Another Slow Day

• What: Treadmill
• Distance: 0.8 miles
• Duration: 20 min
• Calories: 119

I want to go to bed. Have to take Julia to swim lessons early in the morning.  Did an easy walk on the treadmill and now off to shower and snooze.

Slow Day

• What: Treadmill
• Distance: 1.25 miles
• Duration: 30 min
• Calories: 180

Slept badly, ate so-so, exhausted from working the church thrift store and doing some shopping with Julia (clothes for her, groceries). I am feeling all out of sorts and PMS-y. But I kept up the food log and I actually wrote down the tiny walk I squished in while watching Paul play Guitar Hero. Yay me.

Updates…

Julia turned four this week and we celebrated with friends and family yesterday with a backyard party. It went well — we did about the same as last year with food, activities, guest list, etc.

My abs are sore from Friday’s workout — it was really good abs/shoulders day. Small problem with a hip flexor acting up. Julia has a cough this morning so I may end up having to go to gym on my own at an ungodly early hour so she and Paul can just carry on sleeping. (Sick kids aren’t allowed in gym daycare.)

Today I want to do some work on my garden… we plant soon.

Weekend

The weekend was just a blur.

Felt better Friday so I went in to see Emily — another trainer. I’m getting bored of all these “orientation” type workouts so I’m going to try to stick with her as much as possible. I don’t want to meet another trainer and then start the getting acquainted thing all over again! (There’s been some scheduling conflicts and people transferring around so hopefully that is settling down now.)

We did a 30 min. legs routine and I can’t remember now if I did any cardio after that.

Dropped Julia and my parents and we went out to dinner and the bookstore Friday night. It was cozy and we got a chance to talk. Paul had a Merlot with his dinner but I went off and had a martini for fun.

The next day Paul had work and then concert stuff to play in and do sound for. The concert was fun. After cleaning up we took him to dinner (not as fancy) and Julai babbled a mile a minute over why she was jealous Daddy played in the concert. She used to having him for herself on Saturdays and having him gone all day was bothering her.

He ran sound for church the next morning while I was helping with coffee hour so time got away from us. You can tell, because the house looks terribly messy. Just run home and rush back out for a few days with no time to put things back.

Just got home from gym — an hour long weights workout for backs and biceps. It was excellent — really felt like I was doing some work there. Probably will be sore later so I’m going to try to interst Julia in some kiddie yoga this afternoon to help stretch me out and then we have to scrub down the kitchen and living room. Have to get the mess back in order.

Plyometric Workout

Life is busy. Don’t want to list it all but trust me… very busy. And with Julia’s birthday coming soon, we’re busy getting ready for that also.

Yesterday I went back to my trainer appointments. I’m still a bit sniffly, but I think that’s alelrgies now rather than sickness. Julia is well, so she can go back to gym daycare. So off we went.

I had a new guy — Marc. Nice enough but not as bubbly as Nora was. I get Emily next week, so we’ll see how she is.

MArc had me do a plyometrics workout.  The first was 10 reps on each side where I step up on an aerobics step with two risers while bringing a 4 lb medicine ball up and down.  I would hold it out in front of me and slightly raised, and when I stepped up, I had to bring it down to meet my knee.

After that it was curls with 5 lbs dumbbells and then shoulder presses. Still doing 10 reps per side while I kept stepping on and off the aerobics steps. In between exercies, go up and down the stairs.

It wasn’t too bad, but I’m completely out of shape and post-holiday — even worse.  I felt kind of gross for an hour afterwards and I’m out on my inhaler prescription. So I probably need to make an allergist appointment and get a check on the ol’ asthma. (Ugh. Hate going to allergist!)

Had a massage later that night — Carla told me my shoulders were tight.  No surprise there!

Updates

Some updates from my corner of the world?

1) We had friends over tonight to celebrate Paul’s bday in a low-key way. Pizza for dinner, sundaes, and the kids fooling around while we chatted. I really enjoyed it. I think Paul did too. I’m trying to include more friends on our holiday season to help bring more balance into it.

2) I’m -1 lb. And that’s after Thanksgiving, people. I’m rockin’ this holiday season! (I usually aim to maintain and end up adding 10 lbs with the holiday hoo has. To actually be maintaining is exciting!) Though I keep forgetting things. Water, iPod sleeve, heart rate monitor… every day at gym I find I left something at home. But I’m going. Typically gym visits fly out the window during holiday because things get wacky.

3) I put the raised beds in… mostly. I have to do some work levelling and getting in the last one before I go back to digging paths. I also found my friend Carla can donate cinderblocks, so we can put a new one in at church for the kiddies. So… pix of that one to come later.

4) Holidays.

Usually the not knowing drives me up the wall. I want to know what the game plan is as early as possible because there are other things I want to do too. Because I want to know, I end up being the organizer a lot of the time and the stress is sometimes like trying to herd cats.

