Last week my good friend Ali (who I ran this race with) asked me to go for a hike. This wasn't just any walk through the woods... we were going to tackle a 14'er (a mountain above 14,000 feet). It was my very first one... and it was a blast!!!
(unfortunately our nice camera is in the shop... and I have completely forgotten how to use the point n' shoot... so bear with me)
Ali figuring out the way
Both of us are training for a half marathon ( this sunday! yikes!) And we still had to stop frequently... let's just say climbing 5,000 ft in 4 miles gets tiring!
We finally made it to the top!
6 miles in 3 hours... we were pretty proud :)
Now there was another peak we could've gotten too... but the clouds rolling in made us a bit nervous. And thank goodness we weren't feeling too adventurous because half way down the mountain it started raining and the peaks were covered in fog.
Guess we'll just have to hike it another time!
Ali is just way too cute :)
Not only that, she is a fantastic friend and woman of God.
Our conversation for the entire trip was so great and encouraging for the both of us.
Have I mentioned how blessed we have been in the friends department since making our way out to CO?
It wouldn't be complete without a jumping picture :)
Overall my first 14'er was a great experience and I'm pumped to hike some more this fall!
Every Friday I head to the local Lululemon shop and take a free yoga class. It's called vino and vinyasa and yes, I go to get the wine at the end... it's free! Like I'm going to pass that up!
As you remember (or probably not) last year I wrote a little somethin' somethin' about the Yoga as part of the P90X program.
I haven't done much Yoga since then, except for the past few weeks at Lululemon. Every week there is a new instructor and it's always a bit of an experience.
The first week was great.
Fast paced, but easy enough that I could keep up and feel like I knew what was going on.
The second week was iffy.
Fast paced, but she started out with some Hinduism talk and it wasn't vibin' with me. So I prayed the whole time :) It was also a little more intense we held this pose:
for someone without balance...it was a bit on the tough side.
you also have to realize that all of our mats are maybe half and inch apart... usually overlapping.
and yes, I did accidentally kick someone while doing this pose.
i. rock.
The third time around was intense.
Holy fast paced, and crampage batman!!! I of course decided to weight lift that morning and go on a light run and then do yoga... not my smartest move.
And other than an altercation with a creepy guy (thank goodness I had two good guy friends with me that stood up for me) it was good.
A man was teaching this time and he was hilarious! But he was also insanely insightful. During a particularly hard pose and vinyasa flow he stressed that we didn't have to do it.
simple as that.
who are we there to impress?
if we want to take it easy... why the heck not?
He also emphasized that we should be pushing our selves with ease and not force.
When we try to force things in life how often do we get the results we are looking for?
When we force relationships, people, situations in life we are usually so exhausted that we can't even contribute to society how we want too.
Now, obviously this applies to Yoga... but it also applies to absolutely everything else in life as well. Why do we feel the need to force our way through life ? How absolutely exhausted are we making ourselves by doing this?
Today during my run, I was strugglin'. For some reason breathing just hasn't been happening and it's beyond frustrating. I didn't want to walk, but the more I thought about it I realized I didn't want to walk because I was forcing my run, forcing my breath, and forcing this idea that "runners' can't walk.
I then realized how utterly ridiculous this was and began to walk and suddenly felt beyond light. I was able to run the last 1.5 miles home breathing easy. I also came to some truth and realization about the 1/2 marathon coming up (which I'll cover later after my 12 miler).
Although it's been hard, and challenged me in ways I never thought possible I am actually EXCITED for yoga every week. I love that it ends my week and makes me focus on my feelings, thoughts, and stressors of the week. It helps me to release.
And now it helps to reframe how I get through life. am i forcing my way throughor allowing myself to flow through life with ease.
What are you forcing in your life? How are you pushing yourself too far? And where can you maybe push yourself with ease and allow things to happen organically??
This past Wednesday was our last big volleyball day between all of the schools. Volleyball in Korea-land is BIG. Pretty much EVERY Wednesday is volleyball day and every month our schools all get together and have a big 'ole competition.
