You Can't Stand Still to Move Foward

Here we are March 2012 (left) vs. January 2013 (right). I may wear belts all the time now. It's been a long time since I've had a waist like this. Really liked my outfit today, I wouldn't have done a picture otherwise - and the skirt is a Medium! I may be at least almost average size!

So, You Can't Stand Still to Move Forward. That kind of goes without saying, doesn't it. And you can't do the same thing expecting different results. I have been on nearly the same workout schedule for the past few months and although the weight is still coming off I feel the need for something more ...challenging. I want to feel myself becoming stronger, faster and have more endurance. After all that's what (for me) keeps it interesting. Hitting new 'firsts', surpassing goals and being surprised by something I can do today that I couldn't do yesterday.

I have adjusted my training schedule with this in mind and only give myself workouts in which I can measure improvement. It's sort of like having a competition against myself, and being a Leo, I do like competition. For the last few weeks (three I think), this is what I'm doing.

Monday : Run 5k (treadmill or hopefully outside when it's not too frigid)
Tuesday : Insert class I haven't done before (for the last two weeks, it's been Spin Circuit)
Wednesday : CrossFit
Thursday : CrossFit
Friday : CrossFit

Does it look like I'm doing the same thing Wednesday - Friday? Well it is the same class, but it's different everytime. I was recently talking with someone about how people are becoming almost addicted to CrossFit, and I see why. If you have a great instructor (which we're incredibly lucky to have a work) this class can and will push you to your boundaries - and in my case that's nearly passing out and feeling reluctant that you're standing at the end of the class. For most classes it's a certain set of different exercises and you try to complete them as fast as possible. This class format allows me to motivate myself more. I mean, I can do anything for three minutes! I'm doing CrossFit three days in a row, no matter how sore I am from the previous day's class and this has been a great challenge. I am finding new muscle groups - like last week on Wednesday, when we did power cleans for the first time. If you're at all interested in what that looks like : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH_dLhZ2fj8. Now while I'd like to think I look like that when doing it, I don't. I was doing these with 65lbs total (45lb bar plus 2 10lb plates). We did 10 rounds total of 10 power cleans, 10 push ups and 10 squats for time - guess who was the first one finished in the class? That would be me! My competitive nature helps me push myself extra hard. I was so sore in my back and my shoulders for two days after - but I had never felt this whole muscle group be sore before.

Ok, so enough of the workout talk. What else this month? We started some seeds for the garden which I'm pretty thrilled about. Mostly broccoli and other veggies that take 5+ months until you can harvest them. We didn't get broccoli until August last year so we started them earlier. Oh and Noah made his first batch of soap! So instead of me grating bar soap and making it in to liquid he did it up with some nice oils, water & lye. Long process but the result was awesome - it sent me in to a cleaning spree Saturday morning scrubbing down everything from cabinets to stove knobs. What can I say, that stuff cleans!

I'm at about 4lbs down total for January (67 total). Slow going, but any progress is good progress so I'll take it!

Resolutions, the easy way & back to my roots!

Happy New Year. It was both exiting and sentimental to say farewell to 2012, it was a great year but I know that I have the power to make 2013 even better. My big resolution this year is to lose another 50lbs (110 total, whoa) and it's been really easy starting that one as I had already been on the weight loss path for the last 10 months.

I'll be the first to say that the holidays were a rough time for me. With everything going on, not enough sleep and little down time I was definitely not as 'on par' as I would have liked. But that's OK. Having a bad week is ok - a bad month, maybe not. I took my first 'rest time' from training in about three months and while normally this should be a full week, I took four days off from working out. It was plenty. I definitely noticed that I had increased energy for the first two weeks of January and nailed some pretty intense workouts.

I made some smaller resolutions that will help me get to my 50lb goal. First, I really wanted to quit coffee but  I find that sort of unreasonable for me (there are just some days I need it!) I made a small resolution to drink more water. I have really been slacking on this one for the last few months. Ideally, I should be drinking half my body weight in ounces of water daily. I maybe drink 50% of what I should in a day. For the last week I have been carrying my 32oz water bottle around everywhere and have been able to down three of those a day.

This year I really want to work to get my entire beauty routine chemical free. Although many of my household products are homemade, I'm still somewhat lacking in the makeup and hair dept. I knew I had to rid myself of the worst of it - hairspray. I am attached to this stuff, the aerosol kind (ya, I know). Even though I was just doing a little finishing spray, the particles still linger awhile in the air and coat my skin and hair when sprayed on. I was pretty convinced there was not going to be an ample replacement for this product. I tried the first recipe for homemade hairspray I found, mostly because it was SO easy:

1 cup nearly boiling water
4 tsp sugar

I was doubtful to say the least. Sugar water, there is no way that could work as well, right? Well once again, nature proved me entirely wrong, wondering why I had waited so long to try it. It has an incredible hold and does not weigh my hair down - even with the water. The cost to make it is rather ridiculous too, just pennies.

And next up, back to my natural color. I'm allowing myself one hair color application to match to my natural color and then that's it, no more! I'm swearing off the stuff on my head. Plus, I kind of like my natural 'dark golden blonde'. So I took the plunge. Out with the bleach blonde and in with what my hair is really supposed to look like. I'm still getting used to it. Here it is: Before and after...oh ya and those curls are holding with sugar water, after 5 hours:

It does bring out my features more and convinced me that this the way it is supposed to look. I've probably known this for awhile now but it took some time to get the red out of my hair (with the blonde) so I could go back to darker blonde.

For the first time ever I did three consecutive CrossFit classes this week (along with two runs). I'm really trying to switch it up a lot so I've dropped Spin (for now) and am concentrating on faster running speed and CrossFit (because the workout is different, everytime).

In 2013, I'm down about 3 lbs, for a total of 65! Although I feel progress is slow, I feel a lot stronger even than I was a month ago. Exited about the possibilities of 2013.