Currently I Am, Lately I've Been

Why do work out clothes make me feel strong?

Listening to: 



Well, that's not entirely accurate. I've been listening to the band Rooney and not just lately, for like, a year or so, and often. I discovered them on Pandora and never looked back. I love those guys. And Cameron. 




Eating: I've been eating Safeway Select Cafe salads for lunch a ton the last year. They're easy to grab on my way to work and some are super low-cal. I've eaten the Greek salad the most out of all of them. It has feta! and olives! and cucumbers! and red peppers! I love it. But have you ever eaten something so much that all of a sudden, you can't stand it? That happened today. I had the worst, uncontrollable gross-out face reaction. I had to document it.

This was the worst tasting salad I've ever eaten... and you know what? It tasted exactly as it's supposed to. I guess I've ruined it for myself. I did this to myself back in high school with the cheese sticks at the bowling alley, too. 

Watching: The Olympic swimming trials! My and Jamie's favorite Olympic sport to watch is swimming. I really don't know why, but we love it, so we've been trying to catch the trials the past few nights.

Thinking: I'm thinking about how happy I am to spend my life with someone who consistently makes me laugh. We have a little half wall just inside the front door that collects all of our miscellany. After being fed up with not knowing what to call it other than "the thing by the door", Jamie decided that from now on, we will refer to it as The Montgomery. I thought this was a real name that he had learned on the internet. I was wrong. He just made it up and claims it will be easy remember. He's right.

The Montgomery

Loving: This is a no-brainer and probably not a surprise to anyone who reads this blog, but I am still--STILL loving Pilates and Spin. I'm feeling so good about myself and my results and it is keeping me motivated to be healthier.

Anticipating: I have a hair appointment this afternoon. I've decided to shell out the cash for the Keratin Smoothing Complex Treatmant. It's pricey, but I found a salon that offers the treatment for $100 less than everyone else around, so I went for it. I've been growing my hair out for a while now and it's finally longer than it's ever been in my whole dang life. The reason it's never been this long before is that it is so unmanageable at longer lengths. It takes way too damn long to style if I want to wear it down and I just don't have the patience for it, so I decided to try this treatment. It won't make my hair stick straight, but it will smooth out the curls and significantly reduce frizz cutting my styling time down majorly. I'll be sure to dedicate a post to it with before and after pics.

Thankful for: Those big, funky flavored chocolate bars. One or two squares curb my craving for sweets in the evening. Recently I've been enjoying Ghirardelli's milk chocolate with almonds and sea salt and Safeway Select's dark chocolate with lemon and pepper. The serving size for these bars is one third of the bar for between 130 and 180 calories, but I'm only eating one or two squares which is like a third of one third of the bar! So it's really not bad to satiate my sweet tooth.

This photo is irrelevant. 

I nabbed this "Currently" idea from Sometimes Sweet.

I AM a Thigh Master

Okay, so I haven't had much to talk about this last week as shown by my lack of posting. Ah well, who cares. I spent half of those mornings working out, so there. The non-existent posts would have been BS filler posts full of Instagram photos about nothing. (Which reminds me, I need to tell you guys about The Montgomery.)

Moving on.

This week has been good for fitness. I had Spin/Pilates Thursday night, which was subbed by the woman who kicked my ass at Wednesday morning's Spin class, so that was extra fun. I somehow decided that I still wanted more, so after class I signed up for Friday's 10am Pilates. Friday's Pilates was incredible! And fun. And hard. And killed my quads so hard in the face. See this video with the most inappropriate and annoying music ever for an example of what I did most of the class that killed my quads. Looks easy and fun, but my quads told me to go stick it.




I took the weekend off and may have gone a little far with the cheating. I wasn't too terribly terrible with my food, but I sho'did drink. A lot. And not water. Alcohol. It was so fun and worth it as it was consumed in good company. However, I did feel it the next day. A lot. Well, it wasn't really the hangover that was killing me, it was the lack of water consumption. Now that I've been working out, I've been drinking tons of water.  Now my body really knows how good it feels to be hydrated and flushed, so when I wasn't drinking water, my body decided to hate me. It's okay. I forgive it. 

