Workout Round-up: Making Things Work (as best as I can)

Welcome to a late workout recap for the last two weeks. Things didn’t quite work as I was caught up my black hole of TV series and then other projects and social experiments and doing everything other than working out. Week 2 did have some great improvement. Film festival season so expect a lot of walking logged for part of next recap also.

WEEK 1

Wednesday: Zumba

WEEK 2

Tuesday: Walking

It was a busy week so the only thing that I managed to kick off the week was doing some walking. It wasn’t a whole lot but the day took me for a few errands which rounded to about 5 kilometers. Its not a huge amount but its still something. I was speed-walking most of the distance.

Wednesday: Weights & Calisthenics

3 rounds each

Bicep Curls (15 reps @ 5lbs each hand)
Squats (20 reps)
Tricep Extensions (15 reps @5lbs)
Pushups (15 reps)

Friday/Saturday/Sunday: Festival and Walking

Friday: 6km total

Saturday: 2.5km total

Sunday: 2.2km total

This wraps up these past two weeks.
It might seem like I didn’t really do much but to be fair, I do a lot of walking for this festival as the theatres are well distanced from each other and I chose the films by movie preference and not theatre location.

Workout Roundup

I apologize for the tardy post. These two weeks have been about digging really deep. I’m not going to lie that getting back into working out has been a mega hard uphill trek. As much as I acknowledge the necessity of it, there is always that lack of motivation. As I try hard to stay accountable here (and trust me, it really helps), I’m trying to also find back the push to make me want to find that perfect balance of workout that doesn’t put into a boring routine same thing every week but still enough to keep me challenged and motivated.

Weights & Cardio

Done with 5lbs dumbbells

Weights

After a series of days postponing workouts, I had to get in a few days in a row to feel less guilty. With that said, I’ve been trying to strengthen my arms a little so I went back to do another short arms weights workout. I chose the Tone It Up Sculpt Your Arms Workout.

Here’s the link of the Love (and Sculpt) Your Arms Workout!

So I did 15 reps with 5 lbs weight for 3 rounds.

September 7 to 9: DreamHack Event Coverage

This past weekend was DreamHack Montreal. As with event coverage, time runs a little thin on hardcore workout but cardio and excessive amounts of walking and stair climbing was definitely put in the mix here. I realized that I forgot to set my health app after I switched phones so I don’t have an actual amount of distance or step count.

For accountability purpose:

Friday: attended for 4 hours and sat about 20 minutes for eat and watch an esports match
Saturday: attended for 7 hours and sat about an hour or so for events and game trials
Sunday: attended for 2 hours and didn’t sit much at all. It was a quick in and out to grab remaining coverage

Overall…

I can’t say the last two weeks was a riveting success but getting one workout in a week is already a step forward to getting back into a routine slowly. That’s generally the idea. I realize that when I go too intense, the schedule gets warped and I just end up feeling bad that I let something slip whether it be a blog post or editing a video or keeping up with chores so I’ve actually been feeling great about the baby steps back into a solid workout schedule. Maybe in two weeks, I’ll be back and doing two workouts a week. I think thats a solid goal to set. 🙂

Workout Roundup: A month later….

I think with this one done, we’re pretty much all caught up with this one month Fantasia break and getting things back on track to be right back to normal.

Clarification #1: I may not have updated it here but I didn’t completely turn into a slob.

Between Fantasia Festival and work, I actually did get some working out done. I did a weekly Zumba session of 30 minutes whenever I had time to slot it in. While I don’t remember the list of songs or the length of the whole thing, it was my attempt to keep on working out at the very least, especially since there was a wedding at the beginning of August to attend. However, working out may have decreased but we did step into the direction of eating healthier. So progress in general.

Clarification #2: Fantasia is a pretty physical activity!

