5K Update

I kind-of fell off the 5K training wagon while I was on vacation.  I think I over-did my training by doing it two days in a row, because for the next week I had stiff, sore knees.  This tells me that either I’m not ready (physically) for running, or that my form is incorrect, causing extra stress on my knee joints.

I haven’t given up, though.  I’m going to start again, but go slower by not running every day.  I’ll go the every-other day route and hope that my form improves and I’m able to progress.  I’m also going to repeat each training week until I feel like I’m able to fully perform that week’s task without feeling completely wiped out.

This means it’ll take longer to get me there, but I still plan to get there.

I will get there.

I will run a 5K.

I will set a new goal.

It will be a more realistic goal for someone who’s never been an athlete.

I want to run a 5K by my birthday in November.

I’ll keep you posted.

I’m Back!

My trip was great. I did a lot of driving, but at the end of it, I got to see my dear friend Jennifer and experience part of her new life as a herd manager for an alpaca farm.

Alpacas and Llamas are all part of the Camel family. They have cute faces and soft fur and will spit if threatened or scared. They are beautiful, curious, social and timid creatures – skittish when confronted with a person, animal or situation in which they are unfamiliar.

They are not big animals; in fact once shorn, they look very spindly and cute, and you say to yourself, “There’s not much of you under all that fur, is there?

Stated simply, I fell in love with them.

First we visited the farm where my friend works. The animals had been shorn the week prior, so I met them as funny-looking, short-haired, long-necked critters. Actually, I think they are cute when shorn because it’s easier to see their precious faces. I learned that when a farm sees potential in an animal to be a show animal, they will leave the head unshorn, which makes them look like a lollipop; a big, round, fluffy head on a long, skinny neck!

See what I mean? A Lollipop head!

Isn't Lily gorgeous?

Me feeding Graceful Night.

Look at that face!

 

The next day we drove to Nebraska for the Alpaca show. Little did I know that I was driving into a storm system that was producing blizzard conditions where we were going! I fought the wind and freezing rain the entire way. In fact, the gale-force wind blew a Speed Limit sign onto the interstate! I was driving along and all of a sudden, the car in front of me swerved and there was the sign – with me barreling towards it.  I looked left – I looked right – there was nowhere for me to go, so I slowed as much as I could without getting rear-ended and told Jennifer, “Hold on! We’re going over it!” Yes – I had to run over the speed limit sign, posts and all. I pulled over and we felt for deflating tires. The car was fine. I was not. That little experience shook me up a bit. After that we called 911 and reported the downed sign. It was only a matter of time before someone got hurt.

The show itself was interesting and COLD! Because alpaca fur is very dense and hot, they have to show the animals during the early spring and late fall, while it’s still cool. Every farm also brings fans to blow air into the alpaca pens to keep them cool. There were hundreds of industrial fans blowing 45 to 50-degree air around. Despite dressing in layers, I was freezing!

What a perfect excuse to buy this gorgeous red alpaca cape and matching hat! …and gloves and a blanket and socks and another hat. I really was cold!

The hat's a little over-the-top, but I LOVE the cape!

My friend’s farm ended going home with three 1st-Place wins, a 2nd-Place win and two 4th-Place wins. Not bad for a farm that’s only been in operation since October of last year! Here are some more photos for you to oooh and ahhh over:

This is Pin Up. Look at those eyes!

This is Taffeta (and me).

My friend Jennifer and Snooki.

Little Mr. Ferrari

Eloise. Her Champaigne-colored fur is beautiful!

Angel Eyes

I'll finish with an "Awwww" factor; a 10-day-old Suri Alpaca.

 

I had a great time and look forward to going back!

On Vacation

I’m going to be on vacation for a few days, so I might not be posting as regularly as normal.  I’m going to visit a friend who’s a herd manager for an Alpaca Farm!

We’ll be traveling to Nebraska to a popular and well-known Alpaca show, where I’ll get to help with the animals and take lots of photos.  Can you imagine how excited I am to do this?

