Good morning everybody! Get ready for a super long recap post. Grab some coffee, kick back, and relax. 🙂

Sunday: After I published my last recap post, I headed out to Barnes and Noble to buy The Hate U Give. While I was there, I saw that it was $10 cheaper to order the book online and pick it up at the store within an hour than to just purchase it in the store. No clue why it’s cheaper, but I did it! While I was waiting for them to package my book up since it was an online order, I of course had to go to TJMaxx (it’s right next door which is just plain TROUBLE). But seriously, everything there is so cheap!! I am obsessed. I like it even better than Marshall’s. I picked up an adorable flower patterned folder/notebook for when I start orientation at my new job. It was only $5! I also picked up some dark chocolate covered espresso beans for Kyle. They were $2! These kind of stores are my weakness. So many cute things! I’m definitely going to go back soon because I want to revamp my living room and desk area. Once I picked up my book, I headed home and cracked it open.

After I picked up my book, I cracked it open right away. I’ve been dying to read it for a while! I snacked on some cucumbers, snap peas, and hummus. Salt is my weakness so I used to eat a ton of chips and pretzels. Once I started eating veggies more, my salt cravings are so much better! And I feel much less bloated. Win win!

We spent the rest of the night relaxing and taking Chance on a walk.

Monday: STATE FAIR DAY! Before we ventured into Indy for the fair, I took Chance for a long walk and headed to the grocery store to pick up a few things for the week. I picked up salmon and chicken kabobs for Kyle and I to have this week. I also picked up cold coffee, bananas, and almond milk for my smoothies, snap peas, cucumbers, and cantaloupe for my work snacks, and avocados just because I love them!

Then Kyle and I headed to the fair. The weather was perfect, and since it was a week day, it wasn’t crowded!

Look how cute these little donkeys and goats are! They poked their little heads right through the fences to eat the food we had for them. So. Cute.

They had little warmers full of baby chicks and ducks. One was even in the middle of hatching! They were so precious, and it was awesome to see.

So. Many. Ducks. This was by far the noisiest building haha I really loved the black and white rooster. It looked like a Dalmatian.

Side note, my niece LOVES legos and is a genius with them. I took this picture for her because this WHOLE thing is made out of legos. Isn’t that nuts?! I can’t imagine how long that would take.

And here is by far the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. All these baby pigs were precious! If they weren’t eating, they were sleeping HARD. They kept fighting over their mama, and half of them fell asleep in the middle of eating. So. Cute. We were cheering on the little runt of the litter because he was having a hard time getting food, but he finally got some and promptly fell asleep.

All of the horses were super sweet, and let us pet them. Some were a little timid, and I am sure they were super overwhelmed.

The cattle barn was FULL. So many cows. They even had a fenced in area that we could go in and pet the new calves. They were so adorable. It was pretty sweet seeing the cow owners work with them. There were a lot of kids working with the cows, and I am sure they are going to turn into a lot of hard working adults. That’s really cool to see and definitely encouraging for the future. We saw one girl straight up cuddling with one of her cows. How cute is that!?

Little cuddle bugs.

How funny are these little outfits? Apparently, this is how they keep them clean until it’s time to show them or trim their fur.

The bunny on the left was totally zonked. I loved the one on the right! Another dalmation printed animal. So cute!

We had a blast 🙂 We, of course, had our fill of fair food and definitely got our steps in.

Once we got home, we took Chance on a walk. Then I jumped in the shower and got ready for a movie. I met Mackenzie at the theater, and we saw Made For More by Rachel Hollis.

