…Getting out an extra hour early for a GORGEOUS SPRING WEEKEND!!!!!!
Monthly Archives: April 2010
It Doesn’t Get Better Than This!!
Holy GEEZ!! I couldn’t POSSIBLY be more excited about life right now!!! Why you ask?! Well! Let me tell you! 
#1) IT’S FRIDAY!!!
#2) It’s GORGEOUS outside!!
#3) I curled my hair today and actually have makeup on!!!
#4) I love my new earrings
#5) I’m getting my nails done on my lunch break
#6) I’m taking an hour and a HALF for lunch
#7) Dinner party with the Bonfire lovelies tonight…so that means, GREAT, TASTY, HEALTHY food!!
#8) Leaving for Vermont with Nick tomorrow morning 
#9) Everyone is in a GREAT mood today!!
#10) IT’S FRIDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Last night’s Crossfit workout:
3 rounds of:
10 ring push-ups (I did my pushups on dumbbells, to have that little extra range of motion)
25 box jumps (I upped it a little last night with this one; I put a 45# plate on the smallest box, which I THINK is 12″, so it was 16″!)
50 double unders (or 150 singles)
Well, I did pretty well on this (finished it in 9:58) however, I didn’t do double-unders because 1) I hadn’t been to Crossfit all week because of my back. 2) I have to do three singles for every double under I do (probably not a GOOD excuse). 3) I ate a bowl of paleo cereal before I left, with goat milk. What was I THINKING? Well, I know what I was thinking…I was hungry…but as soon as I started ATTEMPTING double unders, I felt that it probably wouldn’t be necessary for EVERYONE to know I ate some paleo cereal (I was thinking of YOU GUYS!). Glad I went though! I got a great workout, and got to catch up with some of the most fantastic people I know
Have a RIDICULOUSLY great Friday, and an even BETTER weekend!!!! I’ll talk to you guys soon
Love,
Jen
“Fiber Isn’t JUST For Cool Poops…”
If you were at Dr. Paul Kratka’s workshop last night on Eating Healthy in an Unhealthy World, you would know why I titled the post that offensively hilarious name. That, amongst many other, ridiculously funny quotes were said last night…and TONS of PRICELESS information was offered for no price at all.
As I sat in the front row listening to Dr. Kratka, I experienced a full range of emotions: from laughing till the point of tears, to shaking my head in disgust due to the cold hard facts he was presenting (Did you know that Nintendo is now coming up with a “GAME” to test children’s blood sugar…we’re making games out of children having diabetes now…someone else think that is disgusting?!). There was a lot of information that I had seen/heard before from Dr. Franson or Nick, as Dr. Kratka assumed there would be, but he delivered it in a fresh, new way…an in your face, direct approach. Here are some of the big things I took away:
1) Dr. Kratka wanted to first off dispel a common myth that we hear all the time…and it’s killing us… “EVERYTHING IN MODERATION.” No…NOT everything in moderation. He talked about how we shouldn’t just drink water in moderation (we should be drinking HALF of our body weight, in ounces…so for instance, let’s say you weight 140 pounds, you should be drinking 70 ounces of water a day…), the same way we shouldn’t be eating cake in moderation, or drinking soda. If you were to, let’s say, drink a bottle of rat poisen…what would happen?? What would happen if you put diesel in your gasoline-running vehicle?? Well, the same thing would happen for BOTH! The machine that you’re putting the “fuel” into would SHUT DOWN! Now, what would happen if you drank a can or two of soda a day, everyday….or what if you put a little bit of diesel in your car, everyday?? What would happen? EVENTUALLY guys, your car would SHUT DOWN!! It won’t happen tomorrow, or today…or even next week…but it WILL! And not because its “old” and just “aging”…eff that!…sorry…but come ON!, we are MADE to be HEALTHY!…and due to our lifestyles, we are causing our CRAVING-to-be-healthy bodies, to break down prematurely. Dr. Kratka would rip that soda out of your hands if he saw you drinking it…I won’t do that…but just think of it as RAT POISEN when you’re drinking it…it’s not good guys…