I worked hard to make up for it, though. I had a pretty good hour of Spin Monday evening, some pretty hard Pilates on Tuesday morning, then crazy hard Spin yesterday morning. And now, here I am at my weekly progress report!


June 7, 2012

• Weight - 163 (+20)
• Bust - 40"
• Waist - 34" (+4)
• Belly - 40.5" 
• Hips/Butt - 43.5" (+3.25)
• Thigh - 25.5" (+2)
• Knee - 16.5"
• Calf - 14.25"
• Arm - 13" (+1.75)

June 21, 2012

• Weight - 159 (-1.5, -4)
• Bust - 39.75" (-0.25, -0.25)
• Waist - 32.5" (0, -1.5)
• Belly - 40.5" 
• Hips/Butt - 42.75" (-0.25, -0.75)
• Thigh - 25" (-0.25, -0.5)
• Knee - 15.75" (-0.25, -0.75)
• Calf - 13.75" (-0.25, -0.5)
• Arm - 13"

June 28, 2012

• Weight - 160 (+1, -3)
• Bust - 39.5" (-0.25, -0.5)
• Waist - 32.25" (-0.25, -1.75)
• Belly - 40.25" (-0.25, -0.25) 
• Hips/Butt - 42.5" (-0.25, -1)
• Thigh - 24.75" (-0.25, -0.75)
• Knee - 15.75" (0, -0.75)
• Calf - 13.75" (0, -0.5)
• Arm - 13"

This week, I've gained a pound, but I'm not really worried about it since I still lost an inch and a quarter. I also have a feeling that it's tied to my cycle. When I lost weight two years ago, I weighed myself daily, and there was always one week that I plateaued or gained. Guess what. I'm on the same point in my cycle that it happened before, so I'm not concerned.

I want to share one more thing. Last week I showed you my knee progress. This week, thigh progress!

Let me start by telling you how much I hate shorts. A lot. I hate wearing shorts. Hate. Mostly because of my thighs. They rub together and cause my shorts to bunch and gather as close to my vagina as possible, then get stuck there. Yeah, that's classy. When I lost the weight two years ago, I bought a pair of shorts. They fit! Oh, cute! I can wear shorts! Then I brought them home and walked around in them. NOPE. Still bunching and wedging and yuck.

Out of curiosity, I decided to try these shorts on the other day. They don't really fit yet, but I was able to button and zip them. It required some muscle, but I got them on. Then I walked around. Uhm what? Still walking. No bunching. What? No bunching? LOOK.

Yes, the shorts are still too small, but they're not riding up! This doesn't mean I'm going to run out and buy some shorts. I'm not there yet. But this shows me that the Pilates is working to suck me in in some really key places. My thighs are still flappy as you can see in the gif, but they're getting so much better.

My shorts curiosity actually stemmed from a realization. Before I started working out and eating better, I was noticing something that I had never had before. When I stood with my feet together, I could feel my inner thighs kind of pushing against each other. Like they weren't quite fitting in there anymore. It was the worst feeling I've had to date about the weight I had put on. The other day, however, I noticed that I didn't feel that anymore! It was so exciting, and that led me to try on the shorts.

So hooray! More results! After three weeks I've lost 3 pounds and 5.5 inches, and I am so so happy with that.

Fitness Update!

Today wraps up week two of Pilates and Spin classes and my efforts to eat better and drink more water. I say "better" because I don't want to put myself on a diet. I've said this before and I really think it's the best choice for a long term change. I was really restrictive and counted calories when I lost weight in 2010 and it worked. However, it's just too different and too much work to be something that I can do daily and have it not piss me off.


Making better food choices is tolerable and can easily become a habit. In some cases it's a no-brainer. Jamie came home the other day with carne asada to grill, Spanish rice, refried beans and corn tortillas; I looked over the nutrition info. In this case, I could skip out on any of the three choices that wasn't the meat and save about 150 or more calories. While the rice and the beans were high in other bad things, they weren't too bad calorically. I decided to pass on the tortillas, which knocked about 220 calories off of my meal. 


In last week's post, I had gone to class Monday and Wednesday and was very sore. I wasn't sure if I should go to my Friday class; I didn't want to overdo it and hurt myself. After some time and thought and Googling "work through DOMS", I decided to push through it! After class on Friday, I was feeling great and really motivated, so I scheduled four classes for this week, all back to back, and so far it's been great. 


