Our first stop off the plane was a farmer’s market. I had a chicken taco, and we shared flour less chocolate cake in a jar for dessert.

The fun thing about Kauai is that there are wild chickens EVERYWHERE; they have chickens like we have squirrels.

While there, we stayed at a condo with this view:

Our first full day there I started off the morning with a hot and humid 3 mile run with my dad. Then, we visited a coffee plantation and took a tour, learning about the coffee growing and making process.

There were 22 types of coffee to sample after the tour. I had a few sips of the caffeinated coffees before retreating to the safety of decaf. I could actually tell the difference between blends! Hawaiian coffee seems to be a little bit lighter than some of the other high quality coffee’s I’ve had (read: less strong). I ordered an iced decaf latte for the full experience.

I’m not sure if I mentioned this before, but we took this trip with my sister’s fiancé’s family, as a joint vacation. Her fiancé and his brother are crazy athletic—they ran down the side of the road from the coffee place to lunch just for fun.

For lunch, I had a basic chicken salad with parmesan and papaya seed dressing.

After lunch we stopped at Auntie Lilikoi for some passion fruit products, and I had a Lilikoi (passionfruit) cheesecake ice cream bar.

Outside we found this family of wild chickens:

Our final stop of the day was Waimea Canyon. It is truly incredible. I’ve never been to the Grand Canyon, so I can’t compare, but I can’t imagine anything grander than what I saw.

Dinner was vegetable pho on the way back.

The next day was my little WIAW post.

At this point, the days are blurring together so I’ll just share some noteworthy moments.

Nike Training Club app workout with my father.

Friendly geese.

Homemade dinner: chicken and my new fav salad: papaya, papaya seed dressing, parmesan.

Horseback riding. I had a naughty horse with lots of personality who kept trying to eat the bushes! Highlights of this ride: the scenery, the baby wild hogs, and the kitty in the barn.

We went out for a nice dinner that night with everyone.

Many of us started out with a cocktail. Mine had champagne, lemon, and pineapple puree. This wasn’t mine, but look how pretty!

For my entree I got an avocado salad and split roasted vegetables with my mom. Both were excellent.

There were lots of cool desserts—you can’t really see it here but our chocolate torte is on fire!

New Year’s Eve morning started with a Crossfit workout at Kilauea Crossfit again. It was Fran: 21-15-9 thrusters and pull ups. We started out with PVC Fran to warm up, which is Fran with a PVC pipe (presses in place of pull ups). The strength was back squats, working to a heavy set of 5. I guess I haven’t done that much equating lately because my legs are still sore!

Afterwards, we made a final trip to the beach. I read my book—I have a nice book shaped sunburn on my legs.

For lunch, we stopped at a roadside food truck that advertised local fare. My mom and I split a chicken lau lau (chicken wrap in taro and banana leaves. Normally lau lau is pork, so it was cool to try!

The purple stuff is loin. It’s made from taro leaf. I like to eat it topped with sugar (which is NOT traditional), but they didn’t have any. Normally it is eaten with Lomi Lomi salmon, which is on the right. That’s sort of like salsa or pico de gallo with chunks of salmon added.

For the night, we ordered a bunch of pizzas from the pizza place essentially right outside our door. They had a gluten free crust which was exciting!

After eating, we broke out the fireworks are firecrackers. This was a new to me experience because they were always illegal where I’ve lived.

We then toasted the new year (at 10pm—midnight in CA) with blubbery champagne (the blueberry was super subtle).

January 1st was ROSE BOWL DAY!!!! It was also the day we were leaving which created some complications.We found a sports bar near the airport that supposedly had 9 TVs, and we arrived 10 minutes before kickoff only to find that that sports bar was out of business. Luckily we spotted a cafe across the street with TVs, and they kindly turned on the game for us. A bonus? The food was really good too!

My mom and I both had caprese salads and split the most amazing sweet potato fries.

For dessert, we all shared a flour less chocolate cake.

The game was AMAZING. We started out right away with a touchdown, and before we knew it it was 35-0. Stanford is so freaking underrated so this was fantastic to see. Because no one bothers to watch us, McCaffrey (our insane runningback) didn’t get a much deserved Heisman. Hopefully this dominant performance will give us some more attention!

