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Happy Friday everyone! Have you had a good week? The best thing about my week has without a doubt getting my tattoo started! Here’s a sneak preview:

I’m back for another 2 hour session in two weeks time to add more colour and to extend the design down my arm and shoulder. When its finished I’ll explain more about the design, its meaning and why I’ve chosen to have it done. The tattoo itself really didn’t hurt that much thankfully. I already have 3 tattoos so I knew what to expect but it wasn’t half as bad as I remember it! I absolutely adore it :-)

In addition to that awesomeness I’ve enjoyed some lovely food this week. I’ve had lots of salads:

1. Cos lettuce, red cabbage, carrots, red onion, raw beet, pinto beans, crumbled blue corn chips, dressing of hemp oil, lemon juice and hot chilli powder 2. Romaine, lentils, peppers, parsley and home made balsamic dressing (blueberry balsamic vinegar, agave, Dijon mustard, hemp oil, garlic powder, water) 3. Romaine, raw beetroot, avocado, chopped salted almonds, dried cherries and balsamic dressing. 4. Romaine, carrot, red cabbage, cucumber, crumbled Raw Health Italian cracker and balsamic dressing

I’ve also had the usual green smoothies, here’s a couple of my faves from this week:

Chocolate Cherry Beet (spring greens, beet greens, beetroot, frozen cherries, chocolate sun warrior protein powder, ground flax, maca powder, water, ice) topped with more cherries, buckwheaties and peanut flour sauce

Chocolate Ginger Pear (spinach, pear, chocolate hemp protein powder, small piece of fresh ginger, maca, ground flax, chlorella tablets, water, ice) topped with raw cacao granola and pumpkin seeds

On Monday we had a planning day at work which meant lunch was at Oldfields again. I had the usual butterbean hummus with epic amounts of fresh warm bread to start and then this wonderful dish with spinach, mushrooms and fennel in a tomato sauce:

It really was so good, I have to try recreating this as fennel is something I’ve never tried much before. I also had lemon sorbet for dessert.

The last couple of evenings I was on raid the freezer mode so used up some soya mince mixed with mushrooms and frozen peas in a tomato sauce (passata, garlic powder, dried oregano and fresh basil), firstly with some courgette ‘spaghetti’:

Then with a baked sweet potato and tons of spinach and nutritional yeast:

Various snackies have also been had…

dried apricots, almond butter and dark chocolate turtles

Raw coconut flour mixed with water, chopped apple and raisins with some agave syrup

Trail mix (inspired by Jemma): roast lemon salted almonds, dried mango, dried cherries and pumpkin seeds (for iron!)

Yesterday I had a fabulous breakfast of a slice of my Banana Coconut Bread made with chocolate chips (slice taken from the freezer) and topped with maple peanut butter (made from peanut flour) and two chopped pears plus coffee of course:

That bread is awesome, I swear it is the best banana bread ever!

Workouts this week have just been the usual:

• Sunday – AM gym – 30 minute relaxed treadmill run (3.25 miles ish) 15 minutes cross trainer, kettle bell class
• Monday – AM 5 min cross trainer warm up, strength workout B from Base phase of Female Body Breakthrough, 10 min HIIT step machine, 10 min HIIT bike
• Tuesday – PM Yoga Class 
• Wednesday – AM 5 min cross trainer warm up, strength workout A from Base phase of Female Body Breakthrough, 10 min HIIT step machine, 10 min HIIT bike
• Thursday – PM Yoga class
• Friday – AM 5 min cross trainer warm up, strength workout B from Base phase of Female Body Breakthrough, 10 min HIIT step machine, 10 min HIIT bike

The yoga has been fun again, in last nights class we were doing poses that all had to be done against the wall. I have to admit I used to think that using blocks and straps were only for people who weren’t very flexible but now I realise that they actually help you to get deeper into the pose and stretch more.

On my weekend send off Love List this week…

Teavivre dragon jasmine green tea pearls

I am obsessed with this tea! I go through tea ‘phases’ sometimes its chai, then peppermint or perhaps liquorice (regular green tea is a daily staple for me though – at least 4 cups a day!). Right now it’s this fragrant and beautiful tea that transforms in your mug. Love it! Also…

The tattoo obviously ;-) // 8 Tracks (James music obsessed that he is, has introduced me to this check it out for a wealth of unique mixes to suit your every mood) // managing to do 14 push ups for the first time ever this morning!

What are you loving this week?

Hi everyone, hope your all having a brilliant week and enjoying the first day of February! Here I am for yet another WIAW...

These are my eats and goings on from Monday. I had a completely different Monday to usual because I was going to yoga on the evening I didn't hot foot it to the gym first thing as usual. It was nice to be able to have a relaxed morning, plus I had even more time available as we had a planning day for work so I didn't need to be in until 10am. I started off with the usual warm water and lemon then made a big fresh juice:

This is my current favourite blend with beetroot, carrot, choi sum (my green grocer is selling this really cheap right now)cucumber and ginger. I added some matcha to it as well. After getting dressed I made a bowl of porridge:

This was just a simple bowl made with oats and water cooked slowly on the stove top. I added a little stevia and then topped with Clearspring blueberry jam and peanut flour paste. When I added it on top I thought it started to look like a ying and yang symbol so I added the dots, I'm so mature I know ;-)

I also had a lovely coffee:

This was cinnamon and hazelnut and hit the spot!

We had our planning day in the upstairs room of a local restaurant that we usually use for team building days called Oldfields. After a morning of planning we had a delicious lunch. I started with the butterbean hummus and rapeseed oil dipping board:

I had this the last time I was here and it was delicious! For my main I just had a plate made up of various side dishes such as roast root veg, roast new potatoes and greens. I added some of the left over hummus on the side:

For dessert I had an apple and sultana compote:

Yum! After we finished our day I went and got some fruit and veg from my favourite green grocer before coming home. For dinner I made myself a big salad:

This included romaine lettuce, crumbled nori, carrot, avocado, sea veggie sprinkles, pumpkin seeds, olives and braggs liquid aminos.

