Friday's Favorite

Hi Gang. Today's Friday Favorite is a recipe for a great snack. It is my intention to have a recipe once a week. Today I'm making it a FF because it is so good it will become a favorite. This is Robin Newman's paleo trail mix which can also be treated like a granola or cereal. Take a close look at all that goodness pack in there.

You can choose any combination but here Robin used almonds, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, pecans, cranberries, raisons and I think I see an occasional coconut chunk. Just go to the bulk foods and choose all your favorite nuts and seeds (unflavored and unsalted of course!). Dump it all in a bowl and drizzle with honey and mix. Spread onto a pan and bake at 350 for about 30-ish minutes, tossing and turning every 10 minutes. NOTE: Put the cranberries in at the end or they'll dry out in the oven and sprinkle 'a bit' of kosher salt over mix if you wish.

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Sprouts will often have sales on their bulk foods. When they do, stock up and make a huge batch of this. What a great energy snack to take on the go and this would make a great homemade Christmas gift as well!

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Have a great weekend!

School lunch, or garbage on a tray?

From what I saw today, it's the latter and the kids think so too!

I joined my daughter for lunch today at school because it's her birthday. It had been a long time since I sat through a school lunch and really looked around at what kids were eating. What a saw was a total lack of color and nutrients on trays laden with processed garbage. And the sad thing was, the kids were all saying it was gross too, and the many tossed their entire lunch in the trash.

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I saw not a single vegetable. Not one! Nothing green, yellow or red. Wait, I did see one apple. The girl bit into it and spit it back out on her tray. It was mushy and bruised. On the rest of her tray … a bread stick, a giant roll, about 3 nasty-looking dried chicken nuggets, and mashed potatoes. The girl next to her picked some sort of 'ham' thing from the line. She dug around and finally unearthed a thin, floppy, greasy slice of ham. She ate it. I tried not to gag. Her little box did have a slice of cheese and now that I think about it, I saw some grapes alongside a hard breadstick. She ignored all of this. Down the row, I saw a girl eating a hotdog bun filled with shredded cheese. Are you grossed out yet?

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I know there are efforts to improve school lunches. Thank goodness! But we need to work harder. The obesity epidemic in our country is out of control and it breaks my hearts to see school age children having to battle this problem. And it isn't just the schools at fault. I know they sometimes have a salad option (even if it's nutritionally devoid iceberg!). But the kids choose nachos instead!

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Eating healthy should be the normal routine! And it shouldn't be too hard or too expensive to eat well. (I know sometimes it is and that's a whole other post.) The best thing you can do for your children is to teach them to love healthy food. To enjoy how it makes them feel energetic and strong. That's a gift that will benefit them their whole life!

Knock Knock --- Who's there? ---

We ARE!!

Hoooraaayy!!

Sorry for the inexcusably long absence. We always disperse a bit in the summer and we're just now getting back into our groove now that the kids are back in school. And, how about this cooler weather!! Can I hear a WoooHoo! I know mid-90's is not exactly 'cool' but hey, it's all relative, right?

Way to go you CFG warriors who battled the ferocious heat this summer.

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We are committed to getting this blog regular again. Our Facebook Page has daily action on it, usually the WOD is posted, but I'd like to do some special stuff here on the blog. I'm thinking of sharing our favorite items as they pertain to health and fitness. A person of the week. Maybe a PR day. I'd love to line up some guest bloggers. I'm brainstorming here and I hope to make the blog more informational and an extension of our fantastic family community we have at the gym.

I'll start off with Friday Favorites. On Fridays, I will post a 'favorite' item that someone will have submitted to me, along with a photo. We all find cool stuff we love, workout gear, jump ropes, wrist straps, Paleo and/or organic resources, websites … you get the idea. If you have a favorite, email me a picture, and link if that applies, what it is, why it's your favorite and any information on how to get it and I'll post in on a Favorite Friday.

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Friday's Favorite:

My new water bottle that I LOVE! We have a ton of water bottles in our house. And I love a lot of them but this is my newest favorite. It's 24 oz, BPA free, has an easy one-click open and shut lid, non-leak … the whole shebang! I really love the drink spout because I don't have to squeeze the bottle, pop a little spout up with my dirty gym fingers and it's not so wide that I splash more water down my shirt than I drink. :) Come on--I'm NOT the only who does this. Admit it!

Here's the coolest thing. See those numbers on the side? Every time you refill your bottle, and you should be refilling many times a day, you move the indicator. This helps you make sure you are getting at least 100 ounces of water a day!

