Photo Shoot

I tried to make our Christmas card last week and quickly realized that I have ZERO pictures of Michael and I from this past year. I mean, unless you think I should use a picture of me doing a pull-up or him doing a clean and jerk. Personally, I think that would be one awesome card, but our families would probably think we were losing our minds.

Some friends of ours out here realized the same thing recently so we all met up at a local coffee shop and took turns trying to capture some workable photos. I wasn't expecting anything fancy, just something we could use for a Christmas card. I much rather would have had my good friend and photographer, Amy Sayre, fly down from Chicago just for this occasion, but these would just have to do.

I think they look even better when I view them on the computer. For some reason, when I upload them to Blogger, I think the quality goes down and they look a little grain-y. What-evs!

Until tomorrow,

Read more...

Weighted pull-ups

Wow, where did I come from? Seriously, I can't believe the improvement I just made with my pull-ups.

On October 4th, I attempted weighted pull-ups for the very first time. I was able to do 2.5 lbs by myself but Michael gave me a little boost when it came to the 5 lbs.

I did weighted pull-ups again today and here's how I did:

I'm on the right side- as you can see, I was able to go as high as 12.5 lbs! That's a major improvement! With every round I kept saying, "I probably won't get this, but here it goes..." and then I'd get it. I could NOT believe it myself but I'm totally pumped about it. And yes, my chin was above the bar on each rep!

Michael took some pictures- as you can see in one picture, he slapped my ass a few times and his white powder print showed quited perfectly on my black pants!

Remember that "big booty" I'm referenced multiple times? Take a look at the difference in this picture between the width of my waist and that of the widest part of my thighs- no wonder I have trouble finding jeans that fit!

 

Until tomorrow,

Read more...

Thanksgiving

I hope everyone had a fabulous Thanksgiving! I know I did... here are some pictures from the past week.

I'm so sad to think that my one week vacation is almost over- total bummer!



Tomorrow Michael and I are getting together with another couple to take pictures. I realized when trying to do our Christmas cards that we have no pictures of us from this past year! Not sure what we've been doing... well, I'm pretty sure people don't want to see us working out on our Christmas cards and that's what we take pictures of! So, we're going to this nearby coffee shop which is adorable- they have a cute patio and a rose garden. The other couple we're going with wanted pictures too so we're going to take each other's. I'm sure they won't be terrific but we'll hopefully have a workable shot or two out of the bunch. 

Until tomorrow,

Read more...

Another PR

I am seriously on a roll right now with my fitness! I set another PR tonight with my front squats...just a few nights ago, I set a Push Press PR so that's 2 PR's in a week. Woot! I'm feeling incredibly strong right now!

Last week, my 3-rep front squat max was 120# and previously, my 1-rep front squat was only 125# so I went into the WOD pretty much knowing I'd be able to set a PR; I just didn't know how much of a PR. I'm excited to report that I did 145# twice!

I almost didn't try 145# because I honestly didn't think I'd be able to get it. And I'll admit, that first attempt I almost didn't. My elbows dropped more than they should have which was why I decided to repeat 145# instead of possibly attempting more weight. The second rep at 145# had MUCH BETTER form and I felt much stronger. I'm sure it was mental- I already knew I could do it so I wasn't scared about that anymore. It was definitely an awesome night!



I spent the day with my sister and my niece. I don't have any pictures right now but I'll post them later this week.

Until tomorrow,

Read more...

Against the clock

Most of the workouts we do, we're racing against the clock- trying to beat your time before. I think simply knowing that the clock is ticking away pushes me to keep going.

Tonight's WOD there was no clock- no timer. It was just me, working out, pushing myself for no other reason than because I should and because my body can take it. It was sort of refreshing and a mental challenge to keep pushing although there wasn't going to be a score at the end.

I did:
20 kettlebell swings, 35#
400m sprint

Then I rested for a minute or two until I got a slight recovery.

Then I did:
8 snatches (45#)
400m sprint

Then I rested for a minute or two until I got a slight recovery.

Then I did:
8 Hang Power Cleans 80#
400m sprint

I went all out and left no gas left in the tank each round because I knew I would get a small recovery. It was a fun workout and we got inside just before the rain started!

