Hi! How are you, friend? I hope you’ve been having a great week. What’s new?

This past week was a good one, but I feel like I was in overdrive with all my various responsibilities. I worked hard to debut a brand new hour of choreography in my LifeBarre class, so I’m glad that’s officially out there, and I was able to teach it twice. Then, as soon as I taught my new barre class once, I started working on a new hour of choreography for my Barbell Strength class next week, in preparation for Monday. I also created a new workout for my Shred class that I taught on Thursday, so this week was very much focused on class prep for group fitness, which is incredibly time consuming. I try to space out when I’m creating new stuff, because it’s a lot to have all three at once. But for some reason, they all needed to be changed around the same time this time around. The good news is that now I don’t have to create anything new for a couple more weeks. Yay!

Other than that, it was a very routine week over here with nothing much out of the ordinary. I had some online training for Life Time to complete, and I also tuned into the annual Beautycounter conference, LEAD, which was super inspiring (more on a Beautycounter sale below). But mostly, we’re doing well in the back-to-school routine. Most days of the week, Brady and I hang out at home in the afternoon, unless I have a class to teach or he has swimming. I feel like the weather will be nice enough to return to our afternoon walks soon too, which will be great. Our weekdays fly by, that’s for sure. How about yours?

This weekend will be fairly chill. I have a hair appointment, Brady has his next soccer practice/game, and we’re doing one fall festive activity, which I’ll report back on later. We’ll also be doing some more party prep for Brady’s upcoming 5th birthday party at our house, which is quickly approaching.

Alright, let’s jump into the faves for the day …

Current faves

Family

Brady’s first soccer practice and team sport experience

Last Saturday, at 7:30 a.m., when we were rushing out the door to leave our house, I was definitely second guessing our decision to sign Brady up for early Saturday morning soccer for the next eight weeks. But once we got there, that indecision went away, because it was totally worth it, and it was a fun experience for all three of us for different reasons.

First of all, I hope you get a kick (no pun intended) out of this sign on the fields for all parents to see before walking their kiddo up to play …

This little local soccer league is Brady’s first experience in a team sport, and we’re so excited to see how it goes for him. Brady is playing in the Charlotte Soccer Academy Kickstarter League, which is just for four and five-year-olds who are new to sports. This program is Saturdays only, with a 30-minute practice followed by a 30-minute game. There are no goalies, and the kiddos just take turns kicking the ball down a small field, so it’s supposed to be no pressure and just fun.

The day before this first soccer experience, we went all over south Charlotte looking for supplies for him, and we found tiny shinguards, but all the cleats in his size were sold out. He was a little upset not to have real cleats, but once we got there, he forgot all about it. And I remembered to order some cleats on Amazon this week, which should arrive today (fingers crossed) to be ready for tomorrow.

Dave is one of the coaches too. I encouraged Dave to step up as a volunteer coach, not only because he played soccer in college and loves sports, but also because I knew he’d be a great coach. He wasn’t exactly sure what to expect, and as a coach of eight four and five-year-olds, he had to do a lot of running, playing and corralling them. It was a real workout for him, and for Brady, and both of them were sweaty five minutes into our soccer experience.

Three other boys from Brady’s preschool class are in the league, so I chatted with the other moms for much of the hour we were there. But I couldn’t take my eye off my little soccer player, and I definitely teared up a couple times watching him out there. He’s getting so big, while also being so small, and I love to see him out in the wild being a big boy. It was incredibly cute, although we did notice Brady was a little rough on the field with his fellow players, so we’ll need to work on that throughout the season. 

Anywho, if you’re looking for us on a Saturday morning for the next eight weeks, you know where to find us! 

Beauty

The Beautycounter Fall Sale is here through the weekend

This past week, I realized I celebrated my four-year anniversary as a Beautycounter consultant! I’ve been a bit quiet on the clean beauty front, but I’m still using exclusively Beautycounter skincare and makeup and helping lots of people with their skin behind the scenes. 