The last clarification is that while Fantasia Film Festival as it says is really watching movies. The pre movie stuff includes speed walking almost every day of the event from work in Old Montreal to Concordia University to make sure that I got there in time to get in the movie. With that said, my speed walking time improved crazily. The cardio I put in was fascinating as I speed walked 30 minutes almost every day and then had to do the same after the movies to catch the bus back home. That’s an hour of some intense walking pace. Fun stuff…especially by the last few days of the episode when I was running on like 4 hours of sleep or something. Then we have the waiting around part which involves a lot of standing. I kid you not..my calves were cramping for the entire week after the festival ended.

With that said! Things have calmed down and we’re back to business and workout round-ups are resuming now. I might put them back to biweekly round-ups as I work through slotting in more workout sessions.

Let’s start on last Sunday..because well, that was when I got back into the determined mind set to get back into the groove of working out more than once a week.

Sunday: Pool Workout

The weather is no longer murderously hot so the pool was on the cool side but still, I wanted to head in to destress and workout. Water has a cool and calming effect and boy, did I need it!

Moves picked up a combination of Popsugar Fitness Pool Workout Videos.

Here’s what I did:

• Jog (in-pool) 5 laps
• Core Rotation (30 reps each side alternating)
• Jump with Knee Tucks (40 reps)
• Shuffle
• Superman Kicks (30 seconds)
• Jog 5 laps
• Straight Leg Kick (30 reps each side alternating)
• Core Rotation (30 reps each side alternating)
• Jump with Knee Tucks (40 Reps)
• Superman Kicks (30 seconds)
• Breaststroke (5 laps)
• Freestyle Swimming

Monday: Zumba

Sunday: Weight Training

There you go! That’s how the week went down!

Two workouts is pretty decent for myself honestly. This week was a little rough for our home so, I’m fairly happy that I still managed to do this. Honestly, that is what I’m hoping to achieve on a weekly basis: a cardio workout and a weight training. Cardio can be something like Zumba or running but it can also be a long walk. So we’ll see what I come up with. Its honestly finding the motivation to keep going on and just staying active. Eventually, I’ll move it to three times a week. Especially with hiking in our plans, I’m hoping that things will be good once things once again settle down because apparently the theme of 2018 is not a moment of nothing.

Weekly Workout Recap – Week 4: When Everyday Life Takes Priority

Four weeks in and its already starting to feel like things are going downhill quick a la slippery slope style.

With that said, I had anticipated that it may be a lull this week. Its not really an excuse but I had another cavity filling session that I had mentioned previously in my Weekly Adventures and the whole numbing my jaw thing really knocks out my motivation and makes me feel all loopy.

Still, lets just see how it went down.

Monday

Rest & Recording
For those of you who know, I co-host two podcasts and one of them had our biggest episode yet with the sheer material to cover today. Nothing like a 2 hour recording session to push back the entire evening schedule. It was a fun show and if its already released, I’ll have the link right under here.

Tuesday

Another rest day (unfortunately) due to cavity filling after work and then hours for the anesthesia to wear off.

Wednesday

Booty (2 rounds of 20 reps)
Single Leg Deadlift (each side)
Weighted Sumo Squat
Single Leg Squat + Kick (each side)
Side Plank Lateral Lifts (each side)
Inner Thigh Openers

Thursday

So many rest days this week.

Friday

Legs (1 rounds of 20 reps)
Stationary Lunge (each side)
Squat Up Downs
Side Lunge (each side)
Side Plank Inner Thigh Lifts (each side)
Tuck Jumps

Saturday

A beautiful weekend brought in a little landscaping in the garden. It took both time and a lot of strength to get it all done so skipped on the actual working out for garden labor. Gardening update tomorrow and you’ll see it all!

Sunday

Hiking is official back tentatively every other week meaning this Sunday was a hiking day. We headed out to Parc Regional Mont-Ham and the post is coming up soon once I sort through the pictures and put them together.

