Challenge!

Copyright : barre3, @realfoodwholelife, @becomingannie

Follow up- right after I posted about barre3 some of the barre3 ambassadors on Instagram threw out this AWESOME deal. Since I had some general curiosity questions from people about what barre3 is, I figured I'd share this promo so that if you want to try it out for yourself you can! Just do what the picture says and you should be good. 

28 to Great is a four-week total body program that gives you some fantastic recipes to try, and access to all the amazing online workouts barre3 has. A.K.A it's a totally doable, healthy, kicker of butts everywhere. I'm doing it because I like smoothies, healthier ones now, and want someone else to tell me what-all I should be putting in my gullet. If you want a legit explanation, hop on over to realfoodwholelife where Robyn explains the whole plan in better detail. 

M and I had a whirlwind of a weekend. Between me applying for internships, writing a paper, M preparing to teach his first college class, going to a department party, and hosting a BBQ, I thought I would be worn out. A year ago, I would have been, but not today! Mostly because the grad students in M's program are AMAZING and cleaned up pretty much the entire house so we wouldn't have to, but also because I've been eating better foods and been working out. BONUS: I was able to walk in heels for an entire night, for literally the first time IN MY LIFE.  Which is all barre3. Win. At our wedding I think I had my heels on for a grand totally of two hours before I gave up. 

*Also, I know I've been talking this place up a lot, but I don't work for barre3 or anything like that. Not that I wouldn't absolutely LOVE to. However, my opinions are all my own. Consult a doctor before you start a new workout plan and everything. I think I heard that off a heartburn commercial once, probably applies here. 

Goldfish in the Gym

SO. This blog has definitely evolved over the few years that I've hassled with it. I still love that McDonald's does weddings though.

Now I'm in my SECOND year of law school and even though it has been the most difficult, and honestly sometimes most nerve racking thing I have ever done, I've found that I absolutely love learning about the law and being challenged everyday.  Now that I'm past all the mandatory classes, I get to choose the classes I take which has been some mixing of children and family law. Who'd of guessed that would happen with my love of weddings...POW blew my mind.

The thing they don't tell you about law school is what a marathon of work it is. Now, I've never completed a marathon. I figure the rest of the fam's got that covered. I'm usually head of the "drink eggnog and down candy corn while fit people run past" brigade myself, so I didn't know what was coming.  By the second semester of my first year, I was feeling like a literal carton of eggnog, forgotten in the back of the fridge since last Christmas that someone kicked for good measure. I couldn't find a schedule that worked well for me, so I was up late with readings for classes and legal research and writing work. Which meant I just ate whatever was laying around. Which was usually M's food. #sorrynotsorry. I also didn't work out, because...eggnog.

After I threw my back out, you know, like 90-year-old's often do, I decided that I should probably figure out a plan before I ended up on some spin-off of Here Comes Honey Boo Boo. Not that I would ever turn that opportunity down. I then realized I was useless as a member of any gym, ever. A goldfish would have a better idea of what to do in that place than I did. I knew I needed a real person to tell me, in small words, what I should do to workout. That's when I went back to barre3, which is a workout class, led by a real person. Win.

The last time I had been to barre3 was 6 months prior, and I literally could not walk down stairs after the workouts, they were so hard. There was a lot of cardboard-butt sliding down the stairs in those days because we lived in a house of stairs.. It seemed. So I was reluctant, you could say, to go back. But I did, because I forced myself to buy the unlimited classes package and the only way to justify that was by actually going. What kept me going was/is my pact app, which I have a real love-hate relationship with, but I haven't lost my workout bet yet and it pays me in real mullah...so I guess it works.

When I went back to barre3 again, and started going 4-5 times a week, I instantly felt like a solid 75-year-old after the first month. Luckily, the barre3 studio in my town has a class that allows me to workout before my day really starts, which meant I was ACTUALLY AWAKE for my 9am classes. Huzzah, I'd found the cure-all, and it wasn't coffee. It wasn't all coffee, I should say. After two months I decided to try eating less like a child in the Willy Wonka Factory, and more like an "actual adult." Which again barre3 had me covered. If you can't tell, I thrive on the "not-having-to-think-about-it-ness." Now, 9 months later I've lost 25 pounds and counting. SUCK IT EGGNOG.