“Om Monday”, anyone? 🙂 I will be talking about yoga, yoga classes, yoga styles and practices on the blog on Mondays now as part of my “Om Monday” blog series. No set in stone schedule for that one yet, but will see if it works out into something regular. Ready?
July 8, 2015
Playlist and Cycling Class Profile: Now and Then
This cycling class profile has a playlist featuring good old tunes right alongside the latest hits topping the charts. With a challenging routine this is a perfect class for any audience.
June 11, 2015
Lower Body TRX Workout – 30 Minutes – Wendy
Even though this class is mostly the lower body TRX workout, it has some challenging core exercises as well. Your students who are new to TRX as well as advanced level students can enjoy the variety of progressions in the lower body TRX workout.
May 27, 2015
Schwinn Cycling Class Profile: Shift to a Higher Gear
In everyone’s life there once comes a time to “shift to a higher gear”. So did it in Corrine’s. Keep reading for Corrine’s inspirational story and her cycling class profile (in Schwinn class format) and playlist she shared with Lean Lena’s readers today.
December 29, 2014
2014 Review: What Happened and What Didn’t
With 2015 approaching, I couldn’t help but think about what 2014 has brought, what I have accomplished and where I’ve failed. It is that time when we all reflect, analyze, think, and hope.
So I decided to do a 2014 review: go back to my 2014 Resolutions and see what happened in 2014 and what didn’t.
October 17, 2014
Skechers Motivation to Walk – Who Do You Walk For?
I don’t talk about my personal life on this blog a lot… But this occasion/opportunity really moved me to share a story with you today that’s personal.
It’s the most difficult post I’ve ever had to write, too…
Meet my grandma.
Her name is Valentina and she’s my maternal grandmother’s sister actually. I grew up with my maternal grandma living with us – taking care of us kids like only a grandmother can, for which I will forever be grateful. Valentina lived away and would come to visit us occasionally. Those family get-togethers are one of the fondest memories I have from my childhood. My grandma’s sisters were all very loud, funny, witty, strong and powerful women. Growing up with these women around was amazing and contributed a lot into making me who I am today.Continue Reading
October 8, 2014
A Week in Workouts and Exciting Fitness News
Hey-hey! Happy Hump Day, folks 🙂 It’s all downhill from here!
I’ve had a couple of really busy weeks here…I don’t know why, but I just can’t seem to catch up with everything ever since we came back from CA – so much going on!
So it’s been a while since I told you about my workouts. A lot’s been up on the fitness front, so let me tell you all about it – Wednesday to Wednesday 🙂Continue Reading
September 11, 2014
ICI/PRO Indoor Cycling Instructor Challenge
Hi guys! Special announcement today! Well, actually I got two announcements – one really special, and one a little less special 🙂
I’ll start with BIG news.
Remember my interview with John for the ICI/PRO Podcast? While we were talking I mentioned how my fitness journey started – with a personal 30 Days Active challenge. After the interview was over, John had an idea to create a similar Indoor Cycling Instructor Challenge.
Well, fast forward a few weeks, and today marks the day we announced the challenge!
September 9, 2014
Whole30 Final Recap – Results and “Now What?”
Hey guys!
So today is Day 30 of my Whole30! I did it!!! I feel pretty awesome and proud of myself 🙂
Since today is Tasty Tuesday I decided to summarize my experience with Whole30 as it all does start with food indeed.
But first, let me remind you what Tasty Tuesday is 🙂
Every Tuesday I post a recipe, a collection of recipes, a restaurant review or anything related to food. There is then a linkup at the end of the post where you can add links to your food-related blog posts! The linkup stays open for a week – right until the next one comes around. How awesome is that?
Don’t forget to check out other link up participants and there’s only one rule to the linkup – link back to this blog or grab the link up badge from the sidebar. Let’s spread the word so we can have more people checking out your posts next week!
We also now have the Tasty Tuesday Pinterest Board where you can pin your posts every week. To be able to do that, please follow me on Pinterest and let me know in comments that you did, and your Pinterest username so I could send you an invite.
August 31, 2014
Whole30 Days 11-20 Recap – What It Really Feels Like
Hey-hey! Happy Sunday, guys! Having a good weekend so far?
