Category Archives: all about me

Yoga 2011

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I just read Run DMTs 2011 year-long recap and sat thinking for a few minutes about what has changed for me this past year.

My office moved, my older daughter became more social, we launched Digital Running…

But the biggest impact on my year was Yoga.

I’ve been practicing yoga for about 8 years. I got introduced to yoga in an odd way. A friend of mine makes music for kids. She’s also been practicing Yoga for most of her life. She decided to put the two passions together and make a video for kids of Yoga put to song to help children learn yoga. She asked if my daughters would like to be in the video. The teacher in the video was Haris Lender, my first Yoga teacher, and now the owner of Kidding Around Yoga, a company that teaches adults how to teach yoga to kids. She has programs for yoga instructors and non-yogis alike – anyone who spends time with children, she has CDs and an adult yoga DVD and lots of fun ways to teach yoga to kids through interactive stories that incorporate yoga poses.

In December 2010, a woman approached my graphic design company about putting together a logo and website for her new Yoga studio. The studio is less than 2 miles from my house. We bartered a bit, and suddenly my occasional yoga practice done in front of the TV  or with my MP3 player in the back of Wendy’s karate class became a regular practice with a teacher, a class, and a mirror. There was more time spent on yoga, more sweat because of yoga, more of my friends joining me at yoga, and I finally stuck my crow pose. I learned more about bandas and mastered a calming breath I can easily slip in to when necessary. I’ve learned a lot more about my physical capabilities and imbalances. I can pinpoint my physical and mental ailments. I know what it means to focus with intent.

I feel more complete when I practice yoga. Yoga is to my workout what my husband is to my marriage.

I think anyone can do yoga at any point in their lives. And I wish everyone would give it a try! Sometimes it’s fast, sometimes it’s slow. Sometimes it’s calming and sometimes it’s invigorating! Each teacher I try – whether in person or on TV – leaves with a little golden nugget I add to my practice. Something they say just sticks with me and reminds me to spread my fingers wider or picture the crown of my head as a many-petaled lotus flower reaching for the heavens.

I don’t have a New Years Resolution this year. Instead, I focus on a different intention each time I practice yoga. It’s much more refreshing and consistent. I much prefer to focus on small goals for the moment than large goals for the year.

I did not suddenly find yoga this year, but I was able to dedicate much more time, energy and focus on yoga this year, and I love the benefits!

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So busy… thus, photos!

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Ragnar TN has come and gone, and I have yet to tell of my experience as navigator in van 2. Obviously traveling creates a time-suck of its own, but we’re also moving our office and moving our clients’ files from one hosting server to another. We’re REALLY busy.

On the other hand, we’ve had some really great time come and go too. I volunteered at a water station for the Womens Half Marathon and met some great people, had family pictures taken, daughter ran in Cross Country Regionals and State meets, have our Ragnar Florida Key team ironed out – and other great things I can’t think about right now.

So – instead of coming up with the right words while my head is spinning, I’ll say it with photos. (Which is more fun, anyway…)

Fun Van 2 folks with kooky animal hats

Our Jack Daniel's themed shirts at the Jack Daniel's pop-up museum

My daughter went to homecoming, laughing in black & gold at a pre-party

Womens Half Marathon Mile 10 sign

RunDMT from deniseisrundmt.com volunteering at Womens Half Marathon mile 12

Wendy broke her thumb and got a cast (1st one for my kids)

Alice at the XC state meet

 

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Drawing Animals

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Last night Wendy asked if I wanted to draw with her. This school year she has been drawing almost every evening after dinner. She said, “We can draw animals, aliens or play finish-the-drawing.” And she tried to win me over with a goofy face:

Finish-the-drawing is when someone draws a head, and then folds the paper over and hands it to the next person to draw a body without seeing the head – they just leave lines where the neck left off, and then that person gives it back to draw the legs. It’s a great airplane game.

I opted for drawing animals.

I drew animals on the runway

In the audience you’ll see Big Bird, Lady Gaga, a pig, and a photographer. On the runway from L to R is a horse, a cat in a 1-shoulder dress and argyle socks, a peacock – and a spider that crashed the event.

Wendy drew animals too.

Animals in a 50's Malt Shop

I added the speech bubble though. But the paper order slips on the spinning thing was all her :)

I made lentils. I tried a new recipe with red lentils and apple.

adapted from here http://yeahthatveganshit.blogspot.com/2008/10/curried-apple-lentil-dal.html

I’ve never had apples in lentils or in any curry, so I went easy on the apple. I needn’t have worried though. It was yummy. Funny how the apple looks like potato in there, but is probably much better for me.

I’ve had 2 lunches from it so far and I think I’ll have one more. Yesterday I had it with a romaine salad, and today I had it with a bowl of mashed banana + vanilla yogurt + cinnamon.

