Category Archives: Fun Stuff

Holiday Cheesecake (or Birthday Twins and Twinkle Lights)

Posted on January 9, 2018 | Comments Off on Holiday Cheesecake (or Birthday Twins and Twinkle Lights)

The last few years it has been a tradition for my birthday twin, Joanna, and I to get cheesecake around the holidays. We haven’t always been successful with our timing, but we have been pretty good about at least doing it eventually between our birthday adventures. But this time, I wanted to make sure we were on top of it and I texted Joanna before around Christmas to find out when we could get cheesecake. Somehow, we both ended up being free right before NYE so we made a date for our cheesecake outing.

I was totally looking forward our hangout and then of course it ended up happening right as I was starting to feel my worst. But I wasn’t going to miss this tradition so I took some painkillers and hoped for the best. Fortunately, Joanna is such an amazing friend and understood that I wasn’t feeling so great. So she probably took charge more often in the conversation and I’m so grateful for her for that! We knew that it was going to be crowded and that there would be a wait for a table, but normally when they tell us it will be an hour it’s really just a fraction of that. But this time, we ended up waiting almost 90 minutes for a table. But we were determined to get our cheesecake and figured this just gave us more time to catch up.

We both have been having adventures in online dating so we were sharing stories about that. And she had just been to visit her family so she was updating me on how everyone in her family are doing. It was a pretty chill hangout and catch up but I’m always so grateful that we get to spend this time together. She and I both have weird and sometimes crazy schedules so we don’t get to see each other that often. More often than not, the only times we see each other are for our birthday and for the cheesecake. So we need to maximize each hangout.

Once we finally got a table, we ordered pretty quickly. We’ve both been to Cheesecake Factory enough to know what we want (although the flatbread that Joanna likes was just taken off the menu) and we got to looking at the menu at the cheesecake which was the most important part of the meal to us. I ordered a salad for my dinner and we decided on red velvet and tres leches cheesecake to have. We’ve learned that we can ask the server to split each piece of cheesecake in half, so we each get half of each slice.

Somehow I always have room for dessert even though I was still feeling pretty awful. But I knew I ate too much so we decided to walk around a bit after dinner. All of the Christmas lights were still up at the Grove and it really was beautiful. It was the first time this season that I had seen the lights and I’m glad I didn’t miss my chance to check them out!

We also went to check out the tree, but it’s so big that it’s almost impossible to get a photo of the entire tree!

But we decided that the tree was the perfect background for us to take a photo together!

It wasn’t as crowded by the tree and decorations as it was near dinner, so it was nice to be able to walk around and not feel totally squished. The crowds are the main reason why I rarely go to the Grove, but whenever I go there I’m reminded about how nice it is there and how fun the holiday decorations are. But I think that it will probably be a once a year type of adventure. Plus, most of the stores and restaurants there are places I can go to somewhere else so I’m not always that motivated to drive over there. But it makes a perfect place to meet for our annual cheesecake dinner!

After checking out the decorations, it was time for us to head back to our cars. I really was trying to keep a smile on my face and ignore the pain I was in, but I knew I needed to get home to get some more painkillers in me (I ended up missing a party I was supposed to go to after dinner because I was feeling so horrible). But even though I wasn’t feeling that great, I’m so glad that I went out for cheesecake. It’s an important tradition for us and also it was a nice distraction from how I was feeling!

While I know that Joanna and I have good intentions to try to hang out again before our birthday, I know that there’s a good chance that the next time we will see each other will be for our birthday dinner. But at least we both know that we try to hang out more often and when we do get together we maximize the time that we have!

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A New Year Of Workouts (or Finally Starting To Feel Like Myself Again)

Posted on January 8, 2018 | Comments Off on A New Year Of Workouts (or Finally Starting To Feel Like Myself Again)

This past week was the first week of workouts for 2018! I’ve got a big number as my goal for my workouts for the year, so I’m glad I got off to a good start!

I did do a class on New Year’s Day since I usually do a class that day plus it was a Monday (one of my normal workout days). But this time it was weird for a few reasons. First, I was still not feeling good so I knew I would have to take it easy. But also, this was my 4th workout in a row! I think I’ve only had 4 workouts in a row once before (I know there may be another one coming up soon) and it’s a lot. So I was pretty tired going into the workout and knew that combining being tired with not feeling great meant I wasn’t going to have my best workout to start off the year. But I did start it off in style with breaking in some new workout shoes!

The workout was an endurance and power day. And despite it being the first day of the new year (so you’d expect a ton of resolution people at the workout) the workout wasn’t that packed so it ended up being a 2 group class instead of a 3 group class. It was a run/row format but I did it as a bike/row. And this type of run/row workout was one where we built upon each block. So we started with block one of the run/row and then we did block one and block two and so on. I made it to the last block when time was called so I was pretty impressed with how far I got even though my workout didn’t feel that strong.

