This past week I was bad.  Really bad.  We vacationed in Nags Head, NC for several days while the hubby went swan, goose, and duck hunting…..and I ate.  And drank.  And shopped.  And ate some more.  And drank.  And drank.  And drank….you get the picture.

    Now I have to pay the piper.  I will not get on the scale, because I don’t want my self worth to be measured by some stupid number that pops up and crushes my ego.  Who weighs themselves after the week I’ve enjoyed?  Only a sado-masochist would.  I will not even post how many glasses of wine or raspberry cosmos I consumed.   And they were DARN good.

    Suffice it to say that I indulged a bit too much.  But I had fun.   And isn’t that what life is all about?  Finding a balance between having fun (within limits) and a healthful lifestyle.  I know I am not able to eat/drink like this all the time.  But I will not regret a great week, with great friends, at a great place.

   Today we begin a new year….2010.  I reflected on this past year.  What I did well, what I did….not so well.  And the thing I see is that I really didn’t eat or drink horribly ALL the time, but I really could have worked out a bit more by the end of the year.  I DID kind of let my workouts slide due to the job (an excuse).  So today, I pulled out the workout wear, slipped in a power yoga dvd, and got my groove on. 

    Tonight’s dinner is chicken breasts, onions, garlic, herbs, carrots, peppers, and mushrooms, sealed in aluminum foil and baked.  We’ll have a little rice with it, and yeah, even a glass of vino.  But yoga in the morning, and a healthy dinner at night?  Yeah, I can live with that.  Start your year off right, and continue as you mean to go on.  That’s my new mantra.

Twas the week before Christmas, when all through the ‘hood

Everybody was slowin’ to look where they should.

The Wyatt’s was gleaming, the wreaths hung with care

The reindeer and snowman were quite the lawn pair.

The children were nestled, but whining all day

About laptops and Wii games and things they could play.

Big Daddy in his running pants, and I in my sweats

Could we make it this Christmas?  Off went the bets.

When up through the pipes there arose such a smell

I sprang from my couch to say “What the hell???”

Away to the yard we all flew like a flash

Soon we both knew it would take reams of cash.

The sun on the breast of the newly turned earth

Soon told us the story of our lowered net worth.

When what to my watering eyes should appear

But a superman hubby in rubber boot gear.

With sleeves rolled up high, and thank God, a plugged nose

He got down to business attacking that hose.

He hit the main line, crap flew a mile high

But hubby’s determined, he’s quite a swell guy.

“Now drainfield, now septic, now distribution box,

I’ll fix this quite quickly, I’ll dig out those rocks.

I’ll buy me a pipe from Lowe’s down the street,

This problem will BE solved, and it won’t repeat!!!”

As dry leaves that before the first snowstorm will whirl

Hubby makes this mom one real happy girl.

So out to the ditches he flew and got started

I watched in amazement as he scrambled and darted.

And then in a twinkling, I heard in the pipes

The water was flowing, that certainly was nice.

I drew in my head, and looked in the bath

Now girlies and hubby no longer faced my wrath.

I could clean up the mess that had pooled in the tub

In the shower and toilets, but now here’s the rub:

We can’t ask the man who caused this great mess

To pay for the cost of repairing the rest!

Jeff was dressed all in mud and other foul matter

His tools were piled high and made such a clatter.

The stump of a beer he held tight in his teeth

And the stench it encircled his head like a wreath.

He had a narrow face, and little soul patch

His energy continued, he’s quite the good catch.

A wink of his eye and a nod of his head

I knew what he expected when we got in bed.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to get clean

He didn’t fill stockings, his pockets were lean.

And laying a finger beside his gray hair

He soon fell asleep in his great easy chair.

He lay there so peacefully, so calm in repose

He snored quite a bit through his elegant nose.

But I heard him exclaim ‘fore he faded away

“I saved this poor family a few bucks today!”

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a Good Night!

Hope you enjoyed my “inspired” version of the poem….this past week was a challenge!!

Obviously, my blogging has fallen by the wayside since going back to work this fall.  Call me a laggart, call me lazy, call me a working mom, loving wife, teacher, etc. but hey…..shit happens.  Literally.

