My New Running Goal

If you look over at the right side of my blog now, you will see this new little image...
After perusing some other health/fitness blogs, I saw some people had set goals to do a race in all 50 states. I've heard of the 50 States Marathon Club (people who run a marathon in all 50 states) and I've thought that was CRAZY!! But a race in each state seemed more manageable. Then I started thinking about the cost that would entail (the cost of getting to each state, staying in each state and then add on those race entry fees to race in every state....YIKES!) So I decided on a slightly modified goal for me...I have a goal to run (either in a race or simply for recreation) in all 50 states plus the District of Columbia. I have 14 states completed, 36 plus the District to complete. One really nice thing about living on the East Coast is that I can complete a lot of these states that are within driving distance fairly easily. I have friends and/or family in those northwestern states so visiting them and running/racing will be a bit easier (and good motivation to make a visit!) Running in Alaska and Hawaii will be really fun goals to meet (I'm hoping to go to Hawaii for our 10 year anniversary...just 3 1/2 years away!!) I think the most challenging part will be all those Midwestern states that are all standing starkly white right now. Anybody have any ideas on how to complete those?!?!?

I always like to have something to work towards in my exercise routines. Obviously this is a LONG term goal of mine (I'd like to do them all before I turn 40, giving me just about 10 years to complete it.) My short term goal is to run the Western Maryland Half Marathon with a PR on September 18th. I've put in the training, but you never know what can hit you on race day to derail your efforts. I may do one more half-marathon this season, but I think I'm putting off doing another marathon this year. I'm just not feeling the "running mojo" that I will need to pound out all those miles. I feel like all the running I've been doing for the half-marathon training has made me go a bit soft in the muscle department (I still weight-train consistently, but not as heavy and I feel like I've lost some definition that I had last spring.) After completing these half-marathons, I'm going to shift my focus a bit more into weight training and HIIT workouts to see what kind of results I can get.

Talking Point: What kind of short and long-term goals do you have related to fitness? Does having something concrete that you are training for help you to workout each day?

Grocery Shopping

You know it's time to go grocery shopping when your fridge starts to look a bit like this...

The only things in good quantity in this fridge are clementines (a new love!!), a few green vegetables (am learning to love) and eggs (have always loved!!) We always tend to have at least two containers of eggs in the fridge at all times. One is for hard-boiled eggs (which I label) and the other for everything else. It's really nice to have an easy protein option available in a pinch, like a good hard-boiled egg/egg whites.

Sometimes I really detest grocery shopping though. I actually love going inside and reading all the labels and seeing the new products that come out, but trying to do all of that while trying to stay within a budget and entertain two squirmy kiddos can be exhausting. I usually try to put it off as long as I can, but once we start to run out of the fresh stuff, I know it's time to enter the war zone again!

An after shot at our newly restocked fridge...


Here's a list of things that can usually be found in our fridge (at least for a few days after grocery shopping anyway)...

Fresh fruit...grapes, apples, strawberries, blueberries, cantaloupe and clementines are the favorites around here. I try to buy mostly organic when it comes to produce, unless it is something we don't eat the skin of like bananas and cantaloupe.

Fresh vegetables...kale, spinach, romaine lettuce, carrots, tomatoes, (though not in the fridge...it makes your other produce spoil faster), green and red peppers and green beans usually top the list.

Greek yogurt for me, regular yogurt or go-gurts for everyone else!
Eggs
Ground turkey
Chicken breasts and tenderloins
Organic milk
Yogurt-based salad dressings (these are a little pricey, but oh so good and healthified!! A friend of mine turned me on to these...)
Hummus
Cottage cheese
Hormel Natural turkey breast slices
Unsweetened applesauce
And my huge 3 liter of water that I strive to drink everyday

Like I said before, I try to buy organic products when I can, but our grocery budget limits me sometimes, so I often have to pick and choose what is really important. Like this week when I saw the price of organic peppers was $5.99 for 2 and I could get regular red and green peppers for $1.69/lb. The budget won out this time and I opted for the cheaper option. Like I said in the previous post, you have to do the best you can and hope for the best sometimes!!

One thing that I do to save a little money is I always buy my nuts in the bulk section of our grocery store. They are a lot cheaper this way and actually taste fresher in my opinion. Almonds, peanuts, walnuts and pecans are my faves!!

I also like to try new things each week to see if I like them (or if anybody besides myself will eat them!!) My new items for this week were...

Individual servings of instant brown rice (perfect for lunch-on-the-go or even a quick meal at home)

Ryvita crispbread crackers (I've tried and love the Wasa brand but I thought I would give these a whirl.) I'll let you know soon what I think of these two new products!

So that's a little look into our food world around these parts.

Talking Point: What kinds of foods do you like to eat? Do you enjoy trying out new things when you grocery shop? What are your refrigerator staples?

