Ryan taught me a new move at the gym today involving the TRX straps.
(Source)
TRX hamstring curls are no joke. I hope I can walk tomorrow. My hamstrings were burning in a way they’ve never burned before.
Ryan told me to try doing the curls one leg at a time… continuously. Sweet Jeebus.
Today’s workout included the hamstring curls in this leg workout:
| Exercise | Reps | Sets |
| Lunges (one leg at a time) | 15 | 3 |
| Single leg squats (one leg at a time) | 15 | 3 |
| Squats | 15 – 20 | 3 |
| Deadlifts | 15 | 3 |
| One-legged leg press | 15 | 3 |
| TRX hamstring curls | 15 | 1 |
| TRX hamstring curls (alternating legs) | 10 | 3 |
| Step ups (with no weight) | 90 seconds | 1 |
Breakfast
Today’s breakfast was nice and basic.
Whole grains + Fresh fruit + Healthy fat + Protein
Honey and peanut butter are such a winning combination.
A simple fruit salad rounded out the meal with chopped apple and white nectarine.
Birthday Cake Discussions
Last night Ryan and I started talking about birthday cakes. His birthday is next week and I asked him if red velvet was still his favorite kind of cake or if his tastes have changed at all.
He surprised me when he said that he was craving marble cake with buttercream icing at the moment!
I have to think my family is rubbing off on him because marble cake was always my dad’s number one birthday cake choice and mine as well up until a couple of years ago when our whole family seemed to shift to red velvet (with buttercream icing, not the traditional cream cheese icing). Marble cake still pops up frequently in the Bream household.
I can’t help but love the fact that Ryan’s two favorite cake flavors are my two favorites as well. Ryan’s third runner up is Funfetti cake which is another one of my favorites. I actually talked about making Funfetti cake our wedding cake!
Speaking of wedding cake… I can’t wait to bust out the top tier of our cake our wedding cake from the freezer to enjoy on our anniversary. It’s been calling to me from the back of my parents’ freezer every time we visit them in St. Pete.
I wish we would’ve saved a piece of the groom’s cake, too!
Go Bulls! 
Questions of the Morning
- What is your favorite kind of cake?
- What flavor was your wedding cake or what flavor would you want it to be?
- What was the best wedding cake you ever had?
My favorite cake is red velvet with buttercream icing, which was also the flavor of our wedding cake. The best wedding cake I’ve ever had at another wedding was pumpkin spice wedding cake. It was fantastic and was served in the spring because the bride loved it so much and wasn’t about to let the seasons dictate her wedding cake!
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Carrot cake. It’s great for breakfast or dessert 🙂
cherpumple
ha!! nice choice.
TRX is my favorite work out! You should try a whole class.. you cant walk for at least 3 days! ha
i wish my gym offered TRX classes. they have “functional training” classes but you have to pay an additional fee & the use of TRX straps isn’t guaranteed. boo.
Your wedding cake is absolutely gorgeous. I’m a choc-o-holic, so I prefer anything that involves chocolate!
The TRX is such an amazing workout tool. If you youtube “TRX Exercises” You’ll be amazed with the kind of stuff you can do with it. Check out some of the ab exercises, the one where you get in a plank position and put your feet in the TRX and tuck your knees into your chest IS SOOO HARD!
i’ve tried that one. it’s KILLER.
I REALLY wanna try TRX! They offer it at my gym, but only on certain days and of course I’m always at work 😛
My friend had a snickerdoodle cake for her birthday and I’m pretty sure I was making inappropriate noises eating it.
Enjoy your day 😀
I just got engaged last week so I’m just beginning to think about all this! My fiance’s fave flavor is red velvet too, so I think we’ll be going for that in some part at least!
oh i’m so excited for you! congrats!!
I feel like I may be in the minority of folks who isn’t regularly very fond of cake or cupcakes. Then again, maybe I’m just not trying the right ones, right? However, for my mother’s graduation from Grad School, she had the most amazing homemade cake which tasted somewhat like a macaroon. We learned later that the secret ingredient was not coconut but APRICOT!!
Color me surprised. I don’t even know what an apricot taste like… but if it’s “like cake”, they’re my new favorite fruit.
now i want to try that! do you have a recipe?
Red Velvet is my absolute favorite cake in the world! Followed closely with any version of a cookie cake 🙂
Yoplait just started making red velvet 100 calorie yogurts, and while I don’t really love the Yoplait version of yogurt, I am obsessed with these!!!!!
