Gym Schwym

Yes. I have a membership to Lifetime Fitness. No. I never go there. I WANT to go there. But, alas, I never quite seem to make it happen.

I've tried going early in the morning, but my babe still isn't sleeping through the night, so I'm really not willing to sacrifice any fleeting amount of shut-eye that I might get. I've tried going at night, but I'm so tired by the time I get the kids to bed, that going to the gym is the LAST thing I want to do. In fact, I want to do the exact opposite of going to the gym - sit on the couch, watch TV, and eat potato chips and ice cream.

I've had a bit of guilt about this. Jeff has been working out a lot (until he messed up his foot) and the pressure is on to keep up. He keeps buffing up and pretty soon people are going to be looking at me saying, "Who's the jiggly girl with that ripped guy?" I actually had that thought one day when we were picking Charlie up from school. I was dressed in my out-of-date sweat pants and my hair was nasty and I had on white sneakers and no make up. My handsome hubby, on the other hand, had on cool ripped jeans, hair perfectly messy, and cool "Brad Pitt" aviator sunglasses. I seriously had the thought, "I bet everyone thinks I'm Jeff's mom."

Anyway, back to my original thought. Today, I had an epiphanal moment. I woke up this morning and walked my kids to school - pushing the stroller with about 40 pounds of kid in it and wrasseling my unruly beagle all the way up the HUGE hill to the school. Then I came home and carried four huge baskets of clean laundry that each had to have weighed at least 15 pounds up the stairs followed by carrying down the four baskets of dirty clothes that had accumulated over the weekend. Then I chased Betty around the street in her Barbie Jeep for about 45 minutes after I had ridden my bike down the street to pick her up from a friends house and towed her back in the Burley.

And then I mowed the lawn (because my ripped husband still can't walk.) This literally almost killed me. Half way through the back yard, I just stopped and laid down right in the grass next to the mower. It took me a while to get back up. (My husband doesn't believe in self-propelled mowers - which is his perogative since he always mows the lawn. But today, his stubborn refusal to make life easier for himself just it about did me in.)

Then I ran to the mall to get some flip flops for the girls since my unruly beagle has eaten all the flip flops in the house. I had to carry Betty in one arm all thorough the mall because she was weepy and tired while pushing the baby in the stroller with my other arm.

My point, fine readers, is that my day was enough of a workout - that I am no longer going to feel guilty about not getting to the gym. I'm sure, someday, I will be able to be on the cool elliptical machine with my i pod on and monitor my heart rate and keep track of the amount of calories I'm burning. Or go to the pilates class or work with a personal trainer who can design a custom plan to shrink my child bearing hips. But for now, I'm just going to be ok with my everyday exercise regimen...called MOM.