Oh hey, and guess what. I'm still seeing results! I'm going to keep this a weekly update, so what I'll do is post three sets of numbers. Because I like to see where I've come overall, I'll post my original numbers. And to see my progress over a week, I'll post last week's numbers. Finally, duh, I'll post my current numbers. So here goes.



June 7, 2012

• Weight - 163 (+20)
• Bust - 40"
• Waist - 34" (+4)
• Belly - 40.5" 
• Hips/Butt - 43.5" (+3.25)
• Thigh - 25.5" (+2)
• Knee - 16.5"
• Calf - 14.25"
• Arm - 13" (+1.75)

June 14, 2012

• Weight - 160.5 (-2.5)
• Bust - 40"
• Waist - 32.5" (-1.5)
• Belly - 40.5"
• Hips/Butt - 43" (-0.5)
• Thigh - 25.25" (-0.25)
• Knee - 16" (-0.5)
• Calf - 14" (-0.5)
• Arm - 13"

June 21, 2012

• Weight - 159 (-1.5, -4)
• Bust - 39.75" (-0.25, -0.25)
• Waist - 32.5" (0, -1.5)
• Belly - 40.5" 
• Hips/Butt - 42.75" (-0.25, -0.75)
• Thigh - 25" (-0.25, -0.5)
• Knee - 15.75" (-0.25, -0.75)
• Calf - 13.75" (-0.25, -0.5)
• Arm - 13"

This week I've lost a pound and a half and an 1.25 inches! I'm trying not to let my lack of change in my belly and arms disappoint me. I scheduled a little more Spin for next week, so hopefully that will help with the fat-burning. 

I am really excited about the results I am seeing: my legs. While I've never been a fan of my thighs, and I am losing inches there, I'm most excited about my knees. I don't wear shorts and tend to keep my thighs covered, and that doesn't bother me. But I love summer dresses and I've been feeling not-so-fantastic about wearing my shorter ones because of that stupid flap of flab that hangs at the top of my knee. I would always see it when I flipped my head over to dry my hair upside down and AGH. But that stupid flab flap is disappearing! Look!

In the before picture, I was mid-turn, so my knees are slightly bent. In the after picture, my knees are locked and I'm bending over to take the picture, which would make the flab flap worse, but look, it's not! And uhm, hello? Do you see my quads?

I'm gonna* keep this up, man.

*Why doesn't "gonna" have a squiggly line under it? Are you serious? Is it a word now? Dumb.

Wordless-ish Wednesday

He hides in the closet, getting everything hairy.

He only snuggles when I have work to do.

He thinks he is a human baby.

He lounges like he don't give a whaaaaa.

He sleeps face down.

His kittie toes are the bestest.

Chase yells almost constantly. He's getting kind of old; he'll be 13 soon. If you look at him? He yells. Walk near him? He yells. He complains to much and is very demanding. But he loves to snuggle and is so very tolerant of me. Well, sometimes.

WHOA.

In participation with Wordless{ish} Wednesday at The Paper Mama

Fifteen and a Half

Jamie always wakes up before me, even on the weekends. On Sunday, I woke just enough to hear him wrestling with some laundry then dozed back to sleep. I woke up for the day when I heard him come back in the house from walking Chuck. He was on the phone wishing his dad a happy Father's Day. I sunk into the mattress and shrouded myself with the heavy comforter.

False advertising. It wasn't comforting.

My dad died on March 2nd, 2011 after a six year, on again/off again battle with colon cancer. My dad had no reservations about telling me how he was relieved when my mom canceled what was supposed to be their first date because he had found out he had VD and "didn't want to risk it." In early 2005, however, he didn't want to be the one to tell me he had cancer.

I knew that the doctors suspected it and I knew when Dad was expecting his results, so I called him from the Metrolink station on the way to work. He wanted to pawn it off on Mom, but she wasn't home; I pushed. Dejected, he answered, "It's cancer."

He was on chemotherapy treatments after his initial surgery to remove a large portion of his colon. After some time, they told him he was clear! No cancer. They removed his chemo port from his chest. What a jinx that was. A few months later, we found out that his cancer had spread through the lymph system to his lungs. The cancer spread more over time and at the end of 2010, it reached his brain. 


