The Windy City Meet-Up

Well Ryan and I had a wonderful whirlwind trip to Chicago this past weekend to meet up with Stephanie Quilao and the rest of the Fit Bloggers. I am so glad that we had the opportunity to chat with Stephanie (Back in Skinny Jeans), Carla (MizFit Online), Leslie (The Weighting Game), Roni (Roni’s Weigh), and Tanya (I Ate A Pie) in person. I love meeting new people who are also interested in healthy living. It was a quick overnight trip, but super fun, none-the-less.

Live Well 360° is a website that focuses on living your best life. A life of wellness in every way. Personally, one of my goals for living my best life is to travel. To get out and see the world. Granted, Chicago is only 300 miles from where I currently live and grew up, but hey, it is a start, right?

For me, traveling is big part of my journey of wellness (pun intended). Experiencing culture, food, being active, being open, learning, teaching – it’s all part of what inspires me. Part of my intention with this site is to share my experiences as I go, in hopes that my adventures inspire you to get out and experience some of the same, or at the very least, give you an opportunity to live vicariously through me. For now, these types of travel related posts will be few and far between, but eventually they will become a bigger part of the blog. Hope you enjoy.

Chicago Here We Come

Saturday morning began with a workout and breakfast. I was up at 7 AM and went for my normal Saturday morning four-mile trail run. I arrived home to the sweet smell of oatmeal banana pancakes topped with peanut butter and sugar free syrup, Wellshire Farms 40% reduced fat bacon, egg whites, and Mackinaw Island Fudge flavored coffee… our typical Saturday morning breakfast. YUM.

Ryan loves to cook just as much as I do, and since Saturday is a day off from working out for him, he had things all ready by the time I got home. Sigh… am I a lucky girl or what? We sat down to eat our delicious feast, showered, packed up, and were on the road by 11 AM.

Side note: I know this looks like a lot of food. I want to tell you that this is the breakfast that I have pretty much every Saturday and Sunday morning, even all the way through my fat loss program. Yes, every Saturday and Sunday. Although in life Ryan is a pretty adventurous dude, he loves his homemade pancakes, bacon, and eggs, so this is our treat every weekend. Being the good wife that I am, I don’t complain about the lack of variety, especially when he is volunteering to make it!

Anyway, one could say that I am a big eater. I like food. A lot. And I was still able to incorporate larger meals strategically into my fat loss program. All it takes is a little planning ahead. Just wanted to put that out there for those of you that may think that losing fat must include bird food only.

It took us about four and a half hours to make the trek through Michigan, Indiana, and into Chicago, the windy city…and by the way, windy it was! We ran into some sleety slush but other than that, good tunes and smooth sailing all the way.

Healthy travel tip: When taking a road trip, make sure to drink plenty of water. I bring a giant jug with us on long car rides, and constantly refill our SIGG bottles. Yes, it is a pain in the butt to have to stop for potty breaks, but it is worth it to stay hydrated. It also helps to ward off the road trip munchies.

Checking In

I made reservations at the W Chicago – City Center hotel (thank you Priceline). W Hotels are my kind of style, contemporary, chic, and very romantic with the dim lighting and candles throughout. The lobby is gorgeous, filled with overstuffed couches, big chandeliers, and deep, rich colors. And I LOVE the scent. I swear they pipe it in.  All W Hotels smell like orange blossoms or something.

After we checked out our room and unpacked, we were starving so we headed out for dinner. We took the complementary Acura MDX ride (nice!) over to the Chicago Pizza and Oven Grinder Co. This restaurant is huge with locals, but not so huge with tourists until, well, the Food Network took their cameras there. Their signature pizza pot pies and their Mediterranean bread bring hungry people in droves.

We Love Food

As mentioned above and many other times in this blog, Ryan and I love food. So, when we get the chance to visit a fun city, we like to take advantage of the opportunity. I want to preface the following paragraphs by saying that our motto is this: We eat very clean meals 95 percent of the time. We are also very active. We are not going to die if we have a little extra fat, sugar, and calories once in a while. It’s all about moderation and planning, and making healthy choices when you can, where you can. So, if I really want something that I typically wouldn’t eat, I can eat it, but I just make sure that I plan for that splurge and do what I need to do to balance it out in the long run (i.e. move more throughout the day, cut back on calories the following couple days, etc). Over years of trial and error I have gotten to this point, realizing that it’s not all or nothing, it’s not binge or deprivation, it’s just about making conscious choices that allow you to live life to its fullest, but also stay on track with maintaining a healthy body.