Dear Yogurt People – please stop using Aspartame! I would by ONLY Stonyfield Farms if it was always in my budget…

Today I did 75 minutes of Power Yoga to start the day. I request utilizing the wall during our class, and we did our inversions up the wall at the end of class. Yesterday Brian worked out at the park with me. We did this:

5 min warmup
Sprint 45 sec (he said this comes to early in the workout, but I think Gina was trying to raise heart rates.)
Walking lunges 30 sec
Jog 2min
30 sec bench pushups
Jog one min
Sprint 45 sec
tricep dips 3o sec
Jog 2min
High knees 45 sec
Squats 45 sec
Butt kicks 45 sec
Jog 2 mi. Easy pace
Sprint 1 min
Tricep dips 30 secs
Jog 2 mm.
Push ups 3o secs
Jog 5 min easy

(adopted from http://fitnessista.com/bootcamp)

Now that our Ragnar Relay TN team for Nov is full, we are starting to look for team members for our DEL SOL team in FEB. Want to run through Tempe, AZ? Let me know! Learn more here… http://www.digitalrunning.com/2012-del-sol-ragnar-relay. And know that I’ll be the one crossing the T’s and Dotting the I’s so you’ll have a grand ‘ole time!

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National Yoga Month!!

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It’s Yoga Month!! It’s my favorite thing about September!!

I went to Power yoga this morning to start it off right. When the teacher suggested we choose an intention to focus on during class, my one word mantra was, “Enjoy“. I wanted to enjoy the class, and how it felt taking the class, and how lucky I was to have the time to take the class, and how I would feel after the class. And at the END of class when she said to think of an intention for the rest of the day, I AGAIN thought, “Enjoy“. If I can enjoy myself during yoga, I should strive to be able to maintain that mindset throughout the day.

Part of Yoga Month includes free classes for a week around the country. Now’s your chance to try Yoga, or try a new studio if you already practice yoga.

Our Ragnar Relay TN team is officially full! We have 12 runners and 3 support staff members/drivers. Brian is listed as a driver so he can be a backup runner in case of injury or illness on the team. We don’t know each other, the team was built online through Digital Running, so someone suggested the team name Stranger Danger. HAHA! I’m excited to be in a new state during a real season (TN in Nov is different from 78 degree, humid FL in Nov!) I love new adventures – they keep me creative and keep life exciting. If you ever want to try a Ragnar, we’ll be making many more teams in 2012!

Here’s how I saved some moolah this week:

Walgreens had (still has) General Mills cereal and Nature Valley granola bars and Fiber One bars 5/$10.
I bought 3 boxes of Cheerios and 2 boxes of Fiber One bars – which I would have bought anyway.
I had a save $1/3 Cheerios coupon (down to $9) and a $.75 Fiber one coupon (down to $8.25) and a $.85 Fiber one coupon: $7.40 for 3 boxes of cereal and 2 boxes of bars for Wendy’s lunchbox. I would have paid that just on TWO boxes of Cheerios without coupons at the grocery store!

I also renewed a domain name with GoDaddy. I clicked through a sale link on my company website here: http://www.rdesignonline.com/tampa-web-design.php and used coupon code FED1 at checkout. Under $9 to renew a .com!

Thai Chicken Wraps:

Morningstar Farms is on sale at Target, and I had a coupon, so we bought a box to replicate Evo’s Thai chicken wraps. Evo’s is a healthy fast food place with a conscience. There is one right near my house and another 20 mins away. They are just starting to franchise – and would be a great concept in any big city if you are thinking of a new career move. We love their Thai chicken wraps, which have baked-not-fried chicken nuggets, rice, spicy Thai peanut sauce and a green wrap around them. We bought green Flatouts BOGO at Publix, used the Morningstar Farms chicken, made some rice, and I made sauce on the stove real fast with peanut butter, soy sauce, diced garlic, a splash of rice vinegar and crushed red pepper for spice. YUM! There’s your dinner for the weekend :)

Did you start off Yoga Month with Yoga? Do you have grand plans for the long weekend?

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Tampa BlogHer Meetup & a 5k

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Shout out and big thank you to Denise from http://deniseisrundmt.com for hosting a Tampa Bay area Blogher meetup last night! More on that in a moment…

Thursday’s workout was 75 mins of power yoga. My focus was on keeping my deltoids and lats in the right place while in downward dog.  I also read this yoga/shoulder article. Wendy auditioned for Annie that afternoon at school. The middle school is doing a production of Annie Jr. Here’s some background – Wendy does not like to sing in front of people, she had a little nothing role as a villager in Beauty and the Beast last year, and I was a little Annie freak with the dress, wig, record and toys when I was a kid. She decided to audition for the role of Pepper, the orphan who is a big bully. That way she has a named part, little competition, and little solo singing. She got the role, and I hope she kicks butt during Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile, which was my audition song for a few years of choir when I was little. Her being in this show will make my heart smile :) Let’s pray her bubbly personality does not clam up on stage.

Thurs night I hung out with a friend after dinner. Just cuddled up and watched a movie. I haven’t done that with someone outside the 4 people in our house for a long time! Nice girl time.

Meanwhile, I come home at 10:30 and the kids are both in bed but Brian is out. He got a text to have some guy time and took advantage of me being out (in a good way). Turns out this new sushi place near our house is hopping AFTER midnight on Thursdays. Who knew? Half price food, karaoke – so packed they had to park on the grass. He said I was the best wife ever because I texted him: I’m home, have fun, take your time, but text me if you need a ride. Be safe!