Sometime toward the end of February 2011, I went home to Ohio. It took me two days as I had to spend the night in Denver. My last normal conversation with my dad was on the phone at the Denver airport. By the time I got there, he couldn't hold a normal conversation. He was still in the rehab center when I first saw him. He was sleeping. My mom woke him up, "Darrell, Darrell! Look who's here." 


He forced out, with raspy breath, "Buttons*." 


I managed to keep it together for a while and didn't lose it until I was alone with him. I sat on his bed, at his hip, facing away to the window. I held his hand while watching the snow fall. The snow on the ground was so new and so white and the flakes that were falling were huge. It was peaceful and I began to tear up. As I was no longer able to keep my composure, I laid my head down on his chest. He kissed me twice on the head and I cried. 


The following two days involved speaking with Hospice, setting up a hospital bed at home in the living room and of course, moving him back into the house. We spent a week or so after that at home with Dad. Family and friends visited and we felt so supported. It seems like Mom and I lived off of pizza and lattes from East West Brew House and sugar wafers, and I have no complaints about that. 


It was an odd relief when my dad died. He had been sleeping for nearly a day straight when it happened. My Aunt Mary had been at the house for a couple hours, and I was in the other room, chatting with Jamie online. In the middle of our conversation, I said "I'm going to go in the other room. Aunt Mary's been here for a while, I'm just going to go in there."

I walked into the living room and stood at the foot of the bed. Dad was sleeping; breathing as he had been. Hong-hoo, hong-hoo, hong-hoo. Mom sat in the chair to my dad's right. Aunt Mary, standing to his left said, in her usual "well gosh!" tone, "Geez, I wish I knew a better prayer in Polish! I only know the Lenten prayer." I urged her to say it, anyway, and she bent down to recite it in his ear. She stood back up. Hong-hoo, hong-hoo, hong-- We waited. He had been having some apnea, so we just stood there a little wide-eyed in anticipation. I held my breath. HOO hong-hoo, hong-hoo. 


We all relaxed. "Wow," I said, "Can you imagine if you said that prayer and then that was it!?"

Hong-hoo, hong-hoo, hong--


We looked at him. We looked at each other and waited.

"I think this is it, Dolly**." Mom said.

It was a really unexpected reaction, but I was relieved and felt at peace. I gazed over my dad and I smiled.

***

It's been fifteen and a half months. Father's Day didn't seem as hard last year as it was this year. I may have still been in my relief stage then, which has since worn off. Time has made the sad days fewer and farther between, but Father's Day was really rough. I think I spent two thirds of the day in a state of weepiness and on the couch with the laptop dialed to Pinterest, which helped. (So did the margarita Jamie made me.)

Over future years, I hope to be able to spend Father's Day with my own kids, showing Jamie how much we love him and telling my children stories about their Grandpa Stancliff much in the way Dad told me stories about my Grandpa Stancliff who had passed before I was born. 

My dad left a lot of things behind and has given me so much over the years. I am just so happy to be able to say that the last thing my dad gave me was a smile.

*Buttons has always been my dad's nickname for me.

**Similarly, my mom has always called me Dolly.

Eight Legs and Lemon Pledge: A True Story

I received an email the other day from Jamie's mom, Chris. (Hi!) She's very familiar with my fear of spiders and can often relate, so she decided to write me and share her adventure of dealing with a spider in the house when no one was around to do it for her. With her permission, I thought I'd share it here with everyone.

Hi Sammy,

I know you'll get what I'm talking about. I ran into our downstairs half bath to use it this morning. I didn't turn on the light and had just sat down when I noticed something black on the floor not far from my feet. It was about the size of a dime, but I didn't have enough light to actually see it well. I decided not to take my eyes off the thing. I was praying that it wouldn't move...and for a minute or so it didn't. Then it did and it was crawling over to the wall. I got up quickly and flipped on the light switch and there it was - - a very black and hairy spider.

I had to think fast. I couldn't yell for Tom because he was out walking the dog. I could never smush it with a tissue or even tissues because it would probably make that popping sound that they all make when their bodies are crushed. Ugh! I couldn't even just flick off the light and walk away because I knew I'd never be able to use that bathroom again unless we hunted it down and I actually saw that the creature had been "made toast."