Hike was 6.9 kms in total and took us 4 hours to go up and down. This is a pretty intensive hike as there is a lot of rock climbing and steep uphills. However, you will see in the post that is coming up in a day or two that it actually takes you to the summit with a cross planted there and its a true 360 degree view. Worth all the energy and hard work! 🙂

Thats it for this week!
I’m starting to stray from the Tone It Up Bikini Series a little.
However, life does take priority sometimes especially for my own well-being (even if its not physical exercise).
Next week is less crazy hopefully so I should be able to get back to running as long as it doesn’t rain everyday.

Weekly Workout Recap #3: Hiking Season Begins!

Week 3 is among us! So far so good, I would have to say that! This week is going to be trying to find some more of the groove. I’d have to say that the first month of establishing the workout routine is probably the most tiring and a lot of juggling around with other commitments. Once the schedule and routine solidifies, its a lot easier to work with it. Of course, that is to say that, I do diverge away from the TIU Bikini Series routine every once in a while for things that I’m working on that day. For myself, I think its fine. If I can, I’ll do the whole thing, if not, at least I’m using it as the body weights and weight training portion since that is the portion I struggle to figure out a routine most of the time.

Week 3

Monday

The First Hike of 2018
Mont Megantic National Park – Le Mont Megantic Trail – full loop 10.7 kms (Recap)

With my husband’s schedule going back to normal, we are determined to go hiking much more frequently then previous years. Our first hike, after much debate, was to Mont Megantic. Its a pretty cool spot. We ended up doing the intermediate trail Le Mont-Megantic but I’d say we did about 10 kms total as we didn’t go up the final slope to the observatory but rather only the first viewpoint. It was a pretty tough trail to start the season though. However, the view is gorgeous and it would be a lovely experience to go during its observatory festival about space and such. The trail is lined with streams on both sides and the path is quite rugged. We actually still had snow for parts of the trail. Anyways, I’ll have a post for it going up.

Tuesday
Booty
5 Toning Moves (2 rounds of 15 reps)

Booty Band Shuffles (30 seconds)
Curtsy Lunge + Leg Lift (each side)
Booty Kickback (each side)
Single-Leg Bridge (each side)
Bridge Openers

This was supposed to be 3 rounds of 15 reps however the hike yesterday was pretty tough so I cut one round.

Wednesday

15 minutes walk/run scheduled = pushed to Thursday

Total Body
2 rounds of 15 reps (supposed to be 3 rounds; cut the last round as my knees were having some weird pain)

Squat + Press
Reverse Lunge + Curl (each side)
Single Leg Deadlift + Row (each side)
Bikini Walkout + Plank Jack
Shoulder Tap (each side)

Thursday

15 mins walk today in the form of an after work errand that I had to run.
Had a few other errands to run so ended up running out time to do a workout. Planning to combine it with Friday’s 5 moves to do a super-sized workout.

Friday

[Thursday’s workout] Cardio + Abs (2 rounds of 15 reps)

Squat Jacks
High Knees (30 seconds)
Mountain Climbers (each side)
Down Dog + Spiderwoman (each side)
Bicycles (each side)

Saturday

With heading out of town to Ottawa and having to come back to do some bits of catch-up on my to-do list, I didn’t end up getting a workout done.

Sunday

[Saturday’s workout] Abs (2 rounds of 15 reps)

V-Sit Crunch
Toe Touch
Plank Up Down
Side Plank Hip Dip (each side)
Rock the Boat (each side)

Cardio HIIT (3 rounds of 15 reps)

Skaters (each side)
Booty Kicks (each side)
Jump Squat
Burpee/Pushup (mod to first round of burpees and second round of pushups)
Plank Jack

Overall…

This week has been a tough one! The hiking on Monday wiped me out quite a bit and the recuperation took some time. I ended up not actually doing the 3 rounds of 15 reps at all. I didn’t end up running either. It was slightly disappointing but through all the fatigue from the hike, I still pushed myself to do at least 2/3 of the workout as much as I could, and if I didn’t, I did a lot of extra walking for whatever errands and such. Its not great but it was going to happen. Next week, I’ll be back on track, I promise!

