Running and Dancing

Today I decided to take the boy with me on my run, just to see how it would go. He loved it, but I didn't love how my lightweight Maclaren ran. It's great for the mall, but over bumpier surfaces, it just isn't very smooth. I started to think about maybe getting a jogging stroller, but those things are freaking expensive! I looked at some on Amazon and they were between $150 and $500 dollars. That's insane.

So, I hopped on Craigslist where I found a listing for this bad boy:

That is a BOB Sport Utility Stroller. They retail for $329 new. This one is a couple years old but in perfect condition minus one flat tire. Since they take the same tubes as children's bike tires, that shouldn't be a problem. It was clear across town, but I figured for the savings, it would be worth the hour-and-half-through-rush-hour drive. I called the number and although it had been listed for a day it was still available!

My price? We paid a whopping $95! I'm so excited! Of course, now that we've shelled out the cash for a special stroller that means I have even more incentive to stick with this running business.

On the way home, as we stopped at a red light, the funniest thing happened. The guy in the left hand turn lane next to us got out of his stopped car and just started dancing in the street. I mean, he was getting down! I about died laughing. As he got back into his car, I caught his eye, so I gave him a thumbs up and applauded. He gave me a thumbs up back, then motioned for us to roll down the window. We did and he asked me, "Was that too gay?"

Seriously. I died. Freaking awesome. I told him no. He then said, "Well, it was kinda gay, right?" I laughed and said "Yeah, maybe a little, but it was awesome!" He gave me another thumbs up.

Then the light changed and they had to drive away. Oh, and bonus - this happened at the intersection in front of Gay Denny's. Kick butt.

Actually, You Probably Can Catch Me

I am proud to say that I ran all three days on plan this week! Sure, at times my running was a glorified shuffling jog, but I did it! After Monday, I realized that since I was running outside I could use the GPS function on the Couch to 5k app. I ponied up the additional 99 cents for the add on and I have to say it's totally worth it! Since I don't have a treadmill to tell me how far I've run, this is a great way to keep track of how far I've gone. I updated my distance tracker on the right sidebar.

Today I managed to turn on the music on my phone but forgot to start the app. I made it all the way to the end of the greenbelt when I realized that two songs had played and that was probably way longer than the five minutes my warmup should have been. I was so annoyed with myself! I wanted to give myself credit for that distance (I'm totally counting the walking parts of the program in my "miles run" count) but didn't want to guess how far I had gone. I remembered coming across a site called Map My Run last year so I checked it out today. I plotted my run from today and found that I had gone almost an extra three quarters of a mile!

I picked up a pair of these on Tuesday and I'm so in love. They're super comfortable. I love that they have a wide waistband to help hold in my chub. Unfortunately I got the last pair in my size and they seem to be out online. I'm trying to figure out what to wear on top though. I ran in a regular tee on Monday but the seams chafed the undersides of my arms. I ran in a bigger tee shirt on Wednesday (a thicker cotton men's cut one) but that wasn't comfortable either. I was going to wear a tank top but it was too cold. Today I ran in a thin long sleeved top and it was good for the first half of the run but then I got super hot and once again, uncomfortable.

Any suggestions?

Ow. Ow, ow, ow.

I started again.

You may remember me taking up running last year. I was doing really well too, working my way up from not even being able to run for 30 seconds to being able to run for eight minutes straight after a few months. Now, I know that's not impressive to a lot of people, but for me, that was a big deal.

Of course, then I fell off a curb walking in the apartment parking lot one day, messed up my ankle, and had to quit. I always intended to start again after it got better, but then it was summer, and then I had that rough period last fall, then we moved... you get the idea.

I've been thinking about starting again for the past few weeks, and finally decided that today was going to be the day. I dug my running shoes out of the closet, spent half an hour looking for my headphones (my husband had them!) and headed out the door. Last time I started this it took me three tries to make it all the way through Week One, Day One. Today, it took me ONE. I'm extremely proud of myself for this, even though I know it will hurt later.

I headed out and just ran along the streets of my neighborhood since I no longer have access to the fancy treadmill. I discovered that since our neighborhood is made up of mostly cul de sacs, there is a grassy area where they meet in the middle with a long sidewalk running the entire length. In some areas there are just bushes and gravel, but in others it widens out to make a small field big enough to play. There is also a large playground in this area, with basketball courts and a fence that I guess could be used for baseball games. I don't know if it's technically big enough to be called a greenbelt, but it's pretty cool.