I’ll share my experiences when I get back.

While on vacation, I will:

• Choose to eat healthier meals. I won’t throw all my progress out the door because I’m “on vacation.”  I will enjoy myself, but will not eat lots of unhealthy food just because I’m “on vacation.”

 

• I will continue my 5K training by taking my running shoes and my training schedule.  I’m sure the hotel will have a gym.  If not, I’ll make do with the parking lot.

 

• I will take lots and lots of pictures to share with you!

 

See you in a few days!

The Salad Artist Strikes Again!

The Salad Artist Strikes Again!

I just find it very fun and informative to play with salads.  You can pack so much nutrition and fiber into a salad if you work at making them special.

Today I had this:

 

Mixed greens topped with rinsed Great Northern beans, tuna and Dijon mustard dressing.

The beans and tuna are packed with protein, so this salad will keep me full for quite awhile!

Stay tuned for more Salad Artistry!

It’s Official

I must be CRAZY!  After dinner tonight I was trying to decide if I should train for my 5K today.  It was raining, so I thought maybe I’d skip today and train tomorrow. My mom, being as full of wisdom as she is, said, “Well, if you were in a real race they wouldn’t call it off for rain, would they?”

Hmph.

Well.

She was right.  So I put on my running clothes, a light waterproof jacket and a ball cap to help protect my glasses.  I’m nearly blind without them and don’t wear contacts.

Out the door I went, into the rain and wind.  I started out with a 5-minute walk.  Then I had to switch to a jog/walk pattern for twenty minutes.  The pattern is 60-seconds of jogging then 90-seconds of walking.  Repeat 7 more times for a total of twenty minutes.

On the second round of the jog/walk, it started raining harder.

On the third round, it started lightning.

On the fifth round, I couldn’t get through the entire 60-seconds of jogging and I wanted to quit!  It was raining, after all!

I didn’t quit, though.  I ran for 42 seconds of the 60, walked the remaining 18 seconds and then persevered into the 90-second portion of the round.  By the time that was over, I had regained my momentum and was able to finish out the workout.

In the rain.

By the way…that jacket WASN’T waterproof!

I must be out of my mind!

Training…for a 5K!

It has begun.  I can’t believe I actually did it!  I just completed day one of my 5K training program! 

Today’s task was to walk for 5 minutes, jog 60 seconds, walk 90 seconds (repeat for a total of 20 minutes) and walk 5 more minutes.

Let me repeat…I did it!

There were some things I want to do better, but that will come with time and experience.  First, I want to run a little faster, but it was all could do today to keep up a slog (slow + jog) for the entire 60 seconds…especially when I had to jog up an incline.

Second, I’d like to walk faster during the 90-second intervals, but today I was so consumed with getting in some precious, life-sustaining oxygen that I was focused on that.

I didn’t stop, though, and I think that’s important.

I’ll be keeping a photo-journal of my progress.  I now present:  Day One.

This is me (obviously) before my jog.  So cheerful.  So optimistic!  So…able to breathe!

Me, after jogging.  I’m still trying to catch my breath. 

 

Can you see the sweat?  I continued to sweat, even more profusely, for about 10 minutes after I returned.  Look how curly my hair gets!

I’ll be repeating this same jogging pattern for a minimum of 3 days this week.

Can you believe it?!?!?  I’m training for a 5K!

A Friendly Warning

        

There’s a new no-calorie sweetener on the market called Ideal.  It’s made with xylitol.  Xylitol, as defined on the Ideal website is:

“a naturally occurring sugar alcohol that can be found in many fruits and vegetables and  is even produced by the human body as part of the normal metabolism of glucose.  With  its low glycemic index, xylitol is a great alternative for people with diabetes since it is metabolized independently of insulin. 