On the floor we had one long block. The moves included plank punches, mountain climbers, plank jacks, squat rows with weights, high/low row combos on straps, and hammer curls. All the moves that had me in a plank position or bent over were making me feel pretty nauseous so I had to go easy on all of those. It wasn’t an easy floor block to get through, but I pushed as much as I could and was just glad that I showed up when I know in the past I would have used how I was feeling as an excuse.

Wednesday I was finally feeling better so I could have a good workout! It was a power day with 3 blocks on each side. On the treadmill, blocks 1 and 3 were pretty similar with push to all out paces. And block 2 was 4 rounds of a 45 second all out pace followed by a 30 second walking recovery. Between the 3 blocks, we had 11 45 second all out paces! I decided to try to do some running so I walked the base and push paces but ran for all 11 of the all out paces! It felt so good to feel normal again and I was so happy that it was a workout that I could push myself in.

On the floor, the first and third blocks were on the floor. We had push ups, chest presses, triceps with weights, squats, side raises, lunges, pull ups on the straps, and triceps on the straps. And the second block was on the rower where we had the same pattern as the treadmill with 45 second sprints with 30 seconds to recover in-between. While I didn’t do anything spectacular on the floor or rowing work, the fact that I felt like myself was such a victory that I didn’t care. Even though I was only feeling sick for a week, it seemed like forever and I worried when I would be able to get back to working on my workout goals.

Friday was an endurance day with no switches between blocks. As much as I wanted to work on running again, I also knew that I need to take things easy as I got back into it so I did all my treadmill work as power walking. All of the blocks had a similar format with a 2 minute push pace and a 2 minute push pace to a 1 minute all out in them. I did 6% for my inclines on my pushes and 8% for my inclines on the all outs.

On the floor we had 1 long block that started with a 500 meter row (I finished it in 2:11 which is pretty decent). Then we had add-on blocks on the floor. Every block started with burpees and then we added things on like squat thrusters, roll outs, swings with weights, and knee tucks. Doing all those burpees wasn’t easy, but somehow I managed to get them done. And we were supposed to do a second 500 meter row once we finished all the moves on the floor, but I was just finishing up my floor work when time was called so I never got to do the second row.

And even though I started the week with my 4th workout in a row (3 of those workouts being for the week prior), I still got a 4th workout in this past week! This time it was a strength based workout but it was a 3 group class. Because it was a strength class and I knew that meant inclines on the treadmills, I did another power walking day. Both blocks on the treadmill were similar with a longer base at an incline (I did 6%) and push to all outs at inclines (I did 8%). I was at my normal treadmill speed but I think I might have been able to push it a bit more in my inclines.

Next I was on the floor where we had 2 blocks as well. The first block was rows with weights, shoulders with weights, and plank leg lifts. The second block was uppercuts with weights, pushups, and running man. And on the rower we started with a 500 meter row and then went down 100 meters each time. After we got to 100 meters, we went back up by 100 meters each time. I made it to the second 300 meter row before class ended.

While this wasn’t the incredible start to my year of workouts, I think it wasn’t too bad. I was dealing with circumstances that I couldn’t control that affected how well I was able to work out, but I still showed up and started off the year with 4 workouts! Now I just can’t wait to see what will happen throughout the rest of the year!

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Ringing In 2018 (or Being Festive While Being Lazy On The Couch)

Posted on January 5, 2018 | Comments Off on Ringing In 2018 (or Being Festive While Being Lazy On The Couch)

I had been looking forward to New Year’s Eve for a while. It’s always a great party and I knew that I’d be seeing a bunch of my friends there. And I was hoping for a much easier time getting home after the party compared to the year before (that’s when my car died). Everything seemed to be going my way until the week of New Year’s Eve.

That’s when I started dealing with the nausea and pain from hormones and I started to question if I was even going to make it to the party. I felt so horrible and wasn’t sure if I’d be a good party guest. But then I realized that not going to the party wasn’t going to make me feel better and I wanted to see my friends no matter what. So I took all my medications to try to help me get through the evening and headed to the party.

I did accessorize with my bracelets with my words of 2017 and 2018 on them because it felt like a fun way to celebrate a new year.

When I got to the party, I wasn’t feeling too bad. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to eat anything, but I was able to hang out outside and be social with my friends. It was a smaller party than it has been in the past so it was easier to talk to people and catch up.

But after about an hour, I felt like my medications weren’t working anymore and the pain and nausea were getting to me again. I wasn’t going to leave the party, but I decided to go lay down on a couch in their living room to try to feel better. For a little while, I was by myself in there and that was fine with me. But slowly people started joining me in the living room to hang out and dance. I stayed on the couch being lazy and trying to feel better but it was nice to feel like I was still involved a bit.

Pretty much everyone at the party knew the situation with how I was feeling, so nobody was making a big deal out of me not doing much at the party. And people seemed to be making a bit of an effort to come over to hang out with me since they knew I wasn’t going to be getting up from the couch. And while I was feeling bad most of the time, there were moments that I felt like myself again and I managed to take a fun photo with some of my friends.

