Thursday, December 31, 2009

Last Day of 2009

What a year it's been! Planning on taking the positives and carry them with me into 2010, the negatives can stay behind!

Today, was a snowy start, so some shoveling this morning, this was quiet and peaceful with the soft blanket of snow over everything.

Yoga this afternoon and I sort of accomplished one of my goals. A handstand. I need only a little help at the top of my kick up into it. Hips were in the right spot but getting that leg to move when it was supposed to still not quite working the way it should. But I am a millisecond away from getting it without assistance. I can totally do headstands on my own!

We also worked on inner hamstring strengthening, so need to get my legs working the way "normal" peoples do. Getting there!

I will admit that Yoga has really helped me with flexibility. I'm also much more aware of the "why" some of the things that I think I should be able to do and can't, happen. Which is helping with my frustration level (a little bit).

Yoga has helped me start to "fix" some of that. Very thankful for that. This is one of the positives I plan to carry with me in to 2010.

Be well in 2010 everyone!

Wednesday, December 30

Started the morning by learning some Tai Chi, I soooooooo need to work on getting my shoulders to relax.

I'm thinking about taking either a Kung fu or Tai Chi class to work on getting my body to move more fluidly, among other things, like movement awareness, strength training and flexibility.

Tuesday, Twin toss...

Get your minds out of the gutter! ;)

I was visiting one of my closest friends from college and she and her husband have twins who are almost 2. The cutest boy and girl!! The girly girl, loves taking flight so I played catch with her. She loves flying! Can't wait until she gets a little older and I can take her to the circus school!

Monday, December 28

Doubles intensive at the circus school! Two hours of doubles trapeze. Did I mention I love basing? :) I was able to swing up into catchers hang tonight! I've been working on beats, so that really helped me. Of course I only had the "power" to do that fairly cleanly twice. After that I had to tag the rope to get up.

Did I mention I love basing for doubles trapeze?

catching up from the holiday week!

So I left off at Tuesday, Dec 22nd. I flaked out on cardio... meant to go at lunch but didn't make it. Tuesday night was aerials at the circus school, since it was the last night of the session it's "traditionally" doubles night. YAY! I love basing for doubles trapeze.

Thursday, Christmas eve day. Awesome workout with Lourdes and Tracey. Dance meets aerials conditioning. We met a little after 10 AM and I headed home at about 1 PM. Great workout. I'm "stealing" the ballet sit-ups! The great part about what Lourdes put together is that it focused a lot on fine tuning basic technique that is often faked through and is not noticed. This meant the conditioning parts were slow and controlled. After the workout we tried to diagnose some of my lower body weird wiring. First up, Bird hang, so it seems that my tight hip flexors may be the cause, I have to bend my knee, otherwise my leg bends on it's own. The next piece of that is the tight hips and the "weak" hamstrings, makes it really hard to hang so I have to assist by holding my leg which is painful for my hip... so working on this. Next thing looked at single ankle hangs on the rope. I think this is directly related to my weak inner hamstrings, my feet flare out which allows the rope to not stay at my ankle and then I'm caught on my pinky toe and well, that just doesn't hold me up!

Christmas and the weekend. Well between travel and then feeling ill.... my workouts were squished. Very sad, but Saturday morning I woke up queasy and the room was spinning! Had I been drinking I would have understood, but not the case, so I'm not sure if it was from the food, my sinus headache or some flu symptoms but it was not fun!

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Monday, December 21

Winter Solstice! Yay, daylight begins to return! Hopefully that helps me to get a little more motivated again!

I turned in my lunch time to get my workout in today. So I didn't accomplish as much as I wanted to, only an hour, but I made my time QUALITY. Like I mentioned in my e-mail today to the team; with the craziness of the holidays, it's hard to balance it all! I for one have lots of things to get ready for Christmas (like finish shopping). So my lunch workout consisted of 20 minutes on the elliptical, at about a 10 min mile pace. Then I did a modified weight workout (this one was focused more toward trapeze). I did 3 sets of ten assisted pull ups (I first did as many as I could on my own which was 5...), I love the pull-up machine at my center city gym, it's set up so that you're comfortably kneeling on the assist part which helps to keep my body in a more natural form. Then I did 3 sets of 15, lateral raises on a bench, I dropped my weight down a little bit to 35lbs, I was going for more control and form. Followed by skull crushers on the bench. Then over to the roman chair. 3 sets of 15, first set straight leg raises, middle set, L-side, center, R-side, center, and the last set was back to straight leg raises. When I first saw the roman chair at the CC gym, I was in LOVE, it's an awesome idea, a bosu ball is what your back is against, so it works for people of all heights fairly well. However, I find that I slide down slowly and then it's at weird spot and that bothers my lower back... I'm going to play around with a towel over the bosu to see it that helps.