That’s it for this week’s workout recap!

Weekly Workout Recap: Week 2

Hello everyone! Week 2 is here! I’m actually updating as I go along every day so its becoming a really nice journal log that you all get to see at the end of the week when I finish the Sunday workout during cooldown. A pretty nice cool down (after stretches), I’d say. Its been only one week and maybe its the mindset that I’m being more active than I had been so its putting me in a much more positive mood about everything.

If you didn’t catch my first week for this segment revival, you can find it here.

Tone It Up Bikini Series goes on for 8 weeks from what I remember so we are heading into Week 2. As I do these workouts, I’m also making sure to start building up the routine for next month so that I won’t stop although I’m debating whether to stick with a regular month of Tone It Up for fun and see how that goes. Less rambling this time and let’s start Week 2!

Bikini Series – Week 2

Monday
Booty (2 rounds of 25 reps/move)

Bridge Openers
Down Dog Booty Lifts (each side)
Squat Up-Downs (each side)
Booty Band Shuffle (each side)
Standing Booty Lifts (each side)

Tuesday
Arms & Abs  Rest Day

2.3 km walk at lunch

I know how this routine is supposed to be a hardcore 8 weeks thing but seeing as I haven’t worked out a ton and my wrist was starting to hurt from either gardening or some exercise thing, I decided to take the Arms day off just to recuperate and prevent any possible injuries, because that would just make everything worse.

Wednesday

Run: 23:53 mins for 3.97km
I did a little longer run. Ended up skipping the 5 toning moves.

Thursday
Abs (2 round of 25 reps)

Ball Rollout Equipment issues, changed to Push-ups
Mountain Climbers
Ball Pike Equipment issues, changed to Oblique Twists
V-Sit Crunch
Toe Touch

Friday
Total Body HIIT (2 rounds of 25 reps)

Single Leg Deadlift + Row (each side)
Squat Jacks (30 seconds)
Bridge + Chest Press
Bikini Walkout + Tummy Toners
Jump Rope (30 seconds)

Saturday
Cardio Abs + Arms (2 rounds of 25 reps)

Plank Jack
Bicycles
Knee to Elbow Crunch (each side)
Bicep Curls
Forward to Lateral Raise

Sunday

Rest day! (kind of…)
No 5K run/walk due to resting up for tomorrow’s hiking day trip.
No 5 moves as well as did 4 hours of gardening (gardening update tomorrow).

Overall…

This was a pretty good week. I kept up with a lot of the daily workouts and pushed through the more tired days, which helped to give myself a lot more energy. The running was also really good since I did a good pace that I was happy with. I’m starting to eat healthier as well. Definitely a great second week. I’ll check back next week with another update!

Getting into Shape 2018: Weekly Workout Revival

Hey everyone!

Its been at least 5 years or more since I wrote a Weekly Workout Recap segment. And that really is because the last few years, its been a horribly unhealthy and health ridden days. It killed my motivation and whatnot. I did do a ton of running and zumba in 2015 in preparation for the whole wedding thing. I feel like I did at some point revive the segment trying to get back into the groove of things, but it didn’t last for the above reasons again. Either way, my lack of health and fitness has lately really affected how I feel about myself so weekly updates, WE ARE BACK!

I’m not tracking by the balance and losing weight. My goal is to just feel good about myself and feeling toned and strong. I don’t necessarily feel that how much I weigh will do that, actually I never have, because if I build muscle, I’ll gain weight but it’ll be good weight as opposed to just building more fat. Either way, I’m trying to eat a little cleaner and less processed foods. The past year, I’ve tried to get back into the groove of things with my sheer desire and wanted to create my own little workout thing and the indecisiveness made it just take too long to start and then too late to begin without sacrificing the little sleep that I get. Then I tried to just keep to a schedule but things always got in the way, finally went back to my go to with the Nike Training program and I just couldn’t stay motivated, mostly because the workouts felt like they were out of my league and then I’d be in too much pain to do the next one in the schedule without risking injury.

