Well… That’s a Wrap and Looking Forward to April

I just came home from my final group exercise class at the gym. My membership expires tomorrow and I work 2 shifts so I won’t be going to the gym at all.

I have really made the most of the last 2 days.

Yesterday I walked 20 minutes to the gym, ran for 25 hard minutes on the treadmill, stretched, huffed and puffed through a 65 minute Body Pump class and then walked home.  I was happy that I had pre-made my lunch and left it in the refrigerator because I was so hungry I would likely have just eaten a protein bar of some kind and not taken the time to make a proper lunch.  Afterwards, The Captain and I went for an hour long very brisk walk so I was pretty wiped out by day’s end.  But if felt great!  Do you ever over-do but really enjoy it anyway?  I love the way that I feel when I am physically exhausted from doing things I really enjoy.

Today I was looking forward to my final Flow Yoga class.  The Captain and I walked for an hour in the sunshine and then stopped at Stabuck’s for coffee before I headed to the gym and he carried on shopping and walking home.  Not all that many of the Starbuck’s locations here have good outside sunny seating so we took advantage of this downtown location today.  Just what I needed before heading into the gym and doing sprint intervals on the treadmill for 10 minutes, and then cooling down and stretching before Flow Yoga.  The leader put us through a very tough lower body workout today and it was brutal and wonderful.  It fit in so well with my desire to gain flexibility in my lower body, which is my April focus.

After the class was over, I took the opportunity to ask her about my making progress Pigeon Pose, and to thank her for her guidance and also to let her know it would be my last session with her for a while. My right hip/groin is so much tighter than my left and I wanted to see if I was doing the pose correctly for my ability, on that right side. She assured me that she had observed that as she walked around and that I am making the correct modification, and to continue and it will improve.  Hurray!

I have so enjoyed these classes, and I thought about starting my home practice with The Captain as I walked the 20 minutes home.

Yesterday, while on our walk I picked up a yoga DVD that I hope will be a good beginning for us.

I chose it for a many reasons:

• I think GAIAM products are good quality overall
• It has 5 different workouts on it that are each only 20 minutes long
• I think 20 minutes is a good length of time for us to start with as it is not a huge time commitment
• There is a beginner’s workout on it
• The workouts are led by different instructors, one of whom is Rodney Yee and I have heard he is very good
• And I thought it might be good for The Captain to have a male to work with occasionally so he can see that yoga is not ‘girly’ – he has not expressed that – I am projecting here
• It was a  very small financial commitment… if it is horrible, I can give it away or toss it
• I wanted a DVD so we can view on the large screen TV rather than having to follow a video on the the smaller computer screen… neither of our current laptops are capable of sending video to this TV. I am concerned about  this is for interest sake.  For myself I am committed enough to do videos on the computer, but for The Captain the TV is preferable.

So, goodbye to the gym… and hello to looking forward to continuing home work in April.  And now I need to get to work on a new schedule for us to start next week. 

Do you practice yoga at home with DVDs?  Any suggestions for newbies?