So summer is quickly coming to an end in Phoenix.  While the days are still hot, the kids are going back to school and my next wave of college freshman are leaving their homes in Phoenix and heading off to places around the country.  I have committed to running the Phoenix PF Chang’s Marathon in January and I am preparing for my long training days.  This summer has been quite successful at getting back into shape and losing some pounds.  I committed to five days a week at the gym and enjoyed my morning spin classes, lifting, and/or eliptical training.  On the weekends, I usually got in a good run before the sun was high and the 110 degree day made it impossible to go outside. 

Phoenicians have it tough in the summer when the kids are out of school, unlike most areas of the country we are forced inside most of the day keeping our kids out of the hot sun.  I found lots of indoor activities for my busy three year old to participate in and was happy that many business owners focused on opening their spaces to their young clientele.  We regularly frequented a cheer gym who had a bouncy house and use of their equipment open to the public twice weekly for a cheap $3 visit.  We frequented the story-hour at Barnes and Noble, participated in the Little Gym, went to library activities, and took regular trips to the mall.  I do believe the mall became my sons favorite summertime treat.  We rode the elevators and escalators for hours and played in the mall play place.  In addition, the mall frequently had kids activities (car racing was our favorite), music, and entertaining fountains all in the cool (almost cold) airconditioning.  As long as I stayed away from shopping, the mall was a free entertainment venue! The Phoenix Zoo had Friday and Saturday evenings open with lots of water play, bouncy houses, and slides to entertain too!  Overall, summer could be a bust when it is so hot, yet you can find cheap and/or free options to get your family out and moving during those hot days.  Finally, our true family favorite is the swimming pool.  Whether you have a pool in your yard or you head to the local pool, swimming cools you down and keeps your kids active.  My son became increasingly water safe and enjoyed countless hours playing in the water.  Get yourself and your children outside as the summer quickly comes to a close!

photo by CRT

Well my son is finally starting to feel better.  He is definitely on the up and up, tonight he asked to go to Cold Stone.  I don’t know about you, but my son absolutely loves ice cream and in particular blue (cotton candy) ice cream with sprinkles from Cold Stone.  Because he was feeling better we indulged his love for ice cream and took him to Cold Stone after he ate a good dinner.  So it is really warm in Arizona right now, it made it to 91 degrees today. so we got him an ice cream and went outside to a nice grassy area to let him and my husband eat.  My son took one bite of ice cream and proceeded to run around and play, unfortunately the ice cream was left in my hands!

This is one of the biggest mistakes a mother can make, eating the rest of her child’s food.  When we usually go for ice cream, my husband and I share some of his ice cream and my son gets his own.  Usually, he doesn’t have a problem finishing his ice cream.  Tonight, I was left with the temptation of a whole cup of blue ice cream with sprinkles.  I admit, I started to take a few bites and realized I needed to stop.  This brings me to my point, many times we fall into the trap of finishing our kids meal.  Those few bites of mac and cheese or that left over chicken finger add up in those calories we eat every day.  I have really committed myself to stop eating his food.  The hardest part is not eating his left over restaurant food.  One of the women I do pilates with told me she actually used to order her son a whole entree and proceed to eat the rest of it.  One good tip is to actually share your food with your child instead of the other way around.  At dinner now, my son and I will split my meal.  If I have a piece of chicken my son gets part of it or when we make ravioli he gets a couple of mine.  I have reached two goals with this philosophy; first, I eat less and second, I have encouraged my son to eat the same food as his Dad and I.  I am happy to say that I have broken the habit of eating my son’s food and cut back on my usual food intake.

photo by flickr family

So I haven’t blogged in a couple of days.  On Thursday night the flu hit our family.  My son has been miserable and I was home from work with him on Friday and up with him the last two days of the weekend.  As a Mom, it is extremely hard to watch your child be sick.   I just wanted to be able to make him feel so much better and there was nothing I could do.  We watched countless hours of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse (ok that made him feel a little better) this weekend and he now loves red gatorade, which he calls “Gator Juice.”  Unfortunately, we were up quite a few times during the night and we are a very tired group in our household, but I am proud to say I still got a workout in!  My mother showed up on Friday afternoon to help out with my son and I was able to get a good run in and enjoy the great Phoenix weather.  On Saturday, I made it to pilates class for an hour and actually was able to go for a bike ride with the whole family (my son needed to get out of the house).  During nap time today, I did a Stott Pilates BOSU workout video that was amazing and very challenging.

