Inspiration & Motivation: Something GREAT is brewing..

Very recently, I met up with Jasmine (@jasminedanker if you are not following her on IG yet), it came across to me like a calling when I had to download kik messenger just for her to retrieve my contact details. In the very same week (last week), I met her for the first time. She shared her dreams and passion with me, she told me what she had been wanting to do and could not find the right person to do with, so she decided to contact me.

We met up as soon as we could last week and had a great workout together (though she's much stronger and fitter than I am), we share a lot of similarities. We have the exact same weight, height, BFP, played netball when we were younger, both Roman Catholics, both mixed blood. Well, the major difference is that she studied sports science and had been in the fitness industry for 5 years, coaching, studying and training (and besides the fact that I'm married she's not yet). We clicked right away and started planning our execution plan.

We have great plans and I believe God brought us together for a reason; a mission to help people who needs help, who needs an extra motivation to stay healthy and fit. Our ideas are all over the place now but we will be revealing very soon, once we get everything organized and ready to go public!

Here are some sneaks! Our logo: Why Hapa fitness (@Hapa_fitness)? Stay tuned! :)

Some of the happenings over last week, celebrated Nic's birthday in advance last Friday too! Great Karaoke with the gang, they sing so well! Been awhile since we had such epic sessions, oh yes and that cake at 11.30pm ZOMG.

Happy Birthday Nic!

Some of my meals.

Met Jasmine to gym on Saturday at Gymm Boxx, really helps when there is somebody to spot, correct my form and constantly goes "RELAX YOUR NECK LIMARAN!" (LOL, reason why I have stiff neck ALL the time). We wore pink to train that day, so we remembered to take photos and hashtag #operationpink to do our part for Singapore Breast Cancer Foundation!

Jasmine paid a boy for this photo HAHA

Cooked when we got home and spent a quiet Saturday with baby. Here's our very own chili beef with tortilla chips! YUMMMMSS!

I will be eating all I want (okay not exactly ALL I WANT BUT..) for 4 days (since yesterday) and starting a new diet (which I'll be sharing soon) on November 1st, together with Jasmine. BECAUSE I have completed 10 weeks (11 to be exact, not counting week 0) of Intermittent fasting! Halfway through the diet I thought this didn't suit me, but I wanted to hang in there and complete the 10 weeks so here is the final look (LOL pls don't judge me!).

I started with this OKAY?! HAHA.

Have a great week ahead everyone! Remember to catch us (Jasmine and I) live with regular updates on our IG (@limaranagustina and @jasminedanker) and our new IG account for Hapa Fitness @hapa_fitness! Till the next!

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Health & Fitness - Arms Training

I usually do not train my arms on its own, I couple my arms training with deadlifts and sometimes I skip doing arms and ended up doing abs, or I'd go very easy on the arms training. Truth is, you are actually working on your arms during other body part trainings, particularly your biceps as they are needed in most workouts. Having said that, I know many ladies out there are very concerned about getting rid of their "bye-bye" arms and had requests to advise on the arms training that we do so here goes, some of the arms workouts that we do.

We need to work on both biceps and triceps so there will be no imbalance of strength on either muscle group. It doesn't really matter which you start with, as long you try your best to cover both muscles during your arms training, it should suffice.

I will usually start with triceps as my triceps are weaker. What Jason is doing in the video: Triceps rope pushdown.

Dumbbell overhead Triceps extensions (P.S: Apologies, I do not have a video or photo of us doing the other triceps workouts).

You can also try dips as well as bench dips.

Dips

Bench dips

Next to biceps, bicep curls and hammer curls, that simple!

Dumbbell bicep curls

Dumbbell Hammer curls

Hammer curls using Tricep bar/Hammer curl bar

Take your pick, and enjoy the videos! So sorry but I could not upsize the videos. We had the honour to attend Julien Fournie for Love, Bonito show last Saturday at FIDE Fashion Week. Thank you so much Love, Bonito for the invitation! It was such an amazing experience as we had never attended any fashion event, let alone fashion show. The Julien Fournie for Love, Bonito show marks the end of FIDE Fashion Week and was a perfect finale!

My outfit for the night

Have a great week ahead everyone!!

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Health and Nutrition - Creamy mushroom soup

It's been awhile since I shared my last recipe so here goes, the recipe for creamy mushroom soup! 

