It's all about Cross Country Skiing right now..

I got over the January Blah's by getting out my cross country ski's. It sure does help that I look forward to working out and burning calories. 

I wanted to know how X-Skiing was compared to running. I've been using my Garmin to tell me the distance and speed. The most surprising was my speed. When I'm gliding through the woods it feels much faster then I could if I was running and definitely going down hills I must be going fast. Surprise, surprise I'm only going 5.3mph for my average moving speed. When I run my average is around 6 miles per hour with hills and that's an easy pace I can keep up. 

Here is how effort breaks down on ski's: (If you want to know..because, clearly I'm all about the numbers)
2.5mph - Slow pace
4.0 - 4.9 Moderate pace
5.0 - 7.9 Brisk, Vigorous pace
8.0 and greater.. Racing speeds!

Where do I fall in pace? Brisk, vigorous pace. I wanted to know how my speed compares for calories burned.  The charts always ask for effort level. I had no idea my pace but used Moderate to calculate calories burned. Probably still a good idea to not get carried away thinking I burned more then I actually did and since I'm on the low range of Vigorous.. I'll stick with Moderate to determine calories. 

Yesterday afternoon, we all went skiing together. I love it when we all get out and ski as a family. My kids love it too but Steve not so much. He would rather be down hill skiing. 

I had already gone skiing in the morning by myself for an hour, which is a good thing because I needed a real workout.  I just skied 5.81 miles at a vigorous pace.

I kind of forget that not everyone can ski as fast. I've been cross country skiing since I was 7?  I used the same pair of ski's from age 12 to last year.. the only thing I changed was my ski boots to accommodate my growing feet. I still have the ski's and I'll never get rid of them. I still think they are the best even if they are the outdated binders and boots. 

I use to pretend to be a ski instructor when I was a kid. I'd make a ski trail around our back yard and pretend I had students to teach skiing. 

I'm hoping my kids will love cross country skiing as much as I do. I got them out on ski's when they were both around 4 years old. 
We all love finding hills to ski down. 

I'm on day 4 of my Challenge to lose 10 pounds. Yesterday was a little tough in the evening. There was lemon pound cake with vanilla ice cream for dessert. I was semi tempted but not really. The hardest days are day 1 and 2.. I was past that. 

We had a delicious soup Steve made. I found this recipe in Lunds/Byerlys magazine. It was made with coconut milk, garlic, sweet potatoes, corn, peppers, carrots and fennel and you top with fresh cilantro and scallions. I found a keeper recipe. I'm going to want this soup again! 

I made some Indian Flat Bread for dinner last night. These make the best taco's. Steve suggested we make them hand size.. much smaller. A really good idea! I just had 1 and then ate some more rice/salsa with out a fried flat bread taco. 

I loaded mine with chicken, rice, guacamole, tomatoes, kiwi salsa and hot sauce. I'm salivating just thinking of how good this tasted. 

Look who I got to spend time holding last night.. our sleepy baby. I even got to feed him a bottle. He is such a sweet little boy.