Fitness: Best Treadmill Workout I Have Found

Hehe. Yep I do this. Every time. Competitive Much?

At the beginning of last December (December 2011), I decided to commit and go against all odds and become one of those "hard-core-I-wakeup-at-the-crack-of-dawn-and-workout-before-work" kind of people. It was really an experiment. More of a challenge. 

There was a day when my sweet endearing husband said "I don't know if you could do it". Of course, he only said this because my nature is to stay in bed and sleep till noon, given the choice. Well, if anyone knows me, they also know that me being told that I "can't" do something is straight up a challenge. Something to immediately prove that I CAN do. And that's also what he was doing. By telling me that I couldn't do it, he knew that it would spur me to want to prove him wrong.

And it worked! Almost 8 months later, I still wake-up early 4-5 days a week and go get a good workout in. Naturally, I've had to change my workout every so often to give me something to look forward to, but I've gotten into a rhythm and have developed some staple workouts throughout my week that I absolutely love. One of those workouts is the one that greets me every Monday Morning.

Brace Yourself.

I start out every Monday with some cardio. Actually, let me clarify. Its hill intervals on a treadmill. Aka death on a Monday. On the blog I pulled this from, Sweet Tooth, Sweet Life, she titles this workout "Sweaty Mess" Incline Intervals. That should give you some insight into what you could get yourself into here. But in the end, after I'm sweating profusely and vastly out of breath, I love it!

If you're looking for something that will burn a TON of calories, help improve your endurance, and tone up your legs, this is a great workout to try out this upcoming week. Keys to success for this workout: a water bottle, some good tunes to keep you pumped up, picking your knees up on the hill sprints, and "driving" your elbows to keep you moving. You'd be surprised at how easy hills become when you pick your knees up and drive/pump those elbows. Just a little trick I learned from my distance running hubby.

Have funnnnnn! :)

Workout Plan: UPDATE!!

A little over a month ago, I blogged about starting a new Workout Plan, and let me tell you, it has paid off.

I committed to waking up at 5:15 every morning to hit the gym before 6 so that I had about an hour to workout and then come home and get ready for work. If you know me, and my undying love for sleep, you know that this was a MASSIVE commitment for me to make. No, but really. Having a new workout plan that was structured for each day gave me a mission to accomplish every morning when my alarm went off and I begrudgingly rolled out of bed. It gave me a routine and direction so that I didn't end up wandering around the gym aimlessly and without motivation.

My goal was to try out this workout plan for a month and see if I was A)seeing results and B)still motivated after a whole month of working out. Well, a month quickly turned into six weeks, and six weeks has now become 7. I've gotten incredibly stronger (I've been able to up my weights on almost every exercise at least twice during the last 7 weeks), and have become surprisingly toned. I've always been chastised for complaining that I needed to workout, but I enjoy being fit and feeling confident after a workout. I know that it's the middle of freezing January, I can say that I would have no shame in putting on a swimsuit where as a month ago, I would have been a bit more hesitant.

If you are looking for a workout plan to boost the downfall of your New Year's Resolution, I will 100% recommend the plan that I posted in December. If you can stick with it, it WILL pay off. Don't forget to reward yourself for hard work too. As a newlywed and recent college grad working an entry-level job, I have no money, so I decided to reward myself by capitalizing on my type-A personality that loves lists and things to check off. I highlight every day that I work out in my planner so that I can look back and feel totally accomplished. If I had spare dollars, I think I would give myself a dollar everyday that I worked out and make a list of things that I wanted and work hard enough to earn and pay for those things!  Do what will motivate you!

The Last Day of 2011

So, on December 31, 2011, we were blessed with some BEAUTIFUL weather. So much so, that Greg and I scrapped our plans of cleaning up our house during the day (hah! like that's ever hard to give up), because we knew we had to be outside enjoying the weather. We did a little research and found a place just 10 minutes from our house where you could rent road bikes at a relatively cheap price and so we decided to commit.

I have never actually ridden a road bike before. Greg, on the other hand, not only owned a ride bike, but the summer before we met, he and two other men rode mountain bikes throughout the Himalayas. Aka, he's kind of legit. So, naturally, I want to be just as cool as him, and I have always dreamed of getting a bike and soaking up beautiful weather when the occasion arose. That dream was crushed when we were moving Greg out of Waco and realized that his road bike had been stolen out of his garage. Only in Waco. So for now, we rent bikes and dream of the day when we can throw down some G's to get some bikes.

We took the White Rock Creek trail that starts at a park near our house and rode down to Dallas White Rock Lake. All in all, the trip was about 15 miles and took us around an hour. It was the perfect way to enjoy the last day of 2011. And yes, I am now a fan of road bikes. It's on my list of things to buy when I'm a millionaire. Someday....... hah.

Need a plan for your New Years Fitness Resolution? Ohhhh Boy.

So... Turns out that when you graduate college to go live and breathe corporate America... sitting on your rear for 8-9 hours a day isn't really conducive to keeping a cute and toned figure. Who knew? I'm such a busy body that sitting for 8-9 hours only make me feel restless and like I have exorbitant amounts of energy to spend. That was why I decided to train for my first half marathon. After getting 6 weeks through training, I found that I was choosing to run and check it off my list rather than make time for my husband and my friends. I loved the running but hated sacrificing those relationships. So, naturally, I gave it up.

After a couple of weeks of no activity, I found I was getting more and more restless and therefore stressed because I didn't have any means of activity in my life. Crazy, non-morning person me (aka I want to kill everyone in sight), decided that I was going to wake up at 5:30 to roll out of bed to hit the gym. The first morning, when my alarm went off, I literally could not figure out why. I was so confused. But I got up, and lethargically went to the gym. Before I knew it, getting up at 5:30 became pretty natural. Shocking, I know.

