Celebrate good times...Come on!

This week was all about celebration. 

On Friday night I went out with the girls. We were celebrating my friend's Hawaiian anniversary. What's a "Hawaiian anniversary"? It's when haoles remember the date they moved to the island. I'm not sure this is an official celebration... But we sure made it one. 

We started out the night with cocktails. We then took the festivities up a notch with some party favors. Finally we finished up with some legitimately good pizza (My friend is from NYC, so she would know). The pizza was a special treat since I've only had it a couple of times since the move. 

Cocktails and blowouts... Cheers!

Pizza at JJ Dolans. The Joisey (white pizza) was delicious!

On Sunday I went to a baby shower. One of my co-workers is having twins. Showers are a nice time to celebrate the momma-to-be, but it's also just a good excuse to hang out with the girls. 

We went to Macaroni Grill, which I'm pretty sure I haven't eaten at since college. Between the pizza on Friday and the pasta on Sunday I'm surprised I'm not in a carb coma. 

Since it wouldn't be a shower without gifts, I tried to come up with a cute gift idea. After spending some time on Pinterest I found the most adorable idea for cupcakes made out of onesies and tiny baby socks. 

These are my "cupcakes". So stinking cute if I say so myself. 

I packaged them up in a bakery box with some speech worthy items tied on top. 

The final "celebration" was mostly sentimental. A year ago this week I made the decision to move to HI. I remember making a pro/con charts, talking with my family and finally making the decision standing in the parking lot of Allison's place before we went to dinner at La Tavola. Ahhhh... Memories!

And now for the pic of the week:

Sunsets + Instagram = Gorgeous results

Mahalo!

Embracing the suck

Several months ago the owner of my gym was giving instructions on bear crawls. This animal movement involves walking on your hands and feet while attempting to stay low to the ground. As the group grumbled about having to work on this, Chris encouraged us to "embrace the suck". His rationale? It is only by doing things that are hard that will we ever get stronger. 

In order to be strong I must embrace my inner warrior princess!

The past week I've had to keep that mantra in mind.  It's not that it was all bad, but there were moments where I was pushed out of my comfort zone. 

Here are some examples:

Every morning I wake up without an alarm between 5:30 and 6 am. This week I woke up like I regularly do, but was so sleepy I refused to get out of bed until the last possible second. I embraced the suck. 

At work I had a day filled with a type patient that I don't normally see. I like to consider myself an expert at my job, so it's not easy floundering around with diagnoses that I have little expirience with. I embraced the suck. 

I had to own up to a mistake I made. Everyone loves to be right all the time, but that isn't always possible. When you're wrong it's best to say you're sorry. I embraced the suck. 

This weekend I spent a morning at the beach, but instead of working on my tan I was working on my fitness. The workout involved open-water swimming, burpees, push-ups and running ... While in my swimsuit! I embraced the suck. 

And now at the end of the week I'm a stronger, better person. I know I can get ready for work in <20 mins. I've added on to my work expirience with another patient population (maybe someday I'll even feel like an expert). I felt the shame of making a mistake, but also the support of the people around me. And of course I proved that I can get through any workout on land or in the sea!

Perhaps "embracing the suck" is easier when you live in Hawaii. 

BTW- Everytime I wrote "suck"  Blogger autocorrected to "duck" and I had to manually change it back. This would have been a completely different post if it had been about "embracing the duck"! Quack quack. ;-)

And now for the pic of the week:

What a great view for my drive home!

Want to know my guilty pleasure this week? I made crack crackers! Here's the recipe:

Crack Crackers

1 box mini saltines (or one sleeve regular)

1 cup olive oil

1 packet dry ranch mix

2 Tbsp chili flakes

- Preheat oven to 250 degrees 

- Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl & let sit for 10 mins

- Bake for 15-20 mins stirring once halfway through

- Enjoy, but be careful cause these crack crackers are addictive!

Mahalo!

Sunday Funday

What happens when you take your workout into the great outdoors? What I got was a chance to test my endurance and agility all while taking in some amazing views!

This weekend a group from the gym spent Sunday hiking on the North Shore. The selected hike was Kealia Trail. In Hawaiian, Kealia means "salt encrustation". This is an interesting name since the only salt I saw was a result of all my sweating. 

In theory it was a perfect day to hike. The sky was blue. There were very few clouds in the sky. The downside... Hawaii is in the middle of a heat wave. Sunday's temperature was SO hot and SO humid it was this close to breaking records. 

The hike started with 19 switchbacks up a mountain followed by a path that went STRAIGHT up. 

The reward? Beautiful views of the North Shore and Makua valley. 

The whole hike took almost 4 hours (Actually I used a timer so I can say it took 3:50:03.31. How's that for exact?!? Ha!). 

There were a couple of highlights to my day: 

I made some sweet little friends. One was my own personal encourager. She kept yelling "Come on Aunty, you can do it!" 

I loved my post-hike Mexican food and jalapeño margarita. Ole!

And nothing beat the sense of accomplishment I felt at completing Kealia Trail. I can now say with confidence that I'm an intermediate hiker ;-)

And now for the pic of the week:

I think I just might be a Mai Tai connoisseur. I know where to find the best (Moana Surfrider), worst (Hale Kulani) and the best deal (Snappers). Raise a glass to that ... Cheers!

Mahalo!