A Case of the Runs

I was a little hesitant to purchase pregnancy-specific workout videos, but it did not take me too long to realize that I would prefer to not have to think up "safe" variations each time I do a video.  I had seen a lot of Tracy Anderson videos online while researching barre stuff, so I thought I'd give her "Pregnancy Project" a try. The fact that it had 9 DVDs was intriguing (although later I realized you're only supposed to do one per month, so not much variety at all), and I figured it wouldn't just be one of those too-easy videos since she seems to be known for results. My initial impression of the cover was like O__o -- basically, WHY is she wearing only a lacy bra on the cover of a workout DVD?!  Well, you know what they say about books and their covers... I was doing/still do some of my normal workout DVDs , skipping anything that feels odd and the ab portions.  So these videos were just part of my rotation throughout the first few months, t...

Many years ago (as in, more than 5), I tried to make pasta using a manual roller that my parents had sitting around.  It was one of the first things "The Ukrainian" and I cooked together. While I don't have a picture of it handy, let's just say it was kind of thick.  Whole wheat on your first attempt is not something I recommend. Years later, when we were registering for our wedding , the lady was pressuring us (as she is employed to do) to add more stuff to our relatively small registry.  To satisfy her, we decided to register for a KitchenAid pasta roller to go with the KitchenAid mixer that we also added but did not think we'd get.  Well, we ended up with both. I know that I don't use the KitchenAid mixer enough.  I was using it to knead bread a lot until the smell of yeast started to get to me, and hot weather makes the thought of turning on the oven a terror.  I had planned on using the roller on the Valentine's Day after we got married, as I was...

Much to my disbelief, I'm more or less at the halfway point of this pregnancy .  Okay, so part of my disbelief is that I will have another 19-21 weeks of being in this state, but of course, I am celebrating this numerical milestone anyway. This is me at what was later declared 18 weeks and 4 days by a technician.  Terrible selfie, I know, but I wasn't about to post the bare-belly photos that I've been bugging "The Ukrainian" to take every few weeks.  At this point, the size of my stomach was largely (hah!) dependent on what I've eaten in the previous day (um, maybe a Pizookie and such) and this was definitely no exception. For kicks, this was taken about a week later.  I have bad posture.  Also, things really took off in the stomach department at this point, so I feel/am much more huge (huge-r?) now. Now, here are a bunch of random thoughts: I toyed with the idea of writing up a "first tri recap" post, but it never came to fruition.  I ...

I realized I never had a chance to recap our recent trip to New York City, and in the spirit of LA beating NY in the Stanley Cup playoffs semi-recently (yep, I'm behind), here it is. (For all my "trip posts," click here .  I'm fairly certain I haven't blogged about everything; for example, this was my third time in New York, and although my blog pre-dates all of those, I've never written about this city.  I used to think I'd want to live there, but each time I return home, I'm thankful for space and quiet.) First of all, I must apologize for the lack of pictures of food, and pictures in general.  I was 12 weeks pregnant at the time, and I was mostly trying to survive the trip while getting everything that we wanted to get done, since it was "The Ukrainian"'s first time there.  Said trip was planned before I got a little passenger myself, but I think the timing worked out because this was just around the point I was able to endure lif...

A few years ago, I reviewed one of those "as-seen-on-TV things" and thought it'd be fun to give another popular item a spin.  My favorite thus far is definitely the workout video category, but what about the fitness gadgets?  I've seen The Flex Belt and the accompanying chiseled abs on TV way too many times, so my curiosity was peaked. In my current state , there is no way I could chisel my abs, but "The Ukrainian" was more than willing to give this product a spin in my place.  (Maybe I can use it later, though!) The Flex Belt retails for around $199.  It uses Electronic Muscle Stimulation to tone the abdominal muscles and has been cleared by the FDA.  The contents of the box are a user guide, charger with the programming unit, the belt itself, a storage pouch for the belt, and a pack of gel pads.  The gel pads need to be stuck onto the belt per the instructions, and when their stickiness wears off, they will need to be replaced for about $15 for a mul...

Half of 2014 is over!  Is this even possible?  I still remember writing this post and ducking out of New Year's Eve festivities as soon as possible because I was under the weather. I did not make resolutions, partly because even though we became homeowners, I had felt so down last year overall, so things could really only go up, right?  Therefore, I'm not going to write about progress like I may have in the past. So far, I can summarize 2014 with the following: - Baked bread -- okay, so after March or so, this kind of went down the toilet - Didn't do a shabby job at Carlsbad Marathon , marathon #15 and probably the last for a while... - Also didn't do a shabby job at Surf City Half-Marathon , particularly because I was under-trained and relatively fresh from the above - Won a spa gift card and treated "The Ukrainian" and myself to massages and facials on Valentine's Day, followed by sushi (how I miss those things now!) -  Followed those...