Category: The Blog

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Good News Monday – Plotting Edition

Happy Monday!  Okay, I’m totally trying to fool myself here.  That Man and I are both working today but the monsters are out of school, which complicates things significantly.  Add to that the fact that Littlest Monster set her alarm (note:  she does NOT do this for school days….) and got up at 6:00 AM….  Grrrr!  That’s earlier than they get up for school!  Needless to say, it’s going to be a long day.

Since I completed Revision Xibalba last week (cheers, definitely GOOD NEWS!), I’ve been trying to get back into 3Aliens.  First up was a read through of everything I have so far (about 15K I think) to see where I went wrong.  Because when the story isn’t quite sparking, there’s usually something wrong.  This premise is too cool not to be working.

Bad news:  the very first opening scene falls short.  So naturally everything that comes after suffers a little from that lack.

Fixing it hasn’t proven as easy as I hoped though.  My original premise – the idea that sparked the entire story – was a line:  “Three aliens walked into a bar, and all hell broke loose.”  So of course the first scene was at a bar.

However, I couldn’t get that bar scene to work the way I wanted, not as the FIRST scene.  I kept falling into cliche territory in trying to set up the characters and story.  I couldn’t get the tone right and I was having a hard time establishing the story goal (although the immediate goal was there) and theme.  Thinking of Blake Snyder’s beats, I couldn’t find a way to mirror the opening scene from a bar into the ending, which I already have in my mind.

Which leads to the crux of the problem:  I was writing from the original spark… the premise…not a plot.  Which is a totally fine way to write and has worked for me before, but in this case, with breaks to work on other projects…  it just wasn’t working for me.  I kept losing the vision.

I have to SEE the story to write it.  It rises in my mind like a 3-D map, full of rises and falls, dark moments, and final victory.  I don’t always have to see the entire story at once.  Sometimes I can fumble around in the dark until I find the next illuminated path, but when I’m short on time (and sleep!) and busy with multiple projects, I just can’t dedicate that much mental harddrive to holding a story in my mind.  There are huge gaps where I’ve overwritten the story with other things.  Gee, don’t even get me started on the memory leaks…

So although I’m tight on time and I might not be able to meet the deadline as a result, I decided to STOP.  Right here.  And plot this story the way it deserves.

Since I’m using Scrivener now and trying to get a working process down in new software, naturally that means I need a plotting template that works for me in this new tool.  I really wish I could use Larissa Ione’s romance template, but she says it won’t work in the Windows version of Scrivener.  *pouts*

So that’s my plan for the next day or two.  Get my plotting template all set up.  Complete the plot for 3Aliens (working title).  And figure out what needs to happen to take what I’ve already written and make it work.

Cue Tim Gunn’s voice.  “Make it work, people!”

What’s your good news for this week?

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Revision Xibalba: Theading the Plot

First the good news:  I finished the revisions to The Bloodgate Warrior and shipped them off to Alissa this morning.  Even BETTER news – she likes what she’s read so far!  Woot!  That’s always such a relief.  Did I interpret her revision letter correctly, thoroughly, and then most importantly, did I carry those revisions through the ms in a logical way?

Which brings me to today’s revision topic.  It’s something I’ve been thinking about the last few days and decided I should blog about it in case it might help anyone else working through a rough patch of revisions.

As I told Raelyn earlier this week, I was so deep into the forest that it was hard to see the trees.  All the threads (changes) I was juggling began to get muddled and tangled, and I was starting to lose my grip on what to pull forward when.

What am I talking about?  It’s that chaos theory I’ve joked about before:  A butterfly flaps its wings on page one and you suddenly find yourself revising every single chapter until it’s an entirely different book.

This is why revisions are hard.

I’m not talking about minor line-edit type revisions, but something more challenging.  For instance, Alissa wrote that she’d like to see more of a contrast between Cassie’s driven focus for her job and what happens when Tecun climbs into her bed.  *winks*  I already had some bits of character traits that I really liked for her — her static trait involves her nightly ritual before getting into bed, for instance — but I didn’t go far enough.  (In fact, I realized as I got into the revisions for this element, that I’d gotten a few things terribly wrong that didn’t jive with her character at all.)

Now you might think this was an easy change.  I’ll just throw in a new trait – like maybe she’s OCD about her schedule and has every minute of this “vacation” mapped out down to the minute.  Easy peasy right?

