The day after. (written on Thursday)

The day after the 10 miles bike ride and I feel surprisingly okay...good even.

Yesterday I got up at 5:40am to catch the 6:33 train. Getting up and functioning wasn't easy. I'm still just getting used to getting up at 6am, so an even earlier alarm is not a welcome thing. My body likes routine. It doesn't like and reacts very negatively to changes, especially when that change happens in the morning. To help my body (specifically my stomach) to cope I popped a couple immodiums. I know I know, no one really wants to read about that, but it's my blog...and my IBS to work through.

I got to the office at 7:30 and shortly after was headed toward North Ave Beach by way of cab. We got to the beach and each were given our vehicles of torture (the bikes). I don't really don't know anything about bikes, but they seemed really nice. After a few humiliating photo-ops with the other office peeps, we were off and riding. We rode roughly 1/2 mile and pulled over to stop to wait for some to catch up. At that point I realized that this whole thing was a big mistake. "What were you thinking, Rach?" I thought to myself. My thoughts raced as e slow-pokes caught up, "how in the world are you going to make it another 9.5 miles?!" we pressed on.

The ride was beautiful. It was all along the path by the lake. It was a sunny day, the water and sky were blue, the city was in clear view. We reached the Shedd Aquarium and that whole area...it was our half-way-ish point. We stopped for a bit to wait for the slow-pokes. At this point I was a member of that group. A really frustrating part of this whole ride was that the rest of my office was a part of the front running group. Didn't they say this was a team outting? I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little sad.

I finished out the ride in just under 2 hours. Bleh. To be fair, we did stop for a few more photo-ops along the way which I'm sure greatly affected my time.

Overall, I am glad I did it and am glad it's over. I would like to take that route again though! It was soooo pretty. I've never seen the city from that view before. It reminded me of what a great city I live in (near). Maybe I will take the hubs request to buy bikes a little more seriously...

First full week.

Well, here I am riding the train for the 7th round trip. My new job is going pretty well. My healthy eating choices are still pretty much on track, and I'm still trying to be more active than I have been in the past. The walk from the train to work and back definitely helps.
I still have second thoughts about making the job change. I talk to my replacement back at the old job and sometimes wonder, "what have I done?" Everyone I talk to assures me that I made a great decision and I, for the most part, agree with them...but there's this nagging hesitant feeling.
The people I work with seem very fun and hard working. This is a great combination! They also seem pretty laid-back too, which is crazy to me because it's a sales office! I'm sure there are plenty of conflicts that I am not aware of at the moment.
Tomorrow the whole office (actually whole corporate group) is doing a charity bike ride. The ride is 10 miles! The 10 mile option is actually the short option. Ten miles seems terribly ambitious for me. I haven't been on a real bike since I was in my teens! I'd be lying if I told you I wasn't nervous. I'm pretty sure I'm going to have a sore butt on Thursday! The craziest part is that we are to meet at the office at 7:30am, start riding at 8:30, be dine by 10:30....then at some point go back to the office and work a bit. Then go to a happy hour at 4:30/5ish! These people are mad! I have 2 more work days in the week!!
The good side is...there are people less in shape than me!

Last weekend

Generally I post for two reasons:

1) Something major in my life happens.  Not necessarily life threatening or changing or anything...just something is different about my life and I want to talk about it.

2) I feel like I have to post because I haven't in a long time.  In this case...my posts are probably pretty weak.  Much weaker than normal.

I completely spaced posting about my brother getting married!  I feel aweful.  I think facebook sometimes interferes with how much I write on this blog.  If I post pictures and comments on facebook about something, I just figure I'm done with it.  In this case, my brother's wedding is definitely something that I want to talk about.

The wedding was held at Christ is Lord church in Omaha,  NE.  I went to this church for a few years and my parents still go.  The weekend started off with the rehearsal dinner on Friday night where the families got to meet each other and all that.  After the rehearsal, we went over to Brother Sebastians restaurant.  I  must say that the tone of the evening was very...umm...different than I've ever experienced.  The bride's parents are very VERY reserved for sure.  It was rather hard to tell if they were excited...scared...in shock??  I think it definitely threw most of us off.

At the dinner I got to chit-chat w/ her Dad and he seemed to be pretty cordial.  I'm hoping that as time goes on, our families will naturally become more acquainted and meshed together.  Her parents did throw a nice brunch after the wedding day for Matt and Jess to open gifts.  I wasn't able to go, but my parents did and they had a good time.  Said Jess's mom made an excellent quiche!

The wedding was fun and beautiful.  Jess made the most stunning bride and Matt was decked out and looking great as well.  I had the privilege of reading during the ceremony, so that was cool.  They originally asked  me to stand in the wedding, however I declined thinking I'd be pregnant by that time. Heh...well...clearly God had other plans!  Her BM's had hairpieces though!!  All of them looked like they had long hair, it was blended SO well!  I just couldn't believe it!  How fun would it be to have long hair for an evening?!?  I totally want to try it now.  So - if anyone wants to try it with me...I'm in!!!