I was wearing leggings in the morning, so I went ahead and left them on instead of changing into my usual running pants. Oh my goodness, they were so much more comfortable than having all that excess fabric on my legs! They were just regular cotton ones, so they were a bit warm. That's fine now, but it's going to start to warm up pretty quickly here where I live, so I went to Target last night and picked up a pair of actual running ones that were capris.

My husband has given me his word that he will work with me on this, and will come home for lunch on the days I need to run. We also agreed that if I could keep this up for a month that I could replace my running shoes since they're over three years old. I'll just be replacing them with the current version of the same shoe. I had my gait and all that good stuff measured when I bought these so I know they're right for my feet and stride.

This will be my fifth pair of Asics, and my second of this particular style. I love these shoes!

Today

Outside my window - One severely overgrown, flowering aloe vera plant. I bought this thing for 99 cents at Ikea, if I remember correctly. What started off as a scraggly little plant has now been transplanted several times and is currently too big for the giant pot in which it resides. I don't know what to do about it! It sent up it's shoot/stalk thing and is now flowering. I wonder if that means it will die soon?

Also, about 50 bajillion baby aloe plants. I'm running out of pots and I don't like aloe vera THAT much. Anyone want some? :)

I am thinking - I have so much crap to do that it's making me feel bad about the stuff I want to do, so neither is getting done. I think I'll make a bunting for my living room mirror and shun housework tomorrow.

I am thankful - For my husband. He's very helpful.

From the kitchen - Today I baked some bread and made some more sorbet using the organic strawberries I got from McClendon's at the farmer's market on Saturday. These berries tasted way better than the ones from the grocery store! I also made a pitcher of lemonade. Did you know my husband had no idea that lemonade was just lemon juice, water and sugar? When I expressed my incredulity at this, he stated that when he was a kid, it either came out of a can found in the freezer or from a packet of Kool Aid.

I'm wearing - Jeans, a teeshirt, and my vintage pink apron. No shoes. Glasses of course!

I am creating - Today I did the baby's silhouette using the instructions Jaimee Rose posted on her blog a while back. He turned 18 months on Sunday and I wanted to capture him at the end of his babyhood. He's a toddler now, can you believe it?

I bought the frame for 50 cents at a thrift shop and spray painted it black. Factor in the two sheets of cardstock I used and this project still came in under $3.50. The hardest part of the whole thing was getting the child to sit still facing the correct direction for long enough to get a picture! I ended up playing YouTube videos on my laptop.

I am reading - The Omnivore's Dilemma. It's long and I only get to read a few pages at a time before some baby boy comes and wants my attention. I'm learning a lot from it though.

I am hoping - That I can be productive tomorrow. I seem to accomplish little on the days I run. Those people who say exercise gives you energy must be smoking crack, because it wears my butt OUT.

I am hearing - YouTube videos on my iPhone, being played by Bubba via the Kideos app.

Around the house - There are lots and lots of Hot Wheels scattered about.

One of my favorite things - naps. Sweet, sweet naps, all snuggled in bed with my boy. They're a double edged sword though, because then you wake up and are all like, OH CRAP I shouldn't have done that because I have so much stuff to do!!!

A few plans for the rest of the week - Bunting! Waffles! Cookies! Laundry! Bathroom cleaning! Running! Farmer's Market! Pizza! Maybe some homemade playdough - we'll see.

A picture to share -

My boy, he is naughty. I had my husband pick up some WASHABLE markers on his way home from work so that the next time this happens, it won't be such a big deal.

I love Food. That is All.

Have you been watching this?

It's on Friday nights, on ABC. I've liked Jaime Oliver since he was doing The Naked Chef on the Food Network several years ago. He's cute and likeable and cooks - what's not to love? You just want to give the man a hug and maybe pinch his cheeks. Maybe I'm just getting old, wanting to pinch cheeks and stuff. Anywho, it's good. He basically is going to the unhealthiest town in America, based on government statistics, and trying to teach the residents about real food and how to get back to eating healthy, but eating good stuff at the same time. He goes into the schools, he goes into their homes - it's awesome. You can actually go to abc.com and watch all the episodes that have aired so far. There's so much to learn for everyone involved, including Jaime. It's a really great thing he's doing.

If you've been reading this for any length of time, you're pretty much aware that I love me some food. You're probably also aware that I've been working my way towards being the best person that I can be - to others, to the world in which I live, and to myself. That includes trying to eat more "real" foods and less processed stuff. In the past year I've started to read labels more and more, past the calorie and fat counts where I would stop before. I read ingredient lists now. Sodium counts. I don't just look at fat grams or calories, but try to figure out if they are in balance with each other. (seriously - 100 calorie snack packs with 8 grams of fat are NOT a good choice) I'm reading about food, watching documentaries about food, going to Farmer's markets, and cooking from scratch more and more.

