Legs/back/Kenpo/Rest/ChestShouldersTris/Abs etc etc etc. I'm playing catchup!

LONG TIME NO SEE!

I've been really busy and down in DC so I haven't posted in a while. Get ready for a SLEW of accountability below this post!

Going high-carb has made it MORE difficult to hit my calorie numbers, believe it or not. This is because when I was using powder to get my protein numbers, protein is easy to ingest. Upping carbs substantially has literally added more meals (meal 7? meal 8?!) to my day because I don't have a powdered low-gi carb. Despite this, the scale is still looking good- I think I've made it to 144.

I'm going to start to ween my way off of 2800-2900 after I get somewhere between 152 and 153. I hope to settle in the 155-160 range and see how that fits me. We'll see!

Anyway, believe it or not, I have many places to go tonight before I sleep. We're going out to eat (custom restaurant ordering abounds) and then it's time for UP, the pixar movie. I'll let you know how it is. :)

Yoga X/Busy and tired

Hey kids. It's late and I'm posting after eating what feels like more food than I've ever eaten ever.

Today since I had sweet potatoes with dinner (lower calorie, lower carb than most dinner carbs that I eat) I ended up having a 7TH MEAL involving 2 english muffins, 1 tbsp earth balance, and 1 medium apple. CRAZY. Laura said to me "Wow, you really NEVER stop eating, do you?"

Anyway, today was Yoga. I was interrupted partway through by the trugreen lawn people who managed to get me signed up to get lawn treatments because my lawn sucks and is practically unmowable in its current condition. Meanwhile, I'm planning my concerts on FRiday and my observed lesson tomorrow.

SO TIRED. WANT BED. Good night friends!

Shoulders and Arms/CARB CRAZED

So I had a great workout today. Shoulders and Arms is so awesome :D I love the way that pump feels! I finally GET IT.

I'm still marveling at this super-heavy carb load. Is this how I should be eating... really? It's crazy eating 1 cup dry oatmeal (that's more than 2 cups cooked, by the way), 3 slices of bread, 1 cup of whole wheat couscous, plus all the carbs from fruit and veggie sources. WHEW.

Anyway, this is a busy busy week. I'm hoping things will calm down a little after this one!

-2 observations
-2 concerts
-mow the lawn
-finally sign up for grad school classes this summer

Talk to you later :D

Plyo X/Cheating is over now/Memorial Day

Sweat like a beast today!

I'm LOVING phase 3 so far CARBTACULAR. It's definitely strange not eating billions of grams of protein though.

All the parties and the baseball game and going out to dinner was fun, but I'm exhausted and tired of cheating. Back to it! All the cheat foods at parties and eating out at restaurants is going to stop finally and I'm actually excited about that! It's hard to keep track of food that way.

Happy Memorial Day!

Rest day/ Chest and Back/Phase 3

Today's the first day of phase 3. I'm back to Chest and Back for the first time in 5 weeks and holy CRAP... I rocked it. All the weight has increased by at least 10-15 pounds in each hand and I far exceeded reps and quality of form. I'm glad it's actually WORKING!

Anyway, this is day two of cheat weekend extravaganza so I'm not logging foods simply because I don't know what's in all the foods at the parties I'm attending. I made sure to do clean eating for all other meals prior to the festivities. I'm back on track after Monday!

I attended a birthday party for Tom's roommate yesterday and I'm going to a sing-a-long party (yes, you read that right) tonight. Tomorrow's a baseball game. After that I'm clean eating in phase 3 of the diet (50/30/20). I'm looking forward to eating even more bread xD We'll see if I gain some more pounds that way as well!

(no logs. Sorry kids, I couldn't find little froofy homemade appetizers in myfitnesspal)

Yoga/BALANCE EEK

So I had a randomly bad day with Yoga. I was falling all over the place. I wonder why? I haven't really changed anything too significantly. I guess I should expect some days to be off days but it was quite frustrating.

Anyway, this is a quick post because I'm heading down to Tom's for a couple days. I'll try to post nutrition tomorrow. :)

Core Syn/Field Day

Today was Field Day at school. What was my station? You guessed it: the DDR station. I spent the entire day playing DDR and sweating like crazy. Then I went home and what did I do? Core Syn. By the time I drank the recovery drink and showered I must've exuded 5 pounds of sweat.

I'm all ready for this weekend. Two parties though--I sense a little bit of cheating on the horizon. I'll keep it to a minimum, I swear!

X Stretch/Found a new restaurant to add to the OK List

Well, tonight I went to Houlihan's unexpectedly and was treated to dinner as part of helping out with the band and strings concerts.

I ordered this "low calorie" item called "herb grilled chicken" on the menu. I had no idea what the nutrition info was but decided I'd just tweak when I got home--I ate clean for the rest of the day so no prob.

I was shocked to find out how good the stats were: 472 cals, 31g carbs, 18g fat, 43g protein. Not bad for eating out! I'm adding this to the list of "P90X approved dining out foods" along with Noodle and Co's house marinara with whole wheat fettucine and subway's double turkey 6" sub with veggies and mustard. The only issue is the sodium!

