Carpeing all the diems in semi-rural Oklahoma...xoxo
Six minutes. Ten questions. Infinite dorkiness. Welcome to the New Year’s Eve (-ish) Vlogging response, Lazy W style.
This is harder than it looks and also more fun. I worked really hard on being hilarious so I hope you guys laugh so hard you have cookies and milk coming out of your noses, but let’s be laughing WITH ME, ok? Not AT ME. Okay.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muG9VtAk14Y#action=share
Happy New Year to Kat Bouska in particular! Big hugs from Oklahoma!
XOXOXOXO
Hello! How was your Monday? Are you off to a great start for the week, whatever it holds for you? I’m checking in for the second time today to talk a little about end of summer fitness and health. I have spent the last few months kind of following my own groove, doing whatever exercises feel good that week and eating what works in harmony with our easy-breezy summer schedule here at the farm. Not surprisingly, this has meant a few skipped miles and more than one bowl of ice cream. It’s no big deal; this approach has also meant lots of new HIIT workouts, extra very yummy yoga, and delicious, healthy meals in between those ice cream bowls, haha! I still feel really great and have maintained my stamina, maybe even gaining a tiny little bit of speed. But now? Now it’s time to focus. I am giving my mind and body six weeks of TLC for these reasons:
The cool thing about making cleanish eating and challenging exercises part of your normal life routine is that everything else you do is then made so much better. Our energy levels skyrocket. Our appetites tend to adjust to crave fuel foods more often than bad habit foods. Our thinking and concentration is easier, swifter. Our complexions clear up. Our moods are lifted. And, oh yeah, if we stick with it, slowly but surely, our clothes fit better and better or maybe even not at all. : )
So those are the three reasons I am focusing sharply for the next six weeks. Here is my plan, against which I invite you to hold me for even more accountability:
Increase running mileage starting this week. Over the weekend Handsome bought me a treadmill, which I broke in today. Yay, I love it! No more driving to either Harrah or Midwest City and not feeling safe while running at public parks or golf courses. Things were getting pretty sketchy in recent weeks, but I just didn’t want to admit it. I couldn’t stand the thought of not running long anymore, and looping the quarter-mile in our back field for two hours, well, we went through that last year. The treadmill is repetitive, sure, but the speed work is controllable. A huge plus. And the treadmill of course is impervious to our weather fluctuations. Anyway! Much more running starting today. Kicked off the new week with 5 miles plus strength and an elliptical cool down.
Shake up the variety in my miles. Short runs will be all about speed work. Most longer runs will be intervals, like first a warm up, then a lightning fast half mile, then a slower one, then fast, etc. There is a cool workout called lassos that makes a lot of sense to me. The treadmill timer should help me tackle that. Very excited. Also, the HIIT nature of this workout is supposed to be great for fat burning.
Slash the foods that always trip me up, just for six weeks. Tortilla chips, late night bowls of cereal, and excessive scoops of peanut butter. I will enjoy birthday parties and the wedding reception, and depending on the day I might have a controlled portion of tortilla chips, but these things will not be the endless summer treats they have been lately.
Continue good habits like drinking seven thousand gallons of water, taking iron and vitamins, and doing strength and yoga on off days. Yes, for sure, the foam roller feels great and makes a difference. Doing more of that.
Just daily stuff, you know?
On Saturday Handsome and I went to an invitational car show that was partnered up with the One Healthy Bod fitness expo in downtown OKC. We had a ton of fun! The cars were all gorgeous, of course, and we chatted with several people with special Smokey and the Bandit memories. Fun fun fun!
The fitness expo part of the day was a great mix of stuff, and overall it was all super inspiring. The men and women who do Crossfit are a whole other breed. WOW! So strong! And those who compete in bodybuilding? Well, my friends, this is how I feel about it…
Okay, thanks so much for checking in twice today! I wish you the healthiest, happiest, most trailblazing week you’ve had in a very long time. Treat yourself well, okay?
“It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver.”
~Mahatma Gandhi
XOXOXOXO
Hey friends! Happy Monday to you, in every possible way! I hope you enjoyed a fantastic weekend and have arrived at the top of this new work week brimming with energy, purpose, and all the good, strong resources you need. I hope today was wide open for you and that in turn you sucked all the marrow out of its bones.
#carpediem
For a while now, Mondays on the blog have been reserved for marathon talk. Or at least running reflections. But I have decided to open up the reach of “Marathon Monday” to include all kinds of motivation because, let’s face it, at least for yours truly marathon season is only about three months long, once or twice a year. But we need motivation all the time, right? Twelve out of twelve months, baby. We need motivation for health, fitness, finances, and all sorts of big, personal goals.
So… Welcome to Motivation Monday #1!