I really HAVE been squeezing in some workouts here and there.  Not as often as I’d like, but they have happened.  A balance is somewhat difficult to find, when you’re also trying to get to children’s sporting events, dances, etc.  And then there’s the above mentioned “shit happens”.

A couple of weeks ago, we noticed bubbling water standing in our yard.  Not a good sign, by any stretch of the imagination.  All the rain we had this fall led us to believe that something was going wrong with our drainfield.  So, we had a septic guy out to check our tank.  Our beautiful twenty year old cherry tree’s roots were growing down into the tank and distribution box.

Just when you’re paying real estate and personal property taxes (and of course, gearing up for a visit by the big guy in the red fur suit), you do NOT want to have to fork out money for septic issues.  OR have a favorite tree ripped up by the roots.  Our family Easter pictures were always taken out under that blooming tree.  Alas, the tree had to go, the roots pulled up, the tank cleaned out.  Voila.  Done deal.  Or so we thought.

Yesterday we had the pleasure of watching all the water (and I use the term very loosely) in all our pipes back up into our toilets, showers, tubs, etc.  All day yesterday we couldn’t use any water.  All today.  Poor hubby had to stay home from work and try to figure out what the crap was going on.  It’s a good thing he’s such a superman and handy man.  He dug up the distribution box.  No problem there.  Dug up the tank.  No worries.  He figured the blockage had to be between the tank and house.  Running a so-called “snake” into the pipe (don’t ask me specifics…I tried NOT to be involved at all), he discovered a total blockage just past the tank…..right where my beloved tree….used…to….be.  Hmmmm.  Digging down, he discovered that the machinery that pulled up my tree also managed to bust the main pipe leading to our house.

For close to two weeks now, we have unsuspectingly been showering, flushing, and washing to our heart’s content.  And then the pipe ran out of room.  Sigh.  Things are clean and back to normal, but it’s not an experience I’d want to relive any time soon. 

Since the next few days are going to be hectic in the extreme, I want to wish everyone who happens to stop by (and I don’t kid myself….I have been on so seldom it would be a wonder if anyone DOES read this!)…..a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!  Blessings on you and yours…

Weekdays suck.  I get up, shower, get Madeline up (she leaves earlier than me or Mackenzie with Jeff), fix her breakfast, get the coffee ready, shoo her and Jeff out the door, get Mackenzie up, feed her…sometimes get to eat myself…..you get the idea.

Then, teach all day, stay after most days for Kenzie’s soccer practice, get home, start dinner, help her with homework if she has questions, we eat, Maddy and Jeff usually eat later when they come in, clean the kitchen, start at least one load of laundry….when the heck am I gonna squeeze in exercise?

I started out the way I intended to go on….working out about three days the first week, maybe two last week, this week…..nada.  Not one weekday.  I felt like such a failure!  Other people have children, work, home life, and they manage to squeeze in a short workout.  I feel run over by a Mack truck in the evenings.  Out of all week, I got in one good workout today…and Jeff browbeat me into it. 

Why is it so hard to motivate myself to get back into this?  I wanted to start work at school again…but I hate working out in the morning.  I already get up earlier than I need to, to make sure Maddy and Jeff have what they need as they head out the door.  The thought of getting up even EARLIER makes me want to hurl.  Definitely NOT a morning person.  That means I’ve GOT to make changes….I’ve GOT to get serious…or I’m going to gain weight over this winter.  Eck.

     Okay, okay, I’ll admit it.  I once was a Martha Stewart wanna be.  I even went so far as to can green tomato pickles one year for Christmas gifts, because Martha said they were fabulous, and the bright green color was so festive.

     Now, time dictates what I consider a “good thing”.  Today, it’s a great exercise tip, food tip, surprise, timesaver, etc.  I recently rounded up a few from magazines, books, and friends.  Enjoy.

     *In the week before your period when those sugar cravings hit, “bulk up” (literally!) on high fiber foods.  The cravings will diminish or go away.

     *Energy drinks have as much caffeine as six cups of coffee.  Okay, if your workout is a.m., but lay off if you’re a p.m. exercise junkie….your slumber time will thank you!

