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Windy to Snowy

Apr 222013

Posted by Britta on April 22, 2013 at 11:24 pm in Life 2 Responses »

Hi Hi! This is going to be a quick little post, but I wanted to pop in and share some adventures from this past weekend. I took a half day from work flew down to Chicago on Friday to visit some college roomies. This is the first time I’ve been able to get together with this group of ladies since we all graduated a few years ago and it was SO MUCH FUN!

I especially wanted to share a few of the Chicago spots we stopped in at throughout the weekend and share some highlights. I did a poor job of taking pictures this time around but still have a few memories to share and save for later:

- Dinner friday night at Gemini Bistro was spent catching up with my friend who was my classmate, coworker AND roommate during our time at Wisconsin together. We had so much fun and saw Kristin Cavallari and Jay Cutler at the restaurant, which is my second time ever spotting a celeb so I was a little excited. FYI – K. Cav looked supa fly with the best hair and the coolest fur jacket. LAGUNA BEACH FOR LIFE!! We shared the scallops and mussels which were perfection!! The mussels came with bread to soak up the delicious broth – so so so good.

- I met Sushi, my friend’s little Shiba Inu for the first time after many months of Instagram-stalking her cute pics of the pup.

- Shopping in Old Town and Michigan Ave – only one new pair of jeans so I controlled the damage pretty well I think.

- Lunch at Ditka’s of all places with my two Bears-crazy girlfriends which I actually loved – I admit I am a bandwagon Packers fan so I can’t defend myself around these ladies at all. They already have the Bears schedule memorized and analyzed, so it was hilarious to check out the Bears memorabilia at this place with them and nod my head and smile while they chatted football. The chicken avocado sandwich was yummy comfort food on a windy chilly day, too.

- Saturday night we got our hair done at a blow dry bar (really fun because who doesn’t love someone else washing and brushing their hair? but not something I would do often I don’t think) and then dinner out at Mercadito where we had almost every taco on the menu and the most interesting and delicious tequila drinks. HIGHLY recommend!! We also had a guac trio and two kinds of ceviche, which are only a sample of the menu. Gotta love a place with an extensive guacamole menu. We capped the night with drinks out in River North.

- Sunday headache recovery took place at Prasilo – insider tip like I know what I’m talking about: my gf told me they take brunch reservations which can be a rare thing in Chicago. I had the BEST eggs benedict ever – on a pretzel croissant with Brie and spinach YUM!! and the servers were very helpful and nice.

SIGHHHH it is so sad to come home away from all my friendlies in Chicago. I always have such a fun time when I visit!!!

I returned from the Windy City to this mess:

Yeah, this is totally fine.

I spent the weekend before last in my hometown visiting my family and hanging out with my BFFs for life, drinking margaritas and… well mostly drinking margaritas –the best kind of night, really. In other news, my legs are totally effed/tight/sore/cramping so I have been foam rolling like a motha all week but no real miles to report. Next week was supposed to be a “step back”/lower mileage week in my training plan so I am taking that weekend off a little earlier and hoping to pick up where I left off next weekend.

I know I haven’t kept up my promise to check in more often. Life and work has been so busy lately and let’s face it, I suck at blogging. Hope you enjoyed this little update anyway!

What I’ve Been Up To

Oct 172012

Posted by Britta on October 17, 2012 at 10:33 pm in Life 2 Responses »

Ah man. I suck at having a blog.

As much as I love word-vomiting TMI all over the interwebs, I just have not been feeling like updating on the blog the last month or so. Sometimes I think my distaste for facebook spills over into full hermit status, and I really think I need a clean slate (I’m a little sick of my collegegraduette URL, schtick, and embarrassing old posts).

Even with my laziness and weirdness over my blog lately, I can NOT believe I have not updated since July and I have actually missed it a little over the past couple weeks. Plus, I have had a few questions from friends and fam that miss my posts, which always makes me smile. SO, without further ado, here is a lil’ update on what I’ve been up to the last 2 months…

We packed in some final summertime fun before the chill hit these last couple weeks, including a fun weekend celebrating one of our best friend’s birthdays at a water park in the Wisconsin Dells (WATERSLIDES!!!), last few boat rides on the lake, and one last September camping trip to Willow River State Park in Wisconsin (WATERFALLS!!!!).

We have been to lots of fun events and delicious restaurants around the city.

The beautiful weather in the summer makes it so easy to get out and enjoy Minneapolis. A couple highlights included…

- Music & Movies in Loring Park (live music and old movies on blankets in the park. The night we went was Artists & Models and the music was a Zimbabwean band – a TOTALLY new experience!). We also attended #catvidfest…. I will let you judge that experience from the article, haha!!

- The County Fair in our hometown (August) and the Minnesota State Fair (Labor Day weekend)

- Bike ride around Lake Calhoun and Lake Harriet

- Buying our Jack-o-lantern pumpkins at the Farmer’s Market this year

We have had great visits from both sets of parents. My parents came up for my birthday weekend (oh yeah, did I mention I’m 25 now? When did I grow up?) and Brandon’s parents came for the State Fair and Labor Day weekend. It was really fun to show our parents some of our favorite spots and it was special to be able to spend my birthday with my parents and a holiday weekend with Brandon’s parents in our “new” home.

My little sister started school in the cities and is halfway done with her first semester of college!! I love love love having her close to us. Her dorm is close enough to where I work that we have grabbed lunch together a few times, and the comfort of having some family close enough to have weeknight dinners or have impromptu hangouts is so nice. I am so excited for her to just be starting her journey through the college years… so much fun and so many life lessons ahead Smile

(pic from the State Fair!)