So, I quietly opened the cabinet under the sink and considered my options. I was going to grab a container of toilet bowl cleaner and whack him, but I knew that I'd have to clean his crushed spider body off the bottle before I could use it again, and that grossed me out. I grabbed a bottle of carpet cleaner and really sprayed him good. The little sucker looked like he'd just bought the farm, but then he started to crawl again and this time right for me. So I grabbed the next bottle I could find...the lemon Pledge that moisturizes dry furniture. I soaked him in it and he must have really been dry because he stopped in his tracks and curled his legs up under his body. I quickly grabbed 4 tissues and wrapped them over each other to make about 12 layers. Then I leaned over and in one fast and smooth motion swept him up (as well as several inches of foamy carpet cleaner and lemony furniture polish)and threw his lifeless body into the toilet with one hand as I flushed with the other.

I cannot tell you how proud I was to have taken care of this monster all by myself, even though Tom's first words when he came back into the house were "What the heck is that smell coming from the bathroom?" I had to remind him that what he smelled coming from the bathroom this morning was far more fragrant than it is on most mornings. (;

love you,
Chris

I had such a laugh reading this as I could imagine just how she felt when she first saw the spot and suspected what it was. I could also relate to just about everything else in this story; I've been known to use hairspray in my defense against the eight-leggers just to prevent having to clean up a smush.

I know some people are advocates of these guys and will either leave them be, or take them outside, but I just can't. If I know he's in there, I'm thinking about it... constantly. Then if he's gone, I'm really concerned with where he might be or where he's going to turn up next. It's too much!

So thank you, dear mother-in-law, for sharing your story. I certainly can relate and I'm sure plenty of other folks can, too.

Dear Internet, It's Working!

Last Thursday I posted about my new adventure into Pilates and Spin. When I posted, I hadn't gone to my first class yet which was later that day. I was pretty intimidated, but was feeling good about getting started so I posted my past weight and measurements along with my current weight and measurements.

Now, a week later, I have gone to only three classes: my first class which involved 30 minutes of Spin and 30 minutes of Pilates, my second class was a full hour of Spin and my third class yesterday morning was a full hour of Pilates. On top of classes, I've been making an effort to eat better with smaller portions, but without hugely restricting myself. I also haven't been stepping on the scale every day, obsessing over whether or not I've lost a pound. When I finally stepped on the scale today, I was so so excited to see what I saw that I went straight for the measuring tape to check my progress.

Here are last week's numbers followed by today's numbers.

June 7, 2012

• Weight - 163 (+20)
• Bust - 40"
• Waist - 34" (+4")
• Belly - 40.5" 
• Hips/Butt - 43.5" (+3.25")
• Thigh - 25.5" (+2")
• Knee - 16.5"
• Calf - 14.25"
• Arm - 13" (+1.75")

June 14, 2012

• Weight - 160.5 (-2.5)
• Bust - 40"
• Waist - 32.5" (-1.5")
• Belly - 40.5"
• Hips/Butt - 43" (-0.5")
• Thigh - 25.25" (-0.25")
• Knee - 16" (-0.5")
• Calf - 14" (-0.5")
• Arm - 13"

I've lost 2.5 pounds and 3.25 inches, you guys! In one week. That is plenty to keep me motivated to keep going. Not that I was having trouble with motivation, but results definitely help. And so, because I'm seeing results, I've worked up the gut to post my before picture! And not only is it a picture, it's an animated gif. You're welcome. Or, I'm sorry. Take whichever you need. I felt really uncomfortable taking these photos. 

So this is really scary for me to put up, but I'm hoping it helps me. Check out that cool muffin top! NOT. I'm not sure when an appropriate time to do progress photos is, so I'll decide that as I go. Maybe monthly? Bi-monthly? We'll see.

As for today, I'm feeling really great having discovered my decrease in pounds and inches. I'm really sore from yesterday's Pilates that I'm considering canceling tomorrow's class just because I don't want to hurt myself and that I'm really certain that I'll be too sore to stand. BUT. The results are encouraging me to push through. I don't have much time to decide before it's too late to cancel and they charge me a fee, so... thoughts? 