     *Tired of searching for the perfect running shoe???  I know I get tired of searching for Sauconys that were discontinued about three years ago.  Ebay can only go so far.  Check out  www.somniorunning.com , which will build you the perfect shoe based on your running needs (support, cushioning, running style–pronator, supinator, etc., weight)

     *Sore muscles after running all the time?  Try drinking cherry juice before  you lace up those sneaks.  Cherries have lots of anthocyanins, compounds that reduce inflammation!

     *If you’re like me, and cook way too much food for you, your significant other, or your family, and always have leftovers you FORGET about in the fridge…check out www.stilltasty.com , which has a system that allows you to input a particular food, how long it’s been in your fridge (approximately!), and whether or not it’s okay to still eat it.  Love it.

     *An easy math problem….how many calories can you eat and still lose weight????  I’ve seen every calculation in the book.  And I’m no Algebra whiz.  So take your desired weight, multiply by 11, and presto….aim for those calories.

     *Love pickles, olives, and pickled beets?  Good thing, because vinegar has been proven to have enzymes that BREAK DOWN FAT.  You heard me, people.  Start drinking that pickle juice. 

     *October is Breast Cancer Awareness month.  I have a good friend who is suffering with this damned disease right now…for the second go round.  Let’s support causes that donate to research to kick breast cancer’s ass.  Here’s a few I recently found: a gorgeous trendy necklace by Prismera Design, $80; Susan G. Komen Foundation gets a whopping 10% www.prismeradesign.com ; like high end sunglasses?  Lacoste shades, super cute $125, another 10% to Breast Cancer Research Foundation, www.lacoste.com for stores;  love sweet/homey smells in your home?  ALL the net proceeds from the Antica Farmacista Home Ambience Fragrance Peonia Romantico collection go to Gilda’s Club (in honor of Gilda Radnor), $25 for 100ml at www.anticafarmacista.com .

     * And finally, an easy peasy lemon cheesy recipe to make your life a little easier….I made this one up, just by being bored one day and wanting something quick, easy, healthy, and of course, using ingredients I had on hand. 

PITA PIZZA: one whole wheat pita, jar of spaghetti sauce (I used leftover piece of a jar I had in the fridge!), fresh mozzarella (I keep some in the summer for tomato and mozzarella Caprese salad….), fresh basil, sliced olives, and any leftover meats from dinner the night before will do.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Spray pita lightly with spray, place on cookie sheet and pop in oven for five minutes. Spread pita with spaghetti sauce, sprinkle with meat and olives, top with small slices of mozzarella and finish with basil.  Turn oven to broil, and slide pita under broiler for about 3-4 minutes or until mozzarella is melted and bubbly.  Cut in half with pizza cutter, and enjoy!

There are my Martha tips for the day.  Sorry there’s not more on exercise…I am working hard to get in at least four days a week, but with the girls’ schedules it’s kind of hit and miss.  Have a great week!

As Jack Nicholson famously said, “I’m baaaaaack!”  After a few weeks off, I started back on some semblance of a workout routine this week.  So far, I have done the evil Jillian’s dvd, weightlifting, a 3 mile run/walk, and an hour power walk.  I have NOT begun tweaking my diet again.  I figured I would see how my body reacts to the activity once more, before I start torturing eating healthily again.

     One thing to note:  I had heard that if you take about two weeks off from exercise, it feels like starting all over again when you do resume.  And boy, was that rumor correct.  My first day back, I thought, “Oh, I won’t do an hour of walking/running/etc., I’ll just do a half hour or so.  Jillian’s tape is only about 25 min., so I’ll just do that.”  Sweet Lord.  The next day I sounded like cavewoman, grunting and groaning while moving about the house.  How could I have forgotten that bitch woman and her kickass approach to fitness???  The day after, I had to take off because of soreness.  Not a great re-entry into my routine.

     So far, I have not gotten back into working out every day, but I figure 4-5 days a week is a good start.  Once that becomes comfortable, I’ll have to start worrying about the diet (or I guess I should call it nutrition, not the D-word).  I have slid back into old (bad) habits that can easily derail the good I am doing with the exercise.  Picking at plates after the girls, eating on the road (hard to curtail THAT one, with volleyball practice every night from 6-8!), not having time to do some healthy grocery shopping…..all combine to make this another hurdle to overcome.

