Yoga is exercise

We've been busy with a visit from some wonderful friends, last days of school work, the everyday business of life, baseball and whatever else has been thrown our way.

I've been eating better. I might not see results but I sure can feel them. I sleep better and I definitely feel better.

Since my last run posted , I have done some home exercises and did 20 min of running up the hill and walking down the hill. Butt kickers is what I like to call them.

I was showing my friend yesterday my little so called muscle on my biceps. Telling her that AB just kept looking at me when I was bragging about it and Hubster is a good man by telling me that it seems like they are getting bigger. She asked if I lifted weights. I said no. Simply because lifting 5lb weights every other week is not going to get me some definition in my muscles. And going to the gym every three weeks is not going to cut it either.

I do think that maybe my arms are getting a little toned just with the combination of exercises I do. I get bored doing one thing over and over. I have to break that monotony. I sort've make up my own exercise combinations and it works for me.

But the thing that I have been doing that is helping out my core(that also helps incontinence) and helps tone up everywhere is yoga. I've been doing yoga with Bob (biggest loser) only about twice a week, but those two times kick my butt, literally.

When I heard of yoga, I constantly told myself that I would never do that. Seriously, how was I going to stand like a flamingo and then suddenly lift my leg up into the wild blue yonder all the while trying to keep my balance. Not to mention, keeping all my body parts from moving out of position. No way!!

I ended up buying Biggest Loser Yoga weight loss video some time ago. It sat unopened for months. I tried it and was sore the next day. Bob keeps you going. I learned new names for exercises that I had never heard of before. Downward dog, upward dog, cow, cat, triangle, warrior, and the dreaded plank.

I do have to admit that the first time I turned on the video to view it just to see if I would like it, I saw them do these poses and told myself, "that's easy, you can do that"

Ha Ha Ha laughed my body when the next time I turned the video on and actually tried it. Your body stretches and reaches and moves and works. Never again will I say that yoga is not exercise.

So L, I think that's what's happening to my little so called muscles. Yoga baby!!

I ran another 3 miles this morning. 30 min this time. I was trying to do a slow and easy 3 miles.
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The boys had baseball games this week. It's been fun to watch them. UB is still in Tball and gets bored during the halfway point. He enjoys it though.

AB is still in coach pitch with Hubster as his coach. During the opening tournament, their team won the championship. It was great. Since then, they've won some and lost one.

AB hit an infield home run on Tue and was quite proud of himself. I was proud of him as well. This is the same kid that last year hit maybe 4 times the entire year. He's been doing so much better this year. It was a good home run. He hit it down to left field, hit the fence and he ran and ran, they threw the ball to the catcher and AB slid right between the catcher's legs(not touching the catcher). The catcher dropped the ball. It was great.

It's funny how even though his daddy is his coach, and he wants to impress him, he still looks for his mom for approval. I love it. He'll tell me that he's going to hit it hard again, or that he's going to catch a pop fly. Well, last night during one of the times that he hit the ball, he made it to first base and was looking at me for my thumbs up sign, he smiled and waved when I gave it to him. I hope he always looks for me.

He even caught a pop fly. He just lifted his arms that are 3ft long and caught that ball that was going high up. It was great. And yes, he looked to see if I had seen it.

Anyway, enough bragging. I'm just a proud momma, what can I say.

We are having company this weekend. My brother in law and his son and my sister in law and her family. Along with more family and friends for a get together or two.

Time to go finish mowing, clean the house, do the laundry, change sheets and just get ready for the company that is soon to arrive.

Have a Blessed Weekend!!!

3 miles in 28 min. Wooo Hooo!!

For the last week and a half, I have done nothing.

I haven't been eating right and I definitely haven't been exercising.

It seems that when that dreaded unwanted monthly visitor is arriving, my body rebels. It wants to eat what it wants and it will only function with sweets and fried foods. It certainly doesn't want to work off this bad food.

Hubster took the boys for a while Saturday morning and I was going to do nothing. Again. Nothing but lay in bed in my pajamas. It didn't matter that I had 5 loads of laundry to wash and dry and another 3 loads that needed to be put away. I was not going to do anything.

Then Hubster called and needed me to take him something. So much for not doing anything.

I get in my workout clothes thinking that since I'm out, I'll go to the gym and run a little. My mind was playing games with me but in the end, my strong will won.

I was only going to run two miles. I hadn't ran in a while and didn't want to hurt myself. At least that's what I was telling myself. It sounded like a good excuse.

I had my ipod on and was listening to some tunes and I looked down at my nike+ and saw that I had already ran two miles. Let's go for three, I told my body.

So I ran three miles in 30 min. Then I went down to the little weight room and lifted weights for about 15 min. It felt good to have all that sweat pouring out of me. Not that I lost any weight.