2) We should buy organic…always! I know it’s expensive (as Dr. Franson would say, but so is chemotherapy)…HOWEVER, I learned why we should REALLY be buying all organic. I dont’ always buy organic, I’ll be the first to admit that. We buy only grass-fed beef or free-range chicken, but some of, a lot of actually, of our produce is NOT organic. I thought, just like Dr. Kratka said MOST people think, that people think we should buy organic due to the pesticides. While that is a reason, but its only a small one. I learned that we should be buying organic because organic produce has all the nutrients. The “regular” produce is being grown in “dead” soil…while the organic produce’s soil is alive, crawling with bugs, and nutrients. Bugs are good in soil So while Nick I were talking about it on the way home, I said we should switch to buying all organic, and we were thinking about how our grocery bill will go up by about 20%, but you know what? I’m okay with that, because if we’re not getting the nutrients in our food that we need…what are we paying for then? Case closed
3) This is something that I’ve said before, but it was re-established last night. EVERY single choice that we make in our lives, is a decision. You’re either, in regards to our health, making a decision to move TOWARD health, or move AWAY from health…but no matter HOW you slice it…it’s a decision that YOU are making. We as a society seem to take so little responsibility in our health…”oh I’m getting a cold, it must be that time of year…” or “I got sick after taking a plane ride because there were sick people on it and you’re all stuck on a little plane…you’re BOUND to get sick…”, or “My knees are going…but that’s just because I’m getting old…”. I would like to think I have more control over my health than that….wouldn’t you? How about if we make an environment in ourselves that is COMPLETELY unappealing to germs…we can do that! How about we CHOOSE to put only healthy, enriching, nourishing whole foods in our body, drink plenty of water, get plenty of sleep and think healthy thoughts…and then see what happens I still get sick from time to time…but SO much less…and you know what, when I DON’T feel well, I know why! I was stressed to the max (stillllll my weak spot…), or I ate a bunch of crap. We are ONLY as good as our cells…and the food we put into our body makes up our cells. Seems soooo simple…but I know, it’s not easy!
4) Thing you should NO MATTER WHAT! stay away from:
Dairy
Processed grains
Processed oils
High-fructose corn syrup
Artificial sweeteners (did you know when they were testing animals for this (Aspartame)..every single one of those animals got a brain tumor??…I don’t remember the story of how those awful people still got it on the market…maybe one of you that were there could clarify that in the comment section…but it did, it got out on the market…and we as a society are BUYING it and PUTTING IT IN OUR BODY!!)
Artificial flavors/food dyes
What we SHOULD be eating:
Vegetables
Lean proteins: grass-fed/free range meat (no antibiotics or hormones used), cage-free eggs
Fruits
Fats (HEALTHY fats!! Fats are SOOO good for us…but still to these fats: fish/olive/coconut oil, avocado, raw nuts)
This was an incredible, entertaining, eye-opening workshop, that I really wish all of you could have been at! I also wish I really HAD taken notes so that I can get all the information to you. For those of you that were there, I would love sooo much if you could add, in the comment section, anything else that I have left out! We all take away different things
Thank you all so much for reading…I am so grateful for you
Love,
Jen
Rainy Day Pleasures :)
On this rainy, cold day in Boston, my mind has been wandering to better things…warmer things…far away things…
However, if you don’t have a huge chunk of change to spare, and you’re letting the rainy mood get to you, here are a few things that ALWAYS make me feel amazing…for under $10!!!
