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Pamper Yourself

Do as  I say and not as I do.  When it comes time to pamper yourself, don’t skip out.  I’m not saying you need to go get an uber expensive spa package every weekend.  What I am suggesting is carving out time to take care of you.  It could be as simple a a nice soak in a bubble or Epsom bath while you read quietly away from the craziness of everyday life.

Pampering yourself isn’t about being over indulgent, but taking time to keep yourself centered, relaxed and healthy.  I love getting massage and so does my body.  After teaching several Zumba classes and running tons of miles, my body is beat.  Fortunately, I have a membership to Massage Envy where I can treat myself to a nice massage.  The massage helps keeps my muscles healthy in addition to helping me relax.

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There’s only one problem with the Massage Envy setup.  You need to be able to carve out time for the monthly appointment.  Thanks to a hectic travel hockey schedule, I can go weekly for the next year due to all the massages I’ve accumulated.  The point is I need to make myself a  priority and make sure I’m taking care of myself.

Treating yourself can take a number of different iterations.  It could be as simple as taking the time for 1 5-20 minute walk during your work day to clear your head.  Or you could sign up for a yoga class at a local studio to help you get your zen on.  If you’re like me, and you like clothes, a nice trip to the malls with friends and sans kids can do a mind and body good.

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Perhaps this weekend I’ll take some of my own advice.  Thankfully, the Mayor’s games are local, which will afford me some extra time.   I may even be able to squeeze in a hair cut, a massage, and a pedicure.   I’m long overdue for all three and they sound so heavenly.    In the meantime, take time this week to pamper yourself.   Take care of yourself physically, mentally and emotionally, which does in fact include pampering yourself from time to time.

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Side Effects of a Hurricane

The side effects of a hurricane are real and they’re sad.  With a storm the size of Irma, you end up spending almost 48 hours caged inside.  If you were unfortunate enough to have lost power, your stuck eating processed food that just isn’t healthy.  Even if you kept power, like we did, the caramel roll and mimosa brunch does nothing for your fitlife goals.

I’ve had a penchant for running for the past two years since my first Purple Stride event in 2015, but fell of the wagon after our Norway trip.  My sister in law took a picture of us post brunch Saturday before the storm hit.  It was sad to see, but I looked like I swallowed a small child.  I swear I didn’t actually eat a small child, but if you saw the picture you would have thought differently.

When my work announced we were reopening the office with a relaxed dress code on Tuesday, a collective sigh of relief went out across South Florida.   Sadly, post hurricane the dolphins on our yoga pants have morphed into whales.  What’s more the dolphins no look like whales.  Oh it was a humbling Tuesday.  If there’s ever a way to reignite your running habit, this hurricane weekend was the it.

Since it has been so hot, I’ve been running on the treadmill.  Unfortunately, the power had been cutting in and out Monday, so I had to run outside.  It would be my luck that I would injure myself post-storm in an unfortunate treadmill accident.  Consequently, the Piggie and I hit the running path and ran 2.65 miles.  I thought I was going to die.  It was as humid as it was hot.  I definitely should have brought my inhaler.  Nevertheless, it felt amazing to be out on the trail my loving running partner.   Tonight marked three notes in a row of running.  We’re back on track!

 

 

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Wonderful Weekend

It’s been a wonderful weekend, but like most it is coming to an end all to quickly.   Friday night we had our favorite take out and relaxed to some of our favorite shows on Netflix.  Our Saturday and Sunday were a stark contrast to the relaxation of Friday night.

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I can’t hardly complain about Saturday.  It is hard to complain about enjoying Peanut Island with good friends (aka hockey family) and on a boat.  We had a blast with the Kennedys and Whips  in the beautiful, calm waters near Peanut Island.  The boys had a blast.  Their favorite part of the day, the visit from the pizza delivery boat.  Amazing!  Unfortuntely, despite the copious amounts of sunscreen applied over and over, I am now the shade of a lobster.  Its not a good look.

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Unfortunately for my sun burnt back, we had a fundraiser for the hockey team last night.  It was a casino night, which meant I had to dress up and a sports bra wouldn’t be acceptable. Boo!   There is nothing more uncomfortable than bra straps on a sunburned back and shoulders.

