Earn the Burn: This is Yogabitch

Hi friends, before we get started, will you do me a favor and go follow any one of my social media sites today; please and thank you... links in the pretty circles to the right ->

I want to introduce you to someone I make snarky comments to several times a week. She's calm and encouraging, and gives great constructive criticism. Yet is a perfect example of why I don't go to the gym.

could she be anymore obnixoulsy supportive?

This is who I affectionately call Yogabitch. I'm slowly getting back into shape and the Wii U Fit has been a big part of my progress. Being a single mom hinders my ability to go out for a run, take a class, and my single mom budget hinders my ability to afford the gym membership plus daycare (is $10 per dropoff really necessary?)

So my most common workout happens at home, on the WiiU balance board, with Yogabitch. She instructs and encourages, and makes it so easy for me to take out my personal frustrations on. There's something so annoying about Yoga being hard for me... is that just me?  Stretching shouldn't be difficult, yet I find myself sore, sweaty, and being judgingly encouraged by Yogabitch.

It's funny to me how one calm voice, of a computer animated woman, can get under my skin. But I feel it has much to do with me facing my own inadequacies more than her being incorrect. However, my inadequacies taken out on a computer generated, non feeling personality, makes things just a little bit easier. She gives me a chance to be angry and get my frustration of daily duldrums out. Besides Yoga should get easier at some point right?

What helps you work out?

 Does calmness help you when you're frustrated?

Starting 2014 off with a challenge

I don't make resolutions, because to be frank I never quite take them seriously. I'm always amazed that so many people seem to. Many of the bloggers I read did a 'wrap up' of last years goals and how many they accomplished. I was in awe, and just like so many other things lately, I thought, "if they can, maybe I can to". 

So this is my start. However a year seems like an overwhelming amount of time to commit. So I'm starting with a 30 day goal, well joining a 30day goal. Hopefully they'll grow from there, but this seems much more feasible. I hope you take a minute read more about the Hoopy New Year Challenge and consider joining. No time like the present to become a new hooper!



So starting tonight, I will hoop at least 30minutes a day for 30days in January! The hooping.com community hosts these a few times a year so I'm looking forward to joining them. I'll keep you all updated throughout the month and may even add extra little goals, tricks I want to learn or a number of new places to hoop.  I'm looking forward to staring the year off on a good hooping rhythm!

What are some of your goals for early 2014?

Are you a resolution-er or very anti?

Have you ever picked up a hoop?

Hooping Love - Fitspiration

My hooping was mentioned in my piece about the collection of fairly random classes . However I guess I didn't quite expand on hooping and how it has become part of my life.
Hooping has created a safe and quiet space in my workout that creates a ray of light even on my roughest days. There is something so meditative about being stuck in a circle and creating expression through movement. A sense of prideful accomplishment with new tricks and a larger drive to keep
trying when it didn't pan out. There's always something new to learn and what's more exciting is someone new to learn from.

There is a super rad "love note"  from a hoop blogger Anah, my favorite excerpt:

"I felt with anyone holding a simple plastic circle. This person could be old or young, any race, any political affiliation and of any gender. If they had a hoop, they were family… period. Just like any family, some felt closer than others, but the love was always there" 

Earn the Burn - I think I'm becoming a runner

I never expected to be a runner, I felt it was boring, and stagnant as I've said before, I prefer trying a wide array of odd classes. However sometimes even a quick class can be complicated to make time for and get motivated to get in the car for. A few months ago I stumbled across Fit dash Personality - a tumbler page from a hilarious 20something runner, who's main message was something I could not only understand but totally agreed with:

Slowly but surely her lifestyle and exercise plan seemed do-able. The super clean eating may take some time to get used to, but I'm doing much better than I used to be. Running however has been actually happening (which is shocking to me). So here goes my newest fitness proclamation! I will surprise myself with my ability to run, eat better, and commit to be fit.

Here are a few tips that I've collected that really made me feel confident I can do this:

1- ACTUALLY GO! The hardest part for me was actually putting on my shoes and stepping out the front door. Your first run will be the hardest, so rip off that bandaid and get out there.

2- Start sloooow: even if you're an athlete and go to the gym, learning to run is not easy on your body. If you try to commit to 5 days a week to start off, you'll likely get burnt out and give up.I started on Tuesday, then ran again Friday and have kept that up for almost 8 weeks now. Make it managable and you're much more likely to succeed.

3- Pace yourself: I took about 2.5 miles for my first run and found a tip that recommended you run until your get winded, run another 15 seconds and then walk until you can run again. This has worked very well for me, I've shaved almost a full 2 minutes off my average mile.

4- Track yourself: I'm a huge fan of the Nike+ Running app. I take my phone with me anyway for music so, its super simple to just let the app run while I do. It shows me my route, average speed, and speeds throughout my route (sprints and slow downs etc). Regardless of what you use, be sure to keep note of how long it took you, how far you went and how you feel. Nothing keeps me motivated like watching myself improve. 

5- Reward yourself: I'm a single mom and often feel guilty "splurging" on myself for no reason, however if I've earned it it feels much more justified. So I've started setting goals, which allow me to really strive for something and stay motivated. So here goes my newest fitness goal proclamation!

Goal #1: 3 runs each week for 2 months 

Reward #1: New workout tanks from Rome&Romie

I'll post new goals as I make them, but every plan has to start somewhere. What are some goals (and rewards) of yours? In fitness or general life?

Sure I'll try it!

I have a theory about learning new things... my theory essentially is "why not?" - I want to try everything once. Sometimes only once but still once. This is a theory I try to press on to Pretty Girl constantly so she too wants to try everything, even if it's only once.

Napa just happens to be a great place to have this particular theory.  We happen to have a very wide and sometimes quite surprising range of classes offered. Most of the ones I have tried, and gotten Pretty Girl to try are physical. However there is a whole other group of artistic bases offerings that I have  yet to scratch the surface of.

For me fitness and motivation have never been easy, going to the gym 3 days a week only happened when I had a gym buddy who literally came by and picked me up.  Here are a few of our favorites and why I love them:

  Sunglow Hoop Dance: Lilea has an amazing passion for hooping! She's amazingly willing to share that passion with locals and teach so many adults that you can do it and it just takes a little coaching. She also hosts partys and performs throughout town. Hooping has been a great addition to my fitness regime something easy to do but is great on your core and has childcare built right in!

Dance: Really any dance, but latest discover has been a great class from World Beat Dance Collective. A delicious look into dances from so many cultures from Afro-cuban and Samba to Hip Hop, throw in a Yoga warm up and cool down and my legs are sore for days.

Some of the best classes for Little P have been dance and swim. She loves music and loves to dance so we've tried a couple different sources. The first class we were in was cancelled due to a small class. So she recently started Hip Hop with Young Champions - its turning out to be a great program for her and she's really excited.

Our other big class has been Swim Lessons. We love to travel and I hope to travel wit her as much as I did when I was young. Swim lessons was a requirement for us. So she swim in each of the 7 seas and every pool in every hotel!

Please take the next class you find interesting, try out a class, grab a friend and go look silly. You'll make great friends and be amazed at what you can do.
Or at least just have a great time hanging out!