Where, oh where, has my motivation gone?

I think the title of this post is sufficient to explain what I've been up to lately.  A whole lot of nothing.  Well, at least a whole lot of nothing in the exercise and health department.  As for work, and my social life, I've been pretty busy.  Here are a few pics to recap where I have been for that last week and a half.

 Nick's best friends from high school got married on September 14th.  It was a low-key, beautiful, country wedding.  Nick is the short, but not shortest, groomsman in green :)  We forgot to get a card to go along with the wedding gift, so Nick and I put our wonderful artistic talents to work, and made one ourselves. 

Super huge, pretty rainbow that was in our neighborhood last week.

One of my besties recently  moved 2.5 hours away.  We visited her and her fiance's new apartment, then spent a night at his parent's cabin on the lake.  The weather was rather chilly, but we had fun just relaxing, playing euchre, having campfires, drinking, and playing with the pups.  

I'm a day late on the whole goal posting, but here goes.  I will be running another half marathon on October 20.  I really don't want it to suck as much as the one in August did, so hopefully my single, puny goal this week will help get the fire burning.  My goal this week is tough, but simple.  

Burn 3,500 calories.

That's a lot of calories... But it is totally doable if I just keep moving.  I have made this goal even more difficult by doing jack shit yesterday.  Therefore, I am already behind 500 calories right out of the gate.  Go me!  

Happy week, ya'll!!

Throw-back Thursday - Prom Style

Today, I am participating in another new-to-me linkup. I love finding all these linkups that lead me to other awesome blogs.  The linkup today is Throw-back Thursdays hosted by Amy at The Story of Us.

This week's throw-back is high school dances. The only dance I have access to pictures of right now is my junior prom.  At my high school, we had junior prom, not senior prom.  And at that, junior prom only.  My graduating class only has 48 people...and two of them were foreign exchange students... so...kind of a small school.  We couldn't be having school dances whenever our little hearts felt like it! 

Anyway, junior year was all about prom.  Prom was in May so you had basically the entire school year to find the perfect dress.  The rich kid's parents took them to crazy places, like 3 hours away to Chicago, to buy their dresses.  The rest of us, we herded to the mall, or the local bridal boutique which also carried prom dresses.

My bff, Anna, whom is still my bff, actually worked at the bridal boutique during high school.  Since she worked there, she was kind of obligated to buy her dress there.  Being as I was her best friend, and visited her at work all the time, and knew the owner, I was also obligated.  And being best friends, we of course bought matches dresses...yeah, matching.  Same dress, just different colors...

You cannot tell very well in the picture, but my dress is in fact hot pink, not red.  I was a huge jock/tom boy in high school, and I did not own one single piece of pink clothing.  For some reason though, I bought I hot pink prom dress.

Why did we think matching dresses was a good idea? Besides the obvious bff factor, that is. Maybe we were going for the Sleeping Beauty theme where her fairy godmothers keep changing her dress from pink to blue? Anna and I are still trying to figure that out, but it does make for a great, cheesy bff story.  Maybe some day, our daughters will wear matching prom dresses too.  Or, more likely, maybe we will talk our daughters out of buying matching prom dresses.

Group photo of ALL the girls I graduated with the next year.  With the exception of the 2 exchange students.

  

Linking It Up

I am jumping on the bandwagon with many folks today, and I am linking up for Weigh-In Wednesday with Heather, Ash, & Bailey AND Finish the Sentence with Jake & Holly.


This little chunky monkey weighed in at 170.1.  I have not seen the 70's in a while, so it was a bummer that it appeared on the scale this morning.  It may have something to do with the giant plate of homemade nachos I ate for dinner last night...  Now that I'm working on getting my routine back on track though, I am very confident that it is a one time thing, and the 70's will not hang around long.

This is my first time linking up for Finish the Sentence.  It sure is fun to read people's response, so I thought I would add my own.

My happy place... Anywhere I can lay around with a good book.  Two places that stick out in my mind for this is 1) Snuggled up in bed, with my dogters.  2) In the hammock, overlooking the lake, on family vacation.

Whatever happened to... Initiative.  It is astonishing how people do not make the move to take care of something on their own.  They see that something needs to be done, but instead of just doing it, they wait until someone else comes to tell them to do it.  I experience this on a daily basis with my student workers, and it just blows me away.  When I was a student worker, just 5 years ago, my superiors barely had to tell us what to do.  We just noticed what needed to be done, and we did it.

So what if I... Hangout with my brother's ex girlfriend more than I hangout with him?  She is a ton of fun, and nobody understands why he broke up with her in the first place.  I can't help it, that the two of us bonded while they dated, and we're still friends.

E! needs a reality show about... I am not much a tv watcher, let a lone a reality show junkie.  I honestly have no answer for this one.

My go-to fast food meal is... Qdoba or Chipotle vegetarian burrito.  I really have no preference for one restaurant over the other, I just go to whichever one is nearby.

