Hello. 🙂 How was your weekend? Ours ended up being busier than we thought it would be, but we did a lot of really fun things.
After we both finished working on Friday, I started cooking us the “date night meal” from the Whole 30 cookbook. It consisted of lemongrass chicken skewers, a makeshift coleslaw, coconut riced cauliflower, and seared scallops with blueberry ginger sauce. All of it was delicious except for the scallops. We honestly both thought the blueberry sauce was disgusting with the fish, but I did save the extra sauce to maybe put on yogurt or something this week. I think the Whole 30 has a ton of really good recipes, but there are a few things in it that are just plain not good (to us at least). I also feel like the times they suggest for cooking some of the meals are way off. I have ended up cooking most things way longer than they say to. We are flying through the series of Lost, so we caught up on a few more episodes of that after dinner.
On Saturday morning I went to my favorite hot yoga class (like always), and it was seriously so tough. I always struggle through it, but this week was way worse than usual. I couldn’t concentrate and kept looking around for no real reason. My yoga teacher said something really interesting though that made me think and has been on my mind all weekend. He said that everything we do has a direct impact on ourselves, and an indirect impact on those around us. Regardless, it was a great class – I wish my gym offered this class like, every morning. After class I showered and got ready at the gym to meet my friend Clare for plans we had made to get lunch at one of our favorite local Italian restaurants. Since I had basically been eating all Whole 30 foods with Chris, Italian food tasted insanely amazing. Bread is so good.
I talked to my sister on my way home from lunch, and Chris and I ended up meeting her at a pet adoption center to look at potentially adopting a cat for her boyfriend, but of course ended up going to look at the puppies, too. We were so, so tempted to get this sweet little grey pitbull with the prettiest blue eyes that was only four months old, but we just aren’t ready for a dog yet. But now I think we know exactly what we want when we are ready…. After that we stopped at Costco and the grocery store to get our shopping done for the upcoming week, went home and made chicken stir fry for dinner, and went to bed embarrassingly early for a Saturday night.
Our Sunday started out the same as always – church, followed by volunteering with the kids at church. We had some time once we got home to just chill for a while, but then I headed out to meet up with my friend Katie to hang out for a bit before we went to our friend Hannah’s daughter’s birthday party. I had to leave early from that party to go to my sister Olivia’s birthday dinner at a hibachi restaurant in a cute little town near us called Rochester. Dinner was delicious, and we finished off the night by having ice cream cake, opening presents, and playing games at my parent’s house. And then of course Chris and I watched Shameless before going to bed. 🙂
__________
So for the last couple of weeks I have been talking about books a lot more than I ever have in the past. I have always liked to read, but especially so since our wedding. I think it started on our honeymoon when I finally was done wedding planning and had as much time as I wanted to just lay on the beach and read. I’m pretty sure I read four full books during our 12 day trip. I have also been trying to make it a habit to read each night before I go to sleep, and I’m not sure if the two are related or not, but I have been sleeping way deeper and I at least partially accredit that to looking at a book before I close my eyes and not my phone.
One of my goals with the books I am reading is to actually remember them. Some of the books I read are fiction which just allow me to get out of my head, but the non-fiction ones hold so much valuable information that I don’t want to just read once and then forget about. So that is the main reason why I decided to start my Behind the Book series and choose a different book each month of 2018 to focus on. I want to keep myself accountable for it, so last week I followed up on the concept of “true belonging,” which is heavily focused upon in the book I chose for January – Braving the Wilderness by Brené Brown.
Today I want to touch on another concept the book talks about a lot – that of real connection. Brené Brown says:
“Commit to assessing your life and forming opinions of people based on actual, in-person experiences.”
The world we live in today is so heavily focused on technology, that sometimes it is scary to me. Like what if our phones were taken away? Would we know what to do? Would we lose our minds? Some people probably would.
Something that I really want to get better at is pursuing relationship in real life – not over text. I think it is a beautiful tool to be able to check in with my girlfriends on a regular basis through our phones. It is convenient and lets someone know you are thinking of them. But I do not want to allow that to be a substitute for actually getting together with somebody. Although it is sometimes tough to actually make plans with someone due to conflicting schedules, it is so worth it and so important. So this week I want to focus on seeing those people that matter most to me and letting them know that face-to-face, not over my phone.
Have a wonderful Monday and start to your week, especially if you have the day off today!
What did you do this weekend? Any book you are reading right now that is really making you think?
Comments