Weeks 5, 6, 7

For the love! It's been entirely too long since I have uploaded Road to Boston info. It is definitely not for the sake of not training. I'm not sure why it is when school lets out a mother's work load doubles. Chore charts, hours of training and teachings that turns into playing in their room, back yard, kitchen, living room, bathroom(s), and "Get out of the garage!" All to the demise of my used to look somewhat clean on most days house. Each day I take a deep breath and pray that somehow the cleaning I did the night before will remain for at least the first half of the day. I pray that my children will one day look at the house and think, "Wow! Look at how clean the house is. Mom sure did a good job. Let's make sure we don't throw our stuff all over the place." If miracles are possible I will continue to pray for this one. I count my blessings on these days to be able to throw my hands in the air, walk out the front door and hit the road running.

So without further ado; my last three weeks of training.

Week 5
Day 1: Step Class
Day 2: Rest
Day 3: 13 miles. Hauled some serious A$$ at the end. And when I say hauled A$$ I mean ran as hard as my legs would allow. I'm certain an 80 year old woman could have lapped me on my last mile, but finish, I did.
Day 4: Body weight workout! Killer!!!! I have found my nemesis in Pull Ups. Someone let my 7th grade PE teacher know I can do two in a row and then I become a bit of a kangaroo to get my chin above the bar.
Day 5: 1 mile warm up, 3 mile Tempo run and 1 mile cool down. Hit the ground running at the crack of dawn.
Day 6: Ran 3 miles, not on the list of to do's but much needed.
Day 7: 6 miles, every 2 miles increased pace for a strong finish.

Week 6
Day 1: Step
Day 2: I'm certain I should have run 14 miles, but because I am a grown up now and I can make decisions, right or wrong. I decided to move this workout to Sunday. High five for me, rest it is.
Day 3: 3 mile run. No frill and no thrills.
Day 4: 14 miles run. Good golly, who would have thought rolling hills on a 14 miles course would feel like I was running in a wind tunnel up a mountain in the rain, sleet and snow. I may be exaggerating. However, today was the first day I thought I've got some serious work ahead of me.
Day 5: Body Weight workout and an easy 3 miles.
Day 6: Step
Day 7: HILLS!!!! I'm fairly certain Sunday would have counted for a hill repeat workout. However, another hill workout is what I did. 5 miles total: 1mile warm up, Repeats of 2 min up at full speed and 2 min rest, 1 mile cool down.

Week 7
Day 1: Step
Day 2:  Yoga. I knew my training was missing something. Stretching after each run just isn't enough. I need some zen in my life.  
Day 3: Rest.
Day 4:10 miles 8:48 pace.
Day 5: Body Weight Workout : Those dang pull ups. I was tempted to tap out before finishing them. However, I was at the gym and after bear crawling, rollercoastering (is that a word?) and air benching I had definitely drawn attention and my pride was not going to let me do one pull up and call it good.
Day 6: Step
Day 7: 1 miles warm up, .50 miles level 9-10 (can't talk, I think I may toss my breakfast), .25 miles level 6-7 repeats (I am doing just fine and can actually feel oxygen getting to my lungs), 4 repeats, 1 miles cool down

Fear not

Fear is standing in the way of our health. Too many of us spend entirely too much time worried, anxious and fearful of happenings that will never actually happen. We allow fear to keep us from moving toward our greatest potential. And we fear what could actually be if we actually reached our goals. Some of us refuse to stand on a scale because we are afraid of what it will say. As if not standing on it will somehow physically change our bodies. We are afraid to start a diet for the fear we will fail. Not only does it stand directly in our path of physical health, it also stands in the way of our psychological and emotional health.

How many of you are refusing to follow your dream because comfortable and safe is so much easier. Have you wanted to dream big? Have you wanted aim high and begin anew? Is there that one thing you swear you would try if you had more courage? No, I'm not saying go parachuting or anything crazy like that, although....I'm just staying stop waiting to have the courage to do something big. Courage doesn't come from waiting. It comes from action, facing your fears and saying enough is enough and today is the day I make a change.

“We can't be afraid of change. You may feel very secure in the pond that you

are in, but if you never venture out of it, you will never know that there

 is such a thing as an ocean, a sea. Holding onto something that is

good for you now, may be the very reason why you don't have something better.”
― C. JoyBell C. 