The reception had a candy-bar at it - filled with all sorts of yummy candies!  It was adorable!  The reception hall was cute and decorated nicely as well.  Their cake was chocolate and they served cupcakes to the guests.  Gotta love that!  The couple was so happy the whole night - it was wonderful to see.  I am a little sad that Brian and I didn't dance together.  He DID however come up and do the Cuban Shuffle with me - which kinda counts as dancing w/ me...  they played "our song" (our 1st dance wedding song) during the dollar dance, so we couldn't go up and dance.  And some of the dj selections weren't terribly dance-friendly, so I'm thinking we just never took advantage of the slow songs that were played.

Here are some pictures from the rehearsal and wedding...

 Matt and Jess at the rehearsal dinner

 This is the 1st time they're seeing each other on their wedding day!

 One of the 100's of pics they had to pose for! haha

 Waiting for the bride....

 more waiting for the bride - sharp looking GM though!

 even more waiting for the bride....great looking wedding party!

 There she is!!

 This is their cute cake topper - they had yummy chocolate cake, however I didn't have any because I had filled up on sweets at the candy-bar!

 The Candy Bar

 Even Mom participated in the Dollar Dance

 I love this picture of me and the hubs...only is it me or does he have 1 blue eye and 1 brown eye in this pic?

Jess and her flower girl dancin' it up!  The other little girl was a dancing maniac too!

Untitled

I'm excited for the weekend! Mostly because that means I don't have to go in to work. Ha! As most everyone knows by now I started a new job. Despite the first day being a little rough for me...I do still think I made a good decision. The office, on the whole, is nice. I believe that the longer I'm there the more true colors of people I will see. All of the recruiters are women...which could go really well or really awful. I'm hoping for a "really well" situation. Only time will tell how all that works out.
God has totally been with me every step of the way though! My stomach has mostly accepted the change of schedule. My body is still getting used to waking up at 6am and catching the 7am train. I've gotten to were I can start eating my to-go breakfast (baggy of pops) 1/2 way through the ride downtown. Then upon exiting the train I crack open a V8 fusion. I'm trying to eat better now days, so that's part of one of my healthy choices. It actually might be working because I did notice having more energy throughout the day last week. We will see how next week goes.
Well, Jr. High Ministry starts up again this Sunday. I will be happy to see the kids, but sad because this marks the end of summer. I'm pretty much dreading to see what it's like to commute downtown in the winter! Today we have an all day training event for jr high small groups. I'm happy and frustrated at the same time about this. Happy there is a training, frustrated it's on a Saturday. I'm sure it will be fun.
That is about all that's going on for now. I'm going to use the rest of my Saturday morning to relax and do nothing!

Too Many Changes!

Ok, everyone that knows me know that I am a fan of changing things up.  I love trying new foods, new things, learning different things etc...  so it REALLY caught me off guard how much I was thrown off of my game on the 1st day of my new job.

Now, I've neglected to really write anything about the upcoming job change because I didn't want anyone finding out before they were actually supposed to, however now the cat is outta the bag and everything is a done deal.  I must say it was a much longer process than I planned on it being!  It wasn't an easy decision either, but in the end, I left my corporate job as the onsite manager at Allstate to go back to recruiting.  I did this for a number of reasons, but the bottom line is that the company I joined is at an exciting time and I wanted to be on the ground level of what's beginning there.  It's hard to explain in type, so I really won't attempt to...suffice to say I'm very excited about the opportunity at hand.  All that being said...I'm SCARED!!  HA!  I was feeling as fine as it gets in the weeks leading up to my 1st day.  I was nervous about leaving my replacement all alone, but the day had to come at some point.  Allstate will definitely be taken good care of by my replacement, so that made me feel better about moving on.  I never expected to have such a negative reaction to my 1st day though!

I set my alarm for 6am, made my lunch the night before, and made sure to set out the clothes I intended on wearing the next day.  Alarm went off and immediately my stomach was in knots.  My body knew something was different.  I struggled through the rough start of my day and got to the train station in time to park, buy my 10 ride ticket, and pay for parking.  Thankfully I got downtown earlier than the office was expecting me, so I took my sweet time getting to the office.  I arrived at my new building - looked up...all around...the buzz and noise of the city, all the people, new place, new things - nothing familiar...all at once I felt overwhelmed and like a lost child.  I frantically scanned the lobby for the nearest bench - nearly ran to it.  Sat down.  Took a couple deep breaths...eyes welled up... then I thought "RACH stop!  You have make-up on and you can't fix it!" I fought the tears back and blinked a few times - ran my fingers through my hair and glanced around as if to act like I'm waiting for someone.  "This is a mistake, you should've stayed in your comfy position, how can I get used to this?  What am I doing here??"  All these frantic thoughts went racing through my head.  The peace I had prayed for so urgently on the train had seemed to just slip through my fingers all at once.  I called the only familiar person I knew was in the office.  Thankfully he not only picked up, but came down to the lobby and bought me an iced tea.  Ahhh - tea...an instant comfort.