I was at the party for a few hours, and for a majority of that time I was on the couch not feeling so great. It was nice to have the distractions of my friends, but it was a bit frustrating to not feel like myself and to not be participating as much as I would have liked. Everyone seemed so happy and at times I worried that I was being a downer and bringing the party down (I know in reality I wasn’t, I just felt that way).

Right before midnight we turned on the tv to watch the ball drop (even though it was technically a 3 hour delay from when it happened in New York). I fortunately was feeling slightly better as midnight approached so I got off the couch and joined everyone to celebrate the new year. Even though I don’t drink that much now, I would have had some of the champagne if I was feeling ok. But I didn’t think mixing pain and anti-nausea meds with even a little bit of alcohol was a smart idea. So I toasted the new year with water instead.

I was happy that I made it to midnight with my friends, but right after I decided it was time to head home and get to bed. The party was going strong when I was leaving, but everyone knows that I like to leave before it gets too late because I don’t want to have to deal with crazy drivers on the road. I was also a bit paranoid that something would happen on my drive back like last year. Fortunately, I got home without any issues and was in bed before 1am.

While this wasn’t the New Year’s Eve that I had been looking forward to, it still ended up being a fun time. I think that just being around my friends is what makes these parties so great for me. The next party will be the Oscar party and I’ve already started to work on my costume for it. I’ve got a fun idea for the costume and I think it shouldn’t be too tough for me to do!

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First Monthly Challenge Of 2018 (or Time To Be A Bit Selfish)

Posted on January 4, 2018 | 1 comment

With the new year I’ve also got a new Volt Planner! They did some minor redesign work on the planner and I love how it looks! It’s so clean with lots of room to write things and decorate. But the redesign didn’t change a lot of the important stuff like the monthly challenges. So since it’s the beginning of a month it’s time for a new monthly challenge!

First, a quick recap on December’s challenge. I set that challenge to be to work on my handwriting. And for the first half of the month, that went really well! I got some new nice pens to use and found lots of free printable handwriting guides to use. I think my handwriting did get a bit better and I learned some new style ideas with writing. But for the second half of the month, I just didn’t work on it. There wasn’t really a good reason, I just didn’t. But I still worked on making my handwriting nice when I was writing anything. So I still want to work on this and I know I will. But I don’t know if it will be something I work on every day.

For my first challenge of this year, I really wanted to think about something that connected to my goals for the year and word of the year. I kept coming back to an idea for a challenge but then rejected it because it didn’t seem right. I felt a bit embarrassed that it would be my challenge and wouldn’t want to share it. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that this should be my challenge. I shouldn’t be fearful about what others think and that’s kind of exactly what this month’s challenge is all about.

This month, my challenge is to allow myself to be a bit selfish.

I know this sounds a bit weird, but I’ll explain myself. This does not mean that I’m only going to think of myself. I’m still going to consider others and be selfless more often than not. But I’m not going to be scared to be selfish and do what I know is the best thing for me even if someone else thinks that something else is better for me.

A perfect example of this was this past weekend. My brother and sister-in-law were going to be in LA visiting friends and wanted to know if I wanted to meet them for lunch. I of course said yes and was very excited to see them. But the day I was supposed to meet them, I was dealing with horrible nausea and pain because of my hormones. This was the worst I had ever felt and none of the medications I have were taking the edge off. But I was thinking I should still go to lunch because I told them that I would and I didn’t want to disappoint them. I knew I wouldn’t be able to eat and I would probably be in a lot of pain, but somehow I was more worried about bailing on plans than my health.

But then I realized how crazy that sounded. My brother and sister-in-law would totally understand if I couldn’t see them. It would have been so much better for me to stay home and try to take care of myself than to push myself and maybe make things worse for me. It felt like a selfish choice because I was putting myself first, but I knew I needed to do it. And it was fine. I texted them to let them know what was happening, they totally understood, and we figured we’d see each other another time. It wasn’t a big deal at all and they weren’t mad or upset with me. It’s silly how worried I was about it when it was fine.

After that, I realized that allowing myself to be a bit selfish is exactly what I need to challenge myself to do. I am very much a people pleaser and sometimes I do that to the point that it makes me unhappy. I want to focus on my happiness and sometimes that does mean being a bit selfish. If someone invites me to a party and I really feel like staying home, then I should stay home instead of going to a party and being miserable. If I want to prioritize myself, then I shouldn’t feel guilty about it.

It seems so weird to make being selfish a challenge for the month, but at the same time it seems so perfect. There really isn’t a good way for me to judge if I’m successful in this challenge or not compared to some challenges in the past, but I think that I just want to give myself permission to be selfish and not feel bad about it. I know that if I’m selfish and feel bad that I can think about it and realize that most likely I’m not hurting anyone with my decision. And taking away that guilty feeling would be the biggest win in this challenge that I can think of.

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My Word For 2018 (or Time To Be Fearless)

Posted on January 3, 2018 | Comments Off on My Word For 2018 (or Time To Be Fearless)

Most of my posts this week will be all about new year stuff. A new year brings a lot of new beginnings, and this is another one. This is all about my word for 2018! I’ve been doing a word of the year for a few years now and I always try to pick something that seems really positive and powerful. Those are attributes that I know I need to work on and the words I pick seems to be things that I feel like I was lacking the year before.

