Lead a Fit and Healthy Life
Archive for January, 2010
Call Me Crazy!
12 years ago
Warmup:
1 leg jump ropes alternating legs each 30 sec 2x
Regular speed jump rope for 1 min
BOSU Mania today for our CORE work:
crunches on the BOSU
6 inches with balancing the BOSU on your legs – a BOSU weights 14lbs!
V-ups on the BOSU
Stomach side – upper body lifts and lower body lifts to work your upper and lower back.
Main workout 2 rounds AMRepsAP
Burpees
Deadlifts – first round: 165# 2nd round: 135#.
Close Grip Bench Press – 65# was standard and I did 22 reps
Jump Rope
Pull-up (KIP) – We were told to practice the KIP swing this session
Power Crunches – Take a 15lb with handles, slide it around a pole and then grab the handles and do crunches keeping your hands at by the side of your face and touch your knees each time. Now that’s a power crunch!
PT Station 30,20, 10x
BOSU Push-ups (your chest touches the BOSU each & every time)
25lb (DB) Hang Clean Squats
Tabatas
I shaved off another minute and half from my final PT station time! And I am down a lb! I felt so much better about this workout today. I actually felt renewed walking out of Plumbline today. I haven’t felt like that in a very long time!!
Our new elliptical machine arrived on Monday, and so far Scotty has been using it in the morning while I am at boot camp. I took a spin on it last night for 30 minutes. We also bought the ifit card for it and Jillian from the Biggest Loser coaches you. It definitely makes it fun when she is telling you to keep going. You know Scotty, if it has a gadget available, we will be first in line if possible!
I am going to try to add more cardio to my overall workout during the week, so I am planning on doing an extra 30 mins 3 more times a week. Call me crazy!
Not Yet For You
12 years ago
by Stephy
in General Reflections
A Dear Family Friend is a writer and oh how I envy his creative talent. I am including one of his poems called Not Yet For You below, but you should stop by and check out his other poems.
Not Yet For You
A perplexed penguin wanted to know
What there was to see beyond his ice floe
How much else did the world have to show
Beyond where his father had not allowed him to go?
What else was there besides ice and water
Herring and seal and occasional sea otter
whale and shark and beautiful puffin?
“Please tell me it’s not just a big nothin’!”
So he stepped out to the edge to see
What else was in that big, vast sea
But the water was deep, deep as could be
Clear on top, but then dark, black and murky.
And just by chance, his father could see
He shouted:
“That’s not yet for you. Leave it to me!”
But perplexed penguins are a curious lot
Often unsatisfied with the things that they’ve got
And so he dipped his little toe
Then flipped a flipper into the water below
And all at once, before he knew what he’d done
He was under the water.
He couldn’t see the sun!
Down he went until all became dark.
And he couldn’t help but remember his father’s remark.
“That’s not yet for you. Leave it to me!”
The little penguin began to despair.
What might happen? Would he run out of air?
But before he knew it, someone was there.
Someone who loved him, someone who cared.
His father took him up top, and sat him down on the ice.
“I’m just going to say this once,” he said, “and I’ll try to be nice.”
“There is plenty of time for the deep, murky dark.
Time for the herring, the whale and the shark.
But now you are small, and you must stay by me.
Until you are grown, and much stronger, you see?
And then when you explore, I won’t worry so
Because I’ll know you’re okay beyond the ice floe.”
“So, while there are wonderful things that you want to know
And wonderful places that you’d like to see
It’s not yet for you.
Please leave it to me.”
The perplexed penguin felt slightly less befuddled
He wanted more, but still wished to be coddled and cuddled
And so from then on, he heeded his father’s advice
And dreamed of the day he was allowed off the ice.
© 2010 Jonathan Hauer and mcgarragal.com. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Jonathan Hauer, Eric L McGarragal and 5 out of 6… with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
News to Note
02 years ago
Vital Signs – Strength Training Aids Mental Acuity in Women, Study Finds – NYTimes.com.
Another reason to do weight resistance training for women. How many more reasons do you need? Just an hour or two a week can help. What are you waiting for?
Play, Then Eat: Shift May Bring Gains at School – Well Blog – NYTimes.com.
So switching the play time before lunchtime has shown behavior and cognitive improvement? Well then let’s do it! Children who played before lunch wasted less food, drank more milk and asked for more water. And as in Arizona, students were calmer when they returned to classrooms, resulting in about 10 minutes of extra teaching time.
Fitness and Nutrition Center: Turbulence Training Fat Loss Bodyweight Workout.
I love reading these type of blog posts when it gives you advice about how to get a good workout without equipment, which means you can do it at home while you are watching your kids, at a hotel room if you are away, or stuck at home in the worst winter snow weather ever! No Excuses!!
Girls may learn math anxiety from female teachers
Young students tend to model themselves after adults of the same sex, and having a female teacher who is anxious about math may reinforce the stereotype that boys are better at math than girls…
Oh great, another thing to worry about. That women themselves are perpetuating the stereotype.
... by the end of the year, the more anxious teachers were about their own math skills, the more likely their female students — but not the boys — were to agree that “boys are good at math and girls are good at reading.
