30-30-30 Workout

Today I did a workout that I found on Pinterest that was composed of 30 exercises for 30 seconds each for a total of about 30 minutes. I did this set of exercises 3 times:

• Burpees
• Speed Squats
• Crunches
• Dumbbell Shoulder Presses ( I used my resistance band)
• Push-ups
• Mountain Climbers
• Pop Squats
• Speed Skaters
• Reverse Crunches
• T-Push-ups

It was a very fast-paced workout. I tried not to take any more time than necessary to reset the timer in between each exercise. I think I may go running a bit later, but if I don’t I will be fine with this as my workout for the day.

Today for lunch I made a spinach crust pizza. I was thrilled with the outcome. I had never had a spinach crust pizza before, but we had the stuff to make it so I decided to try it. I found a basic recipe online and decided to cut the recipe in half because I did not need a 12″ pizza. For the toppings I just used pesto for the sauce, the rest of the mozzarella that we had (it was maybe 1/4 cup), and a few spinach leaves that I cut in half. It turned out super good. I didn’t even think “man, I wish I had some real pizza dough” or anything! The crust was really thin and crispy and had a good flavor. Also, it is not burnt, that is just the color it turns..and where there is a little chunk taken out is where my mom ripped off a piece to try it before I took the picture. It was awesome though. Next time, when I plan to make it, I want to put mushrooms or tomatoes on top, maybe some olives or something. But it is a very good alternative when you really want pizza or when you don’t really have much of anything else in the house to eat (like me 🙂 )

Yesterday was my rest day, but Saturday I did not have time to post my workout. I did a Pinterest arm workout that I have done before, but I did it 3 times through so it took about 30 minutes instead of 10.

Oh Hi There…

I have been super busy this week. I have still been exercising pretty much every day, but I just have not had time to update this blog. Sorry about that! Last week I was staying at my grandparents’ house and all of my workouts were either running or walking because I did not have any equipment and it was just a really great neighborhood to go running in.

This week my workouts have been fairly short for the most part due to lack of time. Some of them I could barely call workouts, but hey, it was some form of exercise so I counted it. Today I got a really good workout in though! I did a 37 minute cardio Fitness Blender workout and then I ran a mile on the treadmill at 7 mph and then walked a second mile. It felt really great. I should have time tomorrow to do another longer-than-half-an-hour workout. I am looking forward to it.

The other day I found a really good, informational video while I was looking at workouts on the Fitness Blender website. It is called 5 Foods You Should Never Eat. It provided a lot of information that I knew and some that I did not know about nutrition and I found it to be reliable information. If you want to watch it, make sure you have a few minutes because I think it is about 10 minutes long. I hope it benefits you like it benefitted me. Here’s the link:

http://www.beyonddiet.com/l/th1-v1-st15-ofr5-c2?vtag=sn-landing

Oh yeah, and one other thing: I am doing a virtual race in July! I am really excited. It is for a really good cause and I like the fact that I can do it anywhere. When I first heard about it on another blogger’s page, I was kind of confused about what a virtual race is, but the website (hyperlinked above) explained it pretty well.

Green Smoothies+ Running!

I love smoothies! I also love spinach…but spinach in smoothies? I had my doubts. I decided to try making one anyway. I was very pleasantly surprised. Other than the color, I would have never guessed from the taste that there was spinach in there. It was sweet and fruity and smooth, like any other smoothie!

My Recipe:

• 1 cup frozen fruit (or fresh fruit with ice cubes)
• 1 handful of spinach
• 1 container of chobani greek yogurt
• 1/2 cup of milk/whatever milk substitute you want

I used frozen peaches and pineapple, peach chobani, and milk with a little splash of vanilla. There are no real instructions…just put everything in the blender, put the lid on, and blend until smooth.

I have been really busy since Sunday and I am spending the week at my grandparents’ house this week helping them train their puppy, so I have not been able to update on here for a few days. Here are my workouts since Sunday:

Sunday afternoon:

1.5 mile run- It was an extremely busy day. This was all I had time for, but it was still a nice little run! It was a beautiful day and I enjoyed running outside!