All of the principal's in their glory. Notice the super fancy chairs with the tennis balls on the bottom.
Sweet.
Before we play volleyball, we should probably eat a ton of food, drink a lot of beer, soju, and then eat some more.... way to get that belly full.
As you can see... Jon and his co-t aren't quite as friendly as my co-t is with us :)
The pleasantries before the game
So it may seem mean but Korean men have a tendency to over-react when hurt, although it turned out this guy was legit in the end.. but he definitely writhed around... a lot.
The second man is... diva. He's the gym teacher at Jon's school. He wears a gold chain, yells a lot, and stomps his feet when he makes a mistake. He yells at the other players, and makes everyone suit his needs. He's was so funny to watch... Jon and I would just look at each other and mouth "diiiiiiva."
I have to say my husband ROCKED volleyball this day. My school is generally known as the best, but Jon's school gave us a run for our money and Jon was a big part of that. That boy can BLOCK!
Going for the kill. The first game we played all of the male teachers decided to hit EVERY ball, spike, serve straight at me...and then taunt me (in a nice way) for every mistake I made. I think the tally at the end was 5 mistakes... not bad for having every single ball aimed my way.
Here I'm back pedaling as fast as possible.
Our science teacher could NOT pick a place. He would back way up into my biznass and then when the ball would come he'd duck or get out of the way... or when it'd come straight to me he'd back up and then I'd just about run smack into him... and did... twice. Bless his undecided little heart.
The prizes?? Boxes of Kleenex. Rock my face off.
My school won it all...and they picked me to pick up the prize :)
In all honesty it is one of the best days I've had with my teachers, we had so much fun! Ahh Korea I'll miss you and your crazy Korean volleyball ways :)
Our visitors left, and the Stainbrook casa seems quite empty. After 2.5 weeks of playing tour guide we are now back to the last 6.5 weeks of our time in Korea land.
As much as I love visitors and would give up my daily routine at anytime for anyone that chose to come over and visit us, I really do enjoy our daily routine. I really started to miss our day to day happenings and all that, that entailed.
With that said, I feel like we aren't doing things that are quite "day to day." We've been looking at booking hostels for Europe, figuring out some plane tickets, and spending A LOT of time on the computer and the Wii. But that's ok, they are all things that need to get done and with school starting next Monday I'm pretty sure our daily grind will be back into business.
With all this routine stuff going on we've also picked back up our workout routine. As boring as it may be for some of you to read about it, it's one of my passions, it's my blog.. and you can quit reading this now if it's that bad. :)
Jon has decided to start up his own workout routines with running everyday and figuring out some good resistance training with the new resistance bands my mom brought over. I'm really proud of him for creating his own schedule and hopefully sticking too it :) It hasn't always been easy to motivate him, but he seems really excited about creating his own plan, so maybe that's the key...letting him create it! I'm excited for him and anxious to see how it goes!
As for me I'm back at Insanity. I started month 2 today and quite frankly I was terrified. All the reviews I read made it sound like Jon would need to resuscitate my dying body afterwards. I knew I would need some....
Oh Korea...only you would come up with something like this.
But quite frankly I did have to keep asking myself if I was ready for the craziness that was about to ensue. I decided I was and gave it a go! It. was. HARD! But I made it through without having to be scooped off the floor. I actually did better than some of the others in the video... which always makes me feel like a champ.
Along with the Insanity I'll also be doing 2 days a week of P90X arm weightlifting, and still testing out my barefoot running skills 3 days a week! It sounds like a lot, but truly it won't be. Actually... after such a long workout hiatus I'm pretty pumped to get back into the grind. I was only able to work out 7 times in the 2.5 weeks we were vagabonding around, which is better than what I'd hoped for... but still not enough for me!
Needless to say, we are happy to be home living life at a relaxed pace, soaking up the rest of our limited time left here.
Are you a routine person? Or do you like to change everyday? I think I'm a mix of both... I need some structure and some flexibility just to keep me on my toes!
As you all know by now my lovely VFF's are not here yet :( But my mom has sent them back and hopefully I'll be seeing them in a few weeks!