How things are going here, fitness-wise: I have very recently experienced a little slowing in my fitness progress. Nothing crazy. But it’s still a bit frustrating, especially after such a noticeable surge in health, speed, and leanness in those few weeks following the April race. These past couple of months I have just yo-yo’d more than is satisfying for me. Don’t you ever make a big, positive leap forward with something hard, get excited, then extrapolate that achievement in your mind, like, If I can lose this many pounds in three weeks, just imagine what I can do in three months! Or maybe, I saved this many extra dollars this month, so in a year I’ll most definitely have a small fortune! It’s not just me, right? I am easily motivated by success and tend to set unrealistic goals following a good little season. Which makes reality, when it is less than what you expect, kinda disappointing.
This current plateau, if that’s what it is, should honestly be chalked up to how thoroughly I am enjoying summertime. How many tortilla chip dinners and late night ice creams (have you ever had a pineapple vanilla sundae from Sonic?) and hot dogs poolside with visiting teenagers are being devoured. I am definitely in the camp of people who can eat healthfully and workout like a maniac over and over again, day after day, until a special occasion rolls around. Social gatherings and basically any really happy time is just a natural reason excuse for me to eat all the delicious, happy foods my mind and body love so much. So I’m an emotional eater, just only at happy times instead of stressful. Kinda makes the whole seek happiness thing a bit of a twisted message. (haha)
So that’s the bad-but-certainly-not-terrible news. I have compromised my own goal-reaching by too many high-calorie snacks. Probably means this isn’t a plateau, right? Probably means I am just just behaving somewhat badly.
Alongside this, though, is the good news: I have been exercising a lot and staying active and happy every day, trying new workout routines that include free weights, yoga, long HIIT videos like Jillian Michaels, tons of swimming, and more. Physically I feel great. I see improvements with strength, flexibility, all-day energy levels, etc. It’s just the actual pounds and certain vanity-appearance things that haven’t changed much. Apparently the fat I have left to lose is the hardest and slowest obstacle for women. Blah-blah-blah. Oh well.
My Plan: I talked all of this over with Handsome (he is not only my best friend; I also value his knowledge of physiology a lot) and did some reading about plateaus and calorie needs and overall nutrition. Long story short? I am going to keep with my fun exercise freedom, enjoying whatever my body craves from day to day, and not get stressed out about a laborious schedule because there’s plenty of time for that in the last leg of marathon training. And we’re still in summertime! I’ll also, though, finally mix in more long runs, something I have been missing since April. Endurance running is wonderful for shrinking oneself. And as I have said so many times, the depletion feels amazing mentally, too. Win-win. I’m also going to try different weight strategies for a few weeks, see how that feels, and (of course) indulge in fewer tortilla chips and pineapple sundaes.
(This last part will not be easy, so light candles for my skinny jeans.)
Attitude Adjustment: Really, I am so happy to be able to enjoy life in every way and still make tiny little bits of progress with my personal goals. It’s a pretty great balance, and I have to take a minute to acknowledge that these efforts are in fact working; they are just working at the same slow, easy pace that I am. (again with the haha) It’s not really time to get frustrated and radically change everything; it’s just time to keep going. Trust that with a little bit better effort, my path will get me where I want to go.
What about you? What goals are you striving to reach that maybe seem further away than you’d like? Is it possible you are making progress, be it ever so slow? Let me encourage you to keep at it, no matter what it is. Maybe reevaluate to make sure the goal is still worthy of your attention, still serving you, then reexamine your methods and take a deep breath. Start fresh or regather your energies and resources and just keep going. I bet you are getting there, slow though it may seem. Remember what you want most and keep a long view. Be patient, persistent, and positive.
Thanks for checking in, friends! See you soon for kitchen notes, farm updates, and more.
XOXOXOXO
Whoa Nellie, it’s Saturday! Yesssss. Happy weekend, friends. Handsome and I are at the tip-top of a week-long Stay-Cation, so we are feeling pretty great. This is a much-needed break from all things Commish for him and some much-needed down time for us together. I have stocked the kitchen to her chalkboard-painted gills with all our favorite edibles, and Klaus and I have done as much of our farm chores ahead as possible. Hopefully this will help us do lots of swimming and bonfiring and eating lazy meals. Minimal work for the next eight days. Fun projects only, please!
By the way, the reason we took off this week is that it’s our wedding anniversary. Fourteen amazing years. : ))
Since it’s Saturday, I have gathered up a collection of things worth reading. I hope you find something here that grooves you. Leave me a link in comments if you have discovered something else!
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Frida Kahlo’s life was tumultuous and sad and inspiring in wild ways. This list distills it nicely into lessons we should consider.
Since I am forever evaluating and analyzing how I spend my time, this article about the human body’s energy clock really spoke to me. And the infographic is great.
Also related to how we spend our time, Neil deGrasse makes some brief comments here about why balance is maybe overrated. I groove this. A lot! Life is such a constant roller coaster, it’s nice to just follow the rhythm and extreme demands sometimes. Nice to let the challenges strengthen us instead of deplete us.