On a side note- my hang power cleans were a little screwy tonight. I wasn't pulling straight up, I was coming out and away from my body for some reason which made it difficult to get my elbows under quickly. Michael pointed it out and I corrected it on the last rep but still, kind of annoyed that I started doing that all of a sudden.

I'm still being uber productive and that didn't end today! Michael and I made our Christmas card list and made a list of all the gifts we want to buy people this year. We didn't actually purchase any but at least we have a game plan where we need to shop. I also washed all the doors throughout the house, washed the window sills downstairs, dusted our bedroom, and wiped down the 2nd ceiling fan. Michael shampooed our carpets even!

While we were at the grocery store, I splurged on a fresh bouquet of flowers! I just couldn't resist. I absolutely love a fresh vase of flowers on the dining room table or near it. I don't let myself buy them that often because they're not exactly practical. I often think that if money weren't an issue, I would always have fresh flowers throughout my house. They just make me so happy!

Read more...

Push Press PR!

Sorry for the blog hiatus. I was traveling for work the past few days up to Flagstaff, Sedona, Cottonwood, Payson, and Prescott. I didn't have my laptop and didn't workout anyway. There wasn't much to blog about!

Totally stoked right now-

Just did 1-1-1-1-1-1-1 of a push press, working up to my one rep max. I've felt incredibly strong all week so I knew I couldn't really use my prior 1 rep max as a guage. I started at 80# and worked my way up from there. I told myself I'd just keep going until I couldn't get lift it. Good strategy right?

(The last time I did a 1-rep max was October 12, 2009 and it was 85#)

80

95

100

105

110

115

120f

I didn't get the 120 but I was close. And 115# is darn good for me- it's a 30# PR from where I was a year ago! I got to update my sidebar! WAHOO!

On a different note- I'm still on this "organization" kick (probably thanks to this blog here). Today I figured out how to sync my google calendar and google task lists to my phone. I love it! I have a little widget on my desktop that shows my various "lists" and I can simply scan through them or add to them the touch of a little button. How awesome is that right?

I can't tell you how much I got done this past week around my house. I cleaned off the ceiling fans and washed and ironed all the curtains. I even washed the window seals around the upstairs but still need to do the downstairs windows. It feels great! Today I reorganized my google reader and updated our online computer backup account.

Read more...

AMRAP 12

We almost did tonight's WOD as AMRAP15 and decided to do AMRAP12 at the last minute. In case all those letter confuse you, it means "As Many Rounds/Reps As Possible" in an allotted amount of time- in this case, either 12 or 15 minutes.

Now that it's over, I'm glad we did 12 minutes! It was a doozy.

Box jumps
Dumbbell power snatch 25#
Push-ups
Sit-ups

Every minute, on the minute, perform as many reps as possible of 1 category until the next minute when you do as many reps in the next category...straight for 12 minutes.

The first round of 4 exercises I did 73 total reps of everything. The second round of 4 exercises I did 82 exercises. And the final 4 exercises I did 84 rounds. Total reps = 239 in 12 minutes!

It was a great workout!

This morning I followed my plan of getting some things done before going to work. I swept and mopped both upstair bathroom floors. I felt good about getting that done and then over lunch I picked up some stuff for the dog that I've been meaning to get for months but I hardly ever go to a pet store. In other words, I'm chipping away at my to-do list!

Read more...

WOD

Man, I am really rocking these front squats. I did them again tonight and felt really strong, which is weird since I am sore from playing softball on Saturday.

Oh, yeah, I played softball on Saturday. There was a charity tournament and my work put a team together. I had a blast- it was insanely fun although we didn't win a single game. I played okay though and didn't make any terrible errors nor did I fall flat on my face while running the bases (a fear I had). So we're good!

I drank a lot on Saturday- more than this old lady is used to and as a result, spent all of Sunday in my pj's on the couch. My husband left at 9:30, came home around 1:30 and said to me, "Yup, you're still in the same spot..."

Yup, I totally was.

