Some fun

After all the fabulous boot camp, hot yoga, and other random workouts this summer, I've been seriously slacking as I get my act together in this new transition to work and school.  I much prefer working out in the morning, and now that we leave so early, that is nearly impossible.  If I work out at night, I'll keep myself awake too late.  During the day, I'm either working or with Pumpkin, so I need something he can do too, or that i can do while he naps, or that I can do on the fly.  I don't really want to pay for anything extra, and I'd love to use what we already have (since we do have a full gym in our basement!).  I can squeeze in some standard workouts here and there, but I need something fun and easy to fit in anywhere that I will actually do.  I have a plan.  I've found two playgrounds close to the kids school, and I plan to do some playground workouts before picking them up in the afternoons!  I like playing on the playground at home with the kids, and can get pretty winded just chasing them around, so why not do the same without them?  So what if I'll look super ridiculous trying to hoist myself up on those monkey bars or lunging along the curb?  Who cares if I attract stares with sprints across the grass?  I'm up for it.  I actually think it will be a ton of fun. 

Perfection

This morning during Bikram yoga class, I had a little revelation.  I was in Savasana or corpse pose, and the instructor started talking about how in the pose the urge is to scratch the itch, wipe the sweat, fix your hair or clothes or mat, and tuck and pull and reorganize, but that you are supposed to just be and rest and allow all of the urges to go unchecked.  For whatever reason, at that moment I understood that unconditional love is just that.  Accepting all of the things you have an urge to fix, and loving what is instead of what could be with one more little nudge.  Cognitively, I knew this already, but today it hit me at a deeper level, and I've been thinking about it all day.

Why do we try to be perfect?  Where does the idea come from that it is at all possible?  I know I am a perfectionist in some (OK, many) ways, but is it just inherently who I am?  Did I learn it somehow?  Can I change it?  Can I accept myself and love "what is" perfectionism and all?  I'm struggling a lot with this lately not just for myself, but for Peanut.  She has a tendency to want to "do right" and becomes pretty tiger like when something goes wrong.  I wonder if I am helping her become that way.  I wonder if she will be 40 before she understands that it is not necessary to be perfect or right all the time.  I'm hoping both of my children know unconditional love, and can move beyond perfect to be themselves. 

Boot Camp

Boot Camp.  Yes, that is the current plan.  Why?  We have a full gym in our house!  We have a neighborhood with sidewalks!  We have hiking trails all over the place!  We have almost every workout DVD known to man! 

Well, it's because I've gotten pretty lazy really.  I know I could get up and do P90X or jump on the elliptical, or run with the dog, but I'm not doing it.  I'm coming up with all kinds of rationalizations to let myself off the hook and just lay there.  I was getting pretty disgusted with myself, and I saw this deal from Groupon for a month of boot camp... and voila!

The first day (I did a demo class two weeks ago to be sure I really wanted to do it) we ran.  We did sprints, hills, and all kinds of things that reminded me of high school track practice.  I was also reminded that I ran around 7 miles a day in college for fun without anyone telling me to.  For God's sake I was a freaking personal trainer/aerobics/pilates/step instructor until a few years ago!  All this running was really hard, but I wasn't the last one finishing up, and was pumped up to do more. 

I'm finding that I can do way more than I thought - I'm actually pretty strong and fit - I'm just carrying around some extra fuel in case I might need it in a crisis.  Every day is a bit different - bands, sprinting up and down stairs, push ups, crunches, leg throw downs, whatever. 

What's been interesting is that I work way harder for one trainer than the other. I've got two trainers who alternate days, and I've realized that with one of them I slack off quite a bit.  As I thought about it, they have different ways of teaching, and different ways of speaking - one says "take another lap!" hands me a weight while I'm doing crunches, adds a step into an exercise I've got down pat, and otherwise throws an extra something at me.  The other says "I'd do another lap", and sees that I'm doing an exercise right and leaves me alone.  So I end up relaxing in one class and surprising myself with what I can do in the other. 

As I thought about this on my way home this morning, I realized that I am working hard for them - the trainers - and I should be working hard for me!  The point of this month is to get a kick in the pants and remind myself how great it feels to work out hard, not to create a dependence on someone telling me what to do.  Starting tomorrow, the work is all for me.    I'm adding on, pushing, and modifying as I need to and want to to make myself work as hard as I can so I'm impressed with myself.  The hell with impressing anyone else.  Ah, the psychology of body conditioning - so interesting.  I'm learning things about myself in the oddest of ways...

