dtr

Really? Me?

| cheriarmour

You really never know where teaching and fitness is going to take you, right?  I was a total slob kabob in college, and I blink, it’s like 5 years later, and I’m in love with what I do.

Which brings me to this.

A few months back, I was invited to speak at St. Mary’s School, an all-girls boarding school here in Raleigh.  It’s so interesting.  The woman who invited me to speak has taken a lot of my pump classes, and felt like I would be great to speak to the girls as a “woman in fitness”.  What she didn’t know asking me is that, one, that I love working with that age group (high schoolers), and I really gravitated toward this group at camp.  I still get Seventeen Magazine, am obsessed with Katy Perry and Justin Bieber, and am routinely mistaken for about 10 years younger than I am.  I hope that is a compliment to my skin, and NOT evident of what people think of my maturity level.  Ugh.

But anyways, all that is to say, I relate to this group really really well, and I’m so, so excited to speak to them, but I’m also 100% freaked out at the fact that someone would want me to speak to their kids.

I’m not sure what to say.  I drink.  I shower as little as society will allow.  I would prefer to spend all my time in a bikini if it is over 80 degrees.  I swear.  Like a lot.  And I’m not sure exactly why Caroline thought of me to speak to the girls.  But I’m honored.  And I hope I say the right things, the things that high school girls need to hear.

What DO high school girls need to hear?

What would I have wanted to hear in high school?

  • Always bring a sweater.  You will always be cold.
  • Start taking care of your body NOW.  Don’t let things creep up on you.  When you get to college, your mom will not be there to remind you to balance your meals.  BALANCE YOUR MEALS.  That means eat something not fried for breakfast.  Eat something sensible for lunch.  Sushi or a salad works.  Same goes for dinner.  Do at least 20-30 minutes of activity today.  You start that shit early, and you will be set.
  • Watch the news when you get ready for school/work.  You don’t want to be that idiot that knows nothing when folks are talking.  Don’t just rely on fake Facebook articles to keep yourself informed.
  • Do something that makes you laugh every single day.
  • I struggle with this one.  Get up early and do something.  Get to bed at a reasonable time.  Again, I struggle with this one but I have never ever regretted getting up early to get stuff done.
  • If you’re interested in it, go for it.  Just do it.  Don’t let your boyfriend, or your mom, or your friends talk you out of anything you have in your mind!

**So update alert.  I wrote this post prior to going out to school.  I went to school to speak to the girls on Tuesday, and it was an absolutely amazing, incredible experience, and I definitely, definitely would LOVE to do it again.

The engagement started with me getting a chance to see St. Mary’s School, a girls boarding AND day school here in Raleigh, NC.  The campus was really pretty, and reminded me of college.  Caroline, who had arranged for us to be there met me along with some students who were enjoying lunch.  I grabbed lunch in their dining hall, which was really nice, and included a painted portrait of Kylie Jenner, which I totally appreciated.

Caroline set me, and the three other women on the panel up in the performance hall, and we got started by introducing ourselves, what we did, and a little reason why we were sitting on the panel.  The women were great.  One was a career counselor.  Another, a director of a non-profit that paired horses with kids who had faced trauma, and still another directed at a local art gallery here in Raleigh.

And then there was me.

When it came my turn to introduce myself, I did what I do best, and I had everyone spread out and lead them through a movement and breathing exercise.

The girls, extremely impressive girls, asked wonderful questions, ans were highly engaged.  They were poised, beautiful, and confident, and I felt absolutely honored to be in their presence.  After the session, I got a chance to hug some of the girls and talk to them, and I was, and still am blown away by what they did.

I would love to guest speak once again, and hope I brought to the girls, a fraction of the joy they brought me on Tuesday.

Happy Friday, y’all 🙂

xoxo ❤

LucetteGrace

| cheriarmour

I like sweet things.  A lot.  I adopted a pretty wicked sweet tooth from my mother, made only worst by my copious consumption of artificial sugar.  Which blah blah, I know it’s not good for me, but my dad is diabetic, and I got into a Splenda and Stevia habit sorta early.  One thing I don’t do – aspartame.  That’s a teeny bit before my time, and to me, it kinda taste like shit.

