Oh my word folks, I have been crazy this past month! I’ve been a travelin’ lady AND I hardly ever travel!
It’s been fun, but it doesn’t make blogging easy! Just over a month ago, we went to Moab (Utah) so Kev and some of our friends could run a Half Marathon. THEN, we went to St. George (Utah) and Zion’s National Park with our little family 3 weeks ago. AND NOW, I just got back from NEW YORK CITY with a bunch of my High School friends!
Oh you guys, it was the best trip evah!!!!! I’m going to tell y’all all about that trip and will share more pics than I’m sure you want to see, but FIRST, I want to update you guys on my healthy living/no sugar challenge!
It’s going great! I still haven’t had ANY sugary treats for almost 4 weeks now. Wahoo! I’m really proud of myself because I’ve survived Easter, our trip to St. George, my son’s birthday and now my trip to NYC.
It really hasn’t been too hard, surprisingly. I’ve kind of just been on automatic pilot; I eat a lot of the same things and just keep on going….day after day after day. I’ve been having a protein shake with my Green SuperFood every day. I love that because it’s simple, easy and full of so much goodness! I have loosened up a little bit on the weekends, but I don’t get too crazy.
I’ve done pretty well on keeping within my macros/calories. I haven’t been 100% perfect, but I’m happy with my efforts. I have some days that I’m over a little bit, some days I’m under and some days when my macros are all out of whack, but I really love having my macros as a guide. It really helps to keep the carbs and fat intake in check.
I have not budged at all with my “no sugar challenge” and I will not quit! Most days I don’t even miss sugar and I hardly even think about it, HOWEVER, there are moments when the cravings come on strong and it seems unbearable. It’s amazing to me how strong those cravings can be! I was on Facebook the other day AND I was hungry and it seemed like I kept seeing all the Tasty video things full of yummy treats! I was dying! But, even though the cravings were strong, they didn’t seem to last too long and I somehow lived to tell about it, lol.
The past couple days I’ve been cravin’ carbs like nobody’s business! I’m sure it must be some sort of hormonal thing because the cravings seemed to have come out of nowhere! I feel like I’m always hungry! I’ve been giving in a little bit to the carb demons and it’s not been good. Still no sugary stuff, but plenty of toast, cereal and a few fries! Auuughh!
Anyway, such is life. I know it can be hard at times, but I know that success comes if you just keep on going and DO NOT give up!
On a brighter note, I think some changes are happening! They are subtle, small and painstakingly slow, but they are THERE! I’m down 3-4 pounds, but they are real legit pounds! Ya know, my weight fluctuates all the time, but these few pounds I’ve lost feel like they are permanent. My clothes are starting to fit better (seriously yay!) and I feel ever so slightly thinner.
It’s so subtle, but so encouraging! It’s just enough to keep me going. I have about 5 more pounds left to lose until I reach my short-term goal. I’m also planning to take some progress pictures next week and I’m hoping to see some progress!!!
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Well, I have to tell you guys about my lovely trip to the Big Apple. First of all, I must mention that New York City is my most favorite city in the whole entire world! Granted, I’ve only been to the United States, the Caribbean and Canada….but SO FAR, it’s my favorite city!
We lived in New England (Rhode Island and New Hampshire) for 6 years and took plenty of road trips to NYC; we took our little family there a few times, we went a few times with friends and family who would come visit us in New England, Kev and I went there just the two of us once, I took a couple Girl’s trips there and we even went to the Macy’s Day Parade one year (loved it!)
But, I hadn’t been in almost 10 years!!! I have missed it soooo much!!! NYC never gets old…it only gets better!!!!!
This time, I went with 9 of my high school friends in honor of our 40th birthdays. It was seriously a perfect trip!! It could not have been better. My longtime friend, Kristen (seriously we have been friends since we were in diapers!) and I flew into NYC late Thursday night and met our other friends at our hotel.
You can see the Statue of Liberty, the Freedom Tower and the Brooklyn Bridge in that picture. Eeee. I was soooo excited!!!
We got to bed very very late and got up early the next morning! Our first stop was Central Park. We decided to go on a Bike/Carriage ride thing and it was awesome! There were 7 of us, so we were divided among 3 carriages.
Our bike rider/carriage puller/tour guide guy was great! He was super friendly, showed us all the cool things around Central Park and even took plenty of group pictures for us.
Here we are at the “Friends” fountain, Bethesda Terrace and Strawberry Fields…
Oh how I love Central Park!
