the double digits.

no, this isn't a workout blog {in fact, i'm not really sure what category this blog actually fits in}. but i do work out. and i do have a blog. so here's yesterday's workout, on my blog:

yeah. i ran a whopping ten miles yesterday. by far, my longest run since m was born. i know she would have loved to have joined me for that hour and a half, but my lovely mama kept her instead and allowed me to lighten my load by about thirty-five pounds.

if you live in corpus, i ran from my house, down ocean to the yacht club/art center light and back. i was so proud of myself. i sweat. i got tired. and i loved it. and oh yeah! my pace? what's that??? you want to know my pace for each *glorious* mile?? 8:36!

and aside from my mom helping out by watching miss moo. thank you. and you. and YOU {for keeping my legs chafe-free}.

SIXXXXXXX!

{miles, that is}. as most of you mamas know, getting in consistent, worthwhile workouts isn't the easiest task to accomplish when you have a kiddo on your hip most of the time. so even though i would lovvvvve for my mileage to be a little higher, i'll take what i can get. and OH YEAH, this is how i got through that glorious six miles.....

'king of diamonds' -motopony

'in sleep' -lissie

'daddy sang bass' -johnny cash

'and it stoned me' -van morrison

'helena beat' -foster the people

'sprawl II' -arcade fire

'lost in my mind' -the head and the heart

'heaven' -emeli sandé

'home' -she & him

'midnight city' -M83

'you've got the love' -florence + the machine

'such a lovely thing' -devotchka

'let me know' -yeah yeah yeahs {but you probably already knew that}

and this didn't hurt either....

...yep, that lasted for about eighty percent of the run. thanks M!

how our weekend was spent.

aside from a pretty lazy saturday, the weekend started off to a very productive start. nick's grandma came to town for a visit and gave me a serious lesson on how to make flan. not exactly sure where she got the recipe, but this one is perfect. normally i'm turned off by the gelatinous texture of flan but this one was almost a custard. sooo good. my mom might have had two pieces. one after another. for breakfast. unfortunately this picture is a very appropriate image of our little abuela about ninety-percent of the time. gotta love her.

{typical 'lita}

and we just polished off this hot weekend with a walk around the park. very much needed after too many spoonfuls of the deliciousness in my fridge {a.k.a. flan}.

apparently i only had one shirt to wear for the weekend. i'm fine with it.

our near future.

i'm going to naïve-ingly hope for this on that wonderful day of june the ninth {our 'guess' date}.

we will finally see baby making all of those wonderful movements without a big wall of skin to block our view.

and miss mila and i will be doing a WHOOLLLLEEE lot of this with help from these girls.

and this.

with a little more workout and diet help from this girl.

can't.
wait.

when without.

{...an idea for a new post} focus on things that make me happy.

not having back pain, thanks to night-time showers and lots of belly and foot massages.

actually RUNNING {okay, jogging} again {thanks, skinny runner}.

having normal eating habits again.

{chick + butternut squash + sauteéd spinach}

putting together loads of stuff for the babe tonight.

{stokke stroller}

{bloom seat and high chair combo}

my *new* idea for a 'push present'. a push to lose any stubborn 'baby weight'.

{garmin four-o-five}

{ipod nano}

{sticking to my 'run a marathon, ANY marathon in 2011' goal}

and looking good while doing it {running, that is}.

{ta ta tamer by lulu}

{26.2 apparel top}

{nike's tempo running short}

{newton running shoes}

now how's that for a PUSHHHHHHH present???

getting ready for the little avocado.

fifteen weeks and four days today. so far this whole pregnancy thing has been pretty smooth sailing. other than some all day minor headaches, i feel great. ever since my workouts have been able to get more consistent again, my days have gotten SOOO much better- amazing what a little sweat can do for your mind, body and heart.
this weekend was especially exciting because i finally got a new car!! after much very necessary research, nick and i chose the toyota prius. i've wanted a hybrid car for yeeeears and now i'm finally able to save this planet one mile at a time.

{my wheels}

now that i'm CONSTANTLY reminded by how my driving effects this planet it definitely has me reading loads more research about this green earth. treehugger usually has my attention and more often than not i get lost in the internet world from one of the fifteen million links that they have on the site. like the link i found to buy these.

