCon looked fairly do-able, if that’s the right word. Maybe more along the lines of less intimidating than other days. Those are the moments when I should say there’s NO SUCH THING! But I don’t, I just think this won’t kill me. Sure enough it was freakin HARD. Broad Jumps?!?!? ARE YOU F’ING KIDDING ME? for 200 ft! Major SUCK in the world of workouts. I promise. I was gassed, dying, melting, etc. I only had 3 rounds, I was spent. WTH is wrong with me is all I kept thinking. Why can’t I kill this WOD? I tried with all my might and I finished and that’s all there is to it, RIGHT? YUP, I FINISHED. All is well and life goes on 🙂 9:54 was my time and only because Grant pushed me on my last 10 KB Snatches. Glad he was there cause I would have dropped the ball. I did my last 10 unbroken and finished under 10 minutes.

Even though mentally I was defeated, Physically I felt good which in turn works on my mental state and I was feeling good overall. I got out the door in good time, early even and in good spirits! UNTIL traffic HIT…. It’s like finally everyone is off vacation mode and back to work and it was chaotic on the road, stalled cars, accidents, major traffic delays. I was HOT! FUMING! Traffic can make my blood boil. But in that boiling state sitting still on the roads, like a bad driver I’m checking the interwebs and I find this post by FitBomb about a High School CrossFit Class and there in my anger I totally let it all go as I listened about Maddy and her journey with CrossFit and Cerebral Palsy. I’ve shared it here for you to watch.

It’s truly amazing what this young girl is accomplishing daily in general and to throw CrossFit in is even more amazing to me. I’m sure she would try anything but it seems like she’s found a good place for her. Just like with any of us. CrossFit isn’t everyone’s cup of tea or KOOLAID but if you find something that works for you then DO IT. FULL ON. NO EXCUSES! You aren’t going anywhere if you keep making up crap to avoid eating right, working out… Life in general! Ya know? You hear me?

Day in and day out I hear excuses. I hear the if’s the but’s the shoulda woulda coulda’s….. Sometimes life throws you curveballs, I know. I live life too. But you gotta press on!

Out of my 3 kids, my oldest is slowly but surely grasping where I’m trying to go with health and fitness. It’s clicking and it’s amazing that’s he’s learning so young. My other two just go with the flow. If my mom “says” then cool, we dig it. But now in the past week they have been asking the why’s and what’s and opening their little brains up. I don’t just brainwash them in case you are wondering. I explain to them what I thought was right, what I’m learning now and how I feel about it all. They have a long way to make up their own minds but hopefully they see the POSITIVE impacts that eating clean and taking care of our bodies helps us all around. And well of course they eat what’s put in front of them 😛 And they do it well. So I don’t have problems when it comes to eating.

All in all, the rant and ramble and disconnected paragraph to paragraph is just another day of me wanting all of you that I know and don’t know that it’s possible to get your life in order. It’s possible to live a happy healthy life. I have my ups and downs too. I don’t want to cook dinner some nights. I don’t want to wake up from my cozy bed. I don’t want to be in traffic. But I am grateful that I do. I’m happy my family is HEALTHY and WHOLE. Not everyone can say that. We are truly blessed. And I’ll be darned that my kiddos make it through all the CRUD that goes around school (with the exception of the occasional stomach bug). I truly believe it’s because they are outside playing in the SUNSHINE and eating a variety of good foods. Same with Ernie and I… we aren’t calling in sick and feeling like poo… we are good. It’s a good life.

So TAKE THAT TUESDAY! I got this! Hahaha… until tomorrow or the next day. 😀

1000+ Views!

I finally made it to 1000 views…plus some! It’s a good feeling. I watch the stats like a psychotic person. I don’t know why I’m so addicted to seeing how many people have viewed this blog. I know there are blogs that get more than that in one day and well I’m just not there so I will take my stats and embrace them! LOL, I don’t know that I’ll ever be “cool” enough to get that many views a day :/

1/16/12 WOD

Had a good WOD today. Short, sweet and tough! We worked on Front Squats and my 1 RM was 115. I was really hoping I could get more but not today.
And for the MetCon… box jumps and straight legged sit ups… 30 seconds for each movement for 5 rounds. The first round was good and I slacked on the second round for some reason. Grant reminded us this was a sprint workout so I got on it and started moving… now wishing I didn’t slack on my 2nd round. But I did so I just had to push the rest of the way through. 120 reps total. Not bad but I know I could have had a few more reps.

