Motivational Monday!

Motivational Monday – Effort = Results!

Three Things Thursday!

1. Today is day 25 of my 30 Day Isagenix Cleanse and I’m feeling awesome! I’ve noticed improvements in my energy level, sleep quality, headaches, strength, muscle tone and body fat. I can’t wait to share my final results with you! Check back next week to hear my review of the products and program!

Want to read more about Isagenix? Interested in the 30 Day Cleanse? Click here.

2. Here are a few of the awesome eats I’ve had since starting my cleanse:

3. Check out the workout I did today with my fitness classes. It was awesome!

My Booty Rocks – HIITbody #2

Motivational Monday – Don’t Give Up!

Green Shirt Guy

So, as most of you know, I teach group ex classes – specifically BodyAttack – at GoodLife Fitness. Well, last night was the first Wednesday night class of the new schedule, and although it was a small class we all had a great workout and lots of fun – despite Green Shirt Guy

So, let me tell you what happened…

It’s about 10 minutes before the start of my class, I am hanging around outside the studio waiting for the BodyFlow class to finish,and chatting with a few ladies who are waiting to come to my class. The gym is fairly busy. There are a couple of guys hanging out around the studio as well, comparing workouts, getting drinks, flexing their muscles – you know, guy stuff!

Well, the flow class ends – a couple of minutes late – but it’s no big deal and bound to happen being the 3rd class of the night. Anyways, the ladies and I head in, I get the music started and get things set up. At that point, two guys walk in – one in a green shirt – who wants to skip, and some other guy – who starts setting up a step system to do who knows what. I politely let them know that the studio is being used for a BodyAttack class for the next hour, but that they are welcome to join in. Other guy gives a wave and leaves, Green Shirt Guy throws a mini tantrum and finally storms off. I then see him skipping outside the studio. Perfect – he’s doing what he came to do and so are we 🙂

About a half hour later another guy comes in – yep, in the middle of my classs – and pulls out a mat to do some stretching. Green Shirt Guy sees that this guy has come in and comes in again. I’m thinking, are you kidding me? but being a professional, I once again explain that we are in the middle of a group ex class, and if they wanted to join in they were more than welcome, but, otherwise, they had to go. We’d be done in about a half hour.

So, fast forward about 25 minutes, we’re in the middle of our stretch, and guess who comes in – AGAIN! Yep, Green Shirt Guy comes in with a few others this time. He pulls out a mat and starts skipping, another guy sets up a step and another couple are planning to do some partner stretching. I’m thinking – you can’t be serious! Really? So, for the third time, I politely ask them for a little respect, can they please give us a couple of minutes to finish up our workout. Green Shirt Guy then yells – RESPECT – and continues to shout about how we are 3 minutes overtime – that the class was to finish at 8:45 and he has every right to be in there. I apologize to my members, and continue on with the last couple of minutes of our class, trying my best to ignore Green Shirt Guy. When finished, I again apologize to the group for the disruptions, wish them a good night, and tidy up my stuff.

I then head to the back of the class and approach Green Shirt Guy. He immediately starts in – not quite yelling at me, but almost – about how he had planned to do his skipping workout and stretching in the GROUP EXERCISE studio and how he already had to wait for the Flow class to finish at 7:45, how he left his family to come to the gym, how no one does a skipping workout like him, how he was a personal trainer and, and, and… So I was like, I totally get that this is first week of the new schedule and the first week with 7:45 group ex classes, applogized for the lack of communicaiton about the new group ex hours, but that this was a group ex studio and that that’s what it is to be used for. Being a personal trainer, he would understand that. He continued to argue about how it should be ok for him to come in and do his skipping while I was teaching my class, that there was nowhere else in the gym to skip or stretch, about how much he pays to be member of the gym, was he really going to have to come in a 8:45 to do his skipping routine and saying that if he couldn’t do his skipping workout he was going to change gyms… he went on and on – it was RIDICULOUS! Every time I tried to explain why he couldn’t be in there (liability issues, respect for other people and their workouts) or when I suggested he could skip outside (what??? and ruin his rope – are you serous!!) he pretty much cut me off. Finally after about 15 minutes, I’m pretty sure he understood that he was free to do his workout elsewhere or after the group ex classes were finished. He had calmed down and somewhat acknowledged that his behaviour was inappropriate. It’s all good.