Jaime Oliver has rekindled the flame of interest in me that may have been starting to wane a little bit. I signed his petition (maybe you can too? just takes a minute!), even though I don't have a child in school, because I've worked in a school and have seen firsthand the junk that kids are given. It really is gross. I'm working towards eating mostly "real" foods, and cutting out as many processed foods as possible.

I no longer use Splenda, on which I used to heavily rely. I quit buying Yoplait yogurt, because although I am a fan of their low calories and large variety of flavors, I cannot abide by the high fructose corn syrup they use. On the rare occasions that I drink a soda, it's usually one made with cane sugar. The last box of cereal in this house has been consumed and now we're having steel cut oats for breakfast. Once the tub of margarine is gone, I'll be making my own spread using real butter and local olive oil. There is actually a bottle of real maple syrup in my cupboard right now.

The eating is REAL GOOD around these parts nowadays, folks.

This is what we had for dinner tonight:

That is spinach, prosciutto, and avocado pizza on a whole wheat crust. I used leftover sauce from the last time I made pizza using Kate's recipe which I had stashed in the freezer. I made it with onions, heirloom tomatoes, basil, garlic and shallots. This is seriously the best pizza sauce I've ever eaten! The crust is Pioneer Woman's recipe, only I used 100% whole wheat flour instead of all purpose. Obviously it wasn't as good as white flour crust, but it wasn't bad either, just different. The avocados were tossed in a little lemon juice to keep them from browning and also to give a little extra flavor. I used mozzarella and Parmigiano Reggiano as my cheeses.

This was SO GOOD! I loosely based it on my favorite pizza from La Grande Orange in Phoenix. They actually use basil, but I didn't have any. I did have some spinach that was starting to look mighty sad, so I used that instead. It was probably healthier anyway. I also skipped the lemon zest since I already had the lemon on the avocado. I have more prosciutto in the fridge and another avocado, along with the second half of the pizza dough, so we'll probably have this for dinner again tomorrow.

And to think - just a few months ago I was buying pizza dough in a CAN. HA!

Of course, you can't just eat all this good food without consequence. I've been sticking to my Couch to 5K program really well so far. If my husband isn't telecommuting on the days that I run (Monday, Wednesday, Friday) then he comes home for lunch and watches the boy while I hit the treadmill. This has been incredibly helpful in getting me to stick with this, and I'm so grateful he's willing to do it. Today he wasn't able to take a lunch break so I had to wait until he got home from work to go run.

Let me tell you, the later in the day it gets, the lower my motivation to get off my butt and do anything gets. It's terrible. By 6:30 pm, I had a serious case of the "I don't wanna's". My motivation was totally gone. I was ready to just say forget it and not go.

But then I had a realization - this is not about having motivation. It's not about searching for or finding motivation. It's about making a conscious decision - this is what I have to do because I made a commitment. That's one of my personal rules - if you make a commitment to something, you MUST follow through. Therefore, my motivation, or lack thereof, was irrelevant. Whether I went or didn't go was based on a decision that I was consciously making. Yes I will or No I won't.

So, long story short, I went. I hauled my fat, lazy, not wanting to run butt across the apartment complex and got on the treadmill. I forced myself to finish the last workout for week three of my nine week program, and do you know what? I'm so glad I did. I'm proud of myself for sucking it up and going and getting to add another mile and a half to the little scorekeeper I added on the right sidebar of this blog.

People are starting to tell me that they admire my motivation. That they wish they could find motivation like I did. That they want to know how I got motivated. Honestly? I have NO motivation. Every day that I run, I hate it. When I'm walking and the chime sounds for me to start running, I mutter curse words under my breath. I hate being hot, and I hate sweating, and I hate panting for air like a dog. I hate that my knees hurt with every step that falls. I hate that I'm reminded how fat I am when I stretch and can't pull my knees to my chest because my gut is in the way. I hate every moment that I'm doing this - with the exception of the one when I'm DONE, when I get to say that I did this, I finished this, I made it. Right about then I feel pretty dang good.

That's a big part of the reason why I like that the app I use posts my runs on Facebook and Twitter. I feel like it's giving me a little bit of positive reinforcement, and hopefully if those notices stop, someone will notice and say something. I guess it keeps me accountable. I also decided to start keeping an album on Facebook of my screenshots after a run so I can see how I'm progressing. In just the few that I have so far, I can already see slight improvements.