WHEAT BELLY - WILLIAM DAVIS, MD

You all know I strive for Paleo and push to eat as clean as possible and discourage grains. I follow several blogs and what not that are Paleo and advise against grains including the Wheat Belly Blog but I had yet to read the actual book. This weekend we bought it and I tore through it. It’s not a long read so that was nice but there was a lot of information on what Wheat does to us. I feel assured that wheat and gluten are the enemy to everyone not just to those with celiac or other gluten intolerances. I don’t want to give you a book report because I think it’s important for you to read and soak it up for yourself. But if you are wishy washy on the issue or don’t even have a clue, then I highly recommend reading it. And at least try giving up all GRAINS, not just wheat, for 30 days. See if it changes you. You will go through a withdrawl of sorts, at least you probably will, it may last 2 days and it may last up to a week or 2 but you should just TRY. And don’t replace your GRAINS with junk… just eat more meats, veggies and fruits. If you don’t feel great and more awesome than ever then go back to your gluten filled ways. It won’t bother me one bit 🙂 Let me know if you do it or plan on doing it. Let me know if you need support or have questions. It’s tough mentally to remove the grains but in reality it’s not that hard if you’re willing to make the change.

I know that after reading the information in the book I am good without the “yummy” things that are made with wheat. Wheat Belly by William Davis, MD! Buy it! It’s good.

Happy Monday, MLK day, etc. Enjoy your day whether you have the day off or have to work it like I do… make it a happy day 🙂

New Workout Schedule means – NO REST THURSDAY!

I had become a little bit of a slacker on Thursdays and I had no REAL reason to be one I just got lazy over the month of December. But with my new CrossFit Schedule I’m OFFICIALLY on a new course.

1/12/12 WOD

This morning’s WOD was a nice little chipper. I felt pretty good the whole way through until I got to the burpees. They got to me for some reason today! I got super hot super quick and couldn’t shed the layers fast enough. Once I regrouped I knocked them right out. And reluctantly went to the sled pull… 30yds, not that far but I’m just not good at this yet. It’s awkward and it’s cold outside… I’m whiny too! Get over it people! Hahaha, yes I do realize I get a little cry babyish…sometimes ALOT cry babyish but I wouldn’t be me any other way. I finished in 8:36… Things to work on: PISTOLS (I suck at those) and PULLING SLEDs!

Like I stated yesterday, dinner would be OUT not IN so no new recipes. I won’t always try out a new recipe either I suppose but I want to at least once a week. Sometimes I may choose to be a little more ambitious 🙂 It’s been brought to my attention by Ernie and others that maybe I should consider creating some sort of Paleo catering/mealplan and in theory it sounds like a good idea but I don’t consider myself a CHEF by any means. I like to cook. I like making something yummy but I’m just a regular ol’ person. I’m pretty clueless most of the time.

So is it an idea I should really try to process or is it a wishful thinking dream maybe turn reality in the future? I don’t know. Do y’all think there’s a market out there for such? I know people do it already. It’s not new or unique but how successful/fruitful can it be? I can’t afford timewise to do it for fun and I can’t afford to do it full time if it doesn’t pay the bills… so much to think about. Chime in if you feel the need. Sponsor me maybe! Hahah, I wish. Any comments for or against the idea are welcome.

Moving on… I did have a little extra chicken on Tuesday so I cooked it up, minced it up, added chopped mushrooms, finely chopped walnuts, jalepenos (roasted and fresh), onion to make a little filling for some lettuce wraps. I like to buy the butter lettuce where it’s still attached to the root. They are giant pieces, sometimes a little flimsy but mostly durable enough. I sent some with Ernie to lunch and he kindly snapped a shot for me. I brought the same thing but I left my tomato and avocado at home so it wasn’t as pretty. Just another quick idea if you’re in a rush. It doesn’t take long to cook a small amount of chicken and sautee up whatever else and slap it in a piece of lettuce to have a quick snack or meal.  NOTE: it’s best to mince, shred chicken while fresh cooked and warm. You may know that but I thought I’d share anyways.

