Weekend Highlights

Since the holidays are over, weekends are very blissful around The Parker household. We are finally back into our usual routine and if you know me, you know I love my routine!

Friday was definitely my highlight of the weekend. I finally got my 200 lb squat in the gym. This was definitely a PR (personal record) for me! And now, my name finally gets to go up on the 'big board'. Thanks to my coach for all the pep talk and to my husband for shoving food down my throat to ensure I had enough strength! Next up, 225lb.

 

Sundays have also become another one of my favorite days. Thanks to my friend Lauren, I have quickly fallen in love with hot yoga. Every Sunday I get hydrated up then go to a 1 1/2 hour hot yoga class where the room temperature is 100 degrees. I have never sweat so much in my entire life! I find myself looking forward to this one class all week though. I leave feeling so refreshed, detoxified and stretched. It's a great way to end the weekend. Yoga gives your mind a time to rest and revitalize. It's great for the mind and body.

I particularly like this studio because they are really involved in the community. Each month they choose a local charity organization to partner with and support. Read about January here: http://y1now.com/karmayoga/
This is a picture from Yoga One (the studio I have been attending). The classes are PACKED and huge. It's a great atmosphere! I'm so thankful to live in an active city where the opportunities for physical fitness are endless!

 

A little note on why yoga is important. This week I stumbled across this great article on why yoga is good for gym junkies. I'm in the gym lifting weights all week...this was a great read for me!
 http://www.negharfonooni.com/2013/01/10/9-reasons-why-yoga-is-good-for-gym-junkies/
 

Twenty Thirteen

Ironically enough my last blog was about a year ago. I wrote about the New Year and how I was going to 'blog more' HAH!

Well, the past is the past and I will not look back. I have so much to blog about this year and I am so excited to start again! In the meantime, let me catch you up on what happened in 2012.

2012 At A Glance

February I turned 25! This was a tough one...no longer in my 'early twenties'
April Took a trip to The Big Apple with my besties, Alisha, Sasha & HG!
May  We FINALLY bought our first home! It's got so much character and we couldn't be happier with where we ended up. We are in a fantastic neighborhood with a great location. Absolutely loving it here!

July Started Crossfit. A little obsessed
October Celebrated our 2 year anniversary!
December Traveled to St. Louis to visit my family for Christmas

What's To Come For 2013

 

 

More blogs!!

 



A New Year

I don't even want to look at the date of my last post. New Year, new beginnings, MORE posts! I have three new years resolutions. 1) Get into Yoga 2) Eat more organic 3) BLOG MORE

I didn't really make life changing resolutions this year, but in a way I kind of did. I am trying to make improvements to my quality of life. For the past several years, I have become slightly obsessed with counting calories and exercising. In my opinion, it is very important to always be in a state of bettering yourself physically! Right now, I am trying to work on getting my body fat down.

As for my new years resolutions, so far so good! Took my first yoga class of the year today, stocked my fridge with basically the entire produce department (all of which was organic) and now I'm blogging!

Let my show you my weekend fling...

Soo, I went out and bought a juicer. In an effort to start the year off right, I wanted to 'detox'. I searched through a ton of green juice recipes and decided on Green Lemonade. As I was feeding the kale stalks into the juicer I was only thinking to myself how disgusting this was going to be. I was SO wrong, it was surprisingly delicious! Not to mention beyond super healthy for you...

Green Juice Detox Recipe (Green Lemonade)
1 head romaine lettuce
5-6 stalks of kale
2 sweet apples (I used Fuji)
1 whole lemon
1-2 tablespoons of fresh ginger root (I used 2)

Yogi quote of the day from my Peach Detox tea bag: "Your greatness is not what you have, it's what you give." I like that!

ABC's of Me

I was blog surfing and found this that someone had posted. It's a little silly, but fun to do! 

