Current faves: SF event, health products, love and weekly workouts

Hi, my friends! Happy Friday! Another week in January is coming to a close. I hope you had a good one … it was rainy over here, but productive. All the usual stuff, like grocery store visits, workouts, teaching barre, subbing a class, getting some writing work done and watching sweet little Brady practicing his walking skills. Yay!

This weekend, I’m hanging out with a girlfriend during the day and having a girls’ night with some other ladies in the evening on Saturday. Woohoo! 

Because it’s Friday, it’s time to look at a random selection of my latest favorites in fitness, food and life. Here we go …

City Event

Yoga, reiki and snacks in Bernal Heights 

Over the weekend, I went into the City for an event hosted by the Health Warrior food brand, called “Wake Up with Health Warrior,” and it was all about establishing healthy morning activities and routines — with mindfulness, movement and nourishment. I took the BART in and then walked to the spot where the event was held in Bernal Heights, which was a private home that was converted into a very well-designed event space. The place was gorgeous, and you can see the sister property in the Instagram account, called Mission Loft.

(I got some questions on Instagram about my outfit this day. Here is my long sleeve, workout tank and super cute and comfy patterned leggings.)

When I arrived, I changed into the slippers they provided, then said hello to all the lovely ladies in attendance. As you guys know, I don’t get out to too many events, but when I do, I sometimes see many of the same bloggers who are local, so I’ve become friends with them, and it’s great to catch up. I also met some new peeps at this event, which is always nice.

The event started off with a 30-minute yoga flow taught by Davida of The Healthy Maven (I’ve now met Davida two times, and she is such a real genuine and sweet person), then we moved downstairs for a reiki healing session with Alice of Alice in Wondrland (another beauty, who just makes you feel calm when you’re around her). 

I had never done reiki before, and the idea behind it is activating physical and emotional healing in the body by touching and connecting with the spirit. Alice had all sorts of drums and chimes and essential oils, and she walked us through a meditation, then moved around the room touching everyone’s head to get that healing going. It sounds weird, but was quite cool in the moment. I felt very zen after it was over.

From there, we had Health Warrior snacks and learned some smoothie-making tips from Molly of Balance by Molly, a health coach and nutritionist, who has a beautiful Instagram feed too. She said you always want at least 20 grams of protein in your smoothie, and you should mix up all the smoothie ingredients together in your blender for a bit before adding protein powder or chia seeds last, once the mixture is already well blended. We then got a chance to try the new Health Warrior single-serve microwave protein muffins, and they were delish.

Hand model much? We also made smoothies with the new Health Warrior protein powder and hung out. Before you know it, I had been there more than three hours, and it was time to head home back to the boys in the East Bay, so I grabbed my gift bag and hoofed it back to the BART, and Dave, Brady and Rudy picked me up on the other end.

Overall, it was a perfect chance for me to get out, talk about wellness and the world of social media and spend time with great ladies and a great brand. And I totally want to eat more of those protein muffins!

By the way, if you want to know how I structure my morning routine, I detailed it in this post, “This is my actual must-do healthy morning routine to start the day.” Hopefully, I’ll add meditation to that morning routine one of these days.

(Photo credit for all of these pics goes to Erin Conger, who captured the event for us.)

Health

Topical magnesium oil

I’ve read about the need for supplementing magnesium for years (and shared a ton of articles about it on here) and finally made the step to buy some topical magnesium oil for myself last month. While you can get magnesium from some food sources (nuts and pumpkin seeds, green leafy vegetables, black beans, seafood, etc.), it’s very common for people to be deficient in magnesium. That’s not good, because you need magnesium for hundreds of processes in the body, all the way from relieving stress to improving sleep — thus, why not supplement to make sure you’re getting enough? 

I decided on this brand of topical magnesium oil after reading the reviews and descriptions on Amazon, and it seems to be pretty good quality. Yes, you can take magnesium orally, but that can cause some digestion issues, and taking magnesium on the skin is the fastest way to get it into your system. I’ve been spraying this oil onto my stomach (not sure why I chose that area, but it works) maybe five nights a week, and I swear, every single time I do, I have a great night of sleep (unless Brady wakes up). I’ve heard people say that magnesium stings on the skin, but I haven’t experienced that at all. Once you spray maybe 5 to 10 sprays, you rub it into your skin, then wash your hands, and that’s that. 