     My job begins in just a couple of weeks…..and I know I need to get a handle on this routine before getting back into the swing of lesson planning, grading papers, making school lunches, etc.  Once that starts, I will be “Back in the Saddle Again” in more ways than one!

I suppose you have figured out by now that I have not been posting updates for awhile.  Call it burn out, call it fatigue, call it hypothyroidism (yup, have that, too), call it two daughters on five collective softball teams…and you have what’s happened to my diet and workout regime.  For now, I’m not sweating it (literally!), but I have let two pounds creep back on.  It’s amazing to me that I can stop all working out, still drink my wine, not be such a beast about my diet, and the only difference is two pounds.  Makes one think.

Anyway, until my girls are done with All Star season (at least two more weeks of nightly games/practices), I am not going to be worrying about it.  Until I’m back on–and taking myself seriously again–I will be limiting my work outs to helping tote softball equipment back and forth to ballparks, and splashing about in my pool.  Hope everyone has a glorious 4th weekend!!!

   I apologize to those who have asked me where I’ve been the last couple of weeks.  Blame it on my facebook addiction.  Everytime I come near the computer to update my blog, my fingers seem to steer me to facebook instead.  Then after checking friend updates, playing Mafia Wars, reading my notifications, etc.  I realize a couple of hours have passed.  Oh well.  I will try to do better!

    Not much to post recently, which is another reason I have neglected to worry overmuch about blog posting.  I have been eating well, exercising when time permits (which during softball season is NOT as often as I did during the winter months), but oddly enough, I am either tightening up or maintaining.  Part of that may be due to the fact that I visited my doctor who confirmed that my thyroid is indeed acting up again (I wondered why dieting and 1-2 hours of exercising daily was having no effect!).  She put me back on my thyroid medication, and once again my efforts are being rewarded.

    Other than that, as I said earlier,  I have recently acquired Jillian’s (of the Biggest Loser fame) workout dvd entitled, “30 Day Shred”.  My oh my.  Even avid exercisers will be challenged by this one.  I first thought, a twenty minute workout????  Big deal.  Well, after day one, I was begging for mercy.  (See the dvd description two posts ago).  I am now at only Level 2, and it still kicks my butt.  Of course, you are supposed to do it everyday and you will advance throught the levels quicker, but I also enjoy things like power yoga and just weight days, so it’s taking me longer.

    So there it is–not much happening in Denise World.  One kudo for myself though….I am now within 3 1/2 pounds of my goal.  And believe it or not, my fourteen year old daughter only weighs 7 pounds less than me!!!  Stay tuned….hopefully by this summer and opening our pool I will be brave enough to post that bikini picture.

  Are you kidding me?  The doc looks at me, and responds…..”No, I’m afraid you have a classic case of shingles. ”  (There follows a lengthy explanation of how the chicken pox virus stays in your body after you contract them as a youth, then reappears later as an adult to attack your nerve endings…yada, yada, yada) 

   Two prescriptions, $75 in meds and office copays, and 100% frustration later, I end up at home, seething.  I have a freaking excruciating painful rash…..right by my left boob no less…..shooting pains around my left side, encircling under my left arm pit, swollen lymph nodes in said arm pit….I just want to cry.  I was doing so well.  I am eating clean (er), exercising pretty much every day for at least an hour, usually more, and feeling great.  Then yet another hurdle to overcome.

  Why is it that just when things seem to be going great, life throws you a curveball?  Is there some great big cosmic joke out there that I’m not aware of?  I have several friends training for Ironman Lake Placid in July….and now a LOT of them are experiencing far worse maladies than I am dealing with.  Of course, there’s a lot of wear and tear on the body preparing for an IM (I don’t even compare my little workouts with all they do!), but I feel so badly that after all the hard work and dedication they’ve put into the race already, that they’re also going through injury/inflammation/chronic pain….etc.  It’s enough to make a grown woman cry.