{cuisinart greenware}

...at the price we got them for, i didn't expect the utmost quality. but on non-discounted sites, the price was pretty competitive and the reviews i read were all pretty good.
besides this renewed attention i'm paying to this planet, this has been my soundtrack for the lovely weekend i had.

'down by the water' by the decemberists

'and it stoned me' by van morrison

'ambling alp' by yeasayer

'little by little' by lay low

'spanish harlem' by aretha franklin

'unstoppable' {because that's what i am!} by santigold

'comment te dire adieu' by serge gainsbourg

'pagan angel and a borrowed car' by iron and wine

'love me two times' by the doors

although this wasn't the 'soundtrack' to my workout today {i usually get those from women's health or my tone it up girls}, it was still great-- a wonderful two mile jog followed by some abs and upper body!

what fifteen weeks looks like.

really wish i had a belly by now but i guess that just means i have some killer abs!!

my routine has finally gotten back to "normal". i woke up a few weeks ago and oatmeal FINALLY sounded good to me again. since then, i've been alternating my workouts with a start of twenty minutes of cardio each time {stairmastr, elliptical but mostly treadmill} then finishing it off with about twenty minutes of:

ANY routine by my girl tracy anderson

or this:

reverse lunge with biceps curl

deadlift to high pull

stability ball triceps extension

plank hold and single-arm row

squat with leg abduction and lateral raise

hamstring curl with chest press

v-sit incline press

side plank with rear fly

...all with eight pounds {except the 

rear fly} for as many sets as i can get 

within twenty-five to thirty minutes

officially a 'non-blogger'.

at least that's what i call people who go almost a full month between posts. i wish i could say that i've been busy the entiiiiiiiire time but that just isn't the case. we did manage to get our booties moved into our new house which has definitely drawn quite a bit of energy out of me. we've officially resided on bermuda street for a full two weeks now and it's going great. so nice to finally have a place of our own again. i don't have too many pictures to post of the nueva casa since it's not exactly 'picture perfect' in my eyes {yet}, but it's getting there.
other than the casita, we have a bit of news on the baby-front. we finally had a sonogram a few weeks ago and over the thanksgiving holiday, during our visit with nick's mom at the hospital she works in, we were able to hear the little limón's heartbeat. today we are meeting with our potential midwife and i'm really hoping for the best. unfortunately our options in good ol' corpus christi are pretty limited when it comes to alternative medicine. so far i've heard many good things about beth overton {the midwife} so my hopes are high.
this week finds me logging in some hours at our office. our lovely secretary had to have a pretty serious surgery so i'm bring home the bacon by answering phones and doing some busy work. what does this mean for you??? hopefully lots more blog posts.
now that you have a little update on my vida, here's for my work outs. last week {and this week so far} i've managed to really get my heart going. since the move, we now live across from a park that's about a mile around. for anybody who just doesn't feel like trekking it to the gym, this makes such a great avenue for getting a truly beneficial workout in. i have about ten park benches that i pass on my walk/jog and here are a few of the exercises i do on them:

incline push-ups

tricep dips

planks

plank with side rotation

decline plank with leg lefts

step-ups

step-ups with pulse back

side step-ups with kick out

donkey kicks at an angle

these are only a feeeeeeew of the things you can do on benches, in between those little fat burners, i mix my mode of traveling with:

speed-walking

skipping

sachés

lunges

jogging

elbow to knee oblique twist

kick ups {dallas cowboy cheerleader style}

kick BACKS .....boootie blaster!!

side lunges

you can seriously do ANYYYYY variation of these exercises, doesn't matter which order...as long as you do at least twelve reps {on each side} of everything!
happy workout!!!

to work out or not to work out. that is the question.

yesterday a little 'health and fitness blog' perusing gave me just enough motivation to spend a quality fifty minutes at the gym. today, it just doesn't seem like that's going to do it for me. i have at least stayed away from those vicious cravings that haunted me {and overcame me for that matter} over the weekend. lately, as soon as i wake up, i throw together a little bowl of kashi and bananas with a mixture of soy and almond milk.

