Category: Fitness

So I am sitting here in my local McDonald’s…(they have great coffee, I don’t eat the food…sorry) and there are a bunch of old timers here drinking coffee, reading the newspaper and shooting the breeze.  They are talking about going hunting this weekend and one man says to another, “What are you hunting this weekend?”  The other man replies, “Women!”  I laughed so hard that they looked over at me and apologized.  I said to them,” This is what I love about people.  The candid and funny conversations you overhear!”  Then a different guy asked what “spooning” was.  He thought it was some kind of new drug people were doing.  A guy in the little gang looked up and said, “Are you serious?  It’s when you lay on your side in a ‘c-shape’ and spoon your partner.”  Hahahahaha!!!!  They are the sweetest guys… and they were kind and sweet enough to let me take their picture 😀

Back to the home gym part due (pronounced “dew-eh”.)  I am one of those people who LOVE the benefits of yoga.  I love feeling peaceful, strong and quite frankly my darn spine feels aligned!  BUT….. it’s getting me to yoga that is the problem.  When I lived in Venice, CA I would hop on my beach cruiser with my yoga mat in my basket and peddle down to YogaWorks on Main St.  It was easier for me then for a few reasons.

1. Yoga studios are EVERYWHERE in L.A.
2. Since there are so many studios, the prices are competitive which means cheap!
3. You could go to a class any time of day!  Even at midnight!   So the accessibility was amazing!

(I once did yoga on a rooftop in Venice on the beach at night and it was my favorite experience with yoga!)

I have always been a “sweaty workout” kind of person.  Holding positions and trying to breathe at the same time doesn’t come naturally to me.  I can run for an hour straight at a good pace just breathing in and out through my nose!  Not so much doing yoga 😦  So, I decided to take what I  learned from the various yogis in L.A. and do some yoga at home.  I love it!!  And with YouTube, you have a yoga class at your beck and call!  I even do yoga at work.  I am on my feet 12 hours a day and about 8 hours into my shift I go find a place where I can lay down a blanket, close the door and do a few quick yoga poses.  OH MY STARS I can’t tell you how much that rejuvenated not only my muscles but my mind as well!  It is a “little reset” button that gets me through the rest of my shift.  I haven’t been able to convince my co-workers to join me yet but I’m wearing them down!

Once in a blue moon I will go to a yoga class to make sure my positioning is correct and to see what is new and then go home and incorporate what I have learned.  The equipment I have…

1. Yoga mat (the sticky kind)
2. Yoga block (for positions that I am not quite flexible enough for yet)
3. Yoga strap.  Dude… you can totally use a belt or a scarf.

It is that simple and totally cheap!  And when you are at home you don’t have to worry about a possible wardrobe malfunction.  You’re in the privacy of your own home. Normally I am in my lounge wear.  I don’t buy into fancy yoga clothing or fancy workout clothing.  I do have a few pieces of performance athletic wear, but I just wear what I have and save a TON of $$$$$ as a result!  K.I.S.S. = Keep It Simple Stupid.

So you don’t have to spend a bunch of money… sure some exercise equipment is an investment but over time it all pays itself off.

Hope you have an amazing Thursday!  My good friend Shannon is in town from Oregon and I am so excited to spend time with her!!!

Part tre to come….

~Lori

“Give what you have, to someone it may be better than you dare to think.”

~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Good morning….LOL… I laugh because I am running on about 3.5 hours of sleep!  (Right now I’m listening to the Jay-Z Pandora radio station to keep me awake! HA!)

So I want to share a few FUN ways I exercise when I tire of my usual routine.  Have an arsenal at my disposal.

It is a small home gym but there is a TON packed into that small space!  From left to right, my bouldering pad, backpack, yoga mat and block, hand weights,  climbing shoes and harness, skateboard (Sector 9 longboard) and last but not least the most versatile piece of equipment on the planet…my treadmill!

You don’t need a ton of fancy equipment to be active.  Oh wait I forgot my FAVORITE exercise piece….

Running is my first love.  More than anything or anyone, when I am having a good day, bad day or whatever kind of day, my running shoes are there for me.  They are without a doubt my go to stress reliever, happy place and my gap!  I have been running since my parents put me, my brother and older sister in cross country in elementary school.  I don’t run for time really any more and I don’t have a desire to run a marathon.  I don’t need a 26.2 sticker on my car.  I run because that is who I am.  Running is where I go to recenter myself and clear out my thoughts.  I get high.. every single time!

Ok ok ok….back to the rest of the small home gym equipment.  My bouldering pad, a.k.a. crash pad.  I climb big rocks or boulders outside.  Bouldering is when you climb short but good size boulders without being harnessed in.  Without a rope.  There is a great park on the westside of Cleveland and I like to get there early in the morning before the neighborhood wakes up.  😀

I’m sure most of you have climbed trees as a kid!  Well now I climb rocks and trees!  Hahaha!  But seriously bouldering is great because you can do it solo.  I would always recommend going with a friend because if something happens there is someone to call for help!  Buddy system…(most of the time I go alone but I ALWAYS let someone know where I am!)  All you need to get started is a chalk bag, for when you hands get sweaty, and a crash pad for when you can quite make that next hold… 😉  The other great thing about bouldering is that you don’t have to be a “climber.”  Anyone can do it!  You may not do it well at first and your hands and most likely your legs WILL get scraped up!  But you just climb as far as you can until you build up the strength and confidence to climb a little higher each time.  Also if you have a fear of heights then this is perfect if you don’t want to be on the big walls because you will really never be that high up to the point where you couldn’t jump down!

