Good morning! Anyone do anything exciting last night? We had our typical Friday night here. After Peter got home, we took a family trip to the grocery store for our weekly groceries. Yes, we spent our Friday afternoon together doing errands. Even the most mundane tasks can be special when done with loved ones. #cheesybuttrue

On the way home, we stopped to pick up the standard Friday night dinner.

Many runners fuel up with pasta the night before long runs. I fuel up with Subway. Whenever we don’t have leftovers available for a quick Friday dinner, we rely on Subway.

Last night’s sandwich came with a side of personal training studying before tuning out with some of Chef Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares.

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Have you seen this show? It disturbs me greatly. Some restaurants are just plain nasty. It makes you wonder how certain places keep in business. I also wonder how many of the restaurants that go on the show actually keep up their “new and improved” habits?

All the above is to say I am obviously the epitome of exciting.  

To keep the excitement bubbling, I hit the hay earlier than normal to do the usual Saturday morning thing. Wake up early. Eat some peanut butter and English muffin. Break out the capris for the first chilly long run of the season.

This week was a recovery week so I “only” had to hit 6 miles. <--- I hate saying “only” 6 miles. That’s such a ridiculous statement. But that’s all besides the point…

For my run, I guess those two days of rest left me feeling refreshed. I ran six mile with an average 9:00 minute pace. I even came home and took fifteen minutes to stretch and foam roll. I really want to stay focused on that after the tightness I experienced this week. Then, you can likely guess what followed that.

But of course a big bowl of oatmeal and more pumpkin spiced coffee without a need for Starbucks. This morning’s oatmeal featured a dollop each of cranberry butter and peanut butter, a sprinkle of raisins, and half a crumbled slice of Pumpkin Carrot Cake Bread. I can now face the weekend with a smile on my face. Not that I wouldn’t anyways. I have some fun things coming my way today! You’ll see.  

• Do you ever watch cooking/food challenge or other similar shows? What is your favorite? Back when we had cable, I LOVED the show Chopped.
• Do you like to go out or stay in normally on a Friday night?

Good morning and happy Friday! I didn’t even think today was already Friday when I woke up, but then Peter assured me that, yes, it is in fact Friday. Works for me! That meant I could have my big bowl of oatmeal right away this morning.

Normally I have a pre-workout snack of some sort in the mornings – a bar, a couple handfuls of cereal/granola, a piece of fruit, etc – and save my oats for when I come home from the gym and can actually sit down and enjoy them. It also makes me not feel like I’m working out with a brick in my stomach. Rest days I get to dive right on in. And do you see it???

My peanut butter had a special little message for me.

I guess it knew I needed that today. Time for a little heart to heart talk.

I ended up taking an unplanned rest day yesterday because my right calf still felt super tight and tender. Logically, I knew I needed to take the day because I would rather have one day off than push a four mile run and weights workout only to get injured or even more pain. It made perfect sense and I was cool with the decision…until sometime in the afternoon.

This is me saying I still go a little mental sometimes and deal with things like exercise guilt. By the time afternoon rolled around, I felt fine and questioned whether I really needed the day off or if I had “lazily” taken a day. The exercise guilt started setting in and overtaking the logical side of my brain.

I started to let myself feel like I had been too lax lately and that I had lost my Body After Baby progress to my happy weight. Even though I’m fitting comfortably in my favorite pair of jeans – the #1 pair of goal jeans I had for myself.

I had already taken an unplanned rest day this past Sunday and felt like taking another was letting myself down…or possibly you all down. Was I being “lazy”? You know… because spending an hour chasing a toddler at the park is lazy, of course!

Basically – I got hit with the ridiculous stick and was in crazy land for a bit there. I guess we’re never fully immune to the body image and exercise/food guilt struggles that have dug their way in before. My oatmeal’s subliminal messaging pulled me out of that you’re-being-WAY-too-hard-on-yourself haze just in the nick of time. Because now I have to see if I can pull myself out of the why-are-you-waking-up-before-6am-baby-B??? haze.

• Give me either your favorite “love yourself” quote or just something you love about yourself this morning. Let’s burn the “ridiculous sticks” that like to try to beat us every now and again!