Hey friends! I’m loving the excitement on my Win a Trip to Run the Cherry Blossom 10 Miler post! Thank you so much for reading my blog and for your kind comments. Please keep those entries coming – I wish I could have ALL of you to run it with me! 🙂
As always, it’s been a busy week over here – starting in late January/early February I usually see an increase in new AnneTheRD nutrition client sign ups and this year has been no exception, so I had a bunch of new clients this week. I worked downtown Tuesday through Thursday which was also nice – I’m so much happier when I’m not home by myself! On Wednesday, I had a morning client in Arlington and didn’t have time to pack lunch before getting out the door. No worries – perfect excuse to have a lunch date with a coshared office buddy downtown!
We hit up MASO, a nice make your own salad and sandwich spot that I’ve been to a few times now. Always delicious! I made my own salad with all sorts of veggies, salmon, quinoa, and feta. Yummmm.
I had another great meal on Wednesday night, when I met my good friend Lara from high school for dinner at a cool new-to-me spot in Arlington called Water & Wall. It had a cool vibe and great food, and it was wonderful to catch up with Lara. There’s nothing like people who know you really well who you can be super real with, you know? Conversation like that is always good for the soul. 🙂
Anyway – we got 2 appetizers and 2 entrees and shared, because tasting 4 dishes is way more fun than just 2! To start, we had a very eclectic mix: the beet tartare… and the creme-fraiche wings. Because, you know, balance. 😉 Both were equally amazing! The flavor of the wings was delicious. Wet nap, please!
For our entrees, we shared the pumpkin curry and the salmon. Both were delicious, but I think my favorite was the salmon – cooked perfectly and the pearled couscous was great with it!
I also had an unpictured glass of Prosecco, obviously. I’m obsessed. 🙂 We looked at the dessert menu but both decided we were full and totally satisfied so we passed. Such a fun night – we must do that more often, Lara! And I’m definitely going back to Water and Wall again soon – delicious and nice spot.
On the fitness front, I went to a really fun event last night with my blogger buddy Chelsea! Heart her. 🙂
Sculpt DC, a boutique cycle and yoga studio in Metro Center hosted an event with JRINK and Reebok for local social media peeps/bloggers that included free 30 minute class demos and refreshments/mingling. The event started at 6:30, and even though it was really cold I decided to walk there from my coshared office near Dupont. It was about a 30 minute stroll and I love walking, especially in the city – such a nice way to decompress and there’s always so much to see. 🙂 Pretty sweet to be able to just stroll by the White House on a Thursday evening like it’s no big deal!
Shortly after we arrived, Chelsea and I hopped into the 30 minute demo cycle class. You guys know spinning isn’t my #1 favorite workout, but it’s nice to mix it up, and I found I liked it better as an evening workout than I have as a morning one – maybe because in the morning I like fresh air or bright lights to wake me up? At night the dark was more appealing. 🙂
It felt kind of like a dance party – the instructor had us doing all sorts of crazy push ups and things on the bike while cycling – kept me engaged and entertained because it was kind of like trying to pat my head and circle my stomach, you know? Also fun: my Victoria’s Secret Sport tights glowed in the black lights a bit. 🙂 I got a ton of compliments on them last night!
After the cycle demo, we had a few minutes to regroup and then headed in for a 30 minute yoga class demo! They had the lights off and glow sticks waiting at everyone’s mat – cool idea! And an unexpected side effect was that balance postures were harder than usual because it was so dark in the room – kind of like how if you close your eyes in a balance posture you almost immediately fall over. 😉
The stretching felt really nice and I liked the vibe of the studio in general – Sculpt DC is on ClassPass so I might have to come back again soon!
Post-yoga, we grabbed some samples from Galley (delicious):
And then sipped on a refreshment from one of my local faves, JRINK Juicery! Sadly the JRINK-mosa was gone by the time we finished yoga (and we weren’t ready for it when I took this photo, pre-yoga), but the spa water was lovely. 🙂
Such a fun event! Thanks again to Sculpt DC, JRINK, & co for having us!
I will end this post with a fitness move that my fellow tight hipped runners can try themselves at home, courtesy of my training session with Paul Medina of Capital Energy Training this morning! (In case you missed it, you can read more about our partnership in last week’s post.)
As you guys know, Paul and I are working together once a week to try to loosen up my insanely tight hips and shoulders. I’ve been having some chronic soreness in my right hip and right lower back from running that I’ve basically ignored… not smart, I know. Today was our third session and I’ve actually already noticed a difference – my hip has been noticeably less sore and my lower back has felt a lot better, too. My lower back/hip has been doing this weird thing over the past year where I almost have to crack it back into place after I sit down for awhile, and I noticed it’s been doing that less, too. I’m impressed – clearly Paul knows what he’s doing!
One of the moves that we did today that I wanted to share with you was this yoga squat that utilized the wall for support/stability so that I could open up my hips more to work on mobility and strength of the pelvic girdle. I’ve done this pose a lot in yoga but it’s always really hard for me to hold this position without losing form/straining because I’m so inflexible. I’ve tried sitting on a block before, but I liked the wall approach a lot better – I felt like I was able to get into a more effective stretch.
Your knees should be at about a 90 degree angle for this position. Keep your chest up and either place your hands together or squeeze a ball between your hands. We started here, then Paul had me slowly move my knees in and out, using my elbows to push out my knees more. After doing this and then coming back to the move again later, I noticed a huge difference in how the pose felt in terms of openness. Give it a try yourself, and I’ll continue to keep you guys updated on my sessions and improvements in the case that any of my local runner readers would like to work with him, too.
And finally, for those of you following along with the Winter Shape Up, the week 4 meal plan is now live and linked to on that main page! Final week – keep up the great work, everyone! 🙂
I will leave you with some links/things from around the web I enjoyed this week:
- What the Healthiest People Do During Their Lunch Breaks – via The Huffington Post (honored to have been included!)
- What is Healthy? – via Avocado a Day Nutrition (love this post – and not just because an article I shared with the author inspired it!)
- The Magic Lessons podcast by Elizabeth Gilbert. I found this podcast via fellow dietitian Alex, who as you know Rachael and I are collaborating with to create a 6 week intuitive and mindful eating program. Earlier this week, Alex emailed us this podcast and told us to listen to the Brene Brown episode. It was AMAZING – highly recommend it. The topic is how essential creativity is for healthy, wholehearted living, and I fully agree. Collaborating with Rachael and Alex to write/develop this intuitive and mindful eating program has been so amazing – we have skype calls once a week to brainstorm and review what we’ve already written and I always look forward to them and leave feeling really inspired and re-energized. So different from how the experience would be were I writing/developing the program on my own. We’re all gathering here in the DC area this spring to shoot some videos for the program and to finish up some of the content, and I can’t wait for us to get to collaborate in person!
