Sunday Brunch: August 21st, 2016

Hey there and welcome back for another Sunday Brunch (minus the brunch)! This has been a pretty busy week (end) so lets get right to it. Oh, but first, just a little heads up, this post is loaded with pictures, I just couldn't help myself!

Monday to Friday was your typical work week. I came down with a cold (ahem, thanks Scott :) on Tuesday and I am still stuck with it. I am definitely feeling better than I was but its turned into a bit of laryngitis now so that's just dandy! Wednesday after work, Scott and I went out for supper with our friends Stefan and Heather to celebrate Heathers birthday since we were not going to be around on the weekend for her party.

Friday after work Scott and Roscoe picked me up and we headed to Nova Scotia for my cousins wedding. As I have said before, I grew up in NS and my parents and all of my family live there as well, so that's where we were headed. We didn't arrive until late, around 10pm, as Scott didn't get off work until 5 and we had to make a few pit stops for Ros.

Saturday morning we got up bright and early and headed out kayaking. Where I am from there are tons of great places to go exploring so we started out in the river in Harpellville and eventually made our way to the ocean! There was quite a group of us; my parents, brother, aunt, a couple of friends of the family and Scott and I, 8 in total. It was such a beautiful morning for it. We went up river first and into a couple of small brooks then turned around once the tide came in and headed down river to the ocean. This was my first time ever kayaking and I was nervous that I would tip it over but I actually did pretty good, I even managed to beat Scott and my brother, Colin, in a race (not really but it was close!). It was super calm on the river but when we got to the ocean the wind came up a bit. It wasn't bad but it was windy enough that we didn't venture out too far. While we were floating around in the mouth of the river we did see a lot of seals though. It was so cool! They were popping up all over the place and actually came pretty close to our kayaks. Scott had never seen a seal that close before so he was pretty excited.

Scott, exploring one of the little inlets

The crew

My brother - Colin

"The Shanty's"

Back on solid land

After a couple of hours of kayaking we headed back to where we had left the trucks. The wedding was at 3pm so we went back home to get ready. This was the first wedding of the season for Scott and I so it was fun to get all dressed up. The wedding was beautiful and the bride and groom looked amazing. It was such a fun night, dancing and spending time with family and old friends. It was a blast from the past for me as there were quite a few people there that I hadn't seen since high school graduation (and that wasn't yesterday!). My cousin, Cody and his new bride, Brittany, got married and had their reception in the same venue that Scott and I did so it brought back lots of memories from our wedding day too! We danced until they kicked us out, it was so much fun but I am feeling it today!

This morning, once we finally all got up and at em', Scott and I took Roscoe and my families dog, Baylee, to the beach to play. They had been stuck inside for most of the evening on Saturday so they had some energy to burn. It was so funny, Roscoe LOVES to swim but he didn't care too much for the big waves. He would run out until he met a wave breaking and then turn around and hightail it back!

The ocean is my happy place

He was only a little happy!

My two loves

Ros and Bay

It was such a great weekend but not long enough (they never are). I am already looking forward to coming back to NS next weekend with our friends Heather and Stefan and baby Avery for more fun and sun!

On another note, I wanted to mention that I decided I am going to start a "mini cut". This weekend kicked off wedding season for Scott and I so I know there will be lots of food and drinks in the near future. Before all this starts I want to get my diet back on track. I have been doing pretty good during the week but I am still not good enough. I don't plan on losing any significant amount of weight I just want to get feeling healthy again and I thought I would share the process on here to help keep me accountable. I will do a more detailed post on this on Thursday so stay tuned for that.

Have a great week!

Sunday Brunch: August 14th, 2016

Is it Sunday already?! Where the heck did those seven days go? It's true what they say; the older you get, the faster time goes by. This week seems to have flown by, as most weeks do, and it's hard to believe that it's already the middle of August! This has been such a great summer but it's going by far to fast! There are only two more weekends of the summer left (I guess technically there are 5 because the first day of fall is September 22nd but I haven't been out of school that long so when August ends it feels like summer should too). Fortunately I have the next 2 weekends off and we have plans to spend both of them at my parents in Nova Scotia!

Anyway, back on track to this weeks Sunday Brunch! Todays brunch special is a refreshing smoothie bowl. I am trying to get back on track with my eating habits and since I am the only one in the house who likes treats, making something sweet would not be in my diets best interest (because I would eat it all myself). This smoothie is blueberry and strawberry with oats, chia seeds, almond milk, low calorie maple syrup and low fat vanilla coffee creamer (why not, right?). Not only does it look pretty but it's also berry delicious (pun intended)!

 

This was a pretty mundane week. I worked and Scott got sick with a stomach bug. He started feeling crappy at work on Monday and by that evening he was very sick. He stayed home sick Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday (which is a testament to how sick he was - he never misses work) and finally was feeling better by Friday. He is still not feeling 100% but everyday is a little better. Seeing as we didn't do much of anything outside of working and watching a new series on Netflix in the evenings (Stranger Things - I highly recommend it), I thought I would do a recap of my workouts this week. It was actually a really good week for me, workout wise, as I got to the gym after work four of the five days. This is still less than normal for me but I'm getting back into the groove!