Easy Breezy Chicken Wrap in Butter Lettuce

So that’s it for Thursday. Back to being active. It feels good. Feels like I was productive. I KNOW I KNOW before y’all tell me, I need rest too. I do get rest. I know when to hold back. My body tells me, I promise 🙂

Enjoy your day. Try to find a ray of sunshine if your day is bad and if your day is going good then just soak it all in! WOW I’m a cheeseball! Aren’t I?

Is It Friday Yet?? (I wonder how many blogs have that as a title… ORIGINAL, I KNOW)

It’s been a busy busy week and it’s only Tuesday. It’s been busy work wise and at home.

I’ve never know where to start when I begin typing. Do I start with last night’s dinner or with the WOD this morning? Blah Blah Blah… y’all don’t even care I’m sure! I understand it’s a trivial decision but I don’t like leaving anyone confused.

So I’ll start with last night’s dinner – SPINACH STUFFED CHICKEN with BACON which turned out excellent! I found the recipe online (http://www.sparkpeople.com/mypage_public_journal_individual.asp?blog_id=4574737) and I’m sure it’s been posted, reposted and modified to anyone’s liking so please NOTE you can be as creative as you want to be with this recipe.

Sizzlin Bacon


Garlic, Onions (washed out :(), and Spinach


Stuffing the Chicken Breast


A Lil Blurry... But Seasoned and Ready to Bake


Voila! Stuffed Chicken, Brocolli and Guacamole


All That Stuffing.... Yummmy!

Spinach Stuffed Chicken With Bacon

INGREDIENTS:
10 slices of “clean” bacon, (nitrate, nitrite free, etc.), divided
1/2 cup red onion chopped (I used yellow onion)
4 large garlic cloves chopped
3/4 pound of spinach, chopped
4-5 boneless skinless, organic, free range chicken breast

METHOD:
Preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Take 6 slices of bacon and chop them up into about 1/2 inch pieces and fry them in a med-large skillet until nice and brown. Then remove the bacon from the pan and saute the red onion in the bacon grease for a few minutes. Add in the garlic cloves and saute until the onion is translucent. Add the spinach, sprinkle with salt and pepper, simmer just until the spinach is wilted nicely, and remove from heat to cool slightly.

Then taking your chicken butterfly each chicken breast and spread filling evenly on one half of each chicken breast. Then flip the other side of the chicken back over to cover the spinach filling, and wrap each with an additional slice of bacon. Place in a glass baking dish, sprinkle lightly with salt, pepper and dried Thyme leaves.

Bake uncovered at 375 degrees for 35 minutes, then increase temperature to 500 and bake for 10 minutes more to brown the bacon. If it is not brown enough you can broil the chicken for a few minutes, but be sure to watch it! Serve and enjoy.

For more recipes visit: CrossFit Eureka’s Paleo Made Easy

Made for a good dinner and I was ready for bed not to long after. This morning was my “first” Tuesday workout in my new 4 day week at the Boom Box and I feel great!

I feel a little better at Snatch and besides not getting low enough on either snatch or cleans, I’m getting better at it in general.

01/10/12 WOD

The MetCon was fun! Yes FUN! I was giving myself a time of around 7 minutes because I haven’t really been doing any deadlifts lately. The weight was 85lbs to help ensure speed but it felt super light. Time 3:55! We have a newcomer that was there with me but he had a modified workout so it was just me on the board that early in the morning. I’m sure the rest of the day will put me to shame ESPECIALLY the high school BOYS… they blew my MetCon out of the water yesterday! Oh to be young 😀

01/09/12 WOD... Those Dang High Schoolers!

When I got home this morning post WOD I got a little ambitious with breakfast and took on some Coconut Pancakes from Mark Sissons “The Primal Blueprint Cookbook”. And they turned out quite dandy and the boys devoured the few I did make! Another win 🙂 I don’t have the book with me as I type this so I don’t have the recipe. But it’s simple and good. I did have to play with the liquids as it was a rather thick batter at first. But in the end they came out YUM-O!

Batter cookin' up - Treat like regular pancakes!


Doesn't look to shabby!


Finished Pancake! You can top with anything... Blackberries and Maple Syrup shown here.