Then it was a quick shower and back to the office and lunch at my desk, I had some awesome soup, thanks to Jeanne Jones of Jeanne Jones Co. She's a friend and an awesome personal chef and caterer. I got soup and muffins for my Christmas greeting. Yummy!!!

Monday, December 21, 2009

Sunday, December 20

Another snowy workout!

After the snow stopped, it left us with about 2 feet of snow! So today's workout..

Resistance... 1hour and 15 minutes or so of shoveling. I switched off sides so I'd keep it even.

Walked over to JJs to get the kid and head over to the sledding area. 2 hours of sledding and some playground fun. sadielicious joined us! What fun. The hill was much harder to walk up with the snow amount.

Back home to more shoveling!

Love it when there's real snow! Powdery and perfect!

Saturday, December 19

Snow, snow and more snow!

Thanks for those who trekked out this morning for the Y workout. When I left my house there was nothing on the ground. In the half hour it takes me to get to the Y. There was probably an inch of snow....

But after the Y I headed home had some breakfast and headed to the sledding slopes with my friend JJ's daughter. I out sledded the 12 year old! :) We had a blast. about 2 hours of sledding and some playground fun.

This was my workout today! Sometimes we need to deviate :)

By the way I jogged to and from JJ's house so I had some extra cardio in there and I think the snow boots and dragging 3 sleds add in some additional resistance work.

Friday, December 18

Feeling the yoga today! My inner-hamstrings are SORE!! Which is a good thing!

I only did a little bit of cardio today. And then several laps around the mall!

Thursday, December 17

Yoga Day!

I'm learning to actually relax a little bit more, which helps. My shoulders were not in my ears as much! Yay. Lots of great stuff tonight! My hamstrings were working! And I definitely need that work!

We ended the session by working on headstands. If you know me and have seen me work on handstands, you'll know that I have no awareness of where my hips are in relationship to my body. I generally end up in a bit of a pike position and in my head I think I'm upright and then I fall over....

I got into a headstand on my own and for the most part controlled! Took a few tries though. The funniest was when I started with my head on the mat and my feet on a bench. I got up into the headstand but when I came out of it... well the best description is jed513's."you look like my dog when I had to jam on my brakes in the car and his front paws were on the floor and his butt was still on the seat".

Yep, kind of felt like that too! But then my last try I did it all on my own, no help, no bench, even got an exclamation of surprise and excitement from jed513.

Good class

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Home Workout :) 30 minutes rowing, followed by weight program. Trying to keep myself motivated in this chilly winter day.

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Monday

Still feeling Cranky, I'm starting to blame it on having a sinus headache...But feeling better than yesterday.

I headed home after work and did my workout at home this week. 15 minutes of rowing erg followed by Program 2 workout follow by 15 minutes of rowing erg.

The endorphines helped with the mood, YAY! :)

Then a lovely dinner of Pork chop, spinach and brocolli.

Weekend Warrior.. not so much :)

Saturday mornings workout was fun! Love circuits and love watching everyone go at their pace and seeing which way you all chose to go! Awesome work!

Sunday morning, after battling the traffic gods and mother nature. I made it to my aerials class in DE. Poor jed513 caught the wave of my frustrations.. I swear the angry looks weren't at her! Need to simplify a few things in my life once again. Stress be gone!!

Although, I think it's also a bit of my fighting the creeping crud. After my session I went home and actually slept the rest of the day and had a headache. I ended up getting up off the couch at like 8 pm and going to bed. A little congested these days.. and still working on my cranky-ness.

Jed513 I promise it'll be gone by Thursday!

Friday, December 11, 2009

TGIF

Wow, another crazy week with lots of work stress. Just lots of deadlines. But so far so good!