Wrong.  Because if you’re going to ADD something to a finished manuscript, it has to have impact.  If the butterfly flaps its wings, there’s wind, no matter how faint, that must spread and ripple throughout the story.  Otherwise why even bother with the change in the first place?

So if I’m going to add a character trait, I have to SHOW it again and again.  It has to affect the plot in some way, no matter how small, or it’s just noise.  Like a random hair color or scar that I mention without ever explaining where the scar came from or how it changed the character’s life.  Why even bother if it’s not important and crucial to the story?  I couldn’t just mention this trait once and let it drop – that would be doing a lazy injustice to my character.

Everything has to matter.  It has to have impact.  WHY is she doing this?  HOW can I show it?  WHEN does this affect the plot?

And that, my friends, is where the real bite of Revision Xibalba comes into play.  Once you start affecting plot, um… news alert… your plot changes.  Scenes change.  Actions mean something else entirely.  If you change one turning point, then all the others are affected too.

See that trickle down effect?  More than shit begins to roll down hill at this point.  And oh, all those pesky trees.  I had several items I was changing at the same time, not just this one character trait, each one like a colored thread that had to be pulled all the way through to the end in a logical manner.

For example, Alissa mentioned in passing that she liked the idea of the family journal that Cassie brought with her to Guatemala and wondered if there was any way to make that more important.  Well sure.  I could — and did — write several thousand words of journal entries, which became a cool way for me to resolve several items in the revision letter at once.

But which events should the entries cover (I ended up spanning over 500 years!!)?  It couldn’t just be backstory or it’d slow the plot too much.  It couldn’t be all emo whining or moaning about the past.  They had to have real, measurable impact.  Things had to change because of these entries.

What clues could I drop in the journal that would make the reader go OOOOOOOHHHHHH when I finally laid out the live-action scene before them?

Notice that if I’m changing the plot or character…that’s more than just copying and pasting a new journal entry into place.  That means I’m changing significant elements of the plot itself.  Alllllll the way through the ms.

So then it becomes a balancing act requiring a delicate touch and a sharp eye.  If I’m going to drop in this little tidbit here, and make it really really matter, then I have to do it again over here.  I can’t drop a bunch of bright red paint in chapter two and never ever paint with red again.  I also have to remember the green and blue I’m adding and balance that with what’s already there and the new red.  It has to be consistent from start to finish.  All of these new colors are important now so I have to drop some over here, and again here, and then yeah, it’d better become crucial and important before the ending again, or…

Again, why bother?

Threading the plot — carrying these changes through in meaningful and consistent ways — building momentum page after page, THIS is the difference between making your editor happy when she opens up your revised document and making her groan and pull out her red pen again.  I truly believe this is where you can really learn to shine as a hardworking professional.

No, I don’t mean you have to blindly accept every change proposed by your editor.  But when you dig in and begin to make those changes, carry them through.  Don’t just plop a few things in and send it back.  Really think and dig.  Yes, it’s more work.  Yes, it’s painfully hard to come up with new ideas once the story’s already done.  Trust me, I know.  I added over 5K to this story (net – I added way more new words but deleted other passages that didn’t work any longer), and wrote another couple of thousand words of journal entries that I didn’t end up using at all.

But you know what?  I loved Tecun and Cassie before I sent The Bloodgate Warrior to Alissa (or I wouldn’t have submitted it, obviously).  But now?

Well.  I always say this but I think with her help, it’s become the next best thing I’ve written.

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Good News Monday – Revision Xibalba Edition

I’m still hard at work on the revisions Alissa requested to The Bloodgate Warrior but I need a break and so I thought I’d get a post up so you didn’t think I’d dropped off the face of the planet!  I took Friday and today off from the Evil Day Job so I’d have plenty of time to wrap things up before the due date (2/15) and guess what?

The monsters got their first snow day today.  *headdesk*

For the first time in my life, I’m grateful for the Twilight movies.  That’s what they’re watching now to keep themselves occupied.  They’re watching them all from the beginning through Breaking Dawn part 1 that I just bought for them this weekend.

Saturday I feared Middle Monster had done serious damage to my knee.  We were playing around and she kicked me square on the knee, forcing it backwards toward hyperextension.  Oh and I also had my rocking Sketchers on, which probably let my leg bend even more unnaturally.  Something did pop and I hobbled over to the couch, terrified I’d torn something.  I’ve never had a serious injury before and I wasn’t sure if this was bad or just a close call.  It didn’t hurt exactly (just ached), which I’ve been told can be a bad thing.