This morning, I got up early and went back to the gym. This time I ran three miles in 28 min. I'd like to shorten my three mile runs to 24 min, but this is a big improvement for me.

Eventually, I'd like to increase my miles and run longer. My mind and my legs are just now starting to get along well, so I'll give them some time to adjust to this.

I'm off to get ready for the last three days of school and to plan my good eats for the day. Starting off with a bowl of muesli.

I'll leave you with a UB moment.
I was in my lounge wear (t-shirt/bra and pajama bottoms) on Saturday afternoon. The boys and I were making some craft they had been wanting to do for a while.

UB adjusts my shirt in the front and says "Mom, you need to fix your shirt, your crack is showing"

Coyotes, snakes and cows oh my!

I didn't get to post yesterday because I had lots of catching up to do with my laundry.


Here's my food for Tue and Wed.
Tue: For breakfast, I had my usual bowl of blueberry oatmeal
For lunch I made some salmon patties. I usually add eggs and crackers but this time I just added flax seed and whole grain bread crumbs.

I thought it was pretty delicious. I had some veggies on the side and then some fruit for dessert.

For dinner, I had roasted chicken wrapped in a herb and garlic wheat tortilla and a sweet potato on the side.
Wed: For breakfast I had a bowl of muesli. It's so yummy. You have to try it.

I made this zucchini lasagna for lunch. I really liked it. Hubster said it was just OK, but he's used to eating heavy. This was not heavy but was very filling. I will post the recipe later.

For dinner it was salad at the church. I didn't eat much because it was lots of different cold types of salads. Corn salad w/chips, broccoli salad with lots of mayo, pasta salad with vinegar and ????, cornbread salad, Chinese cole slaw and fruit salad.

I did eat some but not much. I even ate the brownie that had no nuts. You know I had to be hungry in order to eat chocolate.

I hadn't gotten my run in for the day. Didn't make it to the gym early in the morning since UB woke me up at 3am to inform me that he had a bad dream and he needed to sleep with me. I of course am a mean mom and said no. I went back to bed but didn't get to fall asleep right away.

Anyway, after church last night I went for a jog down my country road. I ran for 2 miles and walked .7 of a mile. It felt good.

While I enjoy running out in the open air as opposed to an indoor track, I don't enjoy the little creatures that are out on the road. Trying to sabotage my run.

Coyotes have been spotted both on my front yard as well as back behind the house. Not just one little coyote. But a pack of about 6 in front and 2 in back.

I'm from a town where the mascot is the coyote. I'm just not wanting to become close friends with the coyote. A pretend one is easier to pet than a real one.

The other thing I have to watch for out there are snakes. They are out now, trying to get some sunbathing in.

Cinnamon goes jogging with me and I feel a little safer. I run down the hill and then hit a gradual slope up a hill. It seems to be going on for a long time. I make it to the top and see cows on both sides of the road. The cows on the left of me run with me and then run away. The cows on the right of me just look up from their dinner and moo. I'd like to think they are encouraging me. They are telling me "Come on and moooooove it mooooove it"

During my run, I hear the grass moving. I hear scurrying. Mice or some little creatures. Birds finding worms.

I get to the bottom of the hill and then there is yet another small hill to the stop sign. I make it over and back but now it's time to go back up the other way. Up and down the hills again. My legs are hurting and my butt is dragging but I push and push. All the while, the cows encouraging me again "Mooooove that booty, yooooou can do it"

I make it to the top of the hill and then back down again. I turn down a road and keep running. While running back down the road to head home, I see a snake in the middle of the road. I stop and look and stay still. Thinking that if I run, it's going to get me because I sure can't out run it. But if I just stand there, his friends will probably come out to play around me.

I realize the snake is dead. But it's weird because I had just ran by there and it was not on the road. You bet your pretty little head that this Mexican girl ran fast and hard to the house. I don't think I had ran that fast in a long time.

I can easily run 3 miles at the indoor track but it's a killer running 2 miles down these hilly roads. I'm just a wimp.

See y'all tomorrow.

I'm back

So I'm back. I've had a hard time getting motivated to write anything. Mostly because what I would like to write about, I can't and what I can write about, I don't want to. Call it stubbornness if you must.

There have been many changes in my house and most of them good. We are still adjusting. But we are all doing great. Boys are growing and Hubster is working hard.

I did run the 5k that I had signed up for back in March. I finished with a slow time of 32:14.
Not bad since I had been hurt, but it could have been better.

AB wanted to run it as well. He wouldn't go train with me and said he could do it. We started the race with some friends and then AB and I went off together. Before I knew it, I left him behind.

I guess if I were a better mom I would have stayed with him. Hope he's not scarred for life.