At halftime, we raced to the airport and got through security as fast as possible. As it turns out, we were able to watch the game from our ESPN apps on our phones will going through security and checking in. Once through, we settled at a restaurant to watch until nearly the end.

SO MUCH STANFORD PRIDE RIGHT NOW. A Rosebowl win to start my Stanford career and a Rosebowl win to end it. Here are some throwbacks from Rosebowl 2013:

Ok, now I ACTUALLY need to go to bed!

This is from Monday! I began the morning with a short 2 mile run to get the blood flowing. This is mostly so I am not a grumpy mess with my family. I got it in before my family woke up thanks to jet lag!

For breakfast, I had a few taro chips for some carbs (hah) plus a couple of pieces of dried mango.

The main course was plain greek yogurt with sun butter and fresh passion fruit.

Plus fresh Maui Gold pineapple!

The morning was then spent at the beach. It was a beautiful day, after a lot of rain the past couple of days! I read my book, and then fooled around with a volleyball with my sister and future in-laws a little bit.

From the beach, we stopped at Chicken in a Barrel and had delicious freshly smoked chicken. With brown rice and coleslaw.

For dessert, I stopped at a roadside fruit stand for a chocolate dipped frozen banana with toffee.

Next on the agenda was dropping into a Crossfit class at Kilauea Crossfit.

Everyone was super friendly and welcoming! For the workout, we worked up to a heavy set of 5 strict presses. The WOD was Open 13.4: 7 minute AMRAP of 3 clean and jerks, 3 toes to bar, 6 clean and jerks, 6 toes to bar, 9, 12, etc. I chose 75# for the clean and jerks and just did knee raises. It was a good one, and a day later I am definitely feeling it! I finished the round of 12 + 1. We finished with some core work.

On the way home I picked up some dried papaya at the grocery store and snacked on some of that.

I also snacked on some local goat cheese and crackers before heading over to dinner with my future in-laws.

They grilled chicken and made some rice and veggies, and we brought a salad with goat cheese and dried cranberries, plus a pie.

As I just mentioned, we brought a pie for dessert. It was guava chiffon.

After dinner back at our condo, my parents and I shared some pineapple cider.

What’s interesting is how drastically different this day of food was from even a week ago when I was home during break. At home, I’ve been eating a lot of soup and small meals. This is partly because my stomach condition isn’t flaring at all now, but I definitely need to tread carefully while I’m here!

What do you eat on vacation?

Since I just got back from my Hawaiian vacation (recaps here and here), why not take a peek at Monday’s vacation food for WIAW?

I will say that Monday’s meals were a bit different from the rest of the week. I think at this point we were all sort of burned out on rich food and meat, so towards the end of the vacation we stuck to lighter meals.

Breakfast:

Thanks to all my food restrictions, I ended up scrapping together a meal that included a Starbucks mango orange smoothie, fruit, and crackers with goat cheese from the goat dairy we visited. We had a harder goat cheese, mango chèvre, and herbed chèvre.

Plus some guava and papaya:

Lunch: Joy’s Place, a little healthy cafe we passed a few times earlier on the trip and I wanted to check out! They had gluten free bread and rice wraps, so I had a turkey and avocado wrap on rice paper, which was fun! Plus coleslaw on the side.

I was excited to finally get some Hawaiian avocado. We had gotten one earlier in the week, but the hotel fridge froze it! Hawaiian avocado is big and a bit denser/more solid than California avocado.

(Throwback to my last trip to Hawaii 2 years ago!)

Dessert: Although we had already driven to Lahaina to visit the gluten free bakery (Maui Sugar Shop) on Friday, we decided it was necessary to make another stop. I had to go with the chocolate cupcake with lilikoi (passion fruit) icing again, but we also shared bites of a cream puff, lemon bar, and pineapple upside down cake.

Dinner:

That afternoon, my stomach flared up so I went for a simple, light dinner that my body could tolerate. We went to Whole Foods and picked up some food to eat there. I had some gluten free crackers.

Plus some vegetable soup with quinoa, topped with nutritional yeast.

