Monthly Archives: December 2019

I Actually Wrote A Book! (or Getting Myself Ready For 2020)

Posted on December 3, 2019 | Comments Off on I Actually Wrote A Book! (or Getting Myself Ready For 2020)

Last month, I did a repeat monthly challenge. I’ve attempted to write my book about online dating for several years now and I’ve never been able to complete that challenge. I knew going into it this past month that even if I complete the challenge it doesn’t necessarily mean that I finish a book. But I wanted to see what I could get done and I was hoping it would be better than my past attempts.

I had changed what my book was going to be about when I thought about it earlier this year. Instead of just telling stories about dates I went on and guys I met, I wanted to organize it into lessons I’ve learned through dating. This allowed me to work on the book without figuring out where things were going or needing to have an ending to it. This book has the potential to be a work in progress with new chapters for a while, so I didn’t want to have to feel like I needed a way to wrap things up. And by making it more about life lessons got me into that mindset.

I was following the NaNoWriMo plan again this year as I had in the past. I knew that I might have some days where I wrote more words than I needed to and other days would be fewer words. My goal was to work on one lesson (or one chapter) a day. And while I had done a lot of research and planning, I knew I would need to plan more lessons during the month because I wasn’t going to have enough. It wasn’t always easy, but I figured out how to split things up differently and new lessons to add so I had enough to work on one a day. And on Saturday, the last day of the month, I made it to the NaNoWriMo goal of 50,000 words!

Writing this book ended up being very therapeutic for me. I had to work through some things that I didn’t realize I wasn’t completely over. I had to revisit some moments that are not positive or that I am ashamed or embarrassed about. I had to be brutally honest with myself as I wrote things because I’m not always the hero of the story. Every day that I worked on the book, new emotions came up but at the same time, I found new peace with some things as well. I didn’t realize how much I needed to write this book for me.

Since I know this is still a work in progress, I don’t want to say that I finished a book. There are still things that may change about it, but I have a full draft of the book as of right now. And I want to start working on the editing process on the chapters I have completed so far. I have several friends who have offered to read it, but I don’t know if I’m ready for that just yet. I can do some editing on my own first and that’s what I plan on doing. Hopefully, soon I will feel ready to share it with some friends for some feedback and editing. And then after that, I can do some more research on what it would take to get my book published in the future.

For this month, I wanted to do another reflective monthly challenge. Not only is this the last month of the year, but it’s also the last month of the decade. That seems monumental and made me think about how I started this decade. I was in the middle of a lot of change and it was a very chaotic time for me. This decade hasn’t always been the best, but I think that I’m in the best place I’ve ever been in with my life so far. And I want to continue doing that into the next decade (and beyond).

So my plan for this month is to spend the time preparing to kick off the new year and new decade as my best self. I want to work on being in the best place I can mentally and working toward the best place physically. And some of the mental work includes working on my physical space, which is something I have been working on lately. I’ve been cleaning up my house and getting it more organized. I’ve been working on finding new ways to store things so my space doesn’t feel as cluttered. It’s been a process, but I’m feeling much better about how my house looks now.

I need to do some serious organizing work with my kitchen and it feels right to do that before the new year. I want to find ways to use my kitchen more and more efficiently. I also have a plan to do some food reaction testing soon and I need to have my kitchen in a good place to do that the best I can. I’m also looking at other things around my house that I want to change because I have lived here for almost 10 years now and some things are things I got when I moved here. I think updating my space after 10 years seems right.

I’m so excited that I’ve finished my first draft of my book (so far) and that I’m in such a good headspace for the new year. Now, I just want to make sure I’m continuing to work on those things so I can kick of 2020 with a bang!

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My Short Workout Week (or 6 Years Of Family Workouts)

Posted on December 2, 2019 | Comments Off on My Short Workout Week (or 6 Years Of Family Workouts)

This past week of workouts ended up being a 3 workout week. I was thinking about trying to make it 4, but it was destined to be just 3. But it’s ok because one workout was my family pre-Thanksgiving workout and that should count for more than one! Not only was my family workout awesome, but this past week was also just a great week for me and that’s what I really needed.

Monday’s workout was a power day, and it was a really great day for me. I only get to take a 2 group class on Mondays (unless I take a class during a time I normally don’t), and this one was a perfect 2 group workout. Because it was a power day, things were short and that was perfect when we were at each section of the room for 30 minutes.

For cardio, we had 3 blocks. Each block had the same pattern with a push pace, a pace pace, and then 3 rounds of all outs with recoveries after. The first block had a 90 second push pace, the second block had a 1 minute push pace, and the last block had a 30 second push pace. The base paces and recoveries changed between the blocks too. And all the all outs in the first block were 1 minute, all the all outs in the second block were 45 seconds, and all the all outs in the last block were 30 seconds. These were great little sprints for me on the bike and I was able to get some high numbers with my wattage and cadence. I kept the resistance level at my base level the entire time, but I think that was almost necessary with how often we were changing up what we were doing. I got one of my furthest distances on the bike that I’ve ever done and I felt awesome when we switched to the floor.

The floor was an interesting plan. It was one long block and we started with 3 rounds of bench hopovers to burpees and a 100-meter row. Then we had 3 rounds of push-ups to plank jacks, squats with hammer curls, and a 150-meter row. The last section was supposed to be shoulder presses to stands, plank work, and sit-ups with rotations with 200-meter rows, but I only got through the exercises once in that section so I didn’t make it to the row. I wasn’t going too heavy with the weights because we were moving around so much and I did have to modify things by using the bench, but it was still a great floor block for me. I know it was a lot of work, but because things were switching up so often it didn’t feel like that and the 30 minutes really flew by. I think it was the perfect workout to have right before traveling and to get me ready for my family workout on Thanksgiving.

My next workout was on Thursday for the family workout. We had 5 of us this year at the workout, so it wasn’t our biggest group and it wasn’t our smallest group. This year my dad, brother, aunt, and cousin joined me (next year or the year after my cousin’s oldest kid will be joining us and then we’ll have 3 generations at the workout!). We were at the Folsom studio again, which is where we were last year. And as always it was a partner workout.

The first half of the class was just 6 minutes in each section of the room without partners. We had 6 minutes of cardio with push and base paces, a 6-minute row for distance, and pull-ups on the straps, squats to bicep curls, and pushups on the floor. My family doesn’t row normally, so I think the 6 minutes of rowing was a bit tough on them but they all did great! Nobody stopped the entire time and that was so impressive!

The rest of the class was partnered in groups of 3. I worked with my dad and brother and the person on cardio set the switching. My dad and brother on the treadmills had a .4 mile run and I had 1.6 miles on the bike. The person on the rower just rowed the entire time they were there. And the person on the floor had squats, single-arm snatches, and sit-ups. We weren’t supposed to reset the rower the entire time, but my dad accidentally did it once so we were missing a bit of our distance at the end of class. But it was a fast-moving partner block and we were switching every 3-4 minutes.

And as always, we had to take a family photo with our coach after we finished the class.

We’ve now had this tradition for 6 years and every year our photos make me smile!

I was back to my regular studio for my Saturday workout. This class was a strength-based one and I continued my streak of having awesome workouts! There were 2 blocks in each section of the room and we switched between each block.

Both of the cardio blocks had the same pattern. We started with a 90-second push pace. After a base pace, we had 45 seconds at an incline and 45 seconds at a flat incline at a push pace followed by 30 seconds at an incline and our push pace. We had a walking recovery and then a 30-second push pace and 30-second all out at an incline. The difference between the 2 blocks was the incline we were supposed to use. I used the resistance levels when we were doing incline work, but for the flat road pushes, I just focused on pedaling faster.

On the rower, the first block started with a 250-meter row and 25 pulsing squats. We decreased the row by 50 meters and the squats by 5 until the block ended. The second block started with a 100-meter row and 10 pulsing squats with increasing the row by 50 meters and the squats by 5 each round.

And on the floor, we had the same exercises for both blocks. We had deadlifts, chest presses, single-arm rows with weights, lunges, and seated shoulder presses to stands. I tried to go heavy with the weights, but I think I wasn’t feeling 100% myself and was a bit tired from traveling so I had to go a bit lower than I would have liked.

This week and next week at Orangetheory are the 12 Days Of Fitness and they are supposed to be harder workouts than normal. If you do 7 of the 12 workouts, you get a pair of OTF socks. But only the first 100 people who complete it will get them. I can adjust my schedule to do 7 workouts (and I’m going to see about trying to do that), but I don’t think I’ll be one of the first 100 to do it so I’m not expecting to be able to get the socks. But I’m excited either way about seeing what these workouts will bring and what I’ll be able to do!

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Default ThumbnailThanksgiving Workouts (or Getting My Family Involved) Default ThumbnailRinging In The New Year With Workouts (or A Rare 5 Workout Week) Default ThumbnailA Short Workout Week (or 3 Workouts In 3 Different Locations) Default ThumbnailAnother Short Workout Week (or Still Can’t Believe My Milestone) Default ThumbnailA Short Workout Week (or I Would Have Ended On A High Note) Default ThumbnailShort and Sweet Workout Week (or Taking It A Bit Easy)

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