I applied ice and Motrin right away, and the next morning I didn’t have any swelling at all.  The tendons down the side of my calf are a little sore, but my legs have been sore ever since I started Power 90, so I don’t know if that was general muscle soreness or injury soreness.  I took the day off from exercise yesterday to be sure but I plan to do Power 90 Sweat later today and see how the knee holds up.  (Aside:  of course this is my right leg, so now I have a bad foot AND a bad knee on that side.)

The best news:  I’m not sick (despite Littlest missing two days of school last week) and I haven’t given myself any canker sores in my mouth yet.  Usually that’s the first thing that happens when I’m stressed out.  Last week, I knew I’d need help to get through this week and so I reordered Borax pellets and started taking them immediately.  No fever blisters in my mouth, yay!  I’m also alternating the coffee with green tea and lots of water, so I’m getting plenty of fluids.  No Diet Coke or Dr. Pepper — I don’t want any chemicals in my system.  I also haven’t given in to stress eating or used late-night eating to stay awake so I can work.  Of course that means I’ve had to go to bed and get more rest than usual, but hopefully the hours I spent on revisions are higher quality that way.

The end is in sight.  I have two more major events that need revision, and then one or two smaller things to tweak.  Then I’ll apply all the changes in a safe copy and re-read to see how badly I’ve messed things up and what I’ve dropped or forgotten along the way.

Happy Monday!

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Eating to Lose

Or why being anal about counting points or calories is not necessarily a good thing.

In my Power 90 update I admitted I was getting pretty frustrated with the scale.  After all this exercise, why was I gaining?!?  I was eating within my points.  I’d cut out this and that.  I’d buckled down really hard.  I was controlling everything in my mouth.

What’s that beginning to sound like?  A diet.  A diet that becomes impossible to stay on because it’s not liveable, because it’s becoming deprivation.

In a way, I was punishing my body for failing to lose when I expected it to.  My first instinct was to cut back even more.  I should eat less cheese.  I should cut out even more whole grains.  I even tried cutting out my half and half to replace with almond milk in my coffee.  (Gag, it made for a nasty chunky sludge.  I love almond milk but NOT in coffee, not even at 40 cals a cup.)

But a friend from Romance Biggest Winner said hey, maybe you’re not eating enough.  I’d already thought that in passing once or twice – especially in regards to protein – but her words made me really stop to think.  The WW point calculation is based on a complex algorithm (that only they know) but a good rough estimate is 40 cals per point.  So by staying religiously under my 33 point – 1320 cal – limit, and exercising 30-60 mins a day, 6 days a week….

Yeah.  I wasn’t eating enough.

Now I could have kept buckled down that low and eventually I probably would have started losing again, but I decided to shake things up.  I’ve been earning those extra exercise points for a reason.  Why not try eating them?  Not in junk food, obviously, but 3-5 extra points a day might just be the ticket to wake up my metabolism and get me losing again.

I even let myself have a few things that I’d cut out – deprivation – because I had the points now.  Like I enjoyed one of Princess’s homemade oatmeal cookies.  Just one.  One night I also carefully measured out 1 oz of Fritos for taco salad.  Oh, my, it was so good.  So wicked and indulgent.  I was afraid, sure.  That opened bag of chips in the pantry was dangerous.  But I kept to my one serving and put the bag out of sight out of mind back in the pantry.

And I lost.  Not just a .2 or .4 loss, but immediately a pound.  The next day, another .6.  The next, .8.  It was crazy.  I was losing my weekly averages (on a good week!) each day, just by eating a little extra.  Enjoying a few things I didn’t think I could have.

Living a normal life.  And isn’t that what this is all about?  I don’t want to have to eat a plain salad the rest of my life when the family is eating taco salad.  I don’t want to miss out on my daughter’s baking experiences (Granny, watch out, I’m teaching her all your old favorites!).  And I don’t have to.

In one week, I lost 2.6 pounds, something I haven’t seen from the beginning of this journey over a year ago.

Obviously, I don’t expect to lose that much each week.  I don’t expect to be able to eat 5 extra points every single day and still lose.  I’ll still have ups and downs.  I should still eat around my daily point limit a few days.  And then “splurge” a few days to go over.  In this case, change is definitely a good thing and keeps my body guessing.

The lesson I took away from this for myself:  sometimes cutting back is NOT the best way to see results.  Sometimes you just need to let loose a little!