I was the first of our group to finish and then 6 min later another friend finished and then the other friend after her. I sat there and waited for him and waited and waited. I walked back towards where the last quarter mile was and finally saw him. He was walking with some people. I cheered him on and told him he had a little ways to go. He started running again and then stopped again. But he did finish the race. I was proud of him.

When we got into the car to head home, he said that it was harder than what he thought. He wants to start training with me in order to get better.

I want to do a half marathon in November so I'm starting training for that. I do need to find me a good training plan. I think I'll do some more 5k's between now and then and maybe a 10k. I wish I could say that I'm doing it for the time and winning but i'm only in it to finish.

Since the weather had been so pretty here, I was running outside but it's crazy weather time and now in order for me to guarantee myself a workout, I started back at the gym track.

So this morning I went running for 30 minutes (3 miles) and then walked for 20 minutes.

My next goal is to start eating better again. I've sort of not been doing very well in that category.

I like to make excuses and say that busy times at the baseball field for games is the reason we don't eat good, but I can always plan ahead and make something to take. Those concession stand nachos are pretty yummy as well as those burgers. Of course, everything is pretty yummy when you are starving.

So enough babbling for now. Going to finish up school with the boys and then go for a nature walk. Taking advantage of this pretty day.

Rambling Monday

Eating better is what I'm trying to do. That doesn't mean that I do it all the time. I still have my weaknesses.

Like this weekend for example. UB's birthday is later this week, but Hubster is not going to be able to take the day off, so we took UB out to eat.

It was also Valentine's Day, so we killed two birds with one stone.

UB chose a steak house. I could have gotten a steak and some veggies and a salad with the dressing on the side. But what's fun about that? Especially since it was V-Day!

I miss those wonderful tasty chicken fried steaks from Texas. And this place has an awesome chicken fried steak. So I got it. And boy was it good.

I indulged in a chicken fried steak, steak fries and some bread. Not something that I should have been eating.

I have lost 6 pounds as of today. It is slowly coming off. And I'm OK with it being about 2 pounds a week. I want to make sure I keep it off.

This morning when the alarm went off, I snoozed it, and snoozed it and snoozed it. I really didn't want to go run. But I knew that if I didn't go, my day would not be good.

Been running for 30 min. now. At a pretty good pace. Today was a slow pace. Guess that chicken fried steak was slowing me down.

I did it!!

I did recover from the twisted ankle. And proceeded to continue on towards my goal of running more than a minute without feeling like I'm going to pass out.

I had been discouraged last week. Discouraged because in my mind I didn't calculate my age plus the fact that I hadn't been physically active for a long time.

I only saw me running 3 miles on the first day. That's when my body went into shock.

As I began training for the 5k I started slow. And I was supposed to pick up minutes every week, but excuses and obstacles came barreling towards me.

On and off I'd run/walk down my hilly road. I'd make it up to 10 minutes (don't know how far) and then I'd stop.

So last week, I was disappointed in myself because I was only at 5 hard minutes. I'd do sprints up and down the hills along with the running.

Yesterday I did it!!!!

I ran 2 whole miles without stopping. I know I probably could have kept going but didn't want to push it. The furthest I had run was almost a mile.

I did talk to several people who run this hilly roadside and at the gym and they said that the gym is much easier to run at.

I guess I was doing good with what I was doing outside. Even if it meant not running as long.

I even ran the 2 miles in about 17 minutes. That is a big accomplishment for me.

I'm hoping to add on another mile by the end of the week.

See? Gloria Gaynor was right "I did survive"

I didn't fall, I was just looking for something

Oh what a glorious day! No ice. No rain. No cold. Just a nice windy 70 something day.

A great day for jogging.

We had finished tests and I sent the boys outside to play while I walked/ran. I hooked up my pedometer to my pants, laced up my shoes, strapped on my ipod and off I went.

I turned on the music and I warmed up by walking. Enjoying the warmth of the sun but trying to stay erect from the force of the wind.

Up the hill and then down the hill. Breathing in then exhaling out. Faster and faster I walked to warm-up.

It was finally time to start my jog. One foot in front of the other, listening to good music. All is well, and then it happens.

My weak ankle didn't get enough warm-up and it turned on me. Knocking me off my feet and onto the ground.

I quickly get up and look around. Making sure that no one saw me make a fool of myself. Living out in the country does have it's advantages.

Coming to the conclusion that nobody was around when I gracefully fell, I pretend to be stretching (just in case someone is coming up the road) and check out my hurt knee.

No scratches, just a bruise starting to form. I give my ankle a lecture and continue on. Fighting against the wind, to finish what I started.

Ironically, the song that I was listening to said "Every time I fall" Maybe I need to start listening to "I will survive".