Anywho, back to the WOD-

3-3-3-3-3 reps of front squats. As you can kind of see by the picture to the right, I did:

75

80

95

110

120

Yay! 3-reps at 120# and trust me, it wasn't easy, but it wasn't like "oh my God I'm about to drop this" hard either. My 1-rep max from a while ago is only 125 so I'm pretty sure I've exceeded that. Next week I will do my 1-rep max and see how I do. I'm so excited!!! 

Then we did a team workout b/c we had 3 additional guys working out with us tonight.

AMRAP 12:

Person 1 does walking lunges down to the corner and back and he/she is essentially the "timer" and however fast this person moves determines how long each person is at their current station.

When the lunge person gets back from his lunges he yells "Switch" and we all rotate. The stations were:

Walking lunges

Double unders

Thrusters

Knees to elbows

Rest

Each of us started at a different station- it was a lot of fun and a tough workout for sure.

I'm still in my little "happy place"- feeling on top of things and content. After being so unproductive this weekend, however, I'm feeling like I have a lot to do before this next weekend. I desperately need to practice the piano and my sister and niece arrive on Monday for the week. My goal is to stay organized, use my lunch hours (I need to actually take a lunch hour first though), and chip away at my to-do lists during the day so I can continue to workout in the evenings.

Read more...

Cleansing

For some reason, I think blogging about this will make me feel less guilty... we'll see if it works.

Normally when I "splurge" with my diet, it's here or there- maybe I'll go out for lunch or maybe I'll drink a frappe from McDonald's. Truthfully, I don't feel too guilty about these instances b/c I honestly feel like I'm healthy most of the time and the only reason I don't go crazy and have serious binges is b/c I allow myself these random bad-for-me-but-oh-so-good foods.

But holy hell, today was terrible. I ate shit all day long. We were treating some of our clerical employees to breakfast so I didn't eat at home. I drank my coffee on my way to work like normal, then we went to breakfast where I had a breakfast burrito. Not terrible but it had cheese and of course the tortilla. Inside were eggs and turkey sausage. I also drank coffee while sitting there. Since I ate so late in the morning, I didn't eat the morning snack I packed (which was healthy of course) and I continued to drink coffee. By noon, I hadn't drank any water which is totally rare for me.

I went to lunch with some coworkers (although, again, I packed a very healthy lunch for myself) and had a grilled chicken wrap. Again, not terrible but there was cheese and the tortilla. At least the chicken was grilled and not fried. I finally had water- the only positive thing about going out for lunch I suppose.

Came back and had a meeting. I remember thinking I should eat my healthy snack before the meeting, but must have been distracted or interrupted or something. I ended up going to the meeting without eating it and so was of course hungry during it. There were pops there to drink so I had a Dr. Pepper. This was my body needing food, not sugar. Dumb me.

Leave the meeting, still don't eat and we leave almost immediately for a happy hour where I have tortilla chips, salsa, and queso dip in addition to a beer. All of which I probably could have passed up easily had I eaten properly during the day and my body wasn't craving SHIT.

Now I'm finally home and I'm going to eat a good dinner but jeesh, talk about a crappy day of eating for me! It's honestly one of the worst days I've had in a while.

My goal is to eat completely- 100% clean on Thursday and Friday. Saturday I'm playing softball all day and it's the kind where you get drunk and then play but hopefully Sunday I'll be back to eating clean.

Slap me for being so dumb and then wish me luck on not doing it again.

I'm curious, do you have any tricks for being disciplined with your eating?

Until tomorrow,

Read more...

So much fun

Wow! What a fun workout! Ever since we turned our garage into a gym, we've had friends stop by now and again for a workout. We have our regulars, like Michael's co-worker who is also named Michael (and yes, he too goes by Michael and not Mike- talk about fricken confusing) but it's random on who stops by and on which days.

So some times like tonight we have a group of people all over on the same night! There were 4 guys in addition to Michael and I so 6 of us altogether. It was so much fun! I can't even begin to tell you!

First we did 5x5x5x5x5 reps of a front squat. I haven't done these in quite a while actually so I wasn't sure how much weight to do. The recommendation was 80% of your 1-rep max which I show to be 125# but that was all the way back in April 2009! Today I did-
65
77
80
95
105

The 105 wasn't easy but I might have been able to do 110 or even 115. I felt really strong tonight.