This past week, I decided that I wanted to spruce up my workout, so I decided to try a new workout plan that I found on Pinterest. I needed something new and different so that I had a challenge to look forward to conquering every morning. When browsing Pinterest, I found this set of workouts and was immediately drawn to them because of the structure and the challenge (seeing as I never do any of the prescribed exercises!). I decided to give this plan a try and if I liked it, continue it for a month. So here is to my second week on the new workout plan.

Let me just say, day one... I almost threw up. That's how you know the workout you just did has kicked your toosh. Not to mention, since Monday's are "Total Body Toner" days, I don't think that there was a muscle on my body that wasn't shaking.

Monday's Workout

I have officially completed Monday - Thursday's workouts (taking a break on Friday), and can already tell a huge difference. If you are looking for a workout that will totally kick your booty, then I will make this workout my recommendation! Here are all the workouts for all six days. You can click on the links above the photos and it will link to the blog where these were originally posted. From the blog, there are links on how to complete each exercise if you are unsure. If you're going to try it, or any other plan for that matter, don't be the anomaly who gives up on your New Years Resolutions, and don't cheat on your workouts!! Come swimsuit season, you'll thank yourself for sticking it out. Enjoy!

Tuesday's Workout

Wednesday's Workout

**Wednesday's Workout is a little hard to read, but here it is:

Warm-Up: 10 Min Cardio

Do 15 reps for each exercise, complete the circuit 2-3 times:

Dumbbell Squats

Dumbbell lunges

Dumbbell dead lifts

Push Ups

Wide grip assisted pull ups

Seated dumbbell shoulder press

Lying triceps extension

Dumbbell bicep curls

Plank (1 minute)

Swiss ball jack knife

Cool down: 10 minutes light cardio

STRETCH!

Thursday's Workout

Friday's Workout

Saturday's Workout

Sunday: REST!!

It's Been a While

It has been a while…. A long while… And I apologize. Life has been pretty crazy with a lot of travelling and other oddities that have filled our time. But have no fear! We are back! I guess my first duty is to inform you of all the exciting (and subsequently, not so exciting) things we’ve been doing within the last month:

• Update: Due to schedule conflicts, we still have yet to make it to the Catfish Plantation for my birthday dinner celebration. Yet, we WILL be going soon. And when we do, expect a full report!
• Neely introduced me to crepes. And Nutella. And I’m in love.
• Greg and I have been able to spend some more time with our LifeHouse from the Exchange DFW and have absolutely loved getting to know this awesome group of people. There is nothing quite like getting to spend time with people who are in the same stage of life as you, specially some who have been married for a wee bit longer. Not to mention, everyone in our LifeHouse is hilarious so we spend a lot of our time laughing and enjoying each other’s company.

• My office (and my company for that matter) is very intentional about giving back to the community, which means so much to me. Instead of working one Friday morning, my office set-aside the hum-drums of Corporate America and we went and served at the North Texas Food Bank. Let me just say, my eyes were opened. After we arrived, we were instructed that we would be filling boxes of food that are taken to a local elementary school where children get to take these boxes home to their families. The boxes we were packing provide a family’s meals for the entire weekend. In 3 hours, we were able to pack over 700 boxes which resulted in over 14,000 meals! It was so much fun being able to serve with some of my teammates from The Hartford and I was impressed by the amount of meals we were able to provide by simply giving 3 hours of our time
• I successfully ran a 5k at a local elementary school. It was a successful run, but let me just say, that was the hilliest 3 miles that I think I have ever run. Or maybe I’m slightly dramatic. But it was hilly!
• In other news, I have officially decided not to run the Dallas White Rock Half.  It’s not that I didn’t want to, or that I don’t think I’m capable, but training was literally taking over my life, and therefore was becoming my life. And I didn’t like that part of it. This is how my day was during training: Get up, go to work, come home, cook dinner, clean up dinner, go running, shower, go to bed. The end. Boring. I felt like I was not getting to live life to the fullest because I was running. All. The. Time. Now, I still run, but I don’t have a strict agenda that I’m following and it allows me to have more free time to hang out with Greg and other friends.

• I finally graduated from training!! WOO HOO! After 18 weeks of learning all the ins and outs of the insurance world, I was able to travel to Hartford, Connecticut with the rest of my training class for a “Graduation Week”. We spent the week wrapping up everything we had learned and had a very nice“graduation” dinner where we were able to interact with a bunch of our top leadership. After approximately 12 tests, hundreds of hours on conference calls, several assignments, and lots and lots of reading, I am an official Underwriter for The Hartford. (Just in case you’re confused about what I do for a living, think Along Came Polly. The only difference is that I don’t do risk analysis on people, just businesses!)
• During homecoming weekend, we joined Greg’s family in Houston for his cousin’s wedding. We had so much fun getting to do some shopping, bowling, and not to mention getting one of the best pedicures I’ve ever had in my life (the boys sat out on this one though). I’ve been blessed with an amazing “in-law” family. They literally do feel like family to me and I couldn’t have asked for anything better! Can’t wait to spend some much needed time with both of our families over Thanksgiving!

• I’ve yet again put off reading Les Mis, and instead have started reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. After seeing the previews for the upcoming movie, and hearing rave reviews of the book, I knew that it was a book that I wanted to read before the movie came out. We’ll see how it turns out!

Well, that seems to be a pretty boring and mundane list. But, I am going to attempt to finish editing photos from Fiji and post them! Wishful thinking… after staring at computer screens all day, its definitely a struggle to go home and work on a computer some more. Keep your eyes peeled!

-K