Monday: CrossFit

I am still not able to do all of the WOD's posted at the box due to my hip injury and today was one of those days. The posted WOD was:

3 RFT (rounds for time):
30 Wallballs
800m run

I am not supposed to squat or run up hills yet so this workout was a no-go. Instead I did a few accessory things as well as my bench program:

Bench 4x5 @ 85#
Goodmornings 3x15 @ 95#
Calf Raises 3x20 @ 95#
Situps (w/feet up on box) 2x20

Tuesday: Shoulders

Since I can't work my lower body I am going to try and build my upper body. I haven't done a real "bodybuilding" circuit in a couple of months so it felt good to really hit my shoulders. I was so sore the next morning, it was great!

Wednesday: Rest Day

This was not a planned rest day. I was supposed to go to CrossFit again but I forgot that I had a bridal shower right after work for one of my coworkers. It probably wasn't a bad thing though because I was still very sore after work.

Thursday: Back & Hamstrings

I know I just said I'm not supposed to be training lower body but my physiotherapist did say that movements that focused on my hamstrings and NOT causing any strain to my hip flexors would be fine. So I did it. I was very cautious and didn't use any/much weight and let me tell you, after a couple months of not specifically targeting those muscles I was sore the next day!

Friday: CrossFit

Bench 3x4 @ 90#
WOD: AMRAP 10 (as many reps as possible in 10 minutes)
8 Pullups
10 Pushups
12 Situps
Total = 6 rounds + 18 reps

Saturday: Rest Day

I slept in with the pooch and took it easy the rest of the day as I had to work at 4pm.

Sunday: Run

If the rain lets up I plan to go out for an easy 3km with Roscoe this evening!

All in all it was a pretty successful week at the gym. I'm hoping to keep it up into next week even though it looks like it is going to be pretty busy! See you next week!

Sunday Brunch

Now that I am starting to gain a little blogging momentum and getting more comfortable with talking about my life I thought I would introduce a new weekly series I guess you could call it. I got the idea from one of the blogs I stalk frequently, Pretty Neat Living. Every Sunday I am going to talk about what happened in the previous week; highs, lows and anything else new or exciting that happened. We'll call it Sunday Brunch and I will try to always have some little treat or snack to go with the post (you know - 'cause it's brunch). They won't always be long but I thought it would be a good way to show what our weeks look like between work, the farm and having some semblance of a personal life. It's also a way to help me continue to get more at ease with sharing my life in internet land! So here goes nothing...

This turned out to be a really busy week for Scott and I. Since last Sunday I worked everyday but Wednesday and Saturday. That is the thing I find hardest about shift work - it's not switching back and forth between day and night shifts or even the sporadic schedules - it's never having a couple days off in a row. It makes the days that you do have off seem so busy because you're trying to get a million things done before you go back to work the next day. However, considering how busy it was, it was still a really great week.

The weather this week was spot on! Almost everyday was hot and sunny and the mornings were especially nice. It made getting up for work a little bit easier!

A beautiful morning in the Vale

One evening after work Scott and Roscoe met me in town and we went on a little adventure to find a swimming hole not far out of town. We found it and it was so neat! Not only did it have a little pool to swim in, there was also a small waterfall. You could tell that not many people go there either so we aren't spreading the word about our find - we are keeping it to ourselves for now!

Our attempts to get a selfie with Roscoe weren't exactly successful!

I finally bit the bullet and bought a French Press so that I can brew my own coffee at home! This probably isn't very exciting to anyone else but to me it was one of the highlights of the week. I have recently joined the coffee addicts club and cannot start my day without one. It was getting expensive buying one (or more) everyday but I also don't have room in my kitchen right now for a coffee maker. I was walking through Superstore the other day and they had French Press's on sale so I got one! So far, I'm liking it a lot, although now I need to find the right coffee for me!

Lastly, this week ended with both Scott and I being away for a bachelor and bachelorette party! Scott's crew rented a bus and went to Montreal for 3 days - you could say they like to go big or go home! The girls and I stayed in New Brunswick but we hired a party boat and spent the day on the Saint John River! Then we went out for supper and drinks in Fredericton. We all had such a blast but I can honestly say I am feeling it today! I had to work Sunday at 4pm and I feel like a zombie (how did we do this so often in college?!). All-in-all it was a great weekend for all and now the countdown is on for the wedding!!

Oh, I almost forgot - todays brunch was 4 ingredient sweet potato brownies! I got the recipe from another blogger that I follow, The Big Man's World. They are flourless, vegan, paleo and gluten free and oh-so delicious! I added a big scoop of Hoof Prints frozen yogurt, taking away all the healthiness of the brownies themselves, but making them even more tasty! I highly recommend you try these!

I hope you enjoyed this new series and I'll see you next week!