But, I couldn’t just leave it there….

I”m a pretty good skipper. I was on the skipping team in elementary school (yep, 30 years ago) and skip now and then with my fitness classes at school. Since he was going on and on and on and on and on and on about how we were messing with his skipping workout, I decided to challenge him to a doubles contest. He laughed, said there was no way I would beat him, said all the CrossFit in the world wouldn’t make me a better skipper than him – I told whatever, I don’t do CrossFit, let’s go! He then suggested a triples contest and handed me a rope. I told him I didn’t know how to do triples, so we settled on a doubles contest.

Keep in mind, I’ve just done taught a one hour cardio class.

I get started – 1…2…3…4…

He starts 1…2…3…he gets tangled in the rope.

I’m still going 5…6…7…

He tries again 1…2…3…4…5…6…7…he gets tangled in the rope.

I’m still going ….15…16…17…

He tries again and gets to 3

I’m still going…25…26…27…

He tries and fails, tries and fails, tries and fails…

I’m still going ….51…52…53…54 and then I quit.

I did 54 doubles in a row, he did 7 🙂

Take that Green Shirt Guy. I think I just earned the right to the studio. You’d better get outside and practice your skipping!

Can you believe someone would do that?

Is there no such thing as Gym Etiquette?

Motivational Monday – The Secret to Change

Three Things Thursday!

Happy Thursday everyone! I’ve got a ton of stuff left to do tonight so this one is going to be short and sweet!

1. I’m 11 days into my 30 day Isagenix cleanse and I’m feeling awesome! I have had the occasional slip up, but for the most part, it has been pretty easy to stick to. Yesterday was cleanse day 2 and it was so much easier than my first cleanse day! I’m feeling healthier, fresher, lighter and leaner already! And I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but I no longer hate the taste of the Ionix Supreme!

2. Tomorrow I am going to a meeting instead of work 🙂 I’m part of the organizing committee for the OFSAA Coaching Symposium, which is a conference held bi-annually for High School Teacher-Coaches across Ontario. I think this will be my 3rd year on the committee and I’m super excited to see my fellow committee members. I’m most excited to be car pooling with my friend Shannon – we used to work together and hang out quite a bit, but now that we have both switched schools and have young kids, we don’t get to see each other as often.

3. After my meeting tomorrow, I’m off for a weekend hockey tournament with my Corona Crusher girls! I have only played one game of pick-up hockey since going to this tournament last year, which was the first time I had played since having my son Tanner the previous January! Thankfully we don’t go for the hockey! Its all about hanging out, having fun, and getting a little exercise while we’re at it! My magic bullet is pack and ready to make my 2 smoothies a day, I have healthy snacks and hope to at least partially stick to my cleanse. The case of Corona I’ve also packed isn’t going to help with that, but hey, I’m not going to worry about it! Its a weekend away with my besties and I’m going to enjoy it! Here’s a picture of us last year – sweet uni’s eh?

Any plans for the weekend?

13 in 2013 – February/March Recap

Hey everyone! Hope you all had a fantastic Easter weekend! We were pretty busy but managed to sneak in a little down time, and even a family nap on Sunday – it was awesome!

 

It’s time for a 13 in 2013 Recap. I totally missed February’s so here’s a February/March combo post letting you know how I’m making out with my 13 goals for 2013.

 

1. Spend less, save more – I am happy to report, we are spending less and saving more!

How are we spending less? Well, we are planning meals, grocery shopping only once a week, buying many items in bulk from Costco, and have not eaten dinner out in what seems like forever!

How are we saving more? Back in January, I came across this idea to help save money. We started right away and since it seemed so reasonable and allows for some flexibility, we decided to double the weekly amount. So, 14 weeks in we have just over $230 saved and didn’t notice it from our budget at all. By the end of the year, we will have set aside $2756! So easy!

