lift. meal plan. relax.

thursday (part deux)

had a great lifting day. back & bi. no pictures, but here's my workout.

warm up:
15 minutes on the stairmaster

back
* wide grip pull up (assisted):
   8 reps (2 sets displacing 52lbs) 
   8 reps (2 sets displacing 58lbs)* close grip pull down:
   50lbs 8 reps
   60lbs 8 reps
   70lbs 6 reps (2 sets)
* cable row:
   60lbs 8 reps (4 sets)

biceps
* standing dumbell curl:
   10lbs 8 reps (2 sets)
   10 lbs 6 reps
* incline bicep curl:
   7.5lbs 8 reps (3 sets)
* dumbell preacher curl:
   7.5lbs 8 reps (3 sets)

i ended with a few light, relaxing stretches. this is something i keep forgetting to do on lift days. with my sore hammy however (did i mention that? turns out i strained my left hammy on leg day last week), i realize that stretching is not something i should be skipping. 

oh, and this haha. adding in this sad picture of my clay owl from my team outing at Color Me Mine. somehow, i ended up with the defective clay piece. just my luck, right? the paint would not soak in, no matter how many coats i applied. 

they have this really awesome effect called the shaving cream effect. essentially, after applying 3 layers of a base coat, you choose a contrasting color that gets swirled onto a layer of shaving cream that's spread across a sheet of tin foil. you then wrap your piece up in that shaving cream and color swirled sheet. next, the tin foil is removed and the clay piece is rinsed. the swirled color is supposed to stay. i should've known better considering the troubles i was having with the paint soaking in, but i gave it a shot anyways (this girl does not give up!)... but when it came time to rinse the shaving cream off, all the paint came off with it. what a sad, sad thing. :( luckily, the lady attending to our group told me to take my piece home and that i can bring it back for  a credit. they'll essentially give me a new piece and one free hour to paint it. the dude and i are going to go back and have a date night soon. :)

before & after: sad, sorry little owl :(

***

friday

i had a pretty lazy friday morning. slept in and it felt great! spent the rest of the morning checking in with my favorite blogs. i sort of let time get away from me, so by the time i was ready to shower it was past 10am and i'd completely forgotten maintenance was shutting our complex's water off from 10am to 5pm to repair the main line. ughhhhhh... of all days to spend the morning on my reading couch!! i made due of course. it sure as heck limited what i could do though. no laundry (except for folding what was already washed). no dishes. good thing i had some filtered water to get me through the day! i'd like to think i got taste of what it was like back in the days that required drawing water from the well. except that my well was a refrigerated brita water pitcher lol. it really did take thought having to ration water for the day. it's amazing how much one person needs to do something as simple as wash her hands over the course of 7 hours!

good thing this lunch didn't require the use of water!

after the dude came home, we looked at houses for a bit (we're moving in a little over a month!) and once again time escaped us both. i'd planned on a full hour of cardio, but by the time we unglued our eyeballs from the computer screen i was hungry to the point of having a headache and being a wee bit grumpy. so mini cardio sesh it was. 

workout:
35 minutes elliptical

followed that up with a bit of stretching. 

gym OOTD: love my cozy Color Run shirt

we allowed ourselves a night to eat out and chose a pretty good spot, if i may say so myself. the place is called Greens & Protein. it's right next to our old gym, and has been a hot spot ever since it opened. they offer a variety of protein shakes, freshly pressed juices, wraps, burgers and breakfast items, all made with natural, organic, wholesome ingredients for the health-conscious crowd. i ordered the black bean veggie burger (containing lentils, black beans, brown rice, mushroom, celery, carrot, onion, cilantro, basil & garlic) with butter lettuce, tomato, alfalfa sprouts, cashews and vegan mayo, all on a gluten-free bun. i opted for the jicama "fries" over the tofu "fries." the bun was a bit very dense, and the jicama could have been seasoned better, but overall i thoroughly enjoyed my meal. 

i'd choose this over a regular burger any day!

***
saturday

saturday was a day of getting things done. i allowed myself a relaxing morning, and then put my booty into gear to tackle my "to-do" list. laundry. dishes. general house straightening. wiping down the kitchen fan (with pets in the house i have to keep tabs on the fans so they don't get gunky with hair. yuck, i know). taking care of bills. meal planning and shopping list writing. oh, and stretching/icing my hammy. 

banana, peanut butter protein shake. aka my fav!

meal planning = prepping for success

my boys have no prob letting me tackle the tough stuff

by the time jared got home from work, i felt so accomplished and on top of the world! he got right to work putting together his meal plan and shopping list so that we could do our weekly grocery haul a day early. it was a goal for us, since lately we've only been planning meals out through friday (sometimes thursday), which leaves us with an empty fridge by the weekend... and more prone to eating out because we normally don't shop again until sunday. shame, shame... but that is all turning around!

next was of course... gym time! legs and shoulders day baby!

warm up:
10 minutes on the stairmaster

legs
* squats: (today was my first time doing barbell squats instead of using the smith machine, so i started out light to ensure i was in good form)
55lbs 8 reps
75lbs 8 reps
85lbs 8 reps (2 sets)
* deadlift:
55lbs 8 reps (2 sets)
65lbs 8 reps
*hip abduction:
60lbs 8 reps
65lbs 8 reps
75lbs 6 reps
* hip adduction:
70lbs 8 reps
75lbs 8 reps
85lbs 8 reps
* standing calf raise:
285lbs 15 reps
300lbs 12 reps
315lbs 10 reps
345lbs 8 reps

shoulders
* military press:
   40lbs 8 reps (2 sets)
   50lbs 6 reps
   60lbs 6 reps
* dumbbell lateral raise:
   7.5lbs 8 reps (3 sets)
* bent over reverse fly:
   7.5lbs 8 reps (2 sets)
   10lbs 8 reps

stretched it out a bit afterwards. my left hammy is feeling 182% better after taking it easy, icing, and stretching this past week. 

so proud of the definition i'm beginning to see in my arms!

caught dinner out again (second time this week), knowing we couldn't make it through grocery shopping on empty stomachs. plus we needed to refuel after a good workout. 

we ended up trying out this new teriyaki place next to our gym. there's a great teriyaki place over by our old gym (along with all of the other health centered eateries) that offers a variety of meals for the body comp trainee, to the health conscious, to the "see food" dieter. honestly, i thought this spot by our current gym would be similar... but boy was i wrong!! unfortunately, i didn't know this until after i'd ordered and received my food. boo! i ordered the low-carb entree, which came with veggies and a choice of a protein. the menu specifically said "sauce on the side," prompting me to order it (i'm not big on sauces in the first place). i chose chicken, because although i'm not the biggest fan, it was the healthiest selection (or so i thought) and i am really trying to incorporate a bit of white meat back into my diet after years of being meatless and then another few years of being pescetarian. well, turns out that everything is marinated in a stir-fly sauce (the cashier told me this after i brought my saucy meal back to the counter in confusion)!! so even though it wasn't drenched in teriyaki sauce, it wasn't the steamed veggies and grilled chicken i thought i was getting. and it wasn't even white meat... oy... i ate it begrudgingly, since i'd already paid for it. some people would have asked for a refund and left, but it was my own mistake for not asking enough questions before ordering. i now know never to go back. 

wrapped up the evening with grocery shopping and more laundry. i have the most exciting life ever, don't i?!