Holy crap, I can't believe I'm half-naked up there for the world to see. 

Blog Design is Fun

I love blogging.

I think I love designing blogs more, though. I can't do any of that fancy stuff you see on those big fancy blogs, but I sure love me some background, banner and button design. Can I show off what I've done? Yeah? Cool.

http://hundyandundy.blogspot.com/

Anyone remember Hundy&Undy? I miss running that blog. If blogging could be my job, I'd run Hundy&Undy again. I spent a lot a lot a lot of time on this one, which is a redesign. I should've screen capped the original design, which wasn't bad, but this one is such an improvement. I still love this design.

http://www.sixandthirtyphotography.com/

I'm not so in love with this one anymore. It's my photography blog and it's just... too much. I'm going to have to work on this one some time.

This next one isn't one of my blogs, it's Misty's new blog! She told me she wanted to start up a blog to document her year of wedding planning, so I offered to design her blog. She told me she liked the stripes on my blog, but wanted them black and white. That was easy. Put together a banner, sidebar photo, tweak some things and we were good to go.

http://mistyandwesley.blogspot.com/

I wish I had more to share! I want to do more to satiate my creative bug .I try to keep the creative stuff digital, because it's free. I used to craft fairly often, but man, that gets expensive... and then I have a bunch of craft crap leftover and a dumb finished product that I have no use for. If you or anyone you know needs a blog designed or redesigned, hit me up man.

Currently (or maybe it should be called "Lately"?)

Food choices are improving.

Listening: I've been spending a lot of time with Jack White's new album, Blunderbuss, on Spotify. While do I love his originals, I'm in love with his cover of I'm Shakin'.




Eating: See above! Since making the decision to join the Pilates studio, I've been trying to make better food choices. One of those is to eat breakfast regularly, and it can't be leftover pizza or cookies. (Too bad.) I picked up a tub of vanilla Chobani greek yogurt, some store-brand granola and some fresh berries and, oh hey look, now I have breakfast! I chose the Chobani because, out of all of the yogurts, it had the least amount of sugar at 16g per serving. That's still a lot to me (when grocery shopping, I look at labels and try to keep it under 10g of sugar per serving) but everything else had 22-26g of sugar per serving. Yikes. The store-brand granola was the best choice as well with only 6g of sugar per serving. It was also only $2.99! My next project will be figuring out lunches to take to work. That's so much more difficult for me.
Watching: We have so many shows right now! Nurse Jackie and Mad Men are coming to a close for the season, which I'm sad about, but True Blood started up again last night! I just love that show. It's so ridiculous, but how can it not be? The humor is great. Fashionable Vampire Pam changing into a borrowed yellow sweat suit with kittens on it from Walmart because she doesn't want to get her clothes dirty when she's buried to "turn" a human and then complaining about it? I love it.
Thinking: OUCH. Ow. While most of my sore muscles have gone back to normal, my abs are still killing me from my first Pilates class. They were so sore Saturday and Sunday that I was having trouble laying myself down and getting up from laying down. Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, I still am kind of sore elsewhere, but my abs definitely were and still are the worst of it. Tonight is a full hour of Spin; I don't have Pilates again until Wednesday morning, so no planking for a little while, yet.
Loving: The weather! Is it just me or has June Gloom not been around much this year? It's overcast in the morning, like usual, but the marine layer hasn't been sticking around all day like in June Glooms past leaving us with beautiful 80 degree days. I'm enjoying wearing some of the summer dresses I'm trying to stock up on. 
Anticipating: Weddings! First up is my brother's wedding in late August. I am so so excited and can't wait to get to Ohio for it. Then, a month later in late September is Jamie's brother's wedding which should also be super fun. 
Thankful For: My husband, man. Sometimes he's just too good to me. 

I nabbed this "Currently" idea from Sometimes Sweet.

Fitness Follow-Up

I am currently aware of nearly every muscle in my body; they're all angry that I haven't used them in a long time.

I went to my very first class last night at Studio 5 here in Ladera Ranch and I'm completely sold. I walked in and was promptly greeted by the instructor, Jenn. "Are you Samantha?" I was. Am. Still am. Sam. Anyway, she handed me a couple forms to fill out, asked if I had ever spun before (spinned? spun. spun? It's "spun" right?) and if I had used a Pilates reformer. No and no. She assured me she'd help me out and offer modifications as needed.

