Thanksgiving Workout

Well, we are officially running off for the holidays! I am so excited about Thanksgiving FINALLY being here, I simply cannot wait. This year, my Mom will be staying with us and her room is just about ready for her. We had the guest bedroom all finished, but then, around 1:00 AM on Monday evening I decided to completely redesign it and move all the furniture around. Two days later and we have some really cute mirrors, floating shelfs, a new nightstand, new bedding, a simple and gorgeous pendant light the hubs installed (my hero), and we are down a dresser that there really was not enough room for anyway. I also found this awesome bed from Target and am waiting for Black Friday/Cyber Monday to order it. For now, Mom will make due on the bed she has :) 

Oh, and pictures will be on the blog when it is all done, promise!

Aaand, back to Thanksgiving, the rest of our family will be arriving today as well, but we will probably not see them until tomorrow. As for what we are cooking, I am doing this vegetarian stuffing, a quick and easy bread bowl of artichoke dip, Brussels sprouts, and a breakfast crustless quiche for our house in the morning! Ahh, it will be so fun! 

Of course, with all this massive, massive eating comes a workout or two. Yesterday I did a 1.5-mile uphill run-a-thon followed by a bum workout and today I am thinking P90X Plyometrics. The little workout guide above was on the Elf 4 Health Facebook page and I thought you would enjoy it as much as I did. Goodness, we could make a pretty fantastic workout with just following what we eat. Mine would include about 30 push-ups, 150 jumping jacks, a whole ton of squats (maybe mix in some Sumo and jumping ones), and more burpees and mountain climbers than I can comprehend. And that is just the first set. Seconds and thirds would be a sure thing. 

Happy Thanksgiving! What would your Thanksgiving workout look like? 

Motivation for Your Monday

{via}

Happy two post Monday! This little bonus is because I just needed to share the Cornbread Stuffing recipe with all you Thanksgiving chefs, but still did not want to leave the motivation undone. Instead of doing my usual one quote today, I wanted to do a few of my favorites from past motivations and a few new. The holidays are officially here and for many, that means more stress, more headaches, and more difficulty keeping a positive attitude in check. It tends to mean that for me.

This year, I have decided to choose to be happy, thankful, and calm this holiday season. To help with that, I have a few go-to quotes about attitude that remind me everything we do is a choice. We can choose to get annoyed in that insanely crowded store or parking lot, or we can choose to breathe, relax, and know everything that must get done will get done. We can choose to show our family and friends how stressed and upset we are, or we can choose to make their day better with our kindness, patience, and understanding. Likewise, the choice of this holiday season being stressful, sad, dramatic, happy, joyful, and calming are all up to us. For this reason, I choose to be happy.

There was a great quote I recently heard which states that we can be in a situation, but our situation does not have to be in us. That is powerful. My self goal for this ending to such an incredible year is to choose to react with positivity, helpfulness, and kindness.

What are some of your goals for the holidays and how are you going to make it happen?

Hands Down, The Best Stuffing Ever!

{via}

Are you looking for a good stuffing for all those friends and family this Thanksgiving?

Every year I make the vegetarian stuffing for myself and all our vegetarian and pescetarian family members. Most years, the carnivores of the family will try a bite or two but they never get more- that is, until last year. Last year, I decided to make this cornbread stuffing and everything changed. Instead of having plenty of my stuffing left and none of the "real stuff" as they call it, mine was the first gone and I could hardly get seconds.

Vegetarians and meat eaters alike love this stuff. And really, I cannot blame them. It tastes like home, happiness, Thanksgiving traditions, a dash of sweet, and a bit of salt all mixed in one. This is seriously the best stuffing ever. If you have looked at the ingredients, you may be thinking that I have lost my mind since it has chicken broth as an ingredient. Well, I have not lost my mind and forgotten that chicken is a meat. Thankfully, this is an easy swap out of vegetable broth instead of the chicken.

The reason I did not put this recipe on the blog last year is because I needed some family guinea pigs to see if it was just as good with the vegetable broth. Turns out, it is! Even my brother-in-law's mother, a southern cook extraordinaire, loved it. So, here are the simple changes I made.

1. Switch out chicken broth for vegetable broth
2. Use 3/4 cornbread and 1/4 white
3. After adding the broth I let it sit overnight and added a bit more before sticking it in the oven.
4. No breadcrumbs over top.
5. And finally, here is a direct link to the recipe to make life a bit easier :)

This recipe is so simple and so good, I suggest everyone throw out their other Thanksgiving stuffing plans for this year and do Vegetarian Cornbread Stuffing instead! Trust me, you would not regret the decision ;)

As far as vegetarian and healthy sides go, I will also be making this Sweet and Spicy Brussels Sprouts recipe for Thanksgiving this year. Since we have some family who enjoy spicy and some that do not, my plan is to add no chili flakes to one batch and have another that is spicy enough for everyone to enjoy! Gah, I cannot wait to put all these in my mouth!

Also, as I write this I have an adorable, giant baby cat purring on my lap and snuggling my face. If you, like me, cannot get enough of adorable baby cats, I would suggest heading over to my insatgram page for blog updates and all the adorable cat pics your heart desires!

And, we will be having a motivation post a bit later today.

Bench Taps

First off, I would like to apologize for not having a post out on Thursday, again. Something seems off with my Thursdays, but I promise to get it together :) To make up for it, I will be doing another post on Sunday! It is still up in the air whether the post will be a This Week in Workouts, or something completely different. Either way, I hope you enjoy it and have an absolutely wonderful weekend!

This weekend the hubs and I are going to see The Hunger Games and I can seriously not wait! Ahh, there is so much excitement in me that I just want to shake a table!!! Who is team Peta+Katniss? I am!!

Before the movie we are going to one of my favorite restaurants downtown that I have not been to in about a year. I honestly did not think we could get in since we are going with a large group of friends, but they were able to take us at the right time when all other places had NOTHING available. Yes, season has definitely struck our little vacation town.

My plan right now is to do about 500 of this bench tap challenge before we go to dinner since they have ridiculously good lobster mac n' cheese. I am sure half the portion is more fat than one should eat in a week, and let's not even start on those carbs. Bench taps are so, so great for the core, the upper thighs, and the bum- pretty much every area us ladies like to work on the most. They are also a massive cardio and plyometric workout. Seriously. My goal today is to complete, at least, 50 reps per leg (100 total) after my morning jog. It will be intense, but so is that lobster mac n' cheese ;)

If you are not sure how to complete a bench tap, this has a great illustration. Pretty much, it is just knee-ups but you stand in front of a bench and tap the elevated foot on the bench top. Simple, not easy!

How many can you do?