And a couple of bites from the hot bar-mashed potatoes and a carrots.

Back at the hotel, I was feeling better and had a splash of wine with my lilikoi goat cheese truffle.

As well as a piece of chocolate covered pineapple. The chocolate covered pineapple was excellent-I haven’t gotten it here before, and it’s the same type of chocolate as the chocolate covered macadamia nuts that I am now allergic to, which was exciting!

I was hoping to have a bit more of an interesting and fun day of food to share, but I really wasn’t feeling well, but that’s life and sometimes that happens!

I still have one more vacation post to come!

What is your favorite vacation food?

Also-shoulder update-it’s feeling better each day but it’s definitely not near where it needs to be. I can now raise my arm above my head, but I have problems rotating backwards. I’m hoping I’m healed enough for Crossfit on Monday!

The plane ride here was pretty painless. I woke up early and ran 3 miles before leaving for the airport at 7, and had plenty of plane snacks, including my banana bread. I used guava syrup as the sweetener-there wasn’t much so I’m not sure it was noticeable but it felt festive!

When we stepped off the plane, this was the view:

However, it was HOT. 90 degrees and 80% humidity. Yuck. Our first stop was the local mall that we have gone to every time for many years. There was a mini farmer’s market going on on the ground floor and we picked up some tropical fruit and some avocado! Lunch was eaten at the food court-we went to a Korean place and I got BBQ chicken+sides.

After exploring a bit, we were able to check into our hotel.

But then it was time for ice cream. I had banana salted caramel.

Followed by exploring the property. My dad is here for a conference so we’re staying in a much nicer hotel than I’ve stayed in before!

Dinner was at the hotel restaurant. It was tapas style, so we ordered several dishes for the table-highlights for me were mahi mahi with mashed purple sweet potatoes and passion fruit, miso kale salad with dried figs, goat cheese balsamic beet salad, and gooey mozzarella tomato salad.

For dessert, we shared breadfruit lilikoi cake (breadfruit gives it a similar texture to cheesecake!) and a dish that was fruit with caramel sauce and chocolate that was then broiled and topped with ice cream.

The view over the infinity pool at dusk:

The next morning began with a slice of banana bread and a 5 mile treadmill run. Normally 4 is my treadmill limit but it was HOT so I just broke it up and did it. Post run, we ordered room service breakfast, and I got a beautiful fruit platter with maple yogurt. We also split gluten free pancakes, which were so, so good! I can’t remember the last time I had real pancakes!

Then it was beach time!

On the way back to our room, we stopped by the hotel’s water slides (!). When I was younger, we’d always pass the fancy hotels with water slides and wish we could go on them, so this was our chance!

After cleaning up, we headed out to lunch at O’Lei. I had blackened mahi mahi with papaya salsa, served with rice and caesar salad.

After lunch we headed to a nearby ice cream shop for some tropical ice cream. I had mango ice cream with mango sorbet swirls, and in the heat, this hit the spot perfectly!

After a grocery stop and some time to cool off in the room, we headed to the luau hosted by our hotel!

(Do you like my tan line? The sad thing is it’s not from wearing a t-shirt, it’s from only sunscreening my shoulders this morning…cute)

When we arrived, we grabbed drinks (piña colada for me) and got a glance at the pig they were pulling out of the emu pit. To cook the pork, an entire pig is buried underground and cooked all day.

After a bit of a wait, it was time to eat! I was pleasantly surprised at what there was for me to eat given my dietary restrictions!

Salad, pineapple coleslaw, roasted purple potatoes, fried rice, teriyaki chicken, lomi lomi salmon, and poi. The lomi lomi salmon is the salsa looking thing. It’s essentially pico with chunks of salmon (that look a lot like tomatoes!). Poi is a pudding like food that is made from taro. It has a bit of a sour flavor, and is often eaten with lomi lomi salmon. If you’re less legit like I am, you eat it topped with sugar!

For dessert-key lime squares, chocolate cake, a pineapple chunk, and haupia. Haupia is sort of like creamy coconut jello.

Then-the show began!

The fire dancer was especially impressive! I cannot imagine sticking a flaming stick in my mouth.

