A Granddaughter Confesses

Confession: I haven’t taken a spin class since 5th November.

Why on earth do I recall so specifically the last time I took a spinning class?

My Battle For Good Skin

Hi everyone, how was your week? You can usually tell from my face whether its been a good week on the exercise front. Its a sad truth that for me sweat = spots, and I’ve sweat a whole load this week! Physically I feel great, probably the fittest I’ve ever been. But my skin looks like its kinda angry at me. When I work out a lot the sweat makes my skin really spotty and blotchy. Okay technically I only have about four spots on my face and I may sound like I’m being dramatic but generally speaking I have good skin so four spots is a big flipping deal.

Katie’s Back

A couple of weeks before Christmas, my mum and I took our first Mix And Match class with instructor Katie, I wrote about how much we enjoyed it in this post. It was sweat-your-guts-out kind of tough and your body ached all over the day after. Over the holiday period the class was obviously cancelled, but when it started back up again in the new year Katie didn’t return. There was a lot of talk about her being ill, but nothing much was ever confirmed. Another instructor Mel took Katie’s place while she was away, and her class gave you a good work out too.

Another New Class

I’m all about classes lately, but this time I’m not talking about Yoga, Spin or Pilates classes. Today I’m talking about a dog training class. Yes you heard correctly! Last night on a bit of a spare of the moment thing, Polly, my mum and myself all went to a dog training class. It was definitely an eye opening experience, but it was good fun!

Achieving Your Goals

Sometimes you set big goals. Sometimes you set little ones. Either way, its still a great feeling when you achieve them. When I joined my gym back in September I mentally made a note to myself, to try all of the different types of classes available. I think that its safe to say that I’ve slowly worked my way through that ‘To Try’ list. And it feels like I’ve achieved something positive from doing so.  When my mum joined shortly after I did, we started taking all these classes together – all but one.

Mix And Match

AKA the class that kicked my butt this morning! I am such a donut sometimes, seriously I’ve been going to my gym for what, 3 months now and I only noticed this class yesterday. As I have an off peak membership I can only take daytime classes and I clearly didn’t pay any attention to Monday mornings on the timetable.

Well, what a start to

Here Come The Colds

I have already caught a cold and winter hasn’t even begun yet. Last year I had so many colds it was ridiculous. I was hoping it might mean this year I didn’t get so many, but so far that looks like wishful thinking.

I had my usual Wednesday morning

Aqua Aerobics

This morning I tried another new class, and this time we were in the pool! I’ve been meaning to try an aqua class since I joined but for some reason kept putting it off. Then yesterday Mum and I decided to put our names down for todays class last minute.

Its All About The Muffin

Thank goodness its the weekend! My morning was dedicated to a spin class. Saturday morning spin classes are quickly going up on my list of favourite things! I’ve been looking forward to it all week, in a weird ‘I’m going to get my butt kicked’ sort of way! Hah. It was my third class today and I still found it tough but so rewarding! I can literally feel my  whole body working and I’m dripping sweat by the end of class. Not a pretty sight but hey!

After the class the instructor spends some time with us stretching out and we do this fantastic squat while holding on to the bike handles – it feels so good to stretch your legs after you’ve just worked them hard! I could stay in that position all day. Well I could try to anyway.

As I was such a sweaty mess I jumped straight in the gym’s showers at 10.45 when class was over. My mum used the gym while I was spinning so we met up in the changing rooms to get ready together.

Then we had to go food shopping. By this point I was pretty hungry anyway so going food shopping only enhanced my hunger. All that was on my brain while I shuffled round Tesco was food, food, food, but more importantly how I wanted to eat, eat, eat!

So anyway, in my hungry state around Tesco I saw loads of tempting things I fancied. We were at the Bakery section  (which smelt oh so delicious) when I made a new food discovery.

Muffins. Now I’ve seen loads of bloggers talk about muffins and to me, I’m like, but that isn’t a muffin! When I think of a muffin I think of this:

A muffin is a cake in my eyes. I’ve just always thought of a muffin as a cupcake! However, these babies are not cake like but they are still so delicious, it was love at first taste! From now on, when I think of a muffin I’m thinking of these. My old version of a muffin is now going to be regarded as a cake.

My next food discovery was equally as brilliant.

Lemon curd! Oh my goodness me. I’m in food heaven today. And are you thinking what I’m thinking?

Lemon Muffin! Hell yeah!  This was such a treat after my spin class. It was soft but slightly crunchy from the toaster, it was warm and it was sweet. Delicious! I was getting so excited about my new food discovery.

So excited that I took way too many pictures than a normal person should of a lemon muffin….  

Okay so one more thing and I’ll shut up about the muffins … I was also pretty surprised by the nutritional content, only 163 calories and 1.4g fat! Not only are these delicious but I’d say that they’re pretty healthy too.

 

 

 

 

 

Its nice to have a little indulgence that isn’t going to give you a muffin   

What I’m Wearing.

I’m loving the autumn feel in the air, even if it is kind of chilly there’s something cosy about it too! I wrapped up today!

I’m wearing a sleeveless Levis shirt (tucked in) with a fairly baggy H&M cardigan.

With a pair of light denim Levis jeans and a belt. I reckon that in the next few weeks I’ll be busting out the knee length boots! Can’t wait

Jewellery.

Purple studs.

With matching ring.

Fossil watch.

F.Y.I Nails are by Barry M

I’ll be back with another food post later tonight!

Switching Things Up

For my workout today I had 45 minutes of cardio planned. After a month of steady exercise I think I’m ready to push myself a little more and increase the amount of cardio I’m doing. But I’m dedicated to planning it right this time, I’ve done things wrong so much in the past that have led to injuries so I’m all about avoiding that. This is how I’ve been planning my training lately and its worked very well for me:

Week Beginning	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Additional Notes:

Click here to see the proper web version of my workout log.

I’ve created this table to give me a day to day breakdown of my workouts for each week of the month. Its keeping me focused knowing that I have a plan and I’m not just going into things willy-nilly.

So for the last month I kept my cardio to a maximum of 30 minutes a session, and I think that worked well as a stepping stone to build me up. But I know that my body is capable of more,  so there’s no time like the present to take it up a step and gradually increase this.

Todays Workout:
Duration:  45 minutes
Workout:   5 min warm up stepper
                  10 minutes rowing
                  15 minutes elliptical
                  15 minutes cycling
Calories:   400
Additional: 30 leg presses
                    30 seated leg curls

As you can see, I really switched things up today in my workout. Rather than doing a solid block of cardio for the first time I thought I could incorporate different activities to keep me motivated. It worked pretty well but my legs were so tired by the end. I’m feeling pretty good now though

Its curry night in our house tonight! Indian food get in my belly!