It's Friday?

Sometimes being a WAHM (work at home mom) has it's disadvantages. I don't "go to work" as in leave the house every morning, do my 9-5, then return home.. No weekends off. No vacations. So sometimes it's hard keeping track of what the actual day is. It's Friday? Well hurray for the weekend, even though weekends don't really mean anything. Anyway.

Friday does mean that there is no boot camp for a few days. Well there IS boot camp tomorrow, HOT boot camp actually that I can't go to. Joel has to work at 4 (YES FOUR) am so he's going to miss it too. Maybe we'll go hiking when he gets home!

I don't remember if I posted about my blood work results... Everything came back normal, somethings are amazing actually.  My heart is in pristine condition, blood pressure is great, blood sugar is great. I had to really pin point why I wasn't losing weight as fast as I thought I should. I came to the conclusion that I just needed more cardio. A lot more of it. The kind of cardio that has me gasping for air, my side cramping, legs shaking. I know that now because after the brutal Gladiator race, which ended up being OVER 7k when we all thought it was 5k, I lost 4lbs almost immediately.  So I basically need to almost DIE to get the results I want. After my victory of completing the race and losing 4lbs, I got very sick. I had a cold before the race but then it got worse and hung out for about 3 weeks. I'm just about better.

I worked out all last week so for the most part, I'm healed. I still have a stupid clogged ear (my fault, squirted the shower hose at the race directly into my ear--twice) but that's mostly just annoying at this point. Now that I'm healed, I plan to go hiking every weekend. See, at the Gladiator race, we ran up a mountain trail. Switchbacks, up & down, slippery rocks... you get the picture. I was very surprised I survived and to be honest if I knew about that mountain I wouldn't have signed up. That mountain was the most challenging part of the race. It was long... brutal... seemed never ended. The hardest obstacle though was this wall.

It was an angry wall. I remember being at the bottom watching this tiny little thing struggling to get up and over. I knew she would eventually because Curtis was at the top barking at her that she "will not give up, GET.YOUR.BUTT.UP.HERE!!" She tried 3 times before finally making it, if that skinny girl could barely get over, there was NO WAY on earth I could haul my big booty over. Hayley made me go first, so I did. I was awesome doing it by myself for the first 2 steps, but once I had to actually go UP the wall I thought it was over. Then I felt a push from underneath me and it was Hayley. I reached up for Curtis' hand and started to move. I took one step then realized I was scared to death of falling and BEGGED, I mean BEGGED for Curtis to just let me go. I pleaded, tears in my eyes and voice to please just let me go, I can't do it. You think he listened? Um NO. Giving up is not part of the Rock Star code.. I don't even know why I wasted my breath, I knew he wouldn't let go. He shouted for help, two other people grabbed my arms and "hey you big guy" came over to help from below. I had a freakin' TEAM of people getting me over that wall! When I got up to the top the crowd below cheered. And then I cried. Joel even told me that he got choked up when I made it to the top... don't tell him I said that :)

Don't mind the funky picture quality, the settings got bumped and I had to recover this photo as much as possible. This is what I was left with, but it's proof I was on the wall. Curtis used this time for a photo op from the top view lol!

Anyway, where I was going with this was I need crazy mountain climbing cardio. I can't do it every day because for one I don't have time and I do boot camp 4-5 times a week. So the weekends it is. Now that I'm better I'm going back to North Mountain. If you remember the time I went hiking with Carmen a while back? It sucked, I hated it, I didn't even make it to the top. I waited for her while she went all the way and when she was done we went back down together. Well I'm going back to do the whole mountain. All the way to the top. Of course it's going to be hard but I already went up Estrella Mountain! I can certainly do North Mtn.

Since I've re-evaluated what's been going on, tweaking my food even more, I've been losing weight at about 2lbs a week. I guess that's okay. I read that 1-2lbs a week usually results in healthy fat loss and muscle gain and keeping the weight off instead of gaining it all back right away. So as long as I'm losing AT LEAST that much, I think I'm on the right track.

Tonight for dinner I'm making chicken patties with mixed veggies (mostly broccoli). It's my favorite go to meal right now and couldn't get any easier.