65 pounds gone forever.  When I lose 8 more, I’ll be at my lowest weight in 12 years since Princess was born.  After that, VFT (virgin fat territory)!

[This entry typed while wearing that pair of jeans that was too small at Christmas.]

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Good News Monday

I’m on a deadline to get the editor revisions made to The Bloodgate Warrior so I might be a little scarce until 2/15.  I’ll try to post at least every couple of days though.  If anyone would like a guest spot to help me keep the blog active, feel free to send me a post and I’ll get it up!

Some good news this week:

  • I have a PLAN for the revisions.  (Sometimes coming up with the plan or the angle is half the battle.)
  • I’ve been playing with my WW points, eating a little more, and strangely enough, I’m losing better.  More later after my official weigh in.
  • Still on track for completing the next 30 days of Power 90.
  • Moved up to 10 lbs on some of the strength exercises.
  • I’ve seen a preview of the new Survive My Fire cover and it’s totally AWESOME!  I can’t wait to share it with you!
  • We have a design plan for the other two covers for The Fire Within and Given In Fire.  Yes, I realize I haven’t written Given yet – but having the cover in hand will certainly give me some incentive to finish it this year.  It’s been on my wish list for years.

What’s your good news?

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Never Going Back

I’ve dieted a hundred times before.  A thousand.  I’ve probably lost hundreds of pounds over the years, only to gain it back and then some.  I was doing Weight Watchers before high school.  My freshman year, we ordered the wrong size in my cheerleading skirt and the absolute only way I squeezed into it all season was my mom giving me THE LOOK every time I even thought about eating something not strictly on my plan.

I still have that skirt.  And it fits Middle Monster, who’s only in the 4th grade!  When I think about struggling with that damned skirt every day, I’m still amazed that I was ever that small.  I was not exactly fat in school – nor was I especially thin.  I struggled constantly to keep my weight down, even though I was active and healthy.

I’ve kept a few things over the years that I “outgrew,” like that ancient cheerleading skirt.  No, I have absolutely no expectations of ever fitting into it again.  But I held on to some of those things, I guess trying to remind myself of how thin I’d once been.  This continued into my marriage, having kids, etc. where the pounds slowly packed on.  I moved a dress from Texas to Minnesota to Missouri that I never once wore because it was too small – in the barest slimmest hope that *someday* it would fit.

I finally donated it a few years ago because it was so sadly outdated.  It never did fit.

But what I realized this time around is that I’ve never donated my “fat” clothes.  Why do I let the ugly memories hang around and remind me of how large and unhealthy I’ve been?  So instead, I choose to CELEBRATE every single time I move down to a new size.  As soon as I’m comfortably into a new size, I clean out my closet and donate it all.

Every single pair of pants in my largest size are long gone.  Then the cheaper ones I bought second hand months ago.  Gone.  The things I’ve been holding on to for ten years and more when I worked in the office each day.  They fit now, but they’re so outdated after all these years that most of them are gone.

GONE.  It’s such a wonderful feeling.  It’s truly liberating.  I don’t have to waste precious storage space on crap that makes me feel bad.  That reminds me of depression, hurt, regret, and guilt.  GONE.

I will never go back.  I refuse to buy a single thing in a larger size.  If I stall out, fine, I’ve got clothes that fit now.  If I start to gain, I have absolutely nothing to wear.  There is no safety net.  No cushion.  I’ll HAVE to start losing again.

For the first time in my life, I’m deliberately buying things when I find a good deal, even if I know they’re too small.  Because one day, they WILL fit.  For a while.  And then I’ll donate them too and pull out the even smaller things I’ve been dreaming about.

Remember those two pair of jeans I’ve been holding on to?  They’re in the same size as my others, but the style/brand is just enough different that they didn’t fit.  I’ve been trying them on once a month or so, then more often this past month as I’ve been working out.  I’m proud to say that this week, I got both pairs on, pulled up, buttoned AND zipped!!!  Ha!!

But then I couldn’t actually MOVE let alone sit down.  ;-)  Soon, though, those jeans are going to be comfortable, and these baggy ones I have on right now will be in the donate pile.

I can’t wait.  Then I’ll go shopping again and find a new goal.  Summer is just around the corner and I have absolutely NOTHING to wear.  No short sleeved shirts, tanks, shorts, nothing.  I haven’t worn shorts in at least ten years, probably more like 15.  Who knows, maybe this time around…

I might even buy a swim suit.