Am I running to get fit? No. Am I running for my health? No. Whenever I've been asked to list my ultimate fitness goal, it's always been to get to wear a really slutty Halloween costume. I know, that's terrible, but it's true. That's changed now. I'm running because I love butter. REAL butter. And bacon and sugar are good too. I'm running because I want to prove that I can do this, and that I'm not a fatass quitter who finds sticking to commitments impossible like some people I used to know. Maybe that makes me shallow and petty, but so be it.

The fact of the matter is that I'm a third of the way through this program, my knee is feeling slightly better, and I don't feel like I want to die halfway through my thirty minutes like I did at this time three weeks ago. I think that's pretty dang awesome and it's all because I decided to choose to finally get off my butt.

April 2010 Twelve of Twelve

It's that time of the month again!

Wait... that sounded wrong. Well, it's the twelfth, and thanks to the lovely Susan I was able to stay on this roll on which I've been.

One french toast cupcake with maple buttercream leftover from the party our friends held to celebrate our confirmation yesterday. I garnished them with little pieces of maple bacon. It kind of weirded people out a little bit at first, but I didn't come home with any cupcakes so I consider them to have been a success. It's always nice to break out of the chocolate/vanilla/red velvet rut every now and then.

My husband telecommuted today and did a load of laundry. Bubba helped. He loves to put clothes in the dryer.

I cleaned out this cupboard. It was getting a bit junky and unorganized.

I wore my new (to me) apron. It was in that load of clothes my husband did, hence the wrinkles.

The boy is a big fan of his father.

I "redecorranged" the stuff on the hutch a little bit. I got rid of the taupe flower pot and replaced it with a ceramic canister painted with cherries. I also added some faux pink flowers to my milk bottle and moved it to the other side. I'm working on doing the top of the hutch now.

I used the last of the lemons that Susan gave me a few weeks ago to make a pitcher of lemonade. I asked my husband if he would prefer lemonade or iced tea, and he said "But we don't HAVE any lemonade!" I reminded him we had lemons, and sugar, and water and he was like, oh yeah huh. I got to try out my new citrus reamer. I love it!

I went for my run. I started week three of Couch to 5k. Last week I had to run for 90 seconds at a time, but this week it got doubled. Three minutes feels like an eternity! But I did it - go me!
I also figured out how to plug in my weight so the treadmill could give me an approximation of my calories burned. That can't be right, can it? Weak.

I did some more "redecorranging," in which you redecorate by rearranging the stuff you already have. I scored a major victory by convincing my husband that the TV speakers didn't need to be up on that shelf/mantel over the tv. They were so ugly and made it hard to put anything up there because you can't block them. Now they're in front of the tv, only unplugged, as a trial to see if some baby can leave them alone. So far, so good!

I got rid of the orange stick things that were in the big vase - they were major dust catchers and nearly impossible to clean. They will be going to Goodwill. I pulled some books from my bookshelves and took off the dust jackets. This is a big deal for me, because I've always been super careful to keep my dust jackets in good condition. These books are on my "Keep Forever" list though because I really liked them, so I figured what the heck. The birdcage I got on clearance for $6 at Target a few years ago but it never really had a good home before now. There's a tart warmer from Yankee Candle on top of the books and a tiny cement frog. I also have an orchid in a short vase of water that was on a corsage that was given to be before church yesterday by a friend. I was hoping it would float but it sank to the bottom. It's holding up surprisingly well though, so maybe that's not a bad thing.

I made Pioneer Woman's Perfect Pot Roast for dinner. Our russet potatoes were all funky so we just boiled these small yellow ones and didn't bother mashing them.

I let Bubba have about an inch worth of lemonade in this tiny plastic tumbler I picked up at the restaurant supply store. I want him to be able to practice drinking out of a regular cup on his own - he can't have a sippy cup forever! (He does fine if I'm holding the cup) It was funny because he'd pick it up okay, and get it to his mouth okay, and start to tip it up slowly... then all of a sudden attempt to throw it back like he was taking a shot! He was very sticky and wet by the end of this, and had to go straight into the bathtub after dinner. Silly baby!

No Pain, No Gain?

Today marked the start of my third week doing this running thing, and the start of my second week of Couch to 5k. I'm going to go ahead and tell you that I'm calling it "running" for the sake of expediency, even though what I'm actually doing is alternating walking with an oftentimes shuffling, sad jog. Hey, you gotta start somewhere, right?

Since my husband was telecommuting today, and the baby was still running a temperature, I waited until he was taking a nap to go on my run. My husband suggested that I try the treadmills in our apartment complex's fitness center and since it was pretty hot out today, I thought that might not be a bad idea.

Can I tell you that these things ROCK?

