Category: Workout

Wednesday Workout Time! Full Body Circuit Workout

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Hi! Wednesday’s are wonderful because once they are over, you know you are so much closer to the weekend!

Remember how I said how I taught some pretty tough workouts last week? I thought it would only be fair for me to share one with you, right?!

I taught this in my UXF class on Wednesday and it.was.awesome!

Full Body Circuit Workout

I liked this workout because it never got boring and even though there were some things I really dreaded (weighted burpees and weighted jump squats), there were lots of things I really liked (Lunge w/oblique twist and monkey sit with biceps curls), which made it go by really quickly! We got through 3 rounds, including a warm up and a few extra abs at the end. For the 3rd round, I did drop it down to 45 seconds instead of 60 to save some time.

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For the weighted burpees, refer to the top two pictures above. Crab walk is bottom left and monkey sit with biceps curls is bottom right.

Couple of notes:

  • Weighted jump squats- you can either hold the weights by your sides and do small jumps, or you can just hold one weight with both hands and squat, touch it to the ground and when you jump up, push the weight up over your head to get that extra big reach.  If jumping is too much, just squat with the weights!
  • Double Knee Strikes- this is a Dynamax move:) This YouTube video shows the first part, but instead of throwing the ball after the 2 single knee strikes, bring both knees into your chest, then start over!
  • Wide leg lifts- instead of holding your legs/feet/heels together when you lift and lower your legs, bring them into a wide V. This works your obliques more!

I think that about covers it! As always, let me know if you have more questions:)

Questions for you: Ever done any of these moves before? Do you prefer to lift heavier weights for a small amount of reps? Or light weights for lots of reps?

Maine & Family- The best way to re-charge the batteries!

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Hey there! How are you doing today? I wanted to pop in and recap my extended weekend in Maine!

Friday

After working from home all day, I had my dad drive me into town to meet up with my mom and her friends at the Back Street Grill. My mom and her friends have been going there on Friday’s after work for as long as I can remember, and I always love when I have a chance to join everyone! I mean, $3 wines… you cannot go wrong with that.

emma(and getting to snuggle sweet little Emma is one of my favorite things!! Look at those cheeks!)

After a couple of wines, lots of gabbing and lots of laughs, mom drove us home to have dinner with dad (and, more wine!).

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012Friday night=fish night for my dad (mom doesn’t eat fish, but I do so I was pumped about fish night!) and lucky for me, he let me share it with him:) I forget what kind we had (some type of trout?), but it was SO good. Paired up with a side of baked potato and broccoli and I was a happy camper!

Saturday

Since I was in bed embarrassingly early on Friday night, I was up and ready to head to the Y for a 9AM class. Although it wasn’t the instructor I was hoping it would be, it was still a great class and I really liked a lot of the moves that we did- especially this cool “skier” squat. Our heels were up on weights, toes pointed towards each other and we squeezed one of those small weighted balls between our knees. With our arms, we held very light weights and did a lat raise combo. Love!

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014Mom met me for the 10:15 Zumba class! I haven’t taken a Zumba class in MONTHS and MONTHS, but I was surprised with how I was still able to pick up very quickly on the steps and dances… must be that former dancer in me? Regardless, we had a blast!

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After a well-deserved shower, mom and I went to get pedicures (as part of her mother’s day gift). Wow, was I was overdue for a pedi! Getting to sit there and relax for about an hour was really quite nice:)

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Lunch at the Springvale Publick House with a beer tasting post pedi was even nicer 😉

lunch

I went to elementary school and high school with one of the co-owners of this restaurant and I have to say, he has got quite an impressive business going. The food is outstanding (and everything is made in house- salsa, dressings, fries, chili, etc.), the beer and wine selection is quite large and the prices are amazing! Every time I drive past and both times I have been there, it’s been really busy and that makes me so happy for them!

After lunch, mom and I did a little shopping and then I went to visit my old boss from my summer job of 7 years at Shaw’s Ridge Farm. The summers I worked there were some of my most favorite summers. By the end of my time there, I was running the place with the help of some very dear friends (Meredith recently moved to Australia and has her own blog- check it out!). To this day, the ice cream Mr. Shaw makes is still the best I have ever had!

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All I wanted for dinner on Saturday night was BBQ on the grill. Thankfully, my dad is a grill master and loaded up the grill with all sorts of goodies!

003Not long after dinner, I retreated up to my room for some quality time with my iPad to catch up on shows I missed last week (Nashville and Grey’s Anatomy). Mom came up to check on me and thought I looked “too cute” and that it would be a “great pic for the blog”. Someone offering to take my picture?! You don’t have to ask me twice!

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I realize now that this post is getting quite lengthy, so I will save my Mother’s Day recap for later this week!

This past weekend was exactly what the Doctor ordered. I was in bed early every night, fed delicious food and drinks, able to get some workouts in and, most importantly, I was able to spend time with my parents!  Any one else feel like you just need to “get out of dodge” sometimes? Meaning, escape the crazy, fast paced city life? Let me tell you, hearing the “peepers” and birds and seeing the stars was so refreshing! But now, it’s back to the grind. I was ready for it, though!

Questions for you: What was the best part of your weekend? Favorite thing you drank or ate? How often do you treat yourself to pedicures?

Greetings from Maine!

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Hey everyone! Greetings from Maine! I drove up to Maine after teaching my kickboxing class last night. I had to get a sub for my SHRED class since I had a late conference call:( I’ll be honest, though, as much as I missed my SHRED class (always love the chance to get some extra strength training in), it was nice going into my kickboxing class with full energy, perhaps too much energy. It was funny- as I was leaving the gym, I thought about my Wednesday and Thursday classes that I taught this week and I actually said to myself “wow. those were really hard classes. Why do I do that to myself?” Low and behold, I wasn’t the only one feeling that way:

hard class noteDon’t get me wrong, I love teaching a hard class, but sometimes I actually question myself while sucking air and trying to yell at everyone (for some reason, YELLING was my theme this week), “What was I thinking when I created this workout?!”.