Holy guacamole look at the time!   I have to jet for now but I will be back to chat about the rest of my small home gym!

I hope you guys all have an amazing morning….AND DON’T FORGET TO VOTE!!!!!

Until  a little bit later…

~Lori

“Give what you have, to someone it may be better than you dare to think.”

~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

What an sweet morning so far!  I spent the night at my older sister’s home so I could sleep over with her 3 amazing children!  I woke them up at 6:00am this morning so I could scoot them on the bus and off to school.  (yes…I fed them…lol)  I love hanging with them!  I call them my little crazies 😉    I also get a little teary eyed when they get on the bus…I think it’s because I was out in California for 6 years and missed them like crazy.  I am soooo happy to be back home in Cleveland  😀  I know I talk a lot about loving Cleveland, its just that it has so much to offer.  A lot of the time when I was out west people would say to me, “Oh…Cleveland.”  I would tell them that unless you’ve been there with someone who is from there, then you don’t know what you are missing.  Between the parks, museums, theatre district, pretty much all major sports teams (sorry soccer fans), lake front, different unique neighborhoods and the westside market, etc.  there is NO shortage of fun and great things to do!

Okay, enough about my love of my town 🙂

About 2 minutes after I woke up I felt it…. the crazy good hurt that could only come from squats and lunges.  DUDE…!!!  I took my younger sister’s older daughter on a walk yesterday afternoon and as I was pushing her along in her Little Tykes car, I decided to make this sloooow moving opportunity into a fitness one!  So I did a bunch of lunges!  I am SURE I looked like a total weirdo but who cares?!  I got my leg workout on!  Later in the evening I did about 20 squats as I was waiting for some pictures to download from my phone to my computer.  Like this one I took yesterday.  I was driving “along in my automobile…bum bum bum di bum…” lol and I came across this field!  So beautiful!

The rest of my day looks will consist of the gym, studying and maybe a little bit of relocation hunting!  I am also going to devise a training session for my friend who is coming over tomorrow morning for her (and my) first personal training “in-training” session.  Today at the gym I am going to focus on my core and upper body.  I’m going to try some new moves that I hope will target muscle groups that tend to get left behind.  Not really muscle groups…  The other day my friend Jeff and I were at CRG (Cleveland Rock Gym) climbing for the first time in months.  We were sore for the next 3-4 days.  My gym doesn’t have a climbing wall so I am going to try and simulate some climbing moves at the regular gym.

Climbing uses the every single muscle in your body!  And I mean in ways you never thought possible and in ways you’ll most likely never obtain at the gym.  Just ask my friend Jeff who is a gym rat and he’ll tell just how totally sore he was for several days post climbing!

Well I am off for now!  Catch ya later!

~Lori

“Give what  you have, to someone it may be better than you dare to think.”

~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

What’s going on everyone?!  Today was nothing short of AWESOME!  I woke up this morning to a warm breeze flowing through my windows…how awesome is that for late October?!  I also had an easy breezy morning that started off with a great cup of coffee.  Have any of you tried Starbucks Via?  I love those little packets!  I ran out of ground coffee and haven’t been to the market in a couple of weeks so I resorted to the little packets I had in my cupboard.  I usually take them backpacking with me, as regular instant coffee is just plain gross!

They also offer instant lattes but I am not a fan of those.  While I was enjoying my cafe I was catching up with one of my very best friends, Allison.  We’ve been friends for quite sometime now but it seems the older we get the busier we are and the harder it is to get together in person and catch up!  So this morning we caught up over her morning drive to work and me having coffee on my back porch 😀  I hopped on the treadmill post awesome coffee conversation and started running.  I know a lot of people get bored on the treadmill.  For me, I get that runners’ high anywhere, anytime I’m running.  I just zone out and keep going until my body says, “Um dude, we’re done.”  I started out at a 8:57/mile pace.  Not too bad after working 6 days straight.  I never put the emergency clip on me but for some reason I did today.  Big mistake!  Right in the middle of my run it pulled off from the consul and my treadmill came to a sudden STOP!  I hate when that happens!  I guess it is a good thing it did because when I looked at the clock I saw that I was going to be late for a meeting at work if I didn’t get my butt in gear!  So I “freshened” up (tried to be less smelly) and drove to the hospital for meeting.  Then it was more coffee with one of my other very best friends Patty!

I am in the middle of studying for my NASM personal training certification.  As I was studying I thought to myself,  “I need to practice these things with a real person and not just online.”  Guess what?!!!  I have my first client!  Of course she isn’t a real client because I am not certified yet.  Also, she is one of my very best friends!  It is like massage therapy students.  They can’t charge you full price because they aren’t certified but they need the practice and the hours!  So instead of charging my friend money, I get to practice on her and she is paying me with what????  COFFEE!!!!  On the days we train she offered to buy my soy lattes!  And it is PSL (pumpkin spice latte) season!!!! YUM!

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