I took this while walking, with my iPhone, which is why it's all cattywampus. It has your choice of four virtual trails on which to walk. You can walk at your own pace, or use it's virtual trainer. You can program presets for walking, jogging, and running so that you don't have to keep using the up and down arrows. This is great for people who are doing programs where you alternate like I do. It has a jack where you can plug in your iPod. You can watch TV on it. It measures your heartrate. The cup holders are big enough for a decent sized bottle of water and deep enough that you don't have to worry about it tipping out. There's a little ledge in front of the screen that will comfortably hold a book or magazine.

It's all pretty and easy to read and you can even save your progress to a usb drive if you like. This thing is pretty kick butt, as far as treadmills go!

I found that I had a lot easier time with my workout today, even though I was running for a longer amount of time. Now, I did some things differently today than I have been doing. For starters, I took an ibuprofen before I started. Then I stretched, which I haven't been doing because I thought (erroneously) that the warm up walk was all I needed. Of course, there was walking on the treadmill itself, and in an air conditioned room no less. Also, I wasn't pushing a stroller today.

So, the fact that I didn't totally want to die could be factored into any of those things, or it could simply be that my body is starting to realize that we are going to be moving more often now. I'm sure this didn't hurt either:

I seriously never want to run on hard ass concrete ever again. I finished and wasn't in pain! My knee wasn't throbbing like it had been. I didn't feel like I wanted to curl up in a ball and cry. It was a pretty awesome feeling, like, hey, maybe I can do this after all! Yay me!

Of course, as I was walking back to my apartment I went and slipped on a curb and rolled my left ankle pretty badly. That caused me to fall on my right knee and skin it all to hell. I now have not only a huge lovely bruise right above the sore spot on my bad knee, but it also looks like someone shoved a golf ball under the skin of my left ankle! I can't even limp properly because I went and messed up both legs. I suck.

I honestly didn't think I had hurt it very badly because even though it hurt so much that I had to sit in the road there for a minute like a total dork before I was able to get up, by the time I got home it wasn't really hurting any more. I didn't realize it was swollen until I was in the shower tonight and went to shave my legs. It shocked the heck out of me because as clumsy as I am, and as many times as I have fallen in my life, I've never had any part of me swell up like that before. It's kind of trippy, if you'll pardon the pun. :)

Hopefully both of them recover enough that I'm able to go on my next run on Wednesday. I will definitely be seeing if I can swing getting over to the treadmills again!

2010 Goal Check-in: March

I set a lot of goals for 2010, and to keep myself honest, I thought I'd do what my blog friend Sam does and do a monthly check in. It's a great way to make sure that those goals don't get forgotten in a few months and I stick to working towards them.

*I want to try and remember to call my child by his ACTUAL name instead of Bubba. It's so embarrassing when people start talking to "Sawyer" and he doesn't respond because he has no idea who "Sawyer" is!

Still working on this, but I did better than I did last month. He will now respond if you call him Sawyer, which is a GREAT improvement. Before, he would ignore you because he did not know who this "Sawyer" character was.

*I want to try to eat less and move more. I will NOT be going on a diet. I decided I love food too much. I also will not be implementing a formal workout plan. Moving will involve cleaning house and taking the baby to the park, among other things.

I started running! Yay! I didn't start until halfway through the month, but here I have two weeks of running under my belt. I finally started Couch to 5K and it was BRUTAL. The first day I wanted to die. Every part of me hurt, even my eyelashes. My chest felt like it was on fire. My ankles were screaming in pain. It was horrible. It took me three tries to be able to get all the way through day one of the program without cheating and resorting to walking when I should have been running.

I am noticing that my right knee is REALLY bothering me though. I hurt it when I was working at the hotel (almost 3 years ago come May, I think). I slipped on a wet (unmarked!!!) floor in the lobby and landed in a kneeling position. All my weight slammed onto that one knee and it was a marble floor. I was carrying one of those giant coffee dispensers on the way to the kitchen to get it cleaned out and luckily managed to not spill it all over! I was okay when it happened, slightly sore by the end of the work day, and could barely walk by the next day. I ended up having to go to urgent care and have physical therapy for a month. Ugh. It hasn't really bothered me since, until this week.

The knee is mostly just a nagging minor pain, except of course when I'm actually running or when I'm on the stairs. THEN it straight up hurts. I've been advised by friends who run and have spouses that run to a) stretch, both before and after (duh, Sara, right?) and also to to b) take ibuprofen before and ice it after. We'll see how it is next week.

Luckily, I at least know I'm wearing the right shoes because I did this gait analysis a couple of years ago where you walked across this pad that showed how you distributed your weight on your tread. They also had me walk and jog on a treadmill while a camera analyzed how my steps fell. Then they recommended certain shoes with a certain type of support, and I bought those. I know it was two years ago, but since I haven't really worn them much, I think they're still okay.