I decided that I would tough it out instead and go straight up barefoot! After my first barefoot run I was excited to get back on the track and work those foot muscles. But of course my plans were put on hold as we had loads of visitors!!!
I was willing to put my barefoot dreams aside for the good of the visitors :) And it wasn't too hard to do. Now that it's just Jon and I again, I'm back out on the track! It was so nice to just go out again and see what my little toes can do.
The Stats
Distance: 1.75
Time: 22:27
I interspersed .25 miles running with .12 walking so that I had a little break in between the runs just to get my feet used to it. It took me awhile to get back into the groove and find my stride. The 1st two times of the running my pace was around 9:50 (not too shabby considering I haven't done really any running since June) and the walking was at 16:30 BUUUUUUUT as I kept on, my pace got better, my form improved, and it became so much easier! My pace dropped down to around 9:19 for the last two rounds of running and the walking was about 15:45. I loved that my body adjusted the way it did... such a great feeling!
With all of our visitors I got a slew of questions about this barefoot running "craze" and I tried to explain why it's so good for our feet, but a lot of times I'm not quite so great at explaining things. Another blog I've been reading up on is The Edible Perspective , Ashley and her husband live in Colorado and I'm secretly hoping that when we move out there we'll become BFF's and run around in our Vibrams together. Her and her husband went to a free barefoot running clinic and I'm pretty jealous. But the information she was able to get was incredible!!!
Lately I've been desk warming... which means I've had loads of downtime.
And with this lovely time I've been researching, reading, and searching for as much info as possible about barefoot or minimal footwear running!
I wrote a post before about the Vibram Five Fingers, and I'm happy to say I'll be receiving mine on Friday!!! After ordering them a month ago and waiting impatiently patiently for them to get here... they will be making their appearance along with my Mom!!!!
Ahhh I can't wait until I have a pair of my own!!!!
So throughout all of this research I found an AWESOME website with all sorts of info about VFF's and barefoot running... and instantly I was hooked.
I've been wondering how to adapt and transition into the VFF's and have REALLY wanted to just be gutsy and go all out with the barefoot running and I came across this encouraging article.
The actually suggested starting with barefoot first and VFF second. Because with the VFF's you really have to work on your running form they suggest that to get the correct form you really need to start barefoot to get it down right!
So I took these babies for a spin
(here they are lovely and dirty in cambodia)
Now as much as I love being barefoot... in Korea it's a terrifying thing. There literally glass on every surface and I'm not really up for completely slicing off a toe. But there is a track nearby and I dragged Jon along with me and we gave our little toes a spin around the track.
We alternated running one lap (about .12) and walking one lap. Jon's smooth and supple feet were "feeling" the track after 2 run arounds and he called it quits, my callousy, rugged feet made it a few more times and it ended up being a mile. My feet are feeling a little sore, but otherwise good.
Throughout all of the reading and researching the one piece of advice I've seen over and over is to start SLOW! And so I am... I think every other day for two weeks I'll try doing the mile alternating the walking and running and then I'll move up the mileage depending on how my feet feel.
As "rough" as my feet feel apparently after a few weeks of barefooting it, my brain will start to recognize that the nerves in the balls of my feet are getting a lot more stimulation. Because of this my brain will start sending signals down to the soles of my feet and fat will start being deposited there. Voila! Instant padding :) Truthfully half the fun of this is, is just finding out how absolutely incredible our bodies are. We are truly created in a unique way and our bodies and feet in general were created so capably and they can do so much! We just have to be willing to put them to use! And I fully plan on it :)
I'm hoping in the future to put up some more of the scientific reasoning behind barefoot/minimal footwear. In the meantime... go get the book Born to Run... now!
As for me I'm going to go soak my sore toes and remember the bliss they felt in all of this glorious Mexican sand :)
If you have anymore questions about barefoot/minimal footwear walking and running send 'em my way! I'm happy to research things and have found a lot of information on the subject :)
Like, I have the AC on, a fan blowing, and all I'm doing is typing on my computer yet I'm sweating bullets...hot.
