3-2-1-EFF

Last weekend was Adam's second CrossFit competition and my very first one. I am not going to bore you with all the details so picture this: lots of spandex, lots of bare skin, lots of abs all mixed with some loud music and protein shakes.

Adam did amazing. He placed 9th out of 31 men competitors and set a new PR on the deadlift (415#!!!!!). I competed with a team and we placed 3rd! (ok, there were only three teams....) but we all tried our hardest and so it really didn't matter what we placed. The workout I had to do for my portion of the team event was a biotch.... and I may have had some suicidal thoughts while trying to get through it, but I did get through (barely) and actually did really well (for me).

Here are some pics from the event.... I just signed up for another compeition in November where I am actually competing as an individual. Fun stuff.

Rowing

Thinking bad, bad thoughts at this point....




Our comp team :)

I suck at blogging

I suck at blogging these days... so sorry, but my life has little to no free time right now. I am so excited, though, because we are FINALLY getting the house put together. Lots of recent changes have taken place that I am excited to share :)

This week's project is our upstairs bedroom. I just got back from buying a new mattress for the bed that will be delivered tomorrow. Now the story of the bed headboard and footboard is one for the books.... so here it goes:

Some of you might remember my bed I had my senior year of college. It is a beautiful antique that I got from my grandma's house after she passed away.... so it has sentimental value. When she owned it, it was yellow and lived in her "yellow room" (she also had the "blue room" "brown room", etc- much like the White house). I painted the yellow an Antique white and took it to college. I always knew I wanted this bed in my future house and have mentally decorated my future daughters room around it.

As you know, we bought a house (finally) and so it was time for me to figure out how to get the bed to Denver. Problem #1: it was at our family's farm in KS. So my parents kindly made a weekend trip out to pick it up. Done. Problem #2: how the hay am I going to get it out to Denver. Well- a few weeks ago we drove back in Phil Mann's TRUCK! Yes! A truck. I thought we could easily load up the bed and bring it back with us. Problem #3. The headboard wouldn't fit in the bed of the truck. So we ended up bringing only half of the bed back with us. Problem #4: FedEx quoted us $500 to ship the headboard out. Not going to do that (this bed is worth purely sentimental value).

Then a few weeks ago, Greg called because I was coming home for another wedding so he volunteered to rent a car and drive the bed back with me after the wedding. So he rented a SUV from Hertz (since it had fit in my Dad's highlander). This past Sunday morning, it took us (no joke) THIRTY MINUTES to get it in the car and FOUR people helping. It would barely fit and it was pretty much like a physics experiment racking our brains trying to figure out which way to tilt it to get it all in + the doors closed. In the process we completely scrapped up the inside of the rental car but we didn't care- we got it in.

The entire way to Denver Greg and I were joking about how we might not be able to get it out, but it had to be easier to pull it out, than to push it in. WRONG. We get to Denver- Adam, myself and Greg spend entirely WAY to long getting it out. It was so bad, I was considering (1) Just returning the car + the bed (how funny would that be) or (2) sawing off a leg and glueing it back on when the bed got out.

Anyways, its out- hallelujah! It just needs to be put together. The new mattress gets delivered tomorrow and its going to be a very cute room- pics to come!

PS- GooGone works wonders on a scrapped up car :)

A year in review

October marks my one year of CrossFitting and wow- a lot has happened in the year. The short version would be something like this:

October 2010- started CrossFit

December 2010- decided I wanted to become an instructor

February 2011- started my 30 hour internship

June 2011- completed the internship/picked up a few classes at the gym

July 2011- Got Level One CrossFit certified

August 2011- Started teaching more classes and joined our competition team

There is a lot to say about CrossFit in general and the way it makes me feel. If you hang out with me for more than 20 mins, you will probably quickly realize how obsessed I am with it. I have gone from being a pretty normal, averagely thin (SOFT!) girl to someone who can (at this point in time) do 29 pull ups on a row, dead lift over 200 lbs, run a 5k in 23mins, lift more than I have ever thought I could lift over my head. I know what things like a snatch, clean, jerk, etc all mean (all weightlifting terms). And pretty much kick a lot of guy's ass as certain workouts. I am not bragging- its just the way it is.

I have COMPLETELY changed the way I eat. I have gone from being almost purely vegetarian and replacing meat with crap. Honestly, I used to not eat meat, so instead would make myself mac and cheese for dinner. Bad substitution people. Now, my diet consists of ALMOST zero processed food. Meat, veggies, nuts and seeds, little fruit, little starch, ALMOST no sugar (minimal dairy, zero grains) . I am still very particular about the meat I eat- but overall I am learning what "healthy" means and becoming more in touch with the way different foods make me feel. Am I perfect at eating like this? ABSOLUTELY not. I am not "paleo" on vacation and I definitely cheat during the week. Balance people balance. I'm not a physco about it.

The BEST thing about CrossFit, actually two things is this:

1) Even though I have been going strong for a year, I don't even feel remotely where I want to be at. Meaning, I can always lift more and try to improve my weaknesses. Every one has their strengths and weaknesses and therefor you never really "master" CrossFit. It really is something you can do forever and not get bored. When a workout gets easy (not sure if thats possible with CrossFit) but all you have to do is increase your weights or put on a weight vest and the same workout is a whole new challenge.

2) The PEOPLE. Honestly, we have the coolest gym around. Since CrossFit is classes only you really get the know the people you are training with. Some of our best friends in Denver are from the gym and its great to have people with the same interest as you to hang out with. I would say 90% of our members are originally from elsewhere- so it is cool to make so many unique/great friends from all different walks of life.

Not that this is the point of the post, but I FEEL so much better when I look in a mirror. Adam even said a few months ago that he hadn't heard me say the term "I feel fat" in a REALLY long time. Thank you CrossFit. I MAYBE will post some before and afters. The owner of our gym, Georgia Maxey (coolest girl in Denver), has some incriminating pictures of me from the beginning of Feb. before we started a challenge (sans clothes). I need to see what those look like and then MAYBE post some... haha.