Hey, my friends! I’ve got a coffee chat coming at you today.

It’s about time for one of these, wouldn’t you say? While I chat casually with you guys on Fridays every week during our current faves posts, I haven’t done a full-on chat session in many months. In fact, the last one was probably some time in late summer of 2020 — and that seems like a world away. So why don’t we each grab an oat-milk latte (unless you have a different order, but I don’t know why you would choose anything else, because oat milk is a superior alt-milk), and sit down and get to talking …

Start of summer 2021 coffee chat

Back at the gym, and back with gym kid care

Here’s what I love about kiddo care at the gym: Brady is just as excited to go to it as I am to drop him off at it. The kid care at the Life Time where I’m teaching is amazing, and they even have extra activities for the kiddos. Last week, Brady took a kids yoga class. I just happened to walk past the studio where it was taking place and was able to secretly watch him for a few minutes. I died from cuteness. And he talked about dolphin pose and flamingo pose for the rest of the day.

Now that he’s on summer break (although, actually, I do have him in a camp three days this week), I’ve been taking him to the gym every morning for about an hour or so. He always has a story about the fun that he’s had in there while I get in my workout or teach a class. Sometimes, I even do a little work in the cafe. We each get some space. It’s much needed. I’m so happy to have gym kid care back in my life. 

The partial end of an era, but not completely

And now for something a little less exciting …

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but last week, I officially turned off “autoship” as an instructor for Les Mills BODYATTACK and Les Mills CORE (formerly Les Mills CXWORX). That means, I’m technically not a “current” certified instructor for those formats any longer, if I’m not receiving the updated choreography every quarter. This pains me deeply inside, but I also know it’s the right thing to do.

My gym doesn’t have Les Mills programs, and there aren’t any good gyms near me that have them either. The only way you can teach Les Mills programs is in a licensed facility (you cannot hold the license yourself, even if you hold the certification), so that means it’s time for me to say goodbye to some of my Les Mills certifications. Les Mills BODYATTACK was a joy to teach and take, and I’m not saying I’ll never go back to it. But for now, that chapter is closed. While I love the Les Mills CORE workout, quite frankly, I never taught the class regularly anyhow. But I have always done it at home, and I will continue to do that.

I did keep, and I will always keep my Les Mills BODYPUMP autoship, not knowing when I’ll teach it again, because I couldn’t imagine not being a current certified BODYPUMP instructor. It’s my first fitness love.

I will always enjoy and appreciate Les Mills workouts as the gold standard, and I will definitely be back to Les Mills On Demand at home once a week or even more, because I can’t stay away. Les Mills programs have been my L-I-F-E for almost 12 years. And I have learned so much from all of my Les Mills instructor trainings too. But things have changed, I’ve moved (across the country two times, because yes, I was already teaching and taking Les Mills classes when I lived in Florida before even moving to California), but these days, I’m teaching more freestyle programs. I’ve branched out a lot. My love for Les Mills will never die, but this is right for me as this moment.

For now, I’ll be over on Les Mills On Demand catching BODYPUMP, Les Mills Barre, Les Mills CORE and hopefully trying out Les Mills Tone, which just debuted on Les Mills On Demand too. Speaking of Les Mills On Demand, they have some big technology advances coming soon, and I’ll tell you more about them once I experience the upgrades. Hop on over to try out the programs, if you haven’t yet, using my free 30-day trial here. Once a member of the Les Mills tribe, always a member, and maybe I’ll return to teaching BODYPUMP one day. But for now, I’m an On-Demander only. 🙂 

Being a blogger is a strange job

Even though I’m a blogger, I don’t talk about “blogging” much. I don’t write about the topic of blogging to you guys, and I don’t talk much about blogging to people in my everyday life either. 

But this blog is my business, and it does matter a ton to me. And it’s definitely a little hurtful when I know people in my life don’t care about it or are just over it. For instance: I get an email round-up at the end of every single day from my mailing-list provider, where I manage the emails I send out for the blog. It tells me the names of people who have subscribed that day and the names of the people who have unsubscribed that day. And when I see a name of someone I know who has unsubscribed, it always stings. And that happens here and there. I got one recently that really stung. 

When you put yourself out there, there’s always going to be some good and some bad. I get that. And over the years, I’ve tried to not take things personally. But when what you write about is so clearly intertwined with you as a person, it can get a little muddy. I don’t want to be doing a different job, and I am grateful that over the many years of pouring so much into this little space, it’s become something I can rely on as my job. But still, we’re friends here, and we’re having coffee, and this has been on my mind.

