Accidental Miles and a New Family Member

After our 80 degree day on Sunday, I woke up to 41 degrees and windy. Really, really windy. I was even wearing 3 layers at work. That being said, I was being a baby and decided that I would skip running in the 30mph freezing winds and stick to my dad's treadmill. I had a terrible night's sleep the night before resulting in about 4.5 hours of sleep so I thought my run would be terrible and said I only had to run 2 miles.

Well, I actually felt great and ended up doing a 5 mile progression run of sorts. I couldn't believe I actually ran 5 miles instead of 2 because my legs felt so great and the time flew by. I even stretched afterward. 

Then I returned to my home gym and pumped some iron. It was a good workout day. I love those. Boyfriend returned from his weekend away shortly after I was done and took me on a date to Phò. I got stir fry to refuel.

Speaking of boyfriend, he's been on a puppy kick. A few weeks ago he suddenly decided he needed a puppy. And then some of his family friends happened to have Border Collie puppies. Boyfriend visited them and fell in love with one of them. And brought one home last night.

As you know, I'm obsessed with dogs, but I'm a bit against this puppy. I may have to get a job out of the area and having three dogs is just not condusive to getting a rental. But the dog is so adorable I can't resist him.

No worries, though, Milo will forever be my favorite dog on the planet. Even more so than Moe. Wait. Am I supposed to say that?

This morning's run was a little harder, but runs are always harder at 5am, I think. I love the morning crowd at the gym. Everyone is so dedicated. There is this group of me. Who lift together at the same time I am lifting and they seem to be multiplying by the week. They all stand around and take turns watching each other lift. There are now 4 of them, but I bet by the time my 12 week student teaching placement is up and I no longer need to be at the gym that early, there will be even more.

My favorite part of Tuesdays and Thursdays is the drive home. Because it's gorgeous, but mostly because I know there is delicious food waiting for me at home.

Tomorrow, boyfriend has to return to work again and puppy has to go to his grandma's house because that's the deal I made with him. I can't believe it's already the middle of the week.

26.2 and I'm Spoiled

I keep track of my runs with the RunKeeper app on my phone. I am meticulous about this, adding in every little tenth of a mile. I was so excited today when I checked my mileage for the week.

That's right! I ran a marathon in a week! Do I get an award for the slowest marathon ever ran and most breaks taken??

Speaking if awards, on Thursday I got a special one from my administrator.

That's right! I had excellent attendance last year. Not perfect, mind you, because I missed one whole day for my sister's wedding, but excellent. I was one of 5 who got an attendance award and two of the others were my mentor teacher an my coworker. We are a classroom full of awesome! My work ethic is one part of me that I take pride in, so this was a fun pick-me-up.

Another fun pick me up is coming home to presents from boyfriend who has been at work for too long. I came home to this.

I am seriously the most spoiled person on the planet. I am so lucky to have him in my life.

In other news, I did squats yesterday and my legs are so sore today. I never fail to get DOMS after leg day.

I also have learned I really like working out early in the morning because no one is around to see me taking sweaty selfies and judge me. I have a blog, people, my readers sit and wait all day to see several pictures of me sweating! ;-)

Can you tell it's late (okay, 9:30) on a Friday night? This post is all over the place.

Any plans for the weekend?

What aspect of yourself do you pride yourself on?

Snippets Of My Labor Day Weekend

This weekend was wonderful, but I am sure you don't want to read every little detail of each day, so I won't bore you with those.  I would gladly write every single little detail because I am in serious homework avoidance mode and it's only the beginning of the second week.  This is going to be a long year.

Friday evening was spent with my beautiful friend who I had not seen in two very long months.  She had gone home to LA for the summer.  It is so good to have her back.

I was extremely tired from the week, so I just laid on the couch with her and Moe while the boys played Mario Kart.  Boys will never grow up.

Saturday was extra exciting.  I did homework.  Exercised for an hour and a half to avoid homework.  Then did homework again.

Boyfriend finally got off work (again!  He doesn't usually work Saturdays) and we were hanging around waiting to go to dinner.  We looked all over for Moe, and finally found him in his new favorite sleeping spot, inside the pillowcase.

