Love + Beef Burgundy + HIIT

Hey everyone!

Weweii wanted to say hey today, too.  It's hard to take pictures of him because he's so dark!

I don't know about y'all but I thought it was Friday all day today.  Imagine my disappointment when I still have another day of work this week.  That called for a trip to Starbucks for a little pick-me-up.

I guess the month of February is time to talk about love in church and devotions.  Our church began a sermon series called Love Revolution last Sunday, and the daily devotional I'm reading is talking about love all week.

I wanted to share a Bible verse with you relating to love.  You may have read it before, but look on it with an open mind:

"If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing."

1 Corinthians 13:1-3

This morning, it hit me that I can be the best at anything and everything, but if I don't love others along the way, it doesn't mean a thing.  I've been having problems with people at work and have been comparing myself to them and worrying about how I rank on the "good teacher" scale.  Some of the other teachers may be a "better teacher" than me, but they just don't seem to love what they do.  They also don't seem to love their students and love the other teachers at the school.

From 104.7 The Fish's Facebook page

I found comfort in this verse this morning.  I know that if I focus on loving others first, then my "status" at my job will have much more meaning than if I'm the best teacher ever but don't love others.  Of course, it's impossible for me to love others (especially some people...) without the love of God.  I will be praying that I can better love others this month, and I hope you'll join me in doing so!

I'm moving right along in the Crock Pot Challenge with new recipe #5 today!  Before leaving for work, I put everything together for Beef Burgundy, following this recipe from Crockin' Girls (I seriously love that website!).

I was concerned about making this for two reasons: I'm not a huge red meat fan, and I also don't like mushrooms. I decided to go ahead with it, though, because I knew that Joe would really enjoy it, and I really love to cook with wine.

Let me tell you: This. Beef. Was. Perfect!  You didn't even need a knife to cut it.  Very tender, and the sauce tasted great, too!  I served it with mashed potatoes and a corn/broccoli mix (but I forgot to take a picture before I dug in).  We both cleared our plates!

Definitely some thing I will make again.  If you aren't a huge red meat fan, I recommend trying this recipe.  All my qualms with red meat (except for the fact that it's not as good for you) are nil in this dish!

After missing my workout yesterday, I promised myself I'd make it to the gym today for Workout B of Best Body Bootcamp.  I went to the gym in our apartment complex for the HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) workout.

As you can see, this workout got me SWEAT-Y!  There were ten exercises completed for 40 seconds with 15 seconds rest in between.  I did three full sets, and I'm feeling good right now.

The "Seconds" app on my iPad made this workout especially enjoyable.  Not only could I set a HIIT timer for 40-seconds on, 15-seconds off, but it played music while the timer ran!  It's free in the app store, so you should check it out if you're looking for a good interval timer.

Questions for you: What do you think of interval workouts?