Just Do It June Workout schedule.

Here we go! It's June again. Yikes. Here is a good total body workout that can either be a supplement or your whole shebang each day. Enjoy!

As always you can join the Diva Facebook group to get more information and some group support.

Jammin' Workout June

Without Further Ado. I would like to present the July Workout Challenge. I am really excited about this one because I feel like it offers people more options for personalization than ever before. Here is a quick look at the calender, please save it, share it, or whatever, but also please link back to me or give credit when you share.



This calender is designed to be used one of three ways.

   1) You can just do what is on the day as written for a quick addition to a current workout routine

   2) You can repeat the routine for each day as written 3 times for a full strength workout.
 

   3) You can add in the cardiovascular option listed at the bottom in between your strength exercises for a cross-training effect. And do that 1-3 times for your desired workout. For example if you were to do the cardio option on the 2nd you would do
       15 Plie Squats
       25 Jumping Jacks
       15 Reverse Lunges
       25 High Knees
       15 Mule Kicks
       5 Burpees
       20 Calf Raises
       25 Mountain Climbers
       10 Jump Squats

 

If you would like to join our support and reminder group on Facebook please follow this link. I have some amazing help from Ali Mc who has the blog Running With Spatulas making the instruction videos and admin-ing the group while I was moving last month.

Fab Ab February.

Ok, so who's with me? I'm starting the Fab Ab February Challenge that is all over pinterest tomorrow. Who is doing it too? If you don't know here is what it looks like. Thanks to this blogger for setting it up.

Holding yourself accountable.

I just joined/started a group for fitness goal on facebook with friends. It's been great so far, now we are only 2 days into it but still, I love having a place that I can go to talk about plans, accomplishments, failures and to ask for suggestions. It is a wonderful thing to have that kind of support when you are trying to become more fit. So the theme of this Fitness Tuesday post is to find a way to hold yourself accountable. When you make a fitness goal it is easy to let life get in your way. If you find a way to hold yourself accountable you are more likely to reach those goals.

Do I think that everyone needs to do this exactly the same way that I have? Absolutely not, there are as many different ways of holding yourself accountable as their are people in the world. I do have a few suggestions though that I will share with you. The first is to arrange a support group among friends. It is great if those friends have a wide range of fitness levels and knowledge so that everyone can teach and learn at the same time. Another way would be to ask your significant other to help you out. DH is incredibly helpful to me, the other night I asked him if he would mind if I went to a home sales party instead of Zumba, he looked at me and asked why, I told him I didn't want to buy anything I wanted the snack food and alcohol. The look he gave me made my decision, we both knew that the party was not a good plan for me so I didn't go. A third suggestion is to journal your eating and exercise, this is good if you are a very private person about your fitness goals. There are many sites available online for this now, just look around and see what it is that works best for you. Like I said earlier these suggestions are by no means the only way to hold yourself accountable, they are just the first three that popped into my head.

Have fun, happy working out and meeting your goals.

~DD

Because I'm Brilliant like that....

Sometimes I feel like I am my own worst enemy. I get these brilliant plans and act on them and then when I am past the point of no return I realize I have messed something up. I did that tonight. It isn't the hugest problem that I created, it is just going to be something that bothers my CDO (OCD alphabetized) brain. So the story.

I have a home-based business. I do home parties for a well known company. Tonight I decided that it would be a wonderful idea to get my whole year mapped out. I would look up all of the monthly specials for hosts and guests for the rest of the year. I would write them in my calender in the appropriate month so that when I am booking shows I would be able to tell people what the specials were in the coming months. I would cross check the specials with the wish lists from my former hosts and set up an e-mail schedule so that I can tell them how to earn what they wanted. I worked diligently for over 2 hours, wrote everything in my most beautiful handwriting so that it was attractive to look into my calender, it was amazing. Then in the last moment I noticed something, something important, something I should have looked at hours ago, something it should have occurred to me to check when I started. What was that you ask? The year. I did all of this work and I used the specials calender from 2010 not 2011.

So now what do I have? A calender full of writing that is useless and 2 hours of wasted time, well now probably closer to 3 since I have been beating myself up over it for almost an hour. Yippie! Happy Sunday night to this Diva. I think it's bedtime, yup, definitely bedtime.

~DD

I now dub thee, Diva Days of the Week.