I got rewarded for doing homework all day by going to eat at the new Vietnamese restaurant.  Now, I hope you are sitting down because what you see will shock you.  I did not order Pho.  I strayed.  I'm a cheater.

Then boyfriend and I went to our friend's CD release party where we danced for hours.  My favorite form of cardio.

Sunday, I forced myself out of bed for my long run.  I told myself I only had to go 5 miles.  I opted for the treadmill again (after hours of debate in my head the night before about running outside) because I truly am scared of getting hit by a car.  Well, I set my pace pretty slow for the first couple of miles, then ramped it up by the end.

I seriously could not believe I went 9 miles.  

We had plans to go to The Orchard for the night.  I decided to be incredibly fashionable.  Please notice the binder and books.  I pretend to be am a good student.  

Boyfriend told me that the hood with sunglasses should never happen.  It's probably a good thing he already loves me.  I didn't get any pictures at the river, but I did snap this on the way there.

After soaking up the sun completely off the grid for 24 hours, I got home and immediately stuffed my face with food jumped into my workout clothes for a run.

After the run and lifting, I went to my dad's for a belated family dinner.  Our Sunday dinners seem to be moving to Mondays.  I forgot my phone, so you don't get to see a picture of the delicious tuna my dad seared for us.  I know you had spent all weekend hoping to see that.  

Now I am in bed ready to sleep.  Tomorrow is another very long day.  But I do get kind of excited to be at the gym early in the morning.

How was your Labor Day?

When was the last time you branched out and didn't order your usual meal?

The Way It Should Be

I am a firm believer that everything works out the way that it's supposed to. I was devastated back in May when I had to say goodbye to my classroom, my students, and my coworkers who felt more like family.

But, it opened up new doors. I got to experience other classrooms, adding more knowledge and to my new teacher repertoire. I even found a classroom that felt like a second home and I got toe student teach under her guidance this summer. I was planning on student teaching under her again at the beginning of the semester, but as I was waiting at the hospital for the baby to be born, I got a call from my administrator that the student had moved and I no longer had a job in that room.

I had a minor freak out about how I was supposed to make money and where I was supposed to do my first 12 weeks of student teaching. It didn't help when I showed up at school on Monday to see this:

Luckily, my administrator is amazing. She called me Tuesday to let me know that not only will I be able to student teach the first 12 weeks in my old classroom with my favorite coworkers and students, I also get to be paid as a sub.

I was ecstatic. I texted everyone in my family to let them know my good news. And today was my first day back in the classroom. And everything felt right.

My drive over the bridge felt like I had never stopped the drive. I saw the same cars commuting that I did for 5 years. And in the classroom, it was as if I never left. When I got to the gym at the hour I used to go, all of my gym best friends were there. The one girl who lifts weights that I try to smile at but she just glares at me. The man who wears inappropriate gym attire, but works his butt off. The old man who grunts really loudly and then wanders around for 20 minutes between sets. My world was right. And so was my run.

My lifts were even better. It was leg day, so deadlifts were a must.

As were squats. As you can tell, I got brave with the sweaty gym selfies. Probably because these people have seen me take months and months of selfies. I'm probably known as the weird girl who not-so-sneakily takes pictures of herself between sets.

I even got brave and finished a very intense lifting session with this:

My dinner routine even felt normal. I made an awesome chicken salad. I realized that I haven't cooked a meal since I've been home from the island.

It's funny how things fall into place and work out exactly how they should. If you're in a running slump, there's a reason for it. If you haven't found that perfect job, there's a reason for it. Just keep on reminding yourself of that when life feels so chaotic you can't breathe. That's what I have to do.

What has gone right in your world?

Tell me about a time you realized things happen for a reason. Do you believe that?

Progress

As I've said before, I can't see the physical changes in myself. I'm afraid I never will. This problem sends me deep into the comparison trap. I constantly get sucked into Instagram and blogs of fitness models and runners and think, "wow, that person is fitter than me," or "that person is faster than me." And then I get totally frustrated with myself and obsess about what I could be doing differently to get to that point.

Showing off my baby bicep for the boyfriend.  He loves it.......