It’s time for my Whole30 Days 11-20 Recap.
This time, instead of showing you just what I ate day-by-day, I wanted to share more of how I felt during my Whole30 Days 11-20. And some things I ate, too 🙂
Here we go!
August 26, 2014
Interview for ICI/PRO Podcast and Other Awesomeness
Hey-hey! Happy Tuesday, you guys!
Is your week off to a good start? Mine is pretty darn awesome so far.
Today we’re interrupting out regular broadcasting for some breaking news 🙂Continue Reading
August 11, 2014
So…Whole30 Gets a….YES!
After careful consideration, my Whole30 Challenge is a go!
Won’t go into much detail as to why – I guess there’s both pro and con opinions out there – and plenty of both, too. I just feel it’s the right thing for me to do at this point in my health journey.
I’m missing something. And I’m hoping that Whole30 will help me find that “something”.
Anywho. It just so happens that Yuliya over at Welcome to Mommyhood is starting another round of hers over there in the Netherlands as well. How exciting is that? I have a Whole30 buddy!
We decided to cheer each other on and post recaps on our blogs for every 10 days of the challenge.
We will also be posting daily highlights over at Lean Lena and Welcome to Mommyhood Instagram pages.
Make sure you follow both our blogs and Instagram pages if you would like to follow along and find out what the first Whole30 feels like (that would be me telling you that) and how to make it enjoyable with Yuliya’s recipes and previous experience with this program. 🙂
Don’t miss out on the real experience and true recaps!
So… Whole30.
This weekend I sat down to plan my meals for the week. I’m saying “my” because my family is not following me along. They’re not crazy enough 🙂 Joking. They are. They just love pizza too much 🙂
The good thing is we don’t have the kids with us for the first 7 days of my Whole30, my husband is very flexible with food so we can eat program-friendly meals and hopefully, I will ease into it pretty quickly with less temptations.
So, back to the weekend prep.
On Saturday we went berry picking. It was so awesome! The place is wonderful and we had so much fun. If you’re in the area, check out the Yellow Hill Farm.
We picked a ton of blackberries.
We made blackberry cobbler that night, and I lie to you not – on Sunday morning my family sat down for breakfast and put away the whole 8″x8″ of it – right out of the pan 🙂 Ok, well…that wasn’t very Whole30 friendly 🙂
Back to the good stuff now.
On the way back from the berry picking we stopped by at the Peach Festival, and got a whole huge bag of peaches!
On Sunday our hot water heater said “I’m done!” My husband and the girl worked on it all day and ended up replacing the whole thing, while I was getting busy in the kitchen.
I made these awesome Turkey Ginger Breakfast Patties (stay tuned for the recipe tomorrow):
Got the pork roast in homemade marinade ready and in the over for dinner.
Cut up some fruit for my smoothies during the week:
Boiled some eggs, too.
I may or may not have made another 2 cobblers (peach and blackberry) for my hungry family 🙂
So, there you have it, guys! I’m ready for the Whole30 and I feel good about it. Bring it on!
Take care and stay healthy. Come back tomorrow for the awesome breakfast patties recipe!
August 6, 2014
30 Days Active Challenge – Final Week Recap
So, the 30 Days Active Challenge is over, guys.
It’s been quite a few weeks for me. If you think about it – the past few weeks were a demonstration of what life is all about when you’re trying to stay healthy – circumstances getting in the way of your workouts, birthdays and celebrations messing up your healthy eating plans. Weather forecast, 11-year-old girls and their dramas, work stress, stars lining up the wrong way – all that is always going to be there and will be getting in your way.
By taking on this challenge I left myself no way to back out. I had to stay active and make good choices every day regardless of all the above.
And that’s the biggest lesson I’m taking away from this.
You have to pick yourself up and keep going – after that extra piece of cake (no guilt, enjoy it), that drama, those stars, that stress…
So here’s the last recap for this 30 Days Active Challenge for you guys. I hope you enjoyed following my adventure!
{WEDNESDAY}
I totally rocked the dinner that night (hubby helped grilling):
After dinner we went for a nice long walk. Good steps that day!