There you have it! Not so sure I’ll be as ambitious tomorrow… but you never know! Happy Tuesday… SMILE! 🙂

Movin On UP — in the BOOM BOX

Starting this week I am steppin up my attendance to 4 days a week with the occasional Saturday WOD included. I know I’m just adding a day but it’s a big step in my mind. Hopefully I get some good gains over the next year by adding this EXTRA day 🙂

We had an all lifting Sat WOD this past weekend and it was all about SNATCH! I only got to 55lb max because for some dumb reason I don’t want to drop under that bar when 65lbs is on that stinkin bar! I did get to work on form a lot and felt like I was “getting” it but I didn’t get the 65lb max 😦 It’s not too heavy with the exception of my fear.. that’s all I can attribute it to excuse wise. FEAR. Sigh… I’m working on it and that’s one of my goals. We were asked to write goals on the white board so I put up 3: Get pullups, Snatch with NO FEAR and be successful at Handstand PushUps…HSPUs.

As I’ve noted in the past I can do a strict pull up with smallest band now and I’m close to a kipping pull up as well. It’s getting there. I didn’t want to set a “deadline” but I did promise myself that post WOD I will work on pull ups for a minute. I haven’t worked on HSPUs in a while so I gotta get going on that as well. And for snatch… NO FEAR!

1/09/12 WOD

This mornings WOD was WORK. Clean and Jerks were just taxing on me today. But I pulled through just fine. As far as the running was concerned… IT WAS RAINING so I thought Running was OUT but I WAS WRONG! (As I usually am) We did DEATH by 10M instead! Woohooooo. I got up to 15 rounds and I was done. I could have and should have pushed for 16 but I feared I would puke and I didn’t feel like puking today :/

That’s it for now. I hope y’all had a great weekend. Below are a couple of pics of dinner over the weekend. I barely remembered to take photos but I did. I remade the HOLIDAY Brussels Sprouts from Everyday Paleo that I had made for NYE and they were still tasty 🙂 Kids enjoyed them as well since they didn’t get a chance to taste them on NYE!

Brussels Sprouts and Onions Cookin'

Walnuts and Cherries

Added Walnuts and Dried Cherries

YUM-O with Chicken and Sweet Potato Fries... I did have more Chicken but I didn't want to forget to take picture!

Holiday Brussels Sprouts

3 tablespoons grass fed butter, ghee, or coconut oil

1/2 cup yellow onion, finely diced

1 lb Brussels sprouts, halved and then cut into strips

½ cup walnuts, chopped

½ cup dried unsweetened cherries, chopped

2 teaspoons raw organic honey

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

1 tablespoon olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

In a large skillet saute the onions in the the butter, ghee or coconut oil until they start to brown and carmelize. Add the sliced Brussels sprouts and cook until the just become tender. Add the diced walnuts and cherries and cook for another minute or two and remove from heat. In a small saucepan melt the honey, add the balsamic vinegar and olive oil and whisk together. Pour the dressing over the Brussels Sprouts and season with salt and pepper to taste. Serves 5-6.

Seriously?!?!?! The year HATES me already!

And I am not joking one bit. I felt so defeated yesterday. After all my proclamations of how great 2012 will be and even if it’s not I’m gonna MAKE it great. Well it freaking stomped my face in yesterday as my car DIED, just flat out DIED in the middle of the road. I was “THAT” person… broke down at a stop light with nowhere to go. All systems down folks. Fortunately for me Grapevine police showed up QUICKLIKE to help me out to which I am grateful.

Now I did know my car was coming to failure as all sorts of warnings and noises were putting me in a panic but I was still going. I wasn’t far from dealership and I just knew I would make it. As I was on the phone with the service department to alert them I was coming – complete POWER FAILURE left me hangin’ out to dry. They called a tow truck to get me, which helped a lot as well. As the tow truck shows up, the guy asks if I needed a ride to the dealer as well and as I told him yes he told me to take a seat in the truck while he hooked up my car. So I’m sitting there and I see out of the corner of my eye a giant TIRE come out of nowhere. I look up and there I see what appears to be Grapevine CrossFit. The pic I have here is a total blurrilicious terd but you can kind of tell. I should have hopped out, joined in and gave em hell but instead I sat there and watched in my sadness.

Grapevine Crossfit ... I think! Appeared out of nowhere while I was waiting in tow truck.