Anyways, its already a pretty long story but point is, back then, I started out being super motivated when I did some Pumps and Iron or Tone It Up workout so I’m going back to where I had started and trying to complete the Bikini Series for Tone It Up which just started. And to stay accountable, I’ll share the workout progress. If you want to join in, they actually have a TIU app which tracks your fitness goals and has the daily workouts and 5 toning moves that changes every day.

Bikini Series – Week 1

Monday (didn’t jot down the moves so just working with memory for Monday and Tuesday)
Arms (2 rounds of 15 reps)

Bicep Curls
Shoulder Pulses
Reverse Flyes
Squat Presses
–can’t remember what the last thing is–

Tuesday
Total Body (2 rounds of 15 reps)

Reverse lunges with curls
Pushups
Bikini Walkouts + Tummy Tucks
Squat Jacks
Bicycles

Wednesday

Didn’t have time for 5 Toning Moves
Ended up doing a 1.5 km walk at lunch

Thursday
Total Body (2 rounds of 15 reps)

Walk 2.5 km at lunch

Single-Leg Deadlift (each side)
Weighted Chop (each side)
Side Plank Crunch (each side)
Plank Row (each side)
High Knees (30 seconds)

Pushing through my own lack of motivation and got a late quick workout in despite getting home late from the dentist and having a late dinner. The small triumphs are what builds habits in my mind. 🙂

Friday
Yoga and Abs (2 rounds of 15 reps)

Bikini Walkout + Plank Jack
Shoulder Taps (each side)
V-Sit
Rock the Boat (each side)
Seated Side Opener (30 seconds each side)

Saturday
HIIT & Abs (2 rounds of 15 reps)

Squat Jacks (30 seconds)
Mountain Climbers (each side)
Toe Touches
Squat Jacks (30 seconds)
Down Dog Booty Lifts (each side)

(extra: do 30 seconds mountain climbers after each round)

Sunday
Arms & Cardio

5KM Run & Walk (or as my Nike running app says 4.69km)
Total time: 33:15 mins

(2 rounds of 25 reps)
Shoulder taps (each side)
Plank taps (each side)
Bridge & Press
Bent-over Row
Cross-body Curls (each side)

Overall…

This week was a lot of making myself get back into the groove. I don’t think that realistically working seven days a week even if its just 15 minutes sometimes works but I’m going to try my best and also start adding in not only the 5 daily toning moves but also some Tone It Up workouts. Thats the plan for the next 3 weeks until the Bikini Series is done. Week 2 of Bikini Series is out. Check it out HERE. Arms and abs have always been my weakness so those double duty things like walkouts and Down Dog Booty Lifts were the hardest workouts of this week that I needed to really push myself to complete. For the record, I don’t have resistance bands, or I might have them but I can’t remember where it is. So just to not murder myself, I did some of these just normal without the added resistance. I’m pretty happy with just staying on track for week 1.

That’s it for Week 1 recap!
It definitely feels both painful and awesome to be working out again.
Can’t say that I’m particularly in the groove since most days I still want to just not do it but end up finding some motivation.
Let’s keep me accountable! And well, tell me if you are working out to stay fit as well. Let’s encourage each other!

My Weekly Adventures [on hold]: The Ugliness of Being Sick

This week is all about being calm and quiet.  My mind not so much but activities, yes.  Trust me, its a good thing. With a breakdown (physical or mental) feeling like its looming in the background earlier in the week, I tried to take it easy and find some routine back in life so that I can avoid it. But, the title already says it all…I lost that battle in a really really bad way eventually…

Still, lets take a look at this week.