1) I LOVE going to Borders/Barnes and Noble, buying a vanilla chai tea, and reading trashy tabloid magazines for hours 
2) A manicure…maybe that’s $15 (as long as you are using your real nails…)…but I think we’re still in the safe zone with this one 
For some reason I ALWAYS feel so pretty when my nails are painted
3) I have discovered that if you are walking down Newbury Street, and stumble across the hidden treasure that is SABON, they will give you a free hand massage (with the scrub) and you will walk out feeling like you have new hands! My personal favorite is the Lavender Apple Body Scrub ;)
4) I LOVE to just walk around Whole Foods with a cup of coffee that you can buy when you walk in the door There is a good chance you will walk out spending more than $10, but it’s DEFINITELY doable
5) I always feel amazing when I leave church. It’s impossible not to when everyone is laughing, smiling and singing! Plus, we get to meditate and relax into a reiki healing. I always get the message I need at that time when I go, and for that I always leave there feeling renewed!
6) OPEN HOUSES!!! I am such an open house NERD, but I could do it for hours, and it brightens up my day! Sometimes I pretend like I’m in the 
market, making up a story…but most of the time I just go in and admire every nook and cranny of the house. While I was in Santa Barbara, I dragged some friends along to an open house in Monticeito for 8.4 million dollars! It was AHHH-MAZING!
While there are the fail-safe things like spending time with family, friends, working out, etc…these are my little “guilty pleasures” that really switch my mood for the better! If I’m already in a really good mood…watch out!
Heading to Franson Family Chiropractic tonight for a workshop with Dr Paul Kratka on Eating Healthy in an Unhealthy World!! I’ll report back tomorrow (I’m taking notes on this one )
Paleo Projects :)
Well, it was no Fran….but I did get in a workout last night, AND a girl’s talk session with my buddy Rhonda! We did a good 4.5-5 mile walk, trying to get some movement in, but trying to AVOID making my back WORSE! Mission accomplished!
I got home right before Nick did, at 8pm, and got started on dinner. It was kiiiind of delicious!! Dropped a healthy dose of coconut oil in the cast iron pan, and then seared up some garlic and onions. MMMM, don’t you LOVE the way the house smells when garlic and onions are cooking? Then came the broccoli. At this point, Nick has walked in for the night, so mini pause on the cooking
How GORGEOUS is this vegetable?!
Okay, and back to it! So a couple of weeks ago I bought two cans of coconut milk. I really have no idea what to do with this stuff…I guess I expected it would be like MILK! However, coconut milk has a butter like consistency, and melts when heated (duh!). So, I got a little kitchen curious. What would happen if I added coconut milk to the veggie mix (mean while, I had grass-fed beef cooking up on the cast iron griddle)? I also planned on adding peeled plum tomato/tomato paste to the mixture…so I was thinking, would that be weird with the coconut milk? Well, we won’t know unless we try!! SOOOOO, in it went, and immediately developed a pink (like vodka sauce..delish!) color. When everything was just about done, I threw in the swiss (rainbow) chard, and dished it up!
Um yeah….DELICIOUS!!! It tasted familiar, but I couldn’t put my finger on it…apparently Nick was thinking the same thing because he said this outloud a couple of times, then told me it tasted like Thai food…YES…it had a hint of that peanut sauce flavor….oh man……..SOOOO GOOD!!
On the peanut sauce thought….I wonder what it would be like if I mixed almond butter and coconut milk, and cooked up some chicken in a pan with that?!!? Project!!
Have a great Tuesday everyone
Thank GOODNESS I Know A Good Chiropractor!
Happy Monday everyone I hope you had a fantastic weekend!! The weather was GORGEOUS…and well, it was the weekend!!
I had a great weekend, mild injury aside. Well, I say mild, but judging by my seriously colossal babiness, you would think otherwise. I hurt my back this weekend. My lower back…ouch!