Then I headed off to my new yoga class! The class was very different to what I was used to, when I have done taught yoga before it has been Ashtanga so quite brisk. This class was much, much slower paced, I didn't break a sweat at all, which I know doesn't have to be the point with yoga, but for me I think I prefer something a bit more challenging. We did do some interesting partner poses, and I did feel extremely relaxed by the end of the class. I also enjoyed this class for being a bit more spiritual. I'm not sure if I'm going to make this a regular thing, at £5 a class its not cheap. I'm thinking I might occasionally visit this class when I feel like I need chilling out!

When I got home it was getting pretty late but I was a bit hungry so I made up a 'vanilla cookie' green smoothie with spinach, romaine, cookies and cream spiru-tein powder, vanilla stevia, water and ice. I also chucked in some maca powder and a couple of chlorella tablets in for good measure:

This was delicious but unfortunately things started to go down hill from there. I ended up in bed at 9pm shivering uncontrollably even when I had a hot water bottle. That was followed by a restless night and waking up yesterday morning feeling like I'd been hit by a bus. I have no idea what it was but I haven't felt that poorly in a long time, I spent most of yesterday unable to get out of bed. Luckily I started to pick up and have been much better today although my manager has just sent me home, I hate being ill!

So I’m thinking I need to look at some other yoga class options to find something that suits me better. I’ve been looking at my gym class time table and I’m thinking of doing more juggling to find classes that will fit in with my schedule. Are you a yoga fan? What kind of yoga do you prefer?

Hi everyone, so happy that the weekend has come back around again!

I’ve had a pretty busy week at work, so glad that I took the time last weekend to prep some food, it really has saved me a lot of time and stress as well as cash!

Workouts this week have been awesome. I think just doing yoga for a few day’s last week allowed by body to have a good rest. I’ve been following my new plan, and for my Monday and Friday strength workouts I’ve decided to generally follow the plans in Female Body Breakthrough instead of NRoL. This is mainly because I can perform more of the exercises from FBB with the equipment my gym has available, plus the plan includes a couple of moves that I know are really going to benefit me. This includes an exercise called the Partial Co Contraction Lunge which specifically gets the glutes firing – an issue that has contributed to my knee injury issues. This week I just did 2 sets of each move but next week I’ll be bumping it up to the full 3 sets.

For my ‘Anything Goes Thursday’ I fancied doing something different so I tried my first You Tube Vid! I did the POP Pilates Beyonce Booty Workout:

This was a killer! Its only 15 minutes but I was sweating by the end of it. I followed it up with the MTV Power Yoga DVD.

Eats this week have been really good, glad you liked the sound of my Autumn Grain Bowl! I made use of the leftover brown rice and butternut puree for an amazing breakfast:

I warmed the cooked brown rice and butternut puree with some rice milk and cinnamon on the stove top adding a chopped apple, raisins and some almond butter sauce. I enjoyed with a mug of black cinnamon hazelnut coffee sweetened with stevia. This was utterly delicious!

For a tasty lunch I made a big salad with romaine, spinach, carrot, pepper and cucumber topped with some basil, pine nut and hemp pesto, hummus, raw aubergine bacon and some dehydrated cherry tomatoes:

I’m not a massive fan of uncooked tomatoes (except in raw pasta sauce) so I dehydrated the cherry tomatoes to concentrate the flavour. I also loved the pesto mixed with the hummus!

I’ve enjoyed the usual green smoothies too:

This was post strength workout and one of the best I’ve had for ages! It contained spinach, pears, chocolate hemp protein powder, rice milk, mesquite, barley grass, midori greens powder, water, ice and gums topped with hazelnut butter sauce and bee pollen.

I’ve also been enjoying soup as the weather has returned to be more autumnal!

Leek Greens and White Bean Soup with a chopped raw pepper and toasted farmers market rye and fig bread with pure spread which was lovely.

I’ve been continuing to enjoy snacking, but have also been making sure that my evening dessert / snack is something that is meeting my cravings to leave me feeling really satisfied:

Chocolate tasting plate with a square of 100% cacao chocolate topped with peanut butter, RAW Health raw cherry chocolate and Divine Dark Chocolate with Orange and Ginger, fabulous! 

Frozen cherries defrosted with chocolate chia seed pudding and raw almond butter:

I made the pudding with 2 tbsp of chia seeds, water, raw cacao, stevia and almond extract, so good!

Today we had a team building day for work which started with a gingerbread coffee in a cafe followed by a 4-5 mile hike around Durham through woods and by the river followed by lunch at a great restaurant called Oldfields that specialise in local and seasonal menus. I called ahead to request something vegan and got a wonderful butter bean hummus and rapeseed oil dipping plate to start:

The bread was delicious dipped in the oil and hummus! My main was some baked mushrooms with spinach and tomato sauce accompanied by some ‘autumn greens’ and roasted root veg:

I also had a fruit salad as a dessert and a glass of red, it was a wonderful meal! We spent the rest of the afternoon doing a lot of planning for the future of our organisation which was exciting!

I’ve enjoyed today so much and have felt very ‘autumny’, especially after a walk through the woods! After the day with work I went and stocked up with cheap seasonal fruit and veggies from the green grocers for the weekend, I can’t wait to cook with them all :-)

Have you done any You Tube workout videos before? Do you have any favourites?

Any big plans for the weekend? I’m probably going to have another chilled out one me thinks! Hope whatever your up to you have a great one :-)