We had a great evening filled with drinks, food, friends and gambling.  I was a little worried about how I was gonna feel this morning.  Especially after enjoying 3 or 4 vodka sodas,.  Fortunately, the bartender was light on the pour.  Thank god because I had a lot to do today.

After our second drink, we felt it was time to lose our chips at the blackjack.  No sooner had I played my first hand when I received a call from Goalielocks.  He, TK and the Mayor were at our house hanging out as John, the hubby and I were at the fundraiser.  Apparently, the dogs were were going insane barking, which worried the kids.  I’m not sure what they thought we could do from there, but I told them to keep the dogs out.

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Our dogs are large and have a bark to match, so they’d likely scare anyone off.  I instructed Goalielocks to call the police if they saw anything unusual and then call me.  I didn’t hear back from them after that call, so I texted him and he informed me everything was now okay.

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Meanwhile Jake started texting me from John’s house where he was babysitting TK’s sisters.  They have a kitten, Destiny, who usually stays upstairs.  Last night she decided to take a trip downstairs.  Last night, we rediscovered Jake’s severe allergy to cats. Quickly his friend Arielle, who lives in the neighborhood,  was able to bring him some benadryl.

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I checked back in on him ten minutes later and he was feeling woozy.  At that point, he informed me that he had taken 3 benadryl. Now I’m freaking out since the proper dose is two.  I was certain he had misread the box since he was feeling pretty rough.  He sent me a photo of the label, which indicated a dose of 1-4 tablets.  I was confused as I had never seen a benadryl box that advocated taking more than two pills at once.

We hurried back to John’s house since I was a bit worried about Jake.  Throughout all our text messages, he neglected to mention that he had taken children’s benadryl. It was kind of a key piece of information to leave out.  Nevertheless, we got him home and into bed quite quickly.

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My sunburn kept me warm all night, so sleeping was not working so well.  I woke up to huge cracks of thunder and copious amounts of lightning.  I’m pretty sure lightning struck our yard or our neighbor’s yard given the amazing thunder we were experiencing.  We spent the rest of our Sunday running all the errands I neglected on Saturday and working out with the boys.  The younger two did awesome job on the TRX.  They’re starting to understand that in order to achieve their own ice goals, they have to work hard on and off the ice.

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Lastly, the big topic of conversation in our house this weekend is the solar eclipse tomorrow.  At this point in the weekend, my boys have been given the “don’t look directly into the sun” speech so many times they can recite perfectly.  Moreover, it seems to put them into a trance like state until I remind them they’ll be going to school tomorrow.  I’m sure they’re no different than 100% of the kids already back in school that are hoping for a random Monday off.

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The Grind

It is easy to get lost in the grind of our day to day to professional and personal lives.  As we grind it out, it easy to lose site of how much progress we’ve made. This week we spent three days as a leadership team working on our budget initiatives for 2018.  It was an invigorating, discussing spurring event that was really productive.

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This was my fourth year attending and my third year presenting.  The first year I presented, it wasn’t pretty. They beat me up pretty good.  Thankfully, each year has gone progressively better than the last year.  This year I presented on two days to a much larger audience than I’d been accustomed to, but it went very well.  As I look back on my previous budget experiences and compare to this year’s presentation, I can see how far I have come.  3b8ffd69e15dcd50329cbd68b15ef30f--teen-quotes-work-quotes

While I’ve made some great progress towards my professional goals, my fitlife goals too a backseat to Twizzlers, Snickers, and catered meals.  When I got home tonight and my treadmill and TRX were glaring at me.  I went for a quick run on the treadmill before dinner.

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My treadmill and I got reacquainted before a great dinner with friends.  My TRX, however, is looking a little neglected.  Tomorrow I will be getting back on the wagon eating right.  There are times that we deviate from our health goals and that’s gonna happen.  We can’t let it derail us completely.  There is no quick way to success be it professional or personal.  There is no elevator to take us to the top floor only hard work and persistence.

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My Running Partners

When I started running over two years ago, I didn’t know that I would love it so much.  Nor did I know that my running partners would be so important in maintaining my training or that they’d bring me so much happiness.

Most days my running partners are Jake and our dogs Maya and Athena.  The beautiful thing about running with these three is they keep a brisk pace.  Jake is particularly fast ,so running with him means I have to push myself.  The puppies like to be first, so which ever dog is in back is racing to catch up to their sister.

