A Grocery Store Experience.

The grocery store by my mother-in-law's house (1 block) closed it's doors yesterday for three months.  It was purchased by another company who is doing a remodel project. 

Normally that would be a good thing.  However, that grocery store was the source of my mother-in-law's exercise and socialization.  She would walk to the grocery store no less than twice a day for exercise, to pick up groceries (maybe one or two items) then go home.  Sometimes she would go to the deli and buy a meal to eat at home and quite often she would sit on the benches and visit with people.

She's 91 years of age and a pure spitfire.  So she's not taking this "desertion" of her grocery store very well at all.   In her words, "it's the pits!" lol

So, herein begins the process of what to do for her 1) exercise, 2) groceries 3) food.  Oh lordy me, what a process this is going to be!

1) Exercise
I explained to Ella that just because the grocery store was closed, it didn't mean that she had to stop walking over to the mall.  There was still the Pantry cafe, White's Home Center and White Drug.  She seemed OK with that.

2)  Groceries was another story. lol.  Today I took her to the "other" grocery store in town.  What an excursion.  She had her list...a whopping five items...grabbed a cart and proceeded to follow me around the grocery store getting acquainted with the store and where everything was.  Of course, everything was referenced by "the OLD store did it this way" or "at the Old store they had 'this' and 'that'". lol   We did finally manage to get everything  after being there for an hour ..for five items. :)

3) Food.  She is used to going to the deli to get something warm and hot to eat each and every day.  That is not an option now unless she goes to The Pantry Cafe for a meal, which she could certainly do.  I've tried to get her "Meals on Wheels" delivered to her, but she says that is "charity, and I don't take charity."   OK, I get that.  She has pride.   So, I have decided that I need to get better at cooking meals, planning, so that I can take leftovers in to her. 

All in all, today was a good day though.  We have a standing date to do brunch and grocery shopping on Sundays.  If anything, it will give me some quality time with my mother-in-law, and give her something to look forward to all week.

This is so cool!!!

A couple of weeks ago I was talking with my trainer, Casey, that I seemed to be hitting a wall in my workouts.  He, in typical fashion, said "work harder."   No shit Sherlock!

Then he suggested that I get a heart rate monitor so that I could see how long I was in the zone and how hard I was working.

Great idea....I immediately went home and started shopping and came up with the "Polar FT-4"

This is a cool little unit!!  First of all, it's pretty pink...  and it does everything but sing to me.  (I'm sure it does that too if I could figure out how to run all the features on it!"

Anywho...tonight at the gym I strapped this baby on for the third time and commenced to working out.

Casey and I had already decided determined that my heartrate zone should be between 128 (min) -148 (max).   I asked what happened if I went in to the 150's and Casey says, "go for it, just don't die on my watch."  Gotta love that guy!  LOL

So...back to my story.

Tonight I was definitely looking to step things up a notch.  And I did just that!

Duration:  1:15:54
Calories: 514
In Zone: 49:11
Average HR: 138
Maximum HR: 156

Keep in mind that this was not all cardio....I was lifting 3 sets of 12-15 reps on legs and arms.

Not bad for a 49 yr old yoga instructor!  

Darkness

This whole time change thing is really messing with my head.  It was rather nice this morning to actually drive to work in the daylight.   However, having dusk at 6pm in the evening bites!  Just sayin!

I'm not one to suffer from SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder), but if I was, I'd be moving to someplace that is sunny and warm ALL the time.   Come to think of it, maybe I'll just move to some place sunny and warm anyways! lol

Now, in an attempt to be fair and positive, I'm going to sit down and find five GOOD things to say about this time change and the dwindling daylight hours.

1) Driving to work in daylight at 7:30 was pleasant.
2)
3)
4)
5)
 

Sherry

What? It's been THAT long?

OK, I know that I've been busy, but this is ridiculous!  I didn't realize that my last published post to this blog was September 29th.  Sheeeeeshhh!!!  My bad, folks!

I need to get better at sitting down and writing something every day so you blog stalkers (you know who you are!) have more insight to my quirky mind!  ;)

So, what has been going on?   Family, yoga, family, yoga, work, exercise, family, yoga, yoga, and more yoga. 

OK.  End of post!   JUST KIDDING!!  lol 

The month of October started out with my cousins Valerie and Keith coming from California so that Keith could experience bow hunting (deer) North Dakota style.   He left without a deer.  lol.   Hey...that's the way the cookie crumbles sometimes.  However, he may have left without a deer, but he and his sister Valerie left some pretty freaking fantastic memories of what us NoDak cousins are all about. 

I took three days off from work so that I could spend time with my cousins and I thoroughly enjoyed every minutes.  Saying goodbye was tough to do though.  

The very next week was the annual Schulz Oktoberfest held at The Bunker.  As usual, it's all about getting together, having some food (duh!  We ARE Schulz's!!) and drink (uhhh...hello!!  Schulz +.Oktoberfest =Beer!).  Besides that, it's about family.  I wouldn't trade those moments with my family for all the gold in the world.  They mean everything to me!

We were missing a few this year:  Shelly, Randy, Glenn, Michael, and Joan.   We'll hope that next year brings us all together and in good health.

As I'm writing this, I just finished my first every yoga retreat.  You'll have to go to my yoga blog www.betterlifethroughyoga.blogspot.com to read all about and see just a few of the pictures from the weekend (more will be posted later).

So ya, October was a busy month for me to say the least.  Truth be told, November isn't looking much better. LOL  Oh well...at least I'm living life to the fullest and not watching it pass me by. 

Until next time my friends,

Sherry