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July 14, 2014

Unplug

Good Morning!

How was your weekend?  Mine was absolutely wonderful & relaxing.  I don’t get a lot of empty weekends so this was exactly what I needed.  Nick was out of town for bachelor trip and I stayed home the entire weekend doing a lot of nothing.  I did workout, of course!  I’m looking forward to a 30 minute evening walk later today to loosen my muscles and take a little break from my more hard-core workouts.  I may make it an hour walk if the weather is nice and I’m enjoying myself.  Tomorrow I’ll go to HIIT, so I want my body & muscles and to be well rested for that so I can give it my all.

webcam-041

Excited to see this little monkey on Friday!

When I left for the gym yesterday, my phone was close to being dead so I decided to leave it at home.  Honestly, I’m so attached to my phone sometimes that I truly enjoy the peaceful moments when I choose to forget about it.  I don’t unplug nearly enough!  As I enjoyed this true alone time, it made me think how important it is to unplug.  Do you find yourself checking your phone regularly throughout the day, even if you know it hasn’t vibrated or made a noise alerting a phone call or text message?  I do this ALL.THE.TIME!  My phone, the social networking, all of it can be such a huge distraction for me.  I don’t leave my phone alone enough, but when I do, I appreciate the lack of stress it brings and the freedom I feel when I’m not attached to it.

Maybe unplugging means something entirely different to you!  I encourage you to unplug regularly, it’s good for the soul – as I learned yesterday during my quiet workout and drive.

I’ve mentioned time & time again about the challenges that Nick and I do.  They vary in time frame and activity.  Right now I’m in the middle of a 21 day workout challenge where I workout for a minimum of 30 minutes every single day for 21 days.  This will help me establish a habit of working out.  I’ve currently completed 14/21.  If I’m sore from my workouts, then my 30 minute workout becomes a walk (like today!)  I have one week left of this challenge and then it’ll be time for a new one.  I’m challenging myself to unplug for 1 hour every single day for a month.  For me, unplugging will be silencing my phone and leaving it somewhere.  I’d love to know if you’re interested in joining me on this month long challenge!  Unplugging can mean something entirely different for you – whatever it is, unplug for one whole hour every day for an entire month and my hope is that you’ll find peace & relaxation during that time.

Switching gears…

I have a delicious & simple dip to share with y’all today!  Now that I’m a vegetarian, it’s extremely important for me to bring something that I can enjoy to parties & office functions.  Of course, I want others to enjoy it as well and I want it to be healthy!  When we had a baby shower in our office, I signed up to bring a veggie tray, but I didn’t want to bring ranch dressing and veggies – 1. overdone and 2. not healthy!

I made this delicious ranch dip that was 2 ingredients & was a hit at the office!

BeFunky_veggie-ranch-dip.jpg

Ingredients:

  • Your selection of veggies (I chose baby carrots, celery, cucumbers [home grown], and grape tomatoes
  • Plain Greek Yogurt
  • 1 packet of Ranch dip

I know this is ridiculously easy… Slice up your veggies, arrange to your liking (I enjoy alternating my colors), Mix up 16 oz. of your greek yogurt + ranch dip.

It’s healthier than plain ranch dressing because you add in that protein rich yogurt.  You’ll also surprise your co-workers or party-goers – The taste is different from your regular ranch.  The greek yogurt adds an extra ounce of flavor!  Everyone who tried it, loved it!  By the end of the day, the entire bowl of dip was gone and there were a few veggies left over.  People will thank you for bringing the veggie tray because everyone else probably brought the fattening stuff!

veggie-ranch-dip-2

Questions for the day:

  • If you joined the month long unplug challenge, what would you unplug from?
  • Share your healthy office-party food, what would you bring?

Filed Under: Family, Food, Recipes, Summer Tagged With: challenge, dip, greek yogurt, ranch, unplug, vegetarian, veggie, work 1 Comment

July 12, 2014

Who am I?

Good Morning!

