Wednesday, February 25, 2009

The Child-Harried Workout

I mentioned a couple of days ago that I've been working out from home. It's great... except for the part where my 5-year-old wants to get in on the action.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love that she enjoys exercise of all types and kinds- she's almost always on the move. Jumping, dancing, walking, waltzing, dancing, riding bike, running up slides, dancing, etc. And lately, push-ups, kettlebell swinging, and Wii Fit running.

Alright, that's fine. What isn't fine is when she's taking control of the workout, telling me what to do, how to do it, and essentially causing me to dial down my work for her benefit. I'm complaining about this because 50% of my workout was doing the Wii running today, which if you haven't tried it, can give a semi-decent workout- if you're not expecting it to actually simulate a real run, or you don't have a competitive bone in your body and don't mind that you just caused yourself to stop breathing for lack of air and it STILL only gave you one star and chewed you out the whole time because you "passed your guide" or didn't "keep a steady pace to burn the most fat." As if.

So, after she got her fill of the run (3-- 4-minute intervals, with 1-2 min rest periods in between), and was chewed out for being bossy, my daughter was able to give up control of the workout and let me get some kind of strength training in. (If you know my philosophy, you know that I prefer strength training prior to cardio, mostly for the injury prevention and partly for the fact that it gives a dang hard workout that way.) I did about three sets of 10-12 push-ups and 45 or so bodyweight squats (another drawback to the Wii Fit: the squats are IMPOSSIBLE- you can put as much of your weight on your heels as possible without falling over backward, and you still can't get into the blue line that says you're performing the exercise right). There was also about 20 kettlebell swings thrown in somewhere.

Not a great workout in my opinion. I got sweaty. That's about all I can say.

Alright, I'll stop the complaining now.

On to better stuff: I'm looking more carefully at my diet, starting to think about playing with things. I've switched back to oatmeal for breakfast from the cereal, of which I am admittedly an addict and just need to stay off of. Similar to ice cream, I just can't have it in the house. My fruit intake could use a boost, although it's not absent from my diet- I've been eating at least one per day. I would prefer three, that's just me. Veggies vary daily. Many of my lunches are leftovers, so however many veggies were in last night's supper is generally the lunch. My hubby's been doing most of the cooking, which is partly pure laziness on my part and partly a scheduling issue- he's the one who's home prior to 6 pm. Strange, how I like to cook but hate to take the time to cook anything.

Scale: no shoes today, down 1.8 lbs to a strong 164.

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