After a fun start to our trip, we have lots of adventures ahead!

First, I want to catch up a little bit. On food. On fitness. Life. Etc.

First of all-my sister is engaged! How crazy is that?? I’m the maid of honor and I’m so happy for the couple! We even broke out the good champagne to celebrate!

It happened on a hot air balloon in Napa-hwo perfect is that? They stopped by for congratulations and to partake in our grilled nectarine salad (because we got nectarines from Costco with only a few days to eat them…)

Recipe here.

Another meal I’ve been meaning to post were these beautiful parmesan and spinach soufflés.

Plus a delicious side salad with herbs, meyer lemon infused olive oil, and aged white balsamic vinegar.

In workout news, I messed up my shoulder today. I was weight lifting with my trainer. We did heavy snatches and I did pretty well-didn’t hit my max but made the lifts I should have made. Then, heavy deadlifts. After working my way up to heavy weights, I did a set of 5 at 210, a set of 3 at 220, and a set of 1 at 230, followed by max reps at 230 (I got 2-apparently my form was going and I wasn’t allowed to try a 3rd with my ‘cat back’). Then,I worked on behind the neck snatch grip presses and snatch balances. It was fine. So basically I spent a lot of time stabilizing heavy weights with my shoulders with no issues. Then since there was a bit of extra time, we did some core work-roll outs. You may have seen those ab wheels before, but I used a barbell with circular plates to roll out. I got a little too ambitious on the first one and roll out to far, and then got kind of stuck and ended up sort of face-planting and felt a pop in my shoulder. I was worried at first, but everything seems to be in the right place and it feels much better than it did initially. The pain is in the same area that my shoulders get creaky, especially this one, so I think it’s just a bit of a sprain/strain. I’m hoping it feels better soon!

In life news, I’m jetting off to Hawaii with my family! My dad has a conference so we’re tagging along and making a vacation of it. To be perfectly honest, I’m a bit worried about what I can eat but I’m sure we’ll make it work. Hawaii is full of nuts and coconut, and the last time I was there I ate both and ended up with a pretty bad allergic reaction to macadamia nuts (this is before I completely avoided them and was still in denial).

It’s actually looking to be a pretty active vacation for me. I have a 10 mile run scheduled this weekend, which will feel great in the heat and humidity I’m sure…Plus some other shorter runs. I’m also hoping my shoulder is ok to visit some of the Crossfit boxes I visited last time I was there! Other excitement includes another visit to see the piggies.

The biggest thing I’m excited about it visiting a goat dairy farm! We went many years ago and I remember trying delicious goat cheese. Plus-RUMINANTS. I think as part of the tour we get to milk them? So pumped!

In terms of my health-my stomach is mostly healed but not 100%. There are still times were I feel super dizzy and nauseous, and tums/pepto still has to come everywhere with me just in case. Luckily, at this point it seems these episodes are mostly linked to certain foods. Which can be frustrating, but I’m trying to be better about figuring out what foods and how to better avoid them The list of things that makes me sick includes dark chocolate, onions, mexican food, tortilla chips, wheat, too much sun butter, too much fatty food. The list goes on. I really do feel like some of this is temporary and won’t affect me in time when I’m fully healed, but we’ll see. In the meantime, I’m sticking to gluten free-all of these breads I make with gluten free flour, and you’d never know it. It seems to be even less noticeable with pumpkin bread than banana bread too.

Which FINALLY brings us to the recipe! I wanted to make sweet potato bread, but couldn’t find the recipe I used in the past so I figured, why not try my own hand at it? Like I’ve said before-I’ve tried very hard to screw up my basic banana bread recipe so I might was well try a little bit harder!

Sweet Potato Bread

Ingredients

1.5 cups mashed, cooked sweet potato or yam

1 c flour

1/3 c milk

2 bananas, mashed

2 T oil (I used avocado)

1 egg

1 T vanilla

1 t salt

1 t baking soda

1 t baking powder

1/4 c honey (can add more-to taste)

1 t cinnamon

1/4 t nutmeg

Optional: 1 T orange juice (I wanted to moisten it and in full honesty the only citrus we had was a tangerine so I just used the juice from that)

cinnamon sugar for sprinkling on top

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Mix wet ingredients well, then add dry ingredients.
3. Sprinkle cinnamon sugar on top (this just makes it pretty!)
4. Bake for about 50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

This dense bread is the perfect segway between summer and fall. It’s a dense, warm bread but doesn’t quite have the kick of fall spices.