This particular Ted talk made me cry happy tears. If you are a parent, or a mentor, or a teacher, but especially if you are a parent, give it a few minutes, okay? I happened to absorb this story right around my trip to visit Jocelyn in Colorado, and my heart is still thrumming from the Love. Malala’s father on not clipping her wings. xoxo
More love: Chances are good that a lot of my friends have already seen this next one, but I am sharing it anyway because it’s so beautiful. Ann Voskamp wrote this handful of brave things to keep in your pocket for hard days in a hard world. These are the kinds of things I pray to my girls (yes I pray to God of course, but I send them prayer emails, sort of, to their hearts, through Him), but as usual Voskamp has articulated it all so well. And you don’t have to be a young girl to benefit from this Love and wisdom. Check it out.
Now for some health talk. I ran across this article by SkinnyMom that explains a concept brand new to me. Have you ever heard of “Ayurveda?” Basically, it’s mindful eating. Really, spiritual, truly culinary… Mindful eating. The notion kept my attention because sometimes I crave certain foods with more than my taste buds; sometimes I feel an actual need deep in my muscles and bones, and after eating that food, especially if I do so slowly and in a healthy way, I feel amazing. Better than good. And happy. Give it a read and let me know if you think it’s smart or weird.
Tina over at Carrots and Cake is a lot of fun, and she has a pretty gorgeous (and healthy!) figure. She promotes realistic living, nothing extreme, which is so great. I started following her around the Boston Marathon for obvious reasons (it was her first, congrats, lady!) and have stayed because she shares so many wonderful ideas for food and exercise. But this? This blog post was profound. And before you dismiss me because you don’t think fitness blogs can be profound, just click over and scan down to about the middle. The Reason Why I Always Want to Work Out is not about mania; it’s about gratitude. Read it and count your blessings. Then go work out.
Okay. I’m outta here! I’ve got some Stay-Cationing to do!!
And some 14th Anniversary Romance to Enjoy!!
XOXOXOXO
p.s. It’s free Icee day at 7-Eleven!!
On the short flight from Oklahoma City to Denver I read several chapters of Lotus Eaters and have to surgically differentiate the main character Helen from the very similar main character in another book I’m nibbling at, It’s What I Do. (By the way? I can’t wait to tell you about both of these books. Wow.) I eat a couple handfuls of dark-chocolate-almond-cranberry trail mix plus a small red apple and a full liter of cold water. It is nervous, happy eating, because that’s a whole lot of food for me at eight in the morning. Still, something tells me the energy will be well spent throughout the day.
I cannot stop smiling as I make my way from the landed plane to a speedy underground train and then to the baggage carousel and my shuttle rendezvous. Texts with Handsome and my firstborn make my heart soar.
Just minutes outside the Denver airport I see the landscape is comfortingly familiar to Oklahoma. Patchwork fields and modest farmland dotted with barns and silos. Scrubby prairie grasses, ponds, and even tree rows gone wild with time. It’s all very normal looking until I realize that above all of this, it’s not traces of clouds and sun I’m seeing, but rather snow capped mountains. Nearly halfway up the dome of the cornflower blue sky, I stare at the teasing, white, fragile looking shapes. Just hanging there. Broken silhouettes of the peaks where summer can’t reach, suspended above purple and blue shadows too smooth and quiet to be real. I have to refocus my eyes several times.
More brackish water in my life. Driving on the divided highway through the familiar-feeling terrain toward a brand new place. Closer and closer to my girl, my first baby, and a group of stunning rocks where her own heart has found purchase. Away from my own very real home. The drive is a pleasant mix of the two for a while, and I pray thank you and prepare my heart. Then once more thank you.
The whispers of the mountain range had been on our left for an hour, just a tenuous suggestion of a foreign land, but now we are turned toward them, facing their immensity, their colors growing sharper with every mile, their heft swelling and gaining a pulse. I catch myself feeling physically sad for the cars driving away. Leaving already? And I catch myself holding my breath.
I see purple wildflowers, five feet tall. A pair of muscular, glossy horses grazing in a field that could be one of our own. A long, thick grove of vaulted trees all leaved out in silver and dancing shamelessly with the very Oklahoma-like wind.
If you are born here, if you grow up with these mountains as your nursery walls, at what age do you first acknowledge their splendor? Then, at what age do you grow bored with them and need reminding?
Now the feet of the giants are visible. Green and carpeted, knuckled with foothills bigger than anything I’ve so far considered a mountain. More silver trees, this time growing in perfect twin rows, flanking a narrow, unpaved drive, a lot like the great ancient oaks in plantations of the South. I see feathery green grass and every kind of tree, but mostly pine. Cabins or boutique hotels emerging here and there. Generous hidden meadows and colorful wildflowers. This impossibly serpentine road as we climb up up up and my ears pop.
I gasp audibly at the massive boulders spilled out everywhere. Tossed like powerful marbles, great and meaningful, shocking in their size and perfect roundness. Others are deeply gouged and creased by long gone water, and I make a wish that I can maybe carry scars so beautifully.
Still climbing, still sprialIng upward, I drink in a wide view of nothing but conical Scoth pines. They are stacked in wallpaper rows and layers, greens and grays, a color scale advancing up the mountain that seems to have no top.
My eyes are greedy for every detail.