Success!!

I've worked out for 3 days in a row now.  I know that seems small, but to me, it's huge since I haven't done that for months.  Here's the breakdown:

Tuesday: Recumbent bike for 40 minutes

Wednesday: Elliptical for 40 minutes, then 75 crunches using the weighted ball (in sets of 20, 25, 30), then about 30 lunges

Thursday: Tennis for an hour (mostly groundstroke and volley drills), then a few weight machines (seated leg press, compound row, and the tricep one with the name I can never remember).  Also 10 minutes on the rowing machine (in 5 minute spurts).

I'll probably be sore tomorrow in my shoulders and arms, but that's okay.  I love a healthy muscle soreness following a heavy workout.  I miss that feeling, and I'll welcome it even as I complain about it.

Let's see how long I can keep up this streak!

Also, I've been making an effort to eat fruits and veggies every day.  Fruit is never a problem because I'm obsessed with it, but veggies I'm slowly starting to like.  I always liked carrots and corn, but so do 5 year olds.  I'm further embracing my love for zucchini and yellow squash and also eating peppers on more of a regular basis.  I feel quite fondly about red bell peppers right now, mainly because they're sweet and thus can be enjoyed raw or cooked (I love eating them raw, either with a homemade dill dip or  just plain).  They're also great in a veggie pasta sauce.  Here's the recipe for the sauce.  It's really simple, and based on what Kevin made for me about a month ago (but no matter how many times I make it, it's never quite the same as his):

1. Chop up 1 red pepper, 2 small tomatoes (or 1 large one), and about 1/3 of a sweet onion. Keep separate.
2. Heat some olive oil in a large pan over medium heat; while it's warming up, add basil, oregano, garlic powder, and pepper (just eye-ball it; I never measure).
3. Once the oil seems hot enough and is starting to sizzle, add the onions.
4. Once the onions are partially soft (but not so cooked that they're brown), add the peppers.
5. Once the peppers are partially soft, add the tomatoes.
6. Simmer on medium-low, covered, for about 10 minutes.
7. Meanwhile, bring water to a boil and begin cooking pasta (rotini is my favorite, and I think it goes well with this sauce).
8. Once the veggies all seem soft (but not mushy), add 1 jar of your favorite pasta sauce.  I like Prego's Roasted Red Pepper and Garlic (it also goes perfectly with these veggies).
9. Mix the sauce in with the veggies and simmer for about 10-15 minutes. The longer they simmer, the flavors all seem to mix in well together.
10. By that time, the pasta should be cooked.  Time to eat!


I'm hungry now.

Exercising for two!

Sorry everybody!  I'm back now.  I even had trouble remembering how to sign in and post an entry.  I'm going to try really hard to update more regularly.  :)

I guess what pulled me away from here, in addition to the holidays and my intense month-long Hebrew grammar course at Eden, is the newly discovered bun in my oven.  That's right!  My husband and I are expecting a little one in late August. 

But, you know, it's kind of funny that that's what pulled me away from here because it is also what has allowed my nutritional habits and workout habits to improve by leaps and bounds.  Well, okay, the workout habits I'm still working on.  But, I've been eating really well.  I've been blessed and I really don't have morning sickness-- just an unbearable and constant hunger.  I mean, I have an old plastic whipped cream container that I fill with animal crackers, oyster crackers, fruit snacks, nuts, etc. at the beginning of every day and carry with me throughout the day because I'm hungry every 30 seconds. 

This is a good thing for me, because I need to gain weight and develop better nutritional habits.  And by "better nutritional habits" I mean that I need to eat more than the amount required for a human to survive, like I did before I was pregnant. 

The other thing I've been doing is drinking a lot of water, which is really good whether you are pregnant or not.  I encourage all of you to up your water intake!  I drink about 64 ounces a day-- 8 8-ounce glasses.  Or, two water bottles! :) My energy is up (well, still down from what it was pre-pregnancy, but I can tell the water is helping), my skin is healthier (well, again, still down from pre-pregnancy, but I know it's helping), I feel much more flexible, etc.  I pee more, but that's okay.  Anyway, my point is that I think water intake is hugely important to fitness and health!  Do it!!

Okay so I mentioned that I'm still working on the workout habits.  That's very true.  What I really want to do is yoga at least once a day.  I've been doing it about every other day lately.  I feel so much better when I do it, so I don't know why it's so hard for me to get motivated to do it.  After I finish this entry, I'm going to do the "Yoga Mama" workout on Netflix, which is actually for pregnant women.  I really like it, and it makes me feel less fat because all the women are in my boat.  I've also been really enjoying this guy who does a lot of yoga videos-- Rodney Yee.  Check him out.  He is kind of silly looking so he makes it that much more fun.  He has DVDs all the way from beginner to advanced.  If you are considering yoga but don't have any DVDs, Netflix has about 6 or 7 streaming.  If you don't have Netflix, get it. 