What is your favorite quick bread? What should I experiment with next?

Hey guys! I’ve seen this in the blog world a lot, and since I know you guys would just love to learn about me, I thought it would be a good post to have in reserve for when the days get busier. So, here we go!

A. Attached or Single?

Single. Attached to my cat-which is no secret. 

B. Best Friend?

I have a few best friends, but given only one of those people might actually read this, I’m going to go with my friend Jessica, who I’m known since 6th grade

We’re such babies here! We were also plaid obsessed, if you can’t tell by the cookies…
C. Cake or pie?

Cake. One hundred percent. This is my favorite dessert. 

D. Day of choice?

I’m going to have to go with Friday. I like having a routine, but it’s also a day to relax and not do homework, 
E. Essential Item?

My phone. I admit, I can’t go anywhere without it. And if it ever dies, I feel lost. It’s kind of sad. 
F. Favorite color?

Blue.
G. Gummy bears or worms?

I’m not a huge gummy bear fan, with the exception of my vitamins. So worms. 

H. Home town?

Just south of SF
I. Favorite Indulgence?

Probably cake. 
J. January or July?

July. January is always sort of depressing because the fun of winter has worn off and the holidays are over. 
K. Kids?

Just my kitties

L. Life isn’t complete without?

Ok if I say cats, will I be crossing into crazy cat lady territory? Let’s go with friends and family instead (but technically cats are family too soo…)

M. Mountain or Beach?

Hmm not sure. Probably mountain? I’m not much of a beach person I suppose. 

N. Number of brothers/sisters?

1 sister.

O. Oranges or Apples?

My first instinct would be apples, but I haven’t had great apples lately, and I’ve had some pretty darn good oranges. I used to hate oranges though so let’s go with apples. 
P. Phobias?

Anyone fairly close to me knows my list, and its order.

1. Puke

2. Drowning

3. Scorpions

4. Hair
Q. Quotes?

“I am Ted F-ing Williams and not even Jesus Christ himself can get me out.” My hitting coach told me to tell this to myself at the plate-power of positive thinking! Fun fact: I began a college essay with this quote. And got in. And now go to said school. 
R. Reasons to smile?

I’m healthy and my body can carry me 12 miles. 

I have a loving and supportive family. 

I get to help raise adorable kittens and give them a second chance at the local shelter. 

S. Season of choice?

At this point I may have to go with fall. I love spring, but fall is more interesting. 

T. Trip for the Future

Hawaii! I’m going at the beginning of September. So this might be posted during that time. 

U. Unknown fact about me?

Before I started blogging, all the photos in my phone consisted of cats or injuries. I’ll spare you pictures, but let’s just say that I had a lot of softball shaped bruises. And of course the gashes in my shin from box jumps…and the frostbite on my foot…Yeah I’m pretty cool. 
V. Vegetable?

Hmm maybe brussels sprouts? Lettuce is an easy go-to though too. 

W. Worst habit?

Running my hands through my hair and pulling out loose hairs. I hate hairs, and obsessively pick them off myself. 

Or just running my hands through my hair when I’m nervous. 
X. Xray or Ultrasound?

Xray? Weird question…
Y. Your favorite food?

I’m a food blogger. I can’t possibly have just one favorite food. Hmm how about favorite meal? Cheese souffles, mushrooms with thyme, and herb salad. 

Z. Zodiac sign?

Taurus. But I don’t really know anything about this kind of thing.

Well, hope you enjoyed a peek into my life! I loved looking at old pictures…any photos with my family are pretty old because any newer photos are on my parent’s computer!

Have a great day!