Last year, after I had picked my word for the year, I found a bracelet from MantraBand that had the word on it. This year, I knew I’d want a bracelet so I decided to use the MantraBand website as my inspiration for what words I wanted to consider. I had a few different ones that seemed to be really perfect for me and I took time to think about what they all meant to me and what seemed to represent what I wanted to accomplish in 2018. And I finally decided on one just before NYE.

There is so much that I am scared about and I want to work past that. And the word fearless works so well for so many different aspects of my life. I know that being fearful can hold me back so I want to make sure that I don’t use that as an excuse to not try. This is for sure something I struggle with and I know that working to get beyond it really will be life-changing for me.

I love the idea of being fearless and just going for what I want or what I love. I love the idea that I won’t be second guessing myself or worried that I might do something that can ruin something for the rest of my life. I don’t want to be scared to see what would happen if I take chances in my career, my recovery, or my life.

I know that this isn’t as easy as being a warrior or being strong, but that’s one of the reasons I picked this word. This not only means making a positive change but changing a negative one that I already have in my life. But because it is going to be more difficult to do, I think that means the results are going to be so much more powerful in the end for me. I have the little voices in the back of my head telling me I should be fearful of something or to hold back from trying something new and I need to find a way to make them be quiet. And once my fearlessness is louder than the voices telling me to be fearful, I think that so much will be possible.

I think that I have made a lot of steps in 2017 to being a bit more fearless already. Getting back into the dating word is a huge step and I put myself out there so much. I allowed myself to be hurt which is something I avoided for a long time. It’s tough for me to be fearless with dating and take chances since in my past someone told me that I would never be loved by anyone. I always have a fear that the date that I’m on might be the last date I have the rest of my life. I know that the chances of that happening are pretty slim, but it’s very tough to believe it when someone told me otherwise for so much of my life.

But if I didn’t put myself out there, I wouldn’t have had the positive things as well. And I know that I want more of that feeling in my life. It’s scary to have faith in yourself and believe that you are going to get good things to come your way, but I’ve finally started to experience that and I know that I am worthy of the good and that the bad are the rare things I have to deal with. I don’t deserve the bad, but sometimes I have to weed through those to find the good. And I’m no longer as fearful of the bad because I know the good is out there.

When I got my MantraBand bracelet, the packaging has a little blurb about what the word means. And I love the one that they have for fearless.

To be fearless is to do what scares you, to take a chance, to make a change. To love again. And to get back up after you fall. To be fearless is to know your fears, but never let them stop you.

This is so perfect. I know what scares me. It’s getting beyond that and doing things anyway that I need to work on. I’m really hoping that this year I can learn how to become more fearless so I can see what possibilities are really out there for me.

So here’s to what will hopefully be my year of being fearless and seeing what amazing things can happen to me when I stop being scared and start living without fear!

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My 2018 Goals (or Pushing Myself And Being Gentle With Myself)

Posted on January 2, 2018 | 1 comment

I think that my goal setting for each year always takes an interesting twist. I get so ambitious with what I want to do and then I get so fearful that I won’t be able to accomplish them. I know that not succeeding at every goal is ok, but I do also like to set myself up for success. So when I was thinking about my goals for this year, I did a lot of reflection on what has worked in the past and what hasn’t worked as well. And I think I created a pretty good set of goals for the year.

My first goal for 2018 is a Orangetheory one. I like setting a workout goal for the year because it helps me stay on top of things. And when I have an annual goal, I can break it down and know what my monthly goal needs to be as well. Last year I did pretty amazing with my workout goal so I want to push that just a bit further. I want to do 199 workouts in 2018. I think it should be possible because I’m pretty much doing 4 workouts a week every week. I need to make sure that I do that again this year. And there’s a chance I might have to have a few 5 workout weeks to make up for things. But I know what I need to be doing each month to accomplish this so I can keep checking in with myself as the months go on this year.

My next goal is to find at least 1 5K race to do. Neither of my regular races are probably happening this year, and I don’t want to have a year that I don’t do at least one race. It’s been a long time since I haven’t had any races in a year and I don’t want to make that this year. It was weird enough only having 1 race last year. I would like to try to have 2 races, but I am picky on what races I do and since I have no clue what will connect with me I don’t want to set myself up too much for that to not work out. Hopefully I’ll have more than 1 race, but I’m going to make sure that there is at least 1.

The next goal could be related to either of the previous goals. I want to set a new PR with my mile time. It’s much more likely that it will happen at Orangetheory when we have a mile challenge than in a race where I need to pace myself, but you never know when it will happen. I know what my mile PR is and I know it will be very difficult to beat it. But I think that having that as a goal will help me work harder on my running so that the goal is much more possible at some point this year.

