Happy Tuesday loves!
Last week was quite possibly one of the most miserable work weeks of my life. I cannot seem to fathom why people are so rude to each other and in my line of work it seems that I just have to take it and move on. I didn’t do a great job of letting it roll off my back and decided to take a few mental health days. I’m flying to Connecticut to visit my family tomorrow so the extra two days has helped me get my life in order.
I seemed to have caught the Harry Potter bug about a decade too late. I feel like a preteen all over again. I finally started reading the books and I am just in love. Can I just go to Harry Potter world @ Universal now?! (Hint, Hint … Matt). I started these last week and finished the first one & began the second already.
I had to give a big training at work on Thursday & was so nervous I had to come home on Wednesday and just chill. Matt was having a crazy night too so we ordered food from Pizzetta’s, for the thousandth time, and went to bed at 7:45. It was still bright outside, haa, but felt soooooo nice. Salad>Chicken Parm, or so I tell myself.
The training went fabulously on Thursday, I made it through without skipping any important details or getting tounge twisted. Friday felt like a huge weight had been taken off my shoulders which led to an early wake up call. I am rushing & running late always so when I wake up early it’s quite the victory that should be celebrated with makeup, iced coffee’s & shopping trips #yearningforfall
We decided that this was the official last weekend of summer, even though it’ll be 90 degree’s here until probably October. When I was growing up my birthday always fell really close to labor day (sep 6th) and it always seemed to get cooler around that time. Even though we are down south now and the weather never cooperates, in my mind labor day is still the official end to summer. Since we deemed this the last weekend of summer it seemed only fitting that we spend the day at the beach. First of course we had to stop at Wake N Bake for donuts! Matt got the white chocolate, strawberry cheesecake, & wake and bacon.
I don’t really like donuts so I always get the fritter. They’ve only had blueberry when we’ve been recently which is amazing but this time they had the apple! Definitely not as good as blueberry but perfect for our “summer send off weekend”
The weather was perfect until it got really overcast and started sprinkling. We had already been there for a few hours at that point so it wasn’t a big deal.
For dinner we went to …. Pizzetta’s because I can’t get enough of their dang salads. They also were embracing fall and had angry orchard cocktails out! I had an apple sangria & Matt had a Whiskey/Angry Orchard mix.
Sunday was so fah-reaking busy. We went to breakfast & then to the gym. Then the next million hours were spent running around town wrapping up a bunch of stuff. Matt is working towards some big changes for our future so we had to get quite a few things. Meal Prepping was easy because I didn’t have to do much for me so I made Matt’s lunches. He loves this recipe and it’s become a staple in our house – SO easy.
Pepperjack Chicken (adapted from this recipe)
Ingredients:
Chicken Breasts (5-6)
Low Sodium Stove Top Stuffing Mix (Chicken)
98% Fat Free Cream of Chicken Soup
1/4c milk
Pepperjack cheese slices (her recipe calls for swiss and i’m sure that’s great too)
Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350
2. Layer chicken on the bottom of a baking dish.
3. Cover with a layer of cheese slices
4. Mix the milk with the cream of chicken soup & pour all over the cheese.
5. Pour the box of dry stuffing mix on top (you can do 1/2 or the entire box).
6. Bake for 45-60 minutes. This will depend on how thick your chicken breasts are. Mine are always so thick so I go 60 minutes.
Usually I make rosemary roasted baby red potatoes to go with this or some steamed broc. This picture doesn’t look nearly as appetizing as it is.
After all that cooking we didn’t have anything for dinner & had to run out. We grabbed dollar taco’s from the new Island’s downtown. It’s like a Wilmington staple and Matt had never been there.
Matt was off work on Monday as well so we could run around town yet again. We had to go to the gym in the morning, which I hate. I am a schedule and routine kind of girl & hate when it gets thrown off. I’m not very flexible and that’s something that I try to work on. I did end up having a killer glutes/hamstrings workout though (posted below). I like to split my leg workouts up when i have time – it’s such a big body part I find it’s easier when I focus on glutes/hams one day and then quads/calves another day with plyometric work sprinkled all over.
I don’t like to write down sets/reps – sometimes I do 2 sets of 30 and sometimes I do 4 sets of 10 – just depends on what gives me the best burn.
warmup: 5 min on the elliptical + lying hamstring curls
SM reverse lunges supersetted with wide sumo squats
Cable Kickbacks – few sets with a bent knee, few with a straight leg
DB romanian DL Supersetted with a glute kickback machine
BB good mornings
BB hip thrusts (**fav booty exercise)
abductor machine 4 ways (1 set leaning all the way forward, 1 set with your hips elevated off the seat, 1 set normal, 1 set pulses really heavy)
followed this with cardio + some plyo work (jump squats, pop squats, jump lunges, 180 squat jumps, etc)
After Matt dragged me around town (Fingers crossed we hear good news though) I forced him to do some shopping with me. Also, got my stitch fix in the mail – eek! I could keep everything in the box again but I’m trying to resist. This top is keeper though 🙂
That’s about it! I’m off to run some errands today including my Mazda’s 1st oil change! I can’t believe I’ve had that car for so long <3. I can’t share too many details about what’s going on but if you are reading this please send some silent prayers & good vibes our ways. We are making big moves towards the future and don’t want anything other than what God has planned for us. We can only take it so far and then it’s truly in his hands.
I’ll be checking in when I get back from Connecticut & will be a year older, oy vey!
thepurcellproject 