Blogger Envy & October Goals check in!

So, as we have all noticed, ya girl does not blog erry single day. I just don't think I'm terribly interesting and I'm not tryin to bore ya with my every day life. I swear, before I started this thing, friends would tell me that I was so funny and that I should blog about my weightloss and my daily life because it'd be great. But now that I'm here with my nice little layout, I'm like yeaaaaa I'm not so cool.

Insert blogger envy. Anyone I follow on bloglovin I truly like what they write. And you guys blog so often! Like every single day! But none of them are filler posts, like some blogs I've stumbled upon. I guess I just wish I had original/unique/interesting topics to write about each day. Because I truly do miss commenting/having my posts commented on, but I'd rather not write at all in place of writing some buuuuullshit. That would be a disgrace to my English degree I believe. So it'd be cool if you guys could help a sista out with ideas on how to get past boring blogger syndrome. Much appreciated.

MOVING ON.

I had some goals for October and I've done great on some, not so great on others.

Less stress, more laughter is going well. I try to make sure I laugh at least 3 times a day! That's really not too hard because my coworker Ashley is freakin hilarious. We goof off about 75% of the day, sprinkled in with some work of course.. She keeps me sane and it's like we share a brain most days.

Get to 165. I've been kickin ass and takin names this month. I started this month off at 175.4 (I really like to go up and down in my weight, obviously) and I'm down to 171.2. I was at 170.8 yesterday, but ya know Aunt Flo likes to fuck around with my emotions and have my weight all over the damn place when she comes to town. Little bitch. Honestly I don't think I'll get to 165, but I DO think 168 is totally realistic since I'm stickin to my macros and keeping my workouts on point.

No shopping till Boston. Big. Fuckin. FAIL. I was doing SO SO SO well. Leon went shopping and splurged on work clothes in Gap (my FAV) and other stores in the mall, and I didn't buy one thing. And then my favorite online boutique, Hazel & Olive, put this gorrrgeous dress online, and I had to have it. I thought about it for a day, asked if I really needed it, and then it was sold out. So I let it go. But then I found myself checking back everyday to see if it was restocked....and then today it was restocked and it magically ended up in my basket and then out of nowhere I was typing in my credit card number. Shit.

Ugh, with black tights and my new booties(another purchase that I felt I absolutely needed..), this sucker will be GORGEOUS.

The booties. Hanging my head in shame...But, but, they were on sale!!!

And theeeen Old Navy had a sale. I'm talkin 25% of $20 items. And then 40% off of one more item, that was $45. I HAD to. Cute sweater dress, puffer vest, and compression capris are on their way to meeee! I mean, at least I shopped on sale for all of these things...right? Well, besides the dress...but I digress.

Besides that big ole fail, water intake is still at 113 oz. a day. I pee A LOT. Like every 20-30 minutes. The other night I woke up at 3 am and could barely walk my bladder was so full. Note to self, do not drink after 8 pm. Running/Lifting is still going well too! I haven't done any steady state running, only HIIT sprints/hills on the treadmill. It's been hard but I'm actually enjoying it and I feel myself getting faster/not breathing like I'm gonna keel over any second.

Lastly, I've already finished 2 books. Emily Giffin's The Heart of the Matter and Laurie Halse Anderson's Wintergirls. Both suuuuper great reads. I find myself in an awkward place with reading material since I'm only 22. A part of me still loves the drama of YA novels, but another part of me enjoys the maturity of adult novels. Any and all suggestions for books are welcome! Anything but sci fi and mystery and I'm good to go.

Have I already posted this picture? I don't know. She's cute. 

-Crystal

Trader Joe's took my virginity!

Hey friends!

So this past weekend was quite busy for our little household. On Saturday we went to IKEA aka the motherland since Leon had a throwaway gift card from his job for me to spend. ummm HELL YES. So I bought some baking dishes since the one we had was destroyed by a nasty meal I made that burnt it. Woops. We were going to buy a coffee table too, but me being a considerate girlfriend, remembered that Leon likes to sit on the floor when he plays video games, so it would be in the way.

After IKEA we lounged around and napped for a while. That evening my old part time job at the dog daycare had their fall staff barbecue and my boss was sweet enough to invite me! So I went and chatted it up with my old coworkers for a bit and ate some delicious food, all within my macros of course, and had a great time. I even woke up to a weight loss! This is after eating crackers, hummus, cheese, a bratwurst, cheeseburger on potato bread, and cookies. Now you tell me which is better, "eating clean" or tracking your macronutrients. Macronutrients for the win my friends.

(IIFYM stands for If It Fits Your Macros)

Anywhoooo, Leon had to work on Sunday so I ventured off to Body Pump at my old gym, which just had a major renovation to the weight room that made me drool all over myself. TWO new squat racks, brand new flooring, its just..heavenly. I got to see some of the regulars I used to chat with and they said they missed me, which felt nice. Class felt pretty hard, probably because I haven't gone consistently since I switched gyms, so that was a big bowl of no fun.

