Big News

I can finally announce my big news! I am going to be a first time grandmother in February. My daughter is going to have a baby. She is doing great right now as she is moving into her second trimester. She is still running and doing her kick-boxing. She follows exactly everything the doctor tells her to do. We are very excited here at our house. I want to continue to stay in good physical condition so that when my little grandchild is about 10 we will be riding bikes together, or swimming together, or climbing a mountain, or roller-blading, or playing kickball, or......... I am getting tired thinking about it. I gotta keep up so I can be a fun and active Grammy!!!

Where Have I Been?

Where have I been? Well, actually I have been right here. I guess I have just been kinda busy and not been posting. I cannot believe it has been 8 days since my last post. I am still keeping up with my exercise. But I have dropped the ball with keeping up with spark people. I have still been careful with my diet, but I have not been recording my food intake for about 2 weeks. And boy, it does make a difference. I have not gained, but I have hit a plateau. Keeping track of exactly what you eat will certainly encourage you to be more careful with your food intake.
This past week: I walked, I ran, I walked and ran, I swam, I biked, I did fitness fusion. Two days in a row I went for a bike ride. I see now that that is not a good idea. My rearend was very sore. I ran this morning with my friend Debbie from church. She runs marathons, and was kind enough to run with me. I had to tell her more than once to go on without me, that I had to walk. She would not do it. She walked with me, and then started running again, and I knew that was my cue to run too. I think we went about 2.5 miles and I probably ran at least 1.75 of it. We plan to meet again sometime on Thursday. I definitely need to be pushed!! I am disciplined enough to go and do exercise, but I am not driven enough to push harder and harder. I hope to take it up a notch and work harder.

Monday August 18

Well, usually I have some good title, but today, I just could not come up with anything that was adequate. Last Thursday I did make my evening walk. I did make it to FF before going with dh to take ds to college. He followed in his vehicle as we went in dh's truck and pulled a trailer. The truck started making wierd noises. We pretty much just dumped my son.... no helping to put away dishes, etc, not taking him out to lunch. We needed to get back home because we were worried about the truck. It made it fine, but my dh decided to drive my suburban on Saturday. he was going to spend the night with his 94 year old father an hour's drive away and did not want to chance taking his truck until he had it checked out. He was about 40 miles away when he called me and he was broke down in this car!! Ugh!! We had to wait quite awhile for a tow truck to get the car back home.

I did not make my walk on Friday or Saturday. Sunday evening I decided to run/walk the 3.4 miles to the end of the pavement. I walked for 5 minutes to warm up and then started running and low and behold I made it all the way to the end of the pavement and even turned around and ran a little further. I ran for 20 minutes. This is great for me... I didn't know I had it in me. I am meeting a friend tomorrow morning who is going to help train me to run. Today I will not be doing my walk because after the run last night and the FF this morning, my hips are sore. I hope I will be ready for the early morning run.

I am enjoying this exercise, but I have kinda neglected things around the house- you know like cooking and cleaning and yardwork. So... I better get off this computer and get with it!

More Swimming

Today my friend T and I again went to Lake Tejas. This time we swam from one end to the other of the swimming area for 5 laps. We had previously done this for 4 laps. It took me almost 19 minutes. I will have to check out swimming at the pool to know exactly how far that I swam. The lack of vision in the water did not bother me as much this time. I know that I need to continue to do this more and more so that I am comfortable doing an open water swim. I hope that I will have time tomorrow to make it to FF, but I am moving my youngest to A&M.

Monday night as well as Wednesday night and tonight I made the 3.4 mile walk. Tuesday made it impossible because it was lightening and raining. Tonight I added a little aternating running with my walking. I talked to a friend who runs marathons that is going to take me on to help me out with this running. I am looking forward to adding running to my routine. If I can get this running down, I know I will be able to do this triathlon.

One of my good friends who has previously done little exercise is now riding her stationary bike and walking. I am so proud of her. She has committed herself to getting fit. Remember, it is not too late to jump in and do something. Start right now where you are and get moving. You will soon feel so good about yourself and be happy with the new fit you.

