Fitness Friday Week 7 Review

It ocurred to me that I do not have a definite end time to this fitness challenge.  I do think that I have made working out a habit again, which was really my main goal.  So, I think that after 10 weeks, I will discontinue the weekly updates.  However, in order to continue to motivate myself to workout, I want to do one fitness post at the beginning of each month, just for my own sake.  This past week was a good one.  Going to those group fitness classes at the gym is fun, so I think it was easy to meet my goal this week.  I worked out 5 of 7 days.  I can see a big improvement in my endurance when working out now.  Today, I did my Jillian Michael's workout, and it had started to become too easy.  I increased the weight for my hand weights, and that made a HUGE difference.  Glad to know that I can still challenge myself with that video.  I ate dessert once, I think.  I didn't pay much attention, but we just had no dessert-type things around the house, so that made it easy.

Picture post! Girls: 16 months and 29 months

Playing before bedtime

Sally LOVES the camera.

They wanted to wear hats.

Sally is such a ham!  This is the face she made as SOON as she saw I had the camera out.

And she continued to make that face over and over so I would take her picture.

Playing in their new kitchen

Sharing some sisterly love

Fitness Friday Week 6 in Review

Well, I ended up working out 4 times last week, which is good considering I was sick part of the week.  I have been working out at a gym since Ryan won a 2 week free pass for us both to a local place.  The gyms are all really nice, and I especially love the group fitness classes.  I also like to work out with the cardio equipment and weights, but group classes are my favorite!  They motivate me and challenge me better than I am able to do on my own.  I did try a Zumba class for the first time.  Ha!  Maybe not the best class for me.  I am SO not a dancer.  Though, out of the 10 or so people there, I would say I was in the top five for coordination.  If you are familiar with my dance skills, you know that this means that the class was HILARIOUS to watch.  NOBODY was coordinated, and we all looked funny, so it definitely made me feel more comfortable.  At the end of this trial period, Ryan is really pushing for us to get a membership at the Y (cheaper).  I am not sure if I want to or if it is more worth it to me to put the money elsewhere.  I feel like I do pretty well finding ways to workout without the membership.  Ryan, however, kind of needs a membership because he can't really lift weights at home or play basketball.  Anyway, we'll see.   I just feel like I can more efficiently fit my workout into our routine at home than I can going to the gym.  It takes up the whole morning, it seems.  You moms who have gym memberships, are you glad you do?  Do you feel like going to the gym is just another big time commitment that pulls at you?

If you have an old house, you don't need a hobby!

Slowly but surely we are completing our home improvement projects!  Next up, taking wallpaper down in the hallway and bathroom and painting (if you have ever removed layers of hard stuck on wallpaper, you know why we have put this project off!).  After that, we plan to replace the countertop in our kitchen, which I am SO excited about.  We got a dishwasher, but right now it just sits between the end of the sink counter and the fridge.  Not a bad place for it, but there is no countertop over it, and it just looks unfinished.  The money we used to fund our projects was given to us at Christmas from generous family members.  We have a little home improvement fund sitting in our savings account for our "big" projects.

While my mom was here, she got me these frames and some fabric to go in them!  We bought the frames new, but if you have some old ones laying around (you could spray paint them whatever color you want), this could be a really cheap wall art project.  Any fabric (or decorative/wrapping paper) will work.  I actually found inspiration for this project from my friend Jenna who framed some pretty paper above her bed.

Our next project was a little bit bigger, and we finished it just in time for my parents to arrive.  We "finished" our basement, or rather, improved upon the previous owner's "finishing" of the basement.  We painted all the walls and ceiling and replace the lights, but decided to hire out the carpeting job.  Normally we are willing to try to do our projects on our own, but after the blood, sweat, and tears of refinishing our wood floors, Ryan (and I) decided it was worth the money to save him the time and headache of learning to install carpet.  The carpet was actually given to us by Ryan's parents after they had their basement re-carpeted.  It was still in great shape and was a much better quality carpet than we were really able to afford if we bought it new.  And with 2 little girls, carpet is bound to be stained at some point. I guess having older carpet lessens the blow of such accidents. 

The before and after pictures tell the story.  We have a bed down there right now, which is not ideal I guess for the "look" of the room, but it makes for a great guest living space.  It is so nice to have a big comfy space for the girls to run around it.  We have moved a lot of their toys down there, so there is less clutter in our upstairs living room.  It also was nice to have this space finished when the tornado came through last week!  If you have to hide out in a basement, at least it was a comfy one to be in.

This is what it looked like when we first moved in.

This is after removing the carpet and putting all our junk in there.