i would love to be eating oatmeal instead, but cold cereal is just so much more refreshing. between 'lunch' and my early-early breakfast {that lovely bowl of cereal made it into my mouth at about 5:30 this morning} i snacked on plenty of purple grapes and two clementines. then i fought back any evil cravings that might come my way by loading a sauté pan full of the veggies that my diet has been seriously lacking lately.

my stomach handled this combo {tofu + spinach + carrots + onions + garlic + broccoli} pretty well. but immediately after eating my last bite, which took about twenty full minutes to get to, my stomach told me to lay back down. not a problem, especially since i took about a two hour nap. it's 2:30 now and i know that i need to get my heart rate up but i seriously cannot think of anything i want to do less. luckily i have these girls

{karena and katrina from "tone it up"}

to remind me how important it is to get some serious exercise on a daily basis.

things are looking up.

so thanks to perusing the tone it up website as well as joining their new tone it up community {which you should ALL do}, i found some serious inspiration to get off my tired booty and head to the gym.
i started off with about twenty minutes on the elliptical. i get really bored on elliptical machines so while keeping it interesting AND incorporating more muscles into my cardio session, i turn sideways, step with my toes turned out and in and lean far back to work my butt a little deeper. i then made my way into the weights area and did a little strength training for about thirty-five minutes. my circuits {using eight pound weights anywhere they're incorporated} looked like this:

assisted pullups X 10 > biceps curls X 15 > body weight squats X 20

chest flyes on physio ball X 15 > overhead tricep ext X 10 > single-leg squats on physio ball

spider pushups X 10 > shoulder press X 12 > adductor with kickback leg extension X 10

got some stuff done around the house immediately after my workout and then i enjoyed {finally} some amazing tom kha soup from thai cottage. this stuff is delicious: lime/coconut milk broth + mushrooms + chicken + cilantro = heaven!

then i parked myself on my little couch and don't plan on leaving for much of the rest of the evening. and i'm sure i'll fall asleep no later than nine o'clock- really getting ready for this whole motherhood thing. i did make a little purchase that i'm pretty proud of. on npr this morning i heard a wonderful bit about unicef and its history. so when i found this

{hsn}

i knew i had to get it. it's designed by cynthia rowley and the feed program was pretty much pioneered by the lovely ms. lauren bush. i think it can be purchased at a cynthia rowley store {however this is corpus, if we don't even have a whole foods, you can pretty much guarantee that a cynthia rowley isn't anywhere near} but i bought it through hsn's website. i'd really love it if it came in before halloween but if not, i still plan on putting some extended miles with it.

soccer mom without kids {yet}.

i swear that's what i feel like lately. i'm pretty sure that i could drive to nyc and back in the time that i spend in my mom vehicle each week. and i don't think i'm the only one that finds this absolutely exhausting. right now nick and i share a car. sort of. basically i have a car and he sometimes uses it. but the vehicle itself is used FOR him about ninety percent of the time.
on a much more pleasant note, i did get a really great workout in early this morning {twenty minutes on the elliptical + light weight/high rep circuits for about twenty-five minutes}. then i head over to first united methodist church to enjoy a really wonderful bible study i recently joined. it's been so nice just being around women at least once a week. other than the girls at the gym {and i only briefly talk to them for the ten minutes i might happen to have when i arrive early to my sessions} i don't get that much girl time. oh! and also my mom's and my little early morning coffee break each morning. nick and i truly are best friends and we definitely spend our days that way. we work out together, eat lunch together, run most of our errands together when we can.... basically we're together A LOT. and i wouldn't trade it for anything in the world. but until you finally do sever that joint at the hip, it's hard to realize how much you really do need a little girly time every once in a while.
one of the things we did together today was pick out a few new appliances.

not much too admire but whatever. we're going with stainless everything since it doesn't age itself the way white does and we just like the look of it better than black. now if we could just get these floors under way. we're really hoping to install hardwood bamboo floors throughout the house but they're turning out to be much more expensive than we anticipated. we don't want to take the step down to laminates but are having trouble finding any corners we can cut {other than installing them ourselves} or floors at a seriously discounted rate. do any of you know of some good flooring pointers?? we'll take ANYthing at this point!
j

how to work out pregnancy style.