We began with 30 minutes of spinning. Misty introduced me to the bike and helped me figure it out and gave me some tips. A few ladies around me chimed in as well as I figured it all out. When I say "a few of the ladies", it really also means "most of the ladies". The maximum class size for most classes at this studio is 6 people. I was weary that this would make me stick out like a sore thumb and feel really awkward not knowing 100% what I was doing. At 24 Hour Fitness, I hid in the back of the class at TKB and yoga until I felt more confident. At Studio 5, it was just me and 5 other women; there's no where to hide! I was quickly put at ease, however, and I spun.

Aside from my sore rear-end today, I really liked spinning! I never thought I would. I always felt really strange on stationary bikes and generally preferred other methods of cardio, but I never knew how muscle-tastic spinning was. While I did have to skip a couple requests to add tension and a couple rounds of standing, I think I did fairly well for my first time. I'm going back for a full hour of Spin on Monday with Misty!

We moved on to Pilates on the reformer. For those who might not know what a reformer is, I'll tell you. It's scary. That's what it is. Well, only at first. It's a Medieval-looking contraption with pulleys, springs, straps, bars and cushions... and it was so cool. Basically, you use the straps to pull your body weight on the sliding platform with extra resistance added by springs.

Image: studio5ladera.com

The first thing we were to do was to kneel on the platform and use the straps to do arm curls (which would pull yourself forward and back with each rep). I, however, was getting an intense toe cramp when I tried to kneel. My instructor, Jenn, didn't hesitate to offer a modification for me. She put the box (that you see at the foot of the reformer in the photo) on the platform and had me sit on it and do my arm exercises that way.

After approximately one hundred million arm exercises (or so it felt to my weakened body), we moved on to planks. I love planks for what they do to my body, but I am so not strong enough for all of the planking we did. See how she's planking in that photo up there? That's what we did. Except! We did them with movements like sliding the platform so we'd be in a pike position, or sliding the platform and bending our knees, et cetera, et cetera. We did maybe 5 or 6 different ones, 15 reps each. Well, I did 15 reps of the first one, where all we had to do was hold the plank and move our elbows forward and back. The rest I did less and less reps with my max being, maybe 5? Wowza were those hard, but I kind of loved them.

While I wasn't able to do as many reps as the other ladies, Jenn was very encouraging and helpful. And in the same way that I didn't feel like a fitness poser while spinning, I was very comfortable in the room with the  other ladies, even when I was only able to do one pike plank before resting.

We finished with some really great leg stretches on the reformer. They felt so great. Instead of explaining them, you can see them below. (Gentlemen, you're welcome.)

So, it's fairly needless to say that I stopped in this morning and signed up for their first month unlimited classes special. I'll use this weekend to recover and focus on making better food choices. I've signed up for three classes next week. First up will be a full hour of Spin with Misty on Monday!

Appropriate Title for Fitness Motivation

I've been feeling like various farm animals lately: pig, heifer, elephant... (I never specified what kind of farm this is.) It's really time to get my ass in gear. (More animals? No.) I've mentioned in this post my struggle with motivation to use our oh-so-convenient elliptical machine. What I've concluded is that there are no consequences if I don't use it. I don't have the discipline to just make myself use it, and I don't have the motivation to use it during my free time. I need consequences! I need to be whipped into shape. (Animal references! Yikes.)

I was explaining this all to Jamie yesterday. He suggested I check out the local Pilates place where our friend Misty and our sister-in-law-to-be Renata take classes. I have heard them rave about this place in the past, but just couldn't wrap my head around the price; I could cover it with my part-time paycheck, but it wouldn't leave me much for groceries and other necessities. (And maybe shoes.) My super-spectacular husband says, "If you want to go, and are going to go, then I'll pay for it."

I chatted and texted with Misty and Renata all about it while looking into the various classes the studio offers, as well as pricing packages. I decided to pay for just a single class to go check it out, which happens to be tonight. I'm pretty scared. The class is Spin + Pilates: 30 minutes spinning and 30 minutes of Pilates on the reformer. I have never done either of those! Luckily, Misty will be there to help me out and hold my hand.