Another busy week in the life

A dull moment - nope we don't really have them. There is always plenty to do and check and try and catch up on and start and finish and redo....

This week, we started preschool with Peanut. A few families from our moms group, the Holistic Moms Network, have created, planned, and finally implemented a small coop preschool. The first few months we'll meet once a week for school with parents rotating as hosts, teachers, and assistants. We wanted an opportunity for our kids to have some structured learning and feed their interests and curiosity. We also think outdoor activity and exploration is really important regardless of the weather! The first month is at our house with me as the teacher, so I am having fun with lesson plans (any teacher I have supervised will know my stance on infant and preschool lesson plans... good to have them, but they never actually go as planned) and the winter theme. We had a great time making pine cone bird feeders, exploring animal tracks outside in the snow, and talking about hot and cold, melting, winter animals, and a myriad of other related ideas. I like to have a starting point and let the kids show their interests so we can get on a tangent.

At snack yesterday, I guess Peanut was thinking about school. She said "look mommy, there's some birds out there eating food! I think they are eating seeds...from a pine cone. We have to check tomorrow." I love to see and hear her putting it all together.

The sleep saga continues with Peanut...we even took her to the doctor (not a really common occurrence in our house) to rule out anything physical. It seems to have made an impression though because Peanut will tell me the doctor said that sleeping is VERY important. We've had some major downs (a four + hour tantrum from 3am on one day) and some major ups (8pm to 4am straight sleep last night!) and have worked and reworked our plan of attack. Now that we are sure it is all behavior, we are feeling better about drawing a line in the sand, and it seems to be working. We have also taken the mailbox idea from Julie. Peanut likes the idea of the mailbox, and liked getting mail this morning even though it was a white post it note that said "No stickers today... try again tomorrow!". She says that when she sleeps through the night her mail will be purple with stickers. OK - I'm in.

My little big man is scaring me a bit - he has decided to take a step towards cruising. He turned 7 months old yesterday. Yeah. A little early I think, but he's all about it. Really, it just goes to show that kids learn to do all the things they need to without the walkers, jumpers, exersaucers, and whatnot. He's never been in any of those and he is speedy fast - so was Peanut.

With my mother's helper, some exercise, a little more sleep, and the ability to wear most of my pre-baby clothes, I am feeling like more of a person this week. Now don't get me wrong - I still have very few unstained items of clothing and makeup eludes me most days so you can see the circles and know how many hours I've slept, but I am on my own list and that feels pretty good.

The Great Baby Weight!

I think your body gains what it is supposed to in order to grow a baby. I am not a fan of the limits that are set on how much one should gain, and as long as you are not overindulging in trash food, you are fine and healthy. When I was pregnant with Peanut, I gained A LOT of weight. I did have a few too many cookies and Doritos at the end, but mostly I ate well. I can clearly remember that I stopped looking at the scale after I had gained 50 pounds, so I gained more than that with her and I remember losing it all pretty quickly. This time around, I gained about 50 pounds, and felt good and exercised pretty much up to the birth itself. I definitely ate better, and had less swelling as an added benefit of a better diet. I know I would be curious, so I am going to keep track of how long it takes to take it all back off.

Pumpkin is 2 weeks old, and I have lost about half of the baby weight so far. I think about 16 pounds came off right when he was born, so the next 10 has been from nursing and whatnot since then. I did my first walk yesterday, and hope to get out walking at least a few times a week - we all need the fresh air and the dog needs a little Caesar (exercise, discipline, affection). I'm wanting to start doing some Pilates and yoga but I think I need to wait until my pelvis stops popping...

OK, so far, here is what I have found to work in getting rid of baby weight:

1 - Have a big baby! This is a great way to see progress on the scale. If the baby is big you can lose a whole bunch before you even get up to exercise!
2 - Nurse! This just takes whatever food you just ate and passes it right along to someone else in my book. Now mind you, you have to eat good food since you are feeding yourself and your progeny - no "crap food" is included in the pass along so you will get, literally, saddled with it.
3 - Cloth diaper! This makes you climb up and down stairs several times a day to do laundry so you get lots of exercise and keep poopy plastic diapers out of the landfill to boot.
4 - Chase a toddler! Said toddler can be yours or one on loan. Mine says "more run" and just goes most of the time. If I don't want her running of onto the golf course, I have no choice but to run.

Of course, I could go on for hours about how our society has a major issue because we are so fixated on weight and appearance and we need to cut new moms (and pretty much everyone) some slack... I'll save that for another day though.