Of course, this is because we had bagels yesterday when we met Sharon and her husband.  That meant no bagel today.   I thought about going out for a bike ride, but it was a little [...]]]> This week is a little different schedule wise.  Breakfast started out not with a bagel, but with this!

Of course, this is because we had bagels yesterday when we met Sharon and her husband.  That meant no bagel today.   I thought about going out for a bike ride, but it was a little drizzly this morning, so I just got down to brass tacks and worked.  Boy, sometimes work just gets in the way of things you want to do, know what I mean?

Lunch time and the sun came out and it got much warmer, so I decided on a summery lunch:

Fage 2% with strawberries and some of that flax crunch cereal (this box is old!!) and honey.

Since the sun was out and shining after a couple days of rain and yuck, I put on the walking shoes and walked to the bank to deposit my paycheck.  I did the happy paycheck dance on the way there, too!

A nice 2 mile walk break during the day.  It was getting warm, too.  Hello vitamin D!

I did a bit more work and then made up lattes.  John was busy, so the duty fell on me today.

I decided to have a larabar with my latte today.  This coconut cream is my new favorite flavor of larabar.  Yum!

Thunderstorms moved in during the late afternoon.  It really now officially feels like spring with thunderstorms and lots of green.  It is about as green as it normally would be in the beginning of June!

Cooked up some chicken thighs for dinner. Nothing exciting and I have neglected the recipe stuff.  I also have a yucca root to cook up for this month’s veggie challenge, but I haven’t gotten around to that!

Generally a quiet day.  Good thing because I am going to be pretty busy for the next several!  Watching Tour of Amgen tonight.  It is threatening rain this evening, so I am going to leave the biking to the pros and just go in the morning.

Doesn’t it sometimes feel like things go around on the internet like the collective in Star Trek?  Lots of posts recently about accepting ourselves or giving up dieting or what have you.

As you know, I have been struggling a bit with body image the last few weeks.  The [...]]]> It’s a thinky post today!

Doesn’t it sometimes feel like things go around on the internet like the collective in Star Trek?  Lots of posts recently about accepting ourselves or giving up dieting or what have you.

As you know, I have been struggling a bit with body image the last few weeks.  The funny thing is that is coincided with me not weighing myself for this month as one of my goals.  I don’t know if that is coincidence, because I don’t weigh myself every day, or if it is just the turn a mind will take sometimes for whatever unknown reason.

I really have been seeing myself as bigger than I am.  Yes, I am 10 pounds heavier than I used to be, but that certainly is not 100 pounds heavier, and I have stayed right around this range (give or take 5 pounds) for the last year and a half.  Yet, I feel almost like I look like I did at 250, which I know isn’t true.

That is the weird part.  I don’t know where that feeling comes from.  Anyhoo, there has been just a little cavalcade of posts and articles the last few weeks that really have kind of fallen into my lap lately.  I am not one to believe in signs, destiny, fate or anything like that, but maybe I have just noticed these in particular because I really need to think about them.

Some of the posts that struck a cord with me lately.  These are little excerpts from the posts, but please mark them all to read in full.

Shauna –  ”Anyway, there I was feeling like a stinking fraud and like nothing I wrote would ever be worthy until the day I could report, Hey folks, you can come back now. I’m normal again! I match the After photo!”

Cammy - “Here’s wishing us all a peaceful spirit and the strength to accept it. We really ARE worthy, just as we are right now”

Yoni Freedhoff (this is an old post, but I love it). “ Set your goal to do your best and never be discouraged if it’s not as good as someone else’s.”

And this one today, which just spoke volumes and volumes to me and I really loved it.  8 Ways to Capture & Keep Your “Body Peace”

Important points for me:

“ If you can’t find a way to be happy in this moment, right now, regardless of your size, shape or weight, then you probably won’t feel happy 10, 20 or 30 lbs less.”   Totally true for me.  There is that fine line you walk between trying to improve because you want to and improve because you aren’t happy.

“Body esteem has NOTHING to do with actual hard numbers. You can find women who are 200+ lbs and who love every curve. It’s a state of MIND.”  It’s all about attitude.

“Is your physique the only thing you have to offer the world?”  Hell no!

Definitely read the rest of that one. It’s good.

I am just going to be me.  I am going to be happy with how I am right this minute, regardless of whether I ever get off 10 more pounds.  It doesn’t matter in the scheme of the world.  Sure, there are going to be people who judge me because people do, let’s face it, but their judgement of me has no value to me – and I need to not judge myself, either.