On Saturdays workout at Crossfit we were split into teams of 3. This was the first time ever I got to be on a team with Nick Guess what the workout was? 3 stations: first station, mile run; second station, as many deadlifts as you can do in the allotted time (they wanted us to deadlift 155#, but since I have never even done that ONCE, I chose to do 100#s); third station, as many strict pullups as we could do in said time. So the way it works…one person runs a mile, another is doing deadlifts, and the other, pull-ups…as soon as the person running get’s back, you switch. I asked if I could go running first, since I don’t LOVE running! Wait, on a side note, I need to talk about this…
A week ago, the thought of running 400m irked me. Seriously, I dreaded going to Saturday workouts because often times the workout included running. The last month, however, running has been the poison of choice in ALL workouts, weekdays included. So what happens when the thing you dread is constantly in your face? You stop thinking it’s so scary! To top it off, I decided to dedicate last week to making running even LESS scary by doing a few of my own workouts that had running as the main course (Two rounds of 1.3 mile runs and 50 double unders, 1 mile for time, etc). So my mindset this past week, and still, is no longer “RUNNING is SCARY so I’m going to avoid it!”, it’s “Running is difficult, so I’m going to face it head on and show that pavement who’s BOSS!!”
Okay, I’m digressing…back to Saturday…
So I was the first to run the mile, and I took off! I was a little worried I would take forever because I knew that the men in my team would be kicking their own bums as long as I’m out there, but I stopped worrying about that about a minute in. I became more concerned with listening to my body, finding a healthy pace, and getting to the end! Guess what! I ran my PR (personal record)!! A week ago I was running a mile in over 9 minutes..closer to 9.5…Saturday I finished in just a little over 8 minutes!!!! Amazing!! Just the encouragement I needed!!!
Okay, no time to throw a party, have to move on to deadlifts. I had 100#s on there…which felt heavy, as it should, but my form felt good and I wasn’t going crazy with them… I did 30 of them in the 7 minutes it took Nick to run the mile. Then once Vlad took off on his run, I banged out 28 strict pullups on the blue band (heck yeah!).
So the workout was great, we went out to breakfast in Manchester, and then came home. A few hours later, my back started hurting…really hurting. It grew more and more painful as the day went on. As the day progressed, I grew more and more worried about my night out dancing. Could I dance? Any of you that has ever seen me dance may have noticed I dont’ take dancing lightly. It’s a full body workout, a full contact sport. There isn’t a muscle I don’t use, or a move I won’t do. My mom usually refers to me as Gumby. So, the thought of dancing when it was painful for me to even walk without looking like I was balancing an apple on my head, was somewhat causing me a tad bit of worry!
Come 8:30pm, some of the guys came over to our house to play poker with Nick, and Lisa and I decided to go get a “drink” before heading over to go dance (I was still going to attempt it at this point). We ended up having the tastiest virgin mojitos EVER and had great conversation, however, my back was not feeling any better. I made the call to go home for the night.
I have been adjusted about 4 times since Saturday, have iced (maybe not as much ice as I should have…but I’m currently sitting here with ice stunningly cold on my back), have moved, have stretched (I was given stretches to do today because my hamstrings are so tight, which is probably what is causing, or at least REALLY not helping my back pain), and still not stellar…just need to keep following the doctor’s orders, and make sure I think twice about mixing running with deadlifting again (dont’ realize your form breaks down when you’re tired…).
As for tackling ”Fran” tonight at Crossfit..not so sure about that…may go and do something else (Fran: 21, 15, 9 of Thrusters and pull-ups).
The rest of my weekend was fantastic Quality time with an incredible man, and a lunch date with my love, Lauren! Mexican, iced coffee, walking by the water and great conversation Love life
Have an incredible Monday guys…kick this week off right!
Child’s Play, Schmild’s Play!
Good morning I can say, with content, that I have started my morning off well. A warm cup of tea, attitude of gratitude on my deck, all the while knowing I have a great day ahead!
The other day I was walking up School Street in Boston to take the checks to the bank for work. My attention was drawn to a little girl a few people ahead of me on the street. She was skipping and swinging her head from side to side with major gusto! No one seemed to think this was odd. Of course not right? She’s a KID!
Now let’s think about this one. What if you saw an adult doing that VERY same thing? A full-grown adult high skipping down Bolyston in her three-piece suit and stilettos, swinging her $200 per salon visit, perfectly polished hair from side to side? Nuts right? You would think she’s NUTS!…
…Why?