Teto has gotten very grown up and is 49% adorable angel and 51% insufferable asshole. In the past week alone he has urinated 4 times on personal belongings in the apartment. We are not on speaking terms, but Brandon has been continuing their morning ritual of watching Big Cat Diary together on the couch and I don’t think he’s being hard enough on the little shit.

Last but not least, I have spent lots and lots of time with my BFFAEAEAE (best friend forever and ever and ever and ever. Obviously) who has been staying with us for a few weeks before she moves away from the Cities. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. Besides the obvious fact that I am going to miss her like crazy and she brings so much entertainment to my life, there are several selfish reasons this is a huge problem. 1) I’m going to need to fill the position of “only person in this city that wants to hang out with me besides my cat and boyfriend” and I don’t even know where to start. Any takers??? 2) Inga has been doing things like folding laundry and doing dishes when we are gone, and I don’t know if the apartment productivity and cleanliness is going to bounce back when she’s gone. 3) We almost had Brandon convinced this was a democracy in terms of things like watching Bravo and driving 10 minutes for frozen yogurt and WHAT AM I GOING TO DO WITHOUT HER??!!??

Actual background of Brandon’s iPad – we convinced him to keep this as his background probably 4 or 5 months ago and he is so used to it, the pic has stayed:

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Love you bingtrain.

Pheewwwww! In between shenanigans, I have been bustin’ at work, done a few freelance projects, and kinda sorta started working out again after my looong hiatus from any regular exercise regimen after my half mar in MAY (lazy.). Not a whole lot of health food to be totally honest with you. I’m working on it.

That’s it! The usual mix of craziness with probably the usual amount of just a little too much detail. Congrats if you made it through that novel of a post, I hope you enjoyed since it might be awhile ‘til the next one… I’m hoping to do another post soon about fitness/food type stuff like I used to but we shall see. What you have fools been up to lately??

Summer Bucket List & Week 1 SSU

Jun 172012

Posted by Britta on June 17, 2012 at 5:03 pm in Goals, Sweat 4 Responses »

I’m having a pretty lazy Sunday over here. Brandon’s brother and his girlfriend were up visiting for the weekend, and I think I overdosed on fun. Friday night, we went to the Twins/Brewers game.

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It was the first time I have ever been to an away Brewers game, and we won! Whooo! And let’s be honest about why I really had fun at the game – I got to eat soft-serve ice cream with sprinkles out of a tiny baseball hat. Saturday was spent brunching, strolling around the Mall of America, and napping (oh yeah). We topped off the weekend with what was possibly the best meal of my entire life at Oceanaire in downtown Minneapolis. Oysters, delicious barramundi, and merlot was consumed. Everyone’s meals were perfectly prepared and the presentation of the dishes took the experience over the top. Our waitress was awesome and gave us a complimentary baked Alaska desert with the most delicious strawberry ice cream filling. OMG I am dying just thinking about it!

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We had a nightcap (or 2) at a swanky bar downtown called Prohibition, which is up on the 27th floor of the Foshay Tower and is set up like an old speakeasy. Such successful weekend-ing.

It’s been awhile since I did that dorky thing that I do and overshare with the Internetz what’s on my to-do list. My goals for May were…

Kick butt at my new job – Work is still consuming lots of my time these days, but I’m okay with it since I am still learning SO much. There hasn’t been a dull moment since I started, which I really enjoy, and I am really starting to feel like I’m in the swing of things. It takes awhile to get to that point with a new job where it feels like the “new normal”, but I’m getting there!

Run my first half marathon – check!

and then choose my next fitness goal – Summer Shape Up coming at ya later in the post. Still deciding what’s next after that but running might make a come back!

Redesign blog format – still haven’t done this because it’s so low on the totem pole. I really hate how cutesy my blog looks right now but I just haven’t had the time to re-do the look and do it right. Someday…

Instead of goals for June, I decided I wanted to do a “summer bucket list”. I got the idea from my girl Janetha, obvs. Here’s my list!

summerbucketlist

Last thing for now – today marks the start of week 2 of the Fitnessista’s Summer Shape Up. I said last week that I wanted to share my progress & stay accountable on the blog while I try to follow the program, but obviously I suck at blogging every day during the week and should quit saying I’m going to.

I followed the meal plan and workout schedule pretty closely during the week, with some switching up of the schedule to match what was going on in my week. I skimped a little on cardio by counting some long walks as “steady state cardio” when I probably could have squeezed in a few runs. I did do Gina’s SSU workout #1 on Tuesday and today. The strength moves combined with the 45 minute Turbo Fire workout I did on Monday kicked my butt and I have been sore pretty much all week.

I did a good job of following the meal plan through the week but I definitely ate (AND DRANK) whatever I wanted to all weekend. I guess that’s balance, right? We are going on vacay this coming weekend (long weekend! traveling with Brandino! lots of wine! I can’t wait) so my workout schedule & eats are going to be pretty flexible this coming week, too, but it has been really fun and motivating to have some new workouts to try and ideas for healthy meals even if I’m not staying 100% “on plan”.

Do you have any big plans for the summer? Have you been stepping it up a notch on eating healthy and working out since it’s summatime? Make sure to check out the Fitnessista’s shape up if you want to join in on the fun Smile

PS – Happy Father’s Day to my favorite dad

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and to my grandpas, too. I am lucky to have you in my life!

(you are welcome, Internet, for sharing the experience my awkward youth self in all of my glory. It’s worth it to also share how awesome my dad is Smile )

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