A Mile A Day

This July when I was on hiatus from blogging, I decided to take a few teeny steps back in to the workout game. Now, don’t get me wrong, I was telling the truth when I said earlier I didn’t set any lofty goals for myself over this blogging break. Instead of committing to eating salads for breakfast, lunch and dinner or losing 15 pounds, I decided to aim a little lower. I got the idea from Elise Joy’s blog to try and run one mile per day, every day. To help keep me motivated, I documented my runs on Instagram under the hashtag #mileadayjuly, looking for fun things to take photos of while out and about.

Here is the thing about running a mile a day, it’s totally doable! I mean, how long does it take to run a mile? 10 to 15 minutes for me, depending on the terrain (I’m no marathoner and my mile time is sort of sad…but it is what it is!), so I knew it wouldn’t take too much out of my day to complete. The whole time issue has been a huge roadblock for me as I figure out this new life and schedule. My child free hours for work are so limited, so I hate using the time when we have a sitter to complete a run. Taking the kids to the gym is an option, but packing them up, driving to the gym, dropping them off at the child care center (which can take from 2 to 20 minutes depending on Tate’s mood and clingy issues), then doing my workout, plus picking them up afterward and getting home, can end up taking over an hour or two! My solution was to get up a bit early and run before the kids woke up on the trails around my house. This was a great plan until Tate stopped sleeping at night and I was way too exhausted to go running first thing in the morning. Also, we went through a crazy heat wave for a few weeks, so my workouts were forced to the air conditioned gym. I know, I know, first world problems, right?

All in all, I ran almost every day of July, but certainly not every single day. There were the four days Tate and I had the summer flu, for example, when there was definitely no running going on. But I still feel like I jump started my workouts again. I had been living like a slug since around March, so just getting out there and doing anything at all was a huge triumph. This month I have been continuing my runs, but have also added on a bit of weight lifting and have been cutting some sugar from my diet. Next month, when we get back into our school/work routine and both kids are back on a normal schedule, I plan to start going to yoga again as well. Or not. It depends on if that darn two-year-old remembers how to sleep at night. But that’s for another post…