The Challenge: Days 8, 9, 10, & 11

Wow, what a week. I can honestly say, that each day this week, I've thought, "If ever there were a day to skip a workout, this would be it." Just goes to remind me how easy it is to make excuses to skip workouts.  In reality, no day this week was unmanageable.  Its all a matter of perspective!

Day 8 (7/20/10): I took the girls to the Outer Banks. We left at 6:30am, drove for 4 hrs (including 1 stop for a screaming Kailyn), met some friends for swimming, lunch, and a little beach time, then headed home around 3:30 in the afternoon.  We stopped to meet Matt for dinner about 15 min from home (again with a screaming Kailyn).  Instead of hitting the workout equipment, Matt and I took the girls on a walk around our neighborhood so that I could realy stretch my legs after so many hours in the car.  Its great that we live in a neighborhood that is a little hilly (and we're at the bottom part of a hill, so the hard part comes first) to add a little extra umph to our workouts when we walk.  We walked about 30 minutes at a good clip - when Olivia was out of the stroller, she had to run to keep up with us and the poor thing fell and skinned her knee at one point, but she was determined, she was not about to give up and get back in that stroller.  That's my girl!!

Day 9 (7/21/10): Somehow, the stars aligned and I was able to get both girls down for a nap at the same time, which freed me up to workout midday.  I hit the rowing machine first, set the timer for 15 min, and when that went off, I was feeling so good, I kept at it for another 15 min.  That's a total of 30 min on the rowing machine!!  But, I wasn't done.  I promptly hopped onto the treadmill and walked for 1 min, ran for 7 min, then cooled down with a final 2 min walk.  I was feeling so good and loving it. I think I might be able to get into this running thing!!

Day 10 (7/22/10): Another rough day.  Kailyn has been absolutely miserable and I'm not convinced her ear infection is clearing up.  So, I took her into the Dr again and low and behold, the antibiotics aren't working.  Well, that would certainly explain why she won't let me put her down or let me out of her sight!  The house is a mess, the kids are a wreck, and what I really want to do is put the kids in bed early and have a margarita.  But, instead, I strap on me tennis shoes and hit the rowing machine and treadmill.  15 of rowing and 15 on the treamill.  I ran 11 of those minutes at a faster pace than before.  I'm feeling really great about running and in addition to having the goal of running 1 mile straight, I'd like to up the ante and run 1 mile at a 10 min/mile pace.  I'll have some work ahead of me to get there, but I'll do it!!

Day 11 (7/23/10): I've hit a wall.  My knees hurt, I'm tired, the girls went to bed waaaayyyy to late (Costco, could you please look into opening more locations in NC, I'm really not digging a 30 min drive for toilet paper....).  My goal tonight was to run for a total of 15 min, up from last night's 11 min.  Um, yeah, every step hurt.  My knee feels like its on fire.  Instead, I ran for 2, walked for 2 for a total of 17+ minutes on the treadmill and then I called it quits.  I still wasn't feeling any workout high, seconds were ticking by slowly, my mp3 player "randomly" selected every slow song in its database, and I was hating my new (and supposed to be improved) tennis shoes.  All in all, it was a crappy workout :(  I need to take something to make my joints feel better and I need to dig deep to find my motivation for tomorrow after tonight's workout.  Help me out, if you can!!!