Take the plunge, make a fool, a mistake, a mess, an uncomfortable moment, a change, fall down, but get up and try again. It's ok to be wrong, embarrassed, and uncomfortable. We have all been there. Some of us learned to make these mistakes as a child. We learned that being scared of failing was ok. We failed at the little things and learned we survived. We took bigger chances as we got older and still learned the world didn't end from making another mistake. Some didn't take or get the chance to learn mistakes were ok. So as adults our fears feel debilitating. That's ok, take small steps toward your fear. Build up your armor and learn it's ok to try and to fail, because with trying comes great reward.

I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.

Nelson Mandela

 

“Courage is not the absence of fear but rather the judgment that something is more important than fear; The brave may not live forever but the cautious do not live at all.”
― Meg Cabot, The Princess Diaries

Surprise Veggie of the Week

Oh I couldn't be more excited! You will all be ecstatic to find out, CORN is in SEASON! I'm not certain why in America we would be concerned as to when corn is or is not in season. Given the fact you can find corn in anything and everything, I don't think this is information we need to place into our reminder list with multiple alerts. In fact I wouldn't be shocked to find corn as an ingredient in my toothpaste(pst it is an ingredient in toothpaste.) Corn, although good for you has completely lost my interest as I have no worry that everyone is eating enough of it. So like the 2012 Miss USA title holder, I have relinquished corn's title of Veggie of the Week and am defaulting to cucumber.

http://www.5dollardinners.com/cucumber-pineapple-salsa/

Cucumbers, oh the puffy eye diminishing delight! These puppies will rid a bad nights sleep in 10 short minutes. Have you actually tried placing cumbers on your eyes to diminish puffiness? Not worth the ten minutes. Other than beckoning my 1 year old over to pull them off my eyes and eat them, they do no good. A cold wet compress will do the job quite nicely. However, if you choose to ingest them, they bring on a healthy wonderful surprise. In an entire cup of sliced cucumbers there are 20 calories, and 4% of your Vitamin A and C needs. Lets not get too worked up over the meager 4%. It adds up. Really! If you ate 25 cups of cucumbers you would be completely full and have 100% of your daily A and C needs consumed. Not a bad idea in my book. Certainly not a good idea either.  Let me say, most of these nutrients are in the skin, so definitely go for organic, wash them before eating and for goodness sakes don't shave all of the skin off.

In the event you aren't into consuming cucumbers like they are Thanksgiving dinner; I recommend eating them in many of your favorite foods to bulk up fullness without packing in the calories.

How to sneak cucumbers into your food:


http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Cucumber-Mango-Salsa/Detail.aspx

Add to...Sandwiches (so long as it isn't PBandJ)
Egg Salad
Ice Water
Salsa
Macaroni salad
Use as dipping agents (instead of bread, crackers or chips)
Dice with tomatoes and avocado as a fresh summer salad.
Pickel aand use as pickles
Diced on morning eggs

Color In The Lines

I am radio silent no more. For the past 7 days I have had house guests. Ones I love, heck I even like. I looked forward to their arrival. I enjoyed their stay and dreaded their departure. However, I learned a very valuable lesson that I feel the need to share. Lack of structure will rock your healthy world! I mean, rock it to the core. Take all of your practices and habits forced or otherwise, throw them into that handy dandy VitaMix you spent all of your hard earned pennies on and hit the Max button. You see, I have spent years trying to determine what makes eating healthy and exercise easier. Building structure into your life is what I tout and drill into client after client, but I haven't really come face to face with the reality of this fact until now.

I ate terribly. If there is another word that could fully describe destroying 6 weeks of hard-work-cleansing you may insert it here. I had zero structure and my diet paid for it. Why is having a structured life so important to improve your diet and overall health? Well, with out structure you eat what you want, go to bed when you feel like it, drink water...never, workout when you "have time" for it. Lets be honest, we are selfish satisfaction driven people at our worst. Don't get your underpants in a twist I'm pointing at myself as well.

We are like children. We need structure. We hate it. We kick and scream and demand to do what we want but we function at our best when we have a clear cut goal. When we know our healthy choices for breakfast we generally eat breakfast. When we know what our "actual" bed time is, we wake up feeling rested. When we have written a grocery list from a menu plan we buy healthy options and forgo the bags of Oreos (most of the time).

