Still Exercising

I don't think there is a muscle in my body that doesn't hurt.

Yeah.

But, I'm still going. I knew it would get progressively harder as life interfered. I was right. Yesterday, Sunday, saw Perry having to, unexpectedly to me, go into work. About 15 minutes before that time he was having E drive the car up on the ramps and the whole front bumper came off.

Yeah. You read that right. The. Whole. Thing.

They tried to put it back on, but apparently were unsuccessful in getting it on correctly since the bumper fell off when Perry tried to drive to work. Sigh.

So, he took the suburban.

And.....he didn't get home until bedtime. Anticipating this, I had J get the treadmill set up and used it. The gym means we all get to workout in a decent amount of time. The treadmill means it lasts all day.

With Perry's unanticipated work it also meant the kids and I had to get the house ready for the stoopid inspection so we can cash the check to pay for the expenses incurred in October. Yeah. It was awesome. It's amazing how many little things still need to be done. I'm waiting for warmer weather where we can set up the equipment needed on the porch and not dodge raindrops.

Today, is S's birthday. She has told me since 12:15 A.M. that it is her birthday. I finally said after the twentieth time and 5:30 A.M., "S, I really, really need to sleep so I can do everything for your birthday tomorrow. Please, pretty please don't wake me up for 2 more hours."

She got up for the day at 8:30.

The kids are schooling and S is playing Kinect. No one in this house has to work or do school on their birthday. Well, except me.

I'm heading out to get decorations and sugar to make frosting. She wants a pink and putple basketball cake with a pillow pet design on it along with a bouquet of flowers. I think I can do the pink and purple basketball part. The rest. Not so much.

Tonight will see Hip Hop at 4 p.m. at 5 p.m. the inspection, then we have to go take S to Red Robin (her choice), be back for me to coach J-Man's basketball at 7 and take M to his bball practice from 8-9. Some time between now and then I'm going to exercise.

Yes. I am. Right after I fold the loads of laundry, sweep the floors for the gazillionth time and help J with his physical science.

Up to Day 19

So far so good. I've decided that in Zumba I have to NOT think about how my body should move. It's been a long time since my body has moved that way and that fast. If I don't think about how the hands go, which are different from the shoulders, which are different from the hips and the feet the other way, it just works by watching the instructor. If I start thinking about each individual movement...............yi yi yi.

19 out of 100 days. The never-ending cold has made it a lot more difficult to do the high intensity cardio but I'm doing it anyway.

S totally rocked in her jazz recital. She completely nailed the move (that had troubled her in the rehearsal) where she has 6 seconds to get into position and then grabs onto her ankle and her leg goes above her head. When she was first given this I was surprised because she has never had any dance before and I wasn't even sure she could stand and still get her leg above her head. But, she did. And, she was solid for the time she needed to be and really the recital was her best performance ever.

M had to take over the lead for hip hop because the other dancer didn't show up. That was a surprise but he did a great job and I'm sure no one knew we were missing a dancer. J-man nailed a 5 second handstand in the dance. I didn't even know he could stay up for 5 seconds. I don't think he knew it either. It just worked.

My mom was able to come and see the recital, thanks to J and E staying with my brother. She rarely has been to any of the kids' events so it was a huge deal to the kids.

I'm hoping this cold doesn't completely kick my hiney. I'm committed. No matter what.

Day 9, 10, 11, 12, and 13

We have been chugging or should I say treading along quite nicely. Until today. I am the only man standing for the 100 continuous days. I knew it would be hard to keep up but thought we'd make it, at least, a month. There are always excuses but I'm not going to make any because I am still going. It's hard to fit into a busy, busy day like today. I got up with 5 sick kids to find Perry working from home. He wanted me to go to Costco but I was hesitant to do so because Little Miss is sick and would need to cuddle and HAD to go to her dance at 4 or she wouldn't be able to be in the recital tomorrow. So, he agreed to stay home and cuddle her and I took Joshua only.

I don't know what happened but I came home 5 minutes before I needed to leave with Little Miss to a not-happy-household. I didn't have time to sort it out but got Little Miss ready and took M with me. Dropped Little Miss off at dance and M and I went to the gym for a half hour work out.

Picked up Little Miss, took M to buy basketball shoes (Perry had called me from M's practice to say he needed new shoes), found said shoes and came home to E making dinner. After about two minutes into a conversation with E, as I started to help him, I found out he was in the middle of a math test when his dad asked him to make dinner. I told him to go finish the test and I would take over. I took over, getting Little Miss to help (she loves to make the shape of the tortillas), eventually J took over while I ate. I was absolutely starving by this point.