Xylitol is also known for its dental benefits*.  Xylitol inhibits the growth of the bacteria that cause cavities. And though we’ve not tested Ideal® to identify its cavity-reducing benefits, many research organizations (including the Calorie Control Council and the  American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry) have identified considerable health benefits  from using xylitol. We encourage you to research this sweet sensation yourself.”

I’m glad there’s another option for sweetening food.  However, many people might not know that xylitol is toxic to dogs.  This warning is also from the Ideal website:

“Dogs digest foods differently than we do, so some foods are not safe for them to eat. Foods like chocolate, apples, peaches, raisins, grapes, avocados, baking soda and xylitol  are not safe for your pet. So, please don’t let them eat anything made with these foods.  If your pet does accidentally eat something made with xylitol, contact your veterinarian immediately.”

I did not read the back of the packaging, but I hope they’ve put that warning on it as well.  However, I know that many people do not read everything about the foods they eat, and my fear is that people will miss this warning and feed their dogs food made with this sweetener.

This post is my way of doing a public service announcement.

If you have pets, especially dogs, do not feed them foods made with Ideal Sweetener.  I have a dog, and because I’m afraid that she’ll accidentally eat something made with xylitol, I won’t be trying this product.

I wish this company the best of luck and applaud them for creating a new sweetener that’s no-calorie and safe for diabetics.

To read more about this product, click here.

Back in the Saddle

In my last post I told you about my childhood gardening memories.  The year we grew the huge potato harvest was the year of “The Incident”.  It involved me, Mom, Daddy, my grandmother’s car and house, and a 1963 Ford Tractor.  I was 10 years old.

My mom, dad and I were harvesting potatoes.  Daddy was driving the tractor and Mom and I were picking up the potatoes.  When we were done, my dad told me to take the tractor back down to the yard.  (To get to our garden, we had to climb the hill behind our house.)

I don’t know why he thought a 10-year-old could drive an old tractor.  I suppose that in his mind, all 10-year-olds should be able to handle “the basics”.  Handling a tractor was a basic life necessity to him.  He was one of 15 children, raised on a farm in the 1940’s and 1950’s.  By the time he was 10, driving a tractor, collecting eggs, milking the cows and gathering the harvest and hanging tobacco were all old-hat to him.

We didn’t live on a farm.  I’m an only child.  I didn’t have the “basics” down yet.

Anyway, being a sassy 10-year-old, I took off on the tractor, and down the hill I went.  Then I realized I couldn’t stop it.  I don’t remember if the brakes weren’t working properly, or if I wasn’t applying them correctly, but I couldn’t stop.

My mom noticed that I was in trouble.  Mom’s have that ability, you know.  She ran down the hill and was trying to keep me from hitting my grandmother’s car, a fantastic 1973 Chevy Nova.  (I’m a car girl.)  My grandmother lived in the house next to ours.

I steered clear of the car, but I still couldn’t stop.  Then my mom ran in front of me ( !!!! ) to try to keep me from hitting my grandmother’s house.  The tractor kept moving forward; mom started backing away, but wasn’t getting out of the way.

I pinned her up against my grandmother’s house with the tractor. 

I thought I’d killed her. 

She was fine.  That model of tractor had front wheels that sat way out in front of the nose of the tractor, so when the front wheels hit the house, there was still 12 inches or so of space between the house and the nose of the tractor.

Still, my 10-year-old mind was traumatized.  I cried for hours and I refused to EVER get on a tractor again.  In fact, I was in my late twenty’s before I even got on a riding lawnmower.

This afternoon I got back in the saddle.  My dad needed some help moving a pile of dirt and he asked me if I felt like I could drive the tractor.  I gave it a try.

I did fine.  I learned that tractors are easier to control now.  They have power steering and brake pedals and clutches that are easy to operate.  I even learned how to raise and lower the bucket!

Me; no longer afraid to drive a tractor!

 

Confidence is a powerful thing.  It allows you to try things that you never thought you could do.  I’ve become more confident with age and with my weight loss.  I don’t hide as much as I used to.  I’ve started to realize that I’m as valuable as anyone else and that I have no reason to shy away from something I think I can do.