This is a list that I'm constantly trying to expand so I'm not constantly chained to the stove, so any suggestions are always welcome!

Stretching tonight was good. I'm off now to get some well-deserved sleep. Field Day tomorrow!

Kenpo/Sleepy

Hello hello!

I'm home alone and trying to vegetate as much as possible after Kenpo. I may go to bed early--feeling really tired! Definitely a day to read/relax.

I'm considering upping calories again because I'm not really gaining weight like I want to. I think I may hold off until my percentages change at the end of the week though--that way I'm not taking liver-destroying levels of protein to exceed 3000 calories! The percentages go to 50/30/20 (carbs/protein/fat) and at that point I'll be an oat-eating machine. Watch out!

I hope you all have a great night!

Day 51 pics/Core Syn

Not much to report today. Core Syn was hard but fun as ever. I took pics finally! No rehearsal tonight either, so we're making burgers! WOO.

Anyway, I'll keep this brief. Enjoy the pics. I may look somber in some of them but I'm quite chipper, really!

Concert in Reading/Lost my keys!/Recovery week

Well, it's recovery week, and I did Yoga today. Went well in general;Yoga Belly 7 is still the bane of my existence! I'm still plugging along and getting better with the half moon poses. Even held crane for a VERY short time!

Yesterday was a concert in Reading, PA--it's about 2 and a half hours away. We rode a bus there and the rehearsal, dinner, and show including bus rides took us from 11 am to 12:30am that evening. I had to eat a WHOLE LOT before I went to bed, so weighing in today didn't seem as accurate as it may have been otherwise--I had 142, but 2 pounds in 1 week? Maybe, but I'll have to see.

I LOST my house keys; it's been a huge fiasco to say the least. I'm going to have to dawdle at school to make sure that I'm here after Laura gets home. What a bummer!

Anyway, here's the nutrition for the weekend. Expect a post tomorrow or the next day with pictures (finally). I know I've been slacking on those!

Kenpo/No AC sucks.

Well, despite having no AC in the house (They're not coming til MONDAY) I managed to start and finish Kenpo, effectively completing week 7. That means next week is a recovery week! Woooooo.

It's been pretty unbearable with no AC. We've shut all the blinds and turned on fans but we can't open windows because of my roommate's severe allergies. We even considered sleeping elsewhere tonight!

And now for something completely different. I'm storytelling a new Vampire: The Masquerade campaign with a bunch of people, which is geeky and exciting. I'm reading all the books to get me back into it and concocting a nice little campaign to run through. Can't wait to roll those d10s! (Such a geek.)

Legs and Back/FINALLY

Today was FINALLY A DAY where I could just work out and relax. I LOVE it! Totally necessary, especially considering that our final subscription concert is this weekend and it'll be an all-day affair involving a bus trip to Reading, PA. We're leaving at 11:30am and we're coming back around midnight. Yeah, that wasn't a typo: midnight.

On the up side, Monday nights will be free for a while after that!

I was concerned because I wasn't hitting the number of reps that I did last week on the first set of pullup/chinups on today's workout, but I brought it on the second half and got a few over each time to make up for it. ROAR

Is it bad that I LIKE the way ab ripper feels now? WHAT is wrong with me?!

I got a very encouraging email from my coach today. :) If you're reading this, I do appreciate it and I'll send you one back when I get a chance!

Yoga X/Concert at Waterloo Elementary!

My kids had their chorus concert tonight and it went FANTASTICALLY. I was thankful to have so many staff members on hand to manage the kids backstage. I was really worried because the usualy people around to help couldn't make it but after an email request I had a raft of people back there. Woo hoo! The music was great. I had my kids singing Gaelic, Italian, spirituals, 2 part, 3 part. No sweat, man!

Yoga was great also. Clearing your mind really helps you maintain difficult balance postures. After tonight's concert I was much more relaxed so I'm glad I did it afterward!

Back and Biceps

Whew man. I came home early and mowed the lawn and then did Back and Biceps. I think I should do it the other way around next time--I was STRUGGLING LIKE CRAZY at the end of the workout today and THEN I had Ab Ripper!

Back and Biceps does make you feel all pumped up afterward though, which is awesome.

I made more P90X pesto tonight and it was delicious as can be. Had to add earth balance to my oatmeal tonight and still barely got over 2800 cals. I think I'm going to have to add something else soon because it looks like I'm still maintaining my weight--I weighed 140 today. Not awful, but if I'm still 140 next week I'll add 100-200 cals.

Back later :)

Plyo X/Nada mucho

Rather uneventful day today. I did plyo which went well and went to rehearsal. We'll be spending all day in PA on the rest day so thank god I set it for that day.

Other than that, it seems to be tough for me to get to my goal calories. Today I had a ton of whey to get to the amount of fat and calories that I needed. Ridiculous!

Chest, shoulders, tris, abs/Yesterday's madness

Hello there.

Well, as you can see, I'm posting this a day late. I seem to be having trouble keeping up for now! Don't worry though, I'm still maniacally logging my foods and doing my workouts.