The Chicago Pizza and Oven Grinder Co = YUM

The decor here is very rustic, think old English tavern with a fake cedar shake roof over the bar and knotty pine booths. The word “hobbit” comes to mind, but in a good way of course. The restaurant is also very small, which is another reason why we decided to go early rather than later, because by the time we left there was over an hour wait for seating. We were excited when we arrived and the wait was only about 25 minutes. YAY.

We sat down at the bar and got something to drink while we waited for our table. Ryan ordered a Becks, on draught, and I got a glass of Merlot. Whoa! Ok, so here is where I need to mention about portion sizes. This place doesn’t mess around. We knew that the food portions were huge, but in Ryan’s words, even the bartender is “all business”, which we found out when he brought my glass of wine, filled literally to the brim. We chatted with some fellow Jimmy Buffett fans while we waited (we always meet such nice people no matter where we go) and finally it was time to get our eat on. We already knew what we wanted to get, an Italian festa salad, Mediterranean bread, and half pound pizza pot pie, all to split. We were pleasantly surprised that we had the option of white or wheat for the Mediterranean bread and the pizza pot pie, so of course we chose wheat.

I don’t even know which was my favorite part, everything about this meal was fabulous. All of the ingredients were so fresh and so flavorful.

The pizza pot pie had the best pizza sauce I have ever had, which I think has to do with the crumbled sausage mixed in. I also love the presentation of the pot pie. They bake it in a bowl, first adding a layer of mozzarella cheese, followed by fresh, large button mushrooms, a meat sauce that tastes like it has been simmering for hours, and then finally topping it off with the pizza dough crust. When they bring it to the table, they flip it over onto a plate and pop the bowl off using a spoon, so that you are left with a pizza dough filled cup of goodness. I highly recommend this restaurant, and suggest that you make sure that you come hungry! As you might expect, we couldn’t finish all of the food, but both agreed, this was a great meal.

Time to Meet the Fit Bloggers…with a Few Stops In-Between

We left and headed back to the Magnificent Mile to do some of what I do best – shopping. I love shopping in Chicago, so many cool stores to visit – the huge North Face store (by the way, I swear everyone in Chicago wears North Face jackets), five levels of Crate and Barrel, Adidas, a two level Apple store, Macy’s and more.

As we made our way toward the Hancock  Building, I overheard a woman tell her boyfriend that they should go to the “New Your Cheese Factory”. Ha. What I think she was trying to say was the “Cheesecake Factory”. I love people watching/listening.

We met up with Stephanie and the rest of the Fit Bloggers at the lobby bar at the Hard Rock Hotel. What a cool bar!! Everyone was so nice and it was great to finally put faces with names. Too bad that I didn’t think to whip out my camera to get pics with anyone.

For you iPhone users, we also got a sneak peak of a new iPhone app, created by Shane Vitarana. This app allows you to track your workouts by selecting exercises categorized by muscle group. It was really cool because he has an image of the human muscular system on the screen, that can be flipped front to back, so that you can touch the muscle group on the body and select from an extensive list of exercises to plug in to your workout plan. From there you go in and add the appropriate weight used and number of reps to be completed. Pretty neat! Shane said that although it is now available through the iPhone App Store, he is working on adding more detail and features, making it even cooler.

We chatted with the bloggers until Steph, Ryan, and I were the last ones standing and then headed off around 1 AM to hit the hay.

Eat and Run

Sunday morning, we packed up and headed over to the Grand Lux Cafe for a late breakfast/lunch. We have always wanted to check this restaurant out while in Las Vegas, but haven’t had the chance, so we were excited when we saw that there is one in Chicago. Their international menu is pretty extensive, overwhelming almost. I ordered a breakfast sandwich, subbing egg whites for the whole eggs, and fruit instead of hash browns. Ryan got the chicken enchiladas, with a side of black beans and rice. Both were delicious.

We also ordered a batch of fresh baked chocolate chip pecan cookies (literally, they bake them as you eat your meal), so that we could enjoy a few and take the rest home to give away to family.

They were sooooo good. When they arrived, they were still warm from the oven. After that, we did a little walking, and then hit the road to head home.

On our next visit, I would like to actually do the touristy Chicago type things like go to the Field Museum, the Shedd Aquarium, the Adler Planetarium, a Cubs game at Wrigley Field, and the Navy Pier, but all in all it was a fantastic time, meeting new friends, and spending some time with my love.

For more pics from this trip, check out my Flickr album.

 Print-friendly version