This post will cover the last couple of days of vacation plus Tuesday. First, I wanted to talk a little bit about being healthy on this vacation. My family’s vacations are often centered around food. And in Hawaii, with so many delicious things around-how could it not be? To be honest, I was a little nervous leading up to the vacation about staying reasonably healthy. The last time I went to Hawaii was almost 4 years ago. I remember getting back from that trip and being 10 pounds heavier than I left. I was not aware that was possible. While I may be a tad flabbier than I left, it certainly is nothing significant, and I returned feeling healthy and strong. So what changed?

1. I didn’t go crazy on desserts. Last time, I remember eating so many chocolate covered macadamia nuts that I felt sooo sick. While sure, I ate more sweets than normal, I didn’t really gorge at any one time. With the exception of a very large piece of chocolate cake that left me feeling off for 2 days after…

2. I split meals. Restaurant portions are often huge (especially at touristy places). Before the trip, my mom and I agreed to split things and it worked out perfectly. We didn’t split a couple of times and both agreed afterwards that we should have.

3. I exercised. I continued to follow my half marathon training plan, so I ended up running 4 times on my 10 day trip. I also visited a few local Crossfit boxes- in Lahaina, Upcountry Maui, and Kihei. Some of my favorite days of the trip were the days I got a tough Crossfit workout in, and I don’t think that’s a coincidence. On one of my no-workout days, I was feeling really sluggish. I busted out a quick 5 minute workout, and I felt like a different person.

4. Eat a healthy breakfast. On vacation, we generally buy food to eat in our room. I was really excited for all the tropical fruit. A healthy breakfast helps you feel good going into your day. Example A: my tropical yogurt bowl-plain yogurt, mango, banana, passion fruit, sunflower seed butter.

I came home feeling pretty strong. Before I get into a ton of delicious food, I wanted to talk a little about the last Crossfit I visited- Crossfit Kihei. I had heard from another Crossfitter that they weren’t very friendly. Well…that was kind of right. Myabe they don’t get as many visitors-I don’t know. I wasn’t exactly comfortable the whole time, in contrast to the other Crossfits where I felt like part of the team. The coach was really uninvolved, and there was no group warm up. Plus, for the WOD, I Rxed it when I really shouldn’t have. It was 50 snatched with squats mixed in. No one else Rxed it and I ended up finished wayyy after everyone else, which was a little embarrassing as I was just a visitor. It was a good workout though so I can’t complain. My shoulders really are feeling it today. 

Ok-food time!

Vacation food:

Turkey sandwich which I got for the avocado-plus it has cranberry sauce-how fun!

Ice cream! I regretted this choice. I don’t like coffee…and this didn’t have quite enough fudge. Oh well-you live and you learn!

Salad with bleu cheese and asian pear.

DELICIOUS dinner-macadamia crusted Mahi Mahi with pineapple salsa, jasmine rice, and veggies. My dad and I split this, and they were kind enough to serve it on separate plates.

Lilikoi (passion fruit) cream pie. 

Chocolate cream pie. Sooo funny story. When my family ordered these desserts to share, my dad asked the waiter for 2 forks…for himself. And yes, he did use both. My family takes our dessert seriously.

Airplane food. You know you’re a blogger when your first instinct is to snap a shot before eating, even on a plane. There were a few pieces of lettuce under there for garnish-you better believe I ate those-vegetables are vegetables!

Aaand that leads us back to today. This morning I ate my typical pre-run breakfast-a ThinkThin bar plus fruit, and ran 8 miles. I would be so much faster if my foot wouldn’t act up! Regardless, I didn’t worry too much about pace. PRing this race will be hard since it’s a very hilly course (Nike Women’s in SF). This weekends long run is 10 miles. And that will be my last flat long run. I have a very hellish run planned for the 11 miler. Anyone from around Palo Alto knows the Dish trail-yeah, that will be smack in the center of my 11 miles. Kill me now….

I went to Whole Foods for lunch and groceries. 

I’m in love with Probiotics.

Chicken, avocado and kale salad, chinese chicken salad, and a few fried plantains. I’m starting a mini Whole30 a week from Friday (I’m doing 7 days), and I want to try to ease myself into it. I’ve been thinking about it, and the list of things I wouldn’t want to give up to eat more Paleo is shrinking. Hummus for salads. Goat cheese. Laughing cow. Gummy vitamins. Run fuel. That’s about it. In the future, I may be sort of Paleoish. The big thing for me is watching the grains and sugar I eat since my blood sugar seems to like to crash.