Yesterday's workout was hard as ever but I'm forcing myself to push more weight in it. I upped several exercises by 5 pounds. Some I simply couldn't raise, though. Surprisingly, I didn't have issues with ab ripper like I usually do on Sundays. Good sign!

I saw hints of the top 4 packs of my 6 pack today. I must've really lowered my body fat! I need to get a caliper.

Still haven't weighed in or taken my pics. I'm saving it for Tuesday this week. Have a good one.

Rest day/Star Trek!

So today was a rest day. I decided to do Stretch X and we went to go see Star Trek. It was really fantastic! Considering JJ Abrams has been messing up his other projects (Heroes) it was refreshing to see some good work. Nice job!

I didn't take the recovery drink today because there was nothing to recover from but I decided to take another carb in its place so that I wasn't down on calories. I saw a hint of me dropping a pound earlier this week so I opted not to drop calories on non-workout days. Let's see if it helps.

Kenpo/I HAD A BEER ><

So I went out tonight and...

I had a beer.

I KNOW I KNOW but it's the first one I've had since I've started and it's not a regular thing. 1 won't kill me! Life will go on... right?

Anyway, Kenpo today. I sweat like a fiend on that workout. Quite satisfying.

Legs and Back/I was busy yesterday!

Sorry, I forgot to post with all the stuff going on!

Yesterday I was doing legs and back and cooking rice and chicken at the same time. It was madness! I got it all done though.

I just paid 80 bucks to get my car's 5000 mile service. Hurts a bit, bit whatever--it's a necessary evil. If you do all the 5000/10000 mile things with a Toyota or Honda, the car usually runs perfectly until death. Let's hope mine does!

Yoga/Saint Beachy

Yoga was okay today but I seemed to have some balance issues on things I'm usually okay with: prayer twist in a lunge and extended right angle pose. On the other hand, I was awesome with my triangle pose. Oh well! I'm getting closer and closer to holding crane and I was okay with the standard half moon today. That's a step in the right direction!

Today I had to run out and eat dinner on the fly because it was the night where my colleague Bill Beachy gives all his strings concerts. We call him Saint Beachy because of his ability to listen to so many amateur instrumentalists. My brain already hurts when I do recorder! His concerts were great. We'll truly miss many of the 5th graders that are quite adept at the violin. They were playing some challenging stuff!

As expected, calories come down by 200 for Yoda and stretch days. Here it is for you.

Back and Biceps/Hulk Smash

ROOOOOOOAR

I love this workout. My arms feel like they're about 50 pounds each from all the pump. Well, see you around; I'm going to go do some hulk-style smashing.

Going out to eat tonight for the first time in AGES. Noodles and Co! I'm getting a small whole wheat noodles with marinara topped with chicken. I didn't know that it'd be so refreshing to not have to cook tonight considering my love for cooking!

See ya.

Plyo X/Rain, Rain

Hello hello!

Well, it's going to be raining for a week straight. Fortunately, all my workouts are inside! Unfortunately, the lawn's going to be ridiculous when I get to it. Oh well.

Plyo was today. Great as ever! I sweat like crazy, of course. I'm following my workout with beef (GASP); deal with it. My 93% lean burgers with onion and worcestershire sauce are pretty healthy if you ask me. I make them 3 oz each and have two on whole wheat english muffins!

Anyway, I have to get ready for rehearsal. Have a good one!

Chest, shoulders, tris, abs/Day 35 pics and weigh-in

Chest. Shoulders, Tris is definitely the hardest workout. My arms kill me after Back and Biceps but Chest, Shoulders, Tris makes it so my arms feel like they're going to fall off. I pushed myself to the limit today!

Good news: I'm 140 pounds! That means I gained around 2 pounds this week. No changes to my diet for now!

Day 35 pics. I know I took pics 5 days ago but Sundays are the traditional day, so I did them anyway. I'm pleased mostly with the definition in my abs and my sartorial muscles. Things seem to be setting up correctly. Now to kill that body fat and gain muscle :D

(If you're wondering why I look crazy sunburnt, it's because I was trying to mess with the shadows/highlights to show actual contours of muscle and I suck at photo editing. Today was horribly overcast and I wanted to show something more than a dark, washed out picture of white flesh.)

A bit of catchup.

So yesterday's Kenpo was interesting. I was without a protein shake pre-workout and had no DVD with me so I literally mixed something up right when I got to Tom's (thankfully I had a ton of whey on hand) and 45 minutes or so later I had Tom read off all the things that occur in the workout and did them without the DVD. It took about 50 minutes or so. I had no idea when I was supposed to do the jumping jacks/jumping rope/jumping X's so I just did them after every 5 moves or so. I was sweaty as can be afterward so it must've been fine.

Today was a rest day. Watched Persepolis which was pretty awesome and did a little mother's day shopping in the District. I roasted some sweet potatoes tonight which was pretty awesome. I think that the nutrition info for sweet potatoes is a little off on myfitnesspal--shouldn't a relatively large sweet potato be more like 200 calories?

Anyway, no workout, so the calorie count was a little lower today. The workout I dred (Chest, Shoulders, Tris) is tomorrow so wish me luck!