After Central Park, we took the Subway down to the Statue of Liberty area. We decided not to take a ferry ride to the Statue, since the wait was wicked long (you really need to get on that first thing in the morning to avoid the wait!) However, we decided to take a different ferry that took us close to the Statue of Liberty and gave us some gorgeous views of the NYC skyline! It was very windy!
Later on, we went to dinner at Ivy. The food was great; the service and atmosphere, not so much. It was a cool restaurant, just very very loud! I ordered the Sliders with fries and they were soooo good!
I think I should mention that I didn’t count Macros on this trip at all! We were so busy and go go going all the time, that we really only ate just one meal a day. I wanted to enjoy the trip and “live a little,” so I decided to eat whatever the heck I wanted (with the exception of sugar stuff) for that one meal! It was awesome.
I also think I should mention, that I packed a few healthy, high protein stuff with me on this trip and I’m so glad I did! I brought protein shakes, homemade protein bars (Jamie Eason’s Lemon Protein Bars), chicken, Quest bars and stuff to make oatmeal. I never ate the chicken, but I ate everything else!
I made oatmeal for breakfast every morning and I was soooooo glad I had it! I just packed 1/3 cup of oatmeal in baggies and then the stuff I like to mix into my oatmeal (protein powder, cocoa, stevia, flax) in a separate bag. I was hoping to heat up my oatmeal in a microwave in our room, but our room didn’t have one! I decided to get creative with the coffee maker and just poured hot water on my oatmeal. Worked like a charm!
Soooo, that was my breakfast every morning and I usually subsisted on a Quest bar for “lunch.” Soooo, I was more than happy to have a legit meal for dinner every day!
Anyway, on Friday night we went to see the Broadway musical HAMILTON!!!
Folks, it was awesome!!! For those of you who don’t know, Hamilton is a musical based on the life of Alexander Hamilton. It’s a very different musical in that it has a lot of “hip hop” songs in it. When I first heard it, I didn’t know quite what to think…a hip hop play based on Alexander Hamilton, our Founding Fathers and Revolutionary War stuff??? Hmmmm. But, it grew on me and let’s just say I’m a little obsessed now! I highly recommend it!!!
We were on the very back row, but it was still great!!! Right before the show started, we heard a lot of commotion and people talking excitedly. We quickly realized that Bernie Sanders was at Hamilton too! I don’t love him, but it was neat that he was there!
Our friends also spotted Craig Robinson (Darryl from The Office) there too! Pretty cool!
The show was phenomenal and I’m so glad I had the chance to go! It is still the original cast and the man who wrote the entire musical (Lin Manual Miranda) played Alexander Hamilton! It was just sooooo awesome!!! It really was the highlight of my trip! I could go on and on and on about Hamilton, but I’ll be quiet now and just share these pics….
After the show, we got cheesecake at Junior’s, but I didn’t have any! Woot! I got a sandwich instead; not particularly healthy, but at least I stuck to my “no sugar” goals, right?
The next day, some of us decided to get tickets to see Wicked!!!!
I love Wicked so much and was so excited to see it again (this was my 5th time. Hee hee.) It’s such a great musical and made me want to sing the rest of the day!!!
After Wicked, we headed down to the 911 Memorial and Museum. I’d never seen the memorial or the museum and let’s just say I was blown away! Wow. It was such a reverent, humbling, sobering, inspiring, incredible place to be.
I really could not wrap my brain around the magnitude of that tragedy. I wasn’t prepared for how much it would effect me and I really just wanted to break down and bawl so many times. There was almost a tangible feeling I could feel there. Everyone who was there seemed to feel it too because it was soooo quiet and everyone was so respectful.
We spent several hours there and I was so grateful we were able to go there. The Freedom Tower and Fountain are absolutely beautiful! We all agreed that everything that was created in that sacred space was absolutely perfect.
Afterward, we headed up to Bella Vita for some yummy New York pizza!
Oh, it tasted soooo good!! We were all starving!
That night, we all wandered around Times Square, shopped for souvenirs and just laughed all night long!
We all decided to buy those “dang cute” Statue of Liberty hats and sported them all around town, lol!!! It was such a fun night!
We brought the party up to our hotel room and laughed and laughed and laughed some more!
The next morning (our last morning there, sniff sniff), some of us decided to go on a run in Central Park and run to The Met (Metropolitan Museum of Art!!!) I was soooooo excited about this folks because I’ve always wanted to RUN in Central Park!!!! Oh, and I love The Met!!!!