Now that the rainy season is pretty much over, the humidity has set in and let me tell you... it's a treat.
Despite the heat Jon and I have still been trying get our workouts in and this week it has been a bit of a struggle. Jon was biking to and from school (one of those bike rides at 12), then we were heading to the gym and playing with my students for an hour...and then coming home to do p90X or and Insanity workout. Talk about some serious sweating.
yes... this is after 2 games of badminton and some jumping rope in the gym. And it gets worse.
and yes... it does get worse than this.
I didn't realize until I sat down on the gym floor just how sweaty I was. My legs were slick... like just taken a shower slick. The students gathered and were beyond confused. They had all been spraying water on each other... and yet I (who had, had NO water sprayed on her) was wetter than the students.
It was slightly uncomfortable. I wish I was lying, but the students were actually touching my legs and hair feeling the sweat, trying to figure out how someone could possibly expel that much water from their body. And just be thankful I didn't take a picture of my head. It literally looked like I came out of the shower. My students were fascinated with my copious amounts of sweat.
I'm cool like that.
Now I handle heat pretty well, and it hasn't really effected me in quite the same way... but as for Jon...
This was him "getting ready" for P90X....
Attractive honey... attractive :)
He also managed to get heat exhaustion and has spent the last 3 days taking cold showers, feeling dizzy, having major headaches, muscle fatigue, and has not been able to function at a normal level.
Honestly as much as I enjoy the heat and the sun, I'd be ok with a little rain for a day. It is bloody hot here and I don't think my husband can take much more of it :)
About two weeks ago I wrote about my break-up with running. The break-up had occurred a few weeks before I wrote that post, so it's definitely been awhile since I had gone on a jog. But I broke the streak this past wednesday with a 5k... and it was FUN!! I just focused on the scenery around me, enjoyed the feeling of running, and started to pay attention to my form.
In the book Born to Run it really talked a lot about how our form as runner's isn't all that great. We tend to strike on our heels, which is good for walking... but not so much for running. So I was really paying attention to striking the ground on the balls of my feet and kicking my heels up... and low and behold I picked up the pace... by about 45 seconds for the last 1.5 miles, and it didn't wind me as much as it would've before! I was PUMPED! And honestly it did feel good to run, but I'm still going to give it some time before I go full fledged.
Another idea that was presented in the book and seemingly everywhere in the running world is the concept of barefoot running, or minimal footwear running. Because I enjoy running, and I enjoy testing out theories I thought it be a fun little experiment to try.
Now I've actually been wanting to try this since last summer, but 1) running barefoot in korea would not be good. There is glass EVERYWHERE and I know I would slice up my feet real fast. 2) I was going to grab some vibram five fingers, but just decided not too. And I regret that decision every day.
However, Amanda and Ian's mom bought them some last year and Amanda has been gracious enough to let me try hers out.
The Verdict: I LOVE them. I enjoy being barefoot, quite frankly shoes and socks are the bane of my existence...but these actually felt like my bare feet.. with just a little padding.
I've borrowed them a few times for some walks and even tried out a little run in them.
Everyone says to start slow, and I'm happy I did. I didn't have any soreness the next day, but I could still feel that I'd worked the muscles in my feet. New theories are showing that by putting our feet in shoes it's like putting them in a cast. The muscles atrophy, and they aren't as strong. Which is why a lot of times people have so many issues with their feet! To me it makes sense. Shoes do all the work for us and our feet aren't "worked". The Vibrams... work your feet.
Plus they're fun :) And it's a way for me to spice up running and working some more muscles that haven't been worked in a long time!
What do you think? Would you give "barefoot" running/walking a try?
I feel that I should be writing something epic for my 100th post... but really it's just a fantastic recipe :) Sooooo do me a favor... make these. right now. do it. they will rock your face off!
I got this recipe from my friend Fallon and made a few tweaks (not many) but I think you can do a lot with these, and truly they are so good.
Butter Free Oatmeal Muffins Makes 12
1c. oats
1c. milk
1 tsp. vanilla ( I usually add a smidge more)
1tsp. Honey
2 tsp. Cinnamon
1 tsp. Nutmeg
Soak all of this in a bowl for 10 minutes
1 medium banana (mash it up!)