today i did probably the only workout that i've found to be the best compromise since finding out i'm pregnant. as you know my cardio sessions aren't all that extensive {think thirty minutes max, usually in the morning or late afternoon with lots of anaerobic activity}. i don't want to lift to much weight since everyone just loves to tell me how that experienced early miscarriages due to picking up something they thought was fine but apparently turned out to be too heavy. therefore, my weight training workouts in the gym have suffered just a bit. i'm trying to stick to about two of these workouts per week, i've gone down significantly on the weight and definitely not lifting until failure and my reps have increased from about twelve to twenty or twenty-five {i'm telling you, the weight is LIGHT}. as for today's super fantastic workout: i leave the house on about a minute and a half jog then walk at a brisk pace for two minutes. i continue alternating this cycle from thirty to sixty minutes {depending on how much time i have}. today i went for forty-five and finished it off with some really light upper body weights and core work for about fifteen minutes. i would definitely recommend this workout for anyone looking for a good AERObic workout or if you're pregnant and you're used to working out pretty extensively. the weather was gorgeous today so i took this workout outside on the water but i'm sure i'll have to try it out on the treadmill pretty soon with this cooler weather coming. here are a few of the tunes i jammed out to during today's calorie burn:

'amazing' by inna

'like a g6' by the far east movement

'don't stop the music' by rihanna

'pumped up kicks' by foster the people

'ambling alp' by yeasayer

obsessed with.

turkish apricots and barney butter.

tina over at carrots n' cake is always raving about how good barney butter is. a jar of any nut butter that costs almost nine dollars has never been something i needed but the other day at sun harvest it was on sale. the mister usually prefers peanut butter over the almond variety but he actually LOVED this kind! recently one of my snacks has involved me standing in the kitchen dipping these deliciously dried fruits in the jar {when nobody's around of course}. it is SOOOOO SOOOOOOOOO good. once that jar is empty i definitely plan to soak up the last bits of goodness with some oats in a jar.
today my mood has definitely gotten better, i had another date this morning with ms. anderson then did shoulders at about noon with nick. i got my shoulder routine from muscle and fitness hers magazine. normally i'm a lover of oxygen and women's health but 'm and f hers' just has better all around weight workouts {rather than just talking about how to magically get rid of that belly fat and flabby wave, they get down to business and tell you HOW to do it}.
here's how it went:

seated overhead press

dumb-bell lateral raises

front raises with a weighted plate

bent-over lateral raises

***three sets of twelve for each exercises***

***between each SET of EACH exercise, i jumped rope for thirty seconds***

....i'd say that i deserve these apricots + barney buttizzle!!

officially obsessed.

remember when i made that vegetarian lasagna last week? wellllll, i was lucky enough to have some leftover butternut squash to snack on {can you believe that was the FIRST time i'd ever roasted this gem of a vegetable?}. i ended up eating all four extra slices and was still left wanting more. so today i made MORE.

{butternut squash + olive oil + salt/pepper = perfection}

this stuff is delish. buttery. nutty. positively perfect side dish. with only sixty calories per half cup, three grams of suga' AND three grams of fiber, i definitely didn't feel guilty when i went back for an extra slice {okay two extra slices...FINE, three}. nick's mom's and my workout was good but not as intense as my usual so i'll probably head back to the gym later today. since nick's out of town my daily activities are significantly diminished {no LYing around watching the boob tube with the mister for me today}. i think this lunch

{grilled chicken + butternut squash + spinach with garlic}

is near-perfect fuel for that later workout. especially after the stupid mini pumpkin muffins i had after dinner last night.

off to a good start.

this morning i was so delightfully reunited with one of my former clients. i trained her for about three years but after i left and moved to college station she too left platypus {the gym i work at}. the other day she came by to take a peak at the new facility, saw me and said she'd be in touch so we could get together again. wellllll, she came to my 8:00 reformer pilates class and left in a sweat. i think i have her hooked once again. so many people think pilates is going to be a simple relaxing class, but when done right one can definitely notice significant changes in their bodies.
with most of my clients right now, i'm trying to get them to simply move their bones, muscles and entire bodies in directions they aren't used to. today that came in the form of a lot of exercises from tracy anderson. if you haven't heard of this girl, google her. she is AMAZing. not only does she train celebrity clients with enviable bodies {gwyneth paltrow anyone??} but she too maintains an amazingly fit physique while running facilities in both l.a. and n.y.c.

