I Love Cycling and Other Confessions

I'm pretty proud of myself for this past week. I was able to track about 80% of the week's food. My goal this week will be 90%. I also listened to my body and decided to switch from running a half marathon to a 10K this past Saturday. It went really well, I ran it in 1:00:17 and was elated to see my mom, husband and kids cheering for me at the finish line! I was VERY proud of my husband, James, who ran the half marathon in 1:54:17. Being healthy role models for our kids is the best feeling!

James finishing his half marathon, boys in toe.

Me finishing my 10K

Family photo after the run (Natalie would rather eat Watermelon than pose)

This week I also went to Weight Watchers for the first time in over a month and faced the scale, all 8 pounds gained. It was very defeating but I know, as stated last week, that I have been struggling with being honest with myself. I have been doing well with working out and need to focus all my energy on nutrition. I am thinking about doing a 3 day detox program to rid myself of all the garbage I've been consuming and to recharge my batteries before the school year begins. I really would like to have the will power to eliminate a couple items from my diet that I know are holding me back and, in the perfect world, a detox would do just that. I am not, however, completely naive in thinking that there is a magic bullet in this weight loss journey. As many know, I have already tried most of the magic bullets: Jenny Craig, Nutrisytem and numerous programs that you see on late night T.V. This time I have had support from Weight Watchers which has helped me to look at food in a different way and not simply supplied me with pre-measured meals leaving me completely helpless when on my own. I have worked WAY too hard to give into a quick fix but would also like to see if a jump start may get me over this hump!?

On to more positive things, I LOVE bicycling and after 4 years I finally have a bike again and since I don't have any races coming up, I am able to devote some time to being on my bike! When James and I lived in Fargo/Moorhead I biked EVERYWHERE. 1) I didn't have my own car. 2) Other than in winter, the F-M area is very biker friendly. Pierre has many trails and I'm excited to ride on all of them and, being a smaller town, I can bike almost anywhere. I want to pass that passion down to my kids and hope we can go on many family bike rides in the future!

I don't usually say this but I'm excited that tomorrow is Monday and can't wait to conquer this week!

Just suck it up, change your attitude and do it!

Well I had an exhausting (but fun) weekend filled with graduation parties, playing with my kiddos, and visiting friends and family. All of these items included LOTS of food! I tried to stick to the veggie trays and fruit platters... but that just didn't cut it... I have a weak spot for potato salad and cream cheese mints, so plenty of those were also consumed. I tried to stay active. I ran before we left on Saturday but had to stop as my pants were falling off as I ran. I know that's a good problem to have and I have to laugh at it, but it cut my run short and by the time I got back and changed I didn't have time to run again. I also made sure to move around as much as I could. I was going to go swimming with the kiddos at the hotel but the water was pretty much ice water.... and I wasn't going in that craziness! We did walk around Storybook land, my favorite place of all time, and I know that helped a little.

Needless to say, I put on a couple pounds over the weekend and woke up in a bit of a funk from it. My frustration was only amplified with the beginning of the last week of school. I know I should be feeling a sense of relief and excitement as the end draws near, unfortunately, the end of the year for a teacher means report cards, progress reports, students awareness sheets, and much, much more... PLUS the students are in 'summer' mode and have no thought processes left to even complete simple lessons. So my main mission today was to keep my students busy learning as much about measurement as possible while fitting in paperwork wherever possible. I didn't leave until 5:30 and definitely could have stayed longer if my husband didn't need to head to an orchestra gig, so I headed home to clean the house and watch my kids play in the backyard.

As I ran around the house picking up and sorting laundry, I decided that I HAD to record what I ate today (even though I knew the dominoes pizza my hubby ordered for supper was going to be bad). I was grateful to see that I had only gone over by a couple points, not as bad as I had thought. This revelation made me rethink my entire attitude toward the day. I take all of my minor hurdles in my life and make them into huge mountains. These mountains seem so huge and daunting that it has a domino effect, making all other obstacles seem monumental as well. After I realized that nothing is as bad as I thought it was today, I decided that I was going to go on a run (since I was also upset that I had missed my workout class today).

I killed two birds with one stone and took the redbox movie I had gotten yesterday for the kiddos on our drive and ran it (literally) back to Walmart and returned home. It ended up being 6 miles in all. It took me about an hour and 4 minutes, so about a 5.62 mph run/ walk when necessary, up steep hills, etc. The best part of the run was the smell of the flowers and having a student scream hello as they rode past in a vehicle. I am also proud of the fact that I finished and ran most of it! That gets me almost to the half way point for my half marathon. My least favorite part of my run was my body and my headphones. I have to say that being a woman who has had three children makes things really difficult. I am grateful that I wasn't a runner in high school or college because I am sure that I would be even more appalled and disappointed with the way my body works or doesn't work now that I have had my beautiful children. Anyone who is a runner without kids, please take a moment to appreciate how wonderfully your body works and doesn't try to corrupt your running efforts... Okay, enough said. As for my headphones, I would take any suggestions for better headphones. I cannot wear the ear buds as they bug my ears and I have the ones that fit over the ears but they fall off constantly on the side away from the arm that I have the headphones plugged in on. I'm thinking I'll have to get the big headband type ones but am not sure... but I really do like listening to music, when it works!

My lesson for the day is that I need to not look at my hurdles as mountains and to push through them one step at a time. Tomorrow is a new day and I will make the most of it!