It was INCREDIBLE. You’ve heard me talk about her before, but this movie was all about her and her RISE conference. Her conference is all about empowering women and giving them the steps they need to build the life they are supposed to live. I cried about 12 times, and I was so inspired. The part that spoke out to me the loudest was when she was talking about an exercise she had all the women do. She passed out papers that had at ton of statements on it. They ranged from “I have been raped” to “I hate my body” and a ton of other hard truths. Every woman anonymously checked the boxes that applied to them and then folded up their paper. They then passed the papers around the room until they had no idea who had their papers and no one knew whose paper they had. Then Rachel read each statement one by one and instructed the women to stand up if that statement was selected on the paper in their hands. Her idea was that if you can’t stand up for yourself, you can stand up for your sister. The part that killed me the most was that when Rachel read “I hate my body”, every single woman in the audience stood up. What kind of world do we live in that it is so easy for every woman to hate a part of their body? I cried in the movie, I cried when I came home and told Kyle, and I’m crying now just writing it. I believe that we can change this. This is why I started this blog. I want to help women love themselves because they are HEALTHY, not skinny or whatever else society is telling them they have to be. I’m on this journey as well, I definitely do not have it figured out. But we can do this. Girl, you can do this.

Tuesday:

My morning started off with my go to protein smoothie. Cold coffee, almond milk, protein powder, frozen banana, coconut oil, cocoa powder, and chia seeds.

On my way to work, the sky was so pretty. I’m sorry the quality is crummy, I wasn’t paying attention to the video while I was driving and was hoping I was getting the sky haha I think it turned out pretty ok!

My snacks for the day were cantaloupe, veggies and hummus, and almonds.

I had 1/4 of a roast beef sub and a salad for lunch. My salad consisted of arugula, tomatoes, and a little vinaigrette dressing.

After work, we took this cutie on a long walk and relaxed for the night. My head started bothering me tonight so I hit they hay a little early.

Wednesday: I got called off work today because our census was low so I got to spend Kyle’s last day before he has to switch back to nights with him.

We started our day off right with COFFEE. Notice Chance at the end begging to go on a walk. I obviously obliged 🙂

I spent the rest of the morning reading The Hate U Give. So far, it’s a great read and very eye opening.

I made chicken kabobs for us before our run. The kabobs had chicken, peppers, and onions. I also threw some grape tomatoes on the sheet. I drizzled about a tablesoon of olive oil and garlic salt on top. I baked them at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes. They were so yummy!

It rained allllll day, but Kyle and I really needed to get a run in. I HATE running on the treadmill so we braved the rain. I actually love running in the rain. I throw on a hat, and I’m good to go. We ran a little over 2 miles which is the longest we’ve done on our training so far! It felt great. I’m excited to build up my mileage again. It’s also really cool seeing how far Kyle has come since our first run. YAY! I couldn’t take any pictures while we were out since it was raining, but the picture on the left is the rainy weather and the one on the right is the aftermath of our water filled run.

I made Kyle and I a protein smoothie before I headed to my HR meeting for my new job. It had almond milk, protein powder, chia seeds, coconut oil, blueberries, and a banana.

I headed to Indy for a meeting with my HR rep and my “physical”. It wasn’t much of a physical since I keep my physicals with my nurse practitioner up to date. They just drew labs and went over my medications. I’ll use any excuse to dress up though because I have to wear scrubs 90% of the time haha 😀

I marinated the salmon with a tiny bit of olive oil, onion powder, and pepper before I left for my meeting. Once I got home, I put it in the oven for about 20 minutes at 400 degrees. We had whole grain quinoa and green beans on the side. It was delicious! Kyle is trying to do better about eating actual meals because it’s so hard to eat well when you work night shift. He said it’s amazing how much more fulfilling a well balanced meal is. It’s so true! We spent the rest of the night relaxing and watching Supernatural before I promptly fell asleep.

Thursday: My morning started off with a yoga session. I don’t know when or why I stopped doing yoga every morning, but I’m forcing myself to go back to it because I’ve been having more headaches, and it helps my day run so much better.

After yoga, I made my protein smoothie and took the cutie above on a mile walk then headed to work.

I was dragging a little because I took some extra headache meds the night before, and they make me a little groggy so an extra cup of coffee was much needed.

Lunch was a little random today because they bought us a couple of different pasta dishes and that’s too heavy for me to eat during the day. I picked out a piece of chicken and had my veggies on the side. It was actually a pretty good lunch!