Monday:

30 minute run- I got up fairly early, ate breakfast, got in my running clothes and was about to head out when my grandfather asked me if I wanted to go to the store with him. I cannot say no to him, he’s so sweet, so I went with him. In my running clothes. I was one of those people. Ha, I don’t really mind if other people want to wear their workout clothes to the store, but I don’t do it if I can help it. Once we got back, it was starting to get warm outside, which is why I wanted to go earlier, but I went anyway. It wasn’t too bad out there. I managed to find my way back without getting too last! Yippee!

Today:

25 minute run and a walk with the dog- I did not get up quite as early today and it was already quite warm outside when I started my run. I was about 5 minutes down the road when my phone rang and I had to take the call. I was a bit annoyed by the interruption, but it was not too long before I was running again. When I got back I took the dog on a little walk and my grandfather came with me.

I think later I might want to do something else, but I am not sure yet. It depends on how much work comes in.

I hope everybody had a very good Memorial Day!

 

Healthy Muffins and Leg Workout!

 

Today I looked at my sister and I said “I really want muffins.” and she said “Wow, muffins sound so good!” so I decided to make some. I found a recipe for oatmeal, carrot, raisin muffins and they turned out really good! You may be thinking Carrots?!?!?!, but let me tell you, these muffins are awesome! The best part is they are healthy and everybody in my family likes them! There are 6 people in my family and it is a very rare occurrence for everyone to like something. I think I will make them again soon!

My Workout today:

Set 1:

• 30 squats
• 30 plié squats
• 30 walking lunges
• 30 side lunges

**short water break**

Set 2:

• 20 squats
• 20 plié squats
• 20 walking lunges
• 20 side lunges

**short water break**

Set 3:

• 15 squats
• 15 plié squats
• 15 walking lunges
• 15 side lunges

**short water break**

Set 4:

• 10 squats
• 10 plié squats
• 10 walking lunges
• 10 side lunges

**short water break**

Set 5:

• 5 squats
• 5 plié squats
• 5 walking lunges
• 5 side lunges

The result: A mild case of Jelly Legs

I used my 5 lb dumbbells on each of the exercises throughout the whole workout. It was a pretty fun workout!

 

 

Thoughts on Healthy Eating

I really like eating healthy. I love knowing that what I am putting into my body is benefitting me. It just makes me feel so good! Since I have been home, it has been harder to eat as healthy as I normally would because the rest of my family does not share the same habits. I do not have the money to go out and stock up on my own food, so I have to eat whatever is at the house. It has been kind of frustrating for both me and my parents. They get very annoyed sometimes when I say I do not want to eat something because it is unhealthy. I do not want to cause any problems or even try to tell them what they should or should not be eating. I just do not want to put junk in my body. The main reason they eat and buy the things they do is because they can unhealthy food cheaper and at a higher quantity than healthy food, but I am pretty stressed out. We have some fruit and vegetables in the house, but the bread my parents buy is barely better than white bread, the peanut butter is chalk-full of sugar, as is the yogurt. My dad also insists on having Little Caesar’s pizza once a week or so and tempting desserts are a constant in the house. After only occasionally eating foods such as these, I now feel as though I am putting trash into my body almost every time I eat.

My question:

How do I handle this properly-without offending anyone?

With that said, I had a very nice walk with my sister this morning.  We were going to run originally, but her ankle was sore and we decided walking would be a better option. It was quite chilly outside, to our surprise, but it felt nice after we got warmed up a bit. We walked and talked and had a great time. Our walk was about 1.5 miles long.

When we got back, I felt like doing more, so I ran on the treadmill. I did a total of 2 miles in about 23 minutes. I started with a warm-up walk for 5 minutes and then ran 10 minutes at 6 mph. At the end of 10 minutes I ran an additional 5 minutes, this time at 7 mph. Then I did a 3 minute cool-down walk for 3 minutes. I had never tried running at 7 mph on the treadmill before and I am very pleased with how it went. It was only for 5 minutes, but I had expected to be more winded than I ended up being. My whole running time zoomed by and felt great. I barely noticed the time passing, except near the end when my phone, which was playing my music, froze and I spent about a minute trying to fix it-while running-before I finally gave up on it and just tried to think of music in my head or focus on breathing. I made it through alright without the music though.