^^

All this to say, that my copious consumption of artificial sweeteners in the past, especially during the summers at camp when I’d road trip a lot (diet sodas) has increased my sweet tooth by a ton (the crap in artificial sweeteners tends to do that), and I’m pretty discerning in my sweets.

Enter LucetteGrace.

So, about a week ago (cue Bobby Schmurda dance) a friend mentioned offhand that she’d gone to this bakery/pastry shop.  She didn’t understand how serious I was about the shop, and as soon as I left her, I hunted around downtown Raleigh to find the shop.  I found it, pulled in, and started to ogle everything behind the glass case, but sadly, I’d forgotten my camera.

The owner came out (his name is Daniel and he has a beard, btws), and saw that I was drooling, and was kind enough to chat with me and help me pick a few treats, and even slipped a few extra in the bag for me to take up and nosh on later.  So I grabbed a friend, and headed back just a few days later for a coffee date.

Lucette 4

Lucette 3

Lucette 5

Lucette 2

Lucette Grace

Lucette 6To me, there is almost nothing more therapeutic than coffee, a sweet, and some time with a friend.  I left feeling like I had filled up my belly (for one), and filled up my love tank for two.  Sweets, words, coffee, and a very golden afternoon with a good friend was so healing.

So technically, LucetteGrace, named for the owner’s daughters, is a patisserie, which a bakery that exclusively serves french cakes and pastries. Located at 235 S Salisbury St, the sweets are sweet, but in a different way than American sweet. You have to try it to understand, but the treats go perfectly with a locally-brewed cup of Larry’s Beans (919 better stand up!), and an afternoon with friends.  What’s really cool about the patisserie, in addition to the taste, is the ambiance and decor of LucetteGrace – the space is clean and decked out in yellows and grays and seems like a good space to sit for an afternoon with your laptop for a productive dessert sesh.  It’s a nice alternative to a Starbucks; no shade to them of course, I’ve been hanging out there and have gotten a lot of work done at these places for years.  Bottom line – it’s difficult to mass-produce shit that tastes good, and Daniel at LucetteGrace has captured something special here.

Where’s your favorite place to get work done? 

With a creative spirit also comes this irritating trait.

| cheriarmour

I’m horribly forgetful.  Horribly, horribly forgetful.  The only way I remember to keep my class schedule and show up to places is that I write every single thing, every single appointment down I have in an appointment  book, and once it’s written, it’s real.

Last week after a Zumba party…
Zumba Party

…I decided in order to keep up with my streak (more on that later), I needed to run, even though it was after 10pm.  But I didn’t want to miss my mile, my honey was gone for the weekend, and I was feeling antsy. So still wearing my Santa hat from the party, I drove to my old condo, which is in a super populated, well-lit area, don’t worry.  I parked my car, hid my keys somewhere in the car, and closed the door.  When I went to test the door to make sure it was still unlocked, I found, much to my immediate horror, that I had locked the door with my keys inside.

Damnit.

I called AAA from my phone, which I’d thankfully not locked in the car, and since in my experience, AAA takes years to get to you to unlock your car, I decided to go for my run, since it was also about 40 degrees out, and I wasn’t necessarily interested in freezing as I waited.  So down the road I went in my purple Moving Comfort jacket and Santa hat.  I’m sure I got a lot of strange looks.

Murphy’s Law must have been at work, because not a half-mile down the road, I got a call, which I answered mid-run from the tow-truck driver.

“Yeah I’ll be there in 10 minutes…”

And in the fastest lockout time in history, I arrived back to my car to the tow truck driver waiting on me.  So I jogged up, and explained to her why I was jogging around downtown at night with a Santa hat on.

Bruise

Now, in completely different news, I discovered this bruise the other night on my thigh, and I cannot, for the life of me, remember how or when I could have whacked myself so hard that me, being the dark-skinned girl that I am, could bruise like this. My forgetfulness at its finest…