bridge | Day With KT

Today’s 44 was inspired by the daily challenge for HappyFitMarch – set a new bridge PR.

Well, I don’t think I had a previous PR for bridge (not sure I’ve ever timed it) but I decided to do do alternating leg lifts for the 44 while I was holding bridge.

I counted a right & left as 1 rep – fun way to hold bridge for awhile!!!

I pulled out another DVD that I haven’t done in awhile – part of the 10 Minute Solution series – Tone Trouble Zones. This DVD came with a band –

I like to use the band/tubing for extra resistance and this workout was a good one especially for my upper back! I did all 5 of the 10 minute sections including the 10 minute stretch. I’ve mentioned a few times that I don’t always take the time to stretch but 10 minutes isn’t too bad and this was actually a nice treat today.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EkFIPev-pz8

The summer that my parents were divorced, I lived with my grandparents. Every morning I watched The Facts of Life and wished that I could live with the girls at a boarding school!!!

I like the theme song – “You take the good, you take the bad…..” Such a very true thing in life every day.

Tuesday, I had to take some bad –

I went to our venue to clean and set up for an event and walked in to see the river floating through our place. After I figured out the problem and took care of it, I mopped up the water then went down to check out the creepy basement. Also flooded – water was still dripping down from the ceiling. Not my favorite way to start a day but thankfully it has been taken care of and last night I was over there and the floors don’t seem to be damaged from all the water.

Yesterday morning I had another appointment with the DR who did my vein surgery last April. I have 2 places (my left ankle and my right inner thigh) that have hurt pretty much every single day since last April when I had the initial procedure done.

This DR said it shouldn’t be hurting anymore but that she thinks it is all fine (I have lumps in both of those places that I can feel and they are STILL bruised). She said if it still hurts in about 6 months she will do some checking because it could have gotten into my muscles.

I’m not sure how I feel about waiting 6 more months since it has been 11 months already for something that was supposed to be “no big deal” and healed quickly. I think that I will give it about 2 months and then look into getting a 2nd opinion if it isn’t better!!!

Some weeks, the bad seems to outweigh the good but I know that every week is different and even the bad isn’t that bad in the big picture!!!

And, to end on a happier note, check out our weather forecast –

Minus the snowflake on Saturday, it looks awesome!! Look at Sunday and Monday – happiness!!!!

Happy Thursday!!

Kim

For today’s 43 I got my inspiration from a post I read yesterday over at Cranky Fitness. The post was all about glute activation. A couple different trainers weighed in with video or pictures and I realized that I had never done the move the exact way they were showing – until today!!!

The move is a hip lift, or bridge (which I have done before) but instead of leaving your feet flat on the floor, you raise your toes.

(Also, your feet are supposed to be as close to your butt as possible – putting them out further allows the hamstrings to do the work and it is supposed to be a butt move!!!)

From the starting position, you lift your hips and try to form a straight line from your knees to your head (I always squeeze my butt as I lift and hold for a little extra bonus):

I held this for a 3-count. Then lowered just enough for my butt to barely touch the ground.

After I finished all 43 I tried a couple of bridges with my feet flat on the ground to see if I could tell a difference – umm, NO because my butt my hips/butt already hurt from the 43!! One thing I did notice by doing this move with my toes up – my shins hurt while I was holding the position. (Maybe I put to much weight in my heels??!!)

Yesterday was an unplanned day off so today I decided to push through. (whine – I still have a residual headache but “suck it up, buttercup!!”)

I did an oldie from The Firm – Aerobic Body Shaping (part of the TransFirmer series) which means I used my cool step.

14" double step (the Transfirmer) — 14″ double step (the Transfirmer)

The double step is used for a lot of the leg/butt work. The angled version (below) is used for a couple of the aerobic sections and a lunge series plus some of the upper body work.

This is a pretty good whole body workout – it includes toning and aerobics in just under an hour. I also did the bonus 10 minute glute work.

First the negative: Tuesday night someone hacked my email account!! Why?? I just don’t understand people. They set it up to send all of my email to a new account and they got into my eBay account (probably from an old email) – 36 people now think I’m going to shell out a total of $25,000 for crap I don’t want! Fortunately after 45 minutes on the phone last night with someone who spoke minimal English, the eBay situation is being investigated. (Plus I spent almost an hour, most of it on hold, on the phone with PayPal to make sure all was good there.) Chris spent about and hour and a half on the phone fixing my email account. Lots of new passwords and all is well!

Now for the Positive!!! I just started using Bloglovin (sorry I can’t get a link on here cause I’m ~~stupid~~ technologically challenged, but I have the button at the top of my page that links) and I love it!!! Because I’m really behind the times (and slow!), I never used Google Reader. I wasted so much time clicking around to blogs only to find that I had already read the most current post. No more!!! (I know, this is old hat to most of y’all but exciting for me!!!)