Our run wasn’t exactly hardcore, but it was a run nonetheless and I was thrilled!!!
The Met was about 2.5 miles away, which was just perfect.
Guys, this museum blows my mind!!! We only had about an hour and a half to look around, but I was happy we got to go.
Here we are with Vincent van Gogh’s self portrait in a straw hat.
It’s incredible to me to think that all the stuff in that museum is legit (of course it is, it’s in a museum….but still!) Old, famous paintings, ancient Egyptian stuff, suits of armor, tons of stuff from Before Christ, and just amazing, amazing things!!! My mind seriously has a hard time computing it all. I could spend a week in that museum and still not want to leave!
Well, we ran back to our hotel, packed up and headed to the airport (some of our friends still stayed another day though.) Here we are trying to make our saddest faces (mine needs a little help…ha ha!!)
It truly was sad to just drive away and leave that amazing city behind. It has my heart.
I snapped this final pic as we were flying away…
I was happy to be going home to my sweet family, but so sad to leave NYC! It made my heart hurt.
It was such a fun-filled, incredible trip!!! I wouldn’t have changed a single thing. I was especially grateful to be able to spend it with such amazing ladies. I’m so so thankful to have such sweet friends!
Well, that’s enough talking for today! I hope to be able to blog a little bit more frequently now that I’m not planning on traveling again any time soon! I hope you all have a fabulous weekend. 😉 xoxo
Hi, Melanie. I love keeping up with you and reading your blog. I am envious of your lovely and fun trip to NYC!
It is wonderful to have women friends to go on trips together. They make everything 10x more fun and memorable. Thanks for all the inspiration for a healthy, happy life!
Thanks so so much Deborah! You are such a sweet person. I miss reading your blog!!! Our trip was just what I needed. I loved every second!!!
Your trip looks like such a blast! So glad you enjoyed. I would love to see Hamilton.
It really was so wonderful!! You would love Hamilton!!! I would love to see it again. 😉
What a fun girl’s trip! I need to do one of those,lol. I live in New York and I haven’t seen the play Hamilton yet! Yeah I don’t know what I’m thinking but seeing and reading how excited you were to see it, I’m going to convince my hubby to go,haha!
It was suuuuuch a fun Girl’s trip! You are such a lucky duck to live in such an amazing city!!! Hamilton was so dang good. I was grateful my friend got our tickets several months ago because ever since Hamilton performed at the Grammys, I’ve heard tickets are almost impossible to get!!! But, since you live there (so lucky!!!), you can probably go when the hype calms down!!!
I loved your summary Mel! I want to copy and paste it to my feed! We have wasaaaay too much fun together!!! Loved this trip so much!!!
I love you my friend and our trip was epic!!! Let’s go back!!!
Looks like you had a friggin’ awesome time in NYC! And I am IN DYER NEED to get my fiance and I tickets to see Hamilton! It doesn’t come to Los Angeles until 2017 though, but I sounds like it might already be SOLD OUT!!
Oh New York City was so much fun! I love that city so freaking much! You NEEEEEED to see Hamilton! I’m glad to hear it’s coming to LA next year!!! I’m sure it will be in high demand!
I was looking it up and tickets are $1000 + and are already sold out!!!!!
Dang it! I’m so glad we bought our tickets in January….before the Grammys and all the zillion awards it’s won. I want to see it again!!! I guess I’ll have to wait a few years, lol.
Wow, almost a month of no sugar is amazing. NYC looks fabulous. I’ll be going for the first time in Nov.
I always learn so much about myself and my food “issues” when I cut sugar out! It’s been interesting.
Oh how I LOVE NYC!!! That will be so neat for you to experience it at the marathon! What an incredible experience!
Glad you had such a great time. I LOVE NY and to go with all my girlfriends ? That would be fantastic ! Those will be lifetime memories for you.
Not sure how you do no sugar… I am so tempted and need a little bit of sugar every day !
Oh NYC was seriously such an amazing trip Karen!!! It was a dream and so much fun to be there with friends!! I felt like a high schooler again, lol!
The sugar thing has been tough. I’m the biggest addict out there, but it gets significantly easier as time goes on!!
I love this post so much! Congrats on sticking with your no sugar rule – even when on vacation. I don’t know if I could’ve done that! And you certainly had a whirlwind vacation. I loved your pics.
Thanks so much Amanda! It’s been tough to stick to my guns especially on vacation, but I’m so glad I have! We had suuuuuch a fun trip!