After dinner I sat down to figure out how to get the kids to their respective games tomorrow along with the recital. Also wrote a letter to the team I coach about a practice change. Then, it was finally time to pull the kids in and have them help get the horribly messy house cleaned.

I was less than happy to be gone for the whole day only to come home to a house that looked like a tornado had hit. It is now clean enough that I'm going to sit and hold Little Miss and think about an earlyish bedtime because tomorrow will be a long day.

So, even with all the above going on I still managed to make it to the gym. That has been my goal for this year.

Day 7 and 8

It's time for us to wrangle to kids to bed but I wanted to make sure to post that we did it. This weekend found M and J-man joining us and the last 15 minutes we do weight lifting with them. Ummmmm...........M can lift more than I can. When did that happen?

Laundry is killing us here, just sayin'. Which has nothing to do with this post.

J and E took turns taking Little Miss out to eat and then to the arcade where they go through copious amounts of quarters, just so we can work out. It's totally worth it and I'm sure she is enjoying the brothertime.

Day 5 and 6

Day 5 found Perry and I in the new class that I was really looking forward to. We agreed to meet at the gym. Both of us arrived late, no we didn't coordinate it, but at the same time. He quickly changed into gym clothes.

There were a lot of people in the room. We slipped in to the back and maneuvered until we could see the instructor.

Long story short here.....the room was really, really hot the whole entire time and the class was disappointing. I didn't like the music as much as the other class this class is taking over for and the instructor (who we both like) wasn't really on. She did the same 3 moves over and over and over. Which would be fine, except when the class is an hour long and high intensity, one needs a different muscle worked or one can't keep doing it. Just sayin'.

So, I'm going to give it a few weeks and won't feel at all guilty taking the kids to their youth group instead of doing the class. I figure in a few weeks she will have the kinks worked out and be able to do more than 3 moves.

Day 6 worked out quite well for me. I'm sure I owe Perry now. The whole family attended. E and J went their own way, eventually ending up on the treadmills side by side. J-man came with me to the treadmills and I ran/walked on the treadmill while he did the erg. Which......remember, I had promised him he could do first. Oh, yes I did and he didn't forget.

M went with Perry to the elliptical. There weren't 4-5 of any type of machine available for us to stay together. About 10 minutes into the workout, J-man was done and so went to Perry. Which.....allowed me to, ahem, not be interrupted every 30 seconds so I could focus on my music and run/walking.

I did look over every so often to see Perry leaning down to listen to M or J-man. Eventually J-man ended up on a treadmill in front of me and M ended up on a treadmill beside E and J. I don't think they are really tall enough to see the TV on the elliptical but they can see it on the treadmill. The TV's are kind of weird in that they are pretty high up on the machine and you can't change the angle but the reflection of the light often makes it where you can't see it. Kind of like a laptop screen, but you can't fix it.

Anyway.............we then went to Target and did a few other errands before arriving home around 9ish. It had been a long, busy day with a little too much complaining from the kids and my patience was long gone so I did something I do all of twice a year and sent the kids to their rooms to read while Perry and I finished up and talked about what we needed to. After about an hour my patience returned and the kids came out and helped finish up making the turkey soup I was making, incidentally from a turkey a friend sent us for Christmas. We eventually finished with a huge pot of soup for dinner the next day and 2 containers of soup in the freezer for another day.

Perry and I retired to our room where we spent some quality time and I'm sure he's exhausted today after getting to sleep at midnight. There is just so much to do around our house trying to put it back together and the kids and I can't do it all.

E still has his stupid cough from the Police Academy he attended so I'm sure it's hard for him to work out right now, but we only require he move even if it is at 2 mph on the treadmill. I'm thinking I'm going to have to take him to the doctor but we're trying a few things at home first.

6 our of our 100 days are completed. Go Us!!

Day 2, 3, and 4

So far so good. Day 2 we had a little chat about expectations while in the gym. The chat went something like, "M and J-man, we will be here for 30 minutes. For the first 15 minutes you may only walk on the treadmill. You may not walk up the treadmill and ride it down, ad nauseum. The minimum speed will be 2 mph and the maximum speed 7, if you really must go that fast. No, don't interrupt, just listen. If you are going 7 mph you may not be messing around with anything on the machine or your headphones. You must have the clip on that stops the machine."

Where in M inquired, "You mean if we don't have to have the clip on if we're not going 7 mph?"