Ingredients:

- Assorted mushrooms (portobello, button, shitake, etc)

- Italian Parsley (flat-leaf)

- 4-5 tablespoon of Greek yogurt (to replace cream)

- 2 tablespoon of cottage cheese (to replace cream)

- Milk

- 1 garlic clove (I used 1.5 but felt it was abit too much)

- 1-2 onions (I used 1 but I thought it'll be nicer if I had put 2 instead)

- 1 yellow onion

- Olive oil 

1. Soak the mushrooms and wash them thoroughly, especially the portobello if you are using them.

2. Chop the mushrooms into small pieces.

 3. Chop the other ingredients up; onions, garlic and parsley leaves.

4. Heat up a frying pan and with a little bit of olive oil and put all the ingredients in except for the mushrooms when the pan is hot. Fry for awhile until you can smell the fragrance (NOT TILL BROWN).

5. Put the mushrooms in and fry everything together. REMEMBER, do not fry till brown.

6. Before you start to put all the ingredients into the blender, pick out some of the mushrooms and lay them in a bowl. This will be added into the soup to boil so there will be some bigger chunks of mushrooms.

7. Portion by portion, put the ingredients in a blender and blend them together, adding a bit of milk every round.

8. Pour all the blended mixture, together with the chunks of mushrooms into a pot and turn on the heat to medium. Stir till it boils, after which switch the heat to low and let it slow boil while you add the yogurt and cottage cheese in. You may add a few teaspoons of salt to season. Keep stirring until everything else blends and there you go! Your creamy mushroom soup is ready!

We also prepared this easy-to-make egg muffins using turkey breast ham as the base. Did not turn out yummy I thought, because I could not find peppers at the supermarket! Will be attempting my next batch using chopped peppers and taco or salsa sauce! Nevertheless, this is simple to make if you do not have much time to prepare elaborated ones.

Ingredients used:

- 200g of turkey breast ham

- 6 eggs

- Parmesan cheese

- Olive oil

1. Lubricate the muffin mould using olive oil and lay the ham on the muffin mould nicely as the bases. Next, put the parmesan cheese in as much as you like and top the cheese with an egg. It's that easy!

2. Preheat the oven to about 180 degree celcius and once then put the mould into the oven. I think we waited about 10 minutes but do take note and watch the muffins just in case they get too cooked.

VOILA! The muffins we made are slightly overcooked so just be careful if you want those very soft-boiled kind of eggs.

Hope you enjoyed the recipes and do post photos and tag me on IG @limaranagustina! Have a great week ahead everyone! Till the next!

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Health & Nutrition - Overnight Oats

This was my first jar of overnight oats, and I started packing overnight oats every night following that night, which made me love oats so much more than usual because it is DUPER YUMMY! I'll share more recipes along the way but would like to share my first experience.

The ingredients can be as simple as just oats and banana, or it can be as elaborated as what I did (was trying to be adventurous. HEH.

What I used:

- A jar (I reused the YUMMI honey jar and portion is huge, for 2-3 separate meals)

- 1.5 tblspoon of Hershey's cocoa powder

- 100ml of milk

- 1 tblspoon of greek yogurt

- 1 banana

- 1 scoop (approx. 1.3 cup) rolled oats (uncooked and DO NOT use the instant oats) 

- 2 medium strawberries

- Chia seeds (I would not miss this if I'm at my own home)

1. Prepare a bowl and mix the cocoa powder with milk and greek yogurt. Stir till mixture is almost fully blended and dissolved.

2. Pour about half of the mixture into the empty jar and then top it up with the rolled oats.

3. Now the fruits, cut the banana and strawberries into slices and put the banana slices in first, followed by the strawberries.

4. Last step, pour the remaining cocoa mixture in and cover the jar. Put it in the fridge for AT LEAST 4 hours, if not, overnight (as the name says).

Take the jar out in the morning and you are ready to eat it! I put in another mixture of chocolate protein and water in the morning too. That's your choice. I hope I managed to show how easy it is to make this. It tastes yummy and I usually bring it out in the morning and will keep it in a thermal bag and will be able to last more than 3 hours out of the fridge. Try to keep it as refrigerated if you can though, especially if you like it really really cold!

Go ahead and try it out, post your photos and tag me @limaranagustina!! Have fun! Stay tuned, because I'll be writing about women and bodybuilding next! Meanwhile, enjoy the photos from 'The Piano Guys' concert I went with Jess (@jesslinet). Thanks once again for the tickets babe! Totally enjoyed it, these super talented guys!

Audience of almost 45,000. SO AWESOME!

Have a great weekend everyone, be safe and keep fit! Till the nexttt! :)

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