Friday I only hit in 30 mins of yoga because I had a meeting at work. I had a great day at work an accomplished a lot of web stuff for clients that had been hanging out there. I took Wendy to a 3:30 ortho appt (wire popped out on both sides, someday I’ll look back on those rush-around appts as a distant memory). Then I drove out to the beach to volunteer at a fundraiser.

You may know I volunteer with My Hope Chest. They are the only national nonprofit that helps fund breast cancer survivors without health insurance for breast reconstruction surgery. Sometimes the Founder feels like everyone gives $ to the large pink ribbon charities who do research, and in the meantime she has a wait list of women who would love to change their lives right now, and they get overlooked. We organized a pub crawl to 4 places on St Pete Beach, and the shops in between the 4 bars had specials and appetizers along the way. I helped with check-in and selling raffle tickets. They were calling me Raffle Raffi. It was a lot of fun, with awesome music by Wendy Rich and the Soul Shakers. Please think about My Hope Chest if you make an Oct. breast cancer awareness month donation or “turn your blog pink”.

I had to leave the party a little early (10pm) to get up for our Sat 6am run. But instead of my usual 3 miles, we ran to The Pier where we stayed and volunteered for the Huntington’s Disease 5k Fun Run and 1 mile walk. I got Alice’s cross country team involved, and the teens were along the route at water stations and pointing runners in the right direction. I’d like to say they were also cheering people on, but a 15 year old girl woken up to stand around at 7am on a Saturday is not typically a cheerleader.

After a shower and quick meal, Brian and I met up with friends for some shop time. After my friend S could not believe I had never been to Ulta, we made plans to go. (Don’t worry, I have been to Sephora.) And as it turned out, a new Yogurtology was opening up nearby that day and was giving out free yogurt from 1-4pm. Usually when I go for frozen yogurt I get a fruity flavor with fresh fruit and chocolate sauce on top. But yesterday I went a little crazy with the sugar. I mixed four flavors of yogurt (oatmeal cookie, sugar free chocolate, yellow cake batter and peanut butter), added graham cracker crumbs and little smores bites, and squirted Nutella sauce on top. And when I was halfway down and the toppings were gone, I may have added some hot fudge on top. I thought the freebies were going to be little 3 oz cups, but it was make-you-own and was probably closer to 8 oz. So yah, I was badder than I had been in a long time, but it was yummmmm-oh!

Me with my Ulta Eyes

At Ulta I had my eyes done in a purple smokey eye and found out they make Makie perfume again. I used to love that in my teens, and could not find it for years. That is going on my holiday wish list! The 2 tips the store manager gave me as she did my eyes was: always remove your mascara before bed and (with my coloring) always wear berry lip stuff.

We hit Dick’s Sporting Goods – with many tasteless jokes about the name. And then headed home to get ready to go out for the night. With my eyes all done up and a little tank dress, I was ready for BlogHer Tampa meetup!

After our talkative group of bloggers filled our table at The Pub, we still had a few last minute bloggers and tekkies show up. Everyone had lots to share about blogging, mommying, goody bags, SEO and more. I’m sure Denise will have photos to post. THANK YOU to Erika from http://www.southernfriedlives.com for her personal attention to my questions about my daughter’s athletic future. Tip of the day: Only have one H1 tag per page of your blog/website.

Looking bug-eyed with Kirsten of Gone Bananas

From there I went to a birthday party for my friend Katie of http://platesandpaste.wordpress.com. I was there for the low-key, hanging out part of the night – which was a good thing because I had been up since 5:15 am.

Today is a weekend day of errands, cleaning, grocery shopping, laundry, etc. Nothing amazing to report – but I am happy, healthy, and bonding with my family so it’s all good!

Coupon tips for today:

8. Loyalty Card Coupons: Most major supermarket chains allow shoppers to upload coupons from their websites to loyalty cards. The trick is to remember which coupons you’ve actually loaded! This marketing method is beginning to cross over to other companies. For example, Shell gas stations offer fuel discounts for repeat customers with rewards cards – I can use my Winn Dixie card to save on Shell gas.
9. Manufacturers’ Websites: Wanting to get a cut of the action, manufacturers began offering their own online coupons, some of which are printable coupons you can use in their stores. Others offer coupon codes for online purchases. The variety of coupons available may surprise you. Everyone from furniture to health-food manufacturers have gotten in on the game. For example, Lane Recliners recently advertised a $100 coupon usable with a minimum purchase of just $499. I go to websites for my favorite food brands, and most let you print each coupon twice. If you are in a “true BOGO state” like I am here in Florida, I can buy something on BOGO and use one coupon on the item I pay for, as well as 1 coupon on the item I get free, saving LOADS!
10. Emailed Newsletters: Sign up for email newsletters offered on merchant websites and many will regularly send out coupons. If you plan on registering for a bunch of these newsletters, create a separate email account so your personal inbox isn’t overwhelmed.

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