Life lately around Charlotte – A Lady Goes West

Let’s talk about what’s been going on around here!

Hi, friend! How are you? We’re due for a chat. Let’s catch up …

Summer has almost started for us, and Brady’s last day of first grade is early next week. I have him signed up for three weeks of summer camps (one week-long full-time camp per month), and other than that, he’ll be with me every day — tagging along to Life Time while I work.

This summer, I have a mini goal to go to our neighborhood pool more each week. The last few summers have flown by without a lot of pool time, and I always regret that. I’ve decided that’s not happening this year.

In other news, about a month ago, Brady tried out for our local soccer academy, and he made the team for his age division. So he has some short evening summer training sessions in June and July, then his practices start in the middle of August. This league is a much bigger commitment time wise and financially (you wouldn’t believe how much the uniforms were), but he’s so pumped about it.

If it were up to Brady, he’d play sports every day, but we’re going to keep him to two sports at a time — just for juggling sake. He moved up to the next level of tennis at Life Time too (from red balls to orange balls), but I’m not 100 percent sure if we’ll continue that after summer, once all his soccer stuff officially starts. Nonetheless, he’s had an amazing year of school, and he’s doing well. But enough about Brady, let’s talk about me.

I’m doing pretty good! Some weeks, I feel way too busy and like I don’t have a second of breathing room between my various parts of my work, momming and life. And then some weeks, I feel totally aligned and in a great flow. I think I’m in one of those better weeks now, so that’s great. And I think that’s just the nature of life. If you find you’re having more crazy weeks than regular ones, perhaps you need a change. But if your crazy weeks are only once in a while and often followed up by mostly manageable ones, perhaps you just need to roll with the intervals.

My current teaching schedule includes eight classes a week, all in the mid-morning on weekdays, and this is the best teaching schedule I’ve ever had in the history of my 16 years of teaching group fitness. I’m teaching each of my programs two times, which is completely ideal. I waited so long for a schedule like this, and it makes me very happy.

Also, I hit my 4-year Life Time anniversary in late April, and as I mentioned, this year, I added on another role — doing the club’s local Life Time Charlotte Instagram page, which has been such a fun addition. As a content creator for many years, I’ve mostly been the one on camera, and this job is all about being behind the camera, which is a position I’m loving.

(Here are my socks, and here’s my mic belt.)

With everything falling into a pretty good place lately, I feel like I’m no longer spending my days wondering about my future, as I was so often for many years. For a long time, I was in the midst of deciding on/trying for another child (that’s officially a firm no) and in the constant midst of deciding if I should switch careers (that’s a no, for now). While I don’t know what the future holds, I’m more pleased with the present than I have been in a very long time. Wow, this life-lately post just turned deep. Let’s move on to some fun stuff …

As always, this is a highlight reel! Just a reminder that regular daily life isn’t always perfect or photo worthy. Take my highlights for what they are. 🙂 

Attending the PGA Championship at Quail Hollow

I’ve been to four golf tournaments in my life, and I’ve had a great time at all of them.

Golf tournaments are quite different from other sporting events I’ve been to. You see, at golf tournaments, the attendees are generally very friendly and orderly, and the vibe is really positive. I love how most golf fans are super supportive of nearly every golfer, calling them out by name and cheering for them no matter how they perform. It’s fun to watch how people lift up all the competitors on the field, which isn’t something you see at most professional sporting events.

We saw that in action just a few weeks ago when we went to the PGA Championship at Quail Hollow, located only a few minutes from us in South Charlotte.

When Dave told me he was offered some tickets to attend the PGA Championship at Quail Hollow, I immediately said I was interested. We decided to bring Brady along with us, and I’m so glad we did. We went on a Sunday, the final day of the tournament, and although it was hot, we enjoyed beautiful blue skies and a truly great time together. We also ran into some people we knew, which was fun.

Brady had never been to a tournament like this, and he handled it well for all the walking we did in the hot sun — nearly all day long from 11am to 7pm. We had a couple hospitality areas to go to cool off and have some cold food and drinks, and that definitely helped us make it through the day. 

What’s nice about the PGA Championship at Quail Hollow is that all the food is free for guests, so you could just walk right up to the counter and choose what you wanted. And, the merchandise shop is one of the biggest and most lucrative shops at a sporting event all year. I bought a shirt, Brady got a hat, and Dave bought some stuff too. There was a deejay playing in the huge merchandise tent if that tells you anything about the vibe in there. It was a real scene.

(Here’s my purse, here’s my dress — I’m in a small, here are my sunglasses, and here are my shoes.)

My mom dropped us off at the tournament that morning (parking is very hard to come by), then we took the free shuttle back to the Ballantyne area, where we live, on the way home. Overall, it was a hot, sweaty and really fun family day of enjoying some golf. 

Edited to add: I wrote this whole recap and left off a part worth mentioning. Even though nearly everyone was really friendly at the tournament, toward the very end when people were hot and perhaps a bit imbibed — we did have one issue. Dave was carrying Brady as we were moving through the crowds to take Brady to a bathroom, and an old man yelled out to us as we passed, “You shouldn’t bring a kid to a place like this.” I held back my immediate reaction at that ridiculous comment. But I was thoroughly annoyed, as golf tournaments are 100 percent family friendly and this poor grumpy soul had lost the memo. 

Reading “Under the Influence” by Noelle Crooks

So I read a book about influencers … I know. But hear me out: “Under the Influence” by Noelle Crooks is a quick, easy and fun read, and it’s based on a real-life woman who once worked for a popular influencer.