1/2 c. unsweetened applesauce (if you can make your own, it's really pretty easy)
2 egg whites
Mix these three together in a separate bowl
1c. whole wheat flour
3 Tbsp. Wheat Germ
3 Tbsp. Ground Flax Seed
1/4 cup brown sugar
1tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 cup raisins or craisins... or both :)
Mix this together in with the oatsand then add in the banana/applesauce mixture.
Pour into greased muffin pan.
sprinkle a mixture of 2 tsp. sugar and 2 tsp. cinnamon on top of the muffins for a little crunch on the top!
Bake at 400 degrees and take out when a toothpick comes out clean, and the tops are nice and brown.
I think you'd also be able to add in dried apricots, blueberries, different types of nuts... etc. These muffins are really filling and pretty healthy.
ENJOY the amazingness of the butter free muffin :)
And I MUST give a shout out to my amazing hubby... as of Sunday he finished P90X!!! 90 days of intense weight lifting etc. He did it and I'm so proud of him for sticking with it and making some changes :)
As if I haven't mentioned it enough, Jon and I've been doing the P90X program. As a matter of fact Jon has only 3 days left until he is officially finished!!! Woo hoo!!!
As part of the program there is a Yoga day. And I have ALWAYS hated it. It's 90 minutes of horror. The first 45 are solid sun salutations, upward dogs, downward dogs, vinyasa's....etc. And it sucks. I've kind of always avoided this day and just done the stretching video.
I only wish I looked this calm and cool during yoga...I'd be tipped over on the floor.
Now for a little disclaimer... I actually don't usually hate Yoga. I actually took my first Yoga class in Korea. Now you'd think learning a sport in a different language would be hard... and it is. But Yoga is a series of sometimes complicated positions and learning it in Korean was a bit of a treat. I'm sure I did the majority of it wrong, but I enjoyed being part of a class and the instructor was always super excited that I came :)
And that is exactly why I was sort of surprised that I actually really disliked the Yoga X video. But after reading why it was part of the program and how beneficial yoga really is to your body I decided to give it another go, same instructor but only 45 minutes and a lot faster paced.
Here's Tony... doin' his thing. (He's the P90X guy)
Buuuuuuut, during this 45 minute video Tony said a little something that made me realize why yoga is so dang difficult for me!
"The vast majority of Americans don't like yoga, because they have to be calm in an isometric posture that is uncomfortable. And, that is working on joints, ligaments, tendons, and muscles. It's also working patience and your breath. It's an atypical exercise, and if there is any society that needs it more in the world it's America just a chance to chill, learn how to chill out and be in the moment and be present and undertake time to breath and understand the physical pain. If you breath and clear your mind you become more open not only phsycically, but mentally, emotionally, and spiritually."
Nailed it right on the head Tony. I have issues with chilling out, being calm, and being uncomfortable. I'm used to exercise that is fast paced, gets my heart rate going, and I'm mooooooving so pain doesn't last too long. Yoga ...hmmmm I'm still moving, but the pain is there because you are stuck in that position. But the great part is I sweat almost as much with Yoga as I dod anything else. It's tough and really does rely on your strength in more ways than a lot of other exercises. It works EVERYTHING and really does keep you limber.
I seriously need to learn how to do this... sweetness.
And to be honest I really do feel that yoga makes you more aware of your body's limitations and abilities. I've been able to focus more on what my body is feeling like that day and certain areas that are tighter than others. I like being more aware of my body and I like being more "in tune" with what's going on.
I'm starting to approach yoga days differently now. I'm trying to focus on the many benefits my body will get from it and really trying too look at it in a positive light! And I actually enjoyed my yoga this morning! We're making progress!
Do any of you enjoy yoga??? Why or why not?
(Oh.... and if you want to see some REALLY amazing shots go to my friend Laura's blog she took some fabulous photos of our other elementary school friend, Haley... who is now a yoga instructor. Seriously amazing shots :) )