A Greater Appreciation
02 years ago
by Stephy
in Fitness/Exercise
I have realized driving home from boot camp each morning, how pretty sunrise time is. I mean – I knew it was pretty, but seeing it every day brings a greater appreciation for just how beautiful it is. It is one of the added bonuses of getting up that early.
Today’s Plumbline Training workout if you remember, is the 5 minute stations. You know what? It didn’t seem as torturous today as it has in the past. Wonder why that is??
We did our warmup as usual:
Checkpoints – a checkpoint is when you go down to the floor in a pushup position with your legs out and then spread them, bring them back in, stand up, touch the points of your hips, and do it again, and again, and again…
forward lunges
frankensteins
push-ups
Core
General stretching
Partner Wood chops with 14lb dynamax ball
Partner 6inch bridges holding the 14 dynmax ball
25 partner push-ups
5 Min Rounds: AMRepsAP
walking lunges (25 dbs)
65lb chest press/back wards rows
box step ups (25 dbs)
65lb hangclean squat presses
Partner Assisted Pull-ups
And then you breathe a sign of relief because you are done! 
What kind of activity are you doing today?
News to Note
02 years ago
Working Women Say Their Marriage Is Richer For It – NYTimes.com.
While the changing economic roles of husbands and wives may take some getting used to, the shift has had a surprising effect on marital stability. Over all, the evidence shows that the shifts within marriages — men taking on more housework and women earning more outside the home — have had a positive effect, contributing to lower divorce rates and happier unions.
Wow, this is great news! Lower divorce rates/happier unions = more stability for future generations? Divorce rates have fallen as women have made economic gains. This is surprising but welcome news to me.
Work It – Kettlebells 101 | The Daily Balance.
Kettlebells are great. This is a great 101 about them in general and how to use them.
Antioxidants and Free radicals.
One of the books – The O2 Diet – that I mentioned on here earlier today talks about antioxidants and free radicals. And how Antioxidants are very heavily involved in the prevention of cellular damage — the common pathway for cancer, aging, and a variety of diseases. Lower cancer rates are found in people who eat a lot of fruits and veges, which are rich in antioxidant.
This is a great website that gives you a ton of good info on eating foods. Including the world’s healthiest food list: http://whfoods.org/foodstoc.php
Calculate Your Basal Metabolic Rate | Fitness Articles, Workout Tips.
Everyone always says its not the # on the scale that matters. Its your BMR. Here is some info on that and how to calculate yours.
Nutrition & Fitness Book Suggestions
12 years ago
My friend Avelina – one of my boot camp buds, emailed me some book suggestions.
The first one is called Skinny Bitch. The cover touts this book as “a no-nonsense, tough-love guide for savvy girls who want to stop eating crap and start eating fabulous.” It is a call to eat a organic, vegetarian diet. Interesting book-couldn’t eat meat, chicken, etc. for a few days after reading one of their chapters. It does contain recipes and lists of organic foods found in the refrigerator or freezer section of your grocery store.
The second book is called The O2 Diet. The cover touts this book as “the cutting edge antioxidant-based program that will make you healthy, thin, and beautiful.” It is about the right things to eat-fruits and vegetables as you can imagine but, without getting into the science, it tells you which fruits and vegetables better protect you against free radicals. There are lists of foods, recipes and lists and explanations of which food are best for slimming down, making you look better and slowing down the aging process, fighting cancer, boosting the immune system, focusing your mind and helping your heart.
I’m curious, has anyone else read these? Would love to hear your thoughts. I am not sure I will read the Skinny Bitch one but I have been interested in finding out more about antioxidants and how they can improve your overall health, so I may check that one out.
Thoughts?
Monday is a good day
02 years ago
by Stephy
in Fitness/Exercise
So I took Fri, Sat and Sunday off from working out. Sometimes when you realize your head is not in the game, you have to just go sit on the bench for a min or two. I am glad I did – it seemed to be just what I needed. And although I didn’t eat clean this weekend at all and will be suffering for it most of this week – I felt raring to go to Plumbline Training this morning!
1 min Burpees- which amazingly gets you warmed up.
CORE:
Teeter totters
Bicycles moving up and down with our torso
One leg up rotations which are called ROBs
25 bottom up pushups
3 rounds AMRepsAP. We had 3 rest/active stations.
45lb OH Back squats/Burpees with a 14lb Dynamax ball
Box jumps/plyo pushups
20lb db push press squats
25lb kettlebell Figure 8s/Sumo squats with 25lb kettlebell
Partner Dynamax Ball toss
I like this workout. The weights aren’t super heavy and you get a good cardio workout!
A few things I n0ticed this morning – when you are in tune with your body, you can really tell when you push it nutrition wise. Most people who know me, know I am not a drinker. I will have one here and there, but it’s hard for me to recall the last time I had one- before this past weekend. I just don’t have a taste for it – hard to believe but true. So when I do drink, it wreaks havoc on me and it takes me literally days to recover. (Maybe that is why I don’t drink!!) So this will be an interesting experiment in how fast my body will bounce back after this weekend. I will keep you posted.
