Yet another beautiful day in the neighborhood this morning. 🙂 I had my normal Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday workout scheduled for today – a full body workout and a run. I split up the two earlier this week, but don’t want to do that on Saturdays. So, I drove to the gym and ran a quick 3.2 mile loop on the roads by the gym. Then, I headed indoors for my weights workout. I ended up with this for today:

After my workout I came home and had a breakfast fail. I had reached the bottom of my peanut butter jar.

That meant OIAJ of course. Since we still don’t have produce, I figured I would do a strawberry yogurt mixed with the oats to get some flavor instead.

Well, the yogurt cooled the oats down. Non-hot oats = non-melty peanut butter = can’t scoop up all the good stuff. That’s the WHOLE point of OIAJ!! At least it still tasted good, despite not being able to savor melty gobs of peanut butter at the end.

And now I must get on with my Saturday…and the week’s features, but of course!

Featured Move: Kick It!

I find kickboxing a very fun and effective workout. You don’t have to take a class or do a DVD though to get the benefits. I have been known to add the moves in the video clip to standard workouts as an extra cardio boost between weights moves or to work the midsection a bit more.

And I do NOT know why the voice is all squeaky and fast in the video. Annoying!

Featured Moment: Body After Baby Progress

Continuing to make progress in my Body After Baby journey. Most importantly…continuing that progress in a balanced, healthy, and realistic way. 

Featured Meal: Springtime Lemon Raspberry Muffins

I’ve had lots of yummy eats this week. Goat cheese + pesto sandwiches. Goat cheese, artichoke, & mushroom stuffed chicken. But you all know I’m a breakfast lover first, so my Springtime lemon Raspberry muffins win the honor. Have you tried them yet?

Featured Cuteness: Nap Time

Last Sunday afternoon, after the fabulous time change, i crashed for a three hour nap with Makenzie. Peter managed to sneak a shot of us sleeping. So special!

Featured Reading: Julie @ Peanut Butter Fingers – The Comparison Trap

Many of you have likely already seen this post because Julie has such a fabulous blog, but in case you haven’t – read it!

Question of the Day – Do you like kickboxing workouts?

This week I have started trying something new with my workout schedule. I quickly learned how much I prefer running outdoors. Problem? I need someone to watch the kiddos for that to happen. Solution? Going in the afternoon. You may recall how much I hated afternoon workouts before because I felt I lost the entire evening. Luckily, I have found a way to make it work with running.

Now, I go to the gym in the morning for my weights workout, then go out for a quick 30 minute run in the afternoon. It works out quite nicely because I get to run outside and still have time for la familia in the afternoon. Win-win-win. I used this method on Tuesday to head to the gym for a quick full body weights workout in the morning:

In-out-done in under 40 minutes, including a quick warm-up/cool-down on the elliptical. And I still felt great for my run that afternoon.

Today, I got my weights done in the morning again. This time, I resorted to an old favorite from the past year. Group Power! (<---my gym’s version of Bodypump) I normally like doing my own thing for weights, but it was nice to mix it up with the class.

After class, I came home craving a simple breakfast. Plain old cereal sounded perfect this morning. I nabbed some Cheerios and then spruced them up with chopped up Cinnamon Roasted Almonds and blueberries.

Who says you need to spend money on overpriced and oversugared fruit and nut cluster cereals? Fruit, nuts, and Unsweetened Vanilla Almond Breeze are all you need to make plain cereal taste special.

The rest of the day went along as normal (thank goodness!) and before I knew it, it was time to head out for my run. I especially looked forward to my run today. Why? Well, two reasons. A – fine company to come out with me.

Even though they weren’t with me while I ran, I still loved having my family there because we could walk and just enjoy the outdoors together before and after my run. It ended up being a nice little afternoon.

And the second reason I looked forward to the run? I had some thinking to do. What better time to relieve some stress and sort through my thoughts than during a run?

The past couple of weeks have presented some motherhood challenges. Nothing major, but I have found myself questioning whether or not I’m a good mother on practically a daily basis. It all stems from Makenzie suddenly acting out a lot more and many times I feel like the one to blame. For not giving her enough attention. For not having enough patience. For not catering to her and doing whatever I can to make every day something exciting and fun for her.

Lately I get this feeling that Makenzie doesn’t feel the same devotion that she used to from me and I feel guilty. I feel like I constantly try to find ways to do more for my family and less for myself. Then I feel guilty when it reaches a point that I refuse to give up some parts of myself – like working out or writing this blog. I had to think all this through on my run today. Basically, I needed to sweat away the emotions to see the reality.

It’s okay to still have passions and care for myself because I DO balance them and keep my family first. I spend on average an hour a day working out, which is not going to make my family fall apart. And I include my family if at all possible. I save any and all blogging for naptime and, over the past couple of months, have really cut back on putting so much time and energy into the blog. 

I am a good mom. I work hard to balance my life, yet always put them first. It’s likely why some days I end up feeling so run down after living so fully for someone else. Actually, make that THREE someone elses. Makenzie is not acting out more because I don’t show I love her.She is acting out because now I have two children to love so fully and she is having to adjust. Sure, I have my rough days where I could have a bit more compassion, but she still knows I love her. This all will pass with time. Until then, I will get through it. With some outdoor runs to help along the way. 😉

Question of the Day – Where do you find the hardest time finding balance?