Bye bye January!

WOW- one month down, 11 to go!   Time, please stop moving so quickly!    It's been a crazy start to the year and January has not been a very bad month.   It's been a very busy Travel Business month, my second highest January sales in the last 5 years and that is with me being gone one full week!  I hope this sets the tone for 2013 and that my overall sales will be up.  I don't see any reason why they won't.   The rest of my life has settled down a bit, giving me the time to actively promote some travel ideas.

We just got back from a week in Maui and it was a nice time away with my wonderful hubby.   Warm weather & lots of chill time.  But even more importantly, it gave me the time to test the waters (so to speak) and start walking again.  I have been eager to see how my foot would fair with walking again (as in power walking) and Wailea has a beautiful oceanside path for just that purpose.   I am stoked to say that I went walking on that path 3 of the 4 mornings that we were in Wailea and walked between 3-4 miles each time.  It was fabulous!    Once we relocated to Makena, Bill & I went for a walk through that neighborhood, while not as gorgeous with a beach path, it is still Maui & this walk included some hills, which was good training since my walks at home are filled with hills. I was able to take a yoga class one of the mornings and then also put some time in at the gym one other morning and did the Elliptical trainer.  Ok, I have not used one of those machines in a very, very long time and today my legs are killing me!  It's a great feeling though!   I can't remember the last time that I took a vacation and did this much exercise.  It's been a long time.    I think I am now ready to get back into my daily routines and walking with Diane and experimenting with a few other classes at the gym to get my fitness on!   Today, I planned on doing Body Pump at home and really wanted that to be "first thing", but had some things I needed to do for mom but made sure I did the full release in my living room before dinner.  Served as a good review of choreography for teaching Saturday and it will also help for that class to not hurt too badly!

Tomorrow, I get back in the saddle again!  I was offered a spin class at the Palo Alto Family YMCA and decided that I would jump at the chance.   I had been emailing the director at Crunch letting him know that if any of the early morning spin classes became available, I would be interested- I sub those classes often and it's a good fit - my style of teaching and the participants.  But so far, nobody is moving.  Figured I would try this class at the Y out and see if I am a good fit for their members.  It's always so hard to take over a class, but it seems as though this class has been shared by 3 other people, so maybe they will welcome the consistency.   I have missed teaching spin, so I am ready to get back on the bike!   This will bring me up to 4 classes per week and my goal by summer time would hopefully bring that up to 6-7 classes per week.  Gold's Gym is looking at potentially adding more Les Mills programs and that is very exciting, so I may find myself in a position to train for another one of those formats!

I have resumed my Weight Watchers program with a twist.  Not only am I counting my points, but I have been trying a lot of new things.  I have been stepping out of the box and putting things in my body that I have previously labeled with the big red circle with the slant line through it!   I have been drinking tea in the morning (not hot chocolate, not sugary cider),  I made a green smoothie before my vacation (well it was brown) but it contained baby spinach, kale, strawberries, banana, peach, pineapple and I drank the whole thing and it tasted pretty ok.    I bought some steel cut oats, but have not tried them yet.  I don't drink sodas that often, but can say that I have not had one in weeks- previously I might have had one every 2-3 days. I have also cut back on wine (sadly), but have really limited wine to 2-3 days each week.  While on vacation in Maui- I snacked on grapes and pineapple.  I tried any veggies that happened to be served on my plate, without having my napkin ready to spit it out.   After two weeks on Weight Watchers, I had lost 6 pounds and this was after being in Maui for 2 days!   In fact, I was prepared to take my Wednesday weight for the week (I weigh in on Fridays), but when I was at the Spa on Friday for my massage treatment they had a scale, so I dropped my towel and jumped up!   I was pleasantly pleased that it registered with weight loss for the week.  I will weigh in tomorrow after the rest of our vacation and if the scale is the same or slightly higher, it's ok, I will bounce back quickly.  In fact, I already feel it.  I was chatting with my mom about vacation and eating/drinking/points and that prompted me to review my week in Maui or at least from last Friday (the last WW week) and yes I am -69 points, to be expected from vacation.  However, it was the alcohol that put me in the deficit.   I had eaten quite well throughout the week.   I was able to control my eating environment for several meals.  It felt good to be able to do that.

Back on track today, went shopping and picked up several fruits, a few veggies and plan to make another green smoothie tomorrow for lunch.  I'm on a mission and my goal is to lose 1-2 pounds per week.   I can do this.  I will do this.

It's going to be a great weekend - a friday of spin, work, dancing.  A saturday of Body Pump, work, Baptismal pre-party and then Super Sunday - starting with Baby Nash's Baptism and then 49ER SUPER BOWL SUNDAY!  So ridiculously excited for the game and the fun time with friends.   Might even see about taking Kristy's Body Flow class between the two making it an even more super Sunday.

Update on Mom:
Mom ended up in the hospital once again while I was in Maui, but fortunately she is out now after a 5 night stay.  Darn Colitis and C-diff (related of course)...she just can't win.  I started thinking a bit more about this tonight and for two weeks she had been experiencing some intermittent dry heaving in the morning or before her first meal of the day.  This stopped after being admitted.  I think we've concluded that it was the Iron Supplement that was upsetting her stomach and I wouldn't be at all surprised if this stomach upset left her vulnerable for the darn C-diff to creep back again.  Hopefully, this is IT!  The legs are considered "healed", which is AWESOME news - time for her to live and enjoy life!   As Valerie from Dr Gillon's office said, let's hope for small goals- so right now we're saying no hospital visits for February.    Also, time for us to figure out what we're doing with mom's house.  Spring is a great time to sell, so we really need to get on it if that is the direction we are going to go.    So TIME, please slow the hell down!!!!