I eventually got rescued by my brother. And car is being fixed. Dead battery and alternator 😦 And I move on. I won’t let it bring me down. 2012 will not defeat me. But I did stumble a bit and the first week isn’t even to a close yet!!!

Onto my WOD which gives me peace and strength (sometimes!?! and sometimes it just pisses me off too, haha).

1/06/12 WOD

As you see we worked Snatch and Clean&Jerk. I am no bueno at the SNATCH but I am determined to get that lift down. It’s so intimidating. So much to think about form wise and that’s just with a bar. Adding weight gives it a whole new form of intimidation. I got a little better, we’ll see what tomorrow brings as I will attempt my 1 rep MAX :O Doh, I SCARED!
I feel a lot more comfortable with the Clean&Jerk and my workout buddy today told me I had a “pretty” jerk! LOL. That made me laugh and I told her I would document it because it was cool to get that as a compliment and never in my life would I have ever imagined that would give me a warm fuzzy inside. Never in my life would I have imagined anyone ever saying that to me so WOW .. who am I? 😀

I felt pretty good about the WOD going in but I knew it would get to me! TABATAs always do. And it was OLD SCHOOL! LOL… air squats, pushups, situps… easy breezy right? WRONG… Not even halfway through squats my legs turned to JELLO. Pushups were murderous and surprisingly I felt pretty good at situps. A total overall rep count of 241. I was feelin pretty good. Worn out but good.

As for dinner last night, it was simple. Some grass-fed steak chopped up and sauteed with mushrooms and asparagus. I failed to take a picture as I was tired, defeated and HUNGRY. Ernie and I ate like it was the last meal on Earth… maybe it was just me though. I finished well before Ernie. The kids feasted on left over chili which by the way turned out pretty good considering I was lacking a lot ingredient wise. They informed me it was tasty and they liked it a lot. I too enjoyed it for my lunch. And I also forgot to take pics. But chili is chili right?

After dinner, I was proactive again and helped the kids out with their lunches and I remembered to take PICS! Yay me. So the whole point of the pictures is that this is EASY stuff to do. We haven’t bought “bread” in a month now. I ran out of Ezekiel Bread a few weeks ago. And all of us are A-OK withOUT it! No one has revolted or threatened my life. We just move along as if this is how it’s been all along. The boys enjoy it and know they are eating healthy. They loved the spinach and had no idea it was spinach. They saw I added zucchini this time around and were excited.. Yes we are a bunch of nerdos!

Preparing the Ham Rolls

Kid Approved Ham Rolls

And that’s how the cookie crumbles! COOKIE..??? Who said COOKIE?

Hahahah I am probably the only one laughing but that is how my brain works folks. I’m weird. Happy Friday to you all! Enjoy the weekend 🙂

Woohoo it’s Wednesday! (and more yummy goodness)

I feel really good today! I think getting back on track eating wise over the past few days has greatly helped me! After the cake ball frenzy before Christmas I continued to eat stocking stuffer candies and what not. I wasn’t too over the top as I was with the pizza and cookies but it was still MORE than I should have consumed in general. And after a couple of days of CLEAN eating I’m already feeling better.

1/04/12 WOD

The BOOM Box did not fail me and I had a great WOD. We worked on kipping and pullups after our warmup. I have the kipping down pretty good considering I suck at pullups. I stole Ernie’s “hand guard” thingies (like the ones gymnasts use) and those helped me out tremendously. I’m such a wussbag when it comes to hanging onto that bar! I’m so close at getting that kipping pullup. I can taste it! I want it so badly but I guess not badly enough to practice at home! Ha! I have to make the effort to work on those at home but I just don’t 😦 So after the kipping practice we had to do 3 sets of 5 strict pullups. I managed to get a few in with just the BLUE band (smallest band there is at our box) then I doubled up blue bands and finished out the reps. It’s hard work but I AM GETTING THERE!

And the MetCon was fantastic! Did I just say it was fantastic? Wow I may have suffered a blow to the head and I don’t recall! With the exception of a few NO REPS on my wall balls, I think I did well. Did I tell you I despise wall balls? Did I also tell you they are my enemy? Hehehe, Yes I know I did, I just wanted to make sure you’re following along! So 7 rounds of 7 wall balls, 7 ring rows and 200m run on rounds 2, 4 and 6. The fatigue really kicked in after the second run. Not sure if it was the cold air in my lungs that was bringing me down or just overall loss in arm strength. Round 6 was weak, but I finished strong in round 7 for an overall finish of 8:45.

