40+ Club: Fall Fitness Fanatics

Its been a busy few weeks for me. Xmas eve we went to my sister in laws house and afterward my daughters. It was nice but we didn't get home til late. So instead of waking up early Christmas so my husband could open gifts with us we decided to open them around 2am Xmas eve. Christmas day we got up and my husband cooked us brunch before he had to go to work so I spent the day cleaning up all the wrapping paper and watched Xmas shows while my son played his new video game. Then made a nice ham dinner for the two of us.
The rest of the week has been filled with going with my husband on some lighting jobs and a late Xmas dinner with my mom and step dad as well as trying to get my house in tip top shape. I don't know why but we haven't been going to bed the past week or more til around 3 or 4am and that means getting up late too. I absolutely have to change that.
My son has been working out the last month which is great for me because when I'm not busy I can go in there and workout with him. I think I need to try to start running. I heard that gets rid of belly fat and that's my main issue. There's no reason to weigh 115 and still have a pot belly.
So what did you all get for Christmas? I hope Santa was good to you all....

Good morning! I can't wait to meet you tomorrow, singfree!! And, no, we won't run away! But you might take one look at me, though, and think to yourself that I have no business being on a site with the word 'fitness' in the title. :blushing: Safe travels!!

tron, good to see you! I was wondering if you'd been caught up in the California storms. I remember you being without power for some time last winter, and was hoping the same thing wasn't going on this year. Sounds like you had a good Christmas. I'm glad you'll be able to workout with your son. That's a huge motivator. Running really is one of the best exercises around as long as your body can handle it. But diet plays a very big part in reducing belly fat so watch the sodium and processed foods as well. But running is a great thing.

alf, have you been doing any of your Jillian workouts lately? I was just wondering if they might be a little easier to ease into than CLX when to comes to weights. I've never done 30 Day Shred, but I was under the impression the weights are pretty light whereas I know some sections of CLX use some pretty heavy weights. You might want to do a week or two of very light weight lifting before jumping into CLX just to get your body used to the movement again. Just a suggestion, of course. But I totally understand missing lifting. Whenever I go through long periods of not lifting, I go absolutely crazy. There is nothing for my body like strength training.

kimmiebear.....welcome back!!!! :flowerforyou:

So all of this talk about growing old recently has gotten me thinking. As I wrote a couple of weeks ago, I have felt aged this year as well....mostly mentally. I feel all grown up, and it isn't necessarily a feeling I'm liking. So the other day I was thinking about a New Year's resolution because I do like to have a resolution every year. A great line from the silly movie 'Mamma Mia' came to mind. There is a part in the movie (for those who haven't seen it) where the main character is upset, and her friend asks what happened to her youthful, fun-loving self. The main character answers "I grew up", and her friend tells her to 'Grow back down". I've decided that's my resolution for this year....to grow back down. I want to find my youthful exuberance again. I also want to stop thinking to myself 'Well, I'm doing okay for 45' and instead just say 'I'm doing the best I can' without reference to age. I also want to get back to my healthier ways because, no doubt, that helps me feel younger. So....there you have it. My resolution for this past year was to find balance, and I think I have achieved that in the past few months (oddly...the move back from Korea helped). So wish me luck on this new resolution!!! I'm just not ready to be 'old' yet. I hope I never am. :happy:

Sing:

Stiring and her lovely husband didn't run away from me and my husand, so she won't run away from you. She is as wonderful in person as she is on this site.

You kids have a wonderful time! LOL Stiring, I hope we can all grow down a little bit in the new year.

On that note, everyone have a wonderful and safe New Year! I am vowing to get back on track in 2012.

Stiring... We did have some power outages this year too and can you believe our electric company paid everyone for being out! First time that has ever happened!!!!

JulieSoCal... Great job! You look amazing!

Alf... I've seen your pics... You with a belly?!?! So not true! And tell your husband acting old = BORING!!

Sing... I'm happy to hear Santa was good to you. Do the new shorts have padding in the rear? I've seen those before so I was just curious.

It snowed last night, not much but right after it cleared up and we all know what that means... ICE! I hope it warms up and melts the ice. Its more dangerous than the snow to travel on.

Happy New Year's Eve Everybody!!

Friday check-in....this week was better than last week in terms of eating, but I feel much heavier this week than I did last week which isn't good. I think everything I ate over the weekend has finally landed on my thighs. Oh, well. My workouts have been good this week. I've already done an Insanity workout today and plan on doing some resistance training in a few minutes. That way maybe I'll at least look like fit heavy when I meet singfree in a few hours!! I can't wai!!

alf, my husband is fine with this. He can be a jealous guy, but only if he thinks somebody is doing something inappropriate towards me. This is, obviously, not the case in this situation. He is going to be joining singfree and I today, and is looking forward to it. He likes meeting new people and had a great day when we met up with zebras and her husband here in DC. And I totally agree with singfree. I don't think your husband would really like it if you acted 'your age!'

zebras, good to see you. So was it a typo when you said you were vowing to get back on track in 2012? I mean....that's a year away. :bigsmile: You've done great in 2010. You've tried and enjoyed new fitness programs and managed to do all of that despite alot of turmoil in your life. Congratulate yourself on that!! You deserve it.