  Honestly, I’ve had the shingles for over a week now.  I just have been a little on the manic depressed side, dealing with the pain, discomfort, and general crappiness of shingles, and haven’t really felt like posting.  BUT, since this is my blog about how I’m dealing with building this body into something a bit better than a middle aged, pudgy couch potato, I thought I would rant just a little bit about the unfairness of it all.

  I only stopped working out for two days….then right back into it.  Lifting was a little tough on that side, so at first I concentrated on exercises I could endure with just some discomfort (treadmill, elliptical, cycle, lower body weights)…then this week added back in upper body lifting and cardio that involved my arms more.  I really didn’t want to ditch all my hard work and blame it on yet another illness.  But I miss my power yoga…..I can’t quite hold those poses yet, though.  It will come.

  For now, I’m just happy I didn’t throw my hands up in defeat.  I conquered that horrendous awful upper respiratory virus a couple of months ago…..and worked my way back after regaining my strength.  Now, even though the shingles aren’t quite “conquered” yet, I feel better, and have a better outlook on getting back to normal workouts.  With Summer just around the corner, I still have that new bikini laid out and the promise of that tropical vacation to try to motivate me to not……give…….up!

I’ve been doing a lot of reading lately on what works and what doesn’t when it comes to working out and eating for weight loss.  (Maybe the oreos spawned that, who knows.)  One topic that kept coming up was muscle confusion.  Hmmmm, I thought.  This sounds interesting.

The idea behind muscle confusion is that if you keep doing the same exercise, day in and day out, the muscles get used to it and stop working at their peak (read–no more weight loss).  I kind of figured that out on my own after weeks of the bodybuilding diet and weight pumping.  Unless I was willing to do competition type eating and lifting, I was gonna go nowhere.  I know some girls who do competitions, and as it draws nearer, they literally have a diet of egg white for breakfast (notice I said egg white not egg whites), lettuce and fish for lunch (also notice I mentioned no salad dressing….plain), a small handful of almonds in the afternoon before their workout (the little bit of fat in them is what they fuel the lifting off of), followed by more lettuce and fish for dinner.  WELL. No way, Hosea.

So, I decided to explore the idea of muscle confusion, and started looking for a dvd that incorporated it.  I already knew that I needed to change up the workouts weekly.  Right now I run a couple of days a week, do at least one day of power yoga, two days where I lift serious weights,  and one day where I do something else like kickboxing or circuit training.  Sometimes it’s hard to plan the circuit training workouts on my own, though, even though I used to have a personal trainer license.  The ideal way to do it is to allow little rest between the cardio and weight exercises, moving quickly from one to another.  Well damn my 44 year old brain it’s hard to concentrate and remember the series I’m working on sometimes, so I thought a dvd would be a great idea–let someone else do the planning, and I’d do the work.

A friend recommended that I try the Biggest Loser’s female trainer, Jillian Michaels.  She has done lots of books and dvds, and I like her philosophy and training methods she utilizes on the show.  She’s a no-nonsense, take no prisoners kind of gal.  So this weekend while at Barnes and Noble for my book club, I picked up the 30 Day Shred by Jillian Michaels. http://www.collagevideo.com/item.aspx?item=7963 

The dvd has three workouts on it…Levels 1, 2, and 3.  I generally work out at least 4-5 days a week and had run three miles the day before, so I was tempted to go straight to level 2 or 3.  I watched the preview, and Jillian said to start with level 1, and as that got easy to move up.  I thought, what the heck, I can do level 1 and then also do level 2 if it’s too easy.  After all, the workouts are just over 20 minutes each….how hard could it be?

Oh….my……the next day it hurt to sit on the toilet.  I’m not kidding.  I am so glad I started at level 1, because that woman kicked my $#% big time.   That’s the last time I start feeling smug that I am getting in better shape.  This workout was a great big heads up that I still have a lot of work to do.  When I watch the Biggest Loser, I forget that these out of shape people are in the gym, daily, with Jillian, busting their chops for 6-7 hours.  I will not WHINE about a 20 something minute workout….I will not….I will not!

So, the muscle confusion issue did answer my question…..what to do to mix it up a little bit.  No matter if you think you’re a great runner, kickboxer, weight lifter, swimmer, etc., there’s always room for improvement.  I found out the hard way!  Kudos to Jillian……

Jillian the Badass