Fun

Marking 10 years of knowing Dave

Some of you may have seen on Instagram on Wednesday, that it was exactly 10 years since the day I met Dave on January 16, 2009. We met during happy hour at a bar in downtown Orlando on a cold Friday night, and the rest is history — even if I didn’t know it at the time that I had just met my future husband, father of my children and partner in life. We basically started dating after meeting that night!

For the first maybe six years of our lives together, we actually went out and celebrated our meeting anniversary. But with busy schedules and with Brady, that has sort’ve fallen away. On January 16 this year, Dave was working at a Warriors game, and I was home with Brady, but I did get a surprise delivery of a dozen red roses, so that’s cool too. Do you celebrate the meeting anniversary with your significant other? Where and how did you meet?

Fun fact: I saw Dave from across the bar, and I was the one who went up to him. Hey, you’ve got to make the first move sometimes, and it all worked out well for me! We even found out that we lived in the same high-rise building in downtown Orlando, so it was meant to be. 🙂 

Beauty

Counterman is here!

Ladies are not the only ones who get to use safer skincare products that won’t mess up your hormones or cause you any issues, now the dudes can use Beautycounter too. 

And not to be a downer, but men need to care about the safety of the products they are using too. According to a survey conducted by the Environmental Working Group (EWG), on average, men use about six products daily, containing a total of about 85 unique ingredients. Of those 85 unique ingredients, many of them are known as endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) due to their interference with hormonal balance. Not to mention, EDCs can affect a guy’s fertility and play a part in obesity and coronary heart disease. Yuck. Basically, guys need Beautycounter too …

Right now, the Counterman Shave and Beard regimens are 10 percent off until January 24, and you get a free gift with purchase. (Ladies’ regimens are 10 percent now too.)

If you want to hear more about Beautycounter, details on the brand or sales on products, sign up with your email here. And reach out any time with questions!

Fitness

Weekly workout recap

And now we’re into the fitness.

Here’s a look at my workouts from last week …

• Monday: 1-hour BODYPUMP class, 10 a.m.
• Tuesday: 30-minute CXWORX and 30-minute BODYATTACK class, 9:30 a.m.
• Wednesday: 30 minutes of BODYATTACK, 11 a.m.
• Thursday: Taught 1-hour barre class, 12 p.m.
• Friday: 30-minute weights workout, 11 a.m.
• Saturday: 30 minutes of light gentle yoga, 11 a.m.
• Sunday: Rest day

This past week had a few hard workouts and a few lighter days, with almost two rest days, because Saturday’s light yoga was very much a recovery day too. It felt great to do a yoga class in person, because it had been a while since I’d done light flow. One day I’ll go back to a yoga studio regularly. One day!

Below is the short weights session I did … (If you want to see more of these workouts, I share them on my Instagram Stories and then save them in highlights under “Workouts.”) 

This particular workout was quite different for me, because I didn’t do my normal circuit training supersets, but took breaks between sets instead. I think I prefer circuit training, so I’ll go back to that this week — but it never hurts to switch up your workout variables. This sort’ve reminded me of a shorter version of a Kelsey Wells PWR workout from the Sweat app, which I reviewed here.)

Favorite reads

Best stuff from around the web 

• Oral health. Here’s a sexy topic we don’t touch on much: keeping your mouth and teeth clean. I switched to natural toothpaste and mouthwash over a year ago and haven’t looked back. My favorite toothpaste is this one, but this article has all sorts of fun oral care products that are also in the clean category with no harsh chemicals.
• Planks and hovers. Do you know the difference between these exercise moves? Which one do you prefer? I find planking easier, so I spend more time in hovers. Here’s how to properly do both.

A Lady Goes West archives

• All about food. From the comments and feedback, it seems you guys were excited to see this post. Yay for food … “All about food: What I’m eating and what foods I currently can’t live without.”
• Body image. Something worth revisiting if you need it … “How to handle a changing body image.”

P.S. Congrats to the winner of the RumbleRoller giveaway, Heather H. I have more giveaways coming next week. Have a great weekend!

Questions of the day

How was your week?

If you have a significant other, how and when did you meet?

What’s on tap for your weekend?

Any latest favorite finds to share with the group?