What did you all do?
Felt like home
02 years ago
by Stephy
in General Reflections
There is nothing like getting a way even for just a day or so. It helps refresh and renew your self. And to get away with a group of wonderful women who are there just simply to laugh, dance and enjoy each others company makes it that much better.
I came home to laundry being done, the house clean and the kids engaged in lego play. My husband was so happy that I actually got away that he made it that much easier to come home.
When you hang out with other women it helps you realize how alike people are. We are a bunch of ladies, all with different stories, careers, families but there were so many threads that intertwined and so many experiences that we all related to. I learned a ton too from these women. It was nice, comforting, informative – all at the same time. It felt like home – warm, cozy, familiar and fun.
Kids and eating healthy
02 years ago
by Stephy
in Uncategorized
Since I am away spending time with some girlfriends, I wanted to give you some information about kids and eating healthy. I believe that kids learn from their parents and community, so the first best thing you can do is you, yourself live a healthy and fit life. Showing them that even though we all live busy lives, that you can fit exercise and healthy living within in. Here are 2 bits of info below that relate to kids and eating healthier.
Jamie’s Food Revolution USA | Campaign for healthy eating | Jamie Oliver.
I believe that every child in America has the right to fresh, nutritious school meals, and that every family deserves real, honest, wholesome food. Too many people are being affected by what they eat. It's time for a national revolution. America needs to stand up for better food!
Hannah Bea – my daughter, hates school food and who can blame her. The few times I have met her there for lunch, I was amazed at the poor quality of not only the food, but the portions and presentation. They call a salad a few leaves of iceberg lettuce and I think it had a few bits of carrots. Come on – we can do better than that. So, for the most part, I pack her lunch daily. It’s a pain but I can be sure she will get good food that she will eat. And for the most part it’s well rounded with some stuff she likes prepared in a healthier way and fruit and veges. Maybe if they did improve the quality – it would improve not only their health but maybe increase some revenue.
Not everyone is lucky enough to live near a Wegmans. I realize this. But if you do, then you probably already realize how lucky you are. They really have great selection and their website does offer great information on eating healthy. Hannah’s Girl Scout Brownie troop recently went to Wegs to a Veggie Patch Cookie class called:
“eat well live well” Veggie Patch Cooking Class for Scouts. In the class the girls had a a hands-on experience where they got to participate in food preparation, try new foods and learn about making healthier choices. They made a great salad, talked about apples, and prepared some great things that were healthy. Hannah came home so excited about what she learned and brought some food home for all of us to try. I think it’s great that Wegmans offers this. The more everyone educates kids about healthy eating and living, the more it sinks in.
Down and Dirty with Kids in the Kitchen.
…we need to focus on how we make food come alive to our children. How can we make it more inviting and fun to play in the kitchen with us, or if old enough, for us?
Please vote for Invisible Children
12 years ago
The Issue
A 9-year-old boy in the suburbs should not be kidnapped from his home and forced to fight as an abducted soldier. If this is true in the United States, we believe it is true in Uganda and in the Congo. We have discovered that young people across North America believe this as well, and are uniting in their local communities to fight this injustice a world away.
For the last 24 years, a rebel leader named Joseph Kony has been waging war in central Africa, terrorizing communities and abducting 30,000 children to be his soldiers. Over 2 million people have been displaced in central Africa as a result of the violence.
This crisis continues today with minimal international attention.
Our big idea is big indeed: rescue the child soldiers of Northern Uganda with the help of young advocates across North America, end the longest running war in Africa, and rebuild what was lost.
The Plan
The plan is to bring this war to an end and return these children to their homes by expanding the youth movement already in motion. Invisible Children makes documentaries about war-affected kids in Northern Uganda and tours them across the continent, exposing the youth of North America to their stories. We then equip them to band together and become activists seeking to end this war. Hundreds of thousands of people have already risen to the call. With donations of less than $20 from students across the world, we have managed to put 760 Ugandans in school, rebuild 11 war-destroyed schools, and implement microeconomic programs to jump start village economies. With the Chase grant, we can dream bigger and finish what we started. We will finally spread the story of child soldiers into theaters, dramatically increasing exposure and improving our advocacy efforts. With exposure and program funding, we can rebuild more Ugandan schools, provide more education, and better economic development.
The Outcome
The outcome is peace in Uganda and an end to this war. The outcome is a generation of young Americans believing in the power of their voice and hard work.
Nothing unites a community like a common goal. Invisible Children has found something that brings every one together: pursuing freedom and justice for abducted children. It is in forgetting ourselves to help another that we discover our own power and value. When communities work together, they become what they were meant to be: a collection of individuals who live, work, play, and care for the mutual good of the community and beyond.
If we are awarded this grant, we can prove that these communities of dedicated young people and families can work in concert to change history and set a precedent for justice like never before. We can end this war, help restore Uganda to prosperity, and help these child soldiers find a new life of peace.
We are already doing it, and with this grant we will see it through. Join us with your vote.
via Chase Community Giving on Facebook | Invisible Children Inc.