Lemon cake with coconut butter cream icing! I’ve never tried red velvet cake, I’ve actually never seen it here! I may have to introduce the Irish too it if it’s that good! 🙂
why have i never tried coconut buttercream icing!?!?
It AMAZING! You have to team it with lemon cake! Though I’m thinking it could be equally as incredible with chocolate!
Your cake(s) were beautiful! I like carrot cake the best!! Yummy yummy!
Funfetti is also another close second for me!
I love carrot cake and basically any spice cakes!
I really love cheesecake and cannoli cake…. I’ve done TRX before! It is a killer! Really, really challenging and works well.
I love TRX too – I just went this morning. It is such a great workout and the hour just flies by! I really like the side bends for the obliques and the different kinds of lunges. The first time I tried it I had soreness in muscles I didn’t even know I had!
I love yellow cake with chocolate icing – the store bought mix variety. It is a winner every time.
box mix yellow cake is delicious!
My absolute favorite would be funfetti cake. Although, I made an ice cream cake that was funfetti and cake batter ice cream, and that combo might be taking over!
I’m not a huge cake person, but I like German chocolate cake. Ice cream cake always wins though!
I think plain vanilla cake with rich, fudgy chocolate icing is my favorite! We are currently looking at wedding cakes and discussing flavors. I’m thinking either pumpkin spice or a fresh strawberry flavor. Too many decisions!
i don’t think you can go wrong with either of those flavors. yum.
It’s amazing all of the various exercises you can do with those TRX straps!
I’m not a huge cake fan, but my favorites are easily red velvet with creamcheese or buttercream frosting (both are fabulous), the “family secret” chocolate fudge cake my stepdad bakes (SO decadent & rich), and definitely Funfetti cake is up there too! We had red velvet with creamcheese frosting at our wedding. It was perfect because two of our colors were a deep red and cream, and it’s one of our favorite cakes. Funfetti brings back great memories too. In college, my friends and I would all make each other Funfetti cakes for our various birthdays. It was cheap and delish!
Your wedding cake was beautiful! I actually just did a post yesterday about what I am thinking for our wedding cake. I am going to choose one layer, my fiance is going to choose one layer and then the top layer will be something that we both love. I know my layer has to be chocolate and peanut butter of some sort. That is my favorite. I love funfetti too! It would be awesome if we could have that as our top layer. I’m going to keep that in mind 🙂
that’s such a cute idea for a wedding cake!
Mmmm cake! I’m hit or miss with red velvet but marble is my weakness too! No icing necessary, just plain sponge! To be honest, I love all cake but the best I ever had was a choc chip cookie dough cheesecake…a huge cookie was the base and pieces of choc chip cookie dough was swirled throughout the cream cheese- I died!
Hi Julie:
Speaking of weddings, I got married in St. Pete Beach at The Don CeSar – ever heard of it 🙂
Our wedding cake was very non-traditional. We had numerous carrot cakes (my fav) and cheesecakes (his fav) displayed on fancy cake stands on a table!
Do you know of a natural alternative to make red velvet cake red? I don’t like to use food coloring.
Thanks!
Hi Denise–the Don CeSar is gorgeous!! My family always ogles it when we vacation in St. Pete. 🙂 I’m sure it was a beautiful wedding!
we looked at the don cesar! it’s gorgeous!
as for your question, i once read that REAL red velvet cake actually doesn’t use any red food coloring… i think it is red b/c of the use of a certain kind of cocoa or something. i can’t remember exactly!
also, i’ve heard of using beet powder to naturally dye it. something to look into, i guess!
I lovve apple cakes 🙂
My favorite cake is red velvet with cream cheese, but it vies for a place in my heart with a good sturdy yellow cake slathered in chocolate buttercream. (Oh. My God. Now I’m craving cake at 9 am.)
The best wedding cake I ever had was last year at my cousin’s wedding–she had “Italian rainbow cookie cake.” You know those seven layer cookies that are pink, yellow, and green with raspberry and apricot jams in the middle and chocolate ganache on top? She made that into a cake!! It was to die for. (And we’re not even Italian!)
My desired wedding cake flavor changes every day…I’ll just have to make every tier a different kind! 😉
I love Red Velvet and Funfetti…I think it’s a toss up. We didn’t have a wedding cake because we served pies (peach, pumpkin and shoofly pie). They were seriously delicious and were purchased from an amish bakery. The best wedding cake I’ve ever had was at my BF’s wedding and it was Coldstone Icecream cake!
I love that move with the TRX straps. It is killer!!’
Our wedding cake had 4 tiers and each tier was a different flavor. But the caramel mousse/nuts tier and the carrot cake were my fav. SO good.