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Power 90 – After 30 Days

Today’s the 30-day mark for my Power 90 commitment started 1/1/2012.  Just a reminder about where I was before starting:

  • I lost 62 pounds last year on Weight Watchers.
  • I was only exercising minimally – an occasional walk, etc.
  • I tried Power 90 two years ago but quit when I’d only lost 3 pounds in 45 days.
  • I’m still on Weight Watchers.
  • I’m doing Phase 1/2 of Power 90 and probably will do so for another 30 days before trying to move up to level 3/4.
  • I’m using 5 lb dumbbells.

So I admit I was pretty discouraged by the scales news this morning.  I’m beginning to suspect I’m the only person who has this much to lose, exercises, and GAINS weight.

I’m up again for absolutely no reason.  Yesterday I was up 3 pounds (TMI, it’s not related to my monthly cycle).  Today I’m only up 1.6 pounds.  But that wipes out this entire month’s loss to only .4 according to my WW tracker (although my official WI day isn’t until tomorow).

Woo.  See me losing like a turtle.

(That’s the bad thing about only losing .4 a week – it gets wiped out really quickly.)

Trying to think positively here, I know it’s not a “real” gain.  I’ve eaten on plan the entire month.  By that, I mean I’ve eaten within my Daily Points (DPs) or only gone over slightly into Activity Points (APs) or Weekly Points (WPs), all there for me to eat if I need to.  A few days I did dip into my APs but not significantly.  I only rarely ever eat my WPs (anniversary dinner at Mythos, for example) anyway.  I tracked every single day.

Other than an occasional Dove dark chocolate and Princess’s homemade oatmeal cookies yesterday, I haven’t had ANY sugar.  I’ve also been cutting artifical sugars out and switching to either honey, pure maple syrup, or none at all.  (Except my WW smoothies – they’re artifically sweetened.  I’m still looking for a natural protein/meal replacement.)  I haven’t had a Diet Coke or Cherry Dr. Pepper in over a week.  I’ve been drinking my hot green tea plain.

Last week, I even started adding a bit more cardio (via Walk It Out on the Wii) to my strength-only days.

I went from earning 0 APs to 104 this month (not counting today!).

While I’ve still got two pairs of jeans in this size that stubbornly refuse to fit, I’ve lost the following inches:

  • Waist:  -2
  • Bust:  -2
  • Hips:  -2
  • Arms: -.5 each
  • Thighs: -2 each

So I *am* losing, even if the scale is lying to me.  I won’t let the unreasonable increase in poundage derail me this time.  Here’s to another 30 days of Power 90 and I’ll hope for better news next month!

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Unfair

I can remember as a kid just SOBBING, heartbroken, because I felt that something unfair had been done to me.  It’s a childish complaint that the monsters shout at each other (and me) all the time.  That’s so UNFAIR!!

And even though I’ve got a few years on me ::cough:: sometimes unfairness – and my childish demands – crop back up.  Especially at my weigh in today.

I’ve been sooooo good.  On program, tracking all food, no slips, no late-night binges on Lays, no coconut pie, no homemade bread…  I’ve exercised more this month than I probably did all last year.  I’ve earned 75 activity points this month – insane for me!  And yet I only lost .2 today – after having an unearned gain of 2.6 pounds all week!

For the entire month (the past 4 weeks, not just January), I’ve only lost 2.5 pounds.

While rationally I know a). any loss is to be cheered and b). an average loss of .5 pounds per week is a healthy rate…  I’m not satisifed.  I want results, dammit, and I want them now!  ::stomps foot::  If I work out that hard…I *deserve* a loss.  It’s so unfair.

::rolls eyes at how childish that sounds::

Yet it’s the truth.  And I’ve always said the truth here.

This feeling of unfairness isn’t limited to just weight loss either.  We can feel it’s unfair that someone at work got promoted and we didn’t, even though we work harder or have more seniority.  Someone got a break and we didn’t, whatever that break was.  We do everything right…and sometimes it just doesn’t happen when we expect it to happen.

What do you do then?  How do you reframe your expectations?  How do you handle the disappointment and sense of entitlement?  Maturity helps, of course — I would expect to handle disappointment better myself than Middle Monster because she didn’t get that iPad for Christmas she wanted, for example.  But even maturity begins to wear thin week after week, month after month, when you’re working so hard, doing everything right, and don’t get what you want, when you want it.

So I thought I’d try on my too-small jeans, on the barest hope that maybe I’d lost inches even if the scale wasn’t cooperating, but that was only another disappointment.  They still don’t fit.