Last night Ernie started his new 7pm Box time versus waking up early and being miserable….so I had some time to myself to play with my food processor and get dinner going. The shredding disc on my processor is AMAZING! In no time I had shredded zucchini and carrots! And I loved it. The kids were rather impressed as well! Now that I have shredding down, the plan was to make faux latkes and that is what I did. They fell apart a little too easy so next time I will add more egg to hold them together. I used grapeseed oil to cook them in and the taste was nice. Not sure how “paleo” grapeseed oil is because I haven’t done much research. It’s in several recipes I used but like you know by now there are varying lines of thought on “paleo”. Overall they came out great! Along with my latkes I baked some chicken and steamed a little broccoli. A nice light dinner 🙂

Dinner and testing out "latkes"

I’m a blog troll who randomly finds recipes from oddball places but I found this following recipe from Paleo Parents. I troll their blog regularly and like them on Facebook so this recipe “glowed” at me. And I knew I had to try it out.

A new treat Chocolate Banana Bites!

Dark Chocolate Banana Bites

2 bananas
5 eggs
3/4 C coconut oil
1/2 C maple syrup, we recommend Grade B
1 Tbsp vanilla
1 C almond flour (or coconut flour if you’re nut-free)
1/2 C cocoa powder
1 Tbsp cinnamon

1/2 C dark chocolate chips

Using an electric mixer or food processor, combine all of the wet ingredients (bananas should smooth out)
♥ In a separate bowl, combine all dry ingredients except chocolate chips
While mixing on low, add dry ingredients to wet ingredients until just combined
♥ Sir in chocolate chips to the dough
♥ Using a silicon mini muffin pan or mini muffin liners on a metal pan, scoop the dough until almost full into mini muffin pans
Cook at 350 for 10 minutes

Makes 4 dozen; store chilled and let come to room temperature before serving or eating. This is a super easy recipe and perfect for letting kids help (♥)!

I had a super mini muffin pan and I felt like these just weren’t very pretty but they tasted just fine! I also have a 6 count mini muffin silicone pan that I have never used and it ended up being just perfect! I had to cook those a little longer, closer to 20 minutes but truly I don’t recall. I watched them for a while but I just don’t remember the exact timing. My apologies for being a slacker. A win from the kids and a SUPER WIN from Ernie as he devoured many of the super mini bites!

I’m glad I have another “treat” in my bag of recipes.

I hope y’all have a great day. See ya tomorrow! Woooooohooooo!

HELLO 2012!

Welcome to the NEW YEAR people! I’m really hoping it’s great. I plan to make it great regardless of what life throws at me 🙂

I bypassed yesterday’s blog because I was lazy and slept in and it was a day off. But today is a new day and I need to get my crap under control!

Let me recap for you NYE and the bringing in the New Year with FRAN! She’s a dirty girl and we started off by kicking her to the curb. I hope I don’t see her for a while but who knows. New Year’s Eve, Ernie and I hosted a small gathering of the Boom Beasts to eat, watch dvr’d CrossFit Games and then head over to the Boom Box to meet Fran.

The FEAST NYE!

As you can see by the spread of food I was a busy girl that day. New Year’s Eve PALEO feast! Everyone brought their own protein and I provided most of the sides. Everything but the Israeli salad (which was great and resfreshing) brought by Josh. On the menu was Kale Chips, Guacamole, Holiday Brussel Sprouts (taken from Everyday Paleo), Sweet Potato Casserole, Prosciutto Wrapped Asparagus, Stuffed Mushrooms, Paleo Deviled Eggs, Walnut Date Bars and store bought veggie tray, fruit bowl and shrimp trays.

