Making progress

I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend! I got to hear a great local band Friday, spent a lot of time resting and relaxing (with a little cleaning) on Saturday, and a lot of baking and such on Sunday! I have a Special Ed staff/paraprofessional christmas party that I am hosting this Thursday and trying to get ready for it!



On the workout front, I have been kicking my ass this month! My swimming is lacking a bit, since I am trying to get 100 miles of biking and 45 miles of running accomplished. I will easily make my biking goal - 100 miles - and am more than halfway there. No worries with that!


I still have about 24 miles to go to make my goal of 45 miles for this months challenge. I am trying to figure out the best way to go about this. Since I have just started experiencing pain free runs, I don't want to push myself into injury again. I have thought of a couple different ways to achieve this distance: 1) do more shorter runs throughout the week, or 2) do a few runs but at longer distances throughout the week.

I think I am going to stick with the shorter runs, but listen to my body. For example, yesterday I got on the treadmill with 3 miles in mind, but ended up doing almost 5 miles again. I threw the towel over the distance and just enjoyed the run. I probably could have gone longer, but wanted to spend a good amount of time stretching and doing some yoga.

I think a lot of my knee issues in the past has stemmed from weak glutes/hamstrings. I also think it might have come from tight hip flexors. I have been doing my AM/PM yoga once and sometimes twice a day for the past week and it has helped immensely. I love yoga!

Do you do yoga? If so, how often and for how long?

What does a ND Blizzard look like?

We haven't had a Blizzard like this since the blizzards (yes, multiple) of the 1996-1997 winter. The weather channel people drove up here Friday night to catch this nasty blizzard and said this was probably the coldest storm they had reported in. We also made the Today show this morning...

Supposedly we only got about 9 - 10 inches of snow, but with the additional wind and drifting, causing white out conditions, it was ugly. Many interstates were closed. However, the spring after those blizzards consisted of the nasty flood of '97. Hopefully this will be our only blizzard this year, as the water levels were already higher this fall before things froze over.

This is the picture I took of my front (side) door last night before heading to bed. Notice the snow drift in the window. I decided to sleep on the couch in the living room because I could already hear the loud tractors clearing out the parking lots across the street at the apartment complex.
Not too long after laying down on the couch I heard a big bang and scraping noises. Yes, someone was shoveling the sidewalk and steps along side my house. That someone being related to my wonderful neighbor.

When you buy a house, especially a twinhome, you never know who you are going to end up with on the other side and I must say I have been truly lucky, and grateful! He has not only plowed my driveway numerous times, but had his 20 year old son shovel my sidewalk and steps last night at 1030pm in the freezing temps.
Here's the view of my backyard from the patio door. It's hard to tell, but there are some pretty tall drifts in the back corners!
When my alarm went off at 6am this morning, I ran to my bedroom window to see what the streets looked like. They were plowed, but 4 foot snow piles were left in front of driveways. It wasn't too long after that that I heard the rumble of a snow plow and knew that my neighbor was plowing the pile of snow at the end of our driveways.


I bundled up and went out to take a couple photos of the aftermath of the Blizzard. Dang, it was so cold (14 degrees below zero - feels like 38 degrees below with wind chill) and I was only out there maybe 2 minutes. But, on the upside, the sun was shining!

Looking South, down my street this morning. Looking north, up my street.

Like I said, the wind was horrible, leaving little to no snow in some areas, and then drifts like this in a neighbors yard.

What does one do when stuck inside a house all by herself?

Besides going stir-crazy? I bake....and baked. First, my favorite (and very easy brown sugar cookies)...

My turtles... consisting of round pretzles, rolos, and pecans.

Homemade peanut butter cups...

And holiday pretzels covered in white almond bark and sprinkes.I still have one more thing to bake, but need to make a run to the grocery store to get chopped nuts. I will finish those later!

Since we do have a snow day (no work, but we will have to make it up in February), I will enjoy my extra day off. Supposedly the gym is going to open at noon, so I will probably head there for a nice run and maybe lift session since I have the extra time!

If anyone is looking for recipes of the above goodies, feel free to let me know and I will post them!

Have a great Monday everyone!