Then we did this workout:
Burpees reps/Kettlebell swings reps
10/1
9/2
8/3
7/4
6/5
5/6
4/7
3/8
2/9
1/10

I used the 35# kettlebell. My time was 9:17 which I was pretty proud of. Michael (my Michael) did it in 6:30 which is insane to me! Everyone was cheering each other on and really pushing each other. It was soooo much fun! I loved it!

Until tomorrow,

Read more...

A chipper WOD for a chipper me

I'm still on this sort of peaceful high. If you didn't read my last post, I mentioned how I'm feeling more organized right now and for some reason, I'm in a good place. My perspective on work is healthy (hem...healthIER than normal anyway, still hate the place) and my workouts have been great.

This weekend I got some smaller, random tasks completed-
1. I cleaned our master bathroom including the shower/tub. I swear having a bathroom that guests never see makes me completely unmotivated to ever clean it. Is that sad or what?
2. I ran to Home Depot and purchased a new burner for our stove. We MAY HAVE possibly, just maybe left it on on day and set our food scale on it which is plastic and it sort of melted all over it. Good-bye scale and we've needed a new burner ever since. tee hee- funny except it was a $26 oopsie :)
3. I started my "ideas" list for Michael's Christmas gifts. I've had all these random ideas in my head and I was afraid I'd forget them. I finally jotted them in a secret location where he can't find it.
4. I sync'd my IPOD and burned some of my CD's I've been meaning to download for a while including my Garth Brooks Greatest Hits CD from high school.
5. I'm completely caught up on laundry and it's all put away which seriously never happens in this house. Are pigs flying?
6. I redesigned my blog header a bit- it's not perfect but it's good enough.
7. I purchased $117 worth of cold medicine, contact solution, pepto, anti-itch cream, etc to get reimbursed from my flexible spending account and stock up.

As you can see, it's all pretty random stuff but I feel great for getting some of these random things done. But we took time to enjoy ourselves this weekend too- last night we had dinner at a restaurant in Scottsdale called True Food Kitchen with 6 other friends and then today Michael and I went to the Phoenix Zoo.

Then tonight we had a pretty intense workout. It was one hell of a chipper- which is a workout you just keep chipping away at no matter how slowly you're doing it because it's usually a lot of reps or takes a while. Here's what it looked like-

20 deadlifts 135#
400m run
20 kettlebell swing 36#
400m run
20 overhead squats 45#
400m run
20 burpees
400m run
20 pull-ups
400m run
20 box jumps (on the tire)
400m run
20 dumbbell squat cleans 25#'s
400m run

My time = 37:00

Yeah, talk about a doozy. It was all physical and then became entirely mental toward the end. Boy oh boy. I tore myself a great blister on my palm doing the pull-ups too.

All in all, it was darn near the perfect weekend. I hope yours was too!

Read more...

Feeling good

I'm feeling pretty good at the end of this week.

First, I only worked 51 hours this week and yes, that's good for me! I applied for some different jobs just today but I feel like I'm in a good place...simply taking it one day at a time, trying to stick it out as long as I can, but not feeling tons of pressure either. I even painted my finger nails black this week and wore it to work which is a big no-no. It was my way of rebeling I think :-P

Second, I started using Google Calendar based on my friend's recommendation. She started this blog about organizing and simplifying and... well... just check it out for yourself because I can't really do it justice. So anyway, I started using Google Calendar to make to-do lists and schedule which day of the week I'm going to tackle particular tasks. It's helped me feel organized and with a plan of attack. There are plenty of nights where I come home and do nothing because I've worked a 13 hour day so it go figure that having it on the calendar doesn't mean you have the motivation to miraculously do it. But at least I don't have all these "to-do's" running around in my head. And my house is cleaner right now than it's been in a while and I practiced the piano this week- both positive outcomes from my new calendar!

Finally, I've had some great workouts. I've eaten like poop (Jimmy John's, cupcakes, donuts, you name it) but my workouts haven't really been affected so that's good. I had my shoulder press PR a couple nights ago, kicked my butt with the guys earlier in the week finishing only 10 seconds after they did, and had another strong workout toda.