I saw this book come up on a list of good reads, and I reserved it at the library right away. The funny thing is, I read the whole book before finding out that one of the main characters — Charlotte (the influencer) — was based off of real-life influencer, Rachel Hollis, who is someone I liked for a long time, until she had a bit of a breakdown and some bad things came out about her. I actually hadn’t heard anything about Hollis in forever and looked her up, and she’s still doing the influencing thing and she got married again.

(“Under the Influence” by Noelle Crooks)

While this book isn’t exactly a Pulitzer Prize winner by any means, I feel like it exposed some things that we all know to be true about really big-time influencers who become brands. Much of their work is done by their team, and they get further and further away from the actual content production as they continue to grow — still passing it off as their own and trying to create a perfect image in everything they do. This book also made some other claims that you’ll have to find out if you read it.

I enjoyed reading “Under the Influence,” because it was pretty light and fast-paced, and that’s what I’ve been in the mood for lately when I do my nightly reading session before bed. I’m on to another fiction book right now and will report back about that one soon.

Celebrating 13 years of marriage

We had an anniversary! Over Memorial Day weekend, Dave and I celebrated 13 years of marriage. We didn’t get to do anything super special that weekend, due to various work commitments, but we did go out to a family dinner with Brady on our actual anniversary.

It’s crazy to think that we got married in downtown Orlando in 2012, and since then, we moved across the country to San Francisco, then to the East Bay of San Francisco and then back across the country again to Charlotte. I don’t see us making any more cross-country moves, but I’m forever grateful that we took those chances, because they always paid off in life experiences.

On our anniversary, Dave and I were talking about favorite times and memories, and some of my favorite ones we shared together were when we were in San Francisco and it was just us. Before we had a lot of friends or we had Brady or even Rudy, we really spent all our non-working time together — exploring and trying new things. As we’ve gotten busier, and added a dog and a child and more responsibilities and jam-packed social calendars, we really don’t hang out quite as often at all just the two of us, and we hardly ever get time to randomly explore. But nonetheless, I’m always happy to celebrate with Dave, look back on all our years together and be proud of the life we’ve built so far.

Teaching a special mash-up event at Life Time Charlotte

Even though I teach a ton of group fitness classes every week, there’s something so fun about a special event in the evening, done outside of my normal class routine.

A couple weeks ago, my instructor friend, Miki, and I hosted an event and put together two of our Signature Life Time formats — MAXOUT Core and Shred — and it was such a good time. We had a full house of folks, our music was loud, the lights were flashing, and we were moving our bodies with joy.

We each took turns teaching segments from our classes. I taught Shred (which is a mostly simple strength circuit-style class with some cardio bursts) and Miki taught MAXOUT Core, which is all about the core. The energy was amazing in the room, both on the stage and off, and it was a true blast to be a part of for everyone involved.

(Often found wearing these cross-training sneakers while teaching classes.)

After our mash-up class was complete, we took a big group photo and enjoyed some snacks and refreshments from the cafe downstairs. I love that we have the opportunity to have these extra interactions with our members, because it’s a good time for all of us. (And just another reason why Life Time is the best place I’ve worked in the fitness world, hands down.)

We just planned a special evening event for later this month, and I’m looking forward to that one too!

Other life lately highlights

Atlanta trip to see my brother

Although this trip was several weeks ago, it deserves a quick shout out in my highlights. We went to Atlanta to see my brother, Matthew, and it was a great time. We went to the Georgia Aquarium, hit some golf balls at Matthew’s country club, made s’mores at home and got to see Matthew play in one of his recreational hockey games (he scored, and they won, what fun).

We loved this little road-trip. And we hope to head back to Atlanta another time this year, in addition to having Matthew and his wife, Stephanie, come see us for Fourth of July, which is fast approaching.

Mother’s Day with my boys

We went to a really nice brunch on Mother’s Day, tried a new-to-us coffee shop and did some relaxing too. Sadly, my mom wasn’t able to join us on this Mother’s Day, but we have a reason to celebrate her this upcoming weekend, which will be nice.

Keeping up with friends

Even when I get super busy, I try to make a little time for my friends — and I’m always glad that I did. In the last couple of months, I’ve had a lot of fun times with my group. I tried a new reformer studio with a girlfriend, went to a mid-week dinner with some girlfriends at our favorite Italian spot, went on a sunset evening walk with a friend, had some friends over for a pizza dinner, met some friends at the park, took two sets of friends to Charlotte FC games, went to a friend’s pool party, and Dave and I had drinks with another couple too.

I say it all the time, and I’ll say it again, one of the best parts about living in Charlotte is the group of people I’ve become close with. We’re all so different, but we sure do have a good time together. And you know what they say: Connection with other humans is an incredibly important part of your health. Even if mine often involves drinking wine.

Brady’s leader ceremony

Last week, I attended a special leader ceremony at Brady’s school where one kid from every class was selected (and voted on by their peers) as a leader. The kids had Chick-fil-a for lunch and then the principal read a little personalized note about each kid from their teacher about why they were chosen as a leader.

This luncheon was a big honor for Brady. What made it extra special is that in the beginning of the year, Brady was having some trouble listening to his teacher and we’d get notes home about his listening skills. But, as the months have gone on, he’s shown so much improvement that he was chosen as a leader. Yay Brady!

I ran over to this ceremony directly after teaching two classes, so I was shivering in my sweaty workout clothes, but also shedding a couple happy tears at the same time (which I always do when I watch Brady’s stuff).

What’s been on A Lady Goes West lately

Did you catch these ones on the blog? If not, here’s your chance … 

That’s it for today. Thanks for swinging by A Lady Goes West to read my words. I know there’s a millions ways you could spend five minutes of your time, and it means a lot to me that you spent them here. Have an awesome day! 🙂 xoxo

Questions of the day

What’s one thing you learned in May?

What’s one thing you’re looking forward to in June?