How was your Friday night?  Mine started out with a really great WORKOUT when I got off work.  I originally planned on doing a Kickbox class, but I got off later than expected.  I’ve really enjoyed circuit workouts lately to help get me back to the gym!  They’re challenging and always different!  Today I warmed up with a 25 minute treadmill walk.  I did the walk before realizing that it was created by The Skinny Student who I actually met at Blog Elevated this past year!  We didn’t get to know each other very well, but she was so sweet and I enjoyed following her blog when I got home!

skinny-student-treadmill-workout

{source}

When I finished that, I had worked up a nice little sweat.  I went on to do another Peanut Butter Fingers circuit workout {NO surprise!}  This one was TOUGH though.  I was a little nervous going into it because she said it was a workout to “kick her butt and leave her dripping in sweat.”  Well if you have read even half a post from Julie, then you know this girl is fit!  I’m working my way there, so I figured it’d be a tough one.  I was entirely correct.

cant-stop-wont-stop-circuit

 

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 I only completed one set, even though it says to complete two.  I wasn’t exactly “dripping” in sweat, but I “dripped” sweat.  Which is a huge accomplishment for me because sometimes I don’t think I sweat enough – compared to others who workout anyways, then again… I shouldn’t be playing the comparison game!

dripped-sweat

There’s the proof.

I’m hoping I’ll be comfortable enough to create my own workouts soon so I won’t be using everyone else’s! haha Right now, it’s nice to have these resources though!

Yeah, I know it’s not much, but it’s a start.  While I was at the gym, my mom asked me if I wanted to get pizza with her and my dad.  Originally I said yes, but then I thought about it and realized that I didn’t make great decisions about my food throughout the week and I really wanted something healthy, so I changed my mind and made a smoothie.  WHO AM I??  Really, pizza is my favorite.

The smoothie turned out great though!  One of these days, I’m actually going to make a pin-able recipe for y’all w/ legit measurements.  After all, that’s what a good blogger does… *sigh*  Let’s cross our fingers for that very soon!

  • a cup or so of orange juice
  • 3 handfuls of frozen blueberries
  • 2 large handfuls of spinach
  • couple dashes of flax seed
  • 3 big scoops of honey vanilla greek yogurt
  • 1 big scoop of almond butter
  • 1 little scoop of cocoa powder
  • 1 little dash of milk for extra liquid

smoothie-drink smoothie-pour

When I made the decision to skip out on pizza, my first thought really was… WHO AM I?  It got me to actually answer the question for myself… which could have been really scary and unpredictable!

There’s the person I am and then the person I want to become.  The person I am is constantly changing in order to find the person I want to become.  I want to become a person who cares more about my health and long-term living, than that large bag of Reese’s.  I want to become a person who chooses integrity and class over outbursts of anger.  I want to become a person who lives to be 100.  I want to become a better friend, family member, blogger, girlfriend, fitness guru, and healthy/vegetarian eating expert.

Surprisingly, I’m becoming the type of person who turns down pizza for a smoothie.  The smoothie is a lot better for me in the long run.  That doesn’t meant to not indulge from time to time, believe me, I did this past week.  That’s why I felt a smoothie was in my best interest.  I’m noticing small decisions I make that are helping me become the person I want to be.  I think the ideal person I want to be will continuously be evolving as well.  You don’t want to get to a stopping point, realize you’re where you wanted to be, but then make no further goals.  I want to constantly be learning, growing, and improving!

It was important for me to join a gym because I knew I wouldn’t take my fitness to the next level if I didn’t.  I need that motivation on a daily basis.  It was important for me to become a vegetarian in January because I knew the leap I wanted to make, but continuously provided excuses.  It was time to stop making excuses and just do it.  It was important for me to change my blog because I lost interest in my old one.  If I wanted to be a better blogger and potentially use blogging as supplemental income, I needed to stop waiting and finally make the change.

So the question: WHO AM I?

I’m usually the person failing at one thing or the other, but I’m also the person striving to succeed, striving to learn, striving to grow, and striving to become a better version of me than I was yesterday.

I hope to do that through this blog, through fitness, through healthy eating choices, through service, through love, through compassion and understanding.

I am not always the person I want to be.  I look back at a particular instance and I’m ashamed of the choices I made or the anger I let control me, but every day is a new day and I’m so thankful for the opportunity of forgiveness and a fresh start!

The questions are always optional, but especially today.  This is more for you to think through for yourself.  If you want to answer and share, I’d love to hear it!  If you’re not comfortable doing so, that’s alright too!

  • WHO ARE YOU?
  • ARE YOU WHO YOU WANT TO BE?
  • WHAT CHOICES ARE YOU MAKING TO BECOME A BETTER VERSION OF YOURSELF?