*I want to quit making excuses and drag my lazy butt out of bed on Sundays to go to church.

Another successful month for this one!

*I want to pick one of my many cookbooks each month and make a new-never-tried-it-before recipe each week from it.

This month I made friends all over again with The Pioneer Woman. I made her Perfect Pot Roast and it was DIVINE. It was the first time I'd ever put any of my All-Clad into the oven. I knew I could do it, but I was a little freaked out by the idea. Now I regret not doing it sooner. That pot roast was so tender I was able to cut it the next day, COLD, with a spoon.

I also made pizza dough and Potato-Leek pizza. They're listed as two separate recipes in the book, so I'm counting them as such here. Also, since the dough is something you have to make ahead, I made it on a Saturday and the pizzas were made on Sunday. That's two different weeks!

If you haven't tried P-Dub's pizza dough, you're seriously missing out! It was so flipping GOOD. This was also my first time ever cooking or eating leeks. They were sautéed in bacon fat, and they were delicious. I used the other half of the dough to make a spinach and four cheese pizza that I found on Kate's blog. SO GOOD. I know I'm saying good a lot but man, you didn't try them.

Huh. I guess that's only three. Ah, well.

*I want to take catechism classes and do my first communion and confirmation.

This is happening this month! Not next Sunday, which is Easter, but the following Sunday, I will be making my first communion and confirmation. I made my first confession on Thursday and it was not bad at all. I seriously thought it would take like half an hour, but it was really fast.

*I want to eat out/eat processed foods less. We've been doing better about this than we were before, but we could do better.

We've been eating a lot of processed foods. I've been lazy and cooking only intermittently. A big part of my problem is that we haven't been to the grocery store. I don't want to do meal plans or a big shopping trip without my coupons, and I haven't taken the time to sit down and just clip and organize them. It's really hard with Grabby-Hands Bub around. It also takes a long time, and I just can't keep him busy for a big chunk of time like that so I can do it.

I did re-read Fast Food Nation and am currently reading The Omnivore's Dilemma. You know what's sad? Even though I know that a McNugget has 27 ingredients (Wendy's nuggets have 30!!!) and even though I know what meat plants are like, and even though I know all this bad stuff, not only about the food, but about the business practices of these restaurants, I still just want some damn fries from Mickey D's sometimes. Sick.

*I want to get the baby baptized.

This will be done after our confirmation this month. I need to make an appointment to have it done. I would really like the deacon who performed our wedding ceremony to be the one to baptize the baby, so we'll see.

*I want to have people over for dinner more often. Maybe a board game after? Is that weird?

We had the baby's soon-to-be godparents over for dinner. It was actually the night that we had the pizza. I stuffed them silly!

*I want to try one new thing (beside the cookbook goal) each month. It could be a new food, a new craft, a new life experience - it doesn't matter, as long as I've never done it before. Then, I have to blog about it.

Ostrich and lamb gyro meat. Yum. o_O (will probably be the last time for both of those) I also had the aforementioned leeks and attended my first Passover Seder, where I had horseradish for the first time. There was also my first time cooking en papillote and my first "adult" toy party. Finally, there was my first time attending mass on Palm Sunday, and starting Couch to 5k for the first time.

I think I have "try something new" covered!

*And of course, I want to work on incorporating domesticity into my life

Same as last month - I didn't clean a whole lot. That whole "lack of inspiration" business really kicked my butt. I need to stop making excuses and just do it.

Weekend (PLUS!) Update

Today, you get lovely iPhone photos because SOME blogger can't be bothered to carry her camera lately. For shame, right?

Wednesday:

My husband telecommuted. He actually telecommutes a couple times a week. Some weeks he can't, but it's always nice to have him around. Here, both of my guys are hard at work at their own respective tasks.

Wednesday night I attended a Passover Seder at Church. That's right, a seder at a Catholic church! Since a lot of our religious history is based on the Jewish faith (Jesus was a Jew, y'all) it was a way for those of us in the RCIA program to learn a bit of the traditions and customs so that we would be able to relate it to what we practice today. We didn't have a full dinner, but we did learn about the symbolism of the foods and got to taste them. It was my first time to have horseradish!

I attended with my friend Susan, who will also be my sponsor when I'm confirmed next month. It was a great learning experience, and a lot of fun besides. We were selected to sit at the head table. It was explained to us the symbolism of who sat where, and also where scholars believed that each person sat at the Last Supper. Turns out, I got to be Jesus. :)

Thursday:

This past week the boy has been in a really grouchy mood. There doesn't seem to be any reason for it - he has all his front teeth and premolars. The two year molars won't be here for a while. He's not sick. He's well fed. He just wakes up screaming, rolls out of bed screaming, walks around screaming, and stands at the front door screaming. It's really quite irritating!