I'm hoping I love it. I think I will love it, and I think I will end up signing up for their discounted new client first month and I think it will work. This place, which has very small classes, in addition to your monthly payment, will charge you $20 if you don't go to a class that you register for. Hello, consequences! Welcome back, discipline and motivation? Hopefully.

I lost 20 pounds during the first half of 2010. I was so motivated and fairly strict with my eating habits and it worked really well. I've done it before, and I can do it again. The main reason I lost track of myself was my dad dying; Mom and I pretty much lived off of sugar wafer cookies for two weeks. It was so delicious, and so worth it at the time. I do not regret the stress-eating. But now, a year later, I'm ready to move on from it. I'm also really certain that I should lose the weight I have before I put any pregnancy weight on in the future. 20 pounds, kidless, will be a lot easier to lose than 20 pounds plus how ever many I put on while pregnant after having a baby, I'm sure.

Motivation from when I was lighter, stronger and kinda bendy.

Now, for the record, I'm going to post my past and present measurements!

April 21, 2010 (Which is the date that photo was taken, and the last time I recorded any numbers)

• Weight - 143
• Waist - 30"
• Hips - 40.25"
• Thigh - 23.5"
• Arm - 11.25"

June 7, 2012

• Weight - 163 (+20)
• Bust - 40"
• Waist - 34" (+4")
• Belly - 40.5" 
• Hips - 43.5" (+3.25")
• Thigh - 25.5" (+2")
• Arm - 13" (+1.75")

My initial goal is to reintroduce strength and cardio into my life while making better food choices. I don't plan on being too strict with my diet in the hopes that I can ease into healthier eating to make it a habit instead of a diet. I'm also hoping that checking in here with progress will help keep me motivated, so please, my dear blog audience, feel free to leave me comments either to give props or give me crap if I seem to be slacking. I need it. 

Ready. Set. Here I go!

"Hello, Newman."

Can you guess who the Newman is in my life? Or maybe I should say "what". It's my period. Newman is my period. My period is such a Newman.

Jamie and I watched the mini-series Hatfields & McCoys on The History Channel last week. Roseanna McCoy gets oopsie knocked-up by Johnse Hatfield, "Mama, I ain't had muh'flow in two months." Unfortunately for me, I don't get to say that quite yet. Fortunately for me, I won't be shunned when I don't get muh'flow since the Ellisons & Stancliffs have no on going historical family feud.

Newman showed up yesterday throwing us back to square one for another cycle. I'm not surprised; while it was definitely possible to have gotten pregnant last cycle, we were a little off our game. It happens. We'll try again!

Uninspired Funk

I can't help but think that uninspired funk would be a really lousy genre of music. It's also a pretty boring state to exist in. Ehh, that sounds depressing; it's not that bad.

I haven't had the urge to update here in about a week. I could have written about what I did last weekend while Jamie was on a boy's trip in Las Vegas, but even my imagination couldn't come up with any way to make "I sat on the couch and drank wine for two days" sound good. (It was soooo good, though.)

image: explodingdog.com

The lack of commitments made last weekend my oyster. I was going to write! I was going to take photos! I was going to get all of the prints I ordered organized and put in photo albums! Maybe I'd have time for crafts!

I did half of one of those things.

I'm not trying to fool anyone, though. Did get lonely? I had my moments. Did I cry when I watched American Pickers because I really wished my dad could have seen that episode? Definitely. (This super old grumpy-yet-charming man was a set decorator for western movies who was all buddy-buddy with The Duke? Dad! You're missing out, man!) But it really was good.

My weekend to myself wasn't the creative game-changer I thought it would be. It was supposed to get me out of my lull, and I can definitely say that it did not work out that way. At first, this disappointed me, but the days following my funk-filled weekend has allowed me to become appreciative for my uneventful time alone. Having two whole days and nights alone with my thoughts and emotions was somewhat exhausting, but really useful. I may not have gotten much accomplished, creatively, like I had hoped but the couch-time was still very beneficial.

Don't confuse this dreary post with depression. I may be missing my inspiration, but life is good and I am happy. Jamie and I are still having fun and making sure to enjoy our kidlessness. Last night, he let me shave his beard into something adventurous.

I guess I haven't lost all of my creativity...