I have decided that I want to have some sort of fun challenge in place for each day of the week, both for me and for you. I think I will also do weekly and monthly challenges, but let's just start out with the small things that we can do one day at a time. So here's the list.

Sunday - Spiritual Sunday, spend some time this day nurturing your spiritual side. While I hope that you will go to a church and experience God's amazing love for you, I understand if that isn't your personal belief system, so do what centers you. (also if you happen to celebrate on a different day, Saturday for example, please just switch the days)

Monday - Make-up Monday, if you are like me there are always chores that get purposefully ignored over the weekend. Take a few minutes to get them back into order.

Tuesday - Take a picture Tuesday, find something that makes you smile or makes you think to take a picture of today. A child, a flower, your sink that's clean for the first time in 3 weeks. Whatever you are thinking about today share it in picture form.

Wednesday - Write it out Wednesday, It seems like in the world of e-mail, text, Facebook, and twitter we rarely send cards or letters any more. Take the time on Wednesday to write a real note or letter to someone. Give your friends and family a happy surprise in their mailbox to go with all of the bills and junk.

Thursday - Think Ahead Thursday, use today to dream and plan. Sometimes we all get so absorbed in the now of it all that we forget to take time to plan and dream. They can be little or big, immediate or long term. They don't have to be practical all of the time, just allow yourself to dream.

Friday - Fun Friday! Do something fun for you, your family or your friends today. Go fly a kite, play soccer or Frisbee, have a gourmet meal or fun cocktail party. Do something to help you unwind after a long week and just have fun!

Saturday - Sharing Saturday, this one is a little vague, but I feel like it has a lot of potential. Share something today, your time, your talents, your stuff. Take donations to Salvation Army, go serve in a soup kitchen, help your neighbor weed their yard, give a freezer meal to a friend who needs a little extra help.

I know that you might not get to all of these each week, but try. I will be trying and sharing each one with you as I do them, and please share with me what you do.

~DD

What to write about.... Hmmmm.....

I am at a loss right now. You see it's that time of night when my routine kicks in. Everyone in my house is in bed, it's quiet, it's my alone time. So I usually pour myself a glass of wine, or pull out some sort of snack and play some games on FB. It's how I unwind. So now I'm sitting here twiddling my thumbs trying to figure out what to do with my time. The way I see it I had a few options. I could

a) clean, do some laundry, something on that line. But I quickly threw that idea out the window... I do enough cleaning and laundry during the day I don't think it would be relaxing.

b) watch some of the old tele. Well, I am doing that, I'm watching American Idol right now. But I have never been able to just watch tv, I feel unproductive and bored (because we all know that games are productive.

c) work on some crafts. Before I became an addict I would spend all of my down time making things, doing crochet, cross-stitch, and making my shirts. I loved doing all of this, but I don't have anything going right now, and I am not sure what I want to start.

d) Resume my before bed bible study, meditation and prayer time. This is the one I should be doing. After all the whole point of this experiment is to improve my relationships with my family and with God.

So what did I choose to do? Blog out the list of things that I should be doing so that I would see that my only option is the final one. So now that I have dragged my rambling out as long as I can I will take myself off the computer and the internet and sit in a quiet place to have some quiet reflective time. Hopefully the change from internet games to prayer and meditation as a calming and centering method will have amazing results.

~DD

It's Lent

So what are you giving up? Are you giving something up? Some years I do and some years I don't, it depends on where I feel like I am in that time. This year I am giving something up, actually I am giving three somethings up. Why? Because I feel like I have let these things get in the way of my relationships with God, my family and friends. Each and every one of them is an addiction of sorts something that I feel compelled to do at the cost of other things. So I am finished for the season, and we will see if I pick them up again.

I am not sharing all three of my addictions for personal reasons, but I will share one. I am giving up ALL of my games on facebook. For some people this might not be a big thing but for me it is. I have no idea how many hours a day/week I spend playing these games, and honestly I am scared to find out. I am not so bad that I could become one of those parents who ignores their dying child to play games, but I am guilty of telling them to wait when they ask for something so that I can finish a game.

I had debated giving up facebook entirely, but because of my lifestyle it is the most convenient way to keep in touch with my friends that are scattered all over the world, so I will keep it running for now.

Now time for me to get off the computer and spend some time with my wonderful kiddos.