JuliaSoCal.....AMAZING photos!!!!! You are SUCH an inspiration. Thank you for sharing those. You have done some amazing things with yourself this year. I am totally impressed.

tron, be careful! I'll take snow any day over ice. I hate the ice.

kadetr, I completely agree with you about getting older. It really bothers me when people in their 20s say women our ages shouldn't have long hair or wear bikinis or whatever. Why? We have alot of living left to do. It would be a shame if we could only have fun for 20 years of our adult lives and then had to spend the next 40 years being old. I want nothing to do with that! I'll happily send you some bread recipes. It might be in a couple of days though.

zippy, good to see you. Happy New Year!!

Well, off to finish my workout before meeting up with singfree. I wish you all the best for the New Year! I hope you celebrate all your fitness and weight loss accomplishments in 2010.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WISHING ALL OF YOU A HEALTHY AND PROSPEROUS YEAR!!!!!

LOVE,
ANNETTE

Happy New Year

Happy belated New Year everyone!
It's been a long day here - took all the Christmas stuff down (inside and out), put it all away and then cleaned the house. It feels so nice to have an "uncluttered" house again. I love Christmas, but by the time the wrapping paper is gathered up on Christmas Day I'm ready to have my normal house back..

Now if I can only find some workout motivation........ the hubby and I took last week off, but my great workout plans didn't materialize. Got two workouts in on the ET and made it to Curves once. I had planned to work out every day to get a head start on the New Years' fitness resolutions :frown: . Oh well..............this week won't be a good one - I'm headed home to Minnesota on Tuesday for my aunt's funeral, so I have no clue how late I'll be at work tomorrow. I might get a workout in on Friday. Home is a 9 hour drive, and I'm not looking forward to the cold. There's a reason why we did't move back north when the hubby retired from the Army 10 years ago!:laugh:

Have a good week all..........
Marla

Good morning!!! Happy New Year!!!! :drinker: :drinker: :drinker: My husband and I celebrated the new year in downtown San Antonio with more than 250,000 people!!! We had a great time! The weather was great!! We stayed in a hotel so we didnt have to drive back home. So far my eating has been great. I teach tonight and spent the day yesterday practicing the new routines so that was my workout yesterday. My Christmas decorations are still up. I will take them down this weekend. Puerto Ricans celebrate The Three Kings Day on Jan 6 so we keep our decorations up until the 7th.

Stiring and Sing, I am happy you had a nice visit!!! :drinker: I love the picture!!!!

MK, sorry to hear about your aunt. Have a safe trip.

Duffy, good to hear from you!!! I wish you a year of health and happiness!!!!

Have a wonderful day!!!!! :drinker: :flowerforyou:

Good morning--I'm with all of you. This week = reversal of holiday bad eating. So far, I'm doing fine, not great. My hubby just left for a trip this morning so I should have a good 3 days where I don't have to make a huge protein-heavy dinner. I miss him when he leaves but it's good timing to set me straight on my eating levels.

Exercise last week was kind of nice. With my son on vacation and so much snow, we went sledding and snowshoeing every day. This involved both of us going down the hill, but I had to go back up the hill over and over and over again to bring the sleds back up, to get him, etc. I probably did 4 climbs to his 1. Really good exercise. I didn't really count it in my exercise goals but hopefully it helped make up for all the cookies and shortbread I ate last week.

I have been contemplating changing my MFP goals to lose, because of that few lbs I saw that I gained when I pulled the scale out. But, I just can't bring myself to eat in that 1200 range...just seems way too low. Anyway, I'm going to stick to what I'm using , but with clean eating (no sweets) for a few weeks, see if I'm feeling thin and confident enough to weigh myself again and then decide from there.

Have a great day everyone!

Good Morning!

kadetr, your exercise last week sounds perfect! Regarding your weight, I think it is wise that you are going to give it a little time before cutting back your calories again. I think most of us feel a bit bigger and heavier than we did pre-holiday, and I know that just the few days of cleaner eating I've been doing is making a big difference. There may be no reason for you to cut your calories after a few weeks of healthier ways. But, again, I also think you need to pay attention to how you feel more than the number on the scale. If at the end of the few weeks you feel strong, fit, healthy and energetic, is there really any need to cut your calories down to 1200 to meet a number on the scale? You are at a very healthy weight for your height even with the extra 2-3 pounds you said you gained, so what would be driving you to cut back? Is it to meet a number? Or is it for your health?

singfree, your workout regime looks good. I know we've discussed this before, but if you don't get three upper body workouts in in a week, it's fine. There is no evidence that three are better than two. If you are going to do three upper body workouts in a week, I might suggest that you change one of them up (number of reps/types of exercises) just so your body doesn't adapt to the plan as easily. Just a suggestion, of course.

All here is going well. My eating is much better, and I'm really feeling much better as well. I'm getting some good workouts in. This morning I did a Turbo Fire workout to start my day, and soon I'm going to do a circuit workout to hit all of my muscles.

Hope you all have a great day!

Good morning!

Stiring--your bread recipe is wonderful-thanks again! I made it yesterday and love it!

So about rethinking my goals---you know what this is? I made that one mistake of weighing myself a few weeks ago--you and Sing both warned me not to--so now those bad obsessive thoughts come back sporadically. Yes, I'm perfectly healthy. Fine weight. I did realize that one of the reasons why it probably has crept up a bit is because it's winter. We aren't outside playing all day long, and running around. I get my walk with the dog in the morning and my typical hour workout, but that's it. I dusted off the old pedometer this morning and am going to see if I'm getting my 10,000 steps--I would guess I am not--and maybe try to back in line with an "active" lifestyle as opposed to a sedentary one. Of course, that means less time noodling on the computer reading posts

take care---enjoy the day!