what's in you wednesday

I wouldn't consider myself in great shape.

I haven't been in great shape since I was an infant.

But it's important for me to do these weekly write ups about what I am trying to do to stay physically active, because if I didn't think at all about physical fitness, I wouldn't push myself to do anything.

I mention this because I receive a lot of e-mails from people asking if I have a target weight that I'd like to achieve. The answer to that is: No. Not really.

Sure, it would be great to lose some weight and not have certain parts of my body jiggle, but they do and, whatever. I'm not nearly as uptight about my body image as I was when I was 20. Which was almost 20 years ago.

Gah!! When did that happen?!

At the moment, I probably weigh around 145. But, that could be as high as 150 or as low as 140. I really have no idea how much I weigh because our bathroom scale is broken and honestly? I don't care. What's important to me is how I feel. And these days I feel pretty good.

Relative to being pregnant with triplets, I feel amazing.

I feel like I can run a little and walk a lot. I can touch my toes and do a cartwheel. I'm not as flexible as I'd like to be, but then again, I haven't done my yoga tape in at least a month thanks to Henry Houdini. (My car keys and one of my credit cards have been MIA for several weeks due to a toddler that likes to stash things. It's like living with a chipmunk.)

This whole fitness thing is a process for me. I'm not devoting my life to it, but I am trying to make physical activity a part of my life. I am mindful that I must stay active because it's easy enough to not think about and then before you know it, you shudder at the thought of walking up a flight of stairs and tying your shoes makes you sweat.

This past Saturday, Charlie and I drove one hour north to pick up our bib numbers and goody bags for the 5K race we were scheduled to run first thing Sunday morning.

Then, we drove an hour home.

By the time our alarm clocks went off Sunday morning, we both realized that we'd rather jump in a kiddie pool full of ice cubes and hungry piranhas than get out of bed, get our kids out of bed, drive an hour north, run three miles with 15,000 other people while pushing four tired children in strollers, and then drive an hour home again.

Ultimately, we decided that it wasn't very important for us to spend two hours driving to and from a race. So, we went back to sleep.

We woke up three hours later. We had a nice breakfast of french toast. And then, we went for a 8.2-mile run/walk across some very hilly terrain while pushing all four children in double strollers. I actually thought the route was more like 12 miles and was terribly disappointed to see it was "only" eight.

This is a self portrait I took by perching our camera on top of a fence post. Notice my purple Team-In-Training jacket and Charlie's Team-In-Training shirt? We've both determined we're part of the "Team" just not really good at the "In Training."

Thankfully, we were visited by a few ladybugs that kept the children entertained because otherwise, there is no way they would have remained seated for the three two hours it took us.

Since that time, we've gone running twice. I ran for about three miles on two separate occasions while chasing the triplets on their bicycles and pushing Henry in a stroller.

All told, I think we've burned a lot of calories over the past few days. But I think I burned the most calories laughing at this professional photograph that was taken of Charlie during his triathlon, last weekend.

What is with the facial expression?

It looks like he is going to bust in to a really! good! cheer!

It seems the people at Opix do an outstanding job of capturing athletes at their best possible moment.

In other news: I did a very poor job communicating the details of the BOB Diaper Bag raffle. Probably because it was 3 in the morning by the time I finished the post. Due to the response on that contest, I'd like to end it today - and announce the winner as Jacqui in New Hampshire!

(Joy, let's talk. I can set you up with something comparable.)

However.

HOWEVER!!

I will be posting a new contest this coming Friday that will hopefully generate a lot of excitement! and interest! and donations!

And hey, while we're on the subject of donations, in the past two months the three of us have raised over $10,000.00 for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. There is absolutely no way that we would have raised that much money if not for the extremely generous contributions from the readers of THIS blog.

You are awesome.

You rock.

You deserve a really! good! cheer!

So what's in YOU and how are you doing with your goals?

What? You don't have any goals?? Well, now is the time to set some.