1) Running Update: Week 3

The rain, my friends! Its been my absolute enemy.  I used to do dragonboat so drizzle, I could work with but its just been downpours. I ended up doing my Tuesday run around my house.  Like I literally ran up and down the stairs then circles around the dining table and my den and my bed then back and forth in the basement, etc then repeat. I was jogging doing chores with one hand because I needed to have the Running App track my movement with the other hand.  It was crazy and I probably looked ridiculous but it was done in the end.

The second thing I’m learning (again) is commitment.  Training is a choice and a dedication.  One that means you trade off certain things and rearrange life to do this because it means something. Just like any goal, right? So with that said, despite the stupid migraine plaguing me on Friday and I eventually just took the night off after starting to feel a little sick.  I actually felt better on Saturday and went for my run, which turned out to be a huge mistake.  You’ll see… especially since I managed to go do groceries and run a few errands before realizing my body was not too happy.

2) Updating the Appearance

I’ve talked about this for two years at least.  My stuff on the side bar was from 2013! 2013!!!! Can you believe that? That’s when I started losing touch with blogging a little but this week, I sat down and took care of it.  Change the header picture last week and then updated a few things and rearranged stuff around.  Now it’s better! I’m not changing the theme since I just changed it last year or something. I’m happy with where this is all going. My indexes are all back up to date and will be updated on a weekly basis as promised and trust me, that Disney baking project! I’ll get that Snow White recipe done! 🙂 I literally have all the ingredients and even a little more for a little baking extra (once my energy level increases).

3) Garden Update

There was a lot of rain in the past week.  I mean, a lot.  So, the good part was my garden was so alive.  Everything grew like crazy.

Lettuce after all the rain

Cucumber Plant

Ground Cherry

We’re starting to harvest the lettuce and its delicious. Both the iceberg and romaine are awesome.  The cucumber plant is having some flowers now so its all good.  And the ground cherries are looking lovely.  My issue is that last year, we had that but it never ripened before it fell.  So I’m hoping to figure out why that happens and fix it.

4) A Little Visitor (who could be my strawberry eater)

Can you see it?

I went out for a little bit of fresh air and to catch some pics for the garden update.  And who knew that I turned around to look at the mess of moving over a plant to free up space for my raspberry eventually and something brown moved around in my peripheral vision, kind of. Its a little bunny.  I have neighborhood rabbits.  I know that because they hang out right in my garden here.  I’ve been suspecting the rabbits are the ones responsible for eating ALL of my strawberries but I guess I can’t get angry when its a cute little one like that…

5) Being Sick with the Not So Forgotten Gastroentritis

Being sick sucks.  We can all agree with that. Its been a while I haven’t had gastro not to mention one that took a billion years to build up to the actual symptoms resulting in my taking a day off work today (as I write this after sleeping and lounging around the entire day). It has not been easy.  From migraines to realizing I had a minor fever on Saturday and having slept 12 hours but still lasted into Sunday and then the fever tapering off and my date with the bathroom began for hours.  It was memorable and painful and I just couldn’t work up the energy to go to work nor did I want to pass on whatever bug I had to my coworkers because I’m not that evil. Its taken me a whole day with some congee, a good amount of warm water, sitting around lounging in bed and watching Netflix and wondering if it was actually over.

As I write this up, I’m rebuilding my energy and my health because gastro is ridiculously damaging especially since I already have the underlying IBS so my digestive system is already bad.  Either way, I don’t know how regular my posts will be this week.  I have the content.  I just need to write it and that takes energy that I’m not sure I have right now.  So I apologize if things are a little slower here this week.  Bear with me as I work hard to recover.  Perhaps, I’ll take this opportunity to write about vacation since that takes a whole lot less time than reviews.

Upcoming:

• Orange is the New Black Season 3 TV Binge
• The Fault in Our Stars Book Review
• Day in Seattle Vacation posts

That’s it for this weekly adventures! Stay Healthy!! 🙂