Oh Yeah....

Oh Yeah... I think I will be able to do that swim. Today when I had to change my plans from working in the yard, I decided to go to the pool and swim. I made myself not ever touch the sides or push off from the side. I swam for 15 minutes and did 12 laps. This ends up being 600 yards. The sprint triathlon is somewhere around 400 meters. So... I do think I will be able to do this. I will not be fast. I have to do other strokes still even after all this time. I cannot just do free style. I will do free style, side stroke, breast stroke, and back stroke. Hey... I just want to be able to finish it. I know I can do the bike ride. So now, I must begin to work on the running if I ever plan on making this happen. I ended up swimming close to 30 minutes today. I know that is not alot, but it was all I had time for. I did my evening walk of 3.4 miles tonight. Tomorrow... well I don't know.... what will I do tomorrow? Swim? Run on treadmill? Bike ride? Hmmm...... decisions, decisions, decisons!

Open Water Swim

Saturday was spent at Toledo Bend Reservoir. I kayaked across the lake from our place to this island. The island did not look far away, but the more I paddled it just seemed like I did not get any closer. I did finally make it to the island. It took me 15 minutes to get there. I did not get out because there was all this thick mossy growth, and I did not want to walk through it. I also did not do the open water swim here. The water was not completely smoothe, and I just was too scared to attempt it.

Yesterday my friend "T" and I went to Lake Tejas. I had this thought coming back from Toledo Bend about swimming here. It is a lake, there is swimming there, and it was not too far away. So after church, we traveled to Colsmeneil. We swam for about 15 minutes without stopping. I am not sure exactly how far we went. I know that I could swim longer. But... I had to swim all different ways- not only because I was tired from swimming freestyle, but because it was really bothering me that I could not see in the water when I am used to seeing that black line in the pool. I always get this claustrophobic feeling with certain things. I had that feeling with not seeing in the water. I was really trying to overcome this feeling more than worried about my strokes or my speed. As long as I did the breast stroke, the back stroke or a side stroke, I was fine. So I know that I can complete the distance in swimming, but I will just be very, very slow. We plan to go again and try it some more.

I walked on Saturday night for about 4.5 miles. I planned to work in the yard this morning and skip my FF, and then my dh told me he had sprayed around the house for ants so I decided to forego working in the flower beds for the next few days. When I found out I was not working in the yard, it was too late for me to make it to FF. Oh well... I will get that exercise in later today.

Still Going

I am still going strong. I see I have neglected to post for a few days. Wednesday was FF and also the 8:30 p.m. walk. It is not hot at that time of day even though we are sweating due to the high humidity. Thursday evening I went for a short swim, actually you would not even call that exercise; it was just cooling myself off from the high temperatures. I did the 3.4 mile walk again last night. I do need to turn this into a run. The tops of my feet have been bothering me, and I am wondering if I need some new shoes. Today my dh and I are going to the lake. I am taking my kayak and maybe my bike. I would like to get in the lake and see how far I can swim. If I am ever going to attempt a triathlon, I have to get used to that open water. Just the thought of it kinda scares me. But I need to step out of my comfort zone and just do it! Ummmm.. I just don't know if I am ready yet. Today I made it to FF and we worked on the Swiss ball. We worked our rhomboids and trapezoids. We did a few pushups off the wall and off the ground and we did a short ab workout. Yes, I do need to do more and work harder, but I am getting results and keeping that weight off. My friend brought by some okra from his garden, and we talked about eating it with stewed tomatoes and cornbread. Yum... it sounds good to me!