Last evening I met Jed513 for our yoga session. I still need to get my shoulders out of my ears! But that may be directly related to what I just wrote about! Stress! I have what I deemed as atlas syndrome, I try to carry the world on my shoulders. Thank goodness they're fairly broad! ;)

Yoga is so good for me! I'm feeling better through my hips and lower back, although I'm still tight and did fall over once.. was lying on my side so not too far. Jed513 did a fantastic roll over, trying to push a pretzel like stretch. I went from looking at her back to being eye to eye. I have a feeling that accidental move will be turned into a trapeze trick...

Did the elliptical for my cardio Thursday not quite to the intensity that I wanted but there's only so many hours in the day!

Today is supposed to be a cardio and weights day, but since I over slept this morning... it is now my day off! I'll be working out after the team workout tomorrow. So all good!

Tomorrow's team workout is "scorecard" circuits. You have a list to choose from... then execute them! Look out as Aimers and I will be right there doing them with you!!

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Got balls? I went to a juggling class last night. I've been challenged to juggle while in the dragon boat. Need to practice and find bouyant juggling balls.

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Whoo! Just finished workout, 20 min cardio intervals on elliptycal, prog #2 weight workout, 20 min intervals on spin bike. Yee haw, endorphines are running high
Was starting to think I wasn't supposed to make it to the gym today. Everytime I tried to leave, something happened. Then the PWR window peeps. I'm here now!

Monday, December 7, 2009

Muddling through

I had my workout yesterday morning with my Aerials coach. I started out like gang-busters feeling awesome..then it was like someone just turned off my lower body's capacity to have any strength. SOOOoooo frustrating! I'm trying with all my might to pinch the fabric under my knee and my body just wasn't doing it... stupid hyper-extensive knees... ugh.. so I tried to not "head-game" myself out of what was really a productive session. I accomplished a few "tricks" that I couldn't complete before.

I really need to start looking at my progress in comparison to me and my capabilities and really be ok with the fact that I'm not a rock star...BUT I am getting better and stronger at the pace that works with my body.

Last week was also a crappy week for me in the way that I didn't really eat properly and I'm stressing myself out with work. So this weekend. I took my "traditional" list and trudged to Trader Joe's in the snow. I love driving in the snow.. I really do!

Anyway, my fridge is now filled again with fresh fruits, veggies and lean meats. I also picked up healthy snacks since it "tis the season" for treats arriving in the office. I'm going to reach for my yogurt with fresh berries or my apple with peanut butter.. LOVE skippy natural! And my snack drawer has almonds easily assessable. So those decadent chocolaty treats won't be as tempting!

I cooked up some chicken breast last night and packed my lunches for the week, so I've no excuse to order in Chinese!!

It's amazing how much food effects my mood, energy levels and constant cravings!

So today is Monday, and I'm going to make it a better week than last!! Off to the gym tonight!

Saturday, December 5, 2009

Great workout this morning! Way to push yourselves team. I know I'll be feeling my two times through sets of crunches!

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

So, my body was telling me it needed a rest. So today was my "off" day. Hoping it's not my body telling me it's fighting the creeping crud.

Shout out to the Running Divas and Walking Babes!

I drove past you fierce gals last night on my way to the circus school. Looks like you had a great group!!

Way to go! I may switch up my class to be able to join you gals!

Rock on!

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Tuesday, December WHAT!??!?!

First day of a new month! Which means a new weight program! Except tonight I have my circus class... which I'm off to now!

Monday, Last day of November! Really? wow

So, I woke up with a KILLER headache. Which wasn't in the plan at all! I had planned to spend my day off of work, hitting the gym and finishing up some small projects around the house. Instead, there was lots of advil and allergy medications, sitting on the couch in the dark, drinking gallons of water.... FINALLY the headache went away around 3PM.. hmmm.. not much of my day left.

Made myself feel human again, and headed to Yoga with jed513. Ya know there's times when I don't see jed513 for weeks, then this week I've seen her 3 times!

Yoga was good. I was a little nervous, since jed513 is little and bendy and I'm neither of those... but we did a lot of stretching and I slept well that night.