To celebrate my four years with Beautycounter with me, how about some clean makeup and skincare right now during the fall sale when most items on the site are either 15 or 25 percent off through the weekend? 

Head here to shop the sale with me! (And by shopping with me, you’re also entered into my personal giveaway for a free skincare product.)

If you’re brand new to Beautycounter and want to shop this sale, use the code CLEANFORALL30 at check-out for an even bigger discount. And thank you in advance for supporting me and supporting the clean beauty movement. Please reach out to me if you need any help at all.

Food

Tasty food items I’ve tried recently 

I have a couple recent food faves that deserve a spot today …

Pumpkin spice smoothie. I’m very much into pumpkin, and I’m not embarrassed about it. I picked up a couple of these Koia pumpkin smoothies from Sprouts, and they have the greatest pumpkin flavor — it’s seriously the perfect spice. I’m a big fan, so I had to share them with you. These have been a pre-tennis and pre-yoga snack for me recently, and I’m going to get more this weekend.

(You can also see my new workout bike shorts here.)

Pumpkin waffles. Lately, I’ve been getting sick of my same old oatmeal every morning, so I’ve been trying to switch it up. This marks my second bag of these frozen Evergreen waffles, and I’m totally into the pumpkin flavor. I toast three of them at a time (they are small), add some almond butter and a banana, and it makes for a filling and delicious breakfast. I found these at Sprouts as well.

Workouts

My workouts from last week

Here’s where I share a recap of my previous week of workouts. I share this to show you how I try to get diversity in my week, and how I always take a rest day (almost always). But remember, I do a little bit more than the average person, because I’m a group fitness instructor. 

Workouts from the week of 9/12

• Monday: Taught 1-hour barbell class, 9:45 a.m.
• Tuesday: Taught 1-hour barre class with light weights, 9:30 a.m., took 60-minute tennis clinic, 11 a.m.
• Wednesday: Taught 45-minute barre class with light weights, 5:30 p.m.
• Thursday: Taught 45-minute combo class with weights, 9:45 a.m.
• Friday: Taught 45-minute barbell class, 11:30 a.m.
• Saturday: Took 90-minute tennis clinic, 11 a.m.
• Sunday: Took 1-hour super-gentle meditation yoga, 12 p.m.

This past week was very routine and light. I taught my usual five classes, I went to tennis, and I went to the most gentle yoga class I’ve ever attended at Life Time, called Surrender. In this class, we mostly laid on our backs, did a couple lying-down twists, and that was it. I think I fell asleep every time we changed poses, so it was very restorative!

This past week, I was a running little tired and busy and decided to skip doing any other workouts other than the classes I teach. Even though I’d love to have more time to work on my own personal strength, if I’m at all tired, I have to skip it to keep enough energy to teach my classes. No big deal, because it was still a lot of diverse movement. I think my travels caught up to me, but I’m back to normal and energized now, so we’re all good.

Best read of the week …

Here’s a fun one I wanted to share with you:

Trader Joe’s fall finds. While I always think you need to get out there and try things for yourself, I enjoyed this list of Trader Joe’s fall items ranked from worst to best. I feel a trip to TJ’s coming on, so I can at least stock up on cans of raw pumpkin.

Quote of the week …

Here’s a thought from a recent meditation on Headspace that spoke to me, and I wanted to share it with you here. Even though “being present” sounds easy, it’s something a lot of us struggle with. If you can for a moment today and this weekend, really be where you are.

Blog archives of the week …

Let’s look back at two blog posts worth revisiting, including a recent one:

All about tennis. This post is a big one, because I had so much to say on tennis fashion, life lessons I’ve learned from starting tennis and so much more … “What it’s like starting tennis as an adult.”

Teaching group fitness. This post is totally from the archives, but it’s still full of great advice if you’ve ever thought of becoming an instructor, while holding down a regular job. That’s how I started too … “How to become a group fitness instructor when you have a full-time job.”

That’s everything, my friend! Take care, and see you back here soon! 🙂 

Questions of the day for YOU …

How was your week?

Have you done anything fall festive yet?

When is the last time you tried something new?