Push Press
5x5x5x3x3x3
65-65-75-75-75-80

I blogged about this before, but we don't have enough weights to do 85 or 90 pounds, you have to go from 80# to 95# unfortunately. We need to buy some more change plates. That's why I stayed at 80# since I didn't feel up for going to 95#.

Then I did 5 rounds of
1 clean & jerk 80#
7 ring dips (feet on the floor)
10 knees to elbows
Time = 10:45

My time is sucky but I blame it on the knees to elbows. To me, those things are entirely a hand workout. I cannot do 10 at a time even though my abs/core feels fine. My hands hurt sooooo bad when I do them. It sucks major so I keep stopping, shaking my hands, then doing a few more. I get the oddest blisters right in the dead center of my palms. Not cool.

Tonight we're going to dinner with a bunch of other couples and tomorrow morning we're going hiking with some different friends then following it up by going to the zoo... so we have a busy weekend!

Read more...

Shoulder Press PR

7 rounds of 1 rep shoulder press

The last time I did this I hit 75#. Then on September 26th, I did 5 rounds of 3 reps and was able to do 2 reps at 75# and then failed on the 3rd rep. I figured today would be a new PR based on my recent performance. And sure enough- 80# and I did it twice just for good measure (with a rest in between each round).

Then I did a 10-minute workout, every minute on the minute, I did the following with a 15# dumbbell:
5 Hang Power Cleans
5 Front squats
5 Split Jerks

I guess you were supposed to use a weight that was 45% of your body weight. Considering I weigh 135#, I should have used around 60#. I tried the first round with 25# dumbbells and couldn't finish even 1 round and knew I had to drop down. I ended up using 2 15# dumbbells instead b/c that's all we had. Next time I should go for 20 if we have that weight by that time.

Then I did 3 sets of 10 reps of each hip bridges and back extensions.

Here's another picture from my weekend in Philadelphia w/ my homegirls :)

Read more...

Couple of workouts

I never got around to blogging yesterday but I did workout. I did AMRAP 20-
10 snatches 45#
10 ring dips (modified- heels on the floor in front of me)
10 knees to elbows

The above workout was a hand-killer. Oh my word. Our new bar is really rough so the snatches hurt. The ring dips were okay but we need to retape them so they do rub more than they should near your thumb. And then the knees to elbows was hard on my palms. By the time the 20 minutes was up, I had at least 5 blisters on each hand forming. It was not fun... oh wait, actually it was fun :)

I completed 4 rounds + 6 snatches so 46 snatches at 45#, 40 ring dips, and 40 knees to elbows. I'm really proud of that workout.

Then tonight I did 7 x 1 rep of back squat. Gosh, I can't remember the last time I did a back squat but according to my blog, it was July 24th. That's over almost 5 full months! It's no wonder that tonight I wasn't able to put up the same weight as I did at that time. I've done back squats with 95# on the bar, but that's the heaviest in all that time- no real "strength" efforts.

In July, I did 160#. I was really trying to hit 165# but I faulted. I backed off 5# and attempted 160# and faulted again. My max for the day was 155#. There are a few reasons for this-
1. See above- not practicing any substantial weight in that length of time isn't exactly a good plan.
2. My quads are sore from all the squat snatches yesterday. I've been commenting all day about how sore they were then I tried to do max out my back squat. Again, not exactly a good plan.
3. We had 2 guys over tonight working out with us. I love this, seriously I do. But when I'd get past parallel, they'd start yelling "Up! Up! Up!" While they all seemed to love this motivation, to me it just distracted me and any focus I had was lost. I'm just not used to it but I'm sure I'll get used to it.
4. I was leaning too far forward. Not sure if this was because I was losing my focus (see #3) or because my quads were sore (see #2) or plain weakness and something I need to work on. I'll be careful of this going forward to make sure it doesn't go on too long this way.

After the squats we took a short break then did the following workout-
400m run
20 burpees
400m run
15 burpees
400m run
10 burpees
400m run
5 burpees

Time = 12:56

I was the slowest tonight but only 10 seconds slower than one guy and 20 seconds slower than the other. Michael finished a whole minute faster than all of us but I'm still proud of my time. Working out with others is certainly a big motivator to keep pushing.

They were a couple of great workouts!

Read more...