Hey there! I hope your week is off to the best start and that you’re having a great Monday. My Mondays have gotten so much better since giving up early training clients. I teach late on Mondays so it made for a long day to go from 6 a.m. until 8:30 p.m. and it kind of felt like I started my week off in the hole. It’s such a kinder and more relaxing start to the week to wake up around 6:45-7, eat breakfast, get my week organized and then head to the studio to teach my first class at 8:15 a.m.

Okay, time to recap the weekend.

We had a fun start to the weekend by teaching a “Back to School Boot Camp” on Friday for our morning crowd. Bonus, it was our friend Wanda’s birthday (she’s the photographer we work with all the time…she shoots everything for the studio and shot both of my books!). She has a birthday tradition of dancing to Flo Rida’s song “Low” so we always make sure to play it for her in class. This year she actually brought boots with the fur that she put on and did yoga in during the song. Love this lady.

The rest of Friday was computer work, working out, training a client, teaching and happy hour with some friends and students. I was home early to prepare for Saturday morning’s event with Premier Protein.

The event was a success and I’ll have a full recap with lots of photos tomorrow.

I met Tanner for lunch at Namastay Kitchen. I had our Namastay Bowl with chicken (and added avocado after this photo was taken).

I couldn’t resist taking a bite of Tanner’s turkey burger. Our brunch burger has balsamic onion jam, crispy prosciutto, arugula, basil aioli, cheddar and an over easy egg. SO GOOD.

I got home from lunch and did dishes and wiped the kitchen countertops. The next thing I knew I had Pledged every surface in our house, cleaned wood blinds, changed air filters, washed baseboards and walls and pulled the couch out from the wall to vacuum.

I also had the contents of one of our closets on the floor. Tanner came home and was like, “What are you doing!? You’re cleaning in like 4 different places?” I am such a cleaning mess. I go in circles where cleaning one thing leads me to the next and the next and then I eventually make it back to thing one.

He jumped in and helped and we ended up moving a ton of furniture around and completely redoing the living room. We finally called it quits around 7:30 and changed to head to a friend’s birthday party.

We stayed at the party for about an hour and then headed over to Foxcroft Wine Co. for a light dinner. We shared this bruschetta with a mushroom duck mixture.

And scallops over grits.

When we got home I made a cup of tea and ate a slice of carrot cake that I brought home with me from the birthday party! 😉

Sunday was a (much needed) lazy day.

I made brunch…nothing new to see here!

After brunch Tanner said, “let’s bake cookies.” He’s been wanting to test cookie recipes for the restaurant. I’d had my eye on some copycat Levain Bakery recipes so we got to work.

Overall, the cookies were a success! I used this recipe but made about 16 cookies instead of 8. Making 8 cookies from 3 cups of flour, 2 sticks of butter and a cup and a half of sugar just seemed insane.

The texture was spot on. They were a little crunchy on the outside and gooey on the inside but I’d like to try them again with a few small modifications for taste. They are so close but not quite perfect. Regardless, I took a big container of them to the studio later that day when I went to teach and they disappeared like hotcakes!

I stayed into my PJs until 3:45 p.m. when I had to change to go to the studio to teach. I got sucked into a three hour vortex of going though old photos that I’ll share more about in coming weeks.

After class I came home to tackle my long run. I waited until the last moment of the weekend to do it but I loved the sunset run. The weather was perfect and it was a nice way to end the weekend.

I did a little over 8 miles at a 9:20 pace. My legs just did not want to move very fast last night but I just went with it and enjoyed the scenery and listening to Glennon Doyle Melton’s new book, “Love Warrior.” It was just released on September 6 and I’ve been seeing so much about it. I liked “Carry On, Warrior” so I wanted to listen to this one too. My initial thoughts are…that it’s really heavy. So heavy in fact that I had to turn it off and switch to music for the last 3 miles and my pace picked up considerably for those last few miles.

Tanner also ran last night (but not with me). He did 6. I’m trying to convince him to run the half with me but I don’t know if that will happen. After showering and hydrating, I whipped up chicken tacos with an avocado goat cheese sauce. The rest of the evening was spent on the couch with Parenthood and having cuddle parties with the girls. 🙂

Are you an “organized” cleaner or do you “clean in circles” like I do? 

Any favorite chocolate chip recipes to share? 

Did anyone else long run or race? How did it go?