The rest of the day was filled with meeting new people and getting my computer set up.  It was boring, exciting, and overwhelming all at the same time.  My new boss and the office admin took me to lunch, so that was wonderful.  Everyone seems to be very nice.  I'm looking forward to settling in.

Also - in other news I have stopped only following the couch-to-5k plan.  I need variety.  Since I last typed I've done a couple Pilates DVDs and went jogging today.  I still do more fast walking than jogging, but I'm getting exercise, so that's good.  I'm making better choices about eating too.  I do my best to bring my lunch and not skip meals...which is super hard for me.

 

Exercise: day 2

Yesterday was a rest day, so that makes today a workout day!

Ok, so I didn't exactly do Day 2, Week 1 of the couch to 5k program today like I was originally planning. BUT I did, however spend 30 minutes of quality time with Jillian Michaels. Hindsight being what it is, I might have fared better on my own with the jogging/walking combo.

Working out with Jillian is like having not only your own personal trainer right beside you, but one who continually reminds you of how strong and able you are. You don't even pay extra for the encouragement! It's pretty awesome. She doesn't shame you for following the "modified/easier version" of the activity, yet she doesn't allow you to slack off either. She's a perfect balance of friend and trainer.

I'm not exactly sure what caused me to decide to work out twice in one week already? I guess I've been inspired by quite a few people around me that take such good care of themselves. I want to feel better about myself as well. Also, whenever I get a workout routine going I do tend to have more energy, eat better, and wake up refreshed in the morning. Right now though...it's difficult to get to sleep because of the pain my body is in. I get headaches because of the tension in my shoulder muscles as well...it's super annoying. I just keep thinking about the end result...maybe I won't be so weak.

I really don't mind being thin, but at times it's just sucks to be the sole weakest one in the bunch. I just don't like being the poor fragile one...it's enough that I have inconvenient GI issues at times. For once I'd like to have some type of physical endurance.

I know what I lack in physical strength I'm sure God has made up for it elsewhere in how He made me, so that's good...but heart-strength really doesn't help me open a jar when Brian is outta town! Lol

Well, now that I've worked in my body, it's time for my soul. Time to spend some quality time with my Savior.

New challenges! Week 1 Day 1

K, here goes...

I've decided that I need to take action! I have groaned and complained and whined about how my waistline and tummy aren't exactly where I want them to be. Now before you go rolling your eyes at me, hear me out. If you know me, you know that I am indeed thin framed, however you probably don't realize that my midsection is the 1st/only place my fat has found a resting place. (well and my upper thighs too, but I would imagine no one really sees that part of me often). Adding fat to my waistline makes it very hard to find pants because what fits in the waist sags in the butt. Ridiculous. I know I know, those of you who struggle with weight are probably sick to their stomachs right now and playing the worlds smallest violin for me. But hey, I figure this is my blog to write about what I struggle with...if you think it's petty, that's totally okay with me. :)

A friend of mine suggested the couch to 5k for me. You must understand...I am close friends with 2 women who ran the Chicago marathon...the MARATHON! How intimidating. I have shot their friendly invites to run with them more times than I can remember. It's a wonder they don't ridicule me for even bringing up this whole exercise thing, I mean I have started more exercise programs than I care to share with you!

So, I've decided to take on a 60 day challenge and hopefully blog about my journey. Today was the first day. Week 1 Day 1. The couch to 5k program. How terribly humbling. Couch to 5k? Really this is what I've come to? This morning I was reminded of how not in shape, lack endurance, and how NOT flexible I am! Lol, this should be fun, right?

Today it was 75 and humid outside. I set out for my 5 minute warm-up brisk walk. As I passed the houses in my neighborhood I thought to myself how goofy I must look. Haha, ok 5 minutes were up, time to start jogging for 90 seconds. Complete! Ha that was easy and kinda felt good. Now walk for 60 seconds. This seems good too, gives me a chance to figure out where I will run next. Jog 90 seconds...and so on. After 15 minutes of this the regimen started to look like jog for 30 seconds and walk for 3 minutes. {{{eye roll}}} a lesson in humility. I must start somewhere. I'm just glad it was early enough on this morning in Palatine for no one to really be out and about to see me drag mayself back home on my self-imposed 10 minute cool-down walk.

So there you have it, day 1 of week 1. What have I gotten myself into?