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I got this one at Target for $9.99. I also saw it HEB for $9.00 in the back-to-school section.

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If you have a Friday Favorite, email it to: info@crossfitgeorgetown.com

Have a GREAT weekend everyone!

The aftermath …

A CrossFit workout has many stages. There's the show up, check out the white board and groan moment. There's the warm up and set up your area with your equipment stage. For some there is the pre-WOD 'potty break'. And commonly, we see this as the aftermath….

There is no question that they worked hard and gave it all they had in the tank. You have the choice every time you work out to push yourself to be better, be stronger, be faster … to give yourself the gift of doing your very best. And when you do, your body and your mind thank you!

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REMINDER: Monday we will have our annual Memorial Day group workout at 9:30 am. No other classes will be held that day. This is always so much fun and quite popular. It's a chance to bring your family and friends and show them the awesome workout you've been doing. It's a chance, if you've never done CrossFit, to come out and see what it's all about. It's open to any and all who want to have fun with the CrossFit Georgetown crew.

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Friday's WOD:

Running Bear

800 m

7 rounds of---using 45% of your body weight:

5 x Deadlift

5 x Hang Power Clean

5 x Thruster

800m

Have a GREAT weekend and hope to see you Monday!

Working on flexibiliy ...

We're nearly 1/2 done with our May challenges, one of which is using the front squat to specifically work and increase the flexibility in our shoulders, hips and ankles. How are you doing? Are you seeing improvement yet? Are you working your squat at home on your days off?

This is an old picture of Julie and she's already improved from this shot. She has great hip flexibility where her butt can just about touch the ground. She's still working on her shoulders.

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Your focus is on extreme depth so your hips are as low as possible while still maintaining good back extension, in addition to getting those elbows as high as possible so eventually they will be parallel to the floor.

Probably unfair to use Chad as an example but this is what you're working toward. :)

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Thursday WOD:

3 Rounds of---

AMRAP in 5 min:

9 Deadlift

6 HPC

3 Front Squat

*rest 1 minute between rounds

**Only completed rounds will count!

Summer temps = Paleo on the Grill!

We're over a week into our Paleo challenge and I'm loving all the recipes being shared in the gym and on our Facebook Page. The other night we had Paleo-Grillin' night. Remember, not just burgers and dogs are for the grill. One of our family's favorites is grilled-salad. In fact, Duncan requested this the other night.

Here are hear the hearts ready for the heat. *Split whole romaine hearts in half. Drizzle with olive oil and your choice of seasonings. I use a bit of kosher salt, cracked pepper, grill seasoning and what I call 'garlic crunchies' which I get in the bulk food section at HEB. (garlic minced is what I think they call it.)

Burgers done, salad and pineapple only need a few minutes at best. This was SO good!

Share some of YOUR recipes!

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Monday:

4 Rounds of:

400m

10 x OHS (95/65)

10 x Box jumps

Tuesday:

"Something Nasty"

Push Ups x 50-40-30-20-10

alternated with …

KB Swings (53lb/35lb) x 10-20-30-40-50

Wednesday:

REST DAY but don't forget your challenge squats and release push-ups! I'm already seeing improvements in everyone's ROM. Great work everyone!

Everyday Paleo by Sarah Fragoso --

As we at CrossFit Georgetown embark on a new Paleo Challenge for May, I'd like to recommend a great cookbook to give you wonderful Paleo recipes and much more to help you during the month and then going forward. Everyday Paleo by Sarah Fragoso was just released and is a fabulous resource for a healthy paleo lifestyle. Sarah also has a great Website/Blog that I personally follow for great ideas and tips.

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Also, check out the STORE on the site for a lot of other Paleo cookbooks! There are options out there for eating healthy.

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If any of you prepare a recipe from Sarah's cookbook or any other fantastic paleo dish, take a picture, do a write up about it and I'll post it to the blog. Let's share some great recipes this month. Eating healthy doesn't have to be a mystery. It's doable, fun, creative and simply what your body deserves!

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WOD for Monday:

5 Rounds--

25 KB Swings

20 Wall Balls

15 Box Jumps

Body Challenge for May:

5 x 3 (sets) of Front Squats--hold rock bottom position for 5-10 seconds

Focus on EXTREME depth!!

Release Push-Ups (or advance, full-range HSPU) Do the number that corresponds with the day of the month. If you miss a day or jump in late, you have to 'buy in' by playing catch up. :)