Halloween

Which means a very crazy night! After picking up the kids we came home and ate a quick dinner before changing into costumes. We trick-or-treated around the neighborhood, then at a trunk-or-treat at a church close to our house, then on the walk back home...LOTS of trick-or-treating going on! B reminded me on our last part of the trip that we needed to visit Aunt D and Uncle J like we do every year so all four of us loaded up in the car! By the time we got home it was well past bedtime! The boys went to bed pretty well, but we still had to get the house tidied up for small group tomorrow night which leads us to now...and a time that is too late for me to do my crunches and dips for the night without ruining my sleep (according to R who I do happen to share a bed with!). Given such, I will get up tomorrow morning to do the crunches and dips and I will do my push ups tomorrow evening on schedule. Then I'll be back on track!

Sunday, Lazy Sunday!

Today was a day off of the challenge - no push ups, crunches, or dips for me! On my calendar for today was either 105 minutes or 9 miles of running. However, today was a nice lazy Sunday for me! We had overnight guests and I didn't really want to leave R home alone with four boys 10 and under. Then it was time for lunch and quiet time for the adults in the family room while the boys played nicely together outside! IT WAS GREAT!!!! I didn't track any calories today (and ate a little more than I probably should have - I'll be glad when Halloween is over and the candy is out of the house!) and started to feel guilty after dinner. I didn't do my run today! I have less than three weeks until my next half marathon! What have I done to myself?!?!? Fear not...the elliptical is in the house! I decided I would do at least an hour and a half on the elliptical to make up for my lack of a run today. R took the boys upstairs for bed at 8:30 and on I hopped! Can I tell you how miserable the elliptical is for an extended length of time? After only 20 minutes or so I was SO BORED...even with decent shows on the television. But I persevered and even overpowered - I stayed on for the whole 105 minutes I was supposed to run today! By the end of the workout I felt fantastic! HOWEVER...it wasn't really "fun" like an outdoor run would have been today, so I'm going to try to remember this next time I want to be lazy! :)

Week 1, Day 3.1 and 3.2

Dips: 28, 39, 26, 26, Max

Crunches: 33, 42, 30, 30, Max

Push ups: 16, 21, 15, 15, Max

My max sets were as follows: Dips – 40, Crunches – 60, and Push ups – 21

Today was a strange kind of day…rainy and just plain yucky and I wasn’t in the mood to do much of anything! I got up this morning to take B to a Destination Imagination Mock Competition – we had to be there by 8:00. By the time we got home my workout plan for the morning was shot and the weather did not help the situation. B is making butterbeer for a school project so we worked on trying out a recipe this afternoon…we need some more work on that! Next was Scouts then dinner with my family as well as my brother and nephews. Once I got home I decided I really needed to do today’s push ups along with the dips and crunches I forgot to do yesterday so off I went! It felt like the old days when I did all three together – glad I’ve broken it up differently this time around! I still didn’t get a run or other workout in today, but at least I did something!

Week 1, Day 2.2

Push ups: 14, 19, 14, 14, Max

My max set was as follows: Push ups – 20

Tonight was baseball for B at 5:15 and JAM for B and A at 6:30. They FINALLY did “three strikes and you’re out” rather than 8 pitches which made the game length much more manageable – the game was over in plenty of time to get both boys to JAM for the Harvest Party. And as all three of my guys rode off to church I headed over to the gym to get a run in on the treadmill. (I would have run outside but it was starting to get darker and I’m a chicken – I’m not afraid to admit it!) Tonight was a 5-minute warm up, 45 minutes of hard (-ish) running, then a 5-minute cool down for a total of 55 minutes on the treadmill. I was going to do my push ups immediately afterward while at the gym, however I realized my running skirt was pretty short and it’s the kind with a brief in it instead of the boys shorts so I thought I would take the show home instead! I’m realizing that jumping into Week 3 of the challenge is HARD!!!! If I were a wimp I would jump back to Week 1 or Week 2 where the sets are a little shorter, but a wimp I am not! I will press on…even if it hurts my arms, abs, and chest! J