{THURSDAY}
On Thursday we decided to go for a bike ride. Yours truly dresses up in all the bright colors to be visible on the road, put on the cycling shoes…only to discover that my husband’s bike had a flat that needed a while to fix. The time was 7:00 pm and we only had 1.5 hour of the daylight left. So we decided to go for a walk instead.
It was such a gorgeous evening! We walked to and around the college football/baseball fields, and it was just amazing out there! We ended up walking over 3 miles that night.
Smoothie of the day was watermelon – peach goodness. Yum!
{FRIDAY}
Casual Friday morning started with Vibrams and a watermelon-mint smoothie 🙂
Friday night was a yoga night. My instructor had been gone for a couple weeks, so it was good to be back in his class and do some much needed stretching.
Funny thing about yoga – your body gets so used to it when you do it regularly that aches and pains come right back if you miss a few classes on your regular schedule.
Was awesome to be back into it on Friday!
{SATURDAY}
I was up bright and early to go to Megan’s cycling class.
The sleepy “before”
I love her classes! I never asked, but I think she’s a cyclist – her classes are always built so realistically – just what you would do on a regular bike, no funky moves or profiles! And – they kick.your.ass. Big time!
The sweaty “after”
Saturday awesomeness continued with a much needed 4 (!!!) hour nap and getting this in the mail:
I can’t wait to go running!
And that was it for the 30 Days Active Challenge, guys. I’m done with it and back to my regular workout schedule with those “take-aways” I talked about in the beginning of this post.
I think I will continue with Wednesday workout recaps on this blog, what do you think? 🙂
Thanks for following along and cheering me on in the past 30 days! I couldn’t have done that without you!
Hugs,
This post has been shared on Work Out Wednesday Linkup.
July 23, 2014
C25K and Week 3 of 30 Days Active Challenge
Hey-hey my fitness gang! How is that hump day going over there?
I’m feeling pretty happy here 🙂 Oh! That’s right! Happy Birthday to me 🙂
Yep, I get to eat at least one of those today 🙂 Image Source
So I’m done with the 3rd week of my 30 Days Active Challenge and I have to say – it has been the toughest yet. Not only because I felt unmotivated for most of it, but also due to the family/life circumstances playing against me.
So here’s the Week 3 recap of the 30 days active challenge I brought onto myself.
{WEDNESDAY} was a C25K run day.
Hubby and I went on another adventure with C25K – Day 2 of Week 2 is where we’re at. We ran/walked for 2.3 miles at about 13 min. average pace.
The stars were stacked against us that night – my Mr. H. pulled something around his knee and is out of running for now 🙁
{THURSDAY} His knee didn’t start hearting until Thursday night after we got home from work.
I ended up staying at home and taking care of him/dinner/house stuff. I tried to make up for no official workout on Thursday by eating well and at least walking more.
{FRIDAY} was a nightmare
Family issue came up big time, which pretty much screwed up my entire weekend until late Sunday evening.
No official workout on Friday, but I did try to stay active and take more steps (I think I pretty much went up and down the stairs at work like every 30 minutes).
{SATURDAY}
I was so tired after Friday events that I was only capable of yoga – or so I thought in the morning anyway.
So I did yoga with Fiona.
I haven’t been to her class in a while and was so happy to get a chance to go – it was wonderful to see how her teaching style has evolved to showcase the strength that I always knew she had. It was a great class and really helped me relax after the stress of my Friday and tune out of everything but what my body was doing in that hour.
Thank you, Fiona. I’m really grateful for that class.
{SUNDAY} Active Day
The family train got back on it’s tracks – everybody was relieved and happy again.
I took a quick bike ride to the swim club choosing to move my legs rather than take a car ride with my folks:
Got a quick refreshment in the pool, got back home and went for a run with C25K!
Lessons learnt: more that 2 days’ gap between runs does not feel good; it’s not the heat it’s the humidity that’s the “run killer”. Temperature was nice and pleasant, but it was still very humid. Besides, I chose a route that had me going uphill most of the time (silly). Oh well. That was done and felt good afterwards.
All my efforts on Sunday were rewarded by the FitBit stats in the evening:
{MONDAY} is my new favorite day of the week.