In Wednesday’s UXF class, we did weighted burpees, weighted jump squats, monkey curls, crab walks and planks w/triceps extensions, just to name a few. Yes, you read that correctly: weighted burpees and weighted jump squats. They are not fun, I’ll be the first one to say it! (I thought I might have been dying from my treadmill run before class, but after overhearing some convos in the locker room, it definitely wasn’t just me!)

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Needless to say, dinner at Life Alive was a well deserved reward for my hard work this week! Plus, I had a leftover balance on the gift card that my sister got me for Christmas, so it was a no brainer to swing by there before making the trek north!

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011The ride north was fairly smooth, except for the massive amounts of fog as I reached Maine. Luckily, I made it! Mom was even waiting up for me when I got home and had made my bed and turned the sheets down for me- I’m a lucky girl!

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As for today, I am working from Maine and then my mom asked me to go meet her in town for a walk before the teachers weekly Friday night drink gathering at the Back Street Grill. I seriously love meeting up with my mom and her friends on Fridays at the BSG- they are a super fun crowd and the wines are only $3. That’s basically stealing, in my eyes! I was also happy to hear that dad is going to cook his “fish night” for me tonight, too… can’t wait to see what he picks up this week!

Being home is such a treat, especially when my sister isn’t with me;) I like being spoiled!

Questions for you! Have you taken any REALLY hard classes this week? Have you ever been to Life Alive? What do you order if you have been there? What’s your favorite thing about being home?

April Arms Challenge Recap

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Hi, hi, hi! How is everyone doing? Now that the April Arms Challenge that my friend Athena lead is over, I thought I would take some time to reflect on how the challenge went! Now, as I mentioned in my birthday post, I am not big on setting goals and doing challenges; in fact, when presented with a challenge, I usually lose interest in what is at hand. I am so internally motivated, that I prefer to do things on my own time, on my own account and when I feel like doing them (selfish, much?), not just because someone is challenging me or because there is a prize at the end (although, don’t get me wrong, I am the biggest sucker for free things). And, I have a fear of not succeeding, or better yet, failing (there, I said it. After Friday’s post, I feel like I can/should share that stuff with you guys). Needless to say, when Athena hosted her January Abs Challenge, my response was “I wish I had time, but with all the teaching I am doing, I don’t want to add another thing to my plate.” Okay, this is partially true- taking on any sort of “challenge” certainly would add more to my already busy schedule, but I could’ve fit that in. No doubt about it.

to do listsource.

This time around, I went for it. Now that I have been teaching for almost a year and have been strength training more consistently throughout that time, I’ve noticed an all around difference in my body, but I knew there could be more. I’ve always wanted those arms. You know what ones I’m talking about: toned, defined, not too stick thin and you can tell they workout. I thought that maybe if I took a month and put extra focus on working out my upper body, I could be closer to having those arms. And, you know what? It did! So much so, that I have decided to not only repeat the April Arms Challenge this month, but I have also started the January Ab Challenge. Bathing suit season is just around the corner so I know I’d love to tone up a bit and my class members probably feel the same way!

Here are some before and afters (not bragging here, just showing that there was a difference and that doing something like this WORKED and was really easy to fit into my normal routine).

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Before & After

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Before & After

And, not just by pictures, but in class when I am teaching, I notice more of a definition in my arms and I LOVE it. Now, I will never have those arms because I think that is really more genetics than working out a lot (some people are naturally graced with better arms or legs or stomach or back, etc. and no matter how much working out you do, if you were not naturally graced with those good features/body parts, they will only look so good. I could be all wrong here, but I really believe this.), but I feel like I have made great progress with the type of definition my body is capable of producing.

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007(Incorporating different AAC workouts into my classes- win win win!)

I cannot do justice by trying to explain how organized Athena was throughout this entire challenge, but I will say that I was totally impressed. She created workouts that were short and manageable for even people like me with a crazy teaching schedule, she incorporated a variety of moves that worked our muscles in all sorts of different ways (and, gave me loads of inspiration for my classes!), she showed wonderful modifications so that the workouts could be tailored to fit everyone’s levels and she kept it fun with prizes at the end!

The workouts were designed in the following format:

  • Sunday Circuit- This workout incorporated cardio, upper body and core (usually), so it was easy to make this into a fully body workout if you repeated it 2 or 3 times.
  • Monday- Pushup Pyramids, increasing the number of reps each week (or, she had us to a 1 minute pushup challenge to see how many we could do).
  • Tuesday- Triceps Tuesday! My all-time favorite day.
  • Wednesday- Biceps Blast- A close second for my favorite day.
  • Thursday- Tabata Thursday- I loved to hate this day, as did my classes!
  • Friday- Friday “Fives”- the workouts varied greatly on this day, but they always incorporated 5 different exercises. These were a bit longer and I usually incorporated some cardio intervals between doing rounds of the Friday Five workout to complete my entire workout for the day.
  • Saturday- REST:)

005So, there you have it! I can’t believe how much more I enjoyed the April Arm Challenge than I thought I would. It’s fun to have a plan and it makes it easier some days because you don’t have to think or plan out what you want to do for a workout. If/WHEN ( 😉 ) Athena does another challenge, I highly suggest that you sign up! Athena, thank you for taking the time, energy and knowledge to plan such a fun month of upper body-focused exercises.

Questions for you:Have you ever participated in an online workout challenge? Are you externally motivated (ie: more apt to follow through with something if there is someone pushing you along)? What is your current favorite workout move?