"No, that's not what I mean. You have to have the clip on the whole time."

I forgot that ours at home won't operate without the clip on and the one's there will.

I continued, "The last 15 minutes you may switch to another machine close to us or share the erg."

About this time we arrived at the gym. I took the treadmill closest to the wall and window, talked to Perry about reminding the boys of the rules and off I went. Only once did I tap Perry to point at M who was riding the treadmill down. Perry put up 2 fingers which quickly reminded M of the rule.

I was able to do some running, which is what I feel I need to do if we are only going to exercise for 30 minutes. It felt great. M scared me to death with his 7 mph stints, but he obeyed so it was all good.

J-man left mad because he didn't get to do the erg as long as he wanted so next time he gets to start with the erg.

Day 3 E and Little Miss stayed home and did Kinect for 20 minutes for their fitness. Perry and I did an extreme cardio class where the instructor now knows him by name and likes to be "encouraging".

Day 4 is our busiest day of the week and we struggled with how to fit it in before 9:30 at night with sick kids at home. We ended up fitting it in between picking S up from Ballet and waiting for E to finish his Police Explorer evening.

I tried to do my running but my clothes kept falling off/down (which is good, yes?) so made a mental note to wear a smaller size next time and only walked at a brisk pace. I think Perry is a month from feeling good working out but he's determined and sticking with it.

I am excited that tonight is the first Turbo Kick and Perry and I are going to meet at the gym to attend together. The younger 3 all have gymnastics but E and J will come to the gym with us. I love the child care workers and, thankfully, so does Little Miss. She gets just as much of a workout in there. She is often the only one and the teenage girls will put on music and dance with her.

We have a few sick kids here so I am interested to see how we don't let this mess up our 100 continuous days.

Day 1 Family Fitness

Happy New Year!!!

It's always better to start something new together. Yes? Yes.

For the next 100 days *we* are going to spend at least 20 minutes per day actively involved in fitness as a family. Now, Little Miss won't be involved but she's the most active, with her gymnastics and dance, anyway. M and J-Man.....we'll see. They can't work out at the gym while I'm in class and they don't want to come to the classes with me so we'll see how we work it out with them. I'm thinking they'll work out when Perry does. The one rule for us is that no one does it alone. So, if Perry is late getting off work, at least one of us will meet him.

E came back skinny and starving from the Academy so he's just looking to keep on keeping on so he'll already be fit for upcoming adventures in the spring and summer.

Today the 6 of us, S stayed at my mom's due to no child-care, went to the gym. The idea was to just do the treadmill. Which..........would've worked if there were those of them who felt like 5 minutes on the treadmill didn't equal 30 and want to go home.

I was told, at the 9 minute mark, that we were finished and had been there for 20 minutes. I explained how to tell time better and *they* found a recumbent bike.

I get extra points (Perry and I keep track for each other *wink wink*) from Perry because while he was face-forward watching TV treading along the whole. entire. 30. minutes, I was telling J-Man that no he couldn't do the erg until the last 5 minutes every 2 minutes. Telling M that 7 mph was fast enough and actually too fast. Then when I wouldn't let him wander around he decided to set the treadmill at .5 mph. I glared at him but was too lazy, oh wait, too motivated to complete my 30 mins, to get off the treadmill and deal with him. Perry was, after all, directly next to him, but blissfully unaware of everything except the TV. Lucky him.

He missed the snap from E when I asked J-Man to go ask E nicely how to do the erg. Yes, that meant there were 5 minutes left. E eventually *helped* and J-Man was a happy camper for the last minutes. M decided that walking to the top of the treadmill and riding it back down wasn't as fun as it was the first 5 minutes and upped his speed so when 30 minutes was up and I walked over to tell Perry we were finished he remained completely unaware of anything but a wonderful workout. Next time he gets to be at the treadmill where he can watch everyone and I get the look-out-the-window-treadmill.

Day 1 is done. I wasn't even winded but didn't want to attempt to run because I knew I would get frustrated if I had to stop a run every 30 seconds. Next time I'm going to have a conversation ahead of time about not interrupting every 30 seconds. Let's, at least, get 5 minutes into it.

Perry learned why we play music loud in the suburban on the way home. It was quite different stopping at the store without Serena. J-Man held my hand and asked to be pulled along on the ice. Nice times. I feel very small walking through the store with all my man-boys surrounding me. M and J-man are almost my height and J and E long ago passed me up.

Day 2 - here we come.