Challenge Update #1 and a New Look

Kaiya having fun in the bathroom while recovering from surgery.

Kent having fun in the kitchen because he was just too darn small to push out side.

Well, my blog’s been sporting a new look for a little over a day now. I wanted to make my blog a little more personal so I added some “allergic to sitting” bling. I’ll keep tweaking as I view my blog in other browsers and on other monitors. It may take a while before I get the look that’s just right.

I won’t bore you with too many Challenge updates; only those that bring insight into our lifestyle and health. But a couple of bloggings ago, I mentioned that Kevin and I entered into the “Spring into ASUFit” Challenge and we’re counting our minutes of exercise each week. In doing so, we’re finding that we weren’t actually spending a lot of “time” exercising before the challenge, just “effort.” For example, we’d go run three miles on Mondays (30 minutes for me, 20-something for him), rest Tuesdays, cross train on Wednesdays (30-60 minutes), rest Thursday and Friday, bust out on a long run on Saturdays (1-2 hours), then rest Sundays. It seems like a lot of exercise, but if you count all of that up, that’s only 2-3 hours of workouts each week. We were efficient, but not continuous fitness nuts.

Now, we’re continuously exercising. We’ve started attending a free fitness class on Mondays called “Boot Camp” and it’s kicking some serious booty (pardon the pun). My quads are still a little stiff from the billions of lunge-type moves we were bustin’ (at least I’m not wincing any more when I stand up or sit down). And the big thing that’s giving us minutes is the dog walking. Now that the puppies are outside and wittle Kent is getting bigger, we like to go on 30 minute walks around the neighborhood. Where before now our kitchen and bathroom looked like the pigsty above due to Kaiya’s surgery and Kent’s smallness. Those are shredded “wee” pads mind you…

In addition, we’re keeping track of other times that we’re walking about, like when we’re shopping for long periods of time. Take yesterday, I went to Hobby Lobby and walked the isles for an hour and 40 minutes after doing a 2 mile run. Now, I’m not reaching my target heart rate while shopping, but I can guarantee that I was burning more calories than sitting on in my recliner sippin’ diet Sprite. I’m all for a shopping diet.

I wuv Hobby Bobby [said in baby voice]!

So far my team has racked up an average of 348 minutes a week (we’re competing against weekly averages). My personal total for last week was 362 minutes (Kevin had 390, the cheater…hee hee). Although we’re not in first place by any means, we’re having a lot of fun and it’s inspiring us to get out of the house.

Speaking of out of the house, I’ve “sampled” some excellent home-baked, gluten free, milk free, soy free but full of taste cookies this past week. By sample, I mean “quality tasted at least 5 cookies in one sitting.” I found one recipe online and baked it last weekend by substituting almond butter for the peanut butter it calls for (see it at http://www.recipetips.com/recipe-cards/t--2736/gluten-free-peanut-butter-cookies.asp). This recipe is so simple it hurts! It’s got five ingredients if you leave out the chocolate chips. And it’s high in protein. Good for those laying off the carbs. The cookies turn out to be crunchy and salty sweet! The Food Allergy Blog recommended squishing down the cookies before baking, which I did, but I don’t think that was even necessary. Perhaps it’s a difference of nut butters…

The other recipe I kind of sorta forgot to get from my ma-n-law, but she took a recipe that also normally calls for peanut butter and she substituted almond butter as well (except she made her’s from scratch by using a little coconut oil and a food processor). Her recipe turned out to be oatmeal, chewy deliciousness! I’ll share the recipe as soon as I can get it next. Or Sandy, you could post it in the comment section if you’d like?

While I’m working off the cookie calories in the Challenge, I hope you have a great rest of the week!