This can be a bit problematic when Jake and his puppy pull away from us.  Usually it’s Maya and I holding up the rear.  Jake’s got his mile below 5 minutes.  Meanwhile, I almost threw myself a party for breaking the 8 minute mile barrier.

Maya trying to keep pace with Jake means we’re pushing race pace almost every run.  Since Jake is so fast, Athena is usually super tired after two miles.  We’ll switch the puppies and walk them for awhile, so they can catch their breath and cool down a  little bit.

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By the time we start running again, the puppies’ energy is back and they’re ready to roll.  Some runs, Goalielocks or the Mayor will come with us.  For those runs, we usually cap our distance at three miles.  The best part of running with the puppies is how happy they are when we run.

While in Norway, Jake and I mixed it up a bit by hiking on the mountain trails.  It wasn’t a rigorous as our runs, but some parts of the trail were quite steep and took a lot of concentration to master.  The views were incredible and so was the weather.  No horrible heat indexes to contend with.

The unfortunate part of summer in Florida, is heat indexes in the triple digits.  As much as I love to run with my kids and my dogs, the summer heat makes it dangerous for the dogs.  Until the heat abates, I’ll be hitting the treadmill and missing my running partners.  When I run on the treadmill, there’s no sweet puppy looking back at me smiling as she enjoy the run.  Nor is there Jake, who motivates me to run faster and further every time we run.

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A Harsh Reality of Adulting

One of the cruelest realities of adulting, by far, is portion control. Who knew that as a women as soon as you turned 25, your metabolism would start slowing to a crawl? That burger you could eat once eat without even thinking about soon gives you pause. The large plate of spaghetti you once ate, turned into a medium plate, at 30 it turned into a small plate and at 35 it turned into a plate of carbless noodles. Doesn’t that sound appetizing?
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Seriously consider the portions you get at a restaurant. Some our 2-4 times the recommended serving size. Depending on the day and the discipline level, this may work for you. As one meal could turn into 3-4 meals that wouldn’t entirely kill your waistline. On a bad day, it could undo weeks of disciplined eating and hard work at the gym.

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If you look at your diet and you’ve cut a lot of the junk out but still aren’t losing weight, take a look at your portions. Many of us eat pretty healthy, but portion control can trip you up. Even if you only eat healthy fats like almonds or avocados to excess, the end result will be the same. You’ll gain weight as your calorie intake exceeds the calorie intake. One of the best ways I have found to counter this is by tracking what I eat and holding myself accountable. My kitchen scale, measuring spoons and cups are my best friends in maintaining healthy portions.

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Infuse a Little Pineapple and Cut a Couple Calories

If you’re like me and you like the occasional cocktail or are a hockey mom and need a low calorie go to drink for hockey season.  Here are a couple of ideas for you:

Vodka pineapple vs. Pineapple infused vodka

A vodka with pineapple juice will give you 182 calories with 28 gram of carbs.  As a lighter alternative, you can substitute the pineapple juice for a pineapple infused vodka as a martini or on the rocks with or without soda water.     This substitute is only 70 calories with 18 gram of carbs.

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You can purchase the infused vodka as a flavor or you can infuse your own vodka.  Since we live in Florida and grow pineapples in our backyard, we can make our own pineapple infused vodka.   To do this you can use a 750 ml bottle of the vodka of your choice.  I prefer Grey Goose, Ketel, Tito’s or Ciroc depending on what I’m using it for.  Keep in mind, the smoother the vodka, the better the infusion will taste.

The pineapple will need to be cut up into chucks and placed into a carafe big enough to hold all of the pineapple and the vodka.   Once the pineapple is in the carafe, pour in the vodka and let it sit in the fridge for 3-6 weeks.  The longer is sits in the fridge, the stronger the infusion.  Once the infusion period has ended, strain and serve cold.

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Vodka mixed drinks vs. vodka sodas

The problem with mixed drinks, aside from their awesome taste, is that they’re often calorie and sugar laden.  It does us no favors the morning after and does no favors to our waistline.  Hockey season lasts from August to well June here in Florida, so drinking that many calories is not conducive to maintaining a healthy weight or lifestyle.  Here are some examples:

Vodka with diet cranberry calories: 108 calories

Vodka cranberry calories: 182-210 depending on type of vodka and juice

Vodka with orange juice 193 calories

Fuzzy Navel: 253 calories

Here are some suggestions:

The hockey mom fit cocktail: 65 calories 16.3 carbs.