You might not know that I... kann ein bisschen Deutsch sprechen and estudio español ahora.  Mi español es mejor de mi alemán.

The hottest quarterback in the NFL is... I'm from Wisconsin, so obviously, Aaron Rodgers.  Not only because he's a Packer, but because he's a stud!

If I could... travel where ever I want, whenever I want, with my dogs and unlimited funds, I would pack up the dogs & Nick, sell our house, and we would hit the road.  Whenever we need a home-base, we'll just stay with our parents :)

My personality is awesome because... I am very empathetic and sympathetic so I relate well to a vast variety of people.

Twerking is... Something I am not entirely aware of... As I mentioned above, I don't watch much tv, so I'm usually behind the times.  I know it's about some crazy dance, but I have no idea what it actually is... btw, I'm only 26...not 86...

I think it is super gross when... There are poop streaks in the toilet.  I mean, c'mon.  Do a courtesy flush, and if that doesn't work, fricken clean it!  I understand this may not be plausible in public restrooms, but then do a double courtesy flush!

Someone needs to tell Miley Cyrus... to keep on keepin' on.  She is an adult.  As long as she is not harming another person, she can do whatever the hell she wants. Why do YOU care about HER choices?



Oooooh, that was fun! I cannot wait to join another Finish the Sentence linkup!

Goals

It has been forever and a day since I have accomplished any goals, let alone create some.  It is now time to get back in the saddle, and create goals to work towards.

1.  Hydration - Drink at least 100oz of water a day (I will admit, I totally copied this goal from our lovely hostess, Carolyn).  My water intake has been sub-par for a while, time to turn that around.

2.  Run at least 3 times this week - I have yet to write a race recap, but I ran a half marathon on August 17, 2013.  I didn't train very well for it, so it was rough, to say the least.  From my lack of training, and not having my body up to par for running 13.1 miles, I developed  stress fracture in my foot.  This led to a sharp, shooting pain that went from my side of my foot, and up in the my ankle, each time I stepped down on my left foot.  I could barely walk, let alone run. After taking 3 weeks off from running, and icing and compressing like crazy, I am finally ready to get back into my running groove.

3.  Go to the gym at least 4 times this week - My gym manager usually deducts my membership fee from my account on the 5th of each month.  Well, I'm not sure if it was an error, or he noticed my severe lack of attendance, but I was never charged for the month of August, and have yet to be charged for September... I live in a tiny town of about 2,000 people, and probably only about 5% of the population uses this gym, so it's easy to notice if people stop coming.  Either way, the fact that I have not been to the gym in well over a month, is not cool.

Overall, this week is about activity and hydration.  I am ready to get back into a fitness routine.  My body has felt all out of whack for weeks, and me no likey!

Happy goal making, everyone!

Oh, and my badass friend, Angela, officially became an Iron(wo)man around 11pm last night!!  After working her booty off for 15 hours 40 minutes and 39 continuous seconds, she made one of her dreams come true.  I so glad I was able to watch and cheer her one! I am so proud of you, Angela!

 

I'm baaaaack!

Hello lovelies.  Remember me?  I took a more than brief hiatus because I was not being inspiring.  The goal of this blog is to keep myself accountable, and inspires others.  Neither of those things was happening, so I decided to take a step back, and re-gather.  Now that my shit is a little bit back together, I am ready to continue sharing intimate details of my life with the blogging world ;)

While I was away, I actually ran a 5 mile race and a half marathon.  Besides those two runs, my fitness side has been basically non-existent.  I’ll write more about that this weekend…

To welcome myself back into the blogging world, I am linking up with the 5 on Friday ladies.  I will leave my “disappearance excuse” and “half marathon recap” posts for this weekend when I have more time.

{ONE}

My pal, Angela, decided months ago to go all beast-mode and sign up for Ironman.  Bitch is cray, but also AH-MAY-ZING!!  The Wisconsin Ironman event is this Sunday, and I cannot wait to see this chica in action and cheer her on.  No matter how she does, she is still my hero!  Just committing yourself to the training it takes to compete in Ironman is awesome. 

After Ang competed in a half Ironman last month.

  

{TWO}

Boot season!  I want these black beauties so badly!!

{THREE}

Leinenkugel’s Orange Shandy.  That’s right, Orange.  Not Summer Shandy.  Not Lemon Berry Shandy.  But, Orange Shandy.  It is delicious!  If you are at all a fan of the Summer or Lemon Berry, get ready to have your world rocked by Orange.

{FOUR}

Having dinner with one of my besties this weekend, in her new house!

My Elly

{FIVE}

Researching new running kicks.  The pictures below are the ones I am currently crushing on, but on appearance only.  I have not yet tried any of them on.  This time around, I am actually going to go to a running store to get fitted.  My right knee is often achy when I am putting in a lot of miles, so I am hoping a professional can suggest shoes that will help with that issue.  I am also hoping one of these babies makes the list of approved shoes! 

Happy Friday, everyone!