MY PLATE NYE

It was a good time and it appeared that everyone enjoyed the food and hanging with each other outside the BOX. A little after 11, we headed out to CrossFit Boom for a little warm up and the countdown to Midnight! There were 9 of us working out and we had to split up into two groups so I didn’t start at Midnight per say, I started at about 12:15. Travis (injured) wanted us to set a goal time so I said 12 minutes. Last time I did Fran was Nov 1 and I used 55lbs and finished in 11:38. This time around I used the RX’d 65lbs, still used bands for pullups and finished in 10:30. I’m getting there slowly but surely. For those of you that don’t know… FRAN is 21, 15, 9 of Thrusters and Pullups. So you do 21 Thrusters, 21 Pullups, 15 Thrusters, 15 Pullups, 9 Thrusters, 9 Pullups! Crazy insane I know but we brought in 2012 like that and it was actually a good time! I had a blast. It was also Jonas’ “first” BOOM workout. He starts officially today. I’m excited for him 🙂

2012 FRAN at MIDNIGHT 1/1/12

Sunday was absolute sleep and rest day. We didn’t do very much at all! Monday was back to CrossFit and shop day since we had the day off and we got all of groceries done for the week.

We did CFT for our WOD and it was good and not so good! I PR’d (Personal Record) my Press by 5lbs and my Backsquat by 5lbs. I did not however do good at Deadlift! I was not happy. I didn’t even come close to my Max of 185. Fatigue and bum hip got to me I think. So overall for the morning 140lbs backsquat, 65lbs shoulder press and 155 deadlift.

1/2/12 WOD

Starting next week I’ll be CrossFitting 4 days a week as Ernie graciously signed me up for an extra day! LOL, it should be good. But it’s still intimidating!

Doing a little Mobility post CFT WOD

So that was it for today people. Short and sweet! Happy Tuesday! Back to normalcy for the most part. No more vacation Days (which really make me lazy) 😦 Like I said earlier… 2012 will be great! Bring it!

All by Myself Wednesday

Found this on the interwebs - LOVE IT!

Oh how lonely it is to show up to the box and I’m the only one there to do work! It surprised me because when I first started out I was the only one at 5 am for a couple of weeks and it was nice. Maybe it was ok then because I was new to it all and I was learning a lot at once. But today it was so quiet. I still put in all my effort just no high fives or unison groans of exhaustion at the end. On the upside I had some extra time to work on kipping and pretending in my head I could do pullups. But geez, the bar hurts my ‘delicate’ hands so much! Yes I need some sort of protection and I need to shop for some gloves or something but I just don’t ever make time for it. My hands have developed some nice calluses but it still hurts! I’m a big ol’ baby, I know. That’s what you’re thinking too, I can feel it!

Even though I’m a big baby I still work hard. Just some things I don’t get along with right now. So onto the WOD for the day:

Skill
Ring Dips
3,3,3,3,3

METCON:

3 Rounds
3×3 Power Clean@75%
3×3 BFB
Add (10-5lbs) after each round

I’m getting better at ring dips that’s for certain but on the last round I tried to go without the band and HOLY SHITAKES it’s hard. I was feeling so strong busting out my measley 3 reps with the smallest band there is but when it came down to no “safety net, crutch, etc..” I failed! Argh, I even suggested they make another colored band just the tiniest bit smaller than the blue one! Hahaha. I wish! I’m getting there… I guess. I just want to get there faster.

This was me in Oct. I'd say my form is a little better now and 65lbs isn't near as heavy 🙂

As far as the MetCon went, I was sailing along smoothly. The 3×3 was confusing in writing but once explained I was good to go…. (3 cleans, 3 burpees) x 3, rest 1 minute, (3 cleans, 3 burpees) x 3, rest 1 minute, (3 cleans, 3 burpees) x 3… THE END. Make sense? I hope so, if not too bad! I finished in 6:17 and I need to start remembering to take pics of the board! GRRRR!

This was an ALL about my workout post today! Hahahah, No FOODs yet. Although we are having a pre-NYE WOD feast at my house, so I will be testing out some new recipes from Paleo Comfort Foods by Julie and Charles Mayfield. It was a Christmas present and I think it will come to good use!

Yummy Goodness Coming Soon!

One last thing – Happy Birthday to my momma who would have been 64 today. A hole is still bigger than ever in my heart from losing her almost a year ago. Wow, time passes fast! I posted on Facebook earlier today: If birthdays exist in Heaven, I pray my Mom is having the best birthday ever! I miss you mom, you left us too soon … still so lost without you.

See y’all tomorrow!