I know I’ve said it before, but oftentimes I feel like I should be trying much harder to grow and expand and do new things, especially if I look around at my peers who have been doing this the same time as me and have really put their foot on the gas to evolve. (Oh how comparison never helps, right?) My blog and readership is so small, and I only put out a couple posts a week with a tiny bit of content of social media — which still takes up all my working time. I could be pushing so much harder and doing so much more. But part of me also knows that I’m happy to be able to handle it all on my own, without needing to outsource too much, and I’m also happy keeping space for other things in my life, like teaching group fitness, momming a whole lot and all of that. I already feel like my time and days are full of a good combination of work and not work, and I’m not wanting to change right now. This sounds like a silly complaint perhaps. But the point is that this blogging-as-a-job thing is not at all as glamorous or as easy as it may sometimes seem. I’m not saying I want to go back to the corporate world, but I am here to share some of the stranger parts with you. There’s always a lot of self-doubt, questioning and uncertainty when you are technically in charge of your own operation. I’ve been feeling some of those feelings in this space lately. And I hope I am providing you some value regularly, even in sharing this thought.

And of course, I’m always open to feedback and suggestions from you. I’ve loved writing the A Lady Goes West Advice Corner posts (submit an anonymous question here, if you want to be included in the next one), because it’s given me a chance to hear from you more. So, please leave a comment, send me a DM or an email, let me know what you like to see here on the blog, what you want to see more of, and what’s on your mind too. 🙂 

Toddler situations

And now for some mom life …

We’ve been struggling with Brady’s listening skills, as of late. I feel like I’m asking him to do things over and over again all day, and he rarely does them. This turns into some major frustration. Getting him out the door is a struggle. Getting him to finish his meals is a struggle. Many things are struggles. We recently started eating breakfast at the kitchen table instead of the coffee table to help with getting through that meal. But getting him to stay seated during dinner is almost impossible. He likes to roam.

And yes, I know that toddlers aren’t usually great listeners. But I feel like he used to do better than he’s doing now. For those of you with multiple children, you’re probably thinking this is no big deal to manage just one. But one toddler is still a toddler, and he fills up the house with his antics. He’s the cutest, sweetest and smartest, but we’re in a phase where he has moments where he’s hard to deal with, that’s for sure.  

I’ve been finding myself a little fed up lately. And from what I understand from my other momma friends, this is a normal occurrence. I think we’re all supposed to say that being a mom is the greatest blessing ever and be done with it without a complaint. And yes, I do feel blessed to be Brady’s mom. But in this coffee chat, I want you to know that Brady has been a total handful lately. Once again, thank goodness for gym kid care, and for the three-day camp Brady is in this week and will be in for a week in July too. I love him to death, but I also appreciate having other people watch him. 

More fun summer plans

After a year of very little activities, we’ve had so many lately.

We loved having my college bestie, Yolanda, visit us from Florida a few weeks ago. We loved having my brother, Matthew, and his wife, Stephanie, visit from Georgia two weeks ago. We’ve loved having my mom visit three times in the last few months (and she is currently here). And of course, we had so much fun going to Ohio to see our friends, Grant and Bre and their kiddos last weekend. Next up, in three weeks, Dave and I are heading to Jamaica with Grant and Bre for an adults-only, all-inclusive four-night trip. This will mark the first big trip we’ve ever taken without Brady — so it’s a big deal for us. Dave’s sister, Gwena, is flying out from California to visit us before the trip, then she will be here taking care of Brady for us, for which we are eternally grateful. Brady loves hanging with Auntie Gwena.

Two weeks after we come back from Jamaica, we’re heading to a wedding in Orlando, then we’re hosting some of our dear friends from California, Phil and Kicki, at the end of July. In August, we’re going to the Keys with my family for a memorial for my dad. So many, many activities are on the agenda, and, I’m not mad about it. Things will be much slower in September, when Brady goes back to school, but this is a lot of stuff over the course of a couple months, that’s for sure. This time last year, I was dying for a trip and/or visitors, and now we’ve got an influx — oh how things change over time.

With a lot of weekend travel and activities, means I’ve got to do extra work during the week, because I have less time on the weekends to get a lot done (and I’ve always worked for a few hours on Saturdays and Sundays). I’ve been managing okay so far and hope I can keep it up, especially now that I’m teaching a Monday morning workout class, which I have to plan and prepare for on the weekend too. Once again, this is all good stuff, but it’s proved to be a lot. I haven’t had too much down-time, but I have had plenty of fun time, and for now — that’ll do. 🙂 

(Wearing these black bike shorts in this post, which are super comfortable.)

And with that, I’ve reached the last sip of my oat milk latte. Thank you so much for joining me today on this little catch-up! I hope you enjoyed our coffee date. As I said above, I love to hear from you, so please reach out any time. Have a wonderful day, my friends!

Other posts you may like …

• How to find inspiration (and why you should care)
• Our first four months of living in Charlotte, North Carolina
• Ask-me-anything A Lady Goes West Advice Corner: third edition
• You asked: Here are answers to the most common questions I get

Questions of the day

What would you want to talk about at our coffee chat?

How are you doing in life right now?

What’s something that’s going great for you right now?