I just don't get it. What I do know is that the surefire way to get him to stop screaming at me is to take him outside. Luckily there is a park right door to our apartment complex and we can walk there in just a few minutes. I can see the gate from my window - it's just across the courtyard.

My boy is outstanding in his field! HA!

I went for a run again and managed to make it all the way through day one of Couch to 5k! There was one segment in the middle where I was supposed to run, and I walked instead, but other than that, I made it! I wasn't hurting QUITE as bad as I was on Tuesday, but I was still feeling pretty rough.

We stopped at the playground afterward on the way home and actually met another stay at home mom from our neighborhood and her son there that day. (of course I meet new people when I resemble a poop sandwich!) Her son is four days older than Bubba, a little bit smaller, but a few pounds heavier. How lucky is that? It was so cute watching them play together on the equipment, and we were able to chat. We exchanged phone numbers so that we could get together again for more play dates.

Thanks to her, I also discovered that my son is way into buckets. Her son had a plastic pail that he wasn't playing with. Bubba was carrying it around and loading it with pine cones and rocks. He's going to be a natural at this Easter egg thing! HA!

Friday:

We started another day with screaming and therefore, another day at the park. I got a small shopping bag from the cupboard and gave it to the baby so he could gather pine cones. He's really into collecting pine cones for some reason! Here, I tried to take a photo of us. I swear he was in a good mood at this point, not that you can tell from this photo.

Friday was Make Up Your Own Holiday Day. I swear I'm not making that up - Google it! I decided that it was going to be Sit On Your Butt Day, but that didn't really work out. Since one of the alternatives I came up with was Buy Your Wife A Present Day, my husband decided to observe that one. He picked me up a little something at Michaels, and Bubba got a little metal pail of his very own. I think it will be his Easter basket this year!

It's still Lent, so there is still no meat on Fridays. Last year I slipped up a lot but this year I've done really well. I made some cod and cooked it en papillote for the first time. It came out really good!

Saturday:
We were going to go to the Festival of the Arts in downtown Tempe, but as we were driving there I saw on my Twitter feed that there was something called Worldfest celebrating Phoenix's sister cities happening. Since 90% of the vendors at the art festival are repeats, we decided to skip it and do Worldfest instead.

It was held at Heritage Square downtown. It was smaller than the art festival, but also less crowded. There are all these neat old houses there and they almost all have pretty flowers in front. Bubba liked them and we had many opportunities to work on "don't touch!" and "be GENTLE."

He also got to try on a little of his Mexican heritage...

Learn about the pandas from China...

Pose for photos on a camel cutout...

and admire plenty of trees and airplanes.

Speaking of trees... how funky is the paint job on this one? This is just a random photo that I snapped while driving home.

Saturday night I attended a Mom's Night Out meetup with our mom/play group. It was a Pure Romance party. Those suitcases in the photo up there? Full of "adult" goodies. It was actually very entertaining and a lot of fun. We played a game where everyone got a Dixie cup with four peanut M&Ms and a drinking straw. You were to put the candy in your palm and the empty cup between your knees. When the party demonstrator said go, you were to use the straw to suck up the candy and drop it into the cup. First person to get all four in the cup, raise her hands, and say "I suck nuts" (I KNOW!!!) won the game.

Yeah, I tied for first. I didn't know whether to be proud or embarrassed! It was funny because I was all like, "Wow, I totally expected that to be a lot harder" and a bunch of the other moms were like "That was too hard!!!"

I came home glittery and smelling good. It was nice to get out of the house and just hang out with people having fun.

Sunday:

No photos today! It was Palm Sunday, and since my RCIA class was going to be attending mass together (meaning I was at Church for a shorter amount of time today) I had my husband and the baby tag along. The baby's soon to be godfather came too, along with Susan and her family. It's so nice to be able to go to church with friends!

Since the service was a bit longer than usual, we dropped Bubba off in the nursery. This is the only the second time we've left him with someone else, and the first time that it was not someone he knew already. I'm happy to say he did great! They said he didn't cry at all and he played with cars most of the time. He got an animal cracker (it was even organic :) and got along with the other kids. I'm so glad, because I did worry about that.

After church we went out for Greek food with the godparents. It was good to get to sit and hang out and chat for a while. The boy was in a pretty good mood too considering that we had gotten him up so much earlier than usual and he was clearly getting tired. He ate macaroni and cheese, a couple of my fries, and even got to try ketchup for the first time. He loved it. GAG.