Maureen tulip:

Queen of the night:

The make such [...]]]> Another week has gone by.  Things are really looking green around here now.  More and more trees are leafed out and we have had to mow the lawn a couple times already. Still a little on the chilly side, but you can’t have everything.

Maureen tulip:

Queen of the night:

The make such a nice combo together.

More teeny daffodils.

One of my clematis (clemati?). This is the Multi Blue.

I moved it to the side of the house to see if it would be more vigorous.  It gets much more sun here, but doesn’t seem all that interested in becoming a real true clematis.

This is Iceland Tulip.  I only got 1 up this year.

I also bought some bleeding hearts a few weeks ago.  I didn’t think I would get any blooms on them this year, but there were a couple!

I love these.

They are in the shade part of the garden.  See how the daylilies are totally overtaking everything?

I have to thin them out.  It’s only May and they are all over the place. If anyone wants any, please let me know and I can dig some up and send them (if okay to your location).  They are the the tall old fashioned orange ones.  The liriope has not come up yet.  Those are late to start in the spring and where the empty spot is

The Shirley tulips are getting darker now:

Getting on the last legs of those.

The passionale tulips are still going strong.  It was hard to take pictures today as it was windy LOL!

I spotted a new bloom coming, too.

This is one of my bearded irises.  A new to me plant.  I have never grown irises before, so I am all excited about that!

Have a great weekend and a Happy Mother’s Day!

I was not sore at all from Tuesday’s workout, but part of that is new moves and lighter weights.  Today was the second part of this month’s stage, so without further ado:

On to Stage 3B

I print out my workouts a little fancier for this since I am doing the same one for a month.  Easier to read than my scribbling.

Today’s protein drink for the workout? Almond milk, cinnamon, applesauce, whey protein.

On to Stage 3A

I completely did not realize that I finished up Stage 2 of the Fit Female on Sunday!  I was checking to see when I would be done thinking it was next week, but I already did 4 weeks.  Dang that went by fast.  Just a refresher that these were alternating workouts 3 times a [...]]]>  

I completely did not realize that I finished up Stage 2 of the Fit Female on Sunday!  I was checking to see when I would be done thinking it was next week, but I already did 4 weeks.  Dang that went by fast.  Just a refresher that these were alternating workouts 3 times a week.  I lifted on Tues/Thurs/ and either Sat or Sun (depending on biking).  Where it says 1a, 1b, 2a, 2b, etc., that means those exercises were done as supersets.  Here were the workouts and my improvements:

Stage A – I did this workout a total of 6 times

I was very pleased with the overhead presses and getting up to using the 20# dumbbells for that one.  Maybe I can get to 25 someday without doing a push press!  I have to say that the single leg dumbbell deadlift was really hard.  I maxed out on what my left leg leg could do.  I didn’t want to go heavier on the right, so I don’t really know what I would have ended up at.  I also was pleased at holding the plank for 80 seconds at a time.  My core is feeling strong.

Stage B – I did this a total of 6 times

I was happy with this group because of the T pushups.  I added dumbbells to them, but balance is quite hard with this, even using hex dumbbells. It hurts my palm, too.  I maxed out on the step ups with how much weight I can hold in my hands.  I can’t hold more than a 30# dumbbell in each hand without losing grip strength.  I messaged Rachel on Facebook and she told me to try using the squat cage and a barbell, so maybe next time.  I also got my lateral raise up to 13# dumbbells!  That is the heaviest I have ever done that move, so I was pretty happy about that.

Thoughts?  I feel much stronger.  I do not feel any thinner.  (I am not weighing myself right now). I think my clothes maybe are fitting a bit looser, but I just have been feeling large lately – major body image issues.  I haven’t liked my pictures lately, so I obviously have something mental going on right now that I need to figure out, whatever it is.

I might have to tweak the eating plan.  Rachel has steps to do for each stage with the eating, but to only change if you aren’t seeing results.  So, maybe that is next for me to try.

Tomorrow starts stage 3 and some old familiar moves for me – like the deadlift!

This was about a 50 mile loop.  We headed out at about 10:30 as we thought we would go out for lunch in Saratoga.  Temps of about 60 predicted. There was a tailwind on the way down there and we were booking!  We [...]]]> Saturday ride time!!  John planned out our route for the day.

This was about a 50 mile loop.  We headed out at about 10:30 as we thought we would go out for lunch in Saratoga.  Temps of about 60 predicted. There was a tailwind on the way down there and we were booking!  We took our first stop at mile 11, which is at the peak of some hills.