After work, I headed to dinner with my mom. We had our favorite… Hawaiian pizza! We can usually finish of a small pizza between the two of us but for some reason, we barely ate half that night. I guess we spent too much time talking so my mom had leftovers to take to my dad 🙂

After dinner, I met my bible study group at a little coffee shop on my way home! It was amazing. It is truly so important to surround yourself with women who can help you walk through this crazy life. We worked through part of the Purpose section of our SHE Refined content. All of the ladies in my group are part of the SoulScripts sisterhood. Another reason why I love this group is because everyone gets something different from each section, and I love hearing everybody else’s thoughts because it might not have been something I thought of.

Once I got home, I took Chance on a nice, long walk.

We finished the night with reads and cuddles.

Friday: I woke up feeling exhausted and super crummy. I thought I just didn’t sleep well so I did a yoga sessions, took Chance on a walk, and had my smoothie.

Another cup of coffee.

My salad consisted of lettuce, cucumbers, tomatoes, grilled chicken, and a tablespoon of honey mustard dressing. I also had some grilled veggies.

After lunch, I was feeling even worse. I had the chills and felt like I had been hit by a bus. Another nurse took my vitals and my blood pressure was a little low and my temperature was 102. That explained it! haha I finished up my patients and my charting and headed home. I took Chance on a walk and curled up on the couch. After I rested for a little bit, I ate some crackers and worked on my blog post about budgeting and getting out of debt.

I decided to do a hair and face mask. My hair mask consisted of coconut oil and caster oil. I mixed it together and rubbed it into my scalp, throughout my hair, and the ends. I am trying to be more proactive about my ends before they start to split. My hair is thin so it split very easily. My facemask was the avocado and oatmeal Freeman mask. It’s one of my favorites. It really cleans out my pores and leaves my face feeling super refreshed. I left the hair mask on for about two hours and then showered to wash it out.

I fell asleep watching Grey’s Anatomy reruns with a puppy curled up next to me. He is so sweet when he knows I am sick. Always watching out for me.

Saturday: I woke up and still feel pretty bad. I decided to spend the day relaxing. I took Chance for a long walk before I curled back up in bed.

I worked on my blog while I had my smoothie. Notice the puppy legs under the pillow holding my computer. 😀

Then treated myself to coffee with caramel almond milk creamer.

Side note: My hair is already feeling and looking better after using that mask one time. I’m excited to see how it looks after consistently using it. I’m planning on doing it 1-2 a week for about 2 hours before I shower and see how it works.

I had a random array of snacks during my afternoon. Cantaloupe, a popsicle, beef jerky, and chips and salsa were what sounded good to me. Another side not- chips and salsa are my WEAKNESS so I’ve chosen healthier versions to indulge in when I want to. I find both of these and the blue corn chips I like at Aldi.

Chance and I headed out for a walk in the afternoon. It was hot but still nice outside! We both needed a little fresh air.

Then I let him run around at our bark park for a while. When he gets hot, he goes and hides in these bushes and I know it’s probably time to get him back inside.

This sweet boy stuck by my side all day. I don’t deserve him!

After our walk, I made myself a smoothie. It had frozen strawberries, a banana, and almond milk.

Being sick always leaves me feeling a little grungy so I applied my favorite face mask and made some lemon ginger tea.  This face mask works so well. It totally pulls out all of the crap in my pores and tightens and tones my face. And it’s super cheap on amazon! I highly recommend it. I never had acne growing up, but now I struggle with some minor cystic acne and pore problems on and around my nose. This really helps!

I love that every yogi teabag has a quote on it. They’re always so positive and encouraging. It’s the little things, y’all!

Sunday: I woke up before 7 and took Chance for a walk. I’m still feeling sick so I crawled back into bed to work on this recap post. Chance is cuddled up at the end of the bed.

I’m planning on taking some clothes to Plato’s Closet, pick up some groceries, and look at buying some new scrubs after I sleep for a little bit. Then Kyle is coming over this evening to run after he sleeps.

I hope everyone has had a great weekend and a relaxing Sunday! 🙂