Why? Because that’s when I teach at the YMCA at 5:30 PM and get to see my cycling gang, ride with them and share this incredible energy they create.
I had 7 people in my class this Monday, no newbies, all my regulars and familiar faces. We had a blast!
If you’re a cycling/Spinning® instructor looking for new ideas for your playlists, check out this page here to see the playlists I use for my rides.
{TUESDAY} Swimming
It was hot yesterday! Really-really hot. So we grilled some chicken thighs, packed some watermelon and went over to the swim club, where I did some laps and then we had dinner there.
And then I got home and picked all this goodness in my garden to fuel my challenged body 🙂 🙂 🙂
So, what did I learn from this week of the Challenge?
First of all – I learned not to turn one slip up into a slip up week. Life got in the way of my workouts on Thursday and Friday, but I didn’t quit or stop the 30 Days Active Challenge. I kept going. Because it is not a failure. It’s a slip up. You get up and keep going.
Because I pretty much missed two days, I am going to extend my challenge until August 2 instead of finishing on July 31.
And that’s how it’s going to be. Bring on the final week of the 30 Days Active Challenge!
Tell me, guys: what was the best work out you had this/last week?
Stay fit, and keep going!
Linked to: Work Out Wednesdays Linkup, The Hump Day Blog Hop, Wine’d Down Wednesday
July 16, 2014
30 Days Active Challenge Follow Up Report – Week 2
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Hey guys! The Hump Day is here!
Are you having a good week so far? I’m pretty excited to be back here with my Week 2 of the 30 Days Active challenge report.
This challenge to myself started with this post where I wrote a Tough Love Letter to myself following a session at FitBloggin’ 14.
And I’m happy to report that the challenge is going very well and I am staying active every day. Here’s how:
{WEDNESDAY} last week was a yoga night! My legs were SORE from biking and running the week before, so yoga just felt super nice and relaxing.
I chose to walk to the Y instead of driving
{THURSDAY} was HOT! Didn’t really feel like spending any time indoors though, so hubby and I went on a nice long walk together.
Sporting our Vibram Five Fingers (Stats on the right are for the day. Yeah, I know…I have a desk job)
Check out what we saw in one of the yards while walking:
Some people are amazingly creative!
{FRIDAY} was another run day – this time my husband decided to join me and train for a 5K too!
And that run marked the end of my Week 1 of 8 with Coach to 5K.
{SATURDAY} I did not feel the energy AT ALL.
All I could push myself to was a yoga class and a few laps in the pool. But I did it! And that was it 🙂
{SUNDAY} was another C25K Day
Hubby and I agreed to leave the house early in the morning (before the major heat kicked in) and go for a run. It was supposed to be the hottest day of the week, that’s why we wanted to get that run in early so we don’t have to suffer through it.
Well, Mr. H slept in and I waited for him patiently (because I am a good wife, you know). And then we suffered through it.
Not only was it miserably hot, but it was also the day in C25K when you switch to longer running sets.
That run was the worst of my life so far! I was drenched in sweat, breathless and a little dizzy when we got home. It took me a while to recover from that one…
The numbers above probably look funny to someone who runs regularly – nearly 14 minute miles… But I’m not sweating it. I’m getting there and working on it.
And I’m still lapping everybody on the couch 🙂 🙂 🙂
{MONDAY} was a work day – I taught my regular Indoor Cycling Class at the Y.
It was raining outside, so I had 7 (!!!) people in my class – a record number for summer time 🙂 It also so happened that the class mostly consisted of my regular riders and good friends (Mr. H attended, too!).
We had a BLAST! I felt such wonderful energy exchange and inspiration! Don’t forget to check out the latest playlist right here to get the feel of what it was like 😉
{TUESDAY} was a weird day…
Mr. H and I were originally planning to go for another run with C25K, but he had to get up really early and leave, so we decided to re-schedule that run for Wednesday.
I had to do SOMETHING! I felt like peace and quiet. So I went upstairs, lit up some candles and did yoga.
And that was it, my friends!
Missed the Week 1 Report? No problem, check it out here.
Do share: what was your most favorite workout of the past week or so?
Stay fit, friends!
This post was shared on the Workout Wednesdays linkup.
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