Well Merry Christmas! I hope Santa was good to everyone. Hopefully you made the Nice List and didn’t end up with coal in your stocking!
We spent Christmas Eve with my family at my grandparents. We had a gift exchange amongst all of us and enjoyed three different kinds of soup. I made Donny’s aunt Judy’s Clam Chowder recipe that must be made every year and it turned out fantastic! I also made a batch of this Chipotle Chicken Soup. My grandma made a homemade chicken noodle soup. I loved all the soups but I basically ate dinner from the chocolate tray. Hahaha my aunt and uncle always make a ton of chocolate-covered everything and it is all so delicious!
Donny & I spent the morning together relaxing, which is a change. I made coffee and then these Banana Pancakes. I actually made Banana Nut Pancakes and added some chopped walnuts to the recipe. Delicious!
It is time for this week’s Anything & Everything Friday post where I discuss whatever I feel like discussing!
1.NicoleWilkins.com: I signed up as a member of Nicole Wilkin’s page, NicoleWilkins.com. She is a four-time winner for the Figure Olympia and pretty much a bad ass in my opinion. I follow her on Instagram and she will show short clips of different workouts or meals she prepares. I finally broke down and I am trying one month right now. If I use it a lot I’ll most likely pay for the annual membership. I spent a couple hours watching her videos and vlogs about fitness and food the other night. She has one on there detailing exactly what she ate 24 hours before the Olympia and really gets into detail about why she ate what she ate. I enjoyed watching them. A few weeks ago she posted a quick video on Instagram about a plyometric leg workout that she created and I was quite intrigued. I decided to make that the first workout I tried and it was killer! It was a heavy strength move for your legs (squats, lunges, leg press, etc) superset with a plyometric move (jump squats, jump lunges, box jumps, etc). The worst one for me was the jump lunges. Yikes, it killed me. I’ll keep you posted on how I like the website. She does a weekly vlog post for FitnessRx for Women and you can find those on their website.
2.How To Stop At Just One Cookie: I had a conversation with a gal in my bootcamp class about this. It has taken me a couple years now to figure out how to back away from sweets and how to say “no thank you” when offered a certain treat or dessert. Don’t get me wrong, I still enjoy sweets occasionally (like chocolate covered anything) and will have dessert sometimes after dinner. I have really worked hard to figure out how to be “picky” about what sweets I choose. I won’t necessarily gobble up 12 prepackaged cookies after lunch, but if my grandma makes her homemade cinnamon rolls then I might have one! I have realized that each brownie that I come across is mostly likely not the last brownie that I will ever encounter. I am a little more picky when and what occasion I enjoy dessert. This article by Sohee Lee on Greatist.com How to Stop at Just One Cookie breaks down how she has overcome some of the temptations. It also makes you realize that it is alright if you enjoy your favorite sweets every once in a while. If cookies are your favorite thing in the whole world then eat a cookie! If you love brownies (yes, I LOVE brownies) then indulge in a brownie every once in a while. Don’t eat the whole pan, but enjoy a brownie!
3.2016 Wellness Trends: I always find this information interesting. What is going to be the big “food thing” this next year? Well & Good.com put together a list of the 16 things they think are going to be trending this next year. Seaweed, matcha and minerals are the food related items they say will be trending. We’ll see. Vitamins get all the attention but they think minerals will be a hot topic. Intense fitness classes is another trend that I dig and hope that it does become big!
4.Tea Maker: We bought a bunch of Market Spice loose-leaf tea when we were in Seattle. I have been making one cup at a time with this Bloom Floating Tea Infuser, but if I want more than just one cup I’ve used our French press. Last weekend I decided to make coffee for me & Donny and our coffee had a slight hint of Market Spice tea! Donny happened to find out what AmazonPrime is all about (we’ve had packages showing up all week because he realizes how cool and convenient it is!). He found this tea infuser that lets you make large batches. We had originally wanted to buy another French press, but then he read that this is one of the best for tea. It is a Smal D-Lux Tea Maker and works similar to a water boiler. Pretty neat! I haven’t used it yet but I bet it is awesome.
5.New Year’s Eve: Any plans for New Year’s Eve? We will probably just hang out at home. I honestly probably won’t stay up until midnight! We were thinking about having a couple or two over and making dinner. Donny suggested fondue, because we received a fondue pot for our wedding and have yet to break it in! Do you have any good fondue recipes?!? I’d be open to suggestions for sure! I was thinking about doing a cheese one with wine or beer. Any thoughts?!
Have a Merry Christmas and a great weekend!!!