This morning I woke up to an excellent yoga class at my local gym (wish I could find an outdoor yoga class!) and then headed home to sip on coffee while I finish up this post.  Today I’ll be studying for my Series 6 test (bleh, investments!) and doing some yard work.  My sis is coming to town, so that’s always exciting!  Have a wonderful weekend!

Filed Under: Blogging, Family, Fitness, Food, Serious Talk, Summer Tagged With: blogging, coffee, pbfingers workout, reeses, smoothie, sweat, walking workout, yoga Leave a Comment

July 10, 2014

Pool Ready in a Jiffy

flat-tire

Good Morning!

That’s not a great sign, is it?  Apparently I ran over whatever the heck that thing is on my way home from work yesterday.  Luckily I noticed it before heading to church last night.  I was pulling out of my drive way, but felt like my front tire might be flat, so I got out and looked, but it was fine.  I went ahead and looked at all of them and sure enough my back tire was flat.

I went ahead and made an appointment last night so I could get my car in quickly this morning.  Thankfully my boss has been out of town these past few days and so I’m not extremely busy at work or I’d be a wreck right now.  I was caught up on everything when I left work yesterday.

What’s really funny is I’m picking my friend Lacy up from the airport today and she said her plane was delayed due to a flat tire also!  We’re all having tire trouble apparently.

It’s a dreary day here in Mississippi.  In a weird way, I love days like this.  I would love a day like this more if I could curl up on the couch reading blog posts and updating my own blog.  What’s your weather looking like?

me-karla-stephen

I’ll be visiting my cousin in a week & a half.  The excitement is overwhelming.  My friend Lacy is joining me and then we’ll be greeted by our friend Noelle who just accepted a job in Texas! I plan on parking myself by the pool pretty much all weekend.  In order to do that though, I need to ramp up my workouts.  I did the 30 day squat challenge a few months ago and saw a lot of improvement with that so I’m going to start that again today.  I also need to take all the ab classes offered at my gym between now and then!

Some other necessities to get pool ready in a jiffy:

  • Drink lots of water!
  • Cut back on my Sodium intake!
  • Apply Jergens Firming Lotion

30-day-squat-challenge

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Besides spending the greatest quality time in the world with my sweet Cousin and her beyond wonderful family, I’ll also be attending the Houston Veg Fest!  I probably won’t attend the entire day, but I’ll be there for a few hours learning about vegans/vegetarians, listening to speakers, and trying products!  You’ll for sure see a re-cap on the blog!

Did I mention that Nick and I want to do the Goofy Challenge?  It’s at Walt Disney World and it’s a Half-Marathon on Saturday, Full-Marathon on Sunday.  The problem is, I’ve never done a marathon.  I’ve done a hand-full of Half’s though.  We haven’t signed up yet because it’s not full and I’d like to see how I feel in a few months.  To kick off our training, we’re doing a Half in Starkville on October 18th.  When I trained for the Disney Wine & Dine Half-Marathon, I planned on using this great training plan I found that was created by (or for) Ellie Goulding.  The training didn’t go so great, the longest I ended up running was about 8 miles and I didn’t have a gym membership so rainy days were a problem and I also didn’t have a good yoga class to go to or a decent DVD / floor space for my yoga.  I still believe the training plan is one of the best I’ve seen because of the heavy amount of x-training and strength training involved as well as yoga.  I’m giving it a try again for this training and I feel it’s going to flow more smoothly now that I have a gym membership with yoga classes offered and a rainy day option on longer runs that are critical to my training!

  • What do you do to get pool ready in a jiffy?
  • Have you attended or even heard of a Veg Fest?  How was it?  What can I expect?
  • Share your favorite half-marathon training plan!
  • What’s the likelihood that I’ll succeed at doing a half & full in about 6 months when I’ve never done a full?

Filed Under: Disney, Family, Fitness, Nick, Races, Summer, Training, Travel Tagged With: Disney, flat tire, half-marathon, marathon, running, squats, Veg Fest, vegan, vegetarian, wine & dine Leave a Comment

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The views and statements expressed on No Bologna are my own. You are reading No Bologna at your own risk and I am not providing any type of professional advice. Unless otherwise noted, all material on No Bologna may not be used, reprinted, or published without my consent. I do occasionally have affiliated links on my blog - this does not raise the price of the product, I simply get a very small commission from the regular retail price if something is purchased using an affiliated link on my site. I appreciate any support by you in regards to affiliated links.

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