ShufflingSista

HAPPY NEW YEAR'S BLOGGIES! Well, this year has seen lots of change for many of us.  I added a very demanding job to my schedule this past June and my miles have suffered for it.  I have also seen a couple of my favorite bloggies take a break from the blog (Kim, Lybi, Marcie, Michelle) and I miss 'em! We've seen babies born, injuries be had, job changes... Lots of change! You wonderful bloggies keep me going and keep me inspired- Brent for instance.  Despite his knees that want to quit... you just keep on trucking Brent- you rock! The silver lining is that I've stayed true to the blog and posted even on weeks where frankly it was embarrassing how little miles I acquired.  I wanted to log 1200 in 2008, at least I got over 1,000.  I'll take that. Well, its a New Year- time to make some new goals.  I'm going to take some time today to redo my goals on my main page.  My main goal for this year is to find BALANCE in my life with my relationship with God, hubby, children, exercise, church calling, work, family & friends .  As far as fitness goes that includes taking off about 10 lbs (eating less bread & sugar, more veggies, drinking more water) and adding more toning.  So my miles will probably stay lower than '07 and first part of '08 as I cross train more.  5ks and the occasional longer races & runs with Sole Sisters will remain a very important part of my life! My entries will probably be brief.  I have a family blog that I tend to elaborate on a bit more. You are always welcome to check it out at www.CarpeDiem95.blogspot.com.  Happy New Year!

So I'm taking my friend Kathy up on the 2009 Healthy Eating Challenge! Here's the details below... If anyone else is interested let me know!

Friday, January 2, 2009

Challenge Details

So here are the details of the challenge.

Points - 12 points possible per day

1 Reporting/Accountability point just for reporting your points each day. You can do it here on the blog or to a friend.

1 Water - drink at least 8 - 8oz cups of water everyday, more if you can!

1 Supplements/Vitamins - take a good supplement, even a multivitamin is better than nothing.

1 No Skipping Meals- NO SKIPPING MEALS OR SNACKS!!! You should be eating every 2-3 hours! Plan ahead. Have some healthy snacks in your purse or in the car.

1 Whole Grains - No white flour, white pasta, white rice, etc. There are now tons of 100% Whole Grain products in the grocery stores

1 No sugar/junk food - No white refined sugar, cookies, cakes, candies, ice cream, chocolate, etc. (some things do have sugar in them like breads and whole grain cereals and those are fine - the grams of sugar per serving should be less than 5 grams unless it contains dried fruit like raisins)

1 3-hour rule - Don't eat for at least 3 hours before you go to bed.

1 Counting Calories - It is amazing how fast calories add up. Pick up a kitchen scale and monitor your portion size. Use myfitnesspal or some other way to track the calories you consume each day. The minimum calories you consume should be 1200 per day, the maximum varies depending on how much weight you need to lose, your current weight and the amount you exercise each day. Even if you go over your daily amount you can still get this point if you are tracking your calories.

Workout Points: up to 4 per day

Low intensity (walking) exercise 30 minutes = 1 point

Moderate intensity (jogging) exercise 20 minutes = 1 point

High intensity exercise (running) 15 minutes = 1 point

Give yourself up to 4 points per day based on how long you exercise and at what level your perceived level of exertion is.

2.5 mile walk with the fam (while Arielle rode her new bike that Santa brought her) It was COLD since we're recently back from Salt Lake we thought we could just go around the neighborhood in sweatshirts- wrong! It was like 30 degrees!

Yesterday and today I did a dry run for my Healthy Eating Challenge.  I am shooting for 10 pts a day (out of 12 possible) starting for real on Monday.  The dry run gave me a good idea of my struggle areas like white flour, junk food & calorie counting.  I ended up with 6 pts Sat. and 7 on Sunday.  10 may be ambitious but I'm going to give it a try.  Taking a water bottle and healthy snacks with me to work on Monday so I can stick to the plan!

2 mile walk around neighborhood handing out RS flyers for Enrich.  Not exactly hard cardio, but gotta count all exercise these days! Sat & Sun I did a dry run for Healthy Eating Challenge and today started the real challenge.  I got 8 pts today, up from the 6 & 7 I got on Sat. & Sun.  10 is my goal (12 possible).  I'm doing good at taking multi vitamin, drinking water, not skipping meals, calorie counting, not eating 3 hrs. before bed and getting A LITTLE exercise. My challenge areas are avoiding sugar & white flour.  I've been getting in more whole wheat but still getting in some white flour too. 

Weight lift class at gym today.  I'm going for 10 pts today! Thanks to an hour long workout this morning that starts me off with 4 pts.  I can do it! I'll report back later.

Oh yeah, and I was confronted by 2 friends at the gym today asking if I'm doing Painter's 1/2.  Its less than 2 weeks away, so its way past commitment time.  I told them YES, I will do it.  It won't be fast or pretty, but I'll be a great long training run and I'll be glad I did it.  Plus I obviously need to kick start my New Year in the running department.

Tummy bug today- no workout! (except for setting up and taking down lots of tables & chairs for enrichment!)

Could it be? A legit run? YES! 5.5 miles at a challenging 9:15 min mile.  Yes, this used to be a very do-able pace for me, but now its challenging! It felt great getting my day off to such a great start with Sole Sisters.  Thanks Shelly for kicking my butt into gear!