Perfection vs. Precision

Some of you have asked questions regarding the "no sugar" challenge for this week. I think each person will have to decide what "no sugar" means to them. For me personally, I will be avoiding deserts, candy, cake, ice cream and the like, but sugar from more natural foods like fruit and milk will still be acceptable. Take for instance last night...I had a group dinner at my house where I ate a few candied pecans on my salad (without even thinking about it) but I did pass on the homemade peach cobber and ice cream. Even though technically I ate some sugar, I still count it as a successful evening over all.

There are times in life where you just have to do the best you can with what you have to work with. If I had all the money in the world, I would love to shop at Whole Foods and buy "organic" everything. Unfortunately our grocery budget doesn't allow this so I have to pick and choose what is important to me. And yes, my kids still love to eat fruit snacks and bright orange-colored macaroni and cheese! But they also like things like shredded carrots and apples dipped in peanut butter so I do my best to strike a balance in the things that they eat and try not to beat myself up about it.

I think we as women really give ourselves a hard time by constantly striving for a state of "perfection." We feel a need to be perfect mothers, perfect wives, perfect friends, perfect sisters, etc. while also trying to attain the look of perfection we see glaring down at us from lofty billboards and magazine covers. When we fail to meet these impossible objectives, we get down on ourselves and wonder why we can't do or be better. If you have ever had any of these feelings, you might like this Youtube video. I found it very interesting to watch and certainly put things in a better perspective for me...



Really makes you think, doesn't it? No wonder people become depressed when they strive to attain something that isn't even real!!

So instead of striving to attain perfection, focus more on aiming for precision. Do those things repeatedly that give you the results that you want to see. This doesn't mean that you won't make mistakes along the way, but as you learn from them, you will start to develop a more concrete pattern for success in every aspect of your life. You will start to see the value that you have to offer to this world regardless of the shape of your nose or the girth of your hips.

Talking Point: Do you ever get discouraged when looking at magazines or billboards and their images of what a person should look like? What is something you did today that makes a difference in the world? And don't overlook the small things either...like today I wiped down the treadmill after I was done using it so that the next person wouldn't have to run in my sweaty mess. I guess I made the world just a little bit better!

New-To-Me Food Tracker

I found this website recently that allows you to download a free fitness and food journal. It has some pretty neat tools to use and it really helps to keep everything organized in one spot. You can set goals, see your progress, track your calories, protein, fat and carb intake, etc.

The program is called "Fitness Assistant 1" and can be found here. Hope you like it!

In other news...how many of you started out this year with a resolution to either lose weight, exercise more or get healthy? A lot of people start each year with high hopes that this will be the year that they will finally get in shape. Gym memberships soar, diet programs make bucket loads of money and everyone is excited and motivated. Usually this phenomenon lasts about 3-6 weeks before most people fall off the healthy-living bandwagon.

If that was you though, you still have time to make 2010 the year you reach your goals. Tomorrow marks the first day of September, giving you exactly 4 months to get back on track and reach some of those goals you may have set for yourself at the beginning of the year. If you start now, you can look at yourself on 01-01-11 with pride, knowing that you don't have to start the year proclaiming your new fitness resolutions but you can simply maintain the healthy lifestyle you've been leading the last four months. This also may give you extra motivation to endure the eating pitfalls that occur during the next few months...Halloween candy, lots of Thanksgiving stuffing and all those endless Christmas goodies.

So are you ready to look and feel your best on one-one-one-one? (01-01-11)

Talking Point: Did you set any resolutions this year that you've been able to meet? Any others that you are still working on? My main goal for this year was to learn how to eat properly. It's definitely a work in progress, but I'm getting better!

Weekly Challenge (Aug. 30-Sept. 5, 2010)

Sorry for the absence. It's been a crazy and busy weekend, but I'm back and ready to write again!

As I was writing the dates for this week's challenge, I was shocked to have to write "September"! Is anyone else amazed at how fast this summer flew by? School is back in session around these parts and every once in a while, I feel a nice "fallish" breeze. I love fall though so I'm excited for the next few months!!

So how did you do with last week's challenge? Starting a food journal can be a bit time consuming and difficult to get into the habit of doing, but it certainly makes you more accountable for everything that you eat.

I have a confession to make though...the challenges for the last two weeks haven't been very difficult for me. I eat breakfast religiously and am already in the habit of keeping a food journal. I know some of you have gotten into new habits with these challenges though, and I think they are very healthy habits to start or maintain. However, this week, we'll be doing a challenge that will be HARD for me. I'm actually copying this idea from bodyrock.tv found here. The challenge will be to go a week without SUGAR!! I'm not talking about natural sugars found in things like milk or fruit, but sugary sweets like cakes, donuts, brownies, soda and my ultimate favorite...ice cream (I would banish flavored dairy this week too, like anything other than plain yogurt and lowfat milk.) I do pretty well avoiding sugar during the week but I almost always splurge a bit on the weekends and enjoy my guilty pleasure (i.e. ice cream) a bit (or sometimes a lot!!) But for this challenge, I am going to do my best to avoid all sugary treats and snacks for 7 full days. So who's with me on this one? Do you think you can avoid sugar all week?