It is extremely hard to keep up with your workout routine when your family is sick.  As mothers, we seem to take care of everyone else and not ourselves.  I find when I get stuck at home with a sick child that workout dvd’s come in very handy.  Getting in a workout in your own living room, usually during nap-time, is convenient and quick.   I am very excited to review some pre and post-natal pilates DVD’s that a British pilates instructor is sending me, I will have more information soon.  I also enjoy all of the Stott Pilates videos, you can get anywhere from an easy to extremely advanced workout from 25 minutes to an hour.  I usually stick to ab and core work for at home workout videos, I prefer to go to the gym or get outside for my cardio and strength activities.  I highly suggest finding some great videos to use when you get stuck at home and need that extra core and ab workout.

My son is slowly recovering from his flu bug.  I think my husband is now taking his turn at being sick.  Hopefully I will miss the sickness and be able to just take care of my boys.  I cleaned the entire house this weekend in order to get rid of all the germs.  Luckily, we had great weather in Phoenix this weekend and were able to air the house out and be outside with the family.   Goal: get rid of the sickness and be healthy and stay in great Mommy shape!

photo by Bob Reck

So I have struggled this week with a sick little boy in my house.  My reward as he got better…I got sick!  During his whole sickness, my little boy simply wanted mommy and to snuggle with me as much as possible.  He proceeded to cough and sneeze pretty much all over me!  So now that he is getting better, mommy is sick.  On the other hand, I am so glad that he is feeling better because it has been a long week of illness including three trips to the doctors office (not including my own).

So it has been very difficult to workout in the past week.  My early morning routine was a struggle and I haven’t been to the gym in the morning since last Friday.  My last real workout was on Sunday when I got in a short run.  So it is now time for me to return to my routine.  I am still getting over a cold and ear infection so my plan is Friday morning.  So my challenge to each and everyone of you:  if your routine has fallen off jump back on and get going again.  Let go of those excuses and get back on the road or in the gym!  If you have been consistent in your routine, make a change in your normal everyday workout and switch it up.  Get your self moving!

Photo by Babybee

Today I spent another day at home with my little boy.  We ended up in the urgent care on Sunday because of a high fever and a reoccurring strep infection.  He is feeling a lot better, but he still isn’t eating a lot so I have tried to give him some healthy foods to get some nutrients.  I have been thinking a lot about healthy eating and foods that are important for our every day health.  I found a great article on WedMd about the “Six Super Foods Every Women Needs” and I thought I would share them with you all.  I am excited about the nutritional benefits and disease prevention of each of these foods and I have given you a little overview of each.   These are great foods for heart health, cancer prevention, and other diseases:

1.Low Fat Yogurt – Probiotics (healthy bacteria), More calcium then an 8oz class of low-fat milk.

2. Fatty Fish – Omega 3 fatty acids with DHA and EPA

3. Beans – Low fat source of protein and fiber, folic acid

4. Tomatoes – lycopene a powerful antioxidant (fights breast cancer and heart disease)

5. Vitamin D fortified low fat milk or orange juice – Vitamin D helps bones absorb calcium

6. Berries – anthocyans (anti-cancer nutrients), Vitamin C, Folic Acid, antioxidants

photo by paolo.pace

I spent the last two days with a sick child.  It is so hard to take care of your little one when they are sick, you want to take all their pain away and make it all better.  Unfortunately, we aren’t mind readers and we don’t always know what hurts or how to fix it.  My son went through bouts of feeling terrible and times where he still wanted to play.  He did tell me that his mouth hurt and I soon learned that it wasn’t his teeth, it was his throat.  He has gotten verbal enough that he can now tell me what is wrong.  This was confirmed when he had an ear infection over Christmas break.  I took him to the doctor to see if he was telling the truth, low and behold he was.  I was excited that he could finally communicate his pain and tell me what was wrong.

So communication has become so much better in our household.  Unfortunately, he also communicates exactly what he wants and he is learning to manipulate a little bit more.  My son loves the show Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, he has realized that when he is sick he can get Mom and Dad to put it on TV whenever he wants.  A little bit of whining goes a long way!  We have TiVo’d it, so we have lots of episodes and he has figured that out too.  Now that he is on the mend, he still expects to get his show whenever he wants.  Of course, we don’t want our child watching TV all day, so we have been working on redirecting this enthusiasm for other activities.  He is still recovering so we wanted him to do calm activities, here are great activities for a sick child that I used yesterday (he didn’t want to nap either). 

• Going for a walk in the stroller and letting him walk our dog was a great activity for him yesterday.   I got a walk in after being home with him all day and we were all refreshed being outside. 
• Art activities like coloring, play-do, or drawing on a magna doodle kept him entertained and calm.  My son hadn’t been eating much and interestingly enough he made different foods with the play-do.
• My son has a lot of small toy animals so he wanted to make his own zoo.  He used blocks to make cages and even made his own carousel.  It’s a great idea and kept his creative juices flowing.
• Of course reading him books was a great hit throughout the day.  We would read a couple at different intervals.
• Finally, he received Candy-land from his Grandma at Christmas.  We played a couple of rounds of the game and even made up some of our own rules.