Paul and I would argue about this. He thinks I do too much and take on extra stress. I ask him when he’s going to take some on to alleviate the stress then? Because til this year I had 3 people on my side. Now with Karen getting married, I’ve bumped up to 4. It is him with the other 33 people on his side! And it’s been me organizing the holiday calendar, the shopping, the mailing, the cooking, the cleaning, etc. for 10 years at least.

Since Julia was born he tries to take on more. It’s a big help.

This year I’ve been actively trying to get more sunlight, not miss workouts, and be more go with the flow. I don’t organize anyone but me. He’s been trying to get firm answers about gatherings from his family and as he endures the waffling back and forth he understands more of why I get grumpy.

Thanksgiving for us has evolved into my bringing my parents to my MILs and having a group thing. Except for last year. My mother reserved Thanksgiving in APRIL because my sister was announcing her enagement and bringing boyfriend to meet the family.

Christmas has been an ongoing problem since the baby was born. (It wasn’t great as an adult couple either with the lack of organization, but we sucked it up, figuring as an adult couple, we were able to take more travel foo foo than the ones with kids could so we’d work around the ones with kids and their needs.)

Now we have a sidekick too.

I happen to think kids shouldn’t be dragged all over, and I think that she’s best off at home. I spent all my childhood Christmases going to midnight mass and then opening presents at home and then lazing around Christmas day. We went around delivering presents before hand, and then the big family hoo ha was for my Uncle’s birthday because it fell on New Year’s Eve. The adults chipped in for food and had it semi-catered, stayed up playing mah-jong all night, and the kids played with their presents from Christmas that they would bring to show the other cousins. Then we’d have firecrackers in the street and go home.

Paul spent all his childhood ones at home also. So you’d think he’d be fine spending them at home now so Julia can have her childhood holidays at home. esp. since Christams is bookended by Thanksgiving and her birthday so it isn’t like we aren’t getting together in groups as it is.
He wants to be home, but he isn’t ready to act on it to make it happen.

I told him I was tired of arguing and I was going to start alternating. We had agreed to alternate when she was born, and last year was her 3rd Christmas already! So I told the grandparents and mine said they’d come see us then and my MIL started the phone campaign to get us to come. I politely but firmly declined any time she got me.

Paul got guilted in with the phone campaign and took the baby down and back in the same night. He dealt with the drive there, the time there, the drive back, and all the rest while I stayed home and had a quiet day to myself.

This year I travel. So I’ve already made sure that we are expected over there on the 24th. My side the 25th.

Quickie

Quick catchup post.  Got two good workouts in last week along with the food log. Result is weight loss back on track.

Phone and power got cut off and restored… don’t know about cable I haven’t bothered to check. The city continues to lay down pipe and hack up the street and yard… don’t know if they will chop more lines again.

Got AC guy coming this afternoon to do the last duct, vents, and set up drywall and paint.

I pray to goodness this means the end is in sight, at least for inside the house. I don’t know how long the outside with the drains will go on.

Julia finishes up swim lessons this week and I plan to put her in for one more round.  Garden is going well. My birthday party is this weekend and I’m busy getting party supplies together. I’m looking forward to it.

Another run

I did the CP25K week 2 again last night, it was fine.  Another one this week, then we who knows when I will do it again.

Next week Mike and I are off to Hawaii.  I have a conference and we are staying a few extra days for some vacation.  I am looking forward to a nice break, even though the first part of the trip will be work related.  If you don’t hear from me, assume I am having a fruity drink on the beach.

week 2

We did the first workout of week 2 of CP25K yesterday.  It was a great run. We did a loop this time instead of an out and back.  The weather was beautiful and the Sun low (bothersome on only the beginning of the course.)  The first run section was a little rough since the sun was in my eyes.  The rest of the time, I made a point to stand up straight, look around, take deep breaths and try to enjoy myself.  It is still a lot of work and painful, but yesterday was also enjoyable.  It is depressing how far I have fallen from 1.5 years ago, when I could run a couple of miles (slowly but surely).

The scale was surprisingly high the last couple of weeks even though I have been eating well and exercising more than regularly.  I am not paying any attn to it, I feel a lot thinner when I am exercising and that is all that really matters.

more jogging = more pain

Mike and I did our second jog last night (well, 8 minutes of jogging, about 30 minutes of walking).  It hurt.  We were just shuffling along, not breaking any speed records or anything, but I had a hard time catching my breath.  The good news is that my new shoes seem to be doing the trick and I don’t have any more foot pain.  I think I forgot to mention that I got new shoes.  I went to one of those atheletic shoe stores that video tapes you running to recommend the best pair of shoes.  It took an hour to get fit, but the new shoes are worth it.  The reason I was going to get new shoes in the first place is that my toes have been hurting after I run or walk. The problem, it turns out, is that I am no longer a wide width anymore so my old running shoes gave my toes too much room and not enough support.  I am not a “regular” width either, though, I am somewhere in between.  After trying on many brands of shoes in regular and wide widths, I chose a regular width shoes that just runs a bit wide.

Tonight we plan to walk around the lake.  I have to keep ahead of my sisters!  I only have a 100 minute lead, they could easily catch me.