My mom is older now, but still fine.  My dad still expects me to learn more of “the basics”, and I’m ok with that.  I think it’ll be fun to learn more about farming.  That fabulous 1973 Nova has been restored and lives with my cousin Bobby.  Unfortunately, my grandmother passed away in 1997.  I still miss her every day.  That 1963 Ford tractor has been replaced with a 1999 Kubota tractor.

And I’m no longer afraid to drive it.

Dirt between My Toes

When I was growing up, I helped in the garden quite a bit.  My most vivid memories are of us harvesting potatoes, green beans and tomatoes.  The tomatoes were the worst to harvest, because my dad is allergic to tomato vines and would never weed that area of the garden, so by late July the tomato patch would be overrun with weeds.

When harvesting tomatoes in a weed patch, the only way to do it is to just yank off your shoes and walk into the mire.  You try to watch where you step, because you don’t want to step on 3 things: a tomato vine, a healthy tomato or a rotten tomato.  It’s like playing Twister with vicious green monsters!  When the game is over, your legs are green from the vines and you’re covered in dirt and sweat.  But ahhh, the taste of a tomato still warm from the summer sun is heavenly!  It’s worth getting filthy for that burst of flavor.  (I have been known to take a salt shaker to the garden with me…)

The potatoes weren’t so bad.  The year we grew the most of those, we used the tractor to harvest them.  Daddy would hook some kind of plow to the back of his tractor and he’d turn up the dirt where the potatoes grew; mom and I would follow behind and pick them up as the earth fell away from them.  The worst thing about harvesting a potato is reaching to pick one up to find that it’s rotten on the bottom side.  For the past couple of years I’ve been using grow bags from the Gardeners Supply catalog.  http://www.gardeners.com/Potato-Bin/VegetableGardening_SpaceIntensive,36-629RS,default,cp.html   These are great if you don’t have a lot of space to work with.  I’ve grown both white and sweet potatoes in them, and they’ve all done well.

I’ve shared that we grow beans the lazy way…we plant them, wait until they are nicely loaded with beans, then we yank the plant out of the ground and immediately replant new seeds.  No bending over bean plants for hours!

I give you my “History of Gardening” because we found our garden plot a few days ago.  In row twenty-two, we have 3200 square feet of beautiful brown dirt to play in, and I plan to do it barefoot!  There’s nothing like the feel of freshly plowed earth between your toes!

Mickey is my gardening partner and he’s been trying his hand at growing some of our starter plants from seed.  So far it’s going well.  Since neither of us have experience in starting seeds, we are pretty proud of ourselves…so far.  We keep telling each other that worst-case scenario – we’ll just go buy plants from nurseries or the Farmer’s Markets.

We should be able to start working in the dirt in a couple of weeks.  I’ll keep you posted!

My home for the summer...

Row 22, here we come!

Mickey and me...and our lovely brown dirt.

Mickey and I; claiming our spot.  If we’d had flags with our names on them, we’d have planted them on all four corners.  “One small plot for gardening, one giant harvest for the future!”

Grow, little seedlings! Grow!

Tomato seedlings.  I hope they live!

Tiger Melons are GGGRRREEAAATTT! (I hope!)

Tiger Melon seedlings.  I have no idea what these will taste like, but they looked pretty in the catalog!

So.  How will our garden turn out?  Only time will tell.  I’m praying for good weather, good health and the stamina to keep the weeds at bay!

The Artist

Do you remember back when Subway first opened?  They called their employees “Sandwich Artists”.

I call myself the “Salad Artist”.

My heaping plate of Health!

Have you ever seen a more beautiful salad?

I’ve combined mixed greens with fresh strawberries, mandarin oranges, toasted almond slivers, chicken breast (home canned, by the way) and a homemade balsamic vinaigrette.

It’s time for lunch now…I hope yours is as good as mine!