It's so hard for me to step out of that trap I get myself into and realize that I am ME and not someone else. I am doing the best that I can do. And each person is different and each person is doing the best that they can do. Their best is different than my best and someone will always be fitter than me and faster than me, and that's okay.  As long as I spend each day being the best me that I can be, that's all that matters.  And I think that's how everyone should live, being the best person that THEY can be.

This is the face I use when I need my students to listen to me.

Today I decided to do some HIIT at the gym. I started out with doing sprints on the treadmill. I warmed up for 5 minutes and then did 10 sprints for 30 seconds each at a 5:30 pace and then slowed back down to my easy 7:30 pace for a minute. It actually felt really good to sprint, even if I sounded like an elephant stampede.

Then I stepped WAY out of my comfort zone and decided to do some intervals on the stair stepper. Let me tell you how much I HATE the stairs. Any stairs. And a machine that makes you climb stairs and get nowhere frustrates me. But I wanted to shock my body. Let me just say it was the worst decision I've ever made hard. And I only lasted 7 minutes. But that's longer than I thought I would last! So that felt good.

Then I moved to the weight room to do some tabatas. I have a tabata timer on my phone and it was the best thing I have ever downloaded. Tabatas are 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off for 8 rounds. It's a total of 4 minutes of work and they are really hard. I did kettlebell swings, sit-ups with a medicine ball, squats with a kettlebell, and v-sit-ups. I was dripping in sweat by the end of it. Everything burned.

At the end, I decided to take a progress picture. I don't take them often enough because I am afraid I won't see any progress. I know I am physically stronger and I am much faster, but I don't feel like it will show on the camera. Well, this is what happens after 8 months of hard work.

I could not believe how big my quads have gotten. And my shorts are much bigger on me. This was when I realized that things are working. I may not look like a fitness model and I may not win races, but I am becoming the best version of me, and that's what matters. I am slowly but surely learning to love myself and I have fitness to thank for that.  So, go out and do something that makes you the best version of YOU every single day.

100 lbs for 100 Posts

Today marks my 100th post. This is pretty exciting. Today was also a REALLY bad run day, but a REALLY good strength day.

Yesterday I was so tired I fell asleep at 9 and was out the entire night. Apparently I had conversations with the boyfriend a few times, but I absolutely do not remember them. Learning takes so much out of me. I also ran 4.1 miles.

And then I did my back routine. I had started a gym pet peeve post because I was so annoyed the entire time by people who did not re-rack their weights, were just standing around chatting completely in the way, and just people in general. I think I was so annoyed because of my exhaustion and not actually the people at the gym.

Today work was really hard. We had 3 kids and 4 adults, so I helped organize paperwork for 2 hours and then we walked to the park for lunch and sat in the sun before touring the Depot Museum. They had so many strange collections of things I had no idea people collected, like padlocks and barbed wire.

They also had old year books from the boyfriend's alma mater, which happens to be the school I'm working at, so I found a picture of baby boyfriend.

The top one.  Not the bottom.

I tricked him this morning by asking him to go running with me before he was fully awake and knew what he was agreeing to. He was surprised when I got home and told him to get into running shoes. I had to wait 30 minutes for him to get ready and tape his foot so he wouldn't get a blister.

Then we headed out on my very hard run. It was such a mental game today. I wasn't even going faster than usual. I think I am literally just exhausted. I even had to stop at the top of a hill to catch my breath. It made me nervous for how my strength training would go. I was feeling so frustrated with myself, but I have to remember that running IS hard. That's why so many people don't do it.

Tuesdays are chest/triceps day. I usually like to go to the gym because they have a nice bench press set up and I'm not strong enough to clean the weight I can press. But, since I had boyfriend to help spot me and hand me the barbell, I worked out at home. And bench pressed 100 lbs!! My 1RM had been 90 for so long. I was SO excited. Then boyfriend got out the pull up bar and I decided to try a chin up.... It has been a huge goal of mine to be able to do a chin up. I haven't been able to. Ever. Well, today I did one!!!!! It was such a good strength day. And then I got to refuel with this.

Yesterday the boyfriend bought us both Costco memberships which was pretty much the best present ever. We took a trip to get me grapes and him some food for work tomorrow.

Now I am going to fall asleep before the sun goes down just to do it all over again tomorrow.