I also couldn’t resist trying these since I love dark chocolate. They’re good!

For dinner, we made Greek salads topped with spicy avocado hummus and a runny egg. 

I also got another kind of hummus to try, which I ate with cucumbers. It’s really interesting and different!

And dessert was some of the pineapple we brought back from Maui. So good. 

A couple of random other things- I got new shoes to replace my walking around/general workout shoes. My old ones were blue and neon green. The new models are blue and pink. I don’t know about the pink though…What do you think? I might get neon green laces. That way I can accidentally match still since all my clothes seem to be neon green and blue.

And lastly-my haul of Crossfit shirts from my trip! I swear, all I bought on the trip were 3 t-shirts but my suitcase was waaaay more full. Huh.

And I’ll leave you with that! Have a great day!

How do you approach vacation? Has anyone done a Whole30? Tips? 

What is your favorite ice cream flavor? Coffee-yay or nay?

Yesterday was a looong day thanks to a 4:30am wakeup and a 3 hour time change. Our flight left at 7am, so we were at the airport at 6. 

Starbucks for breakfast-I actually didn’t want any caffeine since I wanted to sleep on the 5 hour flight as much as possible. A chocolate smoothie did the trick-plus it is one of the less sweet options at Starbucks.

As expected the flight felt long. And the plane was FREEZING-and I was wearing pants and a sweatshirt. Sleeping didn’t happen much, but what are you gonna do? And get this-you had to PAY to even watch a movie. Whattttt. So I did not do that!

Upon landing, our first stop was a local swap meet (crafts plus farmer’s market). We had a couple of hours before my sister’s boyfriend’s flight landed so this was perfect. I loved looking at all the exotic fruits. And look at the size of those avocados!

I’ve never seen non-CA avocados! I can’t wait to try them! Another highlight was freshly pressed green juice. Soooo good.

The perfect start to a tropical vacation!

Once we picked up my sister’s boyfriend, we headed out for some traditional Hawaiian food for lunch-one of my dad’s all time favorite things. 

My mom and I split a giant papaya seed salad and teriyaki chicken.

We then visited our hotel and shopped around at a very touristy but awesome Hawaiian store-Hilo Hattie. Fact: my dad owns 10000 Hawaiian shirts. 

Want to know what’s sad? When my family has come to Hawaii in the past, it’s usually in the winter or spring. It’s HOT in the summer. And….my weather at home is nicer. Like a lot nicer. Not hot or humid-it’s been in the 90s here and humid, and THIS California girl is drowning in her own sweat. #spoiledCAgirlproblems

This evening, we attended a Luau. More pictures on that for another post! My Internet is slow so uploading takes a little while, and I only have about 3 minutes until I have to run. It was tons of fun-and I was SO ready for bed at 9pm. What’s weird is that my ankle swelled up kind of a lot yesterday-and I don’t usually swell much. It’s the one I sprained a couple of months ago that is still kind of stiff. I guess a lot of being on my feet plus flying contributed to that…weird. 

Hope you all are having a fabulous long weekend! 

Anyways, now that I’m done complaining, I’ll highlight some pictures from the last couple of days and get onto TODAY!

A pretty view of San Francisco from my walk the other today. Sad news-I finished my audiobook mid walk. This sure as heck beats mid-12 mile run, but meh. I feel a little nostalgic about that audiobook-it took me through my long runs of my first half marathon training!

This dinner was not really supposed to be this. The plan was to make a quesadilla with this recipe. However, my mom had to brief the guy taking care of our cats while we’re on vacation, and before I knew it it was 9pm and still no food. Instead of going through the effort of making the tortilla, I just microwaved the leftover meat we were planning on using with a can of diced tomatoes and pepper, plus taco seasoning. I also whipped up some guac. Add a bed of lettuce, and we were good to go! I may have gotten a little seasoning-happy. This was SPICY. (Well, keep in mind all the seasoning was mild…#wimp).

Thursday morning was the kitten nursery. I really do love working with them.