However, I have to listen to how I feel, really feel.  I did Walk It Out today because my normal workout schedule was messed up, and I felt GREAT.  I walked and jogged for 45 minutes, sweat my tush off, and ended up walking just under 3 miles.

My foot felt great even walking that far and long.

My schedule was messed up because I took the day off from the Evil Day Job and got my hair done, and Apryl did a TERRIFIC job.  It looks great and I felt really good about how I looked.  She also commented on how much thinner I look (she only sees me once a month).

My watch is sagging so much on my wrist that I need to go in and have a link taken out.

My “skinny” jeans (ironically, the same size and brand as the ones that stubbornly won’t fit, although they’re a slightly different style) are sagging around the waist again.

And I started to feel better.  Am I still disappointed?  Sure.  But I know I’m doing what’s right.  Sometimes that has to be enough reward.  Oh, and I bought myself some new workout shorts – yes SHORTS – I haven’t owned shorts in like fifteen years!!! – and a sports bra.

I figured a little retail therapy couldn’t hurt.  :mrgreen:

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Good News Monday

It’s been dreary and chilly here (but thankfully no snow or ice) and I feel like I’m running on half empty thanks to our busy schedule lately…so I need some good news!!

  • I’ve completed three full weeks of Power 90 and started week 4 yesterday.  I haven’t been rewarded on the scale (yet) but I can definitely feel muscles!
  • I can do more pushups now than when I started.
  • I can hold a plank from my toes, though I still do the pushups from my knees, and I can’t do that one downward dog to runner’s stretch move yet.
  • We’re loving the Vitamix and have used it at least once every single day since we got it.  The only thing that was a complete fail so far – homemade V8.  Ugh it was terrible.  I couldn’t even save it by using it in soup.  Back to the drawing board on that one!
  • Steady stretching has been helping my plantar fasciitis considerably.  As long as I sit on the edge of the bed in the morning and give my foot a good stretch (pulling on my toes, really stretching the calf and arch), then I can walk into the bathroom without pain.  Keeping my good shoes on all day, every day, is also helping.  I can exercise without any pain.
  • The Horse Master of Shanhasson finally went to $0 on Amazon (to match Smashwords pricing) and WHOA, I was stunned to see how many “sales” I had as soon as that happened.  Hopefully my pricing strategy will be effective.  I deliberately want a free read, and then one cheaper at $2.99 to hopefully hook readers into the rest of the series, which is priced slightly higher (but all under $5).  The first book is 20K shorter, and the other 2 are over 100K so I think the slightly higher price is justified.  We shall see!
  • Still slowly working my way through “3Aliens.”  The dam has not yet busted free yet but I’m still making headway.
  • I have Tuesday off this week from the Evil Day Job to get my hair spiffed up again and hopefully get some nice wordage!

What’s your good news?

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Power 90 Update

So I’m into my third week of Power 90 and I had a funny moment I wanted to share.

But first, let me tell you what Power 90 is all about.  Tony Horton & BeachBody put out this “In-Home Bootcamp” series around 10 years ago.  Since then, he’s come out with several variations and improvements, which you might know as P90X, P90X2, etc.  That Man had his eye on P90X after catching a late-night infomercial, but I *knew* it would kill us.  I decided to start at the beginning with Power 90, which is a good starting point for people who aren’t really at any sort of decent fitness level.

Power 90 has two levels:  1/2 and 3/4.  I plan to stick with level 1/2 as long as it takes, even if that’s all I do the full 90 days.  I exercise 6 days a week, alternating “sweat” and “sculpt.”  Even the sweat portion involves power yoga and taebo, so it’s still very strength-inducing not “dancing”.  The sculpt days I use 5-lb dumbbells and my own body weight to complete three sets of weight/strength exercises, including pushups, squats, lunges, biceps curls, etc.  Basic moves, no special equipment, and all something that I can do, or modify slightly to do.

(E.g. I can’t do dips yet, so I just do an extra set of triceps kick backs)

So after I completed the sweat portion today, I jumped in the shower.  I reached down to scrub my feet and felt this hard…thing… in my leg.  It was weird, hard as a rock.  In my lower leg.  I ran my hand over it and then laughed.

It was muscle.  My calf muscle.  Haha.  So that’s what a muscle is!

Okay, it might have actually been cramping a little because it’s still aching, but I definitely felt that nice hard ridge in the side of my leg!!