It was a nice day.  I was a bit chilly to start with.  I just had on my YMX Yellowman shirt and my jacket.

However, I was sweaty at this point.  

We headed back out and zoomed on down to Saratoga.  Hills are easy with a tailwind!

We got to Saratoga around mile 21 or so with an average speed of 14.3 mph!  We ate at Elizabeth’s Table, which is a reincarnation of the Cupcake Lab, which moved.

Not so much focus on cupcakes, though.  They do focus on local products, which is neat. I got an Irish Breakfast burrito, which had egg, potato, cheese and corned beef hash!

Yum!  I had a biking appetite for this.  Early on in miles, I get really hungry.  When  the mileage gets up there, I lose my appetite.

After lunch, we walked around Saratoga and saw a sign for a free Bonsai show.  It was a display of the local Bonsai groups (which is actually pronounced “bone-say”.  I have always said it wrong).  It was neat!

This one was cool:

We got to vote on our favorites.  I chose this one:

I also liked this one:

After we went through this exhibit, it was cuppicake time!  We hit up Bettie’s. I got a Cosmopolitan.  It is a cranberry cupcake with lime buttercream.

Intense!  I don’t think I would get this one again, but it certainly was flavorful.  And full of artificial color goodness    This is a regular size cupcake, which seemed kind of small to me.  I think they make them smaller now.  John got a jumbo German Chocolate and lopped off a hunk for me to eat.  We also had a visit from my sisters and the nieces, who live down here.

Niece noshing on cupcake:

We had to leave shortly thereafter as we had about 2.5 hours of riding ahead of us.  We took a longer route home than to get there.  About a mile and a half out, I noticed the the strap to John’s bike bag was dangling and we pulled over to fix that.  Then I though I would check and see if mine was doing that and I noted that my bike bag was not on the back of my bike!!  I realized that I left it on the bench next to where the bikes were parked when I was getting my helmet and gloves on.  Cue panic!!!  I tried to turn around fast and ended up toppling right over.  At least it was onto someone’s lawn and not asphalt.  John was still upright, so he took off back to where we had parked the bikes.  I got myself righted around and I hit every. single. red. light.  Ugh!    I was almost there and John was on his way back to me with my bag.  Thank goodness.  If we had been anywhere else, that bag would have been long gone.  It had my camera, wallet, phone, keys – all that good stuff in there.  I would have been very sad if it was missing.  Phew.

Of course, all of that meant adding over 2 miles onto our trip, which was already long enough LOL!  Did I mention we were now heading into a headwind?  If not, consider it mentioned.  My legs were feeling quite good, though.  We just kept churning out the miles.   We stopped at mile 36 for snacks:

I had 2 dates.  These are the big medjool dates that are about 65 calories each.

It is a very pretty view on this part of the ride.

I took the lead to let John draft.  He is always much faster at the start of our ride and I am much faster at the end of the ride.  It was brutal into the wind, though, I have to say.  When we hit the downhill portion where we normally hit 30+ miles per hour, we only managed 23!  That was how hard the wind was blowing.  You can see that downhill in the map above.  We reach the river level at the bottom of that downhill.

Phew!

At about mile 45, we came back up that climb and knew we were getting close to finishing up.  My thigh was aching a fair amount.  I have to say that is really so frustrating to have that issue.  There is no solution for it, either.  Booo to permanent injuries.

Here is the top of the hill:

This is the bike route, but it is a very busy road and I don’t like to ride on it, so we just cross over it (we are at an intersection) and take a left at that light.

It takes us out of the way, but we avoid a hill and the traffic – even though it adds several miles to the trip!  Finally home!

Ride stats:

Miles:  51.8  (thank you Lori forgetting her bike bag… )

Average speed:  13.1 mph

Ride time:  3 hours 50 minutes

Calories burned:  1600

Immediately after we got inside, I made protein recovery drinks for us.  Almond milk, unflavored whey protein, chocolate syrup:

These were good!  John doesn’t do recovery drinks, but I had him drink one this time because of the length of the ride.

I also noted my leg:

Chain grease from when I fell over.  I look like a noob!  LOL

After long rides, we like to walk so as not to stiffen up, so we walked up the street for a couple slices of pizza and did a nice 1 mile recovery walk.  Check out my windburn!

I hope the spring winds settle down soon.  I mentioned to John about how much more I hated riding in wind more than doing hills and his answer was “Well, hills have to end, the wind doesn’t”  - so true!