Weekend Update

Happy Monday! 

I kicked off the weekend with a nice little 9 AM workout on Saturday morning. My weekend classes are always fun because the instructor switches things up every week and you never know what to expect. She’s also full of energy and enthusiasm and will push you if she feels you’re not bringing your A game. Most importantly, she comes around and checks for proper form when we learn new exercises. Her classes are the next best thing to having a personal training.

The Saturday class always begins with thirty minutes of step aerobics followed by a series of strength and core exercises. The step portion is my favourite, as the choreography changes every week, making it both fun and challenging trying to keep up.  

After the gym, I was craving some chocolate milk (which might have had something to do with all the “Recharge with Milk” posters plastered all over my gym) so I decided to treat myself.  I then went out for lunch with my boyfriend; we found a cute little cafe downtown that makes homemade soups, salads and sandwiches. I had a whole wheat wrap with eggplant, tomatoes, red peppers, zucchini, hummus and avocado while my boyfriend had a chicken curry sandwich – both were delicious!

For dinner, we went to Whole Foods where I had a bit of chicken vindaloo, palak paneer and basmati rice. I was shocked by how good it was. I love Indian food but I’m very picky about where I eat it. If it’s just mediocre, I usually don’t enjoy it but the Whole Foods version was pretty legit. After dinner, we wandered around the store and sampled some treats from the organic junk food aisle (mmm falafel chips!).

I was then craving something sweet (that Belgian waffle definitely set the tone for the weekend) so we went to Starbucks where I had a mini-carrot cake cupcake, part of the new Starbucks Petites line.  It only has 190 calories but, honestly, it’s not really worth it considering how small it is. You can probably find a larger treat with the same number of calories, like an oatmeal chocolate chip cookie from the grocery store.

At night, we celebrated our friend’s birthday party at Supermarket downtown Toronto. I had two beers, which I worked off by dancing for the next two hours. DJ Faze was spinning and he played some of my favourite songs from my underground hip hop phase. He also played a lot of old school R&B and soul, which I was totally feeling. I never thought I’d hear Jackie Wilson and Mos Def played back-to-back at a club! Overall, it was a great night.

Despite going to bed later than usual, I managed to drag my behind to the gym for my 10 AM boot camp class on Sunday morning. As soon as we started doing Burpees, I began to wonder if I’d made a mistake coming given my tired state. But I made it through the hour and felt fresh and energized afterwards.

To cap off the weekend, I went to my sister and her husband’s house for dinner, where my mom made a delicious baked pasta with lots and lots of cheese. I definitely indulged quite a bit this weekend so I’ll probably cut back a bit this week to make up for it.

In other news, my boyfriend is going to give me his old iPhone (my current phone is a relic from 2007) meaning I can start taking pictures of all this amazing food I’m writing about.