Scapulas and Spatulas

Well, this morning I attended a wedding shower for my sister-in-law. I volunteered to bring blueberry muffins, and there is nothing like freshly baked blueberry muffins. So rather than bake them last night, I decided to wake up early to make them this morning. I needed to leave my house by 9:00am, so between wanting to exercise before the shower, and making muffins, I woke up at 6:30am.

I started on the muffins right away. While the first batch was baking, I did the first 10-minute "Total Body" workout routine from "Crunch Pilates." While the second batch baked, I did the "Belly" and "Butt" zone workouts from the same DVD. Then I needed to hop in the shower. With all of the muffins baked and cooled, and half of my exercises complete, I headed out to the shower!

After the shower, Luke was out with a friend for lunch, so I decided to take the opportunity to finish my exercising. I completed the last zone workout from "Crunch": "Thighs," then the mat pilates routine from "Pilates for Dummies," and finally, "Abs 100" from "Power 90."

By the way, the blueberry muffin recipe I used is super healthy. And I received a number of compliments for them at the shower. I definitely recommend them!

Interruptions

I leave for the cities this afternoon! And since the last thing I will want to do is exercise when I get there, I needed to get all of my exercising done before I leave...

Because I woke up a little earlier than usual, I ate a small breakfast, so I decided to wait about 30 minutes before doing my Power 90 strength training so that I wouldn't get a cramp or something. The phone kept ringing and interrupting my workout, so, the routine took about twice as long as usual, which meant that if I wanted to do a full 90 minutes of exercise today, then I would be cutting it a little close.

So, I resolved to do 60 total minutes of exercise, especially since I put in a long and hard workout just yesterday. Immediately after (finally) completing Power 90, I went on a walk outside, by myself. I didn't want Baxter slowing me down, and my mom was busy working in her garden. As long as I walked way out to the edge of town, I checked up on one of my Dad's wheat fields (at left). The second photo is the road I walked out to the wheat field. If you can't make out the sign, it says "Pavement Ends."

Now, I'm hopping in the shower before packing up my car and hitting the road!

Pilates Marathon

Today wasn't a heavy work day, and I still had some leftover motivation from yesterday to do try a pilates marathon.

When I woke up, I did 55 minutes of mat pilates. At about 2:00pm, I concentrated on abs with Yoga Booty Ballet: Hip Hop Abs, followed by standing pilates, followed by Power 90 5-minute "Ab Ripper 100."

At 8:30pm, I ended the day with some stretching yoga: Core Strength Pilates with Trudie Styler.

That's a total of 3 hours of pilates! I feel great!

Morning Motivation

Well, this morning, I got up and did exactly what I set my mind to last night. I popped the Power 90 Sculpt DVD in my computer, folded up my bed, and did 30 minutes of strength training in my basement apartment.

But even before that, I weighed in for the week: 123.2 pounds. Which means I lost 1.4 pounds in the past week for a total of 8.8 pounds. It's obvious that the weight I'm losing from one week to the next is half as much as was lost the week before. This is because I am getting closer to my goal weight. This just means I will have to amp up my exercise and work harder!

After strength training with Tony Horton, I had to work for 2 hours, but then went on a 45 minute walk with Baxter around Halstad. It was a gorgeous day. In the 45 minutes of our walk, we walked 2.5 miles. I got an amazing burn in my calves!

May Day! May Day!

So today, not so good a day. I had to drive and run around doing a lot of errands today, which affected when I was able to have a healthy snack or meal. So by the time I got around to being able to exercise, I was feeling zapped of energy and fairly uninspired to exercise. It was also getting dark out, so I couldn't simply walk outdoors with Baxter. I decided to walk on the treadmill for 60 minutes, while watching episodes saved in my Hulu queue to help pass the time. I still found myself looking down at the "minutes left" field on the treadmill and silently counting down the seconds whenever it was near a multiple of 10 (i.e. 40 minutes, 30 minutes, 20...).

Because it was such a light exercise day, and because I've been exercising later in the day (when I'd rather start the day with exercise), I plan to get up in the morning and do my exercises right away! Let's see how I do.

The one good thing that happened today was that I visited my Grandma in the midst of running errands and she commented on how I'm still losing weight! Thanks, Grandma!

Multi-Purpose Bedroom

Well, despite all of the cold, rainy weather we've been having in Halstad, Minnesota, the sun came through with a winner of a day. I think the temperature rose above 70 degrees!

Unfortunately, I was not feeling well for the majority of the day. It probably has a lot to do with being on the bus so much over the weekend, and maybe the Starbucks spinach wrap I had this morning for breakfast... At around 4:30pm, after my mom had already been walking with Baxter for 20+ minutes, she came in and insisted I come walk with her, as it was such a gorgeous day outside.

We walked up and down every street in Halstad (running north-south). It took a full hour, and totalled 3-miles in distance.

Much later in the evening, we got around to our strength training with Tony Horton. Since my dad was watching a game on the tv in the living room, we did the routine in my basement apartment instead. See pictures of before and after of my bedroom to workout space above!

Limited Time in Travel

Well, after a long day yesterday of being on the bus and burning the midnight oil out with Luke and friends, I still set my alarm for an early 6:00am wake-up time, because I wasn't sure how much exercise I would get in later in the afternoon. Our day was going to be packed with family events. Unfortunately, I kept hitting snooze...so, it wasn't until 6:30 that I finally rolled out of bed. And then, I was so tired that it took awhile to get changed, queue up my "Pilates for Dummies" DVD on Luke's laptop, and find a pilates mat. It was already 7:30, and I had only done 35 minutes of exercise, but I had to stop and get ready for the day.

Knowing that I may not even come back home before having to go back to the bus station, I packed my overnight bag back up, and threw a pair of tennis shoes in our car, so that I would have them handy in case time for a walk presented itself later in the day. ...It never did.

Regardless, I was able to stick to my healthy diet. For lunch, the entire family ate "Aidells chicken sausages." They come in a variety of flavors, ranging in calories from 160 to 200 per 3 ounces. Props to Ken for finding this healthy brat alternative!