Followed by breakfast-it turned out to be much bigger than this but this is what I got on camera. Yesterday, I discovered I had 2 days to eat 6 mangoes. Challenge accepted. There’s one left. 

I also took a “cat nap.” Haha…I’m going to miss that when I go back to school!

Aaaand here’s some more food. Nothing too crazy. I want to get to today’s workouts!

Ok, onto today! 5:45am spin was cancelled due to Labor Day weekend. Booo. But it did give me an opportunity to sleep in a little and make my own spin workout. I really want to be a spin teacher someday, and it’s been a while since I’ve made my own class. Plus, I want to do a post on my local fitness blog about HIIT training, but…I’ve never done it before. So that would be a little hypocritical. I’ve been reading about the benefits in the book I’m reading, and so many bloggers do HIIT training. I designed an hour long class, which included 18 minutes of HIIT training. I did 1:00 of intense, all out work, followed by 1:15 of moderate intensity. I did this sequence 8 times through.

OMG I was DYING. I have NEVER worked that hard on a Spin bike before. To get the true benefits of HIIT, you really need to go 100% max effort during the minute on. Whew. Ouch. And why did I put this at the beginning of my class? For the intervals on, I did a mix of high resistance fast speed, and pretty high resistance super fast speed. My legs hurt….

Anyways, in case you’re wondering, I thought I’d post the “class” so you can all go out and feel my pain. Sound good?

Here’s the playlist I made.

And here’s the sequence:

(Song #)

1-Warm Up

2- Hill: increase resistance every minute and hold 80 RPMs

3-hill: heavy, hold 1:30 and then repeaters

4-first 2:00 downhill then start Hiit

5-9 HIIT then downhill

10-flat road endurance-hold 100 RPMs at working pace

11- hill- 30 sec intervals in/out of saddle

12- hill: heavy repeaters

13- hill: jumps (8 sec on saddle, 8 out/4 in/out, 2 in/out)

14- downhill, high speed (over 100 RPM)

15- flat road intervals

16- flat road intervals

17-cool down

*Repeaters- 20 seconds in saddle, 20 seconds standing straight, 20 seconds standing over bike

I followed this with 10 minutes of abs.

And then cursed myself for being dumb and not running BEFORE my spin workout. It’s one thing to not run before a 5:45am class, but when I could spin ANY TIME, and it’s not even early, I should run first.

4 miles were on the schedule for today. I actually did a decent portion of it on trails-which I hate but need to practice. It was pretty hot. And I did not choose my clothing very well. A big, thick, cotton t-shirt, already drenched in sweat. I was literally drowning in my own shirt. Eh. Oh well.

I decided to mix it up a little today shoe-wise and wear my Brooks. They actually felt better than I remember! Maybe it was my new inserts?

The rest of my day will be spent getting ready for tomorrow- I’M GOING TO HAWAII! I leave super early (well, as a regular at 5:45am spin it won’t be too bad…), so I have to get everything ready to go tonight! I need to go to the library for fun books and to look for new audiobooks. I also have Crossfit tonight…legs rest up quickly! I refuled from my sweaty run with my post-workout recovery drink (aka homemade chocolate milk) which I made in my Vitamix so I wouldn’t have to heat the milk, and could add in an extra ice cube or two.

In Hawaii, I actually have quite a few workouts planned. Which is probably good-it’ll keep me sane. I have 4-5 days of running, including 2 long runs. I’ve contacted some of the Crossfits in Maui, and will drop in for a class or two while I’m away as well. How cool is that??

I might pop in once or twice with a post while I’m away since I’m brining my laptop, but don’t worry-I’ve got you covered with some AWESOME guest posters while I’m gone! Like, really great. While I read the posts I kept wanting to comment!

I hope you all have a GREAT holiday weekend! I’ll make sure to take lots of pictures while I’m gone!

What are you doing this weekend?

I’m going on vacation in Maui at the beginning of September (I’m leaving Aug 31). I’ll be gone for a little over a week, so I’m looking for some guest posters! Please email me if you are interested! Astottler @ gmail.com. I’d need the posts by August 28th!

Thanks a ton! 

(Awkward photo because I’m wearing a shirt from my rival school…)