Talking Point: What is your favorite sugary treat? Could you give it up for a week? I am all about moderation and I don't believe in "banishing" any foods from my diet, but sometimes it's good to give yourself a bit of a challenge for a short while. I have a serious sweet tooth and LOVE, LOVE, LOVE me some good ice cream but I do tend to overindulge a bit much. I have a hard time stopping at just one bite!!

Ready to sweat

If you're up for a tough workout, you should give this next one a shot. It was tough but kind of fun too because it incorporated a lot of moves that were new to me. There are 15 different moves (I did each one with a 50/10 split...50 seconds of work followed by 10 seconds of rest.) I repeated the entire circuit for a sweat-filled 30-minute workout. It was a great way to get the heart pumping early this morning.

1. Heisman (side to side leaps, landing on 1 foot, other knee up)
2. Front Jabs (basically punching and alternating left and right)
3. Hip Extension Jumps (with feet close together, squat down, touch the floor, explode up.)
4. 1-2-3- Heisman (quick shuffle to side for 3, land in Heisman at end of shuffle)
5. Cross Jacks (legs cross in front of body, arms alternate overhead)
6. Mummy Kicks (straight arms criss-cross in front of body while doing quick straight leg kicks)
7. A plank walk-out (From a standing position, keeping both legs straight, roll down until both hands touch the floor. Walk your hands away from your body, keeping your legs as straight as possible. Walk out into a plank position, hold for a second, then walk back)
8. Ski Jumps (feet together, jump side to side - don't twist, keep body facing forward)
9. Upper Cuts
10. Basketball Shots (shuffle to side for 3, squat low, touch floor with both hands, jump up and "shoot the ball" with your arms)
11. Ab Skiing (in plank position, jump both feet toward right hand, back to start, in toward left hand, back to start...DO NOT STAND UP)
12. Kick the hum (Run in place, bringing your heels to your bum)
13. Squat Ins (starting in plank, jump both feet together between hands, then back to plank, keep repeating...DO NOT STAND UP)
14. Frog Jumps (Jump forward into a wide squat, touch the floor with both hands, jump back into wide squat, touch floor with both hands. Keep repeating.)
15. Bench running taps (using a step, quickly tap alternating feet up on the step as fast as possible)

If you try this workout, be sure to let me know what you think.

Talking Point: What kinds of workouts do you enjoy? Do you like mixing it up, or do you tend to do the same things repeatedly? Are there any fun workout moves that you enjoy (or maybe you really hate them but know they're good for you?!?!?)

There's no place like home

I have belonged to many commercial gyms in my life (Gold's Gym in Provo, 24 Hour Fitness in both Houston and Katy, Texas, Gold's Gym in Bryan, Texas and now Gold's Gym again in Hagerstown.) I really love belonging to a gym because they have such great equipment and I enjoy taking the variety of classes that are always offered too.

But I also really like having the ability to workout from home if the need arises. On those days when I am short on time, have a sick child, or am snowed in (like this past winter!!), I like having the ability to go down into our unfinished basement to get in a good sweat session.

Here is what our home-gym currently looks like (we have collected various fitness paraphernalia throughout the years)...

Our weight bench.

We picked this up at a yard sale this summer. It also came with 250 lbs of weights. Yard sales and Craigslist are great places to pick up inexpensive and barely-used fitness items

One of our newest purchases, a Bosu balance trainer (you can get a great stability workout with this and it helps to make traditional exercises like squats, lunges, planks and push-ups even tougher!)

Our only piece of cardio equipment so far...a stationary bike. This is usually where I warm-up and cool-down.

Our tiny TV corner. I have a few workout DVDs that I enjoy doing at times. Right now it is mostly used to play music while I workout to my own routines, but I hope to add P90X and/or Insanity to my DVD collection for this winter!!

Last but not least, our collection of weights. We have 1, 3, 5, 10, 15 and 20 lbs dumbbells,

two ab balls (8 and 10 lbs) and two kettlebells (10 and 15 lbs). We also have a stability disk, some perfect push-up stands and a pull-up bar that needs to get hung up eventually!

We also purchased some foam flooring to make the concrete a bit more comfortable to work out on. I really do love my home gym and hope to be able to add on to it soon. My goal is to be able to do personal training sessions from my own home someday. A girl can dream!!

Talking Point: What kind of equipment do you have at home to workout with? Any favorite workout DVDs?