 

2. Run a 1:58 half marathon – I plan on running two maybe one half marathons this year. My original plan was to run one in the spring and one in the fall, however, I’m thinking the spring one is not going to happen. I’m a little bummed about it, but really, I’m not loving running right now, and finding/making time to do it has been difficult with my husbands crazy busy work schedule. I’m disappointed because for the first time in forever, I actually ran over the winter. I joined the Winter 100 Challenge and it totally motivated me to run all winter. It was awesome, and I loved running. However, once the training schedule came out and running needed to follow a structured schedule, it totally took the fun out of it for me. Running hills on my lunch, taking time away from my family every Sunday, and having to miss out on other workouts I love, made me start to not love running anymore 😦 

So, with that being said, I’m going to get back into running for fun. I hope to run 5,6, maybe 7k on my lunch a couple of times a week, and hope my mojo comes back!

And if I’m loving running again, maybe I will sign up to do a half this fall and aim to do it in 1:58!

3. Try one new clean eating recipe a week – As far as Clean Eating goes, February and March were pretty good. I made Dark Chocolate Chip No Bake Cookies, Blueberry Crumble Muffins (Clean Eating, Aug/Sept 2012), Potato, Leek and Cheddar Soup (Clean Eating Classic Comfort Foods), Oven Baked Chicken Parmesan (Clean Eating, March 2013), and Kale Chips.

You can find some of these recipes on the NEW Clean Eating Recipes Page above.

 

4. Become a certified RPM instructor – I am was totally planning to on attend(ing) the March 23/24 training weekend HOWEVER, with my husbands crazy work schedule, and the launch of Gillian Michael’s BodyShred at GoodLife, I decided to hold off. As much as I love RPM, I would really, really love to get certified in BodyShred! Unfortunately for me, so would like a million other instructors and since numbers are limited, I’m not actually sure when this will happen for me 😦

In the meantime, I’m super excited to let you all know I am officially on the schedule teaching BodyAttack starting next week! WooHoo!

 

5. Do 10 chin-ups – This is yet another thing that totally took a hit when my half marathon training started 😦 I got into a funk and working out was of little interest to me – which is totally crazy, cause I love it! I will make this happen though! I’ve incorporated a chin-up challenge into both of my fitness classes this semester and will be re-starting the program mid-May.

 

6. Build Strength – I am getting stronger! Mixing up my workouts, adding in some CrossFit, Tabata and a bunch of other stuff is working! How do I know? I actually did the ENTIRE push-up track in Attack yesterday morning WITHOUT modifications, well, on my knees of course, but that’s how I roll! Amazing!

 

7. Go to bed earlier – I’m totally rocking this one! I have no idea when the last time I saw 10pm was!

 

8. Blog more – My goal was to blog 5 days a week – which would mean about 40 posts since my last update. How’d I do? Well, in February I posted 17 times and in March I only posted 11. So, my plan is to get back on track, make better use of my time and hopefully I will get back to 4 or 5 posts a week.

Anything in particular you’d like to read about? Let me know, I’m always looking for ideas!

 

9. Run 3x a week – As I said in goal #2, my plan is just to get running again. I hope to be running 3 times a week before the end of April. I want to keep if fun and love it again!

 

10. Drink more water – As always, room for improvement here! Bring on the warm weather so I can stop drinking WARM tea and starting drinking COLD water!

11. Read 52 books – Week 14 and I’m on my 9th book. Not bad. Maybe I need to chose some shorter books! Hehehe! Check out the Books I’ve Read page to see what I’ve been reading. Have you read a good book or two lately? I’d love some recommendations!

12. Take at least 2 family trips – Work in progress… Our trips will most likely occur during the summer, so we have a bit of time to choose where we will go and what we will do.

13. Date night once a month – Our February date night was dinner out at one of our favourite Mexican restaurants. We hit up Made in Mexico where the food was delicious and the Corona was cold!

I don’t think we actually made it out for date night in March 😦 Will have to try for two in April!

 

So that’s where I’m at. Not great, but not too bad either! I’m hoping April is the month where I get back in track, have time to enjoy the things I love, and continue to grow as a Happier, Healthier, More Fit Me!

How are you making out with your 2013 goals?

Blog Update!

Hey Everyone! Hope you are having a great day!

I just wanted to let you know I’ve added two new pages to my blog – Clean Eating Recipes and Books I’ve Read.

Just click the links above and check them out! There are a ton of great recipes and a selection of some really good books if you are looking for something to read!

Check back often as these two pages will continually be updated!

Motivational Monday – How Far Will YOU Go?