Good morning!

I had an early wake up call for a 6 a.m. client. It’s always tough to get out of bed when the alarm goes off in the five o’clock hour but once I’m up, I love it. Early morning has always been the most productive time of the day for me. When I was in college I would always get up super early the day of a test to study rather than cramming late the night before.

I have yesterday’s meals and workouts for you today along with a few songs that I can’t stop listening to right now. Y’all seem to be enjoying the food posts lately. Oh and I had quite a few requests for the apple cake recipe. I will post it but I want to make the recipe one more time with a few modifications. I am kind of crazy about not posting a recipe until I’m 100% happy with the results and I feel like I could make some improvements in amount of apples and texture. So stay tuned…I should have time to test it again this weekend. I promise to get it up for you though!

I started my Wednesday teaching the 6:30 a.m. double shot class at Y2 Yoga. I picked up this class a couple of months ago and I love it so much! It’s such an honor to help my yogis start their day with yoga. I came home after class to shower and get dressed for work and whipped up my first bowl of oatmeal in I cannot even remember how long. It was definitely pre-summer last time I ate hot oatmeal. Into the pot went old fashioned oats, dried cranberries, sliced banana, pumpkin puree, almond milk, pumpkin pie spice and some water. I topped it with almond butter and had a shot of espresso on the side. I’ve been using my Nespresso more lately.

Last year I wrote a post with five different breakfast recipes using pumpkin, including this oatmeal. Check it out here…waffles, oatmeal, muffins and more!

Lunch was beet-tastic. I got a salad with mixed greens, arugula, roasted beets, pecans, artichokes and goat cheese. I topped it with a quinoa salad that I thought had butternut squash in it but when I took a bite, I realized they were golden beets so it was a little bit of beet overload but still good.

I co-taught the 4:30 and 5:30 p.m. CrossFit classes at Metro CrossFit.

I decided to do the WOD on my own after I taught and it was a lot more brutal than it looked. The snatches were full squat snatches and it’s been a long time since I did anything other than power snatches. This ended up being a major leg burner and the combination of the double unders into the snatches started making me kind of dizzy towards the end of the workout. This was one of my worst WOD performances (based on how I felt during it) in a long time. I finished 11 rounds in the 20 minutes.

I needed yoga in a bad way after this workout so I went to the 7:15 p.m. double shot class at Y2. Nothing like starting and ending your day at the yoga studio! 🙂

I snacked on a cheese and meat plate with some friends after class but needed something of substance when I got home so I heated up a bowl of veggie chili. We’re finally getting fall weather here in Charlotte and this was my first bowl of chili of the season. So hearty and comforting.

Now for a few songs I’m loving.

Lorde’s new album is fabulous and I especially like this song and added it to my playlist for yoga this week.

I love the electronic/Dubstep-esque influence in this new 30 Seconds to Mars single.

How cool is this cover of the Imagine Dragons song Radioactive?

Any songs you are loving right now? I’m always looking for new stuff to add to my playlists.

Have a great day!