Pour one can of Peach/Pear LaCroix over ice, add one ounce of Peach Ciroc mix and garnish with slice of lime.

Other variations:

Cran-raspberry LaCroix served with Berry Ciroc or Goose/Ketel or Tito’s.

Orange LaCroix served with Peach Ciroc

Perrier served with Grey Goose and a slice of lime

Calories per 1 ounce of vodka used:

Ciroc: 65

Grey Goose: 69

Ketel One: 69

Tito’s: 60

Of course over indulging in vodka (as with anything else) with or without a mixer will pretty much derail any attempt to: live a fit life, maintain a healthy weight and  maintain healthy relationships, so enjoy in moderation.

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Our race

As tryout week winds down and my hockey mom nerves unravel, I can feel the tension leaving my shoulders and my stomach.  Friday night we had our last tryouts for the fall season.  Regardless of the outcome of tryouts, the ultimate decision is equally stressful.  I skipped the Monkey to get home earlier with the Mayor, so I could attempt to get to bed early in preparation for the Firefighter Eric Patrie 5k on Saturday morning.

I’m not a morning person, so when I have a race or early hockey game, I usually set several different alarms to ensure I’m out of the house in time to get to the event.  I prefer to get to the race about an hour early, so I can warm up, eat a little something, hit the bathroom and get acclimated for the race.   Saturday morning was not that morning.

I had set my Fitbit alarm, which usually works all of the time.  It doesn’t, however, work when you forget to put it back on after you shower.  I also set the alarm on my phone, but apparently it was for pm and not am.  Instead I awoke to my hubby saying aren’t you supposed to be somewhere by now?  It was 6:05 am and the answer of course was yes!

I ran out of bed, woke up Jake and gave him a ten minute warning.   We rushed to get ready and head towards Delray, so we wouldn’t miss the start.  I grabbed almonds in a rush and popped few on the way along with a GU gel.  We made it in time to park and head to the starting line before the scheduled start, but it felt rushed and our muscles (much like the weather by Florida standards) were cold.

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I had hoped to log a PR, but I was tired, cold and under the weather.  Honestly, I didn’t feel like running at all and was really craving the comfort of my bed and down comforter.  Nevertheless, Jake and I along with our KU running crew, including Evie the sweetest dog,  made our way to the starting line.  It was a gun to chip race, so Jake and I stayed near the front of the start corral to avoid the inevitable starting line traffic jam.

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As I ran the first mile, which felt like five, I fought through the desire to quit, the desire to walk, the desire to go back to bed and tried to maintain a decent pace.  It was a tough mile and slower than I wanted, but not horrible over all.  I grabbed some water continuing on to mile two.  Maybe it was me, maybe it was the weather or maybe it was the route, but mile two seemed to last forever.  I tried to maintain my pace as best I could and saw only a little degradation in pace between mile one and two.

Mile three beat me up.  The unusually cool and dry air dried out my throat and tightened up my lungs.  I had to stop to use my inhaler and was feeling the pain.  At this point, I had a choice to continue to walk and get comfortable or to run the remainder and try to hit my goal.  I chose to run. It hurt, it wasn’t pretty and in the end I missed a PR by tenths of seconds, but I did it.  I fought through the fatigue and pain to do my best.

Initially I was disappointed by my time (28.33) , but I think I was being too harsh on myself.  Two and half years ago, I ran my first 5k at a time of 34 minutes.  I started training in earnest last fall and whittled my time down to a PR of 28:32.  It’s not earth shattering fast, but it represents a lot of hard work and a lot of forward progress.  I didn’t feel 100% physically Saturday morning, but I didn’t let it stop me from giving 100% in the race and that was Saturday morning’s victory.

Meanwhile, Jake finished 6 minutes ahead of me, but was also disappointed by his time.  It was slower than his PR of 21 minutes, but he still  placed in the top 3 of his age group.  This was a very fast and competitive race, so I was happy to see how well he fared against the competition.  Even with the trophy, he was still disappointed with his result.