Next is something I also had last year. I want to get my debt down to a number that is a goal in my head. I missed hitting this goal last year but I also had some financial setbacks (mainly having my hours cut back significantly at one of my jobs) that I think really contributed to me missing the goal. But now with my current financial status I think I can hit that goal and maybe even get a bit further than that. It won’t be easy, but I’m really going to try. I know that no matter what, I will get my debt down more and that is always a victory. But I’d really like to hit this goal this year!

And finally, I set a recovery related goal. It’s always tough for me to pick a recovery related goal because this is where I can really set myself up to feel like I failed. As much as I’d like to say that I want to be in recovery by the end of 2018, that is not realistic. And the baby steps in recovery aren’t easy to measure (or at least, not easy for me to measure on my own). So when I was thinking about what I wanted to do in my eating disorder recovery this year, all I could think about is how I can’t just keep doing what I’m doing. I need to make changes to see changes. And that idea inspired my goal. I want to try new recovery methods and ideas this year. I don’t know what methods and ideas they may be, but I want to be more open to new ideas and see what sticks. Trying new recovery methods doesn’t mean that they will work, but I won’t know unless I try which is the idea of this goal.

So there are my goals for 2018. I think that I’ve set some things that I should be able to do and things I will need to strive for. And I can’t wait to see how these end up getting accomplished this year and I know that before I know it I will be writing my post updating you all on how it went!

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Reflecting Back On 2017 (Kind Of Reaching My Goals)

Posted on December 29, 2017 | Comments Off on Reflecting Back On 2017 (Kind Of Reaching My Goals)

I can’t believe this is my last blog post of 2017! It seems like it wasn’t that long ago that I was writing my goals for the year. This year definitely wasn’t what I expected it to be, but that was mostly for the best. But because of things not being the way I thought they would, some of my goals didn’t end up happening the way I thought. For some goals I totally surpassed what I expected and for others they didn’t happen. But even with the non-successes (I don’t consider them failures), I learned a lot.

My first goal I had for 2017 was 181 workouts. When I set that goal, I expected to be out for a little while when I had surgery so I thought it might be a bit of a stretch. I tried to make up for the time I thought I would be missing by doing more weeks of 4 workouts a week. That ended up being my new normal which was pretty exciting. And then I didn’t have surgery so I didn’t have to take the time away that I thought I would. But that didn’t slow me down and as long as the last few days this month go as planned I will be ending the year with 196 workouts!

I was pretty shocked when I looked at my total and saw how far over my goal I had gone. I knew I was going to be doing more than I thought, but I didn’t think I’d be 15 workouts ahead of my goal. That’s pretty amazing and even if every workout wasn’t the best one, consistency is so important and I think I’ve proved to myself that I have that.

My next goal I had for the year was to get through my liver surgery as easily as possible. I’ve got a history of having an easy time with surgeries, but this was going to be the first time I would have to stay overnight at the hospital and it was a much more extreme surgery than any I’ve had before. Well, as you all probably know from all of my posts about it, I didn’t have surgery. So technically there was no way for me to accomplish this goal. But I reframed it in my mind to be more about getting through this entire situation about my liver with less stress. And I think I did accomplish that. I think that I will always be a little nervous before going in for an MRI because I don’t want the tumors to grow, but beyond that time I really don’t think about my tumors that much at all. I do think about them once a day when I do visualization, but after that I try to not focus on it.

Next was to work on my recovery and hopefully reduce my binge episodes. I’m torn on how I did on this goal. I think that I have made some big strides in my recovery and there was some time where my binges were the most infrequent they have ever been, but that didn’t last. I don’t know what I need to do to keep that momentum, but my awareness is higher than ever and I consider that a win. I think this past year I’ve also become more aware of how long this recovery journey may take and that even if it doesn’t feel like I’m taking steps forward I am. I wish that some of my progress was more obvious and the results could be seen, but I think I’ll just have to wait a bit on that. But it’s a good thing that there isn’t a deadline to be recovered.

Next was a money related goal. I wanted to reduce my debt to be at a number that I had in my head. That reduction would have been about 25% of the debt I have and would have been amazing. I didn’t quite make it to that number, but I did get my debt down about 19% which is better than I have done before. This is also after getting a major reduction in my hours at one of my jobs. I went from 12-15 hours a week to 4 which cut my income down a lot. So to be able to reduce my debt that much and re-budget my life with the reduced money coming in is a big step. I wish I could have done more, but I also know that the circumstances weren’t easy and to reduce the debt at all took a lot of work.

I also set a goal to have a new PR in my 5K race. That worked out pretty well for me since I had a new PR at the one 5K I did this year. I had that PR on the course with the hills which usually slows me down. But because I had my running intervals longer that made up for any decrease in speed I had on my hills. To PR is awesome and I’m so happy that I was able to do that. But I was sad that I only had 1 race this year and that I didn’t have another chance to try to improve on that PR. Next year will be weird because neither of the 5Ks I usually do will be happening, but at least I know that I hit my 2017 goal for my races!