http://ow.ly/2Fg0Z

i go to her for all kinds of fresh moves and she never disappoints. another great part about today?

that's right, i got to start it off with elixir of all elixirs. it's not g.t. dave's but it'll do for now. if i had other options on the shelf, i probably wouldn't buy this type again. buttttt- beggars can't be choosers. and yes, at this point....i AM a beggar. i am missing my kombucha SOOOOOO much. nearly everyday, i make a trip to my local sun harvest, make a beeline for the back of the store only to be disappointed when i see the shelves are instead full of odwalla smoothies. WHERE'S MY KOMBUCHA people?!?!?!
j

really needing it today.

as you saw earlier, i definitely did not get an adequate amount of sleep last night. normally i wouldn't recommend continuing your normal schedule without a nap after sleeping as little as i did, butttttt....being the 'early day' person that i am, i just know that a nap is not coming anytime soon. so far, i've trained clients twice today (pilates session at 6am and a personal training session at 9am). i have definitely stuck with my normal diet (protein pancakes for breakfast and a toneitup protein bar dipped into just a bit of greek yogurt for a mid-morning snack), but for my pre-workout stack, i'm going to have to give myself a little oomph!

all for the lowest price possible, thanks
to bodybuilding.com

when i said i need a little extra 'pep' today, i'm doing this in the form of n.o.-xplode + atrophex (both bsn products). normally i just rely on n.o.-xplode for my pre-workout energy and take atrophex early in the day to really get me going, but i have a feeling that my body might not be ready for the toll i'm about to take on it.
although i'm providing my body with an extra supplement, i still plan on keeping the weight pretty low when i get to the gym today. had i actually rested my little head last night, i would train my booty but instead i'm going to do some serious cardio and about twenty minutes of all-over, light-weight circuit training with a little bit of plyometrics.
how do you recover from a night of minimal sleep? would love to hear how i could be doing this better!!
j

oldie but goodie.

lately the only thing i want for breakfast are tone it up protein pancakes. they're so yummy and perfectly portable. but today i went back to my standard: one-fourth cup of oats with a hoopla of add-ins (pinches of chia seeds, flaxseed, bee pollen pellets, wheat germ, sugar-free maple syrup, cinnamon and almond butter) made with a soy milk/water combo...plus a one and one-half egg omelette.

i know that seems like a lot to put into your oatmeal, but it's such a small amount of everything...but when eaten consistently, you definitely reap the nutritional benefits from all those seeds!! for my omelette, i just threw in three cherry tomatoes that would've gone bad and about ten baby spinach leaves. did anybody catch the today show today? the food segment was devoted to rarely used whole grains (think barley, quinoa, polenta, etc). i'm definitely guilty of not venturing outside of my 'cooking comfort zone' but chef mark pitman had some great ideas and simple recipes for all of these grains. it really is a shame that i haven't tried my hand at some of these fiber-filled grains since almost all of them provide so much more protein than simple oatmeal. think i just might have to get some when i go to sun harvest today and take a stab at them.

this  morning the mister went on a quick two-mile run so i guess that leaves me to do my cardio right before he gets out of work. probably good for me since by about three o'clock i'm ready to park myself at the house and keep the activity level pretty low until i go to bed. so today's plan: 

arms at about 11:30

run at about 4:00

....hopefully it works out that way!!!

j

today's workout.

stairs:

run for 40 minutes

run stairs for 15 minutes:

run down the stairs facing left side

run up the stairs

run down the stairs facing right side

run up the stairs

plyo style: run down the stairs (facing forward), kicking each leg to the side

run up the stairs, side toe side

in between each of the above sets do ab exercises for 3 minutes

gym:

about a 20 minutes ab workout and cool-down

what high intensity cardio workout would be complete without a playlist :

'the reeling' by passion pit

'gold lion' by the yeah yeah yeahs

'mr. pitiful' by matt costa

'pumped up kicks' by foster the people

'sweet disposition' by temper trap

'beautiful nightmare' by beyoncé

'the kids don't stand a chance' by vampire weekend