Catching up and taking Vacation

     If anyone is still following my blog, I thought I'd let you know how things were going.  I am sorry I fell off the grid.  During the finale event, the UNC Wellness Center offered us another 6 months of free membership in return for participating in a study.  The study's requirements were to work out 8 times a month minimum at the Wellness Center, weigh in once a week, continue to take advantage of coaching and fill out any surveys they sent out.  After much thought, my wife and I decided to pass on the offer.  It really is a great opportunity and some might think we were crazy for passing it up.  For us though, there were lots of factors involved.  We were spending 50+ dollars a week in gas driving to the Wellness Center, it took 40-60 minutes round trip in travel time plus the hour workout was a serious time commitment (especially when you factor in that we were already paying for memberships at a gym 5 minutes from the house).
     So I had Paula introduce me to a co-worker who also does training at my gym.  I met with her and she did her own assessment and set up a program for me to following as well as some goals.  I have continued going to the gym every day except for last Thursday and Friday when I was getting ready for vacation.  My wife and I drove down to Hilton Head Island with our travel trailer and we are staying in one of the most posh RV parks we have ever seen.  It has a gym, 2 pools, 2 tennis courts, a kids park, a little store, fishing pier,  laundry facilities and all the standard hookups.
     The kids have gotten to go to the beach yesterday and the pool today.  I realized as I climbed the ladder to get out of the deep end of the pool, that I had tried to do that very thing when we had gone to a pool at a resort near Myrtle Beach and couldn't make it up the last few rungs of the ladder.  The workouts are definitely making me stronger.  I also tell when I hefted the pack-n-play around and it didn't make my arms tired.  Still losing weight, but I'm much more excited now about the health and fitness benefits.
     My wife and I have both been training for a 5K as well.  I'm in week 3 of a couch -to-5K training program.  I wouldn't recommend that someone literally go from the couch and try one of those programs, but it is very much the way to go if you aren't a runner and you want to get into (or back into)  shape for a race.