We popped into a mall on the way home to pick out something for the boy to wear on Easter Sunday. I ended up getting a green and white button down shirt that will go great with his green Chuck Taylors that we bought on clearance before St. Patrick's Day, and the cutest little dark brown bow tie with little dogs on it. It's super preppy. I'm looking forward to it!

Tomorrow I will be going for another run, but for now I'm off to bed!

Run, Miss M, Run!

I have been gaining weight. Since the first week of January, I've gained about seven pounds. This is pretty bad when you consider that I only put on TWO during November and December! Yikes, right?

I mean, it was bound to happen. I don't exercise at all and the eating is very good around here lately. I made pizza on Sunday and discovered that I had eight different kinds of cheese (Tillamook cheddar, Vermont Extra Sharp white cheddar, Brie, Gruyère, Provolone, Parmigiano Reggiano, Mozzarella, and Black Diamond 5year aged White Cheddar, in case you were wondering) in our refrigerator. I get upset when my husband dumps out my bacon fat now. I bake bread a few times a week.

I was just asking for my ass to get fat.

I know I had mentioned on one of my monthly goal posts that I wanted to try the Couch to 5k program to get myself moving again. I even downloaded this app to help:

It's pretty cool. It lets you pick music from your iPod, it tells you when to run, when to walk, and when you've reached the halfway point, you can set it to tell you when you're close to finishing, and it will even brag on Facebook or Twitter for you that you've completed your workout. It also looked nicer and more polished than the other app I saw for this that had good reviews.

(Yeah, I suck like that.)

The problem was that I never got off my butt to actually start the program. I kept thinking that I'd do it on the days that my husband telecommuted, so that he could watch the baby. That hasn't really worked out because he's had a lot of meetings and trainings at work that have thrown his telecommuting schedule out of whack. I didn't really want to take the baby with me because we don't have a jogging stroller, just a plain, simple Maclaren Volo.

Basically, I was lazy and had a bunch of excuses.

Today, I decided no more. I had my husband leave the stroller (usually we just keep it in the car) and decided I should at least try it out. I pulled the tags off the special running shirt with moisture-wicking fabric that I bought in October of 2007 and had allowed to languish in my closet ever since. I laced up one of my THREE pairs of running shoes (in which I never actually ever ran), put my hair into pigtails, grabbed the boy and headed out the door.

Here's what I learned:

1) Don't run in old underwear. If you do, they will start to slide down your butt the second you begin to jog. They may even slide all the way down to where only the crotch of your pants is holding them up. There will also inevitably be some old man running behind you so you won't be able to stick your hand down your pants and yank them back up to where they belong.

I ended up sticking my hands in my pockets, one side at a time (the other hand on the stroller, still jogging) to pull them up past the elastic waistband on my pants so they'd stay put.

2) The baby is actually okay with sitting in the stroller for that long, especially if there are pigeons about to catch his interest. The only downfall I could really find is that the handles were at an awkward angle and not terribly comfortable to hold, but still manageable. Also, sometimes my feet would kick the back of the stroller a little. This happened more toward the beginning when I had more energy and was taking longer strides, I guess.

3) I really need a water bottle. I think I'm going to get a 27 oz Klean Kanteen in the active pink color. (I'm still mad at Sigg for the whole lying about BPA thing.)

4)I'm hopelessly out of shape. I was in bad shape before I got pregnant but could still move okay due to my occasional gym visits and my dance pole. Halfway through my pregnancy it got to the point where I could barely climb up the stairs to my apartment without getting winded. I was so tired all the time, and then even more tired once the baby came, that fitness of any sort was just not important to me AT ALL. Hence, it was a no-brainer that I would be in the worst shape of my life right now.

I had no idea just how bad that was though. Day one of this program has you alternate between running for a minute, then walking for a minute and a half. That didn't sound so bad when I read it, but let me tell you, it was HORRIBLE. That chime would sound to mark the interval, and I would want to cry. My lungs burned. My ankles screamed in pain. My legs felt like heavy tree trunks. I was burning up and sweating like crazy even though it was only 62 degrees outside.

All this and I only made it halfway.

That's right. My fat butt managed to do the five minute warm up and then was only able to run another 12 minutes or so before I had to give up and sit on a bench to rest. That, my friends, is some serious out of shape-ness!

So, what can I do? All I can think is that it HAS to get better, right? I'll just keep doing day one until I can finish, then move on to the next day. I'm supposed to take a day off in between, so I'll be trying again on Thursday. Wish me luck!