Raising "the bar"

One of the things I asked for this Christmas was a totally rockin' workout DVD set called P90X. Ever seen it on an early morning infomercial? Well, I saw it a few years ago, but my sweet realistic husband thought it didn't seem like a good idea. And, he was right. But this year, I've really gotten myself in motion and I'm up for the challenge. So, in addition to the DVDs (from my sweet hubby), I also got for Christmas from my sis and kiddos all the "props" to go along with it...a chin up bar, a super thick yoga/exercise mat and the most important of all some totally cute (pink!) exercise clothes. After all, everyone needs some cute stuff to exercise in. Who wants to have to sweat and burn and hurt in ugly clothes??

Here's Michael and the boys putting together the chin up bar.
One potential obstacle (other than the obvious one...I've never been able to do chin ups!) is that our ceilings and doorways are so tall that I have to stand on a really tall chair just to grab the bar. I was really hoping that there would be a little "cheat" room, but no such luck! The P90X guide says it's helpful if you can do at least one chin up before starting the program, but if you can only do 1/2 or 3/4 that's ok. Whew! I wonder if being able to hang from the chin up bar and wiggle my legs is good enough? But, I had to give it a try. After all, I've really been able to crank out a lot of push ups lately. I know my upper body is stronger than in a long time before. Maybe now I have what I didn't in 4th grade, or 5th grade, or 8th grade or all those grades when we had to do physical fitness tests. Well, I don't! I didn't feel terribly bad until my little boys hopped up there and cracked out 10 chin ups!! 10!! and then the challenge was on. Michael said they weren't quite doing them correctly (not lowering their arms far enough), so then they hopped up there and cracked out 10 more!

Jeremy in mid-chin up. He was the first to do the awesome feat. The challenge is on!

Little man, Jeffrey, acts like it's no biggie and does 10 great ones from the get-go. I had no idea these boys were so strong! You can see how high our doorway relative to Michael. He's 6 feet tall.

Here's Michael (sorry about the dark shot!). He had told me before "I never could do chin ups" so I was interested to see what he could do. He did 3.

Like a ad for the chin up bar. Jonathan does another one! He ended up doing about 25 total in just a few minutes.


Ok, well, now I 'm thinking...I MUST have been doing something wrong before. If they can just do 10 or 15 like it's nothing, surely I can handle 3 or 4. So I give it another go.

That's 1. The boys say it wasn't quite one...I say they need to close their traps! It's ONE! It counts! And by the way, those are my pj's not my cute exercise clothes. Come to think of it, I'm sure I could have done more had I been wearing the right clothes! That'll be next time!

I've just got 10 days left until I finish Power 90 and then P90X...here I come!

AND I've decided if the boys get out of hand, I'm sending them to "THE BAR"!