Back to the drawing board

A couple of the blogs I read had similar posts this week. "When life hands you lemons...". I could chime in with that feeling because this week life handed me a big pile of something, though I'm not sure it was lemons. LOL.

I know we all have busy lives. Spouses and kids and work and things to do at home can really make it hard to find time for ourselves. I've let my schedule get out of control and it's time to reign it in. I've got to get back to the place where I had time to exercise. I like to do it. I don't think of it as a chore. I actually think of it as a luxury. It's something I do for me and nobody else. I was doing so well a couple of months ago and when I tried to get back to it this week, I tried to jump back in where I left off. Unfortunately, I can't find the window of time that I seemed to have before. I think I'm going to have to ease back into it. Start out with a 30 minute walk every day and add on from there. I may have to skip the gym for a while and do some strength training at home. It's easier for me to find 15-20 minutes here and there rather than trying to find 60 or 90 minutes to drive to the gym, do the workout and get back.

Hopefully tomorrow morning I will be able to get my walk in. I miss it. :)

Change in plans already? It's only day 2.

I made a plan Sunday night before I went to bed for what I wanted to do this week as far as my workouts. Each day was based on whether or not I had to take my son to school at 6:00am for his weight lifting. If I do have to take him, I can go to the gym after I drop him off and get my workout done before I have to wake up my youngest son at 7:30ish. If I don't have to take him, I have to wait until they are both gone (around 8:45am) and that means very little time to exercise before I have to get to work. I asked him Sunday what days he had to be there at 6 and he said every day except Wednesday. Great, I can make my plan. So last night hubby tells me that the lifting schedule has changed. Now he is only going Mon, Wed and Fri. UGH! That changes my whole workout schedule. I guess I better come up with a new plan because if I don't, my work schedule will go crazy and I will be sitting at the computer at 10:00pm wondering why I didn't get a chance to exercise that day.

Is it just me or are there times when it is just very hard to make time for yourself when you are a parent? :)

Just start with the first step

Monday is the perfect day to "start over", right? That's my theory today. I've been off of my plan for several weeks now and it's beginning to show. It's time to get back to it. We leave for vacation in 8 weeks, so I'm using that as my new goal date. We all have different strengths, right? Well, in my little weight loss world, I am better at exercising than counting calories, so that is where I decided to start today.

I started last night with a calendar for this week of what I wanted to do each day (specific workouts, etc.) and a list of things to do every day (remember to drink more water, etc.). Today's goal was to do 20-30 minutes on the elliptical, take a 30 minute walk with my neighbor and do a short ab workout. I am happy to report that all 3 had been accomplished before 8:30 this morning. Now I remember why I like to workout in the morning so much. I feel great! Doing this first thing in the morning makes me more aware of what I am eating through the day and usually helps me stay on track.

So let's see if I can get there. 8 weeks to lose about 8 pounds and get this old body toned back up. I'm looking forward to the challenge. :)

Rough week

I am so glad that it's Friday. Unfortunately, I still have to work this weekend, but not as much as I did this week. I had a not-so-great week. We had great weather for most of the week. Sounds like a good thing, right? It was, except I don't have anything to wear for warm weather. My spring/summer clothes are way too big and I struggled to find a couple of decent outfits this week. Going shopping for new clothes was on my list of things to do this week, but I got sidetracked. By what, you ask.

First it was the toilets that needed to be fixed. Yes, you read that right. We didn't have 1 toilet break, we had 2 break. OK, fine. No huge deal. We get the parts to fix them and hubby gets them fixed. Then the car needed tires. Again, not a huge deal but of course it's never just one thing. The repair shop found something else wrong when they were replacing the tires, so 4 hours and $1,000 later I finally had my car back. Then the washing machine broke. That was the straw that broke the camel's back. I am the camel in this story just in case you wondered. I had way too much work this week to keep adding time to deal with everything in my house deciding to break in the same week. So basically I have a house full of dirty clothes because hubby refused to buy a washing machine without me and I just didn't have time to deal with it until tonight. Shopping for a washing machine is not my idea of a fun Friday night, but I guess you do what you gotta do, right? LOL!

So anyway, there is my pity party for today. I managed to walk a couple days this week, but that's it. I was hoping for a couple of free hours tomorrow to get in a nice workout, but my oldest son gets to go to his first invitational track meet tomorrow, so I can't miss that. I'm hoping to get some exercise in, but I will also have to be somewhere doing laundry because my new washer & dryer won't be ready until Monday and I don't know if we can make it that long. :)

Have a wonderful Easter!

Getting back to it

I tell people that the hardest part of starting a workout program is the first day. Getting yourself to do it when you are't used to it is very hard. Now I think the hardest part is getting back into it once you've stopped. UGH! I am really struggling with working out right now and that has always been the easy part for me. I have let my schedule get so full that I can't find the time to get in really good workouts. I did manage to get a 30 minute walk in this morning, but as I was looking at my calendar for the weekend, I can't quite figure out when I'm going to fit in my workouts.

The kids go back to school on Monday, so hopefully I will be able to get back into the habit of doing a 30 minute walk in the morning every day. At least then I know I've done something even if the rest of the day gets too crazy for more.

Happy Good Friday!