Week 1, Day 2.1

Dips: 26, 32, 19, 19, Max

Crunches: 30, 38, 23, 23, Max

My max sets were as follows: Dips – 32 and Crunches – 45

Another morning where I did not get out of bed! So I did my dips and crunches tonight before BodyFlow. I wanted to do 30 minutes on the TM but other circumstances kept me from getting to the gym on time to do so. But that’s okay…I did Flow for the first time in a few weeks and it felt good! My arms are pretty sore tonight from the push ups and dips. I’m SUPER thrilled to think about how they are going to feel tomorrow! (NOT!) The good news is that I’m sore in all the right places which leads me to believe I am doing good form push ups! The bad news is I’m sore. Oh well – you take the good, you take the bad, you take them both and there you have the facts of life, the facts of life! J

Week 1, Day 1.2

Push ups: 12, 17, 13, 13, Max

My max set was as follows: Push ups – 17

I didn’t get up again this morning. I think my bed is just too comfy…and the snuggles with my boys don’t help me get up either! I wanted to go to Power Yoga at the gym tonight, however I wasn’t able to make it there in time as I had arranged to take B to meet with someone to do an interview for his social studies class. However, I did go to the gym and did intervals on the treadmill – 5 minute warm up then 8 intervals (3 minutes hard, 1 minute easy) then 5 minute cool down. Since it has been 12 days since my last run I didn’t make my “hard” intervals as hard as I probably should have. Regardless, I got a run in which is better than last week, right? I did my push ups right after the run when I was nice and warm and ready to rock! Day one done for all my activities – we’re off and running!

The beginning of my digital accountability...and re-starting my crazy challenge AKA Week 1, Day 1.1

Here is the deal...my name is Carla and I am doing this blog to keep me accountable in my fitness endeavors. Maybe if I put it out there in the cyber-world I will be more apt to actually DO what I say I am going to do! My friend and I started doing what I called my "Crazy Challenge" back in June. We blogged our progress, but once we both fell off the wagon (and stopped going to the gym at the same time) the challenge fell by the wayside. However I decided to get started again (about 4 months later!) and thought I would create my own accountability blog to track my progress.

So here it is...my Crunch/Dip/Push up Challenge – Attempt 2!

I started my challenge today. My plan for this challenge to get up in the morning to complete whatever was on tap (either crunches and dips or push ups). I WILL WORK VERY HARD TO GET UP EVERY MORNING TO COMPLETE MY CIRCUIT…regardless of how much I want to stay in bed! (This morning was a fail...but there's always tomorrow, right?) I feel bad that I gave up on this challenge the first time and would like a chance to redeem myself by trying again! Monday, Wednesday, and Friday will be my dip and crunch days. Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday will be my push up days. I will do my dip and crunch exhaustion tests on Sunday and my push up exhaustion test on Monday. I have a plan…now I need to put it into action!

Here are the results of my initial tests on 10/21/11:

Crunches	48	Week 3, Column 3
Dips	35	Week 3, Column 3
Push ups	21	Week 3, Column 2

Comparing my result to the initial test I did back in the middle of June, I have definitely made an improvement in all areas – push ups went from 7 to 21, crunches went from 35 to 48, and dips went from 19 to 35! (I probably could have done more than 48 crunches, but I was afraid someone was going to walk in on me!)

Here was today's action:

Dips: 18, 23, 18, 18, Max

Crunches: 21, 27, 21, 21, Max

My max sets were as follows: Dips – 30 and Crunches – 40

It felt good to get back on the challenge tonight. I didn’t get up this morning (somehow alarms either didn’t get set or got turned off) so I had to complete my crunch and dip sets tonight. Since I’m able to start on Week 3 for all three areas, I’m hoping that I’ll be able to complete the challenge in 5-6 weeks total, which would be great! Also, I only have 4 weeks before my next half marathon and I’ve basically taken the last three weeks off…not boding well for a decent time. This week I will also start doing better with my running. I spent some time last night researching runs to do next year…my “wish list” is getting longer and longer. If it were up to me I’d be doing about 9 halfs next year – wouldn’t that be cool?