If you are racking your brain trying to determine what will make this healthy kick easier. PLAN AHEAD! Write it down. Sketch it out. Paint it in color. Type it into a calendar. Tattoo it on your arm...well maybe not this one. Structure will get you to your goal. I know. I know. Boring right?! It's ok it only lasts for a short time. Once it has become a true lifestyle change you can start to color outside of the lines.

Jot down your goal for the next 7 days and then fill in with your actual outcomes.

Day One:
Wake Up Time:
Breakfast:
Snack:
Lunch:
Snack:
Dinner:
Bed Time:
Water Intake Goal:

Day Two:....

Week 4 - No Frills, No Thrills, No Pictures; Just Done.

Day 1 - Step

Day 2 - Rest - 465 calories burned, 16 ounces water drank, 144 lunges done, 450 squats completed, 5:24 min of abs in the bag!

Day 3 - Cycling Round and round she goes where she'll stop nobody knows. If this whole running thing doesn't work out I could definitely find my second love in cycling. If I could just get past the fact my thighs would NEVER again fit into a pair of jeans.

Day 4 - 10 miles - Early morning run. While waking early seemed like a good idea the night before; when idea met reality it became not such a motivating event. I peeled myself out of bed, pushed the brew button on the coffee machine and waited to wake up. And waited. And waited. Once I realized it wasn't going to happen prior to my first few steps out the front door, I resolved to take each mile one at a time.

Day 5 - 4.5 miles and the hills were alive. I told myself heading out, "Just run 3 miles at a slow and easy pace. 11 min miles? Sure, go for it!" Warm Up done! I was on my way. After three miles of what can only be deemed by Mrs. L my "BIT#*! miles" I finished with 4.5 miles and only enjoying the last mile and a half. Not my strongest or longest run, but some days that's just how it goes.

Day 6 - Step! NO! I spent 5 hours at the local zoo chaperoning 8 children. By the grace of God I had a companion in the fox hole with me. Let me tell you corralling 8 kids all day is exhausting. I'm not sure how our teachers do it, but after five hours of saying the same eight names no less than 1 thousand times I am done.

Day 7 - 3 miles and Weight Lifting - Nothing spectacular. Nothing too fun. This week chalked up to be a just get it done kinda' week.

While training for an event there are always going to be weeks that just seem to be less than spectacular. You look for your "story" to tell, your this is the reason I run moment, and sometimes it's just not there. Sometimes getting out on the road and checking off the training miles is all you're going to get. And that's ok!

Gluten Free Oatmeal Cookies...Granola Bars....Granola

For the love of everything that is holy. I used to be the authority on all things baked. I could make a batch of cookies with my eyes closed that could trump even the Keebler Elves. I prided myself in two things baking cookies and everything else. So while journeying down the road of gluten free and fresh fruits and veggies I hit a serious road block. How on Earth am I going to bake these small disks of goodness. And so begins my journey...

I turned to the world wide web. Google please direct me to a gluten free, no egg oatmeal cookie recipe using only honey. BAM! 1,142 articles, give or take a few. I was gitty with excitement. I was about to embark on a baking adventure. Surely one of these recipes would be close if not at good as my "before-healthy-me" days. Was I sorely mistaken. Egg replacer, check. Home ground oatmeal flour, check. Honey from only the North West, check. 88% cacao (man that stuff is bad), check. I began, blending, grinding, beating, chopping and stirring. I was certain I had at least burned off one of the cookies I would eventually eat.

Into the oven the cookie dough went and out came...GRANOLA! Where the heck did I go wrong? They went in looking exactly like cookie dough. I know, I think we have determined I am an expert. A non paid expert, but an expert none the less. I have spent entirely too long trying to figure out where exactly I went wrong. And when I say I have spent too long. I mean I have made no less than half a dozen gluten free oatmeal cookie recipes. In the oven they go cookies, out they come granola. Every time. I'm serious, if this health kick doesn't work out I'm going into magic.

So here I sit with my bowl of granola and almond milk wondering where I went wrong but realizing this is the best tasting granola I have ever had.