I don’t think I’ve actually had marble cake before! I am a big big vanilla fan – I know it sounds plain, but I love it!! I’d say that something with vanilla in large amounts would be ideal for me, and cinnamon-spiced buttercream frosting. Yum!
Good Question. We have a meeting setup with the wedding planner to eat, sample, and pick flavors, shapes, and colors of cakes! But my favorite is black Forrest with a peanut butter butter cream iceing. But thats all going to take back seat to the icecream sundae bar we are having with the cake
can i come to your wedding? ice cream sundae bar!?!? you’re speaking my language.
haha…inbox me your address you you kids are invited and sitting at the head table! But when we first started planning I said I had only ONE request and that was the ability to have an icecream sundae bar, and that dream is going to come true via the event coordinator, bless her heart…Im stoked and am done wedding planning, I dont need anything else there!
Red velvet with cream cheese frosting is by far my favorite. But do like a good chocolate cake with buttercream frosting! But in all honesty if the frosting is not very good it turns me off on the whole cake! I love the frosting!
I am not sure what I would want my wedding cake flavors to be, I guess that is something that would need to be discussed!
I just got married in August and our cake was pumpkin pound cake with buttercream frosting! It didn’t matter that it was 100+ degrees out, we love pumpkin! Like you, I can’t imagine another wedding cake to be as delish as ours, but I’m willing to test… 😉
We did a move kind of like the hamstring curls in boot camp last Friday. You lay on the ground the same, but you put your feet on sliders and slide your feet toward/away from your body while keeping your booty lifted. TOUGH!
My favorite cake is either carrot cake or italian cream cake!
My wedding cake was different flavors for each layer. The bottom layer was chocolate cake with a cappacuino filling, the next layer was a white cake with an almondine filling and the top layer was a white cake with a strawberry and cream filling.
My favorite cake is either funfetti or carrot cake, but I am not a huge cake person in general. I would much prefer ice cream!
Those hamstring curls are killer for me since I have the tightest hammies.
That idea of freezing your wedding cake is so genius! What an awesome surprise to look forward to. 🙂
I am a freak of nature and don’t really care for cake (I know, the horror!). But this vegan bakery nearby makes an out-of-this-world apple cider cupcake. If I could have that in cake form as my future wedding cake, I might die and go to Heaven.
OOh, I was just thinking about a lower body workout today. Perfect timing. And I’m totally with you with your favorite cake flavors. Although, I’d put funfetti at the top. And you HAVE TO use the rainbow chip frosting.
I love red velvet, but I also love a moist chocolate cake with vanilla buttercream. Simple, but works every time 🙂
oh my goodness, ALL CAKE is my favorite cake! I literally can’t imagine a kind of cake I wouldn’t like. Cake and Ice Cream are tied as my two favorite foods in the whole world, I could eat them forever!!!! If I HAD to choose, I would probably go with Carrot Cake. I haven’t been to many weddings, but at my brother’s they chose three different tiers: Strawberry, Mexican Hot Chocolate, and carrot. The strawberry was to die for! They both love strawberry, which is cute because they’re both red-heads!
mexican hot chocolate!? i’m intrigued!
it was a lighter chocolate with a bit of spice to it! pretty good!
Sometimes nice and basic is the way to go!
I love red velvet I think. It’s sooo good. But I’m also a sucker for a nice yellow cake with chocolate frosting 🙂
I want my wedding cake to be all kinds of different flavors so I can have a little of each!!
Best wedding cake I ever had was my sister’s. It was SO moist and delicious!
picking my favorite cake is like a mother announcing a favorite child. it’s just plain wrong 😉
with that said, i’d say a vanilla coconut cake would have to be my favorite. chocolate mousse is a close second! never understood red velvet cake…is it more chocolate?..vanilla?! seriously, what is it! haha
Have you ever tried Napoleon cake with cannoli cream frosting (no I swear I’m not Italian 🙂 ) Delicious – I love your wedding cake + the idea that you froze the top tier to have on your anniversery. Adorable!
no i haven’t but CLEARLY i need to!
carrot cake with cream cheese frosting, hands down. i’m not engaged or anything yet…but who knows, maybe in the future 🙂
i LOVE that pumpkin spice idea!!!
Your wedding cake is so beautiful!!! And it just looks delicious!
Hmmm cake…I’d have to say I like pumpkin spice cake, lemon cake, or vanilla coconut!!! Weird because I’m such a chocolate fiend, but I usually like lighter cakes for some reason.