New goals? 
--Dog walking, still.  It's new because I'm still horrible at initiating it. 
--Yoga once a day.
--Maintain high water intake and healthy eating habits.
--Post pregnancy progress photos for you all.  I don't think I'm the type to post the size of my belly on Facebook for the world to see, but I would like to post some for you all if I don't get too self-conscious about it.  It seems like they might fit in here. For now, I just look bloated, so I'll wait a month or so.

Thanks everybody for the motivation and the accountability!  Let's keep it up!

Disappearing

Where is everyone??  I include myself in that appeal.  I've neglected this poor blog, but I pledge to do so no longer.

Goals for the winter/spring:

1. Increase readership of this blog.
2. Increase publication to this blog (let's go, ladies. Marissa has been carrying it solo recently!).
3. Strengthen my core muscles and legs.

My arms also need strengthening, but I feel like it's harder to get my legs where I want them to be.  I'm not sure why.  So I want to focus more on core and lower body and incorporate upper body but not as intensively.  Tennis will give me work in all those areas, so I will be playing once per week at minimum.

I also really, REALLY, want to train for a 5k this spring.  I did one last year but I ended up walking/running (mostly walking).  This year, I'd like to reverse the ratio.  I think I can do it. Do you?

Tips? Advice? Encouragement?

Swim!

I see that some of my co-contributors are missing in action. That's cool. The holidays happened and we're starting a new year of shenanigans. I can only assume that all the other ladies are hitting the gym so hard that they scarcely have time to write about it. Right?

I've added a new element to my workouts: water. I used to be a very strong swimmer (and I think I'm still pretty great at it, even if the technical aspects of my strokes and my lung capacity have suffered over the years). My mom bought me a cute competitive swimsuit as an early birthday gift. I've wanted to start swimming laps again since I bought my YMCA membership, but I only had a bikini, and doing kick turns in a bikini is no fun (well, it might be fun for male lifeguards or any straight man with an aerial view, but not for the topless girl in the pool).

So far it's going well. I swam for an hour on Sunday and did two half-hour sessions yesterday, which were broken up by a lifeguard break. I hope to swim two or three days a week and supplement my routine with some weights and core work. Swimming is a sufficient aerobic workout for me, and it doesn't put any strain on my joints, which proved a problem for me on the treadmill and climbing machine.

I'm yammering on. What I really meant to do in this entry was post an awesome workout mix to revitalize and bring even more energy to your routine. As with all of the mixes that I meticulously craft, this is meant to be played in order. If you don't, it may affect warmup, cooldown, and the middle part of your workout, which is ass-kicking time:

1. Spoon "Don't You Evah" (3:39)
2. Spank Rock "Backyard Betty" (3:29)
3. Heartless Bastards "Out At Sea" (3:24)
4. LCD Soundsystem "Daft Punk is Playing At My House" (5:17)
5. Janelle Monae feat. Big Boi "Tightrope" (4:23)
6. Freeway & Jake One "Throw Your Hands Up" (3:43)
7. Los Campesinos! "Broken Heartbeats Sound Like Breakbeats" (3:33)
8. Raphael Saadiq "Keep Marchin'" (2:38)
9. Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears "Boogie" (3:43)
10. Gogol Bordello "Think Locally, Fuck Globally" (4:23)
11. The Hold Steady "Massive Nights" (2:57)
12. The Wombats "Let's Dance to Joy Division" (3:11)
13. The Thermals "Now We Can See" (3:30)
14. Ted Leo & The Pharmacists "Walking To Do" (3:37)
15. The Roots "Adrenaline" (4:28)
16. Passion Pit "Little Secrets" (3:59)
17. Yeah Yeah Yeahs "Heads Will Roll" (3:42)

Total: 1 Hour. I know that's how long I usually keep my workouts.

Row Row Row Your Butt

Rowing machine. Yeah, I got seduced by it. But like any other tawdry affair, it came back to bite me in the butt. Literally.

Feet strapped in, knees flexed, pulling the bow to my chest in great heaves, I reached a speed of about 40 miles per hour. Then I slid off the front of the seat. I don't know if it was the strength of my thrust that did it, the fact that the seat is hard slippery plastic, or that extending my short legs too far makes my whole body hiccup and lift a little bit on the machine. Probably a combination of all three. Regardless of the cause, I flew forward off the seat and landed on the bar that the seat slides back and forth on. Right on my tailbone. I cursed, audibly. Thankfully, there was no one else with me in the small private room. Nobody to laugh nervously at my misfortune, nobody to offend with my kneejerk (pun most certainly intended) cursing.