Tomorrow I am thinking of maybe doing a P90X workout. I have not done one in a seriously long time and I miss it. I need to also think of more workouts I can do and plan them out for different days. It is harder to do when I do not have access to a gym, but I will figure it out!

 

2 Week Workout Day 7

My workout for today was Strength Workout B and Power Walk. I did Strength Workout B with no problem other than the fact that someone took one of the 5 lb dumbbells out of the exercise room and never returned it so we only have one now and I had to compensate by using two 3 lb weights in one hand and the 5 lb weight in the other (I am severely annoyed by this).

When it came time for me to do the Power Walk, both of the treadmills were in use so I had to use an elliptical. I really don’t like ellipticals. They just do not feel natural. I put up with it and made the most of it anyway. I don’t know how fast I was going on the thing, but I was pretty sweaty when I got off so I imagine it was a lot faster than 4 mph.

Today I did something extremely difficult. The cafeteria had tons of strawberries (so SO many strawberries) because we get a bunch after the Strawberry Festival and today they had hot fudge to dip it in. I passed it up and just got strawberries. I have NO idea how I was able to do this. It was pretty awful. I think something inside me died…or at least screamed. I love chocolate and hot fudge is like the best thing ever, but I told myself that I would feel a lot better if I didn’t eat it and I am completely amazed that I actually didn’t give in to the molten deliciousness. So HA! Take that unhealthy food! I win………this time.

They were still delicious…

Exciting news:

I registered for my first 5k today! I am so excited! Even better-my sister is doing it with me! We are doing the Glow Run on May 11th. It is going to be my sister’s first time as well. I had been thinking the other day about how I wanted to sign up for a 5k over the summer so I started looking around on the internet to find one that would be close to where I live. I have been wanting to do the Color Run really badly and there is one in my town this summer, but it is in September and I will most likely be gone for school again. Then I found the Glow Run, which sounds like it will be about as much fun or maybe even more fun than the Color Run! My sister and I are both super pumped and have already started planning for it!

2 Week Workout Day 6

Today I picked up where I left off from what I was going to do on Friday. I did Strength Plan A and Speed Ladder. My workout today went very smoothly. I think I have all of the exercises down correctly (or at least my own interpretation of what is correct) and I didn’t even really have to look at the instructions for each exercise. I felt really good at the end of the strength workout.

For the Speed Ladder part of the workout, which is cardio, I did it according to the directions,  but I did it with an incline of 5. It made the workout a whole lot less boring and more of a challenge. That lasted 30 minutes and when I was done with that I decided to run a mile just because I felt like it. I was rather pleased with myself.

I am also proud of myself for sticking to my plan of eating all of the sweets that I was going to eat last night and getting rid of the rest today. I only ate healthy food today and it felt awesome. I always feel better about myself when I eat healthy and I feel like I get more out of my workouts if I eat healthy also!

2 Week Workout Day 4

My workout today went really well. I did Strength Plan B and Power Walk like the workout on Tuesday. I am afraid my blog entries are going to be a bit dull for the next few days because it is just the same 2 workouts I am doing so I apologize for that. However, I am hoping to learn/ feel something new each day so I can keep track of my progress. Next week has me doing the same workouts, but with a little something extra to each one to make the exercise harder. That should be interesting.

I have noticed that I have been continually sore this week. In a good way. So hopefully this means my muscles are benefitting from these workouts! I like this program so far because it is not like a workout that makes your heart rate go sky high or leaves you drenched in sweat (though I do like those kinds of workouts too), but it still seems to be effective. I must say though, I really miss my regular “schedule” of mixing up different workouts focusing on working different parts of my body. It is not as fun to keep doing the same exercises over and over.

I was really proud of myself this evening because the cafeteria was serving Chinese food as the main dinner tonight and I passed it up for something healthier. I love Chinese food, but a lot of it is fried or covered in unhealthy sauces and such so I talked myself out of eating it. Instead I ate some chicken noodle soup, peaches, and a banana that I dipped in peanut butter and jelly. It was a pretty good dinner and I was quite satisfied.