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Even though my time wasn’t where I wanted to be, I love the feeling of finishing a race.  I love the excitement of the start and the excitement of the finish.  I love seeing a first time 5k runner come through the finish line.  There is no better feeling finishing something you didn’t think you were capable of finishing and theirs is nothing better than seeing that sense of pride on a runner’s face as they finish their first 5k.  Joe – your KU crew was proud to see you cross the finish line and do great your first time out.  Can’t wait to see what you do in your second 5k!

Neither of Jake nor I, hit a time we were thrilled with Saturday, but we had a great time with good friends supporting a great cause.  For Jake and I, its back to training and working towards better results and greater distances.

If you’d like to know more about this event, here’s the website.

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I won the weekend!

I don’t mean to brag, but I totally won the weekend.    Truly, I freaking killed the weekend.  What does winning the weekend even mean?  Let me explain….  At work we talk a lot about what winning looks like.  In order to win, we need to hit certain metrics or certain objectives.  For me to win the weekend, as a hockey mom, it is not dissimilar.  I need to hit certain objectives.   These objectives include incredibly sexy tasks like laundry, cooking meals, vacuuming, grocery shopping, cleaning the house (still in a post hockey season disarray) and logging my miles.  I can count the number of times I have hit all of these objectives on a weekend during hockey season on one hand.   To be fair, it probably happened just once before.  My fellow hockey moms and dads, I know you feel my pain and can appreciate how amazing it is that I could win my weekend during the spring hockey season.

 

Again, this post isn’t about bragging, but relishing in the small joyous victories life sometimes brings.  Friday night was a complete miracle.  I came home to a deceased hamster.  Chuka, Zach’s (aka the Mayor) newly acquired hamster went to the great beyond after a mere 5 days at the homestead.  He was devastated at the loss, so naturally we put the dead hamster in a bag and took it back to Pet Smart for an exchange.  While the Mayor and dad exchanged the hamster, I ran my four miles and it was awful, but I did it.  Before we took the boys to hockey, the Mayor’s new hamster (Oompah Lupa) was in its cage and playing about.   Both boys made it to their hockey practice without being a minute late.  Victory!  By the time the Mayor and dad got home from peewee practice, I had already grilled the chicken (without blowing up the grill), cooked the pasta and made a Caesar salad.  Remarkably, the chicken did not taste like lighter fluid and there were no fires.  Dinner and the Mayor’s sleepover were a complete success.

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Saturday could have been better had my Wild beaten St. Louis, but they choked and broke my family’s collective heart by being eliminated from the Stanley Cup Playoffs.  To be fair, the officiating didn’t help their cause at all.  Nonetheless, I was extremely productive completing the grocery shopping, vacuuming the floor, and completing almost all of the laundry! I even logged my four miles with my Athena.  Best of all, the Mayor’s team won both of their peewee spring games.  Post run as a consequence of some foot pain, we headed to Dick’s Sporting Goods so I could replace my worn sneakers.   New sneakers and a couple workout tanks I didn’t need later, we headed over to PetSmart to buy Goalielocks some new fish.  If he has his druthers, he’ll have a fish breeding facility in his room in no time.

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Sunday was the perfect day to stay home and do nothing as it rained almost all day.  These days rarely happen in South Florida and I took full advantage to finish the laundry and get most of the house organized.   Even had the opportunity to take the boys to Petco to get our saltwater aquarium water’s tested.   Fortunately for my wallet the tank isn’t done cycling.   For now our tank, will keep cycling with the hermit crabs and Bubbles the conch.  Post Petco the sun finally came out, so Jake and I went for a quick 3.5 mile run.  The run was miserable as the pre-run diet of brownies and coffee was less than optimal, but we did it.  We stuck to our goal and made it happen.   Note to self (and cautionary tale to the audience) stop eating brownies and going for a run immediately thereafter.  It makes you want to vomit and slows you down.  Sometimes it all about life’s lessons and small victories.

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To be perfectly honest, I finished all the loads of laundry and maybe by this Friday we’ll get all of the clothes put away.  Small victories will turn into big victories that’s what I keep telling myself.   Either that or we’ll hire a housekeeper during hockey season.   In the meantime, I’ll relish small victories and winning my weekend.