And this is after painting and carpeting!

stairs before

stairs after!

view from the other side of the room

before

after!

Fitness Friday Week 5 and other random news.

It might be nice if I posted a fitness Friday update on a Friday.  I never manage to remember though.  Oh well.  This past week was completely off when it comes to fitness.  I was sick/injured for most of it, so I only worked out 2 days.  Now that I say that though, I realize that before this challenge, 2 days of working out would have sounded pretty impressive to me. 

My "injury" was actually a scratch in my eye.  It happened before I left to go to work on Tuesday night, and I ended up having to leave early because of it.  Word to the wise, when retrieving toys that your children have thrown from a floor a/c vent, make sure the air flow is OFF!  I never realized how debilitating it can be to have a hurt eye!  It seems so small and unimportant, but it kept me from doing anything for a few days.  I had to have a patch on it, and all I felt capable of doing was sitting somewhere with both eyes closed.  (Turns out it is hard work to use just one eye to do all of the seeing.) 

I also have a cold which I am getting over but have unfortunately given to Sally.  She is sleeping restlessly in her room right now with a fever.  Poor girl. 

As far as the eating goes, I didn't do so well avoiding sweets.  Actually I didn't really try very hard to avoid them.  My parents were in town visiting, so I couldn't resist my dad's famous chocolate chip cookies (among other desserts).  It was SO fun to have them!  Their last night here was spent in our basement hiding out from the tornadoes.  One actually came through the city of Wichita, but thankfully missed us. 

While they were here, my parents got us a play kitchen for Sally and Sophie, and they LOVE it!  It is actually a retro one from the 80's like what I had when I was little.  It came with all kinds of kitchen play food and gadgets.  My mom also helped me with an "art project" for mine and Ryan's bedroom.  Taking inspiration from my friend Jenna's bedroom, I wanted to frame some pretty paper or fabric to go with our new color scheme.  I LOVE the end result, and will post a picture soon.  My mom has such a knack for decorating.  My dad is a great handyman, and he helped Ryan run some wiring in our basement to be able to replace a light with a pull string to one that is controlled with a switch.  Now all three ceiling lights match, and they look great!  Another picture in the works is one of our newly completed basement project. 

As for this week in terms of fitness, I am not sure if I will be able to work out 5 times, but hopefully at least 4 if I am feeling better tomorrow.  We got a free 2 week membership to a local gym, so I am really excited to take part in the group fitness classes!  I want to try zumba because so many people I know like it.  Here's to a more fit week 6!

Abuelo and Abuela are here!

My parents are in town visiting right now, and we are all having a blast with them here.  Sally is attached to my mom and keeps following her around and laughing out loud to get my mom to look at her and laugh back.  Sophie loves both my mom and dad, but is especially attached to my dad.  She woke up from her nap and they had gone somewhere.  She kept asking for her abuelo (Spanish for grandpa). I haven't posted about the girls in a while so here are a few videos and pics of them.  They are SUCH a blessing and keep us cracking up all the time.   After I started working on this post, I realized that we don't have any pics of Sally from the time my parents have been here.  I will do a post for her in the next couple of days.

This video is of a GIANT stack of blocks Sophie made.  She almost couldn't reach to put the last block on top and then it fell.  It happens pretty quick, so you have to catch the height of the stack right from the start of the video.

Me feeding Sophie and Sally--so thankful they are both great eaters now.

Sophie at Target in a cute outfit her abuela got her.

Sophie and abuelo swinging

Fitness Friday Review Week 4!

4 weeks, and counting!  I am really excited about this fitness challenge now.  I had a harder time getting myself motivated this week, but still completed 5 out of 7 days of workouts.  That is still one day short of my goal.   I think maybe I should change my goal to 5 of 7 anyway.  This week I think I will.  My parents are coming in town, and I am so excited!  This week, I even did the P90X plyometrics workout, and it is TOUGH!  When I first started this challenge, I don't think I could've completed it very well. As far as desserts, I ate them 3 times this week :(  Ryan was craving cookies one night so we made some, and then I ate them another time plus dessert at a dinner with friends.  Oh well.  I still think I have room to improve on the amount of fruits and veggies I eat.  This week, since I was paying closer attention to it, I realized that I mostly choose something over fruits and veggies because it is easier to prepare.   I am just lazy and don't want to go to the trouble of cutting up that grapefruit or heating up the veggies.  This week, my goal is the same, more fruits and veggies--but now I realize I just have to go to the extra effort to make it happen.  In other news, I have some good ideas for future posts!  We just carpeted our basement, and we are loving it!  I will be sure to post some before and after pics.  Also, the girls have matching Easter dresses on the way, so I will definitely post some pictures of them!