I couldn't walk around the track without limping. Running was out of the question, as were most stretches. I could not lean on the fitness ball. I spent the rest of my workout "recovering" while James finished running. It was awful. So, for the rest of that week I went to the gym and had very limited workouts. Elliptical for thirty minutes, graduating to a climbing machine, then eventually a few sit-ups, with the fitness ball positioned under my lower back and my legs planted on the ground.

I still experience a little bit of discomfort when I sit down. My workouts are finally fulfilling again, but I feel like I'm building back up to where I was now, and with my holiday schedule getting so nutso, I'm nervous that I won't have the time to get back to that four or five day fitness regimen. Here's hoping...

And please. Talk to your kids about the dangers of rowing machines.

Strong!

I had a great workout last Sunday and another on Tuesday evening. Both times I ran three miles on a climbing machine at different levels of resistance. I also focused on my abs using a fitness ball and did more work with free weights.

Instead of doing isolated exercises again last night, I decided to try something that would work several areas of my body at once. I rode a rowing machine. It was a completely engaging workout, and the weirdo kid in me kept pretending I was rowing crew against a bunch of yuppies or trying to race upstream to save otters or something. My one problem is that my butt hurt pretty badly after my 20 minute rowing stint. I had to get up a couple of times during the workout to give my posterior a reprieve. I also got a nasty blister on my left palm. Totally worth it though. Rowing worked my arms, legs, shoulders, back, and abs--yes, I feel it in all of these zones today. It also got my heart rate up something fierce. As soon as the soreness wanes I'll definitely jump into the invisible/robot boat again.

I now want to take a moment to discuss something that I feel is really key to a good workout session: music.

I obsess about music in all areas of my life, so when I go to the gym I usually have a carefully selected playlist in tow. I've found that I work out best to hip hop. Jay-Z's Blueprint 3 is absolute perfection for a workout, as is Big Boi's brilliant Sir Lucious Left Foot: The Son of Chico Dusty. Spoon's Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, is one of my old standbys as well. The pace is perfect, and the entire album clocks in at just under 40 minutes, making it perfect for a treadmill/elliptical session. When I'm in the middle of a run and need something to keep me motivated, it always has to be Wilco's "Spiders (Kidsmoke)". The steady and gradual build of that song and the sporadic and frantic guitar work are great motivators. It's close to eleven minutes long, so if you're looking for a final push near the end of a stair climb or something, boom. Here it is. Britpop can be a good impetus for your heartrate. And I find that my tolerance for godawful pop music is highest when I'm working out. I learned that last time I went to the gym when I had just upgraded the OS for my iPhone, lost my playlists, and had to rely on Pandora's pop station since all of my custom stations are pretty weepy, rootsy, and shoegaze-y. I can't say that I would willingly listen to Jay Sean, Will.I.Am, or the Pussycat Dolls outside of the gym, and I still had to skip Train on principle (people really like them?), but they kept my gams kicking for an hour or so, so we're cool.

I think for my next entry I'm going to post a workout playlist. Get ready.

Right now I want to share this awesome vegetarian chili recipe I whipped up last night.

Three-Bean Chili:

1 can drained black beans
1 can drained white beans
1 can drained red kidney beans
1.5 cups of an IPA of your choice (or you can use vegetable stock, but beer will give you a ton of flavor--the more hops the better, since you'll need it to stand up to the spices)
5 cloves garlic
1 cup sliced crimini mushrooms (or white mushrooms)
1 cup sliced carrots
1 whole onion, minced
1 cup crushed tomatoes
1 medium to large poblano pepper, minced
a generous sprinkle of kosher salt
a generous sprinkle of black pepper
2 tbsp ancho chili powder
1 tbsp cumin

I also added two tablespoons of homemade sofrito, which is basically Mexian pesto. This is totally optional. To make sofrito:

3 small bunches of fresh cilantro
5 cloves garlic
1 poblano pepper, seeded
1 bunch scallions
1 shallot
Juice from a lime
1/2 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp black pepper

This will make about a cup. I basically halved Chef Eric Williams' recipe. Sofrito makes an awesome marinade.

So anyway, throw all of your ingredients into a slow cooker and cook everything on low for about six hours. It's really easy and really healthy, especially if you don't top it with sour cream, sharp cheddar, and corn chips. Which I did, but hey, I work out a lot.

Slacking

All right, all right.  I admit it.  The reason I haven't posted in so long is not because I've been so busy exercising that I don't have time.  It's because I've been slacking.  I've really been slacking. 

In fact, the closest I've come to exercising all week has been the leaf-raking I did on Saturday.  We raked the lawns of some of the older people in the church I'm working at.  It was fun, but I'd rather get back into intentional exercise.

This is a process, right?