Afterwards I went to the Farmer's Market about 20 minutes from our apartment. I freakin love that place. It's called the Mosaic District and it's got kind of yuppie/hipster feel that meshes really well. Plus there's a SweetGreen, and y'all know I love me some SweetGreen Kale Caesar Salad.

I only got a few things this time since I'm trying to save for my trip next month. In the sketchy white bags are homemade dry pasta! This is my second time getting it from this vendor, and I'm still satisfied with the taste and quality. This time I got garlic basil shells and lemon parsley trumpet shaped. I had the garlic basil yesterday...good lord it was amazing. And yes, those are yellow string beans. I'm slightly nervous to eat them, but the guy assured me that they taste like green ones, just a little sweeter. We shall see. Aaaand more organic tomato sauce and vodka sauce right off the farm. I know you can make it yourself, buuuut no thanks I'm lazy. All the ingredients are things I've actually heard of and the flavor is just incredible. Plus honeycrisp apples, because I LIVE for honeycrisp season.

After that little trip, I went to Trader Joe's for the very first time. I was raised in the suburbs of Washington DC, in a city called Manassas, Manass-hole to locals. Sooo no Trader Joe's. I'm the kind of person who needs time to really explore all of the shelves and aisles, so it took me some time to find a solid block of time to explore TJs, hence why we've lived here since July and I'm just now going. It was like stepping into another world of wonderfulness. And, to my surprise, you don't even need much time because the store is TINY compared to the grocery store I usually go to. I asked the check out clerk about the chain and she told that they believe in value and quality over quantity, which is why there aren't a lot of brands and it's a small store. They don't have every single thing you need, but they do have a LOT of specialty things that you can't find anywhere else. Can we say Fontina, Spinach, Garlic Chicken Sausage? Holy delicious. Plus it's suuuuper cheap compared to most grocery stores. I'm talkin $3 cheaper than average. On a regular restock trip I'll spend around $80. I only spent $42. And I got everything I needed.

Ignore my dirty fork. I was cooking, ok?

Organic pumpkin, sesame bagels that were lower in carbs than my usual bagels, Speculous cookie mocha swirl nut butter that I've heard so much about, and this garlic sauce that has been freakin delicious on just about everything. Pasta, vegetables, everything. I know I bought more obviously, but these were the most important. Only frustrating thing was that because Trader Joe's specializes in seasonal flavors, all of their delicious pumpkin things were basically gone and ya girl was not happy about it. I was about to tackle someone if I saw the last pack of pumpkin waffles in their cart. So serious. Same goes for pumpkin bagels. I will hurt a bitch. 

You have been warned, Trader Joe's customers of Northern Virginia.

Happy Mondayyyy! (Also, I'm pretty sure I'm the only person who actually had to work today. LAME.)

-Crystal

Dance Fitness & October Challenge w/ SkinnyMeg!

Hellooooo

So I've gotten back into lifting since the half marathon. I truly do love running, and it'll always be a great form of relaxation to me, but girrrrrrl I love the feeling of being strong. I love seeing my muscles flex in the mirror while the boys look on like, "this hussy can't possibly shoulder press those 35s.." OH BUT I CAN. I love it all. So I'm feelin pretty sore today since I haven't done much lifting in the past month or so.

I really wanted to rest today, but then I weighed in yesterday for the October Challenge with SkinnyMeg and apparently I was the biggest loser percentage wise for my team!! So duh, I wanna keep this momentum going, so I picked a low impact class at my gym. It said Zumba on the listing, and I've done that before so I thought why the hell not. That was a lie. It was not Zumba. It was "dance fitness".

HOLY BABY JEEBUS IT WAS AMAZING.

It was a mix of loud, Hispanic, full of bass music and we did lots of booty shakin, jumping, footwork, arm swinging aaaand sweating. It was the greatest rush and I will definitely be back. At first it was kind of hard because it's set routines that everyone knows and ya girl was fumbling for a bit. But I've danced my whole life, up until I graduated highschool, so I'm reasonably good at picking up choreography. The funniest part about it was that the instructor walked in, and she's this TINY little white lady, around 35-40 years old and she just didn't look like the hip-hop/latin dance type. I dont know, I just expected some loud, curvy woman. Do not ever judge a book by its cover. I've never seen ANYONE, white or black, move like she does. I didn't know butts could move like that. I also didn't know feet could move like that. I just feel like I want to be her best friend now.

So back, to the October Challenge w/ SkinnyMeg. It is so great. It's like a smaller version of the Summer #SMChallenge. It's only around 150 people instead of the 1500, so you can see the familiar faces and whatnot. We're all split up in teams, and there's different goals each week . First week was water intake and tracking food, this week is HIIT workouts and protein intake! I'm not really learning anything new, but it does feel really good to feel like someone might call me out for slackin on tracking food or not losing any weight.