Oh yeah- and I officially signed up for Painter's half yesterday!

8 miles with Sole Sisters, added on 2 more miles alone.  Nice long run.  Green Valley loop was especially peaceful & quiet this morning.  Had good energy this morning, glad I added on 2 more alone.  Needed a 10 miler to be mentally prepared for Painter's next week.

Nice Sunday walk with kids & dog.  Weather was PURRRFECT.. mid 50s and sunny- love it.  Fed the ducks at the pond. Lovely afternoon..

Weight class at gym

5 mile afternoon run.  Just me & the IPOD.  PURRRRRFECT weather.  It was tough doing the hilly loop around my hood, haven't done that in awhile. I was challenged.  Kept 9:30 overall pace.  Good news, bad news for Painter's 1/2 this Sat.  Downhill-good.  Uphill- BAD! Good luck all your racers! Kinda wishing I was only doing the 5k, but I'll survive!

4.5 quick walk with Heather.  She is an amazing little pregnant chic- still so fit! She just recently cut back on running now that she's 7 mo., but still doing weights and walking, eliptical.  She rocks!

according to my Garmin, the course measured a bit long.  I really like the 1:59:41 that I clocked a lot better than my official chip time!

Beautiful day for a race! Good turnout and energy.  This year the city used chip timers and also gave out some nifty winter hats in the race pack.  It was a nice touch.  I passed my hat onto my 11 yr old son- he thought it was cool.  I was running LATE, I know...that's ridiculous considering it was a 9 am start time.  Luckily I found Tammy, Annie, Sheila & Shelly right before the start! I was afraid I was going to have to run it alone.  Felt pretty good until mile 8.  I pretty much expected that since my training has not been adequate. I was about 8 minutes slower than I was on this same race last year.  considering  my hectic life this past year I guess I should just be happy that I'm out there!  I decided I'd treat it like a training run, do what I could- and have fun.  Mission accomplished.  Tammy who was running bandit dropped out at mile 7 and we picked up Steph about mile 10.  It was fun to chat with Marcie, Jody, Steve & Mik'L.  So glad I saw you bloggies! Also enjoyed watching so many bloggies come in the top places- sporting their FRB & SGRC gear.  I feel pretty good for the day after the race except for a stiff right achilles and 4 sore toes.  Here we go again...My toenails were just starting to look normal again after SGM..now they're hammered again!

splits:

8:52

8:33

8:54

8:18

8:57

8:54

8:41

9:27- here's where the obvious crash happens about mile 8... I just hadn't trained on distance & hills enough since SGM

8:56

9:13

9:43

10:16

9:58

9:52 (for .10)

Didn't measure it, but I know it was at least 2.5.  Had the day off from work- yah!!! Fun day spent with Aimee's family who had come down from SLC to get warm for the weekend.  We did lots of fun stuff...saw Mall Cop, went to shopping & to Pirate Island Pizza.   Monday afternoon I finally got out for a walk with my hyper pup. 

I've slept in for the last 2 days like a big huge slacker! Last night I went to bed at 8:30 and slept until 6:45.  It was heaven.  I actually feel alive and alert at work for the first time in forever.  A group of gals from work are going to be walking on a daily basis.  I'm psyched about this, I need any exercise I can get at this point.  We'll be going today so I'll update later...

Plan for rest of the week (yes, I'm putting it in type so that I'm accountable...) is to:

Weight class Thurs

Spin Fri

Run Sat

update: did walk 2.5 (fast) with gals from work.  feels great to get out mid day after lunch!

Actually got out of bed this morning! Its funny 'cause I tried to sleep in, but just couldn't.  I must finally be caught up on sleep (only temporary, I'm sure!) I was wide awake at 5:30 so I got myself to the gym for Tammy's 6am class.  She's a running buddy of mine and it was fun to be in her class.  She teaches a really good class! I sweat bullets and figured it must've been equal effort to at least a 5 miler.

Later in the day after lunch I walked 2.25 with gals from work.  I'm feeling really good about this new walking plan at work! Hoping for some weight loss results after doing this for a couple weeks.

Fun bike ride with the fam.  Got everyone out for 2 miles then added 6 more miles on my own.  The rain kept me in from my Sat. long run so by the afternoon I was REALLY needing to expend some energy.  The bike ride helped...

1.5 mile bike ride with the fam & dog to the school playground.  While the guys skateboarded and Arielle & a friend played on the playground, I walked my dog laps around the school track equalling a mile.  Barely broke a sweat, but every mile counts these days!

Really was going to go to gym after work then had a client come into my office in crisis.  Took up my afternoon and gym workout had to be forfeited.  Instead spent the evening in UrgentCare with my son who cut his finger! He's OK- got patched up and luckily didn't need stitches after all!

2 mile walk with Jim & Teddy after lunch. 

Got on the dreadmill at the gym.  Told myself I wasn't allowed to go home after work until after I'd been to the gym!

This morning I walked for 1.5 mi, then ran for 1.5 mi. These are estimates, I didn't take a watch.  I was just fitting in some exercise while Arielle was at her HB riding lesson, wasn't really prepared to workout! Later in the day we hiked Temple Quarry Trail, as I recall that is a 2 mi. round trip trail.

I signed up for Dam to Dam 5 miler, better get my butt running!