Sunday, Nov. 29

Woke up with a headache, still.. so I battled that for a bit. Then I went to my private aerial lesson wih jed513.

Nothing like an hour of "great! now do that five times", don't get me wrong I love it! jed513 knows how to push me and that makes me stronger and more confident.

Then it was off to the movies with my favorite 2nd grader! Planet 51, and lunch = FUN! Despite the stupid headache that was still lingering. Perhaps being upside down earlier in the day didn't help? ;)

Saturday, Nov. 28

Team workout! Aimee rocked it! :)

I then did an additional 30 minutes of Cardio on the Arc Runner. LOVE the Arc Runner.

After that I started battling a dreaded headache, so I went home and napped for about 2 hours.

Then it was a slow clean-up of my house and early to bed... stupid headache...

Friday, Post turkey day...

Today wasn't as I'd planned. My plan was to sleep in, then go to the gym.

What really happened... My family from Carlisle, my parents and I all met at my Grampa's old house. He finally sold it. So my "workout" consisted of running 3 flights of stairs consistently, chasing down a 2 and half year old, hack sawing scrap metal, lugging scrap metal out of basement into truck, prepping sandwiches and snacks for Grampa (he was supervising of course!), putting out about a million bags of trash (okay maybe not quite a million), and then making it home to crash onto my couch...

Turkey Day! or Tofurkey for some

My Thanksgiving started with the Abington Y's Gobble Wobble 5K.

For those familiar with the Abington area, yes it was hilly! I met Jellybell and jed513. We ran/walked it. Working on getting jed513 back into running! Plus we had to stop as this funky, Brady family era house that was for sale. Peeked in the windows. This place was ultra-mod at some point. Now it's ultra-retro.

Then it was off to my family in Carlisle and Yummy-ness!

I have a lot to be Thankful for! :)

Wednesday, Nov. 25 Pre-Turkey Eve!

I took ultra advantage of the "any other workout" :)

Tone Up Your Turkey at the Roxy Y, was fun. 45 Minutes of Zumba, and me realizing how uncoordinated I am. Then 45 minutes of strength training at a good cardio pace. Loved that! Except I was sweating so much that I kept slipping out of my plank! Came close to a face plant a few times.

It was a lot of fun!

Pre-Gobble workout!

Tuesday, Nov.24

Today was my circus workout at Philly Circus. Although I still get frustrated at my lack of lower body "strength". Stupid hyper-extensive knees!

But otherwise it was a great workout as usual!

Monday, November 23, 2009

Monday! of a holiday week

Today's workout is 20 minutes of cardio followed immediately by the weight workout for team fierce and fabulous you are doing another 15 minutes of cardio after the weights!

Team fun, you're doing cardio then weights.

Rock on! Keep strong this week of feasting festivities, remember it's all about balance. Keep things in moderation and you can enjoy a little bit of everything!

Post weekend update

The Y training on Saturday morning was fun! I still smell like chlorine, gotta love "public" pools and killing germs.

Sunday's 8K, not as good as it could have been for me. My hamstring was acting up with about 2 miles to go and the last half mile, I had to take a walking break because it kind of felt like my hamstring was trying to hatch an egg.. owie... Lots of stretching and water and it's starting to feel better. Jellybell and Sadielicious had a great run. Jellybell always seems to amaze me with her crazy amount of energy!

Friday, November 20, 2009

Friday!! TGIF

Today will end up being a cardio only day as I've visitors tonight. My parents are coming to my house.

Which is ok by me. It's good to have good life balance!

I'm looking forward to the Team workout tomorrow morning, I'm so excited for the aqua jogging class.

Sunday is the Rothman 8K.

Ok so all caught up!

Thursday

phew, almost have my week caught up!

Last night I did 30 minutes on the elliptical at a pretty fast pace. It felt great! I did some core work afterwards then I ran for my train to head home.

Wednesday!

Photo shoot day!

Lots of holding poises. Which made for some sore muscles! But it was great! I can't wait to see the finished products!

So after the shoot I went into work which threw off my schedule for the afternoon. I ended up not having much time at the end of the day, so 20 minute cardio interval for me, on the elliptical.

Tuesday

hmmm... well, Tuesday became an unexpected day off from training. I was supposed to go to the Circus school for my aerials class, but found myself still at my desk at 6:50 PM... So I went home and pretty much feel asleep instantly.

