Chipotle, Chickens, & a quick Shoulder Workout!

Happy Wednesday everyone! I'm on the last day of my staycation, and it's been a much needed break. I feel nice and refreshed, and ready to tackle work tomorrow. 

Tuesday morning before heading out to lunch, I did a shoulder and biceps workout. I love having my adjustable dumbbells since I haven't outgrown them...yet hehe ;)

They can go up to about 40 pounds so that leaves me plenty of room to work with considering I'm only breaking in to using 20s now. My upper body is such a weak spot for me but I'm proud of the progress I've made especially with my shoulders! Turns out I can grow my delts quite nicely but biceps are a whole other story, talk about slow pokes. 

I did a combination of shoulders and biceps with more of a slight focus on shoulders because I personally love working shoulders and biceps aren't a huge goal of mine. I don't like neglecting a single muscle group, though, so I usually work biceps and triceps in on shoulder and back days! 

Those last two sets are killer! I like adding in challenges at the end such as reps until failure, drop sets, or more dynamic sets to really utilize that muscle and feel the burn. This took me about 35-40 minutes and after lifting, I did some incline walking on the treadmill for about 20 minutes and then took Lola and Layla for a walk. 

For post-workout, I had a strawberry yogurt parfait. 

Like I've said, I'm LOVING all the fresh fruits! And Sam's Club strawberries are still the best I've found! I mean just look at the lil beauties. 

For the parfait, I just mixed together a container of Oikos Triple Zero strawberry greek yogurt, and 100g of fresh strawberries. It was delicious! 

For lunch, Amanda and I treated our mom to Chipotle! My go-to is always the chicken salad without the dressing then add in fajita vegetables, salsa, and more lettuce. It's only 10g carbs, 7g fat, and 35g protein. 

In the afternoon, Amanda and I had to return one of the chickens that turned out to be a rooster! I couldn't stop laughing because I think it's hilarious but Amanda is less than amused haha. It just so happened to be the one chicken that was let's just say she/he was on the slower side. My theory is it took him this long to figure out he was a rooster because he's a little dumb since he should've started crowing awhile ago. The way we found out is also slightly hilarious. I was taking the dogs out and heard this really strange noise. At first I thought it was this little dog yapping away in the neighbor's yard. It had this hoarse and slightly strangled type quality or something so I had no idea what was going on. I came inside and immediately Amanda goes "Sam, did you hear that weird noise? It's Bubbles! She's crowing". But it wasn't like a real rooster's crow because like I said it kinda sounded like a small dog getting strangled.  He kept at it though for a bit, and when Amanda sent a picture to the chicken farmers they confirmed it was a rooster. So, we took him back yesterday before dinner, and now Amanda is on the hunt for more chickens! They're getting some older ones soon so we'll probably be making a trip back. Amanda has been dubbed an official crazy chicken lady! 

Power Workout & Lunch

Yesterday morning, I did a power workout at home to kick off my Monday morning! I've been loving my mini staycation except my body missed the memo that I'm off work and don't need to get up at 5am. I wake up around 5 or so but then I fall back asleep until about 6:30-7 and by that point I know it's no use trying to sleep in anymore!

It's funny because if you told me a few years ago that I couldn't sleep in past 7am anymore I'd laugh and laugh and laugh, and then wouldn't wake up until noon. I don't know how I used to be able to sleep that late! Random story but I had a dream the other night where I slept til 10:45am and was actually really upset haha! I was panicking that my whole day was wasted, and that I wouldn't be able to get anything done. 

Anyway, here's the workout that I did! If you're doing this workout at a gym or your own house, the jogging took me about 3 minutes and the sprinting about a minute and a half. In case you need a reference point! You can definitely use a treadmill but I simply went right out my front door and that was just as easy. 

It took me about an hour, and I was POURING sweat when I was done! 

One of my favorite parts about summer is all the fresh fruits now in season! I picked up some peaches this week, and I'm in heaven! As part of my lunch, I had a fresh peach chopped up with some plain Greek yogurt and of course a trusty Quest bar. 

Later today Amanda and I are making a trip back to the chicken farm. Hilarious story (well I think it is but Amanda doesn't hahaha) but one of the chickens turned out to be a rooster! It was Bubbles, and so I told Amanda that we have to rename him. So now he's Michael Bublé for the next couple hours until we send him back. We might end up coming back with more chickens as an "exchange" (Amanda's idea, not mine) so I'll keep you guys posted!  

Fourth of July Weekend Recap

Happy Monday everyone! It's an especially happy one for me since I'm home for a staycation! I had Friday off work for the holiday but then I took today through Wednesday off just for a little vacation. Things have been crazy at work with transitioning in a new coworker plus training her so the timing worked out perfectly. 

Alsoooo, Lola is visiting for the week! Needless to say the whole family is thrilled, especially Layla since she loves her big sister. 

My aunt, uncle, and cousins are all away at the beach, and of course they're right where all those shark attacks have been happening along the Carolina coast! So prayers please that they all stay safe because Hannah told me they're still swimming and going in the water. I told them that's probably not the best idea unless they want to see Shark Week live in action. 

Saturday morning both the pups were feeling extra lazy! My aunt was joking around and told me to make sure Lola actually got rest and relaxation since she knew Layla would be all over her. So, I sent her this picture to reassure her that Lola was getting plenty! 

Lola especially loves coming to our house since she's allowed on the furniture to snuggle :) in fact she's curled up with my mom right now! 

So for dinner that night, I made a little cauliflower stir fry that was really good! I've seen all kinds of recipes for cauliflower rice but I wanted bigger chunks. So that's what I did! I used the bigger chunks of cauliflower as the main base of the stir fry then added in some chicken, broccoli, frozen peas, and frozen corn. I tossed it all together in the pan with some soy sauce, garlic, salt, pepper, and let it cook! It was low-carb and macro-friendly. 

For the Fourth of July, we didn't do anything fancy. My friend Megan was in town for the weekend so we got together for lunch. It was great since she was able to catch up with my mom and Amanda too because she hasn't seen them since she left for Connecticut in January. We went to Burgatory and I got the elk burger again! I don't think I can ever get anything different than that when I go. It hit the spot! Burgatory also has gluten-free options so Amanda was able to enjoy her usual bison burger with a gluten-free bun, and a gluten-free milkshake. 

Sunday morning I had overnight oats before heading off to church. The salty caramel Jif whips is quickly becoming one of my favorites for making overnight oats. It's always bittersweet because I don't want the peanut butter to be gone but at the same time I know that I'll be getting overnight oats haha! 

For dinner, we grilled some salmon and I sauteed up one of the zucchinis from my aunt's garden. It was HUGE, and easily fed the three of us and then some. I have no idea how all the vegetables grow to the size that they do in her garden, and trust me Amanda is desperate to figure out her secret! 

As a sauce on the salmon I mixed together some sweet and hot mustard, some honey mustard, and whole grain mustard. I just eyeballed amounts and tasted it until I got the flavor I wanted. The whole dinner took less than 30 minutes and was healthy and delicious! 

Hope you all had a great holiday weekend, and a good start to the week!