I found out a little more about Paleo. Apparently some people do something called 80/20 paleo which is eating Paleo 80% of the time and allowing for 20% to eat things you would normally cut out on a Paleo “diet” (like honey, whole grains, beans, maybe dairy). I think this sounds a whole lot more reasonable than going all out and cutting out certain foods that are still good for you (even just in moderation). I am quite intrigued by Paleo and I want to try it for a week (if I decide to go full Paleo for a week) or a few weeks (if I decide to do 80/20). However, I have to wait until I am back at home for the summer because I would not survive here on campus trying to do it. I also want to do more research on Paleo as a whole before I try it.

Tomorrow I am going over to my aunt and uncle’s house for Easter weekend so I will have to try and do my workouts at their house. They have a treadmill and I believe they have a few dumbbells so I should be able to do them with no problem.

2 Week Workout Day 3

My workout today was essentially the same as the one I did on Monday (Strength Plan A and Speed Ladder). I think It went more smoothly today though.

The exercises:

• Hip Drop- X 10 each side
• Beach Ball Hug- X 6 each leg
• Full-Body Roll-Up- X 12
• Breast Stroke- X 10
• Read the Paper- X 12 each side

I like most of these exercises a lot, but I am still having trouble with the beach ball hug one. I just don’t feel like I am getting it completely right. I have the basic gist of the exercise, but I would like to do it correctly. I am trying to get the most out of this workout and still follow the instructions on the website so whenever I am given a recommended amount of reps to do, I always aim for the higher reps (like if it said 8-10 reps, I would do 10 if possible). I have noticed this about myself in other workouts too. I just feel like I need to put forth as much effort as I can in order to feel successful. It usually works pretty well.

I also did the Speed Ladder cardio workout. I don’t mind it, but I would like to run a bit. Just walking all week makes me feel a little lazy, even if it is for a half an hour each time. I really like walking, but running makes me feel accomplished. I might add some running in next time or maybe just bump the incline up.

Tonight I was so excited because I bought some grapes and some Mini Babybel Light cheese and I thought to myself “This is gonna be so great for a snack tonight!”, but I ate a grape and it was not a very good grape so I ate another grape and another and none of them tasted very good. It was so sad. They didn’t look bad and they weren’t awful, but I was really looking forward to some nice, crisp grapes. However, I still enjoyed the cheese and I made some nice blueberry tea to drink so it ended up being a fairly pleasant snack after all.

“Dorm-made” Granola

I made my own granola yesterday and it is amazing. I found several recipes online for homemade granola and used them as a sort of foundation that I based my recipe off of. I was not sure how it would turn out at first because I had never made granola before and I was not 100% what made granola granola (how it gets crunchy). I was not sure how putting less of certain ingredients would effect the overall turnout. Most of the recipes I saw had a LOT of sweetener in them. I really wanted to cut back some of that. So I tried it. Also, the person I want to share some of the granola with is semi-allergic to cinnamon, so I reduced how much cinnamon I put in. This is the recipe I used:

• 2 cups rolled oats (I used a multi-grain 100% rolled grain cereal)
• 2 tbsp honey
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 cup nuts/seeds and some raisins (I used a trail mix I bought)
• 1/2 tsp vanilla

Oven preheated to 300

Mix all ingredients together. Bake on a cookie sheet ( I used a foil pan and parchment paper because that is what I had) arranged in a single layer for 15 minutes. Stir, arrange back into single layer and bake 10-12 minutes. Stir again and let cool.

It turned out really good! Next time I might add a touch more honey and if I was not making it for someone who was allergic to cinnamon, I would put more in. Also I may add the raisins in after it is baked next time. I can’t decide if I like the raisins baked or not. I read that you can use an egg or egg whites (I can’t remember which) to stir into it and it will make it clump together-I may try that too!

It seriously is good though and so much healthier than store-bought. I just had some in greek yogurt and it was awesome. It makes me so happy!