Also I have no pictures because I'm a shitty blogger. Workin on it...

-Crystal

Woodrow Wilson Bridge Half - Recap!

Thank the sweet 6 pounds 4 ounces baby Jesus in the manger that half marathon is OVER! I mean yea, I love running, but uhhh yea, half marathon training is no walk in the park. I've been training since freakin July.

Ya girl is tired.

A little recap shall we? Ok great.

I woke up at the buttcrack of dawn. Literally. 4:30 AM my Ellie Goulding alarm went off because its the only one (besides my Sara Bareilles alarm) that I can stand without wanting to stab someone. But I digress. I go "try" to try and avoid tummy troubles later if you catch my drift, but obviously my body was like "bitch, it's 4:30 am, the only thing we need to do right now is sleep." So I ate my half bagel, got dressed, and dragged Leon out the door with me at 5:20. Took my happy ass to the shuttle bus, and of course we got lost on the way, but whatever. There was some hussy on the shuttle laughing hysterically with her friends about whatever the hell could possibly be funny at 5:45 in the morning and she was getting some dirty looks. I'm all for being a morning person, but really, its before 6 am. Chill homie.

We got to the start line at o'dark thirty and it is FREEZING out. My phone said it was 45 degrees and felt like 36, so naturally everyone was in a super mood. More like everyone is huddling around for body heat while the folks who came alone...ME... are standing alone and cursing the heavens for not running with a friend. When it got close to start time I did some jumping jacks, high knees, and generally just bounced around like a dumbass trying to get warm. Got in my little pace area (I chose the 10-11 minute one), and BOOM HERE WE GOOOOO.

I knew at some point my body would give me a big ole "fuck you" and I'd have to go numba 2, so I figured I need to start out fast in case I need to slow down later for tummy troubles. My first 3 miles were all around 9:30 which was quite surprising. Granted the first mile is all downhill, but still, I take what I can get mmkay? Around mile 4 the cramps set in and I'm cursing under my breath about how I just wanted one good freakin race, like seriously? I got up early to make sure I could go, and NOW I have to go!? Nope. Not stopping. I'll hold it. And so I held it.

It was a beauuutiful course. Sorry, I was really trying for a PR so stopping for pictures was not happening. But we pretty much ran the length of the GW Parkway in Northern VA, along the Potomac River. And because it was so cold, fog was coming off the water as the sun rose and it was just amazing.

Found this online. Gorgeous right?! Seriously. One of the best courses I think. It had rolling hills, but you could barely notice them because of the major downhills every couple miles. There was a sufficient amount of water stops as well. It seemed like every other mile honestly. And gatorade at every water stop! I had my handheld so I didn't stop, but if I didn't, best believe I'd be all over that. The only thing I heard people complain about was the lack of porta pottys at the start. There was around 10-15 I think, and there were around 5000 runners. Yea, bad.

After accepting my tummy troubles, the miles kind of went by quickly until mile 9. Apparently the major change this year was extending the race a mile into Old Town Alexandria so that we didn't have to run on gravel. It seemed like the mile into town was never freakin ending and I was getting frustrated. At that point my stupid shot bloks were hard from the cold and ineffective, so I was just ready to be done. Then came the bridge. I had practiced running it before, but when I did I was only at mile 7 or 8 of my run. For the actual race, the bridge is at mile 11. Big difference. That's the bridge from the Parkway view. We ran on the pedestrian pathway that runs on the side of the bridge so they didn't have to shut it down. There was a pretty obnoxious hill at the end of the bridge that you have to run up to actually cross over the bridge, so that was SUPER at mile 12. 

Like so.

After that we finished the last mile along a paved/gravel path to the finish. My mom, brother, and boyfriend were all there and it made my whole day to see them. Pretty sure my mom was crying. She's never seen me run before so I'm sure it was a proud mama moment. I finished that sucker in 2:35:04 and I was happy as hell. I wanted to finished in 2:30 or better, but considering the tummy troubles, my right headphone not staying in my ear at all, and my bib ripping on both top holes (took some walking/fixing/pinning), I'd say 2:35 is damn good. 

My brother looks is 6 years younger than me and 6 feet taller than me, so that's great. Sorry you got cut out homie. My mom is precious. And clearly I have a gatorade addiction. Went home and napped with my dog and my man, and then Leon wanted to go shopping so I got my happy ass up. Didn't buy anything by the way, because I'm trying to save for my trip to Boston, more on that later. I ate Chipotle and it was delicious and I had froyo later on. I do what I want. Woke up a pound heavier and I said "I don't give a fuuuuuck because I ran 13 miles yesterday. *insert middle finger and dancing*"

And then I put on my sexy new boots and went to work. 

-Crystal