Monday

Monday I just did a half hour of cardio on the Arc Runner. I was feeling a bit sore from the Sunday workout.

But it was a good half hour!

Sunday's training

Sunday wasn't as written in the training book. It went like this....
A shared aerials lesson, we spent all of the time on Fabric and rope. Then I did some conditioning afterwards, sit-ups on the bar, straddle ups on the rope. All good!!

Oh, and we had a really great hip/back stretch too!

Then I mowed and racked my yard. I think that counts as something!

GOTR Run for Savanah

The Run was really fun. I jetted off to DE just after our Team workout at the Y. Made it there with about 3 minutes to spare to the start.

sadielicious and jellybell were already there, so it was like having a pit crew! I showed up chip was put on shoe and number pinned on! whoosh!

Then we started. Lots of kids which was great! Sadielicious has re-named the race to the bob-n-weave. Kids have 2 speeds, running like the wind or dead stop in front of you.

But it was so great to see the kids running/walking with their parents and friends.

Wow.. slacking on my posting

Ok I'll do my updates!

Friday, November 13, 2009

Saturday's 5K in honor of Savanah


Girls on the Run (GOTR) New Castle County is honoring our angel, Savannah Pauley, by dedicating the Fall 5K to her and making the theme, “SAVANNAHSTRONG”.

I only knew Savanah for a short time but what an extraordinary girl. Here is the article about Savanah by GOTR Savanahstrong

Keeping it close to home

Today I'm off from work. But I refused to laze the day away!

I did my cardio and weights at home. I trudged into the basement and dusted off the ol' concept2, realized one the batteries had sort of exploded in the monitor. So cleaned that up put in new batteries (and a load of laundry since I'm in the basement with the washer and dryer) and away I rowed. 20 minutes steady state, I took this one easy since last night I pushed it on the Arc runner, and I'm running a 5K tomorrow. So Kept my split time at 2:30 and my spms at about 28-29.

Then up to the living room for the weight program. The stability ball on the hardwood floor added a little more roll to deal with, but it was fun. AND I got to watch the today show while working out! Bonus :)

So I don't own a bosu, so I took off my sneaks and used a chair cushion.. It worked in the pinch, not sure if I'd recommend it though.

Then stretched..

Getting ready to head to my chiropractor, just need a tune up. And getting ready for the weekend!

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Cardio day!! Rocked it out on the arc runner. Don't forget to stretch! I prefer awesome stretches after a workout when the muscles are warmed up.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Just realized.. ONE week to my photo shoot! No crappy carbs or sugar at all for the next week!! Also means you'll see my cardio going nuts! (Only for a week)

Tuesday!

For most (if you're following the calendar) Tuesday was a day "off" which means REST. Rest is important in the cycle of training. A Day "off" gives your body and mind a chance to heal. Feeling sore after working out is also fairly common. Muscle soreness is caused by damage to the muscle fibers themselves. Which is what is needed to increase muscle strength. So taking a day off to rest helps to allow your muscles to rebuild and recover and helps to prevent injury.

This is also why it is best to have at the very least 24 hours in between weight workouts, I suggest 48 hours in between working muscle groups. And be sure to get a good nights sleep!

So with all that said... I had my Circus School "workout" last night. We worked mostly on the fabric and the rope. So lots of climbing and gripping. At the end of each class we do "conditioning", last nights conditioning was pull-ups on the rope/fabric, followed by 15 burpees, and then handstands (on the wall for me).

Monday, November 9, 2009

Note to self

Don't kick innocent person while falling off the bosu!! :)

Ok.. so not the full start I had hoped for, I've an old injury to my hip that's been flaring up so my cardio was not as intense as I usually like it to be. But I powered through and did the back to back cardio, weights, cardio.

Followed by a lunch of baked chicken with a low-fat low sodium BBQ sauce, yes they do exist! Brown rice and spinach. YUM!

My SD training Starts TODAY

I'm headed to the gym at lunch time to do my winter training. I'm going to be following the Team Fierce Plan... for the most part! You will see modifications and additions to the training that I do, because I also train for Runs and Aerials.

Lets rock the gym this winter so we can Rock the boat next summer!