Red Velvet is soooo delicious though, especially around the holidays. I think the redness of it just makes me want to curl up with Christmas movies while I dig in 🙂
XOXO
I LOVE vanilla cake with fresh strawberry filling!!! In our wedding cake we had a tier like that and I wanted the whole tier to myself!!! Selfish I know. Actually, my bridal shower cake was the same. LOL.
Rest of the wedding cake details: The top tier was an almond cake with almond filling… and the bottom tear was marble with chocolate filling. Unlike you guys, we ate our top tier already :/ Our plan is to get another mini anniversary cake for our one year. We just couldn’t wait and we have heard that sometimes the cake isn’t that great a year later. Plus any excuse to get a cake from that bakery is good enough for us 🙂
My wedding cake was actually cheesecake and it was AMAZING! I got the idea from a wedding I went to about 6 months before my own. I loved the idea it because it was different and people weren’t expecting it. I love traditional wedding cake, but I really wanted to serve something different. It looked like a regular 4-tiered wedding cake, but inside was cheesecake. We had four different flavors: white chocolate, double chocolate, key lime, and white chocolate raspberry. I was so anxious to eat the top of our cake on anniversary, which was this past April. Another reason we chose the cheesecake is that it freezes better than regular cake and boy were the right! It tasted exactly the same 1 year later! YUM!!
My favorite cake is a tie between red velvet and carrot. I love all cakes. Seriously, I love cake like you love ice cream Julie. Its my dessert of choice. Im getting married in june and our cake flavors for our three tier cake are marble with strawberry (think neapolitan) for our tier. chocolate with cookies and cream for the bottom tier, and white cake with key lime curd for the middle. The whole thing is going to be iced with buttercream. Yum!
oh YUM. your cake sounds amazing!
we are a MAJOR cake family (cake snobs is probably a better term), each with our own favorites. it became a little contentious around wedding time, so we ended up having a small-ish wedding cake for the ceremonial cutting (just yellow cake w. buttercream) and then we had a CAKE BAR with 12 different kinds of cakes… from carrot to red velvet to banana to snicker doodle (all from sweet mandy b’s for any of you chicago folks!)… and it was fantastic!! the guests loved the choice… and we loved the leftovers!
I love TRX. Love it love it love it. My favorite cake is ANYTHING that the Robicellis make. I am in love with their cupcakes. My current favorite is their apple peanut butter cupcake or their fluffernutter cupcake. MMMMMMMMMMM
I’m a sucker for either carrot cake with cream cheese icing, or coffee cake. Those are my favorites. However, I wouldn’t turn down any cake if offered a slice. 🙂
•What is your favorite kind of cake?
Hmmmm…toughie! I think carrot cake (WITH walnuts, but WITHOUT raisins) and spice cake are my favorites. Oh, & I don’t really do cream cheese frosting either – something too rich & icky about it, but I do LOVE buttercream 🙂
i totally agree w/ your carrot cake preferences! MORE nuts… no raisins!
Totally agree wbout the raisins. I think the only place that gets it right is Publix. Julie, have you ever had Publix’s carrot cake? If not you have to try it!
heck yes for TRX… have you ever used it before?? if your gym offers TRX classes you should DEFINITELY try one.. you will feel muscles you didnt even know you had!
email me if you have any questions about exercises or classes (i work for them out of our main SF office so i might be able to help you find something around Ocala)
i’ve only tried it one time before and it’s amazing. ryan is seriously in love with the TRX and uses it daily to train every muscle group. it looks so intense. i wish my gym offered TRX-specific classes, but unfortunately they don’t. they have “functional trainig” classes, but they cost extra and also aren’t guaranteed to us the TRX.
With 6 months until our wedding, Ryan and I are LOOOOVING the cake tasting process! Last week we tasted a funfetti cake with PB&J filling and a butter cream frosting that I was SUPER excited about! Unfortunately, it was entirely too sweet for us. BOO! We are thinking we’ll go with a hummingbird cake on some of the layers and then a raspberry/white chocolate cake on the others. My fav is hummingbird by far! A good southern classic!
hummingbird cake rocks!
Oh good Lord, my boyfriend would LOVE to have funfetti as his wedding cake haha. That’s his fav, and I’m baking him up a chocolate cake with funfetti frosting for his bday (he’s deployed so it will be getting shipped!).
MY fav cakes (like for a birthday) = chocolate cake with whipped cream and fresh sliced fruit as the topping, and whipped cream and fresh fruit inside the layers (like strawberries and bananas mainly), or marble cake with chocolate frosting. I also have a sweet spot for the Entemann’s Chocolate Fudge Cake my mom used to buy when I was little. 😉