Early Morning Bike Ride

Today was the first Tuesday in quite awhile that I did not have a definite place to go exercise. Since I decided to withdraw from the spinning class, I debated on what I would do today. I decided to go for an early morning bike ride before work. I would have liked to have done a big loop, but I did not want to take a chance on a day that I worked to get stranded somewhere with trouble- like a flat tire or something. So what I did was go in one direction for awhile and then come back past my house and continue in the other direction. I was on my bike by 6:05, and I rode for about 40 minutes. The sky was so beautiful with a gorgeous sunrise. It was so much better than a dark room on a stationary bike. On Thursday I will either go further on the bike or go for a swim. It is just so much easier to be out when the temperature is in the 70's or 80's instead of the high 90's. For now late afternoon exercise is out for me.

Exercise vs. Training

Since I began blogging, and reading the blogs of runners, swimmers, bikers, who participate in marathons, half-marathons, and triathlons, I have discovered that there is a difference in exercise and training. What I do is exercise. I can see that training is so much more focused, organized, and intense. Of course to be training, you are training for something. You can't just exercise and plan to run a marathon or triathlon. You must set goals, schedules, and organized workouts. Now what I am wondering is how do you get to this point? Reading others' blogs? Reading books? Getting a trainer? Hmmmmm.......... I for sure need some hints. I do know the first thing I have to do is decide exactly WHAT I want to train for, and then I guess I can begin a plan of action. But for right now... I guess you can just say that I "just" exercise.

Rain!!

Yes, we finally got rain. Yesterday, LB said she needed more experience riding her new motorcycle and asked if I wanted to go along and ride her mo-ped. We left the house and it was a hot sunny day. I thought that it looked like rain, but that did not deter us from having a great day riding around in the country as well as a city neighborhood. We were about 1 1/2 miles from home and stopped at a stop sign. We could see that the sky had darkened and there was lightening in the distance. Soon after we got back to her house and stored the bikes in their proper places, the bottom busted wide open! The wind was blowing the trees so hard, and the rain was coming down furiously. We just looked at each other with our mouths wide open, and then we expressed what we were both thinking. How happy we were that we had made it back to the house before all of this started. I just said, " Oh thank you Lord, thank you Lord." Not only were we thankful to be out of the rain, but we were also thankful for the much needed rain!

Frio River.... Neches River

Thursday brought disappointment to me because I was to join my beloved Unome girlfriends for a weekend on the Frio River. Several of the unomes had to cancel due to pressing situations at home. Since there were so many that were unable to make the biannual reunion, we decided to cancel our Frio River trip. Therefore, I had some extra money to spend, and I was not ready to just sit home and do nothing. So... I went ahead and bought the kayak from Academy. It is by no means a fancy kayak. Today my dh was taking a flatbottom to the Neches River. So he loaded the kayak in the boat and then we got it out on the bank. He proceeded to ease his way down the river with our dog Roxie. I went ahead of him and kayaked down river. The river was so low that I had to maneuver around lots of downed trees. There was one big tree that I limboed under. He decided to park and fish awhile so I paddled back up river for several minutes. I did miss going to the Frio River because the Neches is very muddy and ugly. Nevertheless, it was fun. Yesterday I went all by myself to Sam Rayburn Reservoir. I have not been there in so long that I did not know that you had to pay if you were going to launch a boat. Even though the kayak fit inside my suburban, it is still considered a boat. It was fun paddling along the shoreline of Hanks Creek. Later that afternoon I contacted my boss to see if I could bring my kayak to practice in his pool turning over and trying to get back in the kayak. Yes, this should have been the first thing I did. I must say that I am glad that I did it. I NEVER want to fall out of that kayak. First, I just tried to get in without tipping myself over. I strained and grunted and scratched and bruised myself hoisting myself across the kayak and then trying to get myself in it. Well, I made it, but believe me.... it was not a pretty site. Then I capsized the kayak. Oh my gosh!!! I did not know it would take on so much water. It did not sink, but it was full of water. I now know I need to carry some sort of container to bail water with. Like I said, I do not want to fall out of the kayak!!! So yesterday, not only did I get a good back and core workout at FF, but I got a good back workout with the kayaking yesterday and today. It was lots of fun, and I look forward to going again!!