1. Age: 24
2. Bed size: Queen
3. Chore you hate: Cooking!
4. Dogs:  My little 4 month old baby Golden Retriever, Dexter
5. Essential start to your day: COFFEE. Every day.
6. Favorite color:  Green..??
7. Gold or silver:  Gold
8. Height: 5'2 1/2
9. Instruments that you can play: Does Mary Had A Little Lamb on the piano count?
10. Job: Work in the buying department at Belk Corporate
11. Kids: NONE! Not for a loooong time.
12. Live:  Charlotte, NC
13. Mom’s name: Cheryl
14. Nicknames: Jamerz...Small Fry
15. Overnight hospital stays: When I was little I had a concucion for falling out of a swing
16. Pet peeve: Loud Breathers. People who eat loud
17. Quote from a movie: "It's go time", "Oohh, the big speech", "Be yourself, be yourself", "Honey, what are you doing any Joyce's?" -Just Friends. I could literally quote that movie all day!
18. Righty or lefty: Righty
19. Sibling: Only child
20. Time you wake up: If I'm working out, 5:00. If I'm not working out, 6:45-7:00.
21.  Underwear: "It's a thong!"
22. Vegetables you dislike: Squash
23. What makes you run late: My dog, Dex when he doesn't listen and won't use the bathroom outside! 
24. X-rays: huh? 
25. Yummy food you make: Reeses chocolate peanut butter cupcakes, my hubby's favorite :)
26. Zoo favorite animal: Girraffe, they are so funny looking!

Feather Holiday?

For the past several days I've been debating on how I am going to decorate for Christmas this year. We are in a new place which calls for new decorations, right?! I'm contemplating 2 different looks right now...

Using some of my existing decorations and branching out into the peacock feather theme (I have a ton left over from my wedding)

or...Gold and Silver

Both of them have such a different feel. I can't decide...What do you think??

I will post pics once I'm all done! 

It starts TODAY

15 minutes of Abs
45 minutes of total body strength training

Body of a goddess? Yes, please!  You're probably thinking, what a terrible time to start trying to get fit! You are right...the holidays are probably the worst time of year to try and start working really hard on your body. However, I am very determined! I figure I have about 4-5 months before the winter is gone and before I'll have to start shedding clothing from my every day wardrobe. My goal is to by spring time, be in the best shape I've ever been in! I don't necessarily want to loose weight I just want to shed fat and get toned! Pintrest has provided me with PLENTY of motivation!! I have all the resources I need at my fingertips (gym, healthy food, motivating people)...the only thing holding me back are my excuses (and love for chocolate). Those didn't seem to hold these chicks back...

So many people think that working out will just cancel out the things that you eat...SO NOT TRUE! You can't out-exercise a bad diet...

 What's holding you back??
Motivation is what gets you started, habit is what keeps you going. Think about it...

Usual Sunday Post

What a fantastic weekend! We had such an eventful weekend and it made me so thankful for our wonderful friends! Old and new :)

I started off the weekend by leaving work early to go see....

It was considered a 'work outting' since the audience is our Junior customer. Pretty good reason to get out of the office on a Friday afternoon if you ask me! Had dinner with Charlie and Alex at Cowfish to end the night. Accidentally left 3 20's on the table...guess the waitor had a good night in tips that night! Whoops....

My best friend Alisha and her husband Zac came to visit on Saturday for her birthday! We had a lot of good food, shopped and went out! It was suuch a blast! I haven't gotten to spend some QT with her in a long time-it was well overdue. It was so nice to have my shopping partner back and SO nice to have her opinion when it comes to picking out clothes. I've gotten so accustomed to living with a man 24/7..it was nice to have a girls opinion again!

Also, some of our college girlfriends were in town for the weekend so we got to go out with them! What a great addition to the weekend!

To wrap up the weekend...we went to brunch this morning (of course), came home and cuddled on the couch, watched a super weird movie and took a 2 hour nap. I'm getting ideas from Pintrest on how to decorate for Christmas and planning what we're making for Thanksgiving.