When did it stop being cool to be SO awesome?!
When did it stop being cool to really FEEL life? To really express your happiness? To really LIVE? I know, I know..we need to be responsible adults who pay bills, have a job to keep, have children ourselves even…but when did that mean we can’t be fun?
Last June I met up with a friend that I hadn’t seen in a long while in Boston. We were walking along the waterfront in downtown when we came upon the fountain….THE fountain in Boston. You know the one I’m talking about, the one where parents bring their kids on summer days, dressed in bathing suits, roaring and ready to run through it for hours. We sat for a bit, watching the kids and catching up. Then, almost at the same time, we looked at each other and you could tell the other was thinking the same thing..I WANT TO DO THAT! So often, we as adults, watch kids have all the fun, even though we’re DYING to play too! Why can’t we?
So we did…and it was AWESOME! I mean, let’s be honest…how many of those parents TOTALLY want to run through on a hot July day…but dont? TONS! Just DO it already!
When was the last time we played tag for fun? Or double-dutch jump roped? How about rolling down a hill? I know, these all seem sooooooooooooooooooo childish…they are! But let me ask you this…how often do you see a kid rolling down a hill STRESSED OUT? Or how about a kid jump roping…do they ever seem sad? Most likely, I’ll take my chances by saying NO! Let’s keep the responsible traits we’ve grown into, and add a few more of the kid like traits we shoved in the back of the closet! Go ride a bike! Make a sand castle! Climb a tree! Do cartwheels at the park! Swing on the swings at the playground (I do this from time to time…but for some reason my ADULT stomach can’t handle it, hahaha), and don’t for ONE second care what all the other ADULTS think…just do something that makes you feel ALIVE!
Have a GORGEOUS weekend
AWESOME BLOG!
One of my new buddies, and morning ritual peeps , has an INCREDIBLE blog!! She gives MAJOR insight into what exactly us “paleo” people eat!! The pictures are phenomenal and the recipes make me HUNGRY! Check this out!
Silly Boys…Girls Have Muscles TOO!
Happy Friday everyone!! Today is a special day here at Welch and Forbes (where I work)…it is “bring your kids to work day!” So I will not be writing a full entry due to the fact that I am face painting extraordinaire today HOWEVER…a fellow Crossfit chica posted something AWESOME on facebook…and I have decided to pass it along to you!
Guys aren't the only ones who can have six-pack abs!
If this doesn’t make you want to be a Crossfit chick…I don’t know what will!! I’m brimming with pride Enjoy!
Sometimes, The Universe Responds Instantly…
People are beautiful.
I am sitting in the Boston Common on my lunch break, post-delicious-salad (kale, cukes, carrots, peas, grapes, steak), basking in the sun, praising the world for a second time today for everything beautiful life has to offer. As I mentally list my words of gratitude, I see a tall, frail man hobbling up the path. Literally, every step looks excruciating for him.
He sits down on a park bench across the wide walkway, and I quietly look at him without him noticing. I notice people staring as he shakes, and watch the people around him get up and leave. I take in the thought that due to his physical state, life most likely is not the same for him; he is not living his best life. Nick says all the time that he makes the best decisions when he thinks from 30,000ft (big picture mentality). I wonder if this man had started thinking from 30,000ft a long time ago, if his life would be different today; if he had chosen what he ate, how he moved and what he thought, with the utmost care. I then took that moment to be grateful for this stranger. I thanked him/her/the universe for allowing this man to sit across from me so I could be reminded of why I do what I do, everyday; why I don’t eat whatever I want (even though everything I eat, I really want ), why I don’t just sit on the couch when I get home, and why I truly DO feel everyday is “FANTASTIC”!
Just when I thought I was through stating my thanks, I watch the man stand up. He takes one painful step after another in my direction. I make eye contact with him. He slowly, painfully, approaches me just to say,
“Has anyone told you you look beautiful today?”
How BEAUTIFUL are people?
