DAY TEN - Stranded...

Alternate Title:  My preciouuuuuussssssss (pillow)

Day Ten!! Wooo hooo! I can officially say, this is the longest I have ever stuck to a challenge/nutrition plan without any little cheats.

Right at this moment, I feel pretty exhilarated. But this morning when my alarm went off at six... not so much. Here's the thing, since starting 28 to Great, I have been sleeping really well. I didn't realize how badly I was sleeping before... the past two nights however, I have been SO sore from the Barre3 classes. My husband even told me that I whimper at night in my sleep. Just rolling over hurts.

In fact a lot of things hurt right now: Our stairs. Getting into my car. Carrying groceries. Putting lip gloss on. Breathing. Lately, I often find myself trying to hide from my kids long enough to just go to the bathroom by myself for a little peace and quiet. Any of you with kids (hopefully) know exactly what I'm talking about - and anyone who doesn't, well, enjoy a little quiet privacy for me.

Last night  I was actually successful in getting some me time (on the potty). Now remember, yesterday was a really long day so this was probably the first time I’d sat down, besides driving. And because I live in such an old house, the toilets are pretty low. So anyway,  I read a book on my cellphone, played a few games of "Where's My Water”, texted my friend Margret my Bachelor predictions.  I even found time to file my nails.

All that said, I probably took a little longer than I should have - and when I was finished, I started to get up and...

Nada. It wasn’t happening for me because apparently my muscles had atrophied on me. My strength and muscle memory had left the building and I was officially stranded on the pot.

So I did what any self-respecting mother would do.  I yelled and yelled for my children to come rescue me. Oh the humanity! Thankfully, Ava and Vivi came right up and (laughing really hard) pulled me up before helping me down the stairs.  Unlike me, they were very amused by my predicament.

When my alarm went off this morning, just rolling over to hit it, made me want to cry. Yes that’s a little melodramatic, but I was fighting an inner battle. I had to have a little talk with myself. Kind of like Smeagol/Gollum on Lord of the Rings. Only my pillow was “the precioooous”

Me: C’mon. Let's just sleep for one more hour.

ME: No. We need to get up now. Trust me. We won't feel like doing the class at dinner, which incidentally is the next time we will have available.

Me: : Shhhhhhhhhh. We’re walking with Christy later, that's plenty for today. Now layyyy your head back down on my preciousssssss.

Me: No way. Not ever. No. No. NO.... well, maybe just for a second. I don’t see how it could hurt anything.  Wait... NO!  Sadie will know. I don't know how, but she'll know. Now GET YOUR BUTT UP.

Man, who knew I could be so mean?

So, pouting all the way, I schlumped myself down the stairs. I opened my laptop and checked Sadie’s email to see what we were supposed to do. Because of our schedules, Christy and I are doing our brisk walks on Monday and Wednesdays - so when I saw that today’s assignment was Runner’s Workout, with Kait, I almost went straight back up to bed.

Kait can be tricky. On one side she is little and adorable, but don’t be fooled.  She can seriously put the hurt on a person, just ask Chad (apparently he is still limping from Monday). But I forged on and walked into the living room and rolled out my mat.  A moment later I hit the link and lo’ and behold, it was the TEN minute runners workout! Wooo hoooo!

I almost wept with joy. It turned out to be a really great workout with lots of stretches that felt really good on all my sore places.

Is Sadie a wizard or what? She seemed to know exactly what I needed. Love that woman.

So once again, just my regular one cup of coffee to start the day. I used to have two, but Sadie said just one. And all you holier than thou, tree-hugging, green tea drinkers can kiss my...  Just KIDDING!!! :) I also had an apple with almond butter on it. before my walk.

Around 9:00am, I met Christy for a walk, who had printed out her email from Sadie and didn’t know that we were only supposed to do the ten minute runners workout. Instead, she had already done the 30 min one!  She wasn’t as happy for me as one might think, even though I told her that those extra 20 minutes would make her much hotter than me in the long run.

For lunch I made myself a kale salad with dried cranberries, tomatoes and pine nuts.  I also added the chicken that was leftover from the night before.  If you don’t know the trick about massaging kale, do yourself a huge favor and learn it now!

Cut or rip up as much kale as you want to eat, excluding the middle stem part (it’s bitter). Then assemble the rest of your ingredients on the side.
Next drizzle some olive oil onto the kale and massage the oil into the kale (you want it to get all limp and yummy). Squeeze some lemon juice on it, add some salt and cracked pepper (and whatever else you want).

In case you’ve wondered why I haven’t been making all of the recipes off of the barre3 blog, I wanted to clarify, It’s not because they don’t look good. They do and the ones I have tried, I’ve loved. But that’s one of the things I love about the 28 to Great challenge. They also give you a list of approved foods so you can make it your own. This has just been easier since I already know my own recipes. All that said, tonight I made the Harvest Lentil Soup. 

It was so so good. I'm a total carnivore, so I added some pork tenderloin to mine and I didn't have a jalapeno pepper so I just added some red pepper flakes. It was very comforting and filling and my whole family loved it so it was a definite keeper.
 Here's the recipe:
Harvest Lentil Soup

I really wanted to thank all of the people who have been commenting, here on the blog and on facebook and Twitter. It's so much fun feeling like we are in this together. You people crack me UP.
oxoxo
Missy