And my final goal for this year was to have more fun. I think I totally succeeded in this! I had so many Disney and Universal adventures with friends. I went to a lot of fun parties and just tried to have a lot of fun with the random things of life. And even though dating can be crazy and stressful at times, I’ve been having fun with that too. It does help that I’ve been turning all the bad stories into stories for my book so whenever I have a bad date I think about how funny it will be when someone else reads it. I haven’t gotten serious about anyone yet, but to have fun with dating is something that hasn’t really been in my past before and I’m glad that’s kind of my experience now.

Overall, I think I had more wins than non-successes with my goals. I might not have achieved everything I wanted, but that’s not really what goals are about. If they were all easy to reach then I didn’t set them high enough. I need to be striving for things and not reaching my goals does motivate me to do better. Look at my workouts as an example. I missed my goal in 2016 but far surpassed it in 2017. Missing that goal last year motivated me to do even better this year.

My next few posts will all be about what I’ve got in mind for 2018. I’ve got some big goals again that I’m thinking about and I’m excited to share them next week. But for now, I guess that’s a wrap on posts for 2017! It was a great year for me and I’m so grateful for you all following me on my journey! Have an awesome NYE (and please don’t drink and drive!) and hopefully we all have an incredible start to 2018!

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Default ThumbnailRecapping My 2016 (or Almost Doing All That I Wanted To) Default ThumbnailMy 2018 Goals (or Pushing Myself And Being Gentle With Myself) Default ThumbnailMy 2017 Goals (or I Know This Year Will Be Amazing!) Default ThumbnailReflecting Back On 2014 (or How I Did With My Goals) Default ThumbnailReaching New Goals (or Time To Go All Out) Default ThumbnailAn Almost End Of The Year Review (or Looking Back At My Goals)

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Posted in Celebrations, Dating, Fitness, Food, Fun Stuff, Health, Saving

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Making My House Look Fancy (or Doing Some Upgrades For The New Year)

Posted on December 28, 2017 | Comments Off on Making My House Look Fancy (or Doing Some Upgrades For The New Year)

I’m not sure why, but for some reason I’ve been on a big cleaning and organizing spree. Maybe it’s because so many of my friends posted photos of their holiday decorations and I thought their homes looked much nicer and more grown-up than mine. Also, I know that things have gotten a bit cluttered lately and I know how easily that can get out of control. But mainly, I just wanted to upgrade some stuff around my house because it was time to do so.

Things started pretty basic with getting a new shower organizer (my old one was starting to rust) and I got some baskets I could hang off of towel racks in my bathroom (I have a serious lack of storage in there). I also wanted to do some better organizing in my kitchen. I had won a blender at Orangetheory a while ago but hadn’t organized my kitchen to fit it in there. I had my old blender still in there and I knew that it was time to get rid of that. So I started to clean and move things around in my kitchen to find a space for the new blender and that got me to move things around more.

And of course when I started moving things around I realized that I needed to do some more shopping and organizing. My parents gave me a set of knifes over 10 years ago that I never opened because I already had a knife set. But since I was doing so many upgrades I decided to switch knife sets. And since the new knife set didn’t have a knife block, I had to get one. I ended up finding a really compact one that didn’t have pre-cut slots so I could use it with any knife set. I also found a new dish drying rack that was much smaller than my old one. Since my kitchen counter space is limited, it’s nice to have more space now that I’ve switched things up.

And the most recent upgrade was inspired by my first one. The new shower organizer was nice but since I could put more things it in I wanted it to look nicer. The variety of bottles in there made things seem more cluttered than it really was and I wanted to fix that. I’ve used nicer containers for soap before since the giant bottles don’t fit where I use them. So I decided to look into new containers for my shampoo and conditioner. I ended up finding glass bottles that looked almost identical to the face wash bottle I already had. I got those (I realized that I could have just gotten more face wash bottles, but it was much cheaper to get the new bottles).

I also had learned from past mistakes about decanting one liquid into a new container and got some funnels too. And while it was a bit slower than I thought to move everything into the new containers, the end result looks so nice!

I’m thinking about maybe getting more containers like this for other things I have around my house like lotions or my body wash (which is still in the original bottle in my shower). It really does look so much nicer this way when the containers are out and I don’t have somewhere to store them away. And I can get the bigger sizes of things now and then pour them into the smaller containers (which should save me a little money).

Of course, all of these upgrades did cost me money which wasn’t the best. I really wanted to save money, but once I got started on these projects I wasn’t really able to stop. I’ve got a few more projects in mind that I want to do, but I’m hoping that I can do them without buying more stuff. A lot of this organization has been trying to minimize what I have in my house. I’m aware that I have too much stuff at times and I need to work on that. But when I’m getting rid of stuff, it helps to also make the stuff that I’m keeping in my house look nicer.

My organization and upgrade project is an ongoing thing. But it’s nice to know that I’m going to be starting 2018 in a much nicer looking place that feels much more grown-up to me.

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Default ThumbnailMore Empty Space In My House (The Cleaning And Organizing Continues) Default ThumbnailOrganization Time (or Seeing A Bit Of A Mess) Default ThumbnailBrunch and Shopping (or Helping A Friend Make Some Upgrades) Default ThumbnailNew Year’s Eve Fun (or Making Sure 2014 Is A Lucky Year) Default ThumbnailGetting Rid Of Extras (or Cleaning House) Default ThumbnailStill Doing More House Projects (or Just Trying To Find Busy Work)

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A Very Low-Key Christmas (or Not Spending My Day Off Doing My Usual Stuff)

Posted on December 27, 2017 | Comments Off on A Very Low-Key Christmas (or Not Spending My Day Off Doing My Usual Stuff)

I really didn’t do much at all this year on Christmas. It was a bit unfortunate that it fell on my day off of work because it didn’t feel like much of a break. In fact, it was a bit annoying at times because I would think of an errand that I would want to run like I do on a normal day off but couldn’t do it because everything was closed. Since I couldn’t do my normal day off stuff, I tried to not really focus on doing much at all.

Originally I was thinking about hanging out with some friends for the day with watching movies and getting Chinese food. I do that a lot and it is always a fun way to spend Christmas. But as it got closer to Christmas, my friends weren’t able to meet up. Some ended up having something to do with relatives that weren’t that far out of town. Others didn’t feel like doing anything that day and didn’t want to get dressed to leave their house (I don’t blame them). And other friends ended up getting the nasty cold bug that has been going around and I was happy that they weren’t going to come over to expose me to getting sick.

But spending Christmas alone isn’t that big of a deal to me. It would have been fun hanging out with friends, but I was able to just be lazy for the entire day and do everything that I wanted to without worrying about anything. It’s award screeners season and I’ve got access to all my digital screeners (the DVDs haven’t started arriving yet). So I spent a bit of my day watching some of the screeners so I don’t feel like there is a crazy rush to watch them all before I vote for the SAG Awards.

I also hadn’t had a chance to catch up on shows that I have been recording on my DVR or streaming so I started to watch some of those. And I love to read and wanted to get through some of my library books so I spent a lot of time doing that. And of course, I got my Chinese food. It was just delivery food since I was on my own, but I made sure not to overdo things. And once I was done eating, I didn’t want to keep the leftovers in my house because I didn’t want to keep eating when I knew I didn’t need to. So all my leftovers went in the trash as soon as I was done. It did feel like a bit of a waste of money for what I spent on food, but the wasted money is fine when it is helping me. Plus, I figure I save a ton of money on other things by having free movie screeners or getting books from the library so I didn’t have to feel too guilty.

I didn’t see anyone besides the food delivery guy the entire time. I spent the day in sweats with no makeup on and my hair up in a top knot. I was kind of a basic white girl for the day, but that worked for me. I didn’t feel like making an effort if I was just going to be home alone for the day and it is nice to not worry about things.

I know I need to do some of my regular errands during this week after work to make up for not getting them done on my day off, but I didn’t have a ton that I had to do anyway. And with my next day off being New Years Day, at least I know that most stores like grocery stores are open so I don’t have to put things off for another day.

I’m sure that for some people reading what I did for Christmas is a bit depressing. But Christmas isn’t really a holiday I’ve ever celebrated. It feels like just another day to me. And yes, I would have loved spending time with friends seeing movies and going out for dinner but I can also do that other nights. I like that I have my traditions on Christmas that can be done on my own or with my friends. But whether or not I’m celebrating the day with others I always seem to have a good time.

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Default ThumbnailA Solitary Christmas (or Just Enjoying Being Alone) Default ThumbnailA Christmas Lunch (or The Levin-Levin-Levine Summit) Default ThumbnailLow Key Labor Day (or Just A Regular Weekend) Default ThumbnailLow Key Halloween (or Costume Flashback) Default ThumbnailLow-Key Halloween (or A Work In Progress) Default ThumbnailHave A Low-Key 4th (or Friends, Fries, and Fireworks)

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Holiday Workouts (or Getting Some Confidence Back)

Posted on December 26, 2017 | Comments Off on Holiday Workouts (or Getting Some Confidence Back)

This past week of workouts ended up being one of the better ones I’ve had lately. I didn’t expect that at all, but I love when my workouts end up surprising me and I have some great accomplishment! Things didn’t really get awesome until the end of the week, but the entire week was still a good one.

Monday’s workout was a 2 group workout instead of the 3 group that we usually have on Mondays. There was a focus on endurance, strength, and power but for me I did most of the treadmill work the same way. I did my normal walking speed and my base pace incline was 4% and my push pace and all out pace inclines were at 6%. The endurance block was longer push paces with the pushes increasing throughout the block. The strength block was supposed to be hills, but I just used my 2 inclines. And the power block was 6 rounds of 30 second all out paces and 30 second walking recoveries. That last block was so tempting to try to run, but I chickened out because I knew I’d be going to San Diego right after my workout and I didn’t want to be in pain if running was going to hurt my toe.

On the floor, we started with upper cuts with weights, Y raises on the straps, and heel touch abs. The next block was upright rows with weights, bicep curls with weights, and skaters. I’m getting a lot better with the skaters and that surprises me since so much of it has to do with balance on one leg. I struggle with most single leg stuff, but somehow I’m not having as much trouble with the skaters as I do with the other stuff. And the last block was decreasing rows starting at 400 meters and going down 100 meters each round. And between each row we had frogger squats. None of my rows were amazing times, but they were all pretty decent and within the range I like to be in.

Wednesday was a strength and endurance day. There were 2 blocks on the treadmill and 2 blocks on the floor and we switched between each block. Both of the treadmill blocks were similar with 4 rounds of 90 second push paces followed by 45 second base paces. Both blocks also ended with a 1 minute push pace to a 30 second all out. But in the first block we were supposed to increase the incline each round and on the second block we were supposed to start at a higher incline and decrease it each round. But I kept my same plan with just 4 and 6% inclines. I did try 8% for a bit but it felt a bit too high for me. It’s been a while since I’ve had the higher incline so I think I need to start working toward that.

On the floor the first block had single arm chest presses, bicep curls on the straps, plank low rows, and tricep pushups. The second block had tricep work, shoulders, double crunches, toe touches, and a 300 meter row. I tried to make up for my lack of strength (aka incline) work on the treadmill by going a little bit heavier on my weights on the floor. I hate that I feel like I’m not pushing myself, but I also know that recovering from an injury is always frustrating for me because I always mentally feel ready to be back to normal before I’m physically ready.

But after feeling a bit let down on Wednesday, I totally made up for it on Friday! First of all, I was very excited for this workout because I knew my coach, Bruce, would be wearing the Santa hat I got him 3 years ago. This was the 4th year of a Santa Bruce workout and I feel so happy seeing him wear the hat that I randomly got for him my first year at Orangetheory.

But the festive outfit was only the start to my awesome workout. We had a run/row endurance day which started with a 1 mile run. I knew that there was no way I would be getting a PR on my mile, but I decided to use this opportunity to see if I could get back into running. The goal was to do the mile with 2 minute run/1 minute walk intervals but I didn’t know if I could do that or maintain it for the entire mile. But I wanted to see what could happen so I went for it.

It wasn’t an easy or pretty mile, but I think I did pretty decent. I was able to keep the intervals for the entire time except at the end I just kept running instead of adding in any walking. And I bumped up the speed at the very end because I wanted to see if I could be close to 14 minutes. Of course, after seeing what I got I was kicking myself that I didn’t bump up the speed sooner or went a little faster.

But considering that I hadn’t run in about a month it was a huge accomplishment to do any running at all, let alone do run/walk intervals for the entire mile! This wasn’t a PR, but it was one of my faster mile times so I was pretty excited about that! After the mile run, we had a 400 meter row. I was still catching my breath when I was rowing, so it wasn’t the best time. And because my mile took so long, I only was working on the next treadmill interval (which I did as a walk) before it was time to switch to the floor.

The first block on the floor was goblet squats, hop overs, and seated knee tucks. And the second block was lunges, pullovers, pushups, high rows on the straps, and running men. It was a tough floor block because each move was hard and the blocks were long. But I was trying to do the best that I could after the longer run and I think I was pretty successful on the floor work too.

After a really successful Friday, my Saturday wasn’t as great. It was a combination of factors including having some pain which was likely caused by the running as well as only getting about 2 hours of sleep (when I hurt I don’t sleep as well). It was a 3 group workout which did help because I wasn’t anywhere for too long. Each section had 2 blocks and we switched between each block.

I started on the treadmill and realized that it wasn’t going to be the best option for me. So within a few minutes I stopped the treadmill and headed to the bike to do that for my cardio. When I’m on the bike, I’m not as focused on the intervals but instead just trying to be consistent with my cadence. I know I didn’t get as much of a cardio workout as I would have gotten on the treadmill, but I also knew that if I had been on the treadmill it would have caused me to be in a lot more pain so I’m glad I avoided that.

On the floor, the first block was plank work, squats, and burpees. And the second block was arm swings with weights, mountain climbers, and lunge hops on the straps. And on the rower the first block had all out rows with recoveries. And the second block was timed rows with squats using medicine balls between each row. I wanted my rowing to be great, but it just wasn’t my day for that. I know that my workouts suffer a lot when I’m tired, but sometimes it’s not my choice to be tired and I just have to do the best I can.

This week of workouts will be a bit weird with my schedule, but I’m still getting them in. I’m excited to know that I’ve really done amazing with my workouts in 2017 and can’t wait to see what the last few workouts of the year have in store for me!

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Default ThumbnailA New Year Of Workouts (or Finally Starting To Feel Like Myself Again) Default Thumbnail3 Workouts In A Row (or Using Fitness To Beat A Cold) Default ThumbnailFeeling More Back To Normal (or A Good Week Of Hell Week Prep) Default ThumbnailMixed Up Workouts (or Not Knowing What To Expect) Default ThumbnailSome